Carl and Sandra Ellston Ars Poetica: Essayist Adrian Shirk

Date: Thursday, March 2
Time: 6 p.m.
Location: EOU Library

Please join us for a reading and conversation with Adrian Shirk, whose latest book is Heaven is a Place on Earth: Searching for an American Utopia (Counterpoint 2022): “Told in a series of essays that balance memoir with fieldwork, Heaven Is a Place on Earth is an idiosyncratic study of American utopian experiments—from the Shakers to the radical faerie communes of Short Mountain to the Bronx rebuilding movement—through the lens of one woman’s quest to create a more communal life in a time of unending economic and social precarity.” Kirkus Reviews calls the book “[a] sprawling synthesis of memoir and social history . . . [A] rigorous, personalized argument for the continued relevance of an old idea.” Shirk is also the author of And Your Daughters Shall Prophesy: Stories From the Byways of American Women and Religion, named an NPR Best Book of 2017. Raised in Portland, Oregon, she now lives at the Mutual Aid Society in the Catskill Mountains and teaches in Pratt Institute’s BFA creative writing program. She is a frequent contributor to Catapult, and her essays have appeared in The Atlantic and Atlas Obscura, among other publications. Shirk will be in conversation with Nick Neely, Assistant Professor of English/Writing.