KAFKA CAFÉ: celebrating A Flash of Darkness by M. M. De Voe

Schedule

Thu Jun 08 2023 at 06:00 pm to 08:00 pm

Location

Pangea | New York, NY

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Join author M. M. De Voe and friends on a funhouse-mirror literary carnival-ride celebrating her debut collection of cross-genre stories
About this Event

M. M. De Voe interviewed by Victor LaValle is the much-anticipated main event to launch her collection of cross-genre short fiction, A FLASH OF DARKNESS (Borda Books, 2023)--but the literary lead up to this part of the night will make you dizzy !

Join the Kafka-cafe party on June 8, 2023 at Pangea (178 E 2nd Ave, NYC 10003). Doors open 6:00. First ten to arrive receive a free signed copy of the story collection! (with thanks to Christina Chiu, author of Beauty!)

In celebration of this author’s debut: PT Barnum’s Showman’s Shorts host Betsy Golden-Kellem, author of the circus history blog “Drinks with Dead People,” will emcee a three-ring Literary Circus with a “femme-Kafka” theme.

Performances by Poetry Brothel denizens Velvet Envy, ASIF the Dragon, and Monah Mayhem set the mood.

A translation of Kafka’s “A Hunger Artist” & a short story reading from the author’s book A FLASH OF DARKNESS will culminate in Q&A led by genre contortionist and literary genius Victor LaValle.

Rimas Polikaitis of Bellows & Ivory provides Lithuanian atmosphere on the accordion. (De Voe was born in Texas to Lithuanian parents.)

PANGEA requires a $20 minimum food/drink per person.

RSVP is free and suggested especially if you would like a book to be reserved for you – for post-show signings, bring your own book, or buy one onsite for $20 (note: book purchase does not apply to the $20 food/drink minimum.)

To be guaranteed a book, order it online and bring it to be signed : https://www.amazon.com/Flash-Darkness-Collected-Stories-Voe/dp/B0C1HZYRNT

Please arrive early as seating is open. Show begins after dinner orders are taken. The author will sign books after the show and if the event sells out, be aware you can still come after 8pm for the afterparty. (I think the Pangea $20 minimum still applies.)

Now meet the terrific cast:


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Master of Ceremonies, Betsy Golden Kellem is a circus historian and a scholar of the unusual. Her writing has appeared in venues including The Atlantic, Vanity Fair, The Washington Post, The Public Domain Review, Smithsonian, Atlas Obscura, Slate, and Narratively. Betsy serves on the boards of the Barnum Museum and the Circus Historical Society, writes and hosts the Emmy-nominated Showman’s Shorts video series on P.T. Barnum, writes for JSTOR Daily on entertainment history, and regularly teaches and speaks for academia and industry. She keeps up her history site Drinks With Dead People, an ongoing effort to answer the old party question: if you could have a drink with anyone in history, who would it be? If you ask nicely, she may juggle knives for you.


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Genre contortionist Victor LaValle appears as a Special Guest to interview his former Columbia MFA classmate, M. M. De Voe. His novel, The Changeling, will soon be airing on Apple TV+ starring LaKeith Stanfield.

He has been the recipient of numerous awards including the World Fantasy Award, British Fantasy Award, Bram Stoker Award, Whiting Writers' Award, a Guggenheim Fellowship, Shirley Jackson Award, American Book Award, and the key to Southeast Queens.

He was raised in Queens, New York. He now lives in the Bronx with his wife, the writer Emily Raboteau, and their kids. He teaches at Columbia University and is probably the smartest kind man you will ever meet.


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M. M. De Voe (creator of this event as well as author of the absolutely brilliant and frankly unparalleled short fiction collection A FLASH OF DARKNESS) writes internationally-acclaimed speculative literary fiction and poetry.

Her work has won more than 20 literary awards for everything from poetry in Twitter format (NYCPOETWEET) to grants for her unpublished literary/folkloric, gay, coming-of-age manuscript about a young musician's search for self on a two-week trip to Soviet Lithuania.

