Current & Upcoming Events:

Saturday December 1st, 2007

Bantam Cinema -Special Presentation-

On Saturday December 1st at 11:30AM the Bantam Cinema offered a special program to introduce David Halberstam's last book: THE COLDEST WINTER, a masterful assessment of the politics surrounding the Korean War andthe stories of the soldiers on the front line.

This presentation was a collaboration between the Bantam Cinema, The Litchfield County Writer's Project and the Hickory Stick Book Store. We showed a DVD about the book and Professor Karl Valois of the University of Connecticut, History Department provided an overview of both the book and this remarkable period of history. There was be time for questions.

English 217 Fall 2007: Writers of Litchfield County: Fiction

August 29 - December 5, 2007

Lecturer: Davyne Verstandig
Wednesday evenings 6:30-9:00pm

Class website: http://lcwp.uconn.edu/eng217fall2007.html

This fall saw The Litchfield County Writers Project at the University of Connecticut’s Torrington campus presenting “Writers of Litchfield County: Fiction.” The discussion series examined definitions of literature through the ages and looked at "chick lit." and "gender genre", as well as the effect marketing and media have on how we read and what we read.

The fall series featured some of America's best-loved and award-winning fiction authors and their work, including Arthur Miller (Presence and The Misfits); Lauren Lipton, (It’s About Your Husband); Dani Shapiro, (Black & White); Candace Bushnell, (Trading Up) and Roxana Robinson, (A Perfect Stranger).

All classes are free and open to the public to attend. There is no need to reserve a seat.

Monday November 26th - The Road to Reno

Photo: Reno, Nevada, 1960. Copywright Inge Morath Foundation / Magnum Photos, 1960.

Presented by John Jacob. Director of The Inge Morath Foundation

  free and open to the public, presentation, Q&A, book sale, reception 6:30-9:00 Lecture hall
– Davyne Verstandig, English 217 Writers of Litchfield County: Fiction

Wednesday November 7th - Roxana Robinson

Photo: Jose Nicolas

Author of A Perfect Stranger

  free and open to the public,  Q&A, book signing, reception 6:30-9:00 Lecture hall
– Davyne Verstandig, English 217 Writers of Litchfield County: Fiction

Thursday October 25th - Barbara Parsons

Author of Reawakening through Nature: a Prison Reflection, from Wally Lamb’s newest anthology, I’ll Fly Away: Further Testimonies from the Women of York Prison

  free and open to the public,  Q&A, book signing, reception 6:30-9:00 Lecture hall

Wednesday October 24th - Candace Bushnell

Author of Trading Up

  free and open to the public,  Q&A, book signing, reception 6:30-9:00 Lecture hall
– Davyne Verstandig, English 217 Writers of Litchfield County: Fiction

Wednesday October 10th - Dani Shapiro

Author of Black and White

  free and open to the public,  Q&A, book signing, reception 6:30-9:00 Lecture hall
– Davyne Verstandig, English 217 Writers of Litchfield County: Fiction

Wednesday September 26th - Lauren Lipton

Author of It’s About Your Husband

free and open to the public,  Q&A, book signing, reception 6:30-9:00 Lecture hall
– Davyne Verstandig, English 217 Writers of Litchfield County: Fiction

"In Memoriam" - a commemoration of 9/11

September 10th, 2007

On September 10th in a special event to mark the sixth anniversary of 9/11, Litchfield County Writers Project hosted a screening and discussion of “In Memoriam, New York City, 9/11/01”. The documentary film, produced by Brad Grey Pictures and HBO, draws on a remarkable collection of still and video material from over 100 people who witnessed the events of that day, including former New York City Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani. The film is a unique portrait of 9/11 and is supported by a poignant score performed by the New York Philharmonic and created by American composers.

“It wasn't just an attack on America -- it was an attack on much of the civilized world,” Giuliani said, “If you censor it too much, if you try to find too many euphemisms for what happened, then I think you rob people of the ability to actually relive it and therefore motivate them to prevent it from happening in the future.”

