Limited edition cards by Amos Kennedy
Indie Bookstore Day is Saturday, April 27 from 10-8 p.m. Between 10 a.m.-6 p.m. We’re having a bookstore raffle with a giveaway of specialty items, books, and a top door prize of a $100 gift certificate. The first 40 customers will also recieve a limited edition print by the great Amos Kennedy! We have a new edition of our “Cool People Read” t-shirt printed in silver as well a new silver drippy Destroy All Monsters t-shirt, and a beautiful two-sided MI Book Hop bookstore tote to honor the day. Thank you for supporting your neighborhood bookstores!
We will once again be participating in the Michigan Book Hop! Win prizes! Pick up a bookstore bingo card online or at participating stores.
From 1-2 p.m. artist and photographer Rick Lieder will by stopping by to sign his new book The Mighty Pollinators. Copies will be available in store. It is the seventh collaboration between Leider and author Helen Frost. A seventh seamless blend of poetry, nonfiction, and captivating photography from the dynamic duo behind Step Gently Out, The Mighty Pollinators belongs in every classroom—and in the hands of any curious child eager to understand nature and its wonders.
April 27, from 6:30-8:00 p.m:
On the Poetics of John Sinclair
An evening of poetry and discussion on the work of John Sinclair will be held from 6:30-8:00 p.m., with a few close friends, poets and writers, some who have known John Sinclair for over 60 years! We will also have available hot-off-the-press copies of John Sinclair: The Collected Poems 1964-2024 (Ridgeway Press, 2024).
• At 6:30 p.m. poet George Tysh will give a short introduction on the poetry scene at Wayne State University in the early 1960s before Sinclair’s arrival. George Tysh’s latest book 26 Tears, was published last year and co-written with his wife the poet Chris Tysh. George is a founding member of the Artists Workshop, first editor of the Montieth Journal, an educator and director of the Line Series at the Detroit Institute of the Arts.
• Author and activist Peter Werbe will give a special presentation of Sinclair’s “Poem for Warren Stringfellow” with two members of John Sinclair’s original Blues Scholars and will also discuss Sinclair’s connection with the Fifth Estate. Werbe is the author of Summer on Fire and Eat the Rich, he was a longtime editor of the Fifth Estate, a commercial DJ, and host of the long running local talk show “Night Call.”
• Playwright, poet, critic, and novelist Bill Harris is a founding member of the Artists’ Workshop collective, a former professor of English at Wayne State University, and recipient of the 2011 Kresge Eminent Artist Award by The Kresge Foundation. He is the author of I Got to Keep Moving (Wayne State University Press, 2018), a collection of short fiction.
• Photographer and activist Leni Sinclair came to Detroit by escaping from East Germany in 1959. She was a co-founder of the Red Door Gallery and Artists Workshop, Detroit’s first art collectives. Together with John Sinclair and a group of like-minded friends, they pioneered the political youth movements Trans-Love Energies, the White Panther Party, the Rainbow People’s Party and helped to legalize marihuana. Leni has contined to document Detroit’s rock, jazz and cultural scenes as well as documenting in New Orleans. In 2013 she won the Kresge Eminent Artist Award by The Kresge Foundation. Her early photo work was collected in the monograph Motor City Underground (MOCAD, 2020).
• Poet Robin Eichele was an early editor of the Montieth Journal, a founding member of the Detroit Artists Workshop, and managed the early stages of the Artists Workshop Press and bookstore for the collective. His work has graced countless publications, radio programs, poetry conferences, arts festivals, bookstores, and cafes over the years. His latest collection of poetry is The Wayland Sessions 2017-2020.
• Poet, publisher, member of the Ridgeway collective, and Wayne State University English professor M.L. Liebler will present the new Ridgeway publication John Sinclair: The Colected Poems 1964-2024. Liebler has written over 18 poetry books and edited many titles on Detroit culture including RESPECT: Poets on Detroit Music (Michigan State University Press, 2020) co-edited with poet Jim Daniels.
We will have selected works by the presenters available as well as a selection of John Sinclair’s books and his recordings on Jet Plastic.
Below is a short section from a reconstructed reading by John Sinclair from his last performance held at the Bourse de Commerce in Paris, and produced by the Pinault Foundation and Blank Forms: