Category Archives: Malvern Events

Puzzling Out Tender Buttons

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2014 marks the 100th anniversary of the original publication of Gertrude Stein’s Tender Buttons. Described variously as “explosive, tantalizing, and delicious” and “the fullest realization of the turn to language,” Tender Buttons is a modernist masterpiece of unpredictable delights. And it’s also a famously difficult read—Stein claimed she was attempting to “make words write without sense,” and many readers come away from a Tender Buttons encounter shaking their heads at what can seem like a “maddeningly opaque” jumble of words.

Given its rather challenging reputation, Tender Buttons might seem like a tricky work to share with an audience of poetry lovers—but poet Daniel Carter can pull it off in fine style. Daniel has designed a puzzle-based edition of Tender Buttons that provides readers “with new models of engagement and the infrastructures needed to enable them.” And last Thursday Daniel (below left) and musician Chris Ledesma (right) stopped by Malvern Books to treat us to an interactive evening of Tender Buttons escapades, featuring tales of a failed salad cake, an ode to Encino Man, and a performance from a distorted banana.

Daniel Carter and Chris Ledesma

As well as puzzling out a little of Stein’s enigmatic goodness, we also celebrated the release of City Lights’ new centennial edition of Tender Buttons (fanned out below). This is the first version to incorporate Stein’s own handwritten corrections (discovered in a first-edition copy at the University of Colorado), as well as corrections discovered among her papers at the Beinecke Library at Yale University.

Stein Books

We had a packed house (thanks, in part, to a lovely preview in the Austin Chronicle), and I think we can safely say that the audience enjoyed their guided journey through the intriguing world of Tender Buttons. Hearty thanks to Daniel and Chris for providing us all with a fascinating introduction to a work that now seems a lot less scary and a lot more fun.

Karaoke Capers

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What better way to celebrate National Poetry Month than with a few lively rounds of poetry karaoke? On Tuesday, the delightful W. Joe Hoppe (of Poetry Corner fame) hosted a night of roll-and-read poetry at Malvern Books. (For more pics, check out our Facebook album.)

Karaoke chap

Schandra at Karaoke

How does one play poetry karaoke, you might ask? It’s easy! No backing track required! Participants unleashed their inner D&D nerd by rolling a lettered die, then added a +2 strength modifier to their Cleric selected a poem by a poet whose last name starts with the letter the die landed on… and then they read the poem aloud to an audience of boisterous poetry fans.

Vicente at Karaoke

Karaoke T-shirt

As always, we captured a little of the action on video (below). Hearty thanks to W. Joe and everyone who took part. It was a very fun evening and a fantastic way for people to share some of their favorite poetry. And if this leaves you craving a little more verse in your life, check out some of our awesome new titles and then come on down to Malvern to take advantage of our rather generous April poetry offer.

The Enchanting Ivy

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We hosted something rather special at Malvern Books on Saturday: a multi-media evening of Ivy-themed entertainment. The book Ivy and the Wicker Suitcase has been described as “an epic surreal ear movie musical” and “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland with a distinctly Austin twist.” It’s an illustrated story acted out with music, sound effects, and dialogue—and it’s a whole lot of fun.

Ivy

Brian and friend

The book and accompanying show were created by Austin couple Brian Beattie (above right, the book’s author) and Valerie Fowler, Ivy’s illustrator extraordinaire. As well as performing some of the musical numbers from the book, Brian introduced us to Ivy’s pre-story in the form of an epic (and very funny) poem, “The Back Story Ballad of Ivy Wire.” Brian was accompanied by Kathy McCarty (above left), who plays the character of Celia Wire. Brian and Valerie also debuted their charming new Crankie Show (see video #4 below), in which Brian plays a song from the book while Valerie “cranks” along an illustrated scroll, creating a kind of mesmerizing low-tech video.

