The Norman Mailer Center Gala - A Meeting of Giants

Date: Thursday, October 4, 2012 at 7:00 pm
Location: Mandarin Oriental Hotel, New York City 
What: Fourth Annual Benefit Gala honoring Robert A. Caro, Joyce Carol Oates, Barnet Lee Rosset, Jr., and The Muhammad Ali Center represented by Muhammad Ali

'With the pride of the artist, you must blow against the walls of every power that exists the small trumpet of your defiance.' -- Norman Mailer 

Norman Mailer and Muhammad Ali arm wrestling

The Norman Mailer Center supports and celebrates writers who challenge readers' perspective on the world around them, promoting a vision of writers as "people of action."

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and Muhammad Ali

A diverse set of programming supports the Center's mission, including creative writing workshops, the Mailer Fellowships, and initiatives for international outreach and exchange. Through its work, the Center provides support to early- and mid-center writers in all genres who embrace the values that drove Mailer's work: those who reach a broad audience, fully excise their creativity, apply themselves to the craft of writing with the rigor of an athlete, and thrive on dialogue and debate. 

The Norman Mailer Center and the NM Writers Colony

In 2011, the Center launched a Capital Campaign to purchase the historic Mailer Home in Provincetown, MA, from the Mailer estate, which includes his writing studio and Mailer's personal library of over four thousand books. 

The Center aims to preserve the role of the engaged writer's as not only a legitimate, but indispensable voice in the contemporary discourse (The Normal Mailer Center Website - nmcenter.org). 

Whale Week returns to Provincetown, July 23-28

The winners of the 2011 Build Your Own
Boat Race Best Costume Category
PCCS Image 

The Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies invites you to bring family and friends to Whale Week- A Celebration of the Sea!

This fun, marine-themed festival, which takes place between July 23 and July 28, was launched in 2011 and is the brain-child of the Center’s Education director, Jesse Mechling, who wanted to expand visitors’ connection with the marine environment on the Outer Cape.

Whale Week features a host of fun, family-friendly events and activities, all with a briny theme. 

The festival begins on Monday, July 23 at 5pm with the hugely entertaining Home Made Boat Race, sponsored and coordinated by Venture Athletics Kayak Shop. 

Jesse Mechling, Director for Education,
shares the secret wonders of Provincetown's
tidal flats with a group of enthusiastic, young
naturalists.
PCCS Image

Teams from local businesses and organizations will launch their water-craft on the beach behind the Whalers Wharf and the Crown and Anchor. Jay Critchley of the Provincetown Community Compact will emcee and Candy Collins-Boden of the Provincetown Chamber of Commerce, Erin Atwood of the Provincetown Business Guild and comedian Mimi Gonzalez will judge. Points will be awarded not only for the contestants’ speed on the water, but also on the inventiveness of their boat and costume, and on the amount of marine debris they collect en route. Pledges collected by participating teams will support the Center’s education programs. 

On Tuesday, July 24 at 9:30am, Center naturalists will lead an exploration of the tidal flats at the West End Breakwater. This free tour introduces people to the diverse and fascinating critters that inhabit the harbor and marsh. At 11 am a Marine Scavenger Hunt begins from the Center for Coastal Studies kiosk on MacMillan Pier, with a “shopping list” that will take participants along the wharf and across the town beaches. Tuesday activities wrap up with a Nautical Trivia Night at 7:30 pm at the Underground Bar on Commercial Street.

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For more information, please contact:

Cathrine Macourt 

508.487.3622 Ext. 103 

cmacourt@coastalstudies.org

International Encaustic Conference

By Rebecca M. Alvin
Provincetown Magazine

International Encaustic Conference
Provincetown, June 1-3

For the second year, throngs of artists working in the encaustics medium will descend upon Provincetown for the International Encaustics Conference, co-produced by founder/director Joanne Mattera and Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill. The conference, which is now in its sixth year, moved to Provincetown from Montserrat College of Art last year, because it had outgrown its space. 


This year, the conference integrates itself further into the community, with a total of 14 galleries participating with their own encaustics shows. It’s quite a growth spurt.  “I’m very thrilled about this,” says Francine D’Olimpio, owner of Kobalt Gallery. “There are a lot more galleries participating this year... The whole town seems to be involved in it this time and the conference organizers should feel very good about that.”
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An Evening with Paul Theroux

Paul Theroux

Date: Saturday, June 30

Time: 6:00 pm 

Location: Provincetown Town Hall Auditorium 

The Provincetown Public Library, in collaboration with the Norman Mailer Center and Writers Colony, proudly presents a special appearance by acclaimed author and Massachusetts native Paul Theroux.  Theroux has written multiple best sellers including The Great Railway Bazaar: By Train Through Asia.  He will be on hand at the historic Town Hall Auditorium for a discussion about writing, his life, and his new book, The Lower River.   

Theroux, who holds honorary doctorates in literature from Trinity College in Washington and Tufts University, is appearing as part of fundraising efforts organized by the Norman Mailer Center and Writers Colony.  He is also the 1977 American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters Literature Award winner and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and the Royal Geographic Society in Britain.  Doors open at 5:30 pm and the event is free to all Provincetown residents, although donations are accepted.  Non-resident admission is $10.  Cash and checks only will be accepted at the door.

Following the Town Hall presentation, at 8:00 PM, there will be a private reception, with an opportunity to meet Mr. Theroux, at the Mailer Center at 627 Commercial Street.  Reservations and a donation of $125 per person (of which $100.00 will be tax-deductible) are required for the reception, which will be limited to 80 persons.  All proceeds of the evening will go toward the Center's capital campaign to purchase* of the Mailer home from the Mailer Estate.

Reservations for the reception at the Mailer home can be made by calling 646 374 3939, option 1. 

Notes from Land's End: February 14

Stanley Kunitz, provincetown.com 

Provincetown's Poets WAX about Love

By Laura Shabott
February 14th, 2012 

Provincetown is rich with works of ardor written by authors and playwrights who call our beloved town their muse. Let’s begin this Valentines Day online poetry slam with a brilliant jewel by former Poet Laureate and Fine Arts Work Center co-founder Stanley Kunitz:

Tennessee Williams, courtesy of Nola.com

YOUNG LOVE

At his incipient sun

The ice of twenty winters broke,
Crackling, in her eyes.

Her mirroring, still mind,
That held the world (made double) calm,
Went fluid, and it ran.

There was a stir of music,
Mixed with flowers, in her blood;
A swift impulsive balm

From obscure roots;
Gold bees of clinging light
Swarmed in her brow.

She is a tree in spring
Trembling with the hope of leaves,
Of which the leaves are tongues.

Her throat is full of songs,
She hums, she is sensible of wings
Growing on her heart.

Tennessee Williams changed the world with A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE and THE GLASS MENAGERIE. His deep understanding of love and heartbreak is just as profound in this delicate piece: 

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