Calling all fellow writers and book-nerds! Last Sunday I attended the first Downtown Literary Festival presented by McNally Jackson and Housing Works Bookstore, in celebration of New York's literary culture. My first destination was the event in honor of poet Frank O'Hara, where guests were invited to dine on readings from his influential book Lunch Poems. The packed talk appropriately started with renowned New York poet Eileen Myles reading O'Hara's In Memory of My Feelings with the same bravado as the beloved literary icon. The readers that followed animated the often amusing poems with their own unique candor, too. Following the reading, I grabbed poet Elizabeth Willis and asked her a few questions about O'Hara's work, which you can read below.
The next panel I visited, You Should Have Been There: Stories of the Best Show Ever, featured musicians and writers recounting their experiences of the city's most notorious acts. Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore shared his fondest Patti Smith concert memory from a 1976 show, where he was forced against a wall by CBGB employees who were mysteriously clearing the center of the room. Shortly thereafter, an elderly William Burroughs was escorted in. "It was the best Patti gig I ever saw. It was all for William. It was beautiful," he said.
Nikolai Fraiture of The Strokes also took part in the reminiscing, and talked about seeing Jane's Addiction at the Hammerstein Ballroom with his bandmate Julian Casablancas. He also added a few anecdotes about their boyhood antics, which involved a lot of inebriated nights wandering aimlessly around the city. When the festivities came to a close, I ended my day enjoying complementary treats provided by the Brooklyn-based bakery Spirited––a perfect nightcap to a delightfully entertaining day.
Shannan Smith: I have very specific memories of reading Frank O'Hara poems. I think because so much of his poetry is based on specific places. Do you have a memory or place tied to reading O'Hara?
Elizabeth Willis: Not a specific place geographically, but O'Hara is great to read in bed, in the kitchen, on the beach, and in the park, because he writes in such a lived space.
SS: After reading O'Hara and other New York School poets, I was really inspired to move to New York. Did their work have this same effect on you?
EW: They didn't make me move to New York but they let me know about what I ended up loving in New York. When I first got to New York I thought, "Wow, where have you been all my life?" I mostly discovered O'Hara after I had already been to New York.
SS: What does reading O'Hara to a modern New York audience mean to you?
EW: To me, it means his poetry is so durable. His poems seem as contemporary as anything I've heard by a living poet lately––they seem totally relevant and in the moment. So to me, it just affirms the fact that if you really do your work, something lasts. It sort of feels like he is still in the work, which is so moving and sort of sexy in the same way that it is with someone like Walt Whitman, who's always reaching through the poem to the reader in the present.
SS: Everyone was laughing and sighing in the audience today. So many years later, people still get the jokes, which I think is so great. That's what I love––it's so relatable.
EW: Which is amazing, because he names so many of his contemporaries. You would think that would close him off, but it has the absolute opposite effect. It opens his world to us and keeps it present.
SS: As a writer, what gives you the most satisfaction participating in an event like this?
The next panel I visited, You Should Have Been There: Stories of the Best Show Ever, featured musicians and writers recounting their experiences of the city's most notorious acts. Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore shared his fondest Patti Smith concert memory from a 1976 show, where he was forced against a wall by CBGB employees who were mysteriously clearing the center of the room. Shortly thereafter, an elderly William Burroughs was escorted in. "It was the best Patti gig I ever saw. It was all for William. It was beautiful," he said.
Nikolai Fraiture of The Strokes also took part in the reminiscing, and talked about seeing Jane's Addiction at the Hammerstein Ballroom with his bandmate Julian Casablancas. He also added a few anecdotes about their boyhood antics, which involved a lot of inebriated nights wandering aimlessly around the city. When the festivities came to a close, I ended my day enjoying complementary treats provided by the Brooklyn-based bakery Spirited––a perfect nightcap to a delightfully entertaining day.
Shannan Smith: I have very specific memories of reading Frank O'Hara poems. I think because so much of his poetry is based on specific places. Do you have a memory or place tied to reading O'Hara?
Elizabeth Willis: Not a specific place geographically, but O'Hara is great to read in bed, in the kitchen, on the beach, and in the park, because he writes in such a lived space.
SS: After reading O'Hara and other New York School poets, I was really inspired to move to New York. Did their work have this same effect on you?
EW: They didn't make me move to New York but they let me know about what I ended up loving in New York. When I first got to New York I thought, "Wow, where have you been all my life?" I mostly discovered O'Hara after I had already been to New York.
SS: What does reading O'Hara to a modern New York audience mean to you?
EW: To me, it means his poetry is so durable. His poems seem as contemporary as anything I've heard by a living poet lately––they seem totally relevant and in the moment. So to me, it just affirms the fact that if you really do your work, something lasts. It sort of feels like he is still in the work, which is so moving and sort of sexy in the same way that it is with someone like Walt Whitman, who's always reaching through the poem to the reader in the present.
SS: Everyone was laughing and sighing in the audience today. So many years later, people still get the jokes, which I think is so great. That's what I love––it's so relatable.
EW: Which is amazing, because he names so many of his contemporaries. You would think that would close him off, but it has the absolute opposite effect. It opens his world to us and keeps it present.
SS: As a writer, what gives you the most satisfaction participating in an event like this?