Find out everything about her writing all at once on her website: mmdevoe.com or subscribe to her substack "This is Ridiculous" for a weekly dose.

She is the founder of the literary nonprofit Pen Parentis, and since its onset in 2009, has featured hundreds of great authors (who happen to also be parents) at the monthly Pen Parentis Literary Salons. She is also the author of a fun, instructional memoir, Book & Baby, which won first place in writing/publishing at the 2021 Indie Awards.

She lives in Manhattan where she spends her days reveling in irony.


(photo credit: Luba Grosman NYC)


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VELVET ENVY is played by Anna Winham.

Anna Genevieve Winham serves as the Editor-in-Chief for Passengers Journal and the Development Director for the Poetry Society of New York. She was formerly the Journal Coordinator for Oxford Public Philosophy, and she won Ninth Letter's 2020 literary award in Literary Nonfiction for a "notable" essay in Best American Essays 2021. Anna writes and performs with PSNY, moonlighting as Velvet Envy in The Poetry Brothel. Her work sits at the crossroads of science and the sublime, cyborgs and the surreal.

Her prose appears in Brooklyn Magazine, The Oxford Review of Books, Grist Journal, Meetinghouse Magazine online, and others. You can find her poetry in New York Quarterly, Wild Roof Journal, High Shelf Press, Cathexis Northwest Press, and others. While attending Dartmouth College (which was the pits), she won the Stanley Prize for experimental essay and the Kaminsky Family Fund Award.

Get to know her better: https://www.annagwinham.com


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ASIF the Dragon is Allison Sylvia, an artist, poet&dancer in Brooklyn.

She joined the Poetry Brothel in 2016 as Hypatia Rose Wonderland and has evolved thru ‘all:( 1 ) labia’ to ‘all:0M labia’ to her current DRAGON form. She was on the build team for the 2019 Electric Forest and collaborated on an Alice in Wonderland style mural of the cast and crew w/sketch artist Gregg Emery .

Allison made a chandelier out of cow bones from Nick Adamski’s land in upstate New York. She is working on a one woman show - Saharazad - that combines her love of poem.song&dance w/her love of costume&burlesque. Allison Sylvia’s Living Zoom hosts Sunday Salons to promote artists&art in isolation


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Monah Mayhem by day is Emi Bergquist, a Brooklyn based poet and performer.

Emi has been an active associate of The Poetry Society of New York since 2015. She is also a regular cast member of The Poetry Brothel, an editor of Milk Press Books, and a collaborator with the Pandemic Poems Project. Her work often explores grief, family dynamics, and the legacy of memory. Emi is currently published in over ten literary journals including What Rough Beast, Oxford Public Philosophy, Oroboro, Passengers Journal, For Women Who Roar, Noctua Review, In Parentheses, and others. She spends most of her free time with her dog, Zola, at the park.


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With many years of piano and accordion lessons behind him, Rimas Polikaitis ventured into the world of musical performance, starting as an accompanist for a Lithuanian folk dance group – Audra. Subsequent musical performance highlights in Los Angeles included accompanist for the Lithuanian men’s quartet, Lithuanian folk dance group Spindulys, soloist and accompanist for a stage production “Viva Europa”, member of the band “Rok & Shlock”, organist for the St. Casimir parish church choir.

Rimas’ keyboard performance offered him the opportunities to perform in Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Australia, Germany, U.K., and Canada, and in many cities and locales in the U.S. Rimas has performed with pop stars from Lithuania, for the governor of California, and even at the Hollywood Palladium. Since moving to Conneticut in 2010, Rimas has formed a folk duo (Eastlande) and has performed on stages in Florida, New Jersey, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, and California. As a member of the Little Theater of Manchester, he was honored to be the 1st to play the built - in 1886 E. & G. G. Hook tracker organ, for a stage production at Cheney Hall. His website is BELLOW & IVORY should you ever need an accordionist.

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Where is it happening?

Pangea, 178 2nd Avenue, New York, United States

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