Coming from American slam roots, queer Jewish poet sam sax has used his raw and intimate poetry to vocalise the complexities of his own identity, animating his own experience through language. Amidst his burgeoning accomplishments in the states, Poet in the City is thrilled to collaborate with Out-Spoken to offer you the rare opportunity to see this dynamic artist just a little closer to home…

From the complexities of mental health to queer preconceptions, to stories of the Jewish diaspora, sax questions both history and his own ancestry in an attempt to unpack some of the most pressing matters of our time. Join us in exploring these issues and more in an engaging evening of discussion and live poetry performance hosted by Dr. Devorah Baum, an exciting voice on contemporary Jewish identity and the way our context impacts how we engage with the world around us.

sax and Baum will be joined by UK based poet Lisa Luxx, whose fierce and revolutionary poetry tackles similar themes of mental health and queer identity, as well as feminism and the concept of unlearning love.

sax’s work has received much literary acclaim, garnering an admirable collection of accolades, including the American Literary Award, the National Poetry Series, and most recently the James Laughlin Award for his 2018 collection Bury It. A bold and inspiring performer, sax has also taken the title spot at the Bay Area Grand Slam Championship twice, as well as featuring on notable online platforms such as Button Poetry and Buzzfeed.

sam sax is a queer, Jewish poet and educator. He’s the author of Madness (Penguin, 2017) winner of The National Poetry Series and Bury It (Wesleyan University Press, 2018) winner of the James Laughlin Award from the Academy of American Poets. He’s received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, Lambda Literary and the MacDowell Colony. He’s the two-time Bay Area Grand Slam Champion, author of four chapbooks and winner of the Gulf Coast Prize, The Iowa Review Award and American Literary Award. His poems have appeared in BuzzFeed, The New York Times, The Nation, Poetry Magazine and other journals. He’s the poetry editor at BOAAT Press and will be a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University in 2018.

Lisa Luxx is a writer, performer, essayist and activist of British Syrian heritage. Winner of the 2018 Outspoken Prize for Performance Poetry and a regular feature at major literary events across the UK and Lebanon. She’s also the author of three poetry chapbooks, including The 4th Brain. She is currently finishing her first full-length collection, Breastmilk Martini, a love-anarchy book for the anti-romance generation.

Dr Devorah Baum is Associate Professor in English Literature and Critical Theory at the University of Southampton.  She is the author of two books, Feeling Jewish (Yale University Press) and The Jewish Joke (Profile), and co-director of the creative documentary feature film, The New Man.  She has written for a range of publications including The New York Times, The Guardian, The Financial Times and Granta.  She is currently co-editing a special issue of Granta Magazine on ‘The Politics of Feeling’, coming out in Feb 2019.

This event is part of Out-Spoken’s US Poets touring programme, bringing exciting US artists to the UK to deliver a programme of workshops and live poetry events. Poet in the City is delighted to be co-producing and co-curating the US Poets London events alongside Out-Spoken.