[Quincy Lehr]

Join us on May 24 at

Otto's Shrunken Head
538 E 14th St, New York, New York 10009

3 PM for a reading by A.E. Stallings, R.S. Gwynn, Claudia Gary, and Janice D. Soderling.

A.E. (Alicia) Stallings studied classics in Athens, Georgia and has lived since 1999 in Athens, Greece. She has published three books of poetry, Archaic Smile (1999), which won the Richard Wilbur Award; Hapax (2000); and Olives (2012). Her new verse translation of Lucretius (in rhyming fourteeners!), The Nature of Things, is published by Penguin Classics. She is the recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation. She lives with her husband, John Psaropoulos, editor of the Athens News, and their children, Jason and Atalanta. She is also in the running for Professor of Poetry at Oxford.

R.S. (Sam) Gwynn was born in Leaksville (now Eden), North Carolina, in 1948. After attending Davidson College, he entered the graduate program at the University of Arkansas, where he earned his M. F. A. Since 1976, he has taught at Lamar University, where he is Poet-in-Residence and University Professor of English. His first two collections were chapbooks, Bearing & Distance (1977) and The Narcissiad (1980). These were followed by The Drive-In (1986) and No Word of Farewell: New and Selected Poems 1970-2000. His new collection is Dogwatch (2014) from Measure Press. His criticism appears regularly in the Hudson Review and other publications, and he is editor of the Pocket Anthology Series from Pearson-Longman. He lives in Beaumont, Texas, with his wife, Donna. They have three sons and seven grandchildren.

A 2014 finalist for the Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award and a 2013 semifinalist for the Anthony Hecht Poetry Prize, Claudia Gary writes, edits, sings, and composes (tonally) near Washington DC. She is author of Humor Me (David Robert Books, 2006) and several chapbooks including Bikini Buyer's Remorse (2014). Her poems are included in anthologies such as Forgetting Home (Barefoot Muse Press, 2013) and Villanelles (Everyman Press, 2012), as well as -- so far -- in journals published in the USA, Canada, UK, and Netherlands. A former senior editor of Vietnam Magazine, she also writes articles on health for The VVA Veteran and other magazines.

Janice D. Soderling's fiction, poetry and translations appear in one or more times in over 130 international English-language and 40 Swedish-language journals. Her publishing credentials include Rattle, Light, Raintown Review, Evansville Review, Beloit Poetry Journal, Tar River Poetry, Mason's Road, Malahat Review, Fiddlehead, Hobart. She is assistant fiction editor and proofreader at Able Muse. Her several Swedish prizes and awards include 2007 Woman Artist of the Year presented by the Foundation for Women's Creativity and Artistry. Her work is included in six English and three Swedish anthologies. She has read her work on the Swedish national radio, at the Rattle reading series, First Wednesday Formal, the Troubadour in London, and the onlineTransAtlantic Poetry series. Janice is winner or finalist in competitions in both languages, including first prize at Glimmer Train Stories, and received the Harold Witt Memorial Award from Blue Unicorn for Best of Volume 2010. She has been nominated several times for a Pushcart Prize, Sundress Best of the Net, and Dzanc Best of the Web. She is a member of the Swedish Writers' Union.