SpokenWord Paris

The Paris streets were like a ghost town last night – everyone was indoors watching the great Sego vs Sarko debate. But in the Ogre à Plumes Spoken Word filled the upstairs bar for an intimate gig that spilled out onto the street.
Some razor sharp poetry and a lot of funny poetry, all kicked off with the opening from Under Milk Wood as an entré. Toby Dress spent 38 weeks in the womb and a night in Guadalajara, or somewhere like that. Naomi described the Hell of sleeping with an atheist and wished she was blonde. Neil dodged bullets to break the last glass angel in his grandma’s house. Seth finally went out for some meaningless sex and found himself tied down and with a vicious desire to destroy all those ungraded essays. Denis played sax to Norma’s night of the iguana. My poetry went on the run in Los Angeles. Bex was pursued by a walking cliché. Maxime, well, Maxime went mystical but was pinned down by Trudie’s poem about himself. Christine met the love of her life and everything they said was simultaneous.

Till next time,
David.

Jen who does the fragment78 listing told me I had to go to this, so I did. And it was well worth it. Just 3 poets read, two sets of 12 minutes for each poet. The quality is really high. The styles wide ranging. This week there was Cralan Kelder, who had us laughing for most of both sets – a real performance poet. Mark Terrill, who combines poignant observation with sharp punchlines. Sean Street, who was more in a BBC Radio 4 traditional poetry vein.
This was the 144th Live Poets Society night that John Kliphan has directed since he created it 15 years ago. He says he has some 88 poets on tap, all professionals with great credentials. He is always interested in new voices though and says he will always respond if poets contact him about reading.

Live Poets Society
2nd (or sometimes 3rd) Tuesday of the month – check in fragment78, link on the right
at The Highlander pub (see link on the right)
8 rue de Nevers
75006
Metro Odeon or St. Michel
Donation 5 euro

If you would like to read, submit stuff to John Kliphan, 103 Avenue Philippe August, 75011 Paris or tel. 01.43.70.62.05.

SpokenWord Paris

Who is that mysterious stripey man with the hat?

Yves, effortlessly acting the role of nonchalant barman

Rolling that last cigarette

End of the night

Reports are reaching us from 2nd May at the Ogre

Nila wishes a heartfelt Good Morning to everyone who has stayed so long that it is now in fact morning.

Kurt Vonnegut is dead. Henry is momentarily confused.

Ariana Reines – winner of the 2006 Alberta Prize – "anarchic, graphic and literal" her poetry "cannibalizes everything."

Review of The Live Poets Society

Conor at L'Ogre à Plumes

Archives