Readings, music featured as part of New Issues fundraiser
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Mark Schwerin
August 20, 2012
Scott
KALAMAZOO—Accomplished Michigan authors and live music from a well-known southwest Michigan Celtic band are on tap as part of a fundraiser for Western Michigan University's New Issues Poetry and Prose.
The literary press' fourth annual fundraiser is set for 2 to 5 p.m. Sunday, Aug. 26, at Bell's Eccentric Cafe, 355 E. Kalamazoo Ave. The event will celebrate and help support the creation of the Herbert Scott Legacy Fund, named after the longtime WMU professor of English and founding editor of the literary press. A donation of $10 is suggested for admission or $5 for students.
The event, called the New Issues Annual End-of-Summer Celebration, will feature readings by Lisa Fishman, Susan Ramsey, Diane Seuss, Deborah Gang, Traci Brimhall, Nancy Eimers, Phillip Sterling, Elizabeth Kerikowske, and Elizabyth Hiscox as well as live music by Whiskey Before Breakfast. A silent auction, featuring a wide range of items from rare books by Scott to art and jewelry by Michigan artists, also will be held.
A look at the readers
Lisa Fishman earned a master of fine arts from WMU and is influenced by the British Romantic poets and the pastoral tradition. Her most-recent poetry collection, "Current," was published in 2010.
Susan Blackwell Ramsey is the winner of the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry for 2011 for her manuscript, "A Mind Like This." She is a graduate of Kalamazoo College and also received an Irving S. Gilmore Emerging Artist Grant in 2002.
Eimers
Diane Seuss is a writer in residence in the Kalamazoo College Department of English. Her collection of poems, "Wolf Lake, White Gown Blown Open," won the Juniper Prize for Poetry.
Deborah Gang is originally from Washington, D.C, settled in Kalamazoo and became a psychotherapist. She resumed writing in 2007, and her poems have been published in Encore.
Traci Brimhall is the winner of the 2011 Barnard Women Poets Prize, the Crab Orchard Series in Poetry First Book Award, the ForeWord Book of the Year and other awards. Her most recent collection is "Our Lady of the Ruins" published in 2012.
Nancy Eimers is a WMU professor of English and author of four poetry collections. She is the recipient of the Nation "Discovery" Award, a Whiting Writers Award, two National Endowment for the Arts Fellowships and a Pushcart Prize.
Phillip Sterling is professor of languages and literature at Ferris State University. He is the author of the short fiction book "In Which Brief Stories are Told" and four collections of poetry.
Elizabeth Kerlikowske earned bachelor's and doctoral degrees from WMU. She is an English instructor at Kellogg Community College in Battle Creek, Mich.
Elizabyth Hiscox serves as an associate editor for News Issues Poetry and Prose, and her poems have appeared in Golf Coast, The Fiddlehead and Ampersand Review, among others. She served as poet-in-residence at St. Chad's College of Durham University, England, and is pursuing a doctoral degree at WMU.
