A Blog of Seattle Arts & Lectures
At a word, we jump, run, and jostle our way to a far corner, vying for a spot on the cushioned couch instead of the cold floor. We attempt to be quiet and hold in our laughter as we peek over the edge of the couch towards the door amidst scolding words from our teacher. […]
By Rebecca Hoogs, SAL Associate Director Maggie Smith is the author of three books of poetry and just this fall, a book of micro-essays entitled Keep Moving: Notes on Loss, Creativity, and Change. You might have first encountered Maggie through the poem, “Good Bones” which—let’s not say, went viral, let’s say, took hold, let’s say, […]
By Ruth Dickey, SAL Executive Director In one of my favorite passages in Song of Achilles, Madeline Miller writes of the first time that Patroclus hears Achilles play the lyre: His fingers touched the strings, and all my thoughts were displaced. The sound was pure and sweet as water, bright as lemons. It was like […]
“There’s a reason Sappho wrote in her complex hexameter.” 2019/20 Youth Poet Laureate cohort member Maeve Kenney reads her poem “Ars Poetica,” which she performed before Madeline Miller’s 2020/21 Literary Arts Series event, presented on the digital SAL stage.
I am the breeze that hits you on a cold day I am the perfect but imperfect plant you try to grow I am the expected but unexpected snow on a chilling night I am the rain that disturbs a sunny day But I’m not the fresh-baked pie straight from the oven Or the perfect […]
This essay is part of a series in which Poetry Northwest partners with Seattle Arts & Lectures to present reflections on visiting writers from the SAL Poetry Series. On Friday, January 22, Maggie Smith will read and discuss her work at 7:30 pm PST. Subscriptions and tickets to future events in the Poetry Series can […]
Dear Friends, Two years ago, Isabel Allende joined us at SAL to talk about life, love, writing, grief, and her then-new novel, In the Midst of Winter (listen to that talk here). The novel begins with an epigram from Camus: “In the midst of winter, I finally found there was within me an invincible summer.” As we navigate what are […]
Today is the shortest day of the year in Seattle—the sun rose at 7:55 a.m., and it will set at 4:21 p.m. In our opinion, that leaves us with two clear bright spots in our day: First, we can spend the darkest day reflecting on the best parts of a difficult year and anticipating what […]
If you’ve been following us for a while, you may know of Tessa Hulls, the “SAL Official Doodler” and author of the forthcoming graphic novel Feeding Ghosts (MCD Books, 2022). On December 2, Tessa watched co-editors Kimberly Drew and Jenna Wortham’s online-SAL Presents conversation with contributor King James Britt, celebrating the release of their Black […]
In this lovely meditation, SAL Board Member Jennifer Leatherman Wong reflects on falling into the work of a recent SAL author. In this distanced, sanitized, and frightening time, Wong finds comfort in going deep into the dark and the surprising lightness one can find there. By Jennifer Leatherman Wong I stumbled on Tana French’s novels […]