If you liked my voice on NPR

I think you would enjoy its unchained adult rasp

KEEP THE SABBATH WITH ME

"Forms of Fire" by Andrei Codrescu, Lynnea Villanova , and Micah Ariel James; Directed & Choreographed by Clove Galilee

A powerful, multimedia theater experience that intertwines the lives of three people—a scientist, a music teacher, and a dancer—each grappling with the long shadows of personal and collective trauma. Through a fusion of scientific exploration and artistic expression, the play delves into the fragile human psyche, asking how and whether we can truly rewire our minds to overcome the past. Set against the backdrop of experimental neuromodulation, the characters’ journeys are mirrored in kinetic sculptures that evolve as metaphors for their fractured identities and disparate quests for healing. With a chorus of dancers embodying their internal struggles, "Forms of Fire" offers a poignant meditation on memory, resilience, and the transformative power of connection.

This staged reading offers a first glimpse into the evolving piece, with immersive and staging elements prototyped in real time. The audience is not only witness but participant in the experiment.

MEET THE CREATIVE TEAM

Created by: Lynnea Villanova MD

Co-Authors: Andrei Codrescu, Lynnea Villanova, Micah Ariel James

Dramaturg: Micah Ariel James

Director/Choreographer: Clove Galilee (Mabou Mines)

Composer: Melvin Gibbs

Sound Design: Dean Parker

Installation Art: Jingjing Lin

Scientific Advisors: Boris Gutkin

Lighting Design: Cat Tate Starmer

Sculptors: Rosa Elling; Lute Breuer

CAST

Amanda - Meghann Reynolds

Edgar & Diego - Jack Pappas

Irene - Shauna Pinkett

Mila - Christianna Nelson

Sasha - Finley Rosser

Zeb - Felice Rosser

The Chorus - Nicola Bosco-Alvarez

Narration - Liz Colarte

This performance is presented by the Romanian Cultural Institute with additional support from TRICKSADDLE, The Rogovy Foundation, Mabou Mines, and Bowery Arts & Sciences Ltd. With additional support from LA MAMA.

Group reading with a lofty group

“This Machine Fights Fascists”

In 1943, Woody Guthrie put this phrase on this guitar, believing in the power of song. The quote was from a sticker placed on items coming from a war effort factory. In honor of Woody’s patriotism and faith, the Library offers a program in words and images which will make you feel free. Andrei Codrescu and Jeffrey Cyphers Wright invite you to a double book party.

How to Live Under Fascism, Andrei’s new book from Black Widow Press, is a guide for those who seek poems that terrorize the state with brazen observations about our corrupt body politic. Plus poems about love and the plague and the pleasure of making things up. Andrei’s mother and father were both photographers and this new book also features Andrei’s own photos which are strangely and not so strangely connected.

Erato’s Inbox by Jeffrey Cyphers Wright is another kind of guide book, one that proposes passion as a path to peace and transcendence. Written from the viewpoint of Erato, the muse of love, this mini épopée is a delightful and wise romp, instructive, bawdy, and uplifting. The poem is accompanied by sublime and bizarre AI generated images. Published in collaboration with Barbara Rosenthal and Xanadu Press.

Andrei joins the friends of Carmine Street Metrics to support and encourage poetry for all

More info here (this information is for the April reading - hour/place are the same, date is 6/1/2025)

Co hosted by Anton Yakovlev, Wendy Sloan and Terese Coe of Carmine Street Metrics

Jefferson Market Library Willa Cather Room

Andrei will read from his new collection of poems and photographs, How to Live under Fascism (Black Widow Press, 2025) at the Romanian Cultural Institute (RCI).

Fighting the basilisk of doom in Romania and the United States – filling the gulf of ignorance with the music of resistance

We are grateful to the Romanian Cultural Institute for hosting this event

Event link here

Link to purchase book here

Group reading of translations from Polish poet Witold Wirpsza. More details to come on the list of luminaries reading

‘the John Ashbery of Polish poetry’ – Andrei Codrescu

Von Bar, NYC

Live Mag!, the annual arts and poetry publication, invites you to an afternoon of celebration and acknowledgement.  In conjunction with the release of the new issue, noted East Village poet, John Godfrey, will be given the Live Mag! Lifetime Achievement Award for 2025.

With performing contributors: Andrei Codrescu, Lila Dlaboha, Elinor Nauen, Harris Schiff

Art by Martha Diamond, Donna Dennis and others in the issue, including Pamela Lawton, Curt Hoppe, Kim Keever, Rick Klauber, & Yuko Otomo.

Hosted by Publisher and Editors: Lori Ortiz, Ilka Scobie, and Jeffrey Cyphers Wright.

