Larry Bassett — Writer

The writing life.

Photograph by David Isenberg

Young Writer: A School Picture from the Island Park School, circa 1954

Striking an Intellectual Pose, from the Eighties

The Writer at Work (photograph by David Isenberg)

READINGS/BOOK SIGNINGS UPON REQUEST

I'm on the road quite a bit doing workshops, master classes, residencies, and readings, but on my travels I also like to meet with my readers — especially readers of Marjorie, Possum Love and Other Poems, and Northern Tier. If you're one of my readers and would like to arrange a reading or a book signing, I'd be glad to try to work you into my schedule. From living rooms to coffee shops to library basements, for groups from a handful to millions (!!), I'm available.

USE READINGS/BOOK SIGNINGS FOR FUND-RAISERS

Do you have a favorite cause or charity? If so, a reading/book signing can serve as a fund-raiser, too. Set up the reading/book signing, charge a cover or collect donations at the door to benefit your cause or charity, and I'll donate a chunk of my book sales at the reading to your cause or charity, too.

SPECIAL "YOUTH IN REVOLT!" PROGRAMS FOR 2012

This year (2012, that is) marks the tenth anniversary of the publication of my novel Marjorie. To celebrate that milestone, I've put together a combined reading of material from Marjorie and a selection of my poems. The program is aimed primarily at libraries, but civic organizations can also get involved.

Why call the programs "Youth in Revolt!"? Well, when I set out to write what became Marjorie, I had one phrase to work from: “It was so still.” In the event, those words became the first thing we hear Marjorie thinking in the book, and the book became the story of how Marjorie uses the summer before and the first few months of her senior year in high school (in, maybe, 1962 or 1963) to disturb that stillness. I’d like to think of the book as a kind of extended metaphor for the swimming some of us did toward a certain kind of freedom back then. Look at our high school yearbooks from the first few years of what became “the Sixties.” We all look like we’re forty years old — or pretending to be. What Marjorie’s about is how some of that stillness left over from the Fifties was shattered because some of us, like Marjorie, were, well, “willing.”

Publicity materials are available, and 50% of all book sales generated by the programs will benefit the sponsoring library or civic organization.

Interested? If so, just drop me a note at

mrbassett@verizon.net

(Writing "reading/book signing" or "youth in revolt" in the subject line will help me keep things organized.)

Some of What I've Written

“An English Class With Emily” (article)

English Journal (March 1998)

Marjorie (novel)

Sterlinghouse (January 2002)

“A Satisfactory Settlement” (short story)

Artisan (Summer 2002)

Possum Love and Other Poems (Chapbook)

Shadows Ink Publications (September 2005)
Shadow Poetry

“At the Forks: Part One” (short story)

“At the Forks: Part Two” (short story)

The Pennsylvania Reader (September and October 2005)

“Vine Girls” (poem)

English Journal (May 2006)

“The Sweet Corn King” (poem)

Pittsburgh City Paper (October 2006)

“Water’s Work” (poem)

Blue Collar Review (Summer 2007)

“The Joke’s On Me” (short story)

The Iconoclast #97 (Fall 2007)

“Hands” (poem)

Mulberry Poets and Writers Journal (Fall 2007/Winter 2008)

"Wild Child" (short story)
Tattoo Highway

"The Doctor and His Wife" (short story)
Slow Trains

“Driving Plow” (poem)
“Driving to Elmira, 1964” (poem)
“Winter: Northern Tier” (poem)
Get Your Kicks on US Rte 6 (Exhibit Catalog,
Blue Heron Gallery, Wyalusing, PA, March 2009)

"Waves" (short story)
Tattoo Highway

"After Breakfast" (short story)
Watershed: The Journal of the Susquehanna
2009 / Issue 2 / Number 1

"Red Indians' Chief" (short story)
Tattoo Highway

Northern Tier (chapbook)
Shadows Ink Publications (Spring 2011)
Shadow Poetry

Larry Bassett — Writer

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