Memoirist & Poet at Writers' Night Out, July 12

 Reading + Open Mic in Blairsville GA

“I know I was a male Chauvinist pig in a past life, 

and they made me come back as a woman in corporate America.” 

- Victoria Barkan in The Monkeys Rule

Writers' Night Out

Friday, July 12

7 pm 

reading followed by open mic

Featured Readers:

Local poet, actor, student Ryvers Stewart

Atlanta author Victoria Barkan 

Union County Community Center 

Blairsville, GA.

Victoria Barkan will read from her new memoir The Monkeys Rule, which covers her successes as well as the discrimination she faced in her 20-year career in the burgeoning, then booming, cable TV industry. Her story continues with her spiritual journey that helped her recover from the ordeal.

Barkan’s long career included 11 years at Cox Communications where she became Director of Marketing Operations. She also travelled the globe extensively as Cox’s consultant to Southwestern Bell in the UK. She is now writing her second book and also focusing on her art, with paintings in an upcoming art show in Alpharetta, GA. She has a BS in art education from Bowling Green University and painted the artwork on her current book’s cover.

Ryvers Stewart hails from Murphy, NC. She has written poetry since middle school, but in high school truly fell in love with it, as well as with acting. She is working on her Associates in Fine Arts degree at Tri-County Community College with graduation on track for 2020. Stewart is also an actress who performs locally. On the weekends she can be found participating in the roleplaying games, D&D and Pathfinder. She is currently working on her first poetry book.

Writers’ Night Out takes place on the second Friday of every month through November. Anyone wishing to participate in the open mic can sign up at the door to read three minutes of poetry or prose.

The Union County Community Center is located at Butternut Creek Golf Course at 129 Union County Recreation Rd., Blairsville, Georgia 30512, off Highway 129 near the intersection of US 76, phone (706) 439-6092. Food and drinks are available for purchase in The View Grill, but please arrive by 5:30 pm to get served.  

Writers meetings and workshops in July

MOUNTAIN WRITERS MEETING IN WAYNESVILLE, NC

1) From our idea man Bob: Our July meeting follows the July 4 weekend, so when we get together let’s talk about fireworks. Not the explosive kind, unless you’re speaking metaphorically. Let’s talk about passion and subtext and intrigue and how to inject those things into your story. We’ll borrow some advice from the romance writers, so that should be fun. Join us for “fireworks” at noon on Tuesday, July 9, at Panacea coffee shop for the next meeting of the Mountain Writers of North Carolina.

VALERIE NIEMAN

Novelist and poet

Saturday, July 6, 1:00 – 4:00 PM

Moss Memorial Library, Hayesville, NC

Under Pressure: Creating Complex Characters in Poetry and Prose

         You don't want to miss this great opportunity to get to know and to learn from a well-published writer of novels and poetry. She teaches at the JC Campbell Folk School and is a regular presenter at conferences. We are fortunate to have her come to our area and for such a nominal fee because she is sponsored by NCWN-West. Her novel, Red Clay, is one of my favorite books. Read about it on her website.

Nieman graduated from West Virginia University and Queens University of Charlotte. A former newspaper reporter and editor, she now teaches creative writing at North Carolina A&T State University and at venues ranging from the John C. Campbell Folk School to WriterHouse.

Valerie will have handouts and materials for poetry and prose writers. Check out her website: www.valerienieman.com   

Fee: $40.00         Contact Glenda Beall regarding registration. 828-389-4441 or glendabeall@msn.com

Coffee with the Poets and Writers - Wednesday, July 17, 10:30 AM, Moss Memorial Library, Hayesville, NC, featured writer, Patricia Zick, novelist and nonfiction writer.  Open Mic follows. Public is invited.

Quote from Joseph Bathanti, poet laureate of NC, 2012 - 2014

Accessibility

When I first started writing poetry as a high schooler, I adopted what I call “The Seven Layers of Enigma” model. I wrote a verse that I did not understand, but was sure that others would marvel at simply because it was so inscrutable. 

I wrote this way because I had found few poems – dished out to me in school by well-meaning teachers – that I understood in the vein that one understands prose. Once I began reading on my own and discovered poems and poets that used clear language that told stories, I was evangelized, and my poems became more narrative, more rooted in stories, often about working-class citizens, and much more accessible to hopefully everyone, including folks who don’t typically like poetry. Robert Lowell, in his poem, “Epilogue,” writes “Yet why not say what happened?” I ascribe to that.

I’m decidedly a narrative poet, although I don’t let that get in the way if I want to step outside those lines and fool around with other kinds of deliveries, and I’m also very fond of writing sonnets, as well as writing in other traditional forms. Nevertheless, I do find my central story in narrative because, at heart, I’m a storyteller. Robert Creeley once famously said, “Form is never more than an extension of content.” I do start a poem with a notion of style and shape, but tend to allow Creeley’s dictum to guide the ultimate temperament and form the finished poem will take.

Bathanti will be one of the presenters at A Day for Writers, August 24, in Sylva, NC at the Jackson County Public Library.