Tompkins Square Park Library

Julian Semilian’s documentary Fish Have No Psychiatrists, chronicling the life and imagination of Andrei Codrescu, was warmly received by a full house. The screening was followed by an engaging conversation with Julian and Andrei

This warm, surreal adventure is a must see for those looking to subvert

The Broad Theater, New Orleans

Andrei read from his new book, How to Live Under Fascism (Black Widow Press, 2025) to the delight of fans and patrons on Chartres St in New Orleans, during a heady week of festivals and post-mardi gras jubilation

A Gallery for Fine Art

Crescent City Books

Illustrious Bowery Poetry Tuesday night series features stalwarts of the LES in this winter 2025 series

01/14/25 ANDREI CODRESCU - LILA LABOHA - SIMON PETTET

01/21/25 ANSELM BERRIGAN - DONNA DENNIS - TONY TOWLE

01/28/25 LEE ANN BROWN - JOHNNY STANTON - KAREN WEISER - DON YORTY

02/11/25 MARCELLA DURAND - WANDA PHIPPS - JOHN YAU

02/18/25 EDDIE BERRIGAN - MIKE DECAPITE - MITCH HIGHFILL - JOEL LEWIS

02/25/25 JAIME MANRIQUE - NANCY MERCADO - EDWIN TORRES

03/4/25 ED FRIEDMAN - BOB HOLMAN - BOB ROSENTHAL

Singing in Unison Part 9: Peter Acheson & Gret Sterret Smith @SLAG&RX Gallery, NYC

Produced by the Brooklyn Rail, this festive gathering and poetry reading celebrates the closing of Singing in Unison Part 9: Peter Acheson & Gret Sterret Smith, featuring readings by Andrei Codrescu, Alicia Mountain, Vincent Katz, and Phong H. Bui

more info here

Bucharest Inside the Beltway presents a bevy of brilliant Romanian-American poets

Adela Sinclair, Carmen Firan, Adrian Sangeorzan

Guaranteed timelessness

Andrei joins local musicians, poets and authors of like winter-minds

Full line up here

Andrei reads a 2:25p

Andrei and Vincent are delighted that the inaugural reading from their new collaborative poem A Possible Epic of Carew (Black Widow Press 2023) will be held at the Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundation

Hosted and introduced by the Foundation’s curator and Program Director, Alex Paul Chapin, the reading will include a reception and book signing

The Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundationis a nonprofit organization that promotes the legacies of the artists Milton Resnick (1917–2004) and Pat Passlof (1928–2011) and supports the work of other painters by organizing exhibitions, publishing catalogs, and hosting related programming in Resnick’s former home/studio in Manhattan’s Lower East Side

Vincent Katz, born in New York, is known for his work as a poet, critic, curator, and translator. He is the author of fourteen books of poetry, including Broadway for Paul (Alfred A. Knopf 2020), Southness (Lunar Chandelier Press 2016), Swimming Home (Nightboat Books,2015), Understanding Objects (Hard Press 2000) and Cabal of Zealots (Hanuman Books 1988). He is the author of The Complete Elegies of Sextus Propertius, which received the National Translation Award from the American Literary Translators Association. He has curated exhibitions on Black Mountain College and Rudy Burckhardt, and recently co-curated a retrospective of the films of Isabelle Huppert at Film Forum in New York City. From 2010 to 2021, Katz curated "Readings in Contemporary Poetry" series at Dia:Chelsea in New York City. More info vincentkatz.net

The authors are grateful to the The Milton Resnick and Pat Passlof Foundation and to Alex Paul Chapin for graciously hosting this event

tickets and information here

To celebrate the launch of the new podcast The Second Oswald –– Live one-night-only play with totally slammin’ poet Bob Holman & followed by a discussion hosted by Jesse Walker, author United States of Paranoia: A Conspiracy Theory. HarperCollins, 2013

A new podcast and play, THE SECOND OSWALD sheds light on a little known aspect of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination in Dallas, Texas on November 22, 1963. Could the accused assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald, been set up to be the patsy? The series focuses on writer Kerry Thornley who served with Lee Harvey Oswald in the US Marines and wrote a novel about him a year before he killed JFK. Thornley would later implicate himself in the conspiracy and became a major influence on Q-Anon and other fringe underground groups through his writings. T

This is not just another conspiracy theory

tickets available at evenbrite here

Press: The Village Sun | Going Deep with Russ Baker

New York Public Library Jefferson Market Branch and Three Rooms Press present 

A Dual Book Launch with Peter Carlaftes & Kat Georges – celebrating the release of their new poetry collections

LIFE IN THE PAST LANE and AWE AND OTHER WORDS LIKE WOW

with special guests Andrei Codrescu • Uche Nduka • Puma Perl • Karen Hildebrand • Jane LeCroy • Sophie Malleret

Jefferson Market Library NYC – free & open to the public more info here

WHITE RABBIT  magazine, Ed. Dorothy Friedman August, and Jefferson Market Library present The Two Steves, a compilation party and a reading dedicated to Steve Cannon and Steve Dalachinsk

This is an ensemble, group participatory event to commemorate the life and work of these two larger than life denizens of the LES poetry scene

