The 2015 Craft Issue represents a culmination our staff and contributing students’ efforts to document Old Dominion University’s 37th Annual Literary Festival. The theme of this year’s festival was “The Hungry Heart is Telling You.” Taken together, these interviews depict more than portraits of the distinguished artists, writers, and educators who participated in the festival; they form an expansive interrogation of what it means to devote yourself to a life in writing. We are deeply grateful to all our interviewees, and for the opportunity to share their answers with our readers.
Here’s a taste of what you’ll find inside:
Michael Ruhlman talks about training the unconscious mind, using fear as the ultimate motivator, and plays a game of “Would you rather?” that includes a question about cannibalism.
Sasha Pimentel discusses what’s at stake in the classroom workshop, Jane Hirshfield’s poems go on OKCupid, and Sarah Lightman tackles the importance of herstories.
Tara Shea Burke delves into the vital relationship between poetry and the body and knowing who you are.
Annia Ciezadlo gives an honest portrait of reportage in the Middle East, Luisa Igloria writes a poem a day, and Kate Christensen talks about writing black comedy and the path to finding her voice.
Plus additional interviews with poet Tarfia Faizullah, playwright Brian Silberman, Dr. Delores Philips, and distinguished Professor Emeritus Philip Raisor.
In addition to this new issue, we’d like to announce that we are extending the deadline for the 2015 Norton Girault Literary Prize in Poetry until April 15th. You can read more about the contest and submit your poems via our Submittable page. This year’s judge is Natalie Diaz, author of When My Brother Was An Aztec. There are three prizes totaling $850. Winners will be announced in the Spring and published in the Fall 2015 issue of BSR.
Thanks again to everyone involved for making this one of the most impressive Craft Issues to date, and as always, thank you to our readers and contributors. BSR’s Spring reading period ends March 31st.
See you in Minneapolis at AWP.
– Michael Alessi, Managing Editor
Table of Contents
- The Making of a Writer/Chef: An Interview with Michael Ruhlman
- Creative Eats: An Interview with Dr. Delores B. Philips
- Those Who Stay and Those Who Roam: Annia Ciezadlo on Private Life and the Collision of War in the Middle East
- Grappling with Seams: An Interview with Tarfia Faizullah
- An Interview with Philip Raisor
- An Interview with Playwright Brian Silberman
- A Voice in Two Worlds: An Interview with Dr. Luisa Igloria
- Saying What Can’t Be Said: An Interview with Sasha Pimentel
- Documenting Herstories: An Interview with Sarah Lightman
- Food, Writing, and the Land of Zenobia: An Interview with Kate Christensen
- Jane Hirshfield’s Poems Write Their OkCupid Profile
- 8 Questions, 2 Coffees, and 1 Voice: A Morning with Tara Shea Burke