Programmarchiv

reading and discussion with Ryan Ruby and Alexander Wells

Ryan Ruby is a poet, novelist, translator, and one of the anglosphere's most admired literary critics. This November, the California-born Wahlberliner is publishing his newest book—a book that only he could, or perhaps would, write. Context Collapse: A Poem Containing a History of Poetry (Seven Stories Press) is exactly what it sounds like, a playfully discourse-hopping epic verse essay about the history of poetry itself.

Epic in sweep, it offers a secret history of the poet—from Bronze Age Greece and Renaissance Italy to the cafés of Grub Street and the Latin Quarter, from the creative writing departments of the American Midwest to the boardrooms of Silicon Valley. It has been described as "delightfully witty" (Rosemarie Waldrop), "erudite and perceptive" (Eugene Ostashevsky), "compelling" (Boris Dralyuk), and "basically unpublishable" (Ryan Ruby).

The reading and a discussion will be hosted by local critic Alexander Wells, followed by an audience Q&A and a signing over drinks.

Ryan Ruby is the author of Context Collapse: A Poem Containing a History of Poetry (Seven Stories Press, 2024) and The Zero and the One: A Novel (Twelve Books, 2017). For his book reviews and essays, which have appeared in The New York Times, The New Yorker, Harper's, and elsewhere, he received the 2023 Silvers Prize for Literary Criticism. He lives in Berlin.

Alexander Wells is a critic, essayist, and event moderator from Australia. His writing has been published by The Guardian, The Drift, The Baffler, European Review of Books, and Meanjin among others. Since 2020, he has been the Books Editor for local print monthly The Berliner.

We would like to point out that the lift in the building is unfortunately not working at the moment. For this reason, access is currently restricted. We would like to apologise for this.