Yuko Otomo, Nancy Mercado, Ron Kolm, Danny Shot, Austin Alexis, Katherine Arnoldi, Ama Birch, Ken Angel Davis, Jim Feast, Bonny Finberg, Philip Giambri, Diana Gitesha Hernandez, Bob Holman, Linda Kleinbub, David Lawton, Mindy Levokove, Prince McNally, Lissa Moira, Shalom Neuman, Eve Packer, Puma Perl, Barbara Rosenthal, Yuyutsu Sharma, Larissa Shmailo, Joanna Sit, Mervyn Taylor, Richard West

WHITE RABBIT’S publisher is award-winning poet Dorothy Friedman whose work has appeared most recently in Tribes WORD anthology

This event is free and open to the public

more information here

2023 NYC ¡DADA! DO PART II

Andrei has contributed to and particiapates again this year in Three Rooms Press Maintenant 17’s complication of contemporary dada art and literature

It will certainly live up to its promise: A Highly Eclectic DADA Performance Event plus Part II of the NYC Coast launch of MAINTENANT 17: Journal of Contemporary DADA Writing and Art –– An evening of provocative, exuberant, eclectic performance and poetry is slated to hit the stage

Readings by: Joel Allegretti, Billy Cancel, Robert C. Ford, Robert Gibbons, Gordon Gilbert, Mark Glista, Meghan Gruposso, Heide Hatry, Adeena Karasick, Matthew Hupert, Debra Jenks, Jerry Johnson, David Lawton, Jane LeCroy, Martin H. Levinson, Karen Neuberg, Ruth Oisteanu, Valery Oisteanu, Jane Ormerod, Giorgia Pavlidou, Puma Perl, Bruce Robinson, Martina Salisbury, Lynnea Villanova, George Wallace, and Francine Witte

Three Rooms Press co-founders and MAINTENANT editors Peter Carlaftes and Kat Georges host. 

This event is free and open to the public

more info here

A Possible Epic of Care: A Collaborative Poem Between Andrei Codrescu and Vincent Katz

Andrei on his collaboration between himself and Vincent Katz: ‘Our common bonds at that curious time of the planet-engulfing Plague were various: we were friends, we were poets, we took poetry seriously enough to believe in its superpowers, but above all, we both had mothers who at ages past Ninety needed the care and attention that we could provide them. Our exchanges quickly became an ongoing epic of care. It became also a store of reminiscences, activities and ideas that paid homage to the women we cared for—communiqués and confessions that we would have liked them to appreciate’

It feels dry to recite Vincent’s bona fides; Vincent is Andrei’s esteemed colleague and very dear friend. Vincent Katz is a beautiful poet, translator, critic, editor, and curator. He has authored fifteen books of poetry, including Broadway for Paul (2020, Alfred A. Knopf), Southness (2016, Lunar Chandelier Press), Swimming Home (2015, Nightboat Books), Rapid Departures (2005, Ateliê Editorial), Understanding Objects (2000, Hard Press), Pearl (1998, powerHouse Books) and Cabal of Zealots (1988, Hanuman Books). more here

From A Possible Epic of Care: ‘I was washing an eggplant at the end of the world on February 4 2020 when I heard from Vincent. It was Mozart's 39;s birthday, a momentous event that the melophiliac
Vincent Katz would never have let pass without a celebratory panegyri

There it was in the email, beginning. It’s Mozart's39th birthday. He's only 264.years old; Mozart died young but kept on living. Vincent and I were older already than
Mozart was when he died, but if we had any chance at living as long as he did we had better get to work’

purchase here

Black Widow Press, October 17 2023

ISBN: 979-8-9880852-2-5 paperback, 144 pages

Renown film director Werner Herzog will receives FilmScene’s Cinema Savant award at the Second Annual Refocus Film Festival. Afterwards, Andrei will appear in conversation with Werner to discuss Werner’s life in film and soon-to-be-released autobiography, Every Man for Himself and God Against All: A Memoir

If you find yourself in Iowa City in mid October – this stimulating conversation will prove a must-see

event information here

award information here

recap here

Andrei is again delighted to participate in the Boog City Arts Festival – always a favorite!

Andrei will join Vincent Katz, Joanna Fuhrman, Jiwon Choi and Uche Nduka. Hosted by Boog City editor David A. Kirschenbaum

Keep an eye out for the forthcoming collaboration: An Epic of Care by Andrei Codrescu and Vincent Katz – Black Press (fall 2023)

Here’s link to last years’s Boog City 16 Arts Festival – this years’ is on the way!

I once tried to give Kundera $60,000 to give a lecture in Oklahoma

Andrei provides his recollections and insights into Kundera’s literary contributions, without revision

As folk wisdom has it, there is a long, possibly infinite line of better-than Shakespeare Shakespeares waiting in the afterworld for their rewards

read the article on The New Black Bart Poetry Society’s online publication here