The Bratty Poets Series

Day: Saturday

Stage: Algonquin

Time: 3:30 PM

Interview with curator Carina Finn.

1. Tell us a little bit about your organization.

The Bratty Poets Series was started in Brooklyn, August ’88, when I was born and made my mom go through 28 hours of labor before an emergency c-section; my dad was out playing golf and getting Chinese food during most of the ordeal. It was also started March ’12 in New Orleans, when a stranger bought me several jell-o shots and then proceeded to stand on the sidewalk and tell me that going to school for poetry was the dumbest thing he had ever heard. It was also started February ’63 when Sylvia Plath put her head in an oven, and again in February ’10 when I dressed up as Sylvia Plath and wore a turquoise cardboard oven on my head, and again in June ’12 when I was ripping apart strawberry pancakes at the  Horus Cafe in the East Village and crying and chain-smoking Nat Sherman Fantasias while reading Ode on a Grecian Urn on my iPhone.

The mission of The Bratty Poets Series is to create a space where Poets can be Bratty without worrying about anyone judging them for being brats. At a Bratty Poets Series event, you’re allowed to drink too many picklebacks and make out with everyone and then puke in a Whole Foods bag; a Bratty officiator will hold your hair back and then order you a mini-hamburger and french fries from Seamless and share a milkshake with you while you cry about how you will never write a poem as good as The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock. We’d also like to encourage better fashion at poetry-related events, in general.

2. Who is reading in your slot at the Festival and why?

Ben Fama is reading on Saturday and Jiyoon Lee is reading on Sunday; each will be accompanied by a secret special guest. They were chosen because they’re two of the biggest brats in New York City and probably the world. They have impeccable style and are great at brooding and pouting. They’re also a diverse pair; Ben is a very public Brat, a neo-vintage flaneur who does amazing work with memes and Facebook statuses, and Jiyoon is an adorable plastic gothic lolita rainbowbrite doll with an Android phone for a brain.  They also write really, really, really good poems and read them in a non-nauseating manner.

3. Who else are you looking forward to seeing at the Festival?

Amber Tamblyn, CA Conrad, Dottie Lasky, Mark Strand, Christie-Anne Reynolds, Niina Polari, Paul Legault, Jennifer Michael Hecht, Timothy Donnelly, and anyone who stops by the Action Books table, which is where the Bratty Poets will congregate when they’re not reading poems.

4. Did you attend the Festival last year? If so, what was your favorite thing about it. 

Yes. I really enjoyed the parasols, and the rainbow sprinkles on the vanilla ice cream cone I got from the Mister Softee truck.

5. Why is live poetry important? 

Live poetry is important because most poets are not dead; well, most living poets are not dead. Some living poets are probably a little bit dead, but that must be due in part to the fact that they do not take part in live poetry, or if they do, they do it without conviction, like a zombie eating their non-zombie best-friend’s liver. Live poetry is also a great excuse to wear a really good outfit and hang out with your friends.