Were we ever so young. LitCrawl PDX The weekend before the election, the Wordstock festival kicked off with Lit Crawl (a festival in its own right) on Friday, November 4. I wrote about it imagining it would go up on the blog on Wednesday alongside some celebratory post-election posts—not even considering the possibility that we’d […]
Joshua James Amberson
Joshua James Amberson's work has appeared in The Los Angeles Review of Books, The Rumpus, and Tin House, among others. He's the author of the chapbook Everyday Mythologies on Two Plum Press, and he's currently working on a young adult novel about memory loss and a collection of essays about eyeballs.
Posted inArts
Aaron Gilbreath on Loving the Questions
The Local Essayist Considers Everything We Don’t Know
The local essayist considers Everything We Don’t Know.
Posted inTheater & Performance
CoHo’s The Gun Show Starts a Crucial Conversation About America’s Gun Problem
OWEN CAREY In CoHo’s production of The Gun Show, the fourth wall is down, the script is onstage, the playwright is in the audience, and the actor playing the playwright is periodically having conversations with the playwright about the play. Unpredictable and absorbing, The Gun Show is, for all its ostensible complexities, a straightforward work […]
Posted inArts
The Gun Show Won’t Be a Hit with Everyone
But It Starts a Crucial Conversation About America
But it starts a crucial conversation about America.
Posted inBooks
Local Literary Journal Big Big Wednesday Looks to the Future
Sam Loper Over the last few years, the annual local literary journal Big Big Wednesday has become for many in the literary arts community one of those much-anticipated Portland summer traditions. In each issue’s 100-plus pages, the multi-genre, multi-medium journal mixes new work from internationally-recognized authors like short fiction icon Lydia Davis and poet Mary […]
Posted inBooks
8,500 People Showed Up to Last Year’s Wordstock. Here’s How the Organizers Plan to Meet the Demand This Time Around.
At last year’s Wordstock, it was impossible to feel alone in your book nerdiness. Every event was at capacity and the bigger ones had lines around the block. Kelsey Wroten Two years ago, Wordstock seemed to be on its last legs. Despite being one of the largest annual literary festivals in the country, the independent […]
Posted inArts
Big Big Wednesday Is “A Beautiful Object”
The Local Literary Journal Looks to the Future
The local literary journal looks to the future.
Posted inArts
Wordstock’s Challenge: Too Many Readers
2,500 People Were Expected at Last Year’s Festival. 8,500 Showed Up. Here’s How the Organizers Plan to Meet the Demand This Time Around.
2,500 people were expected at last year’s festival. 8,500 showed up. Here’s how the organizers plan to meet the demand this time around.
Posted inMusic
Advance Base Paints Curious Portraits of Fictional Lives
ADVANCE BASE Musical short stories. Jeffrey Marini OWEN ASHWORTH has written songs about bank robbers, obsessive recluses, and small-town riot grrrls. In his songs, Ashworth’s characters have fallen in love outside of punk shows, wrecked cars, had abortions, written suicide letters, and celebrated Christmas in a wide variety of disheartening ways. “A lot of the […]
Posted inMusic
Advance Base’s Daisy-Chained Vignettes
The Chicago Songwriter Paints Curious Portraits of Fictional Lives
The Chicago songwriter tells odd stories of rusted Chevy Novas and portals to hell.
Posted inBooks
Tin House’s Perfect Literary Summer Hangout is Here
Of all the events that make Portland summers ecstatic and overwhelming, Tin House’s outdoor reading series at Reed College—with its mix of casual ease and unrestrained literary glee—sits close to the top of my list. The free, open-to-the-public part of the local publisher’s annual Summer Writers’ Workshop, the reading series features consistently stunning lineups of […]
Posted inBooks
Tin House’s Perfect Literary Summer Hangout
The Annual Summer Reading Series Is Back—with Joy Williams, Michelle Tea, and More!
The annual summer reading series is back—with Joy Williams, Michelle Tea, and more!