The Writer’s Center and Poet Lore welcome poets Bryan R. Monte & Claudia Gary to celebrate the latest issue of Amsterdam Quarterly, which publishes, promotes, and comments on writing and art in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, and the world. The readings will be followed by an Open Mic for all attendees who would like to participate.
Free and open to the public, limited space, registration required. Please view and agree to [link id=’2132036′ text=’The Writer’s Center COVID Safety Policy’] before attending our live events.
Bryan R. Monte is a poet, anthropologist, and editor, who lives in the Netherlands. He will read from his new book, On the Level: Poems on Living with Multiple Sclerosis from Circling Rivers, Richmond, Virginia. T.S. Eliot Prize winning poet Philip Gross (The Water Table) applauded On the Level. “These poems [bring] readers…to the experience of MS in their own bodies as well as in the mind. But the grace of the writing, its tenderness and often humor, lift us.” Fiction writer Jacob B. Appel, author of Who Says You’re Dead, praised On the Level as being “In the spirit of Sarah Manguso and Porochista Khakpoor, Monte transforms his own body into a literary landscape. An arresting debut.”
In 2021, Monte was a finalist in the Hippocrates Open Poetry Competition, (he placed second), as well as in the Gival Press Oscar Wilde Award. In 2022 he was a commended poet in the Hippocrates Competition. His work has appeared in journals such as The Arlington Literary Journal, Friends Journal, Irreantum, Italian Americana, Kaleidoscope Magazine, and the South Florida Poetry Journal, and in the anthologies Gathered: Contemporary Quaker Poets (Sundress Press), Immigration & Justice for Our Neighbors, (Celery City Books), Voices from the Fierce Intangible World, (SoFloPoJo Press), and the 2021 and 2022 The Hippocrates Prize (The Hippocrates Press). Monte edits Amsterdam Quarterly.
Claudia Gary’s villanelles, sonnets, and other metrical poems appear in journals and anthologies internationally. She leads several poetry workshops here at The Writer’s Center, and has chaired panels including “The Sonnet in 2016” and “Poetry and Science” (2019) at the West Chester University Poetry Conference, as well as panels on Poetry and Music at both the WCU and Frost Farm poetry conferences. Author of Humor Me (2006) and chapbooks including Genetic Revisionism (2019), Claudia is a three-time finalist for the Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award and a 2013 semifinalist for the Anthony Hecht award (Waywiser). Her poems have appeared in many journals including American Arts Quarterly, Amsterdam Quarterly, Angle, Antiphon, Chronicles, Light, Loch Raven Review, Mezzo Cammin, Poet Lore, The Rotary Dial, and String Poet; as well as anthologies including Villanelles (2012),