It was a magical evening, and the crowd found Ivy and pals to be utterly enthralling company. The footage below will give you a better sense of just what goes on in the wonderful world o’ Ivy…

Bigger in the Spring

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Another glorious month, another glorious Everything is Bigger bash! We had an especially large and lively crowd for Wednesday night’s event… could it be that word is getting out about our raffle delights? Our host Tyler Gobble really outdid himself this time—his prizes (or, as he puts it, “things I don’t want”) included a “Stone Cold” Steve Austin biography (“an enjoyable and quick read” according to this reviewer), an Everything is Bigger tank top, and a can of everyone’s favorite party starter, Four Loko.

Steve Austin

Four Loko

This month’s lovely and accomplished readers were Andrew Zawacki, Laurie Saurborn Young, and Fernando Flores (pictured below, with Tyler). Thanks to the three of them—and Tyler, of course—for their sterling performances.

Everything is Bigger April

Our next Everything is Bigger reading will be on May 14th (our Facebook page is a great place to check for updates on all our events), and we’re looking forward to it already. Meanwhile, here’s a little Bigger YouTube action for y’all…

A Plethora of Poetry

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A merry Malvern Monday to you all! We have a couple of timely bookstore tidbits for you:

  • Bigger is back on Wednesday night! The enchanting Tyler Gobble will be giving several of you some utterly mad prizes, and our readers, Andrew Zawacki, Laurie Saurborn Young, and Fernando Flores, will be giving all of you some utterly stupendous performances, so don’t miss out on THE FUN.

Karen and Richard

Speaking of all things fun and eventful—on Friday night we had a packed house for an evening with poets Karen Kevorkian and Richard Bailey (pictured above). Be sure to check out footage from their readings below (our apologies to Karen, whose impeccable performance went partially unrecorded due to, ahem, camera-related difficulties… curse you, technology).

And on Saturday night we were delighted to host a reading and celebration for participants of the Free Minds writing workshop and students of the Class of 2014 (pictured below). The Free Minds workshops are founded on the notion that each person has a unique and powerful voice that deserves to be heard, and the students’ compelling narratives were a moving testimony to this belief. Thanks to everyone who took part, and I’m sure we’ll be hearing more from y’all in the future!

Free Minds

The Chapbooks Are Coming

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We don’t do things by halves here at Malvern Books! We’re already celebrating National Poetry Month with a very generous offer and a multitude of readings, but we decided to go for the Hurray Poetry! trifecta by adding something rather special to the Malvern mix: chapbooks. Yep, we’re soon going to be stocking a bunch of them.

Making chapbooks

Most of you are probably familiar with the wonderful world of chapbooks, but for the four of you who are picturing volumes of poetry encased in leather trouser-coverings: stop it, you weirdos. Chapbooks are just short books, generally no more than forty pages long—and they’re often very, very beautiful.

Poetry Society of America

Locket, Master

In the interests of bringing y’all the best of the very best, we decided to check out the wares at last week’s NYC/CUNY Chapbook Festival, which was held in a gloomy basement in midtown Manhattan. (All literary festivals must take place in basements: it’s the law.) There were a ton of small presses in attendance, and we were thrilled to take a peek at the offerings of some of our favorites, including Factory Hollow Press, Bloof Books, and Ugly Duckling Presse.

Theatre of the Cow

And we also made some lovely new discoveries, like Lost & Found, a publishing project of CUNY’s The Center for the Humanities. Their exquisite chapbooks feature all manner of rare and unpublished texts, from Adrienne Rich’s teaching materials to late work by Harlem Renaissance poet Helene Johnson.

Chapbook Misc.

Another chapbook champion? Ed Rayher of Swamp Press. Founded by Ed in 1976, Swamp Press produces limited edition letterpress books so beautiful they’ve found their way into the rare book collections of the Boston Public Library, the New York Public Library, Brown, Harvard, et al. And Ed really knows his stuff vis–à–vis printing techniques and equipment—if you ever want to discuss Benton Pantographs and Thompson Typecasters, well, Ed’s your man!

We left the fest with a groaning tote bag full of cards and brochures and a ridiculously long To Buy list. (You’re welcome to add to this list by emailing us with suggestions.) We can’t wait to make room on our shelves for a whole heap of chapbook goodness, and we’ll be sure to let you know as soon as they arrive!