oral tradition

Frances Washburn reads from Elsie's Business (2006) and The Sacred White Turkey (2010).

Cecilia Vicuña presents an improvisatory oral performance in response to space and time as part of the Poetry Center's 2012 Poetry Off the Page Symposium. This recording includes a question and answer session with Claudia Rankine and Christine Hume, who performed along with Vicuña at the Poetry Off the Page Sonic Lens night.

N. Scott Momaday reads both poetry and fiction for the Writers at Work series. He begins with a series of short epitaphs, followed by a series of charms inspired by the Native American oral tradition. He reads a few more poems, including selections from his collection The Way to Rainy Mountain (1969). He concludes the reading with a selection from his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel House Made of Dawn (1968).

Richard and Nora Marks Dauenhauer read from their English translations of Tlingit poems and stories, providing fascinating explanations of the traditions behind the literature. They read first the original Tlingit and then the English translations. They conclude by reading from their own original poems.