LIT TOP 5 Photo: R.S. Jenkins Lit1 Claudia Rankine and Angels and Beasts DECEMBER 2018 Newcity Will Rawls. Museum of Contemporary Photography. An Interview with Poet Ruben Quesada Poet Claudia Rankine and choreographer Will Rawls By Toni Nealie discuss “What Remains,” a performance which explores Energetic poet, translator, editor and teacher Ruben Quesada seems to move at how erasure and exposure the speed of light these days, between reading around town and teaching at Northwest- shape black American life. ern University, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Columbia College Chicago. Author of “Next Extinct Mammal” and “Exiled from the Throne of Night: Selected Transla- December 4 tions of Luis Cernuda,” Quesada is editing a volume of essays on poetry by contemporary Latinx poets, “Latino Poetics”(University of New Mexico Press). Of Costa Rican heritage,2 Chicago Review he founded the Latinx Writers Caucus that meets annually at the Association of Writers and of Books Awards. Volumes Bookcafe. Who will win this year’s CHRBYAwards for fiction, nonfiction and poetry? December 83 Chase Twichell. Poetry Foundation. Chase Twichell is the author of eight books of poetry, including “Things As It Is” and“Horses Where the Answers Should Have Been: New and Selected Poems,” which won a Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award and a Balcones Poetry Prize. December 114 Sunday Reading Series. Hungry Brain. Featuring Rachel Mennies, Rebecca Morgan Frank,Annah Browning and Ruben Quesada. December 165 “Mr. Dickens and His Carol.” American Writers’ Museum. Samantha Silva’s novel “Mr. Dickens and His Carol” imagines Charles Dickens with writer’s block. December 3 51
Writing Programs (AWP) conference, connect- This collection makes a significant departure and you’ll land on your feet. I left a small town ing Latinx and Latin American poets and from any of my previous work. A reader would in central Illinois to be in an environment with a writers from around the world. Quesada never recognize this as my work if they were community of people like me. I needed to be discusses this bright moment for Latinx only familiar with my first collection of poetry. around other Latinx humans and other LGBTQ poets, as well as his latest work “Revelations,” The craft and which twins his sharp, contemplative work content have with moving translations of exiled Spanish matured and poet Luis Cernuda. developed far beyond my You write in this collection about faith, expectations. doubt and chaos? What faith? What This new work chaos? What doubt? Does this pertain to maintains the wider patterns around us, or is this more cinematic and deep, personal? What are the revelations? imagistic quality of my work, but There is a tradition in American poetry, most the content is notably between the two World Wars, that philosophical and addresses faith in humanity. Poets at the tackles larger time were attuned to the danger coming concerns about from technology. They observed the growth life and love. in weapons of mass destruction. When mass-production bombs and eventually How do you work atomic weapons entered our culture, people and what is began to doubt whether humanity would your process? survive. How can we have faith in humanityNewcity DECEMBER 2018 when our own survival is at risk, because of I try to always humans. The creative humans of Chicago like the technology we created? I have the same write about ideas, you, Toni, Kenyatta Rogers, Tina Boyer Brown, doubts when I see how capitalism and the emotions, experi- Tara Betts, T Clutch Fleischmann, Stephen free market put profitability ahead of the lives ences. I write on Young, Elizabeth Metzger Sampson, Natasha of people in the healthcare system or even my phone, in a Mijares, Rebecca Makkai, Mary Hawley, Mike within our own political system. Most people notebook, on Puican, Lisa Wagner, Kendra Curry-Khanna in the United States are led and under control my computer. and so many people in this city have welcomed of a free-market and political system that Sometimes I’ll me into their literary spaces and communities does not have its best interest in mind. simply make a over the last three years. I couldn’t have found voice recording a more generous group of humans. “Revelations” has a gruesome cover, a if I don’t have time detail