The award-winning film, which is 60 minutes in length, was shown from 6:30 – 7:30pm, after which, Davyne Verstandig, Litchfield County Writers Project Director led a discussion with Sheila Nevins, President HBO Documentary Films, John Hoffman, Vice President HBO Documentary Films, both of whom produced “In Memoriam”, and its editor, Paula Heredia.

“In Memoriam” was screened on September 10th, 6:30pm at the University of Connecticut, 855 University Drive, Torrington, CT, 06790.

Charles Van Doren on Robert Frost: July 18th 2007

The annual summer lecture by Professor Van Doren is now a firmly established event on the cultural calendar in Litchfield County. The distinguished academic turned his attention to Frost after delighting audiences with readings of his father, Mark Van Doren and also Mark Twain in previous years.

This year, Charles Van Doren offered his thoughts about the quintessential American poet, Robert Frost, reading and commenting on a baker's dozen of poems that "can’t be got rid of easily”. As he explains: “Every serious poet, said Robert Frost, wants ‘to lodge a few poems where they can't be gotten rid of easily.’ What did he mean? And did he do it?”

A book signing with Professor Van Doren took place as part of the reception following the reading.

June 8^th, 2007 - Renowned pianist Anne Chamberlain and cellist Peter Zay performed sonatas by Brahms, Schubert and Prokofiev at the UConn Torrington Campus. Chamberlain and Zay performed in concert here last summer, and the event drew so much positive feedback from the audience that it returned by popular demand.

April 27^th 2007 Creative Sustenance - The annual Creative Sustenance fundraising event for the FISH Food Pantry and the Torrington Community Soup Kitchen was held at UConn Torrington campus. Monetary donations or canned and non-perishable food items are welcome all year round . There was an Open Mic poetry session from 4.00 – 5.00pm, followed by poetry readings from invited poets from 5:00 – 8:00pm. There was be a reception and book signing from 8:00 – 9:00pm.

April 10^th 2007 Taylor Mali - performance poet Taylor Mali appeared in honor of Poetry Month. Taylor was a teacher for nine years and is the most successful poetry slam strategist of all time. He is a passionate advocate of teaching and his mission is to, “…reform education in America from top to bottom.”

Drama 251 Spring 2007: Filmmakers of Litchfield County

January 17- April 25, 2007

Lecturers: John Long and Davyne Verstandig
Wednesday evenings 6:30 - 9:00pm

Class website: http://www.torrington.uconn.edu/drama251filmmakers.htm

The Litchfield County Writers Project located at the University of Connecticut’s Torrington Campus presented a lecture series last spring entitled “ The American Film – Filmmakers of Litchfield County .” The discussion series examined the issue of human rights through film documentary and also the adaptation of literature to film. The course was offered Wednesday evenings at the Torrington Campus from 6:30 to 9:00 PM, running from January 17 to April 18. It included films by Karen Bernstein, Andi and Harvey Hubbell, Amy Costello, Gregg Watt and Adam Kimmel and appearances by Amy Costello, Greg Watt, Anne Makepeace, Barbara Gold and Tom Schiller.

English 217 Fall 2006: Writers of Litchfield County Nonfiction and Memoir

August 30 - December 6, 2006

Lecturer: Davyne Verstandig
Wednesday evenings 6:30 - 9:00 pm

Class website: http://www.torrington.uconn.edu/english217nonfiction.htm

Litchfield County writers reflect through memoir and nonfiction on a variety of issues: addiction, recovery, the death penalty, suicide, and life as immigrants. One of the major focus points of the course will be the question of what is truth versus what is invented truth.

English 217 Spring 2006: The Beat Generation:  a counterculture in the 50’s

Lecturer: Davyne Verstandig

Thursday evenings 6:30 - 9:00pm

Class website: http://www.torrington.uconn.edu/english217beats.html

Some of the topics covered were : American postwar society and its paranoia after the McCarthy era, suburban living and conformity, the new consumer culture and materialism, TV, the rise of Civil Rights and Anti-War Movements, the “culture of spontaneity” versus the “culture of conformity”, the abstract expressionists, influence of be-bop and jazz and the chauvinism of the male Beat writers.

Rebels and non-conformists…the counterculture of individuality

We also looked at the influence of Buddhism on the Beats. There were supplemental readings in Big Sky Mind, Buddhism and the Beat Generation (on reserve).

