Chase Berggrun

8 years sober, today (coin courtesy of my wonderful sober mother)

I’m so so pumped to be teaching this class, online via @poetshouse.bsky.social, a syllabus of poets fundamental not just to my poetics but my personhood. Come read with me! poetshouse.org/event/semina...

Erasures & Appropriated Text: A Crash Course with Chase Berggrun Placing poetry at the crossroads of American life since 1910.

I’m teaching a five week seminar on erasure for @poetrysociety.org ! Come read and think and play with me! Discount code “FallLearning20” gets you 20% off. More here: poetrysociety.org/events/crash...

Writers Against the War on Gaza on X: ""On March 25, PEN America fired me for living up to their mission" writes Kori Davis on his termination from @PENamerica after he shared articles critical of Zionism to the internal listserv. Davis now shares how the free speech organization betrays their mission and employees." / X "On March 25, PEN America fired me for living up to their mission" writes Kori Davis on his termination from @PENamerica after he shared articles critical of Zionism to the internal listserv. Davis now shares how the free speech organization betrays their mission and employees.

Thread: x.com/wawog_now/st...

PEN America claims to support free speech, but fired me for speaking about Palestine The free speech organization PEN America fired me three days after I published an article about how they investigated me for sharing an article critical of Zionism. My termination is a sad reflection ...

This is infuriating, unsurprising, and absolute bullshit. A
@penamerica.bsky.social employee has been fired from a "free speech" organization for ... practicing free speech. Shame on PEN y e t a g a i n.
mondoweiss.net/2025/08/pen-...

Sans intervention immédiate, les derniers reporters de Gaza vont mourir 21 juillet 2025 L'AFP travaille avec une pigiste texte, trois photographes et six pigistes vidéo dans la Bande de Gaza depuis le départ de ses journalistes staff courant 2024. Avec quelques autres, ils sont aujourd'hui les seuls à rapporter ce qu'il se passe dans la Bande de Gaza. La presse internationale est interdite d'entrer dans ce territoire depuis près de deux ans. Nous refusons de les voir mourir. L'un deux, Bashar, collabore pour l'AFP depuis 2010, d'abord comme fixeur, ensuite comme photographe pigiste, et depuis 2024 comme principal photographe. Samedi 19 juillet, il est parvenu à poster un message sur Facebook: « Je n'ai plus la force de travailler pour les médias. Mon corps est maigre et je ne peux plus travailler ». Bashar, 30 ans, travaille et vit dans des conditions égales à celles de tous les Gazaouis, allant d'un camp de réfugiés à un autre camp au gré des bombardements israéliens. Depuis plus d'un an il vit dans le dénuement le plus total et travaille en prenant d'énormes risques pour sa vie. L'hygiène est pour lui un problème majeur, avec des périodes de maladies intestinales sévères. Bashar vit depuis février dans les ruines de sa maison de Gaza City avec sa mère, ses quatre frères et sœurs et la famille d'un de ses frères. Leur maison est vide de tout aménagement et confort, à part quelques coussins. Dimanche matin, il a rapporté que son frère aîné était « tombé, à cause de la faim ». Même si ces journalistes reçoivent un salaire mensuel de l'AFP, il n'y a rien à acheter ou alors à des prix totalement exorbitants. Le système bancaire a disparu, et ceux qui pratiquent le change entre les comptes bancaires en ligne et l'argent liquide prennent une commission de près de 40%. L'AFP n'a plus la possibilité d'avoir un véhicule et encore moins de l'essence pour permettre à ses journalistes de se déplacer pour leurs reportages. Circuler en voiture équivaut de toutes les façons à pre…

🚨BREAKING: The last journalists working for AFP in Gaza have said they can no longer work for the news agency.

They are out of energy and they are starving to death.

I have never seen a statement from a news organisation like it.

🧵

The real beauty of reading: No two readers experience the same book in the same way. @themountaingoats.bsky.social doesn’t dig the footnotes in The Competition of Unfinished Stories; @patriphobe.bsky.social loves them (as do we). Form your own opinion in November when this Kurdish novel is out.

Out of curiosity—what about the footnotes didn’t work for you? (I loved them)

New York! I’m teaching a class on the poetics of resistance this summer at Brooklyn Poets! Come join us.

Poetics of Resistance — Brooklyn Poets How can we, as writers and as human beings, reject the hollowing violence of neutrality in favor of a poetry that stands as tall as our bodies in the streets? In this six-week, in-person workshop, we ...