of Hieronymus Bosch’s triptych to type something What is on the horizon for you? “The Garden of Earthly Delights” showing out. It’s important naked humans punished for their sins. to me to keep the I’ll be finishing my full book over the next few What exactly are we looking at and how thoughts flowing. months and looking for more opportunities to does it connect to your poetry? I’ll eventually sit and represent this great literary scene of Chicago put it all together, as I share my work around the country. The image on the cover of my book is from once or twice a the third panel of Bosch’s triptych, which week, just to collect Ruben Quesada reads on December 16, shows a hellish landscape. The cover depicts everything I’ve been 7pm at the Sunday Reading Series: Poetry, a creature devouring a human being. This thinking about. Prose & Cocktails hosted by Simone Muench is Lucifer with the head of a blue bird— Sometimes it’s nothing and sometimes the and Beth McDermott at Hungry Brain, a nightjar. The nightjar is known to consume thoughts come together to form the begin- 2319 West Belmont. large insects. The bird is consuming human nings of a poem. corpses that have succumbed to evil and “Revelations” by Ruben Quesada, sin. The painting itself demonstrates the What is it like to be a Latinx poet in the Sibling Rivalry Press, 38 pages, $10. potential of humanity ending with this final United States at this time? moment of complete loss. It’s the end of mankind. A moment I hope never arrives. It’s an exciting time to be a Latinx poet in the United States. I believe the importance of What drew you to Luis Cernuda and why singular experiences has always been on the did you intersperse his work with yours? minds of creative humans, but the accessibility to publication in journals and the visibility of They are interspersed in the collection to Latinx humans is on the rise. Editors and break up the tone of my poems and to publishers are making space for our work to provide some relief and hopefully some be read and purchased. levity from the religiosity of my own work. I’m drawn to Cernuda’s vivid and plain style You teach at institutions around Chicago, of poetry. Most of his poems engage same- yet you took a break a while back. Was sex desire, which was unusual for an early that restorative? What is positive and twentieth-century poet. Many of Cernuda’s what is difficult about teaching currently? poems wrestle with faith and doubt in humanity, much like my own. It’s difficult to leave a tenure-track job. If you’re a queer human of color, leaving a tenure-track How does this work connect to your job is unheard of. Someone might think you’d previous work? How have you developed lost your mind. But if you’re a good teacher, as a poet, in style and content? and you’re ambitious, people will take notice52
1928 2018Arts + spirit in the magnificent setting of Rockefeller Chapel’s resonant spaceHANDEL’S MESSIAH THE TALLIS SCHOLARS PIPES FOR THE SEASON A RENAISSANCE CHRISTMASSUNDAY DECEMBER 2 | 3 PM SUNDAY DECEMBER 16 | 5 PM SUNDAY DECEMBER 9 | 3 PMContinuing the beloved tradition of a matinée An hour of gorgeous seasonal music by candlelight,performance of Handel’s Messiah, with the The world-renowned Tallis Scholars fill Rockefeller with delicious hot cider served. Free.Rockefeller Chapel Choir and Motet Choir, Chapel with their pristine intonation and impeccableconducted by James Kallembach, featuring soloists blend, performing carols, chorales, motets, and CHRISTMAS EVE: A FESTIVALKaitlin Foley, Lindsey Adams, Matthew Dean, and mass settings: works by Palestrina, Josquin, OF LESSONS AND CAROLSVince Wallace, with members of the Haymarket Byrd, and others. Tickets at tickets.uchicago.edu,Orchestra, concertmaster Jeri-Lou Zike. Tickets at $38 general, $30 University faculty and staff, MONDAY DECEMBER 24 | 4 PMtickets.uchicago.edu, $25–55. $20 under-35, $10 students. The cherished candlelit service of Lessons and Carols for Christmas Eve. Members of the A UChicago Presents concert Rockefeller Children’s Choir present the Christmas story in the traditional tableau. Free.Full details at rockefeller.uchicago.edu | Rockefeller Memorial Chapel | 5850 S. Woodlawn Avenue, Chicago IL 60637 | 773.702.2667