There were also other spiritual readings by the Beats, including Some of the Dharma by Kerouac. We came to understand not only how but why the Beats influenced the 60’s Bob Dylan, the “Flower Children” and/or “Hippies” and present day writing.

Scheduled speakers:

Thursday, March 16th, Anne Waldman

Thursday, March 30th, Joy Gould Boyum, Professor of Humanities Education and Director, Studies in Arts and Humanities Education

Thursday, April 13th, Ann Charters

Past speakers:
Thursday , Jan. 26th, Robert Crooke, Author of American Family (2005). Bridgewater novelist Robert Crooke contemplates themes of loyalty, betrayal, patriotism, social activism and dissent in his compelling new work of historical fiction.

Thursday, Jan. 26th, Shelly Frome, author of The Actors Studio: a history. Shelly Frome is a recently retired Professor of Dramatic Arts from the University of Connecticut. he has written thirteen articles on acting and playwriting, composed over twenty-five plays and dance/theater pieces and was a professional actor in New York.

Program at NYU, will discuss the film, Pull My Daisy, and its relevance to the Beat Generation. The film will be shown prior to the guest lecturer.

Lecturer s: Davyne Verstandig an d John Long

This course was open and free of charge to the general public and was also taken by students for credit in English. Co-taught by John Long, Professor of Drama and Film and Davyne Verstandig, Professor of English, the course showcased the novels, films and guest speakers listed below.   Litchfield County writers had their say on issues that included prejudice, racism, faith and family.

Comments from the Frank McCourt lecture

Frank McCourt
December 6, 2006
English 217

(photo:Justin Lyga)

Frank McCourt was born in 1930 in Brooklyn, New York, to Irish immigrant parents, grew up in Limerick, Ireland, and returned to America in 1949. For thirty years he taught in New York City high schools. His first book, Angela’s Ashes, won the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the L.A. Times Book Award. He spoke about his book Teacher Man .

Peter Duchin & Brooke Hawyard Duchin
November 15, 2006
English 217

(r: photo by Justin Lyga)
Son of the celebrated bandleader Eddy Duchin and Marjorie Oelrichs, Peter Duchin grew up to be America’s preeminent society bandleader. He is vice-chairman of the New York State Council on the Arts and serves on the boards of many cultural institutions. Duchin co-authored two mystery novels, Blue Moon and Good Morning Heartache, with John Morgan Wilson. He spoke about his memoir Ghost of a Chance co-authored wtih Charles Michener. Michener is a former senior editor for cultural affairs at Newsweek, and now a senior editor at The New Yorker as well as the music critic for The New York Observer.
On the same evening, Brooke Hawyard Duchin, the daughter of film star Margaret Sullavan and agent-producer Leland Hayward, spoke about her book Haywire. The family biography, written in 1977, exposes the tragic underbelly of a world of privilege and glamour. Brooke is the wife of Peter Duchin, with whom she has three children.

Tom Hunt
November 1, 2006
English 217

(r: photo by Justin Lyga)

Tom Hunt teaches English at Kent School. He spoke about Cliffs of Despair: Journey to the Edge , an expansion of his essay of the same name cited as a notable work in The Best American Essays collection.

Donald Connery
October 24, 2006

Ken Simpson
October 19, 2006
(2005 Neag Distinguished Visting Professor in British Literature at the University of Connecticut )

(photo by Justin Lyga)

“Of Mice and Women: Sentimental Encounters in the work of Robert Burns and Laurence Sterne.”

Ken Simpson, a scholar on both Scotland and Burns, was the founding Director of the Centre for Scottish Cultural Studies at the University of Strathclyde where he taught for 34 years. In addition, he established and directed the annual International Burns Conference and organized the Writerfest program of readings by Scottish Writers. Scot Robert Burns was the most celebrated literati of his time, so beloved that over 10,000 people attended his burial. A national celebrity to this day, Burns has been honored with traditional Scottish feasts on the anniversary of his birth in 1759 for over 200 years. The title of the lecture is a play on famous Anglo-Irish writer Laurence Sterne’s work A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy. Sterne, a novelist and clergyman of the 18 th century, is best known for his book The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy. Both Burns and Sterne have influenced and continue to influence writers to this day. Ken Simpson is the 2005 Neag Distinguished Visting Professor in British Literature at the University of Connecticut.