How can we, as writers & as human beings, reject the hollowing violence of neutrality? In this 6 week, in-person workshop w/ @patriphobe.bsky.social, we'll explore poetics as a vehicle of change, as a call to action & as part & parcel of the work of opposing empire. brooklynpoets.org/workshop/p/p...

Happy Pub Day R E D Friends, Today is the official publication date for R E D, by Chase Berggrun! It’s available now as a Handpicked title for May from SPD. Get 20% off with code HANDPICKED. ...

7 years ago, Birds LLC helped me bring R E D into the world! I am so grateful for the readers & teachers who spent time with this text, & the way it has resisted the truncated lifecycle of a poetry collection: for the generosity you have all afforded my lil book.

birdsllc.com/news/happy-p...

Included are some never-before-seen messy process documents! &, as a part of their “Not Too Hard To Master” series, the essay is accompanied by a writing prompt designed to discourage you from writing erasure poems: www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazi...

A new essay in @poetryfoundation.bsky.social, on the politics & pitfalls of erasure (I too dislike it), my own history with the form, Srikanth Reddy’s Voyager, & the process & experience of writing my erasure of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, R E D, is now online! www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazi...

As part of a Palestine Studies cluster hire, Hunter College is honored to announce its search for two open-rank tenure-line professors, with an expected start date in Fall 2025, in Palestinian studies with one in the social sciences and the other in the humanities

R E D by Chase Berggrun (Birds, LLC)

Small press knowledge means needing the perfect birthday gift and ordering directly from the press because you know it will be far, far faster than even your local indie bookstore 📚💙 Support your local poetry presses, readers! #NationalPoetryMonth @patriphobe.bsky.social

Susan Abulhawa’s response to PEN America’s complicity with genocide Read Susan Abulhawa’s scorching letter to the head of PEN America where she takes a blowtorch to the organization’s continued complicity with Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

@susanabulhawa.bsky.social on PEN America's refusal to acknowledge the genocide in Palestine: mondoweiss.net/2025/04/susa...

If you've been nominated for a 2025 PEN America award, please get in touch via email or DM!

To reiterate: THE BOYCOTT STANDS

www.writersagainstthewarongaza.com/boycott-pen-...

The fact that this org is not concertedly dedicating the entirety of its resources to defending Mahmoud Khalil & students being targeted at Columbia & across the country confirms that these useless nonprofits serve as nothing more than tax havens for self-satisfied liberals.

An FAQ from PEN America - PEN America We thank the members of our community who have spoken to us about their concerns, and want to be transparent in sharing publicly the information we have shared with them.

This "FAQ" is a direct response to WAWOG's demands, though it answers not a single one of them. Instead, point by point, they double down on their hypocrisies. Predictably, their response merely illuminates the need to continue boycotting this shameless org.
pen.org/an-faq-from-...

I'm not gonna respond point by point but this one drives me insane: ⁨⁨this links to a statement opposing the cancellation of a talk by "Sam Fried, an American-born IDF soldier, in an event titled “An Evening of Conversation: The Story of One American IDF Soldier.”⁩ Not a writer, scholar, or artist.

I received an invitation from PEN America.
I declined.
In 2024 writers initiated a boycott because of PEN’s silence on the genocide and that silence is still loud.
I believe daylight matters.
Here is the text of my response:

THE BOYCOTT STANDS! Despite the ouster of Suzanne Nossel after concerted pressure from thousands of writers, @penamerica.bsky.social has made no effort toward repair or meeting any of our demands. More info here:

www.writersagainstthewarongaza.com/boycott-pen-...

The poetry that he brought into the world saved me, it taught me, it will enlarge my conception of possibility to the end of my days. Thank you, Pierre. Thank you so, so very much.

His Nomadics blog is a record of a life spent dedicated to bringing literature from around the globe to English-speaking readers. His insistence on the internationalism of language was a life-long, serious, and noble project.

pierrejoris.com/blog/

Pierre Joris' poetry and his translations of Paul Celan changed my life. Breathturn Into Timestead, his rendering of Celan's later books, transformed my conception of what a poem is and can do. He was an inimitable steward of language, bringing light to everything he touched.

and yet PEN has been silent for decades as "Israel" has tortured and murdered thousands of political prisoners. I guess hostages are only hostages if they're not Palestinians.

There are a few! With some lovely poets and comrades! Doesn’t diminish the real fuck you of platforming these sickos.