MusicNewcity DECEMBER 2018 Album tial election, but by then it was too late to their respective years, but they carried of the Year make a difference. To posit that its philosophy significance because of their moment. would have the opportunity to disseminate Shemekia Copeland and marinate in the public consciousness As 2018 draws to a close, the year’s most Stakes Her Claim outside of hip-hop and modern R&B con- important record, if not necessarily the best, sciousness and impact election results may although it’s close, is “America’s Child” by By Craig Bechtel be hopelessly naïve, but stranger things Shemekia Copeland. Copeland, who appears happened that year on the “we can’t be this month at City Winery, has been a rising star The last three years have seen a singular, cynical enough” side of reality’s spectrum. for years, which belies her youth as compared landmark, treasure chest of an album to the “old souls” of the blues community. Her from a particular artist, mining veins from Gospel veteran Mavis Staples’ 2017 “If All I debut record dropped twenty years ago, but traditional African-American music such as Was Was Black” is a soul classic, the apex she won’t turn forty until next year. hip-hop, gospel and blues, all worth their of a series of collaborations with Wilco’s Jeff weight in soul. Tweedy, timed perfectly for release in 2017 Her eighth album, and second since as a meditation on the state of life in America returning to Chicago independent blues label If there was any criticism against Common’s inspired by the darkness under the current Alligator, begins with a trifecta of political extraordinary “Black America Again,” it was its presidency (and timed to coincide with Greg powerhouses: “Ain’t Got Time For Hate,” release date. Originally scheduled to come out Kot’s biography of Staples, featured as a a delineation and celebration of the variety of earlier in 2016, the Chicago native pushed it to selection of the Chicago Public Library’s “Americans” (“free to be you and me… We’re drop the night before the November presiden- “One Book, One Chicago”). walking, talking contradictions, no two are the same, that’s what makes us beautiful, Each of these was a hallmark for its artist. I hope we never change”) and the electric- They may have not been the best albums of blues-oozing “Would You Take My Blood?”54
which channels the musical approach With “America’s Child,” Shemekia Copelandof Robert Cray and asks the white has given us something real; and just as Mavis Staples’ most recent recordingsupremacist if he were dying and needed MUSIC TOP 5 was penned and steered by Jeff Tweedy,a blood transfusion, would he take hers? 1 Thom Yorke. Chicago Copeland here had a strong guide in Theatre. The Radiohead frontman showcases his“The Wrong Idea” is a simmering, rocking producer and collaborator and Americana idiosyncratic, often visionary solo work, accompanied bynumber where Copeland pushes back at Instrumentalist of the Year winner Will experimental cellist Oliver Coates. December 4a man trying to pick her up during a night Kimbrough, who plays guitar and organ 2 Birds of Chicago.out with the girls. “What makes you think and writes several songs. Kimbrough SPACE. Former locals JT Nero and Allison Russellthat you got a shot of getting this good stuff fronted Will & The Bushmen in the 1980s, return with the wind of theirthat I got?” she sings over vibrant, honky- and penned songs for many greats since, 2018 folk-rock masterpiece including Emmylou Harris, who contributes “Love In Wartime” billowingtonk-soaked fiddle and electric guitar. As their sails. December 6 backing vocals here, and has become ais her standard operating procedure, she 3 Noname. Thalia Hall.includes one song penned by her late father, serial collaborator, including with Staples. No one better to gobluesman Johnny Clyde Copeland, and it’s “Shemekia Copeland is the real deal,” valedictory on 2018 than our homegirl poet-slash-rapper,another highlight: “Promised whose ravishing album “Room 25” was one of the year’sMyself” slows down the highlights. December 29-31proceedings to a slow 4 Hamid Drake. Constellation.burn, giving it the torch- The adventurous Chicago drummer-percussionist teamssong treatment, accented with double-bass legend Tatsu Aoki; the next night with trioby legendary guitarist Steve Mako Sica. December 21-22Cropper. While she may 5 Travis Scott. United Center. After a memorablenot