Antoinette Bosco
October 18, 2006
English 217

(r. photo by Justin Lyga)

Antoinette Bosco is a syndicated columnist with the national Catholic News Service in Washington D.C. A prize-winning journalist and the author of over 200 magazine article, several thousand newspaper stories and columns, she is widely known as the leading proponent against the death penalty. Author of over a dozen books, Bosco received the Walter Everett Humanitarian Award for her work in the advancement of human rights. Antoinette Bosco spoke about her book Choosing Mercy: A Mother of Murder Victims Pleads to End the Death Penalty.

Robin Magowan
October 4, 2006
English 217

(r.photo by Justin Lyga)

Robin Magowan founded the transatlantic review Margin in 1986, which he edited until 1990. Magowan has published seven books of poetry including Lilac Cigarette in a Wish Cathedral, which was chosen for the “James Dickey Contemporary Poetry” series. His books include a translation of Michaux’s Ecuador; Narcissus and Orpheus; travel writings such as And Other Voyages and Fabled Cities: Samarkand, Bukhara, Khiva; and two books on bicycle racing. He spoke about his memoir Memoirs of a Minotaur, from Merrill Lynch to Patty Hearst to Poetry.

Dani Shapiro
September 27, 2006

English 217

(r.photo by Justin Lyga)

Dani Shapiro is the author of three acclaimed novels, Playing with Fire, Fugitive Blue, and Picturing the Work. Slow Motion: A True Story was chosen as a LondonTimes Best Book of the Year. She teaches in the creative writing program at Columbia University and The New School, and has written for many magazines, including The New Yorker, Vogu, and Granta. Dani spoke about her memoir Slow Motion.

Burton Bernstein
September 20, 2006
English 217

(r.photo by Justin Lyga)

Burton Bernstein was a staff writer for The New Yorker from 1957 to 1992. His works of fiction include The Grove and The Lost Art; The Sticks, a Profile of Essex County, New York; Thurber: A Biography; Look Ma, I am Kool! and Other Casuals, a collection of humor pieces; The Great and Terrible Wilderness; and Plane Crazy: A Celebration of Flying. Bernstein spoke about his memoir Family Matters, Sam, Jennie, and the Kids.

“Mark Twain: In His Own Words”
Charles Van Doren
July 21, 2006

On Friday July 21, 2006 Charles Van Doren read selected works by Mark Twain in a talk entitled “Mark Twain: In His Own Words.” A member of the UConn Torrington English faculty, Charles Van Doren has authored more than a dozen books, including The History of Knowledge and The Joy of Reading, and also has served as Executive Editor of the twenty-volume series Annals of America. The Connecticut educator, scholar and writer comes from a family of intellectuals, two of whom received Pulitzer Prizes, including his father, poet Mark Van Doren.

On Saturday, June 10, 2006 at 7PM PeterZay, cellist and Anne Chamberlain, pianist performed a Sonata in C, Op. 65 for cello and piano by Benjamin Britten; Three Meditations from “Mass” by Leonard Bernstein and Sonata, Op. 19 for cello and piano by Sergei Rachmanioff.  

Cellist Peter Zay’s musical achievements have taken him to concert halls throughout the United States, Europe and Central America. He performs regularly at the International Musical Arts Institute summer chamber music concerts in Fryeburg, Maine. Mr. Zay is a member of the Hartford Symphony Orchestra and the Hartford Symphony Chamber Orchestra. He has freelanced regularly with many other organizations including the Boston Lyric Opera, the

Pro Arte Chamber Orchestra, the Boston Modern Orchestra and as a pit musician for Broadway shows.  

