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 Getting to know Michael Perry, One Story at a Time Amanda Duncan, UW-Manitowoc News Staff A self-described "Country Chronicler" says the //Washington Post// while //Kirkus // raves "Dryly humorous, mildly neurotic and just plain soulful.” Michael Perry, writer and humorist from Fall Creek, Wisconsin has written several books including //Population: 485;// //Coop ////: A Year of Poultry, Pigs, and Parenting; ////Truck: A Love Story; //and //Visiting Tom: A Man, a Highway, and the Road to Roughneck//. Perry will help kick off the 50th anniversary celebration of UW-Manitowoc as a campus on the lake, on October 13, 2012 at 7:30 pm with stories related to the anniversary theme, “A Sense of Place.”

Dr. Jessica Van Slooten, UW-Manitowoc English instructor, said she chose Perry’s work for her English 101 class because “it has a wider range of stories and focuses on the importance of place.” Van Slooten explained that she likes “to include narrative reading and writing in English 101 to help students focus on clear, descriptive, engaging writing, to encourage students to find their own writing voices, and to see that we all have important moments and stories that need to be told.” When Van Slooten met Perry at a reading, he was “very personable and seemed surprised and interested that she taught his books” at the university. She later asked him to stop in Manitowoc as part of his tour for //Visiting Tom.//

 Van Slooten intends to have her class to read //Population: 485// and write their own narrative essay about a place that is special to them from their home town, using Perry’s book as a model. Van Slooten said she hopes “students learn that their stories and experiences are important and valuable--that people want to know who they are where they’re from--and that writing is a great tool for sharing ourselves with others.” She invited Perry for a reading “hoping that students learn that there are many kinds of writing, and it’s possible to blend descriptive, narrative writing with informative, analytical, and research writing.” Van Slooten also hopes her students “learn that a strong vocabulary range is wide, from slang and everyday language to what I call $5 words. Perry is a great example of all of these writing traits.”

Perry will read from his new book, //Visiting Tom: A Man, a Highway, and the Road to Roughneck //which is his first book to make the //New York Times// bestseller list, tell some stories from “The Clodhopper Monologues” and make up other stories on the fly. This event, sponsored by the Lecture and Fine Arts Committee, the UW-Manitowoc English Department, and the UW-Manitowoc Foundation, is open to the public. General admission tickets are $5.00; UW-Manitowoc students with ID are free. Tickets may be purchased at the UW-Manitowoc Administrative Services Office in advance during business hours, Monday-Thursday 8:00am-6:00pm, and Friday, 8:00am-4:30pm or at the door starting at 7:00pm.

Poet Denise Sweet to Visit UW-Manitowoc

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">By Lindsay Brookshier, UW-Manitowoc student

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Poet Denise Sweet invites you into a world rich with culture, emotion and humor. The poems speak to your core pulling you further in. Poetry is said to engage the mind and the soul; her poems do not disappoint. You will find yourself coming back to them, to the bold patterned words reflecting your personal experiences. They will entwine your heart and engage your mind, leaving you breathless for just one more stanza.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Denise Sweet, White Earth Professor Emerita, Humanistic Studies, English, and First Nations Studies at UW-Green Bay, has shared her work through nearly 100 public readings across the United States, Canada, Mexico and Guatemala. She has won several of awards for her poetry including the Diane Decorah Award, the Posner Award, the Woman of the Year Award from the Wisconsin Women's Council, and the Native Writers' Circle of the Americas First Book Award for Poetry.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Sweet’s poetry connects to Native American culture in rich, varied ways. The poem titled “Discharming” begins with a line from a Chippewa charming song, "Hear the voice of my song -- it is my voice. I speak to your naked heart." Interestingly, her poem speaks in an opposite context from this quote. The stanza,

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">“While I shake the rattle of ferocity moments before sunrise

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">while I burn sage and sweetgrass, and you, my darling,

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">while I burn you like some ruined fetish and sing over you

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">over and over like an almighty voice from the skies”

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Bright, striking words like //ferocity//, //fetish// and //almighty// empower this work. The poem is the opposite of a Charming Song and causes a “discharming” towards love. Thus Sweet lures the reader into the depths of her intricate poems.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Sweet also uses a touch of humor in some of her poems that hit deep with the resounding message buried within the folds of her work. The poem, “Zen and Woman’s Way of Parking,” strikes at the casual gender stereotype surrounding jokes about women and driving. There is a hint of sarcasm and triumph throughout this work. It has the feeling of a revolution as the stanzas conclude with the powerful line, “We are at last in the driver's seat, and we laugh in the face of cruise control.” Is this merely just a statement about gender stereotypes or this is a line striking the bigger picture of how our country values women? Sweet paints us a bold picture.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',serif; font-size: 12pt;">Denise Sweet, Wisconsin’s Poet Laureate from 2004-2008, will read her poetry on Tuesday, October 18, 2012 from 5:30 to 7pm in Hillside Hall, Room 102, at UW-Manitowoc. The reading is part of the university’s Spirit of the Rivers course, and is open to the public through Continuing Education. Call <span class="skype_pnh_print_container_1349455403">920-683-4702 for tickets, $10.00 for non-students; UW-Manitowoc students are free with ID.