have the range of Lolla gig; the rapper returns with his “Wish You WereAretha Franklin, her delivery Here” tour—whose name might apply to the guestbrings Franklin to mind. stars on his acclaimed “Astroworld” album. But he’sHer approach and delivery well worth seeing on his own.of each note is naturally December 6brilliant, seemingly instinctive,and that throughline makes“America’s Child” a spectacu-lar collection. Copeland is “In The Blood Kimbrough says. “‘America’s Child’ goes DECEMBER 2018 Newcity of The Blues,” as she sings deep and Shemekia‘s voice—a national in a fiery number later in the treasure—carries the songs effortlessly, album, and her delivery on whether topical, personal, spiritual, political that number is such that or just plain raucous fun. Shemekia rears hooks seem to spring from back her head and what comes out is her vibrato alone. As Mary humanity made vocal.” Gauthier, who sings back-up and co-wrote two of the Maybe this is the best record of the year. compositions, with executive producer Every time I listen, I think, have I heard and regular collaborator John Hahn, puts any album better than this in 2018, from it, “her voice on these songs is nothing end to end? There are moments of levity short of magic.” She calls “America’s Child” and moments of seriousness and heart-“a groundbreaking, genre-bending work break; it’s not a perfect album, but the of beauty.” one constant is her palpable passion, and that is Shemekia Copeland through- I can’t argue with that, even though and-through. the record never grows too far from its blues roots. She gave birth to her son Johnny Lee Copeland-Schultz in 2016, and she says Other highlights include a stellar duet with that’s what inspired the album’s title. “After local folk hero John Prine on his “Great having a child, I started thinking about the Rain,” J. D. Wilkes’ electrifying harmonica world I brought him into, how it actually is part on the searing “One I Love,” a fascinat- and how I wished it was and all the things ing reinterpretation of a Kinks deep cut, he will have to go through. And to live in and the closing lullaby, the traditional this world today, you have to have a strong“Go To Sleepy Little Baby.” foundation like I did to make it through. So that’s what ‘America’s Child’ means to me.”“America’s Child” is a record that stays fresh after repeated listens and offers a new December 26-27, 8pm at City Winery, 1200 favorite moment with each spin. At the West Randolph, citwinery.com, $38-$52. moment, mine is another number penned by Gauthier and Hahn, “Smoked Ham and Peaches,” featuring Rhiannon Giddens of Carolina Chocolate Drops on African banjo.“Truth ain’t a rabbit, a trick you pull out of a hat / Somebody tell me, what made us fall for that,” Copeland sings and by the chorus, she’s practically begging: “When the whole world seems fake, give me something real.” 55
StageNewcity DECEMBER 2018Triggered In Steppenwolf Theatre Company’sA Defense of Theatrical production of Bruce Norris’ “Downstate,”Content Warnings Tim Hopper plays a survivor of childhood sexual abuse who, as an adult, confrontsBy Amanda Finn his abuser, played by Francis GuinanCW: Sexual assault of adults and children /Photo: Michael BrosilowTrigger and content warnings: they area topic of debate in all kinds of circles andhave popped up frequently in my own circlelargely because of the play “Downstate” atSteppenwolf Theatre Company.There is a lot of criticism targeted at triggerwarnings. They can be seen as infantilizingan audience. Yet when it comes to offeringpeople a chance to consider their ownfeelings, it shows that the theater takesrespect of its audience into consideration.Take, for example, this lovely sentiment froma 2016 opinion piece about content warningsin academia from the New York Times: “It isnot that difficult issues should not be taught—it is that they should be taught with nuance.Allowing a military veteran to skip a screeningof ‘Pearl Harbor’ or to opt for a less graphicversion of a chapter about the Vietnam War isnot succumbing to ‘political correctness’ orinterfering with learning; it is treating peoplewith basic decency and respect.”