Past Forward

Today our podcast connects with Namrata Poddar. Namrata Poddar writes fiction, non-fiction, occasionally translates Francophone writers of Afro-Asian diaspora into English and serves as Interviews Editor for Kweli where she curates a series on Race, Power, and Storytelling. For over a decade, her work has explored the intersection of storytelling and social justice via race, class, gender, place a...

To celebrate the launch of Steven Sanchez’s first full-length poetry book,  Phantom   Tongue,  Mike sits down with Steven, Michelle Brittan Rosado, and Mathieu Cailler to talk about the process of putting a book together, how one manages to keep making love poems interesting, the power of persona poems and so much more! Mathieu Cailler ’s poetry and prose have been widely featured in numerous nati...

Rocky Kuner is a 20 year old singer songwriter from Orange County. She graduated from the Orange County School of the Arts in Santa Ana and studied Commercial Music and Music & Theater. She plays mulitiple instruments including guitar, dulcimer, bass, drums, cajón and piano. She is currently in a Rush Tribute band called YYNOT as the lead vocalist and has already traveled to play in Florida with t...

Today our podcast connects with Steve Martinez. Los Angeles native Steve Martinez is a fine artist, muralist, photographer, graphic designer, and painted a 20’ x 8’ mural in the 1888 Center. His contemporary work deals with the discourse between the symbolic and the realistic within daily urban life. The thread of Mayan symbols and hieroglyphs—both representative of Martinez’s history and culture—...

Mike sits down with novelist Liz Harmer, poet and community organizer Trevor K Allred, and a poet Shauna Barbosa to hear the work from their individual projects and discuss the power of audience, politics, the meaning of portals, the meaning of water, the magic of astrology and why fake bluster is important (AND SO MUCH MORE)! Trevor Kaiser Allred has work published in Boned Stories, Eunoia Review...

Driven by their love of music Bright Is My Sun formed a group that would be inspirational and positive. As a collective, they have many different influences and use their experience and tastes as a tool for success in making music. Bright Is My Sun has the ambition and talent to settle into the industry just nicely… especially with their message of positivity, considering everything else is about...

Today our podcast connects with Sarah Nicole Smetana. The Midnights (HarperTeen / HarperCollins) is her first novel. Sarah Nicole Smetana grew up in Orange, California, where she wrote songs, played in a few bands, and successfully pilfered all of her parents’ best vinyl records. She received her BFA in Creative Writing from Chapman University and her MFA in Fiction from The New School. Currently,...

Today our podcast connects with Panio Gianopoulos. Panio Gianopoulos is the author of the story collection, How to Get Into Our House and Where We Keep the Money , and the novella, A Familiar Beast . His stories, essays, and poetry have appeared in Tin House , Northwest Review , Salon , The Rattling Wall , Chicago Quarterly Review , Big Fiction , The Brooklyn Rail , Catamaran Literary Reader , and...

Back in February, Mike sat down with poets Eric Morago, Nan Cohen, and Victoria Chang to discuss how becoming a publisher can affect one’s writing, the influence of history and religion, and intense poetry projects, plus a whole lot more! Eric Morago  is a two-time Pushcart Prize nominated poet who believes performance carries as much importance on the page, as it does off. Currently he hosts a mo...

Today our podcast connects with Irena Praitis. Irena Praitis’s fifth book The Last Stone in the Circle received the 2015 Red Mountain Press Poetry Prize.  Her poems, translations, essays, and reviews have appeared in more than 100 journals including Southwest Review , Denver Quarterly , and Rattle . She was a Fulbright Scholar in Vilnius, Lithuania, and is a professor of creative writing and liter...

Today our podcast connects with Jonathan Alexander. Jonathan Alexander is a writer, literacy scholar, and cultural critic. Jonathan is Chancellor’s Professor of English at UC Irvine, where he is director of the Center for Excellence in Writing and Communication. He is the author, co-author, or editor of 13 books, including Writing Youth: Young Adult Fiction as Literacy Sponsorship (2016) and the n...

Another edition of  Writers’ Block Live!  Back in May, Mike sat down with nonfiction writer Doug Dechow and poet Jason Morphew to talk about research into one’s own family, separating fact from fantasy, the allure of isolation, lyric poetry and much more! Doug Dechow  is researching and writing a book about his grand-uncle Harry Dale Park, who died over France in World War II.  Doug’s article on t...

