Clinton Community College will host Iowa’s Poet Laureate Mary Swander on Thursday, February 23, 2017, as part of the CCC Library Grand Opening activities, welcoming the community to the renovated library. The event will be held at 11:45 a.m., in the CCC Auditorium, 1000 Lincoln Boulevard, Clinton, IA. The public is invited to attend this free event.
Swander will present the dramatization of her narrative poem collection “The Girls on the Roof,” with the Eulenspiegel Puppets.
Eulenspiegel is known for witty scripts, original and expressive puppet designs, soft-sculpted, hand-dyed scenery, evocative music, and strong graphics. Eulenspiegel Puppet Theatre is the recipient of the 2000 Iowa Arts Award for Long Term Commitment to Excellence in the Arts.
Swander has published individual poems, essays, short stories, and articles. She received her M.F.A from the University of Iowa Writers Workshop. She is a Professor of English and a Distinguished Professor of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Iowa State University. She lives in an old Amish schoolhouse; raises geese, goats, and a large organic garden; plays the banjo.
The setting is the Mississippi River flood of 1993. A mother and daughter are stuck on the roof of Crazy Eddy’s Café, while flood waters—and all the flotsam and jetsam of their small town, Pompeii—swirl around them. Crazy Eddy speaks for himself and other travelers washed out of the cemetery, on his way downriver, wishing it were Mardi Gras, not “the Apocalypse on the off-season.” Other inhabitants, living and dead, make their appearance and tell their tales.
In this one-hour, not-for-children production, Swander reads poems and tells the story of Maggie and Pearl. Puppeteer Monica Leo brings the scenes alive through the use of hand, rod, and shadow puppets. The show is filled with old-time banjo and harmonica music, romance, intrigue, humor, folklore, and the flora and fauna of the Mississippi River Basin. Prepare to be dazzled by its poetic rhythms and likenesses of unforgettable characters.
Swander is the Poet Laureate of Iowa. She is the author of “Vang,” a drama about recent immigrant farmers, and “Map of my Kingdom, or Who’s Going to Get the Farm?” Her play “Farmscape” has been performed throughout the U. S. with a special performance for Secretary Vilsack at the U.S.D.A. Ice Cube Press published the play with a collection of essays in 2012. Swander is the co-founder of AgArts, a national group designed to imagine and promote healthy food systems through the arts.
Her memoir, “The Desert Pilgrim” (Viking, 2003, a Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers selection) has just been re-issued by Ice Cube Press, as has her memoir “Out of this World” (Viking, 1995) by the U. of Iowa Press. Swander is the author of three additional books of poetry, “Heaven-and-Earth House” (Alfred Knopf, 1994), “Driving the Body Back” (Alfred Knopf, 1986), “Succession” (University of Georgia Press, 1979), as well as a book of literary interviews, “Parsnips in the Snow” (with Jane Staw, University of Iowa Press, 1990.)
Eulenspiegel Puppet Theatre was founded in 1974 as a touring puppet troupe. Founding member Monica Leo was joined by Teri Jean Breitbach early in 1975, and the two performed exclusively as a duo until the 1990’s, when they began to incorporate musicians and other puppeteers. The Eulenspiegel Puppeteers have experimented with almost every type of puppet imaginable; collaborated with musicians, playwrights, directors, designers, and other theater companies; worked tirelessly to hone their art form. They performed at seven National Puppeteers of America Festivals, 15 Regional P of A festivals, a National festival in the former German Democratic Republic in 1987, international festivals in Austria, Japan, and the Czech Republic, and a National festival in Germany.
For more information about the Eulenspiegel Puppets and “The Girls on the Roof,” please visit http://www.puppetspuppets.com.