“Downstate” is the story of four sex offenders who live together in a group home in downstate Illinois. They’ve committed acts of sexual assault against minors (pedophilia) and are coping with their choices. It is a taboo subject, to be sure. Steppenwolf took appropriate actions to warn It’s also worth noting that “Downstate” was decide to check for content that they feel will audiences of the content including a warning not built into Steppenwolf’s current season upset them can do so too,” says Long. online about “graphic descriptions of child model, which includes all of the company’s abuse and rape, drug use, smoke effects main stage Downstairs Theatre productions Even so, sometimes it takes being in the and graphic depiction of self-harm.” Further, while allowing subscribers to pick and choose space for an audience member to be there are warnings within the play synopsis, which of the productions in the Upstairs overcome by a topic. Sometimes previous performance reminder emails, and notices on Theatre they would like to attend. The theater experiences in the theater will halt them the doors of the theater. “All of our audience is also working on a system in which patrons from considering the show all together. services and front-of-house staff are trained are able to “opt in or out” of knowing about and prepared to share content warning specific content. “This way, patrons who I reached out to the theater community for information,” according to Steppenwolf senior want to maintain the ability to be surprised their take. Several individuals responded on communications director Madeline Long. or shocked can do so, while those who the subject of trigger warnings and how they “The theater has had many conversations about balancing the obligations we owe to audience members who do not want to be exposed to potentially traumatic depictions on stage, versus audience members who come to the theater explicitly to be surprised.”56
were personally affected by productions. enacted live onstage should seem so STAGE TOP 5They are published here anonymously much more affecting than violence,to respect their safety and privacy. even more gruesome, onscreen. But 1 Hellcab. The Agency Theater when [self-harm occurs,] I immediately Collective. Over the courseSubmissions have been edited for style thought of “Gloria,” and how it had felt of a cold Christmas Eve, a young cab to watch the first act of that play. driver takes the wheel, encounteringand length. an unusual parade of fares in this alternately frightening, hilarious andIn my opinion, the theater is meant to I wasn’t remotely prepared for poignant trip through the Windy City.do two things: entertain and educate. “Downstate.” When the victim read his letter to his abuser in the beginning Opens December 6Within those two larger purposes is a of the show I knew it was going tomyriad of emotions theater can (and be a rough time for me. I clenched my 2 The Winter Wolf. Otherworld[one hopes] will) elicit. I can certainly fists so hard during the performance Theatre Company. The Winterbe entertained while also being my arms hurt for days. I’ve written Wolf comes for Cora’s grandfather, butchallenged. While being educated by that victim’s letter a thousand times in the girl manages to trap it. A magicalexperiences outside of my own, I am my mind. journey through the mysteries of timealways hopeful that my empathetic follows, as Cora learns how far one cannature will be aroused. So, while in the Empathy for human beings is an go for the sake of someone they love.grander scheme of things it boils down innate need in the world, don’t get meto entertainment and education, my wrong. And I believe in rehabilitation, Opens December 8experience with theater is still nuanced. but having known abusers it made me physically sick to watch actors (who 3 The Full Monty. Theo UbiqueI love seeing plays that show worlds were damn good) ask a victim if he Cabaret Theatre. Based on the hitoutside of my own. I love seeing plays actually remembered things correctly. movie of the same name, unemployedwhere the protagonist isn’t perfect. Having been gaslighted like that for steel workers come up with a bold andI love seeing plays where a “villain” years and dealing with the effects to unclothed way to make quick cash,is so well written that you almost this day, those moments destroyed only to find themselves exposed, androot for them. me. I was a mess for days after seeing not just physically. Opens December 10 that show. I had nightmares. The kindHowever, in my opinion, theater should I hadn’t had in years. 