Pianist Anne Chamberlain’s numerous performances have included concerts at Alice Tully Hall and Town Hall in New York City, as well as appearances at other major halls. “Anne Chamberlain, a pianist with the technical tools and intellectual acuity necessary to play 20 th century music well, did not let her century down in her recital at Alice Tully Hall. Early or late composers found in the tall young artist a persuasive advocate.” – The New York Times

Creative Sustenance
April 24, 2006, Monday 7:00PM-8:00PM

On Monday, April 24^th at 7PM The University of Connecticut’s Litchfield County Writers Project, the Community Outreach Committee at the Torrington Campus and the Creative Writing Program at the Storrs campus will co-sponsor Creative Sustenance, a poetry reading to benefit the Community Soup Kitchen of Torrington and FISH, the local food pantry.  The reading will feature eleven members of the “The Monday Poets”, a group of fifteen women initiated by Helen Trubeck Glenn and Lynn Ray Hoopes.  The poets have been writing together for the last seventeen years.  The members who will be reading include:  Julia Bolus, Sharon Charde, Cheryl Della Pelle, Sandra Bishop Ebner, Victoria Givotovsky, Lynn Ray Hoopes, Arlene Jones, Susannah Lawrence

Marie Prentice, Davyne Verstandig, Sallie Wright.  A book sale, signing and reception will follow.

Canned and non-perishable food items or monetary donations may be brought to the reading.  All donations will go directly to the FISH Food Pantry and the Community Soup Kitchen of Torrington.  Donations are tax deductible.

The Soup Kitchen has been in operation since l983.  An average of over 2,000 meals a month is served, over 24,000 meals yearly, presently 80-100 meals a day.  One of their expenses is $1,000 a month rent in addition to insurance.  The Soup Kitchen is supported solely by public donations and grants.  Volunteers assist daily with food preparation, serving, cleanup and provide weekend coverage.  Their mission states:  We are committed to providing a nutritious meal to ANY INDIVIDUAL who, for whatever reason, is unable to provide a proper meal for him/herself.

FISH opened its doors in 1972, originally to provide transportation and neighborly assistance to people in the community.  Today their operation consists of a food pantry, a 35 bed homeless shelter including 10 beds for veterans, a Beyond Shelter program and an energy assistance program.  The agency’s mission is: 

• To meet the most basic of human needs in the community
• To nurture individual and community hope through donations and volunteerism
• To promote individual and community development

Dag Sundby, Norwegian Poet with translations by Joan Kunsch
April 19, 2006, Wednesday 1:00 – 2:00PM  

Norwegian poet and author Dag Sundby will read from his works, letting listeners absorb the captivating sounds of the Norwegian language in all the richness of their music.  Immediately following each poem, Joan Kunsch will read the English translation, giving the audience a second type of experience with the same poem as its meaning is revealed.  The poems explore human attachments, international locales and memorable incidents in a poetic style that is taut, spare and nuanced in a way that heightens the intensity of his expression.

Coffee House
April 19, 2006, Wednesday – 5:30PM
Readings and presentations of prizes for the inaugural issue of Creative Hills Journal sponsored by LCWP.  

Ann Charters, Beat Scholar
April 13, 2006, Thursday – 6:30-9 pm
Ann Charters is a foremost Beat scholar who wrote the first biography of Jack Kerouac.  It’s nearly impossible to come across a significant study of Jack Kerouac without encountering her name. A foremost Beat scholar, she wrote the first biography of Jack Kerouac and has studied his milieu for over 20 years.  She is the professor of English at the University of Connecticut and has been interested in Beat writers since l956, when as an undergraduate English major, she attended the repeat performance of the Six Gallery poetry reading in Berkeley where Allen Ginsberg gave his second public reading of Howl. She has edited 2 volumes of Kerouac’s letters, The Portable Jack Kerouac, The Portable Beat Reader, Beat Down To Your Soul, The Story and Its Writer: An Introduction to Short Fiction and she was the general editor of the two-volume encyclopedia The Beats :Literary Bohemians in Postwar America and has published a collection of her photographic portraits of well known writers in beats &Company. She also edited Jack Kerouac’s On The Road for penguin Century Classics.

Charters has taught at Brown University, Columbia University, and the University of Connecticut, where she has been a professor of English since l974.

