Tickets are $5 online to guarantee seating, or $5-10 suggested donation at the door. No one will be turned away for lack of funds.
Click here to purchase tickets.
Brattleboro’s newest small publisher, Mount Island, is throwing a launch party on Saturday, October 19, and it will be no ordinary literary soirée, but instead “Touché!” a tournament-style game show. The evening will be filled with several rounds of fun and friendly literary battle. The doors open at 7 p.m., with a $5-$10 suggested donation at the door. No one will be turned away for lack of funds! Touché is a Brattleboro Literary Fest affiliated event.
This new literary magazine challenges popular (mis)perceptions of rural communities by supporting the visibility and creative aspirations of rural LGBTQ+ and POC writers and artists. A recent report from the National Black Justice Coalition, the Movement Advancement Project, the Equality Federation, and the National Center for Lesbian Rights confirms the national need for that visibility and inclusion, stating that, “..an estimated 2.9-3.8 million LGBTQ/SGL people live in rural America, accounting for roughly 15-20 percent of the national LGBTQ/SGL population.” Many of these individuals are queer folks of color while one fifth of all rural Americans, that is approximately 10.3 million individuals, are people of color. In a landscape that is often filled with assumptions about what rural life is life and who dwells within the landscape, Mount Island is setting out to break down the walls of perception locally and nationally.
The evening will include judges Francis Cannon, GennaRose Nethercott, and Donald Mutebi who will be joined by four contestants who will engage in a playful battle of words until the last round. Desmond Peeples, creator and editor of Mount Island adds, “I wanted to celebrate our contributors and invite the community into our work through play, in a way that could welcome folks who might not otherwise go to a ‘literary’ event. So we created this Frankenstein’s monster of a game show, stitching classic word games and writing exercises together and lacing the rounds through with poetry and prose from our new issue.”
Additionally, individuals will be able to purchase limited edition poetry broadsides and donate to Mount Island’s fundraising efforts. The first digital issue of Mount Island will be available October 31. Excerpts from the upcoming issue, including an excerpt of the poem to be published as broadsides, “Selections from Inferior Normal” by Tyler Orion, can be read for free at mountisland.com.
Join Mount Island on Satuday October 19, 7-9PM at 118 Elliot to celebrate the new magazine and play “Touché! A Tournament of Words.”
Mount Island is a literary magazine and small press dedicated to creating space for rural LGBTQ+ and POC voices to be heard on their own terms and find solidarity in community. Mount Island is a magazine by us, of us, and for anybody who wants to see rural America for all it really is. Learn more at mountisland.com.