New poetry collection by Peter Balakian

Ziggurat, published by the University of Chicago Press on September 11, 2010.
 
 
“With characteristic originality, Balakian finds his echoing motif in the construction of the first great skyscraper, the Ziggurat at Ur, and this gives his epic poem ‘A-Train/Ziggurat/Elegy,’ a historical depth I have found nowhere else in American poetry in recent years. What Balakian has achieved here is a brilliant assimilation of the historical, philosophical, political, and psychological.”
                                                                        —Carolyn Forche
 
“Peter Balakian’s new book Ziggurat ingests calamity and dissolves it into an exhilarating rhythm and image, pushing the language until it feels like it’s breaking into something new. This is how idioms change, advance. The harrowing long poem “A-Train/Ziggurat/Elegy” jostles a range of perspectives and narratives. It is a panorama of contemporary witness, but a syncopation of the same. Balakian renders scenes and at the same time enacts the sensibility being breached and affected—9/11 is just short-hand for our new magnitudes of violence and dissociation.
                                                                        —Sven Birkerts




SCHEDULE OF READINGS and interviews:

Tuesday , September 7: PBS NewsHour, poem of the week, (end of the show/and then on-line)

Saturday, September 11: Interview with Scott Simon, Weekend Edition.
NEW YORK CITY            Friday, September 3, 3 - 5 pm. Seminar at Center for the Study of Terrorism, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, 899 10th Ave (between 58th and 59th), Room 630-- with Chuck Strozier, Andrea Le Blanc

Thursday, September 16,  7 pm. Gallery 25CPW (62nd Street and Central Park West) - with Bob andLee Woodruff and works by photojournalist Ed Kashi  

SYRACUSE, NYFriday, October 1, 7 pm. Downtown Syracuse Y, 340 Montgomery Street

NEW YORK CITYWednesday, October 13, 7 pm. The National September 11 Memorial and Museum, Liberty Streetand Broadway

Thursday, October 14, details TBA, Columbia University

CAMBRIDGE, MAMonday, October 18, 8 pm. Blacksmith House Poetry Series, 56 Brattle Street

HAMILTON, NYThursday, October 21,  4:30 pm. Living Writers Series, Colgate University, Persson Auditorium

MENLO PARK, CAThursday, November 18, 7:30 pm. Kepler’s Books, 1010 El Camino Real

SAN FRANCISCO, CASaturday, November 20, 7:30 pm. The Booksmith, 1644 Haight Street

BERKELEY, CASunday, November 21,  4:00 pm. Mrs. Dalloway’s, 2904 College Avenue

LOS ANGELES, CAMonday, November 22, details TBA. ALOUD Reading Series, Library Foundation of Los Angeles, 630 West Fifth Street

For further information visit www.PeterBalakian.com