Archive for the 'Events Archive' Category

Litquake is hosting a summer gala, Booked, at the elegant Green Room in the historic Veterans Building at 401 Van Ness Ave. Guests will enjoy live music, delicious cuisine prepared by San Francisco’s favorite culinary masters, select wines, and an enticing silent auction. We will be joined by such renowned authors as Amy Tan, Peter Coyote, Tobias Wolff, Robert Mailer Anderson, Ishmael Reed, Beth Lisick, Bharati Mukherjee, Mary Roach, Michelle Tea and ZZ Packer, among others.

Honorary Host Committee includes The Hon. Mayor Gavin Newsom; Phil Bronstein, San Francisco Chronicle; Sydney Goldstein, City Arts & Lectures; Craig Newmark, Craigslist; Carey Perloff, American Conservatory Theatre; Elaine Petrocelli, Book Passage.

Litquake thanks all of the Booked donors. Take a look at images of select silent auction items!

Purchase Tickets:

Note that at the bottom of the payment page you can add the names of the ticket holders.

$75 Well-Read Insouciant
One admission ticket to Litquake Benefit Party August 21, 6-9 p.m. at The Green Room, 401 Van Ness Avenue at McAllister

$300 Literati Gadabout
Two admission tickets to Litquake benefit party August 21, 6-9 p.m. at The Green Room, 401 Van Ness Avenue at McAllister, along with acknowledgement on signage at event

$500 King or Queen of the Literary Scene
Three admission tickets to Litquake benefit party August 21, 6-9 p.m. at The Green Room 401 Van Ness Avenue at McAllister, along with acknowledgement on signage at event, on website, and in program

$1,000 Literary Lion
Six admission tickets to Litquake benefit party August 21, 6-9 p.m., at The Green Room, 401 Van Ness Avenue at McAllister, along with acknowledgement on signage at event, on website, and in program

When: Saturday, April 22, 9pm
Where: The Edinburgh Castle, 950 Geary Street, San Francisco
Cost: $10-$20 suggested donation at the door

Come out to support Litquake at our first fundraiser of 2006, which raises an eyebrow toward famous (and not so famous) literary hoaxes, including 60’s alleged erotica classic, Naked Came the Stranger; the diaries of Hitler; the autobiography of Howard Hughes; the touching Native American children’s memoir The Education of Little Tree; JT Leroy’s big-sunglasses-wearing-boy-hooker-with-a-past persona, and much more.

Hosted by Litquake’s Jack Boulware and Alan Black and featuring:

• Bucky Sinister - author of Whiskey and Robots and King of the Roadkills
• Cameron Tuttle - author of the best-selling The Bad Girls Series
• Beth Lisick ” author of Everybody Into the Pool
• Eddie Muller ” “Czar of Noir”; founder of Noir City Film Festival; co-author of Tab Hunter Confidential
• Anthony Bedard ” star regular at San Francisco’s Porchlight storytelling series
• Mal Sharpe - legendary man-on-the-street radio prankster
• John Vanderslice - musician, producer, hoaxster

In addition to the readings there will be a slide show of classic hoaxes through history that aren’t literary, including Orson Welles’ War of the Worlds broadcast, the Loch Ness Monster, Big Foot, and Milli Vanilli”as well as informed conjecture about whether we ever really did put that man on the moon.

 In keeping with both the festival and San Francisco’s appreciation of irony, tattered literary traditions, sense of the past, but also our awe/joy regarding the written word, HOAX will keep you very entertained!

When: Saturday, January 21st, 3 P.M.
Where: The Noir City Nightclub, Palace of Fine Arts, 3301 Lyon Street, San Francisco, CA 94123
Cost: Suggested Donation: $10″advance tix available via www.noircity.com or www.brownpapertickets.com

Before film noir, there was lit noir.

And in homage to the pulpy literature that inspired a cinematic genre, Noir City and Litquake are conspiring to produce an afternoon of criminally enjoyable readings of works that went on to enjoy iconic film status.

Noirquake takes place at 3 p.m., Saturday, January 21 at the Palace of Fine Arts.

In keeping with last year’s wildly successful Litquake opening night tribute to Allen Ginsberg’s “Howl” and other Bay Area revolutionary writings, local writers”working with accused “Czar of Noir” Eddie Muller”have paired up with works with whom they share deep, perhaps even baffling affinities. For example, at the Litquake opener, Daniel Handler (aka Lemony Snicket) read from Gertrude Stein. For this event he will read from Patricia Highsmith’s Strangers on a Train, which will be followed by a screening of the corresponding clip from the classic Hitchcock film of the same name.

Other pairings include 
· Michelle Tea smiling through Jim Thompson’s The Grifters 
·  Former bank robber turned memoirist Joe Loya reading from W.R. Burnette’s The Asphalt Jungle“not so ironically, fiction about a ring of jewel thieves 
·  Joyce Maynard breathing life into Raymond Chandler’s Farewell My Lovely 
·  Robert Mailer Anderson opening the sash on Cornell Woolrich’s Rear Window
·  Los Angeles crime writer Gary Phillips exposing the offer to Kiss Me Deadly from Mickey Spillane 
·  Former SF private eye Joe Gores takes flight with Dashiell Hammett’s revered Maltese Falcon 
·  Barry Gifford knocking at the door with James M. Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice
· Peter Plate suffering from the Miami Blues thanks to Charles Willeford 
·  And finally, don’t be surprised if a special guest finds him or herself In a Lonely Place, courtesy of Dorothy B. Hughes

