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!

Trystan Reese in Conversation With Andrew Solomon

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

When Trystan Reese was just a year into his relationship with Biff (now his husband), the couple learned that Biff’s niece and nephew were about to be removed from their home by Child Protective Services. Immediately, Trystan and Biff took in one-year-old Hailey and three-year-old Lucas, becoming caregivers overnight to two tiny survivors of abuse and neglect. From this surprising start, Trystan and Biff built a loving marriage and happy home — learning to parent on the job. They adopted Hailey and Lucas, and soon decided to grow their family biologically with a child that Trystan, who is transgender, would carry. Trystan’s groundbreaking pregnancy attracted media fanfare, and the family welcomed baby Leo in 2017. In How We Do Family: From Adoption to Trans Pregnancy,…

Free

Dovesong Labs Midsummer Poetry Camp

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

🚨 POETRY WORKSHOP ANNOUNCEMENT! This summer, I’m teaching a 6-week poetry workshop for Black+Indigeneous Queer/Trans Writers (of Color)! Space is limited (15ppl max) Applications due JUNE 20th! Wednesdays June 30th - Aug 11th 4 PM PST Applications Due June 20th

Free

Midsummer Poetry Camp

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Midsummer Poetry Camp is a 6-week long writing intensive for Queer & Trans writers. Students will take part in weekly workshops via Zoom, with assignments & peer feedback due at each session & a class reading at the end of the session. Participants will have access to a full syllabus of resources & optional office hours throughout. Applications due June 20th Application forms here. *IPRC Workshops will be taking place via zoom through summer 2021. Instructor: jayy dodd Class sessions: 6 Wednesdays, June 30th – August 11th 4-6pm PST via zoom Cost: $120 Sliding scale and no-cost spots available Midsummer Poetry Camp is for writers 18+ For more info about summer youth programming, check out our Show:tell Camps

$120

Morgan Thomas in Conversation With Kristen Arnett

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

The nine stories in Morgan Thomas’s shimmering debut collection, Manywhere (MCD), witness Southern queer and genderqueer characters determined to find themselves reflected in the annals of history, at whatever cost. As each character traces deceit and violence through Southern tall tales and their own pasts, their journeys reveal the porous boundaries of body, land, and history, and the sometimes ruthless awakenings of self-discovery. A trans woman finds her independence through the purchase of a pregnancy bump. A young Virginian flees their relationship, choosing instead to immerse themselves in the life of an intersex person from Colonial-era Jamestown. A young writer tries to evade the murky and violent legacy of an ancestor who supposedly disappeared into a midwifery bag. And in the uncanny title story, a…

Free

Lars Horn in Conversation With Elena Passarello

Powell's City of Books 1005 W Burnside Street, Portland, OR, United States

Lars Horn’s Voice of the Fish (Graywolf), the latest Graywolf Press Nonfiction Prize winner, is an interwoven essay collection that explores the trans experience through themes of water, fish, and mythology, set against the backdrop of travels in Russia and a debilitating back injury that left Horn temporarily unable to speak. In Horn’s adept hands, the collection takes shape as a unified book: short vignettes about fish, reliquaries, and antiquities serve as interludes between longer essays, knitting together a sinuous, wave-like form that flows across the book. Horn swims through a range of subjects, roving across marine history, theology, questions of the body and gender, sexuality, transmasculinity, and illness. From Horn’s upbringing with a mother who used them as a model in photos and art…

Free

Democratic Socialists of America: Abortion is Healthcare, Healthcare is a Human Right Protest/Rally

Lownsdale Square SW 4th Avenue and Main Street, Portland, OR, United States

‼️TODAY‼️ Roe v. Wade has been officially overturned by SCOTUS. Join us TODAY at 5:30pm in Lownsdale Square to rally against the decision.⁣⁣ ⁣⁣ We’ve got a guest speaker lineup to talk about reproductive justice, its intersection with queer and trans healthcare, and the fight for labor solidarity!⁣ #AbortionIsHealthcare⁣ ⁣⁣ Read our full Portland DSA chapter statement here: bit.ly/3HOHHbw⁣⁣ ⁣⁣ ——⁣ ⁣ Image descriptions: ⁣⁣ ⁣ Slide 1 in red, black, and white shows Portland DSA logo and reads, “Abortion is Healthcare, Healthcare is a human right! Join us today in protest at Lownsdale Square at 5:30pm. ⁣⁣ ⁣ Slide 2 in red, black, and white reads, “Portland DSA condemns the Supreme Court’s decision. Join us at 5:30pm today in Lownsdale Square! We’ve invited a…

Free

Sidewalk Sale: I’m Having Top Surgery

IPRC (Independent Publishing Resource Center) 318 SE Main Street #175, Portland, OR, United States

In June, IPRC member Rimona Eskayo published their first book, I’m Having Top Surgery: An Illustrated Guide For You And Me. ⭐️ Part-essay, part-handbook, and full-on love poem to my community, this 96-page risographed book draws upon my experiences of top surgery alongside the knowledge of trans scholars, healthcare experts, and friends. A special thanks to Regional Arts & Culture Counsel for their funding and belief in this project. Come by the IPRC on Saturday, September 10th for an outdoor sidewalk sale (where our garage door is on Main St.) between 2 and 5 pm. Book pre-oders can be placed through Rimona’s online shop HERE.

Free

Neil Cochrane

Powell's City of Books 1005 W Burnside Street, Portland, OR, United States

Trans sailor Darragh Thorn has made a comfortable life for himself among people who love and accept him. Ten years after his exile from home, though, his sister asks him to reconcile with their ailing father. Determined to resolve his feelings rather than just survive them, Darragh sets off on a quest to find the one person who can heal a half-dead man: the mysterious enchanter who once gave him the magic he needed to become his true self. But so far as anyone knows, no one but Darragh has seen the enchanter for a century, and the fairy tales that survive about em give more cause for fear than hope. In lush and evocative prose, and populated with magical trees and a wise fox,…

Free

Morgan Thomas in Conversation With Genevieve Hudson

Powell's City of Books 1005 W Burnside Street, Portland, OR, United States

The nine stories in Morgan Thomas’s shimmering debut collection witness Southern queer and genderqueer characters determined to find themselves reflected in the annals of history, whatever the cost. As Thomas’s subjects trace deceit and violence through Southern tall tales and their own pasts, their journeys reveal the porous boundaries of body, land, and history, and the sometimes ruthless awakenings of self-discovery. A trans woman finds her independence with the purchase of a pregnancy bump; a young Virginian flees their relationship, choosing instead to immerse themself in the life of an intersex person from Colonial-era Jamestown. A writer tries to evade the murky and violent legacy of an ancestor who supposedly disappeared into a midwifery bag, and in the uncanny title story, a young trans person…

Free