 
Taylor Mali, Performance Poet
April 3, 2006, Monday 12:45 – 1:45PM

Performance poet Taylor Mali is the most successful poetry slam strategist of all time, having lead six of his seven national poetry slam teams to the finals stage and winning the championship itself a record four times before anyone had even tied him at three.  He spent nine years teaching and now performs and lectures for teachers all over the world.  His show about poetry, teaching, and math called “Teacher! Teacher!”  won the jury prize for best one-man show at the 2001 U.S. Comedy Arts Festival.  He is a vocal advocate of teachers and the nobility of teaching.  His mission is to “…reform education in American from top to bottom.”

March 30, 2006 6:30-9 pm
Joy Gould Boyum, Author Double Exposure: Fiction to Film

Author Joy Gould Boyum is Professor of Humanities Education and Director of the Arts and Humanities Program at New York University.  She organized and provided annotations for a film series – Beats on Film – as part of NYU’s l994 Beat Festival and has contributed to The Voyageur Company’s Criterion Collection of laser disc film renditions. She is the author of Double Exposure, Fiction into Film.

March 16, 2006 6:30-9 pm
Anne Waldman, Poet

Anne Waldman has stood in the center of the American poetry scene since the late l960’s when she became part of the latter-day Beat community.  Her dictum through the decades:  “It is the poet’s task to move the century forward a few inches, as William Carlos Williams reminds us.  Keep the world safe for poetry.”  She has spent a lifetime devoted to furthering the cause of American poetry, politically, aesthetically, and spiritually.  She is the author of over forty collections of poetry and poetics, including Fast Speaking woman, In the room of Never Grieve, Vow to Poetry: Essays, Interviews & Manifestos and the newly released Structure Of The World Compared To A Bubble.

Waldman is a longtime student of Buddhism and one of the founders of the celebrated Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado, where she, Allen Ginsberg, and Diane di Prima began the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodies Poetics in l974 body. She is a distinguished professor and curator of poetry and poetics and a political/cultural activist. Waldman has been associated with the Beat Literary Movement and the New York School as a second-generation lineage holder as well as carrying forward the experimental strands of the New American Poetry.  She ran the St. Mark’s Church Poetry Project for a decade.

In honor of National Eating Disorders Awareness Week
February 28, 2006, Tuesday 4:00 – 5:00PM 

Dr. Margo Maine, cofounder of the Maine & Weinstein Specialty Group will be the guest speaker discussing the treatment and prevention of eating disorders, women’s health, and related issues.  Dr. Maine is a clinical psychologist who has specialized in the treatment of eating disorders for over 25 years and is a clinical consultant at the Institute of Living in Hartford, Connecticut, and former director of their Eating Disorders Program.  Her most recent book, co-authored with Joe Kelly, The Body Myth: The Pressure on Adult Women to Be Perfect, concerns adult eating disorders and body image concerns (John Wiley, 2005). Also author of Body Wars: Making Peace With Women’s Bodies (Gurze, 2000) and Father Hunger: Fathers, Daughters and the Pursuit of Thinness (Gurze, 2004), she is a senior editor of Eating Disorders: The Journal of Treatment and Prevention. 

A R Gurney, Playwright, Guest Speaker
December 7th at 6:30PM
A. R. Gurney was the guest speaker discussing his screen play and film version of "Love Letters" as part of an ongoing course "Writers of Litchfield County and Films Made From Their Works: A Discussion Series." He was most generous in answering questions and his insights about writing for both stage and screen was enlightening. The film was shown on November 30th and was also free and open to the public.

Poetry Reading by Sharon Charde
Nov. 14, 2005

Sharon Charde read from her newly published chapbook Bad Girl At The Altar Rail, which won first prize in the Flume Press (California State University) competition.

In February 2002 she edited and published a chapbook anthology of the girls' poetry from Touchstone, a residential treatment facility for female juvenile offenders in Litchfield, Ct.,called I Am Not A Juvenile Delinquent, and in 2004, a full length second edition of that anthology.
That anthology has won the 2005 Literature PASS Award (Prevention For A Safer Society) given by the National Council on Crime and Delinquency in California.

Ms. Charde was presented with the Inge Morath Award in September 2005 in recognition of the significant social impact she has made to the arts in Litchfield County through her work as Director of the Creative Writing Program at Touchstone.

