A resource for the PDX literary community. Produced by Old Pal.
LitPDX seeks to amplify marginalized voices, and welcomes all, their ideas, their events, and their words.
For details regarding specific events please contact the organizers or venues. If you are an organizer or venue and would like to reach out to us please feel free to contact us or submit an event using our submission form. We’d love to hear from you!
A discussion with author and attorney Will Falk, centered on his recent book How Dams Fall, about his attempt to seek rights of nature for the Colorado River.
Zach St. George’s The Journeys of Trees: A Story About Forests, People, and the Future (W. W. Norton) is an urgent and illuminating portrait of forest migration, and of the people studying the forests of the past, protecting the forests of the present, and planting the forests of the future. Forests are restless. Any time a tree dies or a new one sprouts, the forest that includes it has shifted. When new trees sprout in the same direction, the whole forest begins to migrate, sometimes at astonishing rates. Today, however, an array of obstacles – humans felling trees by the billions, invasive pests transported through global trade – threaten to overwhelm these vital movements. Worst of all, the climate is changing faster than ever before,…
For the opening night of the 2020-21 season of Portland Arts & Lectures, an evening with Helen Macdonald, we will be presenting a virtual event on October 13, 2020. Given that Macdonald lives in England, and the uncertain timing of when we can gather again in the Schnitzer Concert Hall, there was not a reasonable way to reschedule. Again, this event will be highly produced and re-imagined to give our subscribers a special and exclusive evening. Details about how to access these digital presentations will be sent via email to subscribers. Portland Arts & Lectures 2020/21 Season Presented by Literary Arts Join Literary Arts for another five-part season of engaging talks from some of the world’s best writers and thinkers. Helen Macdonald is a writer,…
Join us for a live event featuring local nature writer and butterfly expert Dr. Robert Michael Pyle in conversation with actor David Cross (Arrested Development, Mr. Show). The two will discuss their roles in the recent film, The Dark Divide, a fictionalized account of Pyle’s 1995 trek across the Gifford Pinchot Wilderness in search of new butterfly species, and a way through the grief after losing his wife. Pyle has written 22 books including Where Bigfoot Walks: Crossing the Dark Divide, upon which the film is based. This event is cosponsored by Orion Magazine, “America’s Best Environmental Magazine,” a quarterly, 100% ad-free publication, in print since 1982. Orion is a reader-supported nonprofit at the convergence of ecology, the arts, and social justice, and the magazine…
What does it mean to write about nature now? We are living at a time of great ecological peril and promise, when some are questioning whether “nature” still even exists. How to write about this complexity in authentic and evocative ways? How to convey both the beauty and the corruption of beauty? Together, we will consider a wide sampling of historical and contemporary nature writing. Noticing how the genre has changed over time will help us understand how our cultural conceptions of self and nature have both changed and remained the same. Contemporary nature writing often reflects complex social and political realities, while also reminding us of the abiding depth of feeling created by, for instance, placing one’s hand on a tree trunk and pausing…
WITH: Brigid Yuknavitch and Lidia Yuknavitch WHEN&WHERE: Saturday April 3rd and Sunday April 4th, over Zoom. 10am-1pm PST both days. HOW MUCH: $450. Twenty person cap. Payment plans are always available, contact Daniel at registration@corporealwriting.com. SCHOLARSHIPS: Click here to apply. What are the trees saying in their ways and what might we say? How many trees have been nearby in your life, standing as you were cradled and and then walked and then moved into the world? Did you see them touch them, hide inside them, or behind them? Did their smells come onto your skin as if you were a tree? Did you hear wind through them or watch the light flicker? How have you been with trees? In this generative writing workshop we…
“I love you, love you, love you / sad as you are, O world.” — Adelia Prado This class will offer an introduction to nature writing that is celebratory, joyful, loving, even sexy. While there is much to lament or critique in our current ecological moment, there is also much to honor and embrace. When we fall in love with a place, we can be receptive to its vital complexity through that lens of love. You will receive weekly prompts, contemporary and historical readings, and the opportunity to share your own work in a supportive workshop environment. Class time will also offer guided writing exercises that will help you revel in summer’s bounty and wildness wherever you find it. Access Program We want our writing…
The Dandelions Are Prophesizing: A Writing Workshop Through Plant & Mycelial Encounters A 4-Week Online Workshop starting July 19, 2021 “The world is not a problem to be solved; it is a living being to which we belong. It is part of our own self and we are a part of its suffering wholeness. Until we go to the root of our image of separateness, there can be no healing. And the deepest part of our separateness from creation lies in our forgetfulness of its sacred nature, which is also our own sacred nature.” – Thich Nhat Hanh “If we are interested in livability, impermanence, and emergence, we should be watching the action of landscape assemblages. Assemblages coalesce, change, and dissolve: this is the story.”…
What does it mean to write about nature now? We are living at a time of great ecological peril and promise, when some thinkers are questioning whether “nature” even exists. How to write about this complexity in authentic and evocative ways? How to convey both the beauty and the corruption of beauty? Together, we will consider some historical and contemporary nature writing in order to learn how the genre has changed over time alongside our cultural conceptions of self and nature. Contemporary nature writing often reflects complex social and political realities, while also reminding us of the abiding depth of feeling created by, for instance, placing one’s hand on a tree trunk and pausing to simply feel. In this course, your writing will be informed…
Portland Audubon’s Wild Arts Festival — The Northwest's premier show and sale of nature-related art and books is back in person on the PSU campus – just in time to kick-start holiday shopping Nov. 20-21. Something for everyone, all weekend long This year’s Wild Arts Festival at PSU’s Viking Pavilion will highlight dozens of artists and authors plus a robust silent auction. Find the perfect gift or something for yourself, with proceeds benefiting Portland Audubon’s education and conservation efforts. Meet some of your favorite nature writers at the Book Fair! It’s a fun, safe weekend celebrating nature through the arts. Michelle Nijhuis and Bonnie Henderson at Portland Audubon's Wild Arts Festival 2021
