Thursday,
14 June 2001
After you pick up your copy of Thea Hillman's first book,
DEPENDING ON THE LIGHT (Manic D Press, $13.95), make
arrangements to take a cab home.
Thea Hillman will read from her
literary collection, 'Depending on the Light,' at
Outwrite Books June 18. |
As
soon as I picked the book up, I became so enthralled with the
San Francisco poet's casually brilliant verse that I just
couldn't look away from the pages. Even to drive home in rush
hour traffic. Two close calls later, I finally hid the book
under the passenger seat to force myself to focus on the road.
"Depending on the Light" is a collection of short works
from several genres, including poetry, prose and haiku. Each
chapter focuses on one of five topics: sex, family, queer
culture, language and social change.
Hillman's literary roots are in slam poetry-she holds a
tag-team Haiku Slam championship title-and her book is infused
with slam's pithy, rebellious spirit. Mix that with queer
riot-grrl sensibility, emotional insight and witty
descriptions, and you've got a book that will leave readers
wondering why they thought they could read and steer at the
same time.
Hillman herself may be trying to read and drive-or write
and drive-this very minute. She's on the road with guitarist
Storm Florez, touring from San Francisco to Atlanta and up to
New York City. She'll stop in Atlanta for two readings June 17
and 18, where she and Florez will be joined by author
Elizabeth Stark.
Hillman's book includes a piece titled "Home on the Range,"
which is about her first poetry tour. She writes, "What I
didn't know is that I'd feel at home on the road, that home,
as an object, as a feeling, as comfort broke into little
pieces, broken glass that reflected me over and over as the
light hit me in each state."
Hillman still loves to tour. "Everyone just opens their
homes and their kitchens and their venues," she says, calling
from Albuquerque, N.M. on her cell phone. "People are so
generous. People think it must be really hard to book a tour,
but once you start asking it's not, because there's a whole
network of people who are used to poor poets coming into town
and making it easy for them to do that."
Hillman
decided to bring her tour to Atlanta after attending the
Creating Change conference here last November. "I knew had to
come back-I loved it," she says. She was working too hard at
the conference to spend much time exploring the city, but was
taken with the women and atmosphere at My Sister's Room in
Decatur, Ga.
When she performs here, Hillman says, she'll gear the show
towards Atlanta dykes. "I try to do stuff that shows the range
of my work, but because I'm reading to a girl-heavy audience
I'll probably do more over-the-top pieces," she says.
Her range is considerable. The poems and stories in
"Depending on the Light" were culled from Hillman's work as a
writer, teacher and spoken word performer.
| Action
Info |
Thea Hillman in Atlanta
Thea Hillman and Elizabeth
Stark
Outwrite Bookstore
Monday,
June 18, 7:30 pm
991 Piedmont Ave.,
Atlanta
404-607-0082
Thea
Hillman, Elizabeth Stark and Storm
Florez
Sunday, June 17, 7 pm
Red
Light Café
553 Amsterdam Ave.,
Atlanta
404-874-7828
| |
She's
been writing for years, but didn't decide to create a book of
her work until she was in graduate school pursuing a Master of
Fine Arts degree.
"I realized that I was halfway towards a book because I had
already published all over the place, I was performing, I was
teaching, and I was in school with all these people who'd
never done any of those things," Hillman says. "I realized I
was waiting for someone to tell me, 'You need to do a book,'
and that doesn't happen necessarily."