A live recording of our educational podcast with Nicole Miyuki Santo. Nicole Miyuki Santo is a freelance artist, graphic designer, teacher, and recent published author of By Hand: The Art of Modern Lettering . Since 2015, she has taught in-person hand-lettering workshops empowering her students to tap into their creativity and develop their own unique voice. She is a kind spirit and truly believes...

Dréa is a singer, songwriter, classical pianist, poet and spoken word artist. Her songs tell the story of a life lived thus far, encompassing a wide range of emotion and conviction. Robert is an Oscar & Grammy winning, Emmy nominated Producer/Engineer/Mixer and owner of Defy Recordings. Recent clients of note include Paul McCartney, Lady Gaga, U2, Chaka Khan, Placido Domingo, Ingrid Michelson, Chr...

Today our podcast connects with Rebecca Makkai, author of The Borrower , The Hundred-Year House , which won the Novel of the Year Award from the Chicago Writers Association, and Music for Wartime . Her work has appeared in The Best American Short Stories , Harper's , and Tin House , among others. She lives outside Chicago with her husband and two daughters.     1888 Center programs are recorded an...

In this episode Peter connects with artist Sandra Jones Campbell. Visual and fine artist Sandra Jones Campbell discusses her inspiration and resulting artwork, a form that has touched millions.  Her experiences allow an exploration of multiple issues that artists confront, from the nature of art as an extension of oneself and the legal system's limited protection for moral rights in the artist's c...

A live recording of our educational podcast The Purpose of Past Tense  with Daron Joffe. Produced in partnership with the Orange Home Grown . Biodynamics is a holistic, ecological, and ethical approach to farming, gardening, food, and nutrition. Biodynamic agriculture has been practiced for nearly a century, on every continent on Earth. Biodynamic principles and practices are based on the spiritua...

A live recording of our educational podcast The Purpose of Past Tense  with Nick Cole. Produced in partnership with the California Writers Club. Nick Cole is a former soldier and working actor living in Southern California. When he is not auditioning for commercials, going out for sitcoms or being shot, kicked, stabbed or beaten by the students of various film schools for their projects, he can be...

A live recording of our educational podcast The Purpose of Past Tense  with Maci Peterson. Produced in partnership with Chapman50 . Maci Peterson is a Millennial entrepreneur and marketing expert. She has been named “Tech’s Newest Innovator” by Essence Magazine, and is a recognized subject-matter expert and advisor on entrepreneurship, innovation and diversity initiatives. Maci is the co-founder a...

A live recording of our educational podcast The Grammar of Science and Technology  with Dr. Robert Trivers. Moderated by Dr. Terence Burnham. Robert Trivers is an evolutionary biologist who concentrates on social theory based on natural selection, and on evolutionary genetics—the twin backbones of biology. Early work concentrated on reciprocal altruism, the evolution of sex differences, the sex ra...

Another edition of  Writers’ Block Live!  Back in March, Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz and Derrick C. Brown came by to read from their newest books ( How to Love the Empty Air  and  Hell o. It Doesn’t Matter . respectively). They also share about their writing processes, how a poem becomes a poem, about what it’s like being friends for twenty years! Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz is the author of seven books...

Peter interviews fan fiction author and writer Emma Lord to discuss the critical role fan fiction plays in developing writing talent, in broadening writing environments, and in finding outlets for different viewpoints. In exploring these issues, we learn more about the role of copyright law and fair use law when exploring existing characters in different settings or new characters in existing cont...

A live recording of our educational podcast  The How, The Why  with Sara Saedi. Sara was born in Tehran, Iran smack-dab in the middle of a war and an Islamic Revolution. She received a B.A. in Film and Mass Communications from the University of California, Berkeley and began her career as a creative executive for ABC Daytime. Since then she’s penned three TV movies for ABC Family and a pilot for t...

Inventing in the Trenches is the theme for this episode of The Arts Counsel. We connect with designer Tara Cavosie of HookedUp Shapewear and explore intellectual property in fashion design. This podcast interview with fashion accessory designer Tara Cavosie of HookedUp Shapewear explores the intellectual property regime touching those in the fashion design space.  What do you do when you have a gr...

A live recording of our educational podcast  The How, The Why  with Amy Wallen and guest moderator Samantha Dunn. Amy E. Wallen is Associate Director at the New York State Writers Institute and teaches creative writing at the University of California, San Diego Extension. Her first novel, Moon Pies and Movie Stars , was a Los Angeles Times bestseller.  When We Were Ghouls , releases in Spring 2018...