4 A Midsummer Night’s Dream.not be a traumatic experience. Chicago Shakespeare Theater. Celebrate twenty years of ShakespeareLast year I saw a production of “How I I’m grateful that Steppenwolf warned on Navy Pier in a wonderland where DECEMBER 2018 NewcityLearned to Drive.” I was vaguely aware audiences. It’s impossible to fully warn fairies fly, a donkey bursts into songof the subject matter but was not people about how they’ll react to and love potions can change hearts.prepared for how much the character something without ruining the show.of the pedophile is humanized. As I wish I had taken the warnings more Opens December 14a survivor of a sexual assault that I seriously and known myself better.believed was consensual at the time It’s a topic I can’t handle. I didn’t have 5 La Ruta. Steppenwolf Theatre(I was a young teenager, he was a pity for those four men onstage and Company. Inspired by testimoniesman in his mid-twenties), I was deeply the loving person that lives in my heart from workers in U.S.-owned factories intriggered by seeing the production. hates that about myself. Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, Isaac Gomez‘sIt stuck with me for weeks and due new play is a visceral unearthing ofto that experience and its aftermath I saw the trigger warnings for “Down- secrets buried in the desert and aI decided it was not safe for me to state” that Steppenwolf provided and celebration of the Mexican womensee any other plays where we were made the educated decision to see who stand resiliently in the wake of loss.asked to sympathize or empathize the play, knowing that there would bewith pedophiles. conversations about child abuse and Opens December 20 assault, in addition to a depiction ofFor this reason I chose to stay far self-harm. I was upset, but not triggered,away from “Downstate.” by these things on their own, in watching the production though I knowI am not saying that a play like “How that many would be and [I] appreciateI Learned to Drive” or “Downstate” Steppenwolf’s content warning.shouldn’t exist, but I do wish thattheaters felt a responsibility for the The depiction of a victim of sexualemotional safety of their audiences. assault being dismissed and disbelieved when confronting his[In response to “Downstate”] abuser, without comment from the playwright or direction, was harmful.I feel fine and functional today, and Ihesitate to describe myself as triggered A more conscious exploration, or eventhough I thought of my own childhood program note, would have opened asexual trauma several times during conversation about whether or not wethe course of the show and thought should defer to believing survivors nowith some alarm about the even more questions asked, while still allowingvisceral experiences others in the the audience to trust the playwright’stheater might be having. intentions. I was blindsided and felt dismissed by the production in itsI’m sure [theories have] been written second act, due to a lack of adequateand published about why violence exploration in the material. 57
Newcity DECEMBER 2018 Life is BeautifulBy David Alvarado58
3V0 Aenrdtoisrasn ALL UNDER ONE ROOF DINE IN OR TAK E OUT FOR A COMPLETE LIST OFVENDORS, EVENTS, HAPPY HOUR SPECIALS & LIVE MUSIC, VISITCHICAGOFRENCHMARKET.COM 131 North Clinton, Chicago (Between Randolph and Washington) Monday – Friday 7:00 a.m. – 7:30 p.m.Saturday 8:30 a.m. – 5:30 p.m. Sunday closed.
12 31 2 3WEST BYON THE MCA MIDWESTSTAGE: MARIANO NOV 17, 2018PENSOTTI –JAN 27, 2019ARDE BRILLANTE EN LOS Students of Anna Halprin’s San FranciscoBOSQUES DE LA NOCHE(BURNING BRIGHT IN THE Museum ofDancers’ Workshop perform City DanceFOREST OF THE NIGHT) on July 24, 1977, in San Francisco.JAN 24–27, 2019 Documentation of Anna Halprin, City Dance, Contemporary Art1977. Photograph transferred to digital video. Anna Halprin Papers, The Elyse Eng Dance Collection, Museum of Performance + ChicagoDesign. Photo: Buck O’Kelly. MCA STORE MCACHICAGO.ORG/LOOK FIND SOMETHING FOR #MCAMadeYouLook EVERYONE ON YOUR LIST OPEN LATE UNTIL 9 PM TUESDAYS AND FRIDAYS FREE FOR YOUTH 18 AND UNDER GIFT CERTIFICATES AND MORE AVAILABLE AT MCACHICAGOSTORE.ORGMariano Pensotti: Arde brillante en los bosquesde la noche. Photo: Loderndes Leuchten.
Search