Peter Maravelis”editor of the recent anthology San Francisco Noir“will emcee the event, a co-production between Noir City and Litquake

The Noir City Film Festival runs Jan. 13-26, 2006 at the Palace of Fine Arts and Balboa Theater. Complete schedule information is available at www.noircity.com

About Noir City
The Film Noir Foundation is a non-profit public benefit corporation created as an educational resource regarding the cultural, historical, and artistic significance of film noir as an original American cinematic movement. It is the mission of the Foundation to find and preserve films in danger of being lost or irreparably damaged, and to ensure that high quality prints of these classic films remain in circulation for theatrical exhibition to future generations. January 13-26. Palace of Fine Arts and Balboa Theater. www.noircity.com  

Thanks to everyone who joined Litquake and 826 Valencia to celebrate the first ever San Francisco Literary Map

The Literary Map party was a huge success; audience members heard local literary luminaries Michael Chabon, Ayelet Waldman, Kirk Read, Michelle Tea, Gary Kamiya, The Talking Heads’ Jerry Harrison (reading JT LeRoy), Belle Yang, Courtney King, and Jenny Traig read works that pay homage to specific Bay Area neighborhoods ” all of which are on the map.

Special musical guest Jonathan Richman rocked despite a scratchy throat and an auction of artwork by Literary Map illustrator Paul Madonna went swimmingly.

The Literary  Map is a visual guide that highlights local literary landmarks and resources and includes:

* A timeline of San Francisco’s literary history
* Literary landmarks
* Locations of bookstores, publishers, journals, and magazines
* Annual literary events
* Ongoing poetry readings and open mic nights
* Literary organizations
* Illustrations by Paul Madonna, author and illustrator of the
Chronicle’s All Over Coffee
* Text by Jenny Traig, author of Devil in the Details 

The Literary Map will soon to be available in bookstores and online for $7.

Litquake, the SF Writer’s Grotto, ArtSFest, and the Friends of the SF Public Library Present:
 
A BOOK LAUNCH PARTY & BENEFIT 

Celebrate the release of The Geneticist Who Played Hoops With My DNA … And Other Masterminds From the Frontiers of Biotech by San Francisco author David Ewing Duncan, published in May by William Morrow/HarperCollins.

May 10, 2005 

7-9 p.m. at

MIGHTY
119 Utah Street at 15th  Street, at the base of Potrero Hill, where 101 and I-80 split

For a GENETIC experience, featuring:
 
DJ Polywog, the CarpetBag Brigade Dancers, and plenty of parking!
  
$8 donation at the door, all proceeds benefit Litquake; donate
$25 and get a copy of the book, too! Cash Bar.
 
For more information about the book and to order, visit www.davidewingduncan.com
 
Books for sale at Mighty from the Friends of the Library BookBay Bookstore

An opportunity to meet your favorite local authors in an intimate, elegant environment and to find out all about Litquake.

MONDAY, JULY 25, 2005
VIP Reception from 6-7 p.m. with champagne and caviar

Party from 7-9 p.m. with hosted full bar, fine wines, and delicious hors d’oeuvres

RNM Restaurant
598 Haight Street (at Steiner) in San Francisco with featured guests including:

ROBERT MAILER ANDERSON
PO BRONSON
DANIEL HANDLER (aka Lemony Snicket)
ANN PACKER
ISHMAEL REED
AMY TAN

and

CRAIG NEWMARK
of Craigslist.org, Litquake Advisory Board Member
PHIL BRONSTEIN
Editor of The San Francisco Chronicle, Litquake Sponsor

Complimentary valet parking provided. Literati attire preferred, but “Garden Party” and “Eurotrash” are also acceptable.

Only a very limited number of tickets available, so RSVP right now using our Paypal account below. When asked, be sure to fill in your shipping address so we can send you a thank-you letter and tax deduction information. Your email and mailing address will be used for no other purpose than processing your RSVP.

Special thanks to Chef Justine Miner of RNM Restaurant, Steele Wines, Oakville Ranch Vineyards, Christie Ward for event production, and Adrian Morgan for invitation design.
 

A big thanks to everyone who came to the Litquake/Inforum poetry month event. It was a great night!

For those of you who weren’t able to come, see what you missed below:

POETS SOUND OFF:

INFORUM AND LITQUAKE PRESENT

A NATIONAL POETRY MONTH CELEBRATION

50 years after Allen Ginsberg set the City on fire with his poem "Howl," locals continue to make San Francisco one of nation’s richest cities for poetry and spoken-word performance. Join INFORUM and Litquake for a lively overview as our homegrown poets take to the stage and perform original works in celebration of National Poetry Month.

Come hear from Juvenal Acosta, Kim Addonizio, Justin Chin, Diane Di Prima, Marc Bamuthi Joseph, Alan Kaufman, devorah major, and Kay Ryan, along with two up-and-coming young poets from Youth Speaks. From acclaimed established poets to rising young stars, you’ll enjoy a cross-section of the best the Bay Area has to offer.

The program begins at 6:30 p.m., with a reception at 7:30 p.m. at the Commonwealth Club Office, 595 Market Street, 2nd floor, San Francisco

 $8 for Members and Litquake newsletter subscribers, $12 for Non-members, $5 for Students (Students must have valid I.D.; call 415-597-6705 to reserve student tickets)

Co-sponsored by Litquake and The Commonwealth Club’s Good Lit program