The Mark Webster Reading Series showcases work by second-year MFA students in the Helen Zell Writers’ Program.
Usually held on Friday evenings, Webster Readings present two readers (most often one poet and one fiction writer), each introduced by a fellow poet or fiction writer also in the graduating cohort.As the culminating event for students of the program, Webster Readings are hosted in partnership with the University of Michigan Museum of Art and held in Helmut Stern Auditorium. An opportunity to hear from emerging writers in a warm and relaxed setting, these readings are free and open to the public.
The Mark Webster Reading Series remembers the poetry and life of Mark Webster. Webster’s work is available in the Hopwood Room.
Today: Ian Burnette and Carl Lavigne
The Webster Readings are organized by second-year students, and feature their poetry and prose. Post-graduate Zell fellows are regularly invited to introduce and/or open for writers scheduled to visit local bookstore Literati.
Today: Katarina Bishop and Thea Chacamaty.
A farce by Patrick Barlow, presented by RC Players. 39 Steps is a parody of the classic Hitchcock spy thriller, where four actors play every role.
Also Saturday, March 23, at 8 pm.
Keene Theater, East Quadrangle, 701 East University, Ann Arbor, MI 48109. Free.
An evening of Buddhist storytelling with Rafe Martin. Listen to Buddhist Jataka Tales. He will be joined by longtime Zen Buddhist teacher and storyteller, Haju Sunim, and Zen storyteller Sandong Kurt Iselt. Children and families welcome, as well as all those who are curious about the wondrous stories that underpin Buddhism and Buddhist teachings. Rafe will be available for book signings after the event. $25. $15/ages 16 and under. Contact Zen Buddhist Temple at 761-6520; annarbor@zenbuddhisttemple.org or zenbuddhisttemple.org.
A farce by Patrick Barlow, presented by RC Players. 39 Steps is a parody of the classic Hitchcock spy thriller, where four actors play every role. Keene Theater, East Quadrangle, 701 East University, Ann Arbor, MI 48109. Free.
All invited to listen to guild members swap stories or bring their own to tell.
2-4 p.m., Ann Arbor District Library 3rd fl. Freespace, 343 S. Fifth Ave. Free. annarborstorytelling.org .
Readings by writers featured in Surrendurance, the 11th annual edition of Prison Creative Arts Project book that features work by incarcerated and formerly incarcerated writers. Also, a performance by the U-M Men’s Glee Club. Book sale.
3 p.m., Pierpont Commons East Room. Free. 647-6771.
Join us for a free public screening of Chernobyl Heart and White Horse, followed by a Q&A with filmmaker Maryann De Leo and Residential College and Slavic Languages and Literatures professor Herb Eagle.
Maryann De Leo is an American director and producer. She has been working in documentary filmmaking for over twenty years. Her work addresses timely issues under the umbrella of social justice, such as gender-based violence (Rape: Cries from the Heartland, 1991 and Terror at Home, 2005), mental illness (Bellevue: Inside Out, 2001), and urban blight (High on Crack Street: Lost Lives in Lowell, 1995). De Leo has received numerous awards, including an Academy Award for Chernobyl Heart, 2003.
Chernobyl Heart (39 min.) is an Oscar-winning documentary about the effects of radiation on the children of Belarus, 16 years after the accident at the nuclear reactor at Chernobyl. The film begins with the journey into the exclusion zone, driving to the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, and follows the invisible trail of radiation to the country’s hospitals, cancer centers, orphanages, and mental asylums, where the children live, or are being treated for their disease.
White Horse (17 min.) is a short documentary by filmmakers Maryann DeLeo and Christophe Bisson that features a man (Maxym Surkov) returning to his Ukraine home for the first time in twenty years. Evacuated from the city of Pripyat, Ukraine in 1986 due to the Chernobyl disaster, he has not returned since then. White Horse was nominated for a Golden Bear in the 2008 Berlinale.
This local writer reads from and discusses You’d Be Mine, her debut romance novel about the relationship between a sweet country music heiress and a country superstar with a bad boy image who convinces her to join his tour. Signing.
7 p.m., Nicola’s, Westgate shopping center. Free. 662-0600
