12 December 2006 12am - 12am

The next installment of the Test Reading Series features the ever charming Jon Paul Fiorentino and a rare Toronto reading by British ex-pat New York Schooler Simon Pettet (it might even be the first!).

Tuesday December 12, 7:30 p.m.

JON PAUL FIORENTINO and SIMON PETTET

Mercer Union, A Centre for Contemporary Art

37 Lisgar Street, Toronto

pwyc

JON PAUL FIORENTINO’s most recent book of poetry is The Theory of the
Loser Class (Coach House Books, 2006). He is the author of the poetry
book Hello Serotonin (Coach House Books, 2004) and the humour book
Asthmatica (Insomniac Press, 2005).

“Fiorentino is smart and deft.”—Globe and Mail

“Fiorentino deserves your attention.”—Dose

SIMON PETTET is an internationally renowned English-born poet,
long-time resident of New York’s Lower East Side. His new book of
poems is called More Winnowed Fragments, and his Selected Poems is
still in print and available from the same publisher, Talisman. He is
the author of two classic collaborations with photographer-filmmaker
Rudy Burckhardt, Conversations About Everything and Talking Pictures,
and the editor of the Selected Art Writings of the
Pulitzer-prize-winning “New York School” poet James Schuyler.

“He sounds those same simplicities of profound music Blake also knew.
He moves with a deft and practiced quiet.…He speaks the truth.”—Robert
Creeley

“Like Beethoven’s Bagatelles, Simon Pettet’s short poems have a great
deal to say, and their seemingly modest dimensions help rather than
hinder his saying it.”—John Ashbery