Martone, One Poet’s Notes

What do Steve Scafidi and Michael Martone have in common, aside from both being published in Indiana Review and having alliterative names? Don’t worry; we won’t keep you guessing… Next week, these writers will both give readings in Bloomington! Steve Scafidi will read Tuesday, October 4 at 7 p.m. in the Indiana Memorial Union’s Faculty Club Room. Michael Martone will read Wednesday, October 5th at 7 p.m. at Boxcar Books.

Scafidi, How a Poem Happens

Steve Scafidi is the author of Sparks from a Nine Pound Hammer, which was nominated for the 2001 National Book Award and the 2002 Pulitzer Prize, and won the Fifth Annual Larry Levis Reading Prize. For Love of Common Words, his second book, was published in 2006.  He occasionally teaches poetry at Johns Hopkins University, and he works as a cabinet maker in West Virginia, where he lives with his wife and two children. In case you can’t make it to the reading, or if you want a little sneak peek, listen to him read select poems here.

Michael Martone is the author of five books of short fiction, including Seeing Eye published in September of 1995 by Zoland Books, as well as Pensées: The Thoughts of Dan Quayle (Broad Ripple Press, 1994), Fort Wayne Is Seventh on Hitler’s List (Indiana University Press, 1990), Safety Patrol (The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1988), and Alive and Dead in Indiana (Alfred A. Knopf, 1984). He has edited two collections of essays about the Midwest: A Place of Sense: Essays in Search of the Midwest and Townships: Pieces of the Midwest (University of Iowa Press, 1988 and 1992). He edits Story County Books, and his newest book, The Flatness and Other Landscapes (University of Georgia Press, 2000), a collection of his own essays about the Midwest, won the AWP Prize for Creative Nonfiction in 1998. Martone is currently a Professor at the University of Alabama, where he has been teaching since 1996. He lives with poet Theresa Pappas and their two sons, Sam and Nick.