Basement Reading Series 
Return of the Basement Reading Series!
Invite folks. Tell everyone!
Sunday, November 9th, 7:30 pm
Location: 2390 Mission Street, at 20th and Mission, Third Floor
New location on the third floor! We're moving up!
Admission $3- $5 (nobody turned away)
After a long summer, we're coming back with a great line-up. Wonder girl of the San Francisco underground (and above ground) writing scene Michelle Tea channels tales of gritty surrealism, Mary Burger will stretch your mind around her fascinating, toothsome and mellifluous poetry, and Matthew Iribarne, masterful storyteller and road trip connoisseur, whips up tales of love, humor and everyday horrors.
Look forward to
· Tantalizing mix of experimental and narrative writers
· New and improved space (same building)
· Drinking and carousing afterwards
· Friendliness beyond compare
Michelle Tea's second book, Valencia, was selected by the Village Voice as "One of the Top 25 Books of 2000" and snagged a Lambda Literary Award for Best Lesbian Fiction. Her recently published memoir The Chelsea Whistle was one of the San Francisco Chronicle's "Top 100 Books of 2002" and is presently in the running for a Lambda Award in the Autobiography slot. She is the co-founder of the notorious all-girl poetry roadshow Sister Spit, and continues to drag herself and other brave performers across the United States on grueling performance art boot camps. Her writings turn up on Nerve.com, in The Stranger, Girlfriends magazine and other shady places. Born and raised in Chelsea, Massachusetts, she presently lives in San Francisco with her transboyfriend.
Mary Burger has been enjoying a personal anti-technology revolt, building a wooden shed and installing a hand-crank letterpress. She also likes to rearrange furniture, and to watch the garden grow. Her book Sonny, an American midwestern, is forthcoming from Leon Books. New work will appear in the upcoming issue of VeRT, http://www.litvert.com/issue9.html.
Matthew Iribarne is the author of Astronauts & Other Stories, published in 2001 by Simon & Schuster. He has been the recipient of the Nelson Algren Prize in Fiction and the Joseph Henry Jackson Award, lives in San Francisco where he is currently working on his novel.
More about previous readings in 2003:
Jan 2003
Feb 2003
Mar 2003
April 2003
May 2003
Jun 2003
About the Basement Reading Series:
The Basement Reading series is a monthly
reading series. It is designed to give writers a chance to read work
that is in progress and to build more community among Bay Area writers.
It is a place for writers and readers to gain inspiration and create
a dialogue among the varied schools of writing in the Bay Area.
Contact info: Jenny Bitner 415-647-1015 jenny@jennyart.com
The Basement Reading Series (Tue/18)
Sweatin' to the Posey
It's well past time for
a new literary reading series in the Mission (Adobe has had a lock on
bookish hipsters' hearts for too long) and, judging by the incredible
turnout for the Basement's first couple of events, the literature-loving
94114 demographic agrees with me. The Basement Reading Series, started
up by local upstart Jenny Bitner, writer and editor of To-Do List
magazine, meets monthly in a sultry, still-sweat-fragrant Bikram Yoga
studio at 20th and Mission. Bitner is an excellent hunter and gatherer;
she knows some of the finest young poets and writers around these parts,
spanning the literary spectrum from "experimental writing to gritty
naturalism to post-magical realism." Next Tuesday night, poet James Hoch
("A Parade of Hands") will read with poet Glori Simmons ("Graft"), and
Bitner herself will unveil a new short story. -- Jan Richman, special to
SF Gate
Looking for Irrational Exuberance? Click here.
Check back soon for more info on the 2004 series.