Bill C. Davis: "Writers of Litchfield County and Films Made From Their Works": A Discussion Series, English 217
Nov, 9, 2005

Bill C. Davis was the guest speaker discussing his screen play and stage version of "Mass Appeal,” the story of a clash of ideology and personality between an older entrenched priest, Fr. Farley, who accommodates to survive, and a young scorching seminarian, Mark Dolson, who attacks to force salvation.  Each in his own way uses his relationship to the congregation to resolve personal scars. As each tries to force the other to be a good priest, they learn, in unexpected ways, the nature of courage, friendship and the infinite varieties of love.”  (Dramatists Play Service)

Frank McCourt : "Writers of Litchfield County and Films Made From Their Works": A Discussion Series, English 217
September 29, 2005

[left photo: Davyne Verstandig and author Frank McCourt. ]

[right photo: John Long, author Frank McCourt and Davyne Verstandig. ]

Frank McCourt was the guest speaker discussing his memoir and the film version of "Angela's Ashes” .
Comments from the Frank McCourt lecture

Domestic Violence Awareness Month - Lecture by Barbara Parsons

On October 20th 2005, Barbara Parsons was the guest speaker at the UConn Torrington Campus, discussing her experiences as a victim and survivor of domestic abuse.  Ms. Parsons also survived ten years of incarceration for the shooting death of her husband.  Her memoir, “Puzzle Pieces”

was published in the book Couldn’t Keep it to Myself, Testimonies From Our Imprisoned Sisters, an anthology of short pieces written by inmates and edited by Wally Lamb, while she was incarcerated.  “(Parsons) has hitched her sorrow, fear, despair and anger to vivid remembered detail and transferred her emotions to the page….  The operative emotion that drives her later pieces is righteous anger.” (Wally Lamb)

Artist: Dana Gringas

The Inge Morath Award was given September 24, 2005 to celebrate and recognize women in Litchfield County who have had a significant impact on the economic and/or social development of the arts in this region. This award is given with the support of The Estate of Inge Morath.

     
For more images from the event, click here.

"The Poems of My Father: Charlie on Mark", a look into the poems and life of Mark Van Doren as read and told by Charles Van Doren. July 22, 2005, 7 p.m.
There were many misty eyes in the audience as Charles gave a moving account of his father's life and poems. Mark Van Doren was a Pulitzer Prize winning poet and author of numerous books.

Charles Van Doren has advanced degrees in both mathematics and English Literature. As Vice President/Editorial of Encyclopedia Britannia, Inc., he produced many reference books, some alone or in collaboration with Mortimer J. Adler. He is the author of more than a dozen books, including the Idea of Progress, The Joy of Reading, and A History of Knowledge. He has been reading his father's poems ever since he learned to read, which was seventy years ago.

Librarians & Town Historians of Litchfield County Reception
June 10, 2005 7-8:30 pm.
An overview of the Litchfield County Writers Project by Director Davyne Verstandig followed by a sharing of town lore by the Town Historians.

For more images from the event, click here.

"Robert Lowell and Elizabeth Bishop: Distant Soulmates" , reading performance by Susan Kinsolving and Jack Gilpin in celebration of National Poetry Month, April 27, 7 pm.

Ms. Kinsolving's most recent book of poems is The White Eyelash, (Grove Press, 2003) which won the Friends of Literature Award. Her previous book, Dailies & Rushes, was a finalist for the National Book Critics Award.

Jack Gilpin has appeared in over 25 films including Compromising Positions, Heartburn and the Broadway revival of The Elephant Man. His many television credits include Law and Order, The Cosby Show and two years in the role of Roger on Kate & Allie.

"Inge Morath: Litchfield County" Photography Exhibit

(October 22, 2004-Present)

Opening Exhibit and Lecture and Slideshow on Inge Morath
Speaker: John Jacob, Director of The Estate of Inge Morath
Thursday, December 9, 2004, 7 p.m.
Lecture Hall

Pictures from the event

List of Photographs on display

The Sex King : a reading of Bill C. Davis' newest play
October 27, 2004

Back row: Bill C. Davis, Jack Gilpin, Chris Blum
Front row: Davyne Verstandig, Jessica Stewart

2001 Festival of Authors