Welcome to Page Meets Stage! This pairing will be a great one.
AMY LEMMON is the author of two poetry collections: Fine Motor (Sow’s Ear Poetry Review Press, 2008) and Saint Nobody (Red Hen Press, 2009) and co-author, with Denise Duhamel, of the chapbooks ABBA: The Poems (Coconut Books, 2010) and Enjoy Hot or Iced: Poems in Conversation and a Conversation (Slapering Hol Press, 2011). Her poems and essays have appeared in Rolling Stone, New Letters, Prairie Schooner, Verse, Court Green, The Journal, Marginalia, and many other magazines and anthologies. Twice nominated for a Pushcart Prize, she has contributed articles to The Greenwood Encyclopedia of American Poets and Poetry, and the Facts on File Companion to Twentieth-Century British Poetry. Amy holds a PhD in English/Creative Writing from the University of Cincinnati and is the recipient of a Walter E. Dakin Fellowship, as well as scholarships from the Sewanee Writers’ Conference, Vermont Studio Center, West Chester Poetry Conference, and Antioch Writers’ Workshop. Awards include the Elliston Poetry Prize, the Ruth Cable Poetry Prize, and the Ruskin Art Club Poetry Prize. She is Associate Professor of English at New York’s Fashion Institute of Technology and Poetry Editor of the online literary magazine Ducts.org. Amy lives in Astoria, Queens, with her two children.
LEMON ANDERSEN is a critically acclaimed artist who has been a pioneer in the spoken-word and theater scene for the past decade. He has the greatest number of appearances on HBO’s Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry, with eight performances in six seasons. Lemon is an original cast member of Russell Simmons’ Def Poetry Jam on Broadway; the show took home the Tony Award for “Special Theatrical Event” and the Drama Desk nomination for “Unique Theatrical Experience.” His most current appearance will be as “Geronimo” in the highly anticipated movie The Son of No One starring Al Pacino, Channing Tatum, and Ray Liotta. Lemon appeared in and wrote for Joe Wright’s The Soloist, starring Robert Downey Jr. and Jamie Foxx. His other film credits include Spike Lee’s Miracle At St. Anna, Sucker Free City, She Hate Me, and he appeared opposite Denzel Washington in Inside Man. His other theater credits include Slanguage, which was directed by Jo Bonney and premiered at the New York Theater Workshop to rave reviews and sold out shows. He is currently touring County of Kings, the show was produced by Spike Lee and the Culture Project and premiered at the Public Theater. His most recent stop on the tour was the prestigious Spoleto Festival in Charleston, South Carolina. The book based on the show was the Grand Prize Winner of the 2010 New York Book Festival. His poetry has been featured on various media channels from radio and viral spots, to print ads, on the limited edition Absolut Brooklyn bottle, and most recently he wrote and narrated the Boost Mobile commercial “Be Heard” for basketball superstar Carmelo Anthony. Lemon has performed at such prestigious venues as the Apollo Theater, The Chicago Theater, Hollywood’s Kodak Theater, and The Nuyorican Poets Cafe. Lemon has taught performance art workshops at both colleges and correctional facilities; from the University of Michigan, to Harvard University, to New York’s infamous Sing Sing prison. He has studied master acting with Wynn Handman at Carnegie Hall and has trained with the Public Theater’s Shakespeare Lab. He is also the author of Ready Made Real, a collection of original poems. A native New Yorker, Lemon was born, raised, and currently resides in Brooklyn.
Page Meets Stage was born in 2005 when Billy Collins and Taylor Mali read together on the same stage in an event called “Page vs. Stage: The Final Smackdown!” Now it is a monthly series curated by Taylor and Marie-Elizabeth Mali which brings together two poets—one ostensibly repping the “page,” the other ostensibly repping a more performative style—to read/perform back and forth, poem for poem, continuing the conversation of where poetry exists. Some of the most prominent poets in the United States both in the “academy” and in spoken word circles (Gerald Stern, Mark Doty, Carol Muske-Dukes, Valzhyna Mort, Paul Muldoon, Thomas Lux, Roger Bonair-Agard, Patricia Smith, Rives, Lynne Procope, to name just a few) have been involved.
All Page Meets Stage events are co-productions of Words Worth Ink and Blue Flower Arts in collaboration with Bowery Arts & Science, the educational wing of the Bowery Poetry Club). Check out YouTube to see some of the more memorable moments in the series (search for “Page Meets Stage”), or go to www.PageMeetsStage.com for the complete schedule.
Tickets are $12 ($6 students) and are available ONLY at the door on the night of the show. Call 917-743-6911 for more information.
Bowery Poetry Club (308 Bowery, between Houston & Bleecker, F train to Second Ave, or 6 train to Bleecker)
