literature

William "Bill" Hickok died Monday at the age of 82 in Marina Del Rey, Ca. Two decades ago, Hickok and his wife, Gloria Vando, co-founded a literary community center in Kansas City, Mo. called The Writers Place.

Hickok, a first cousin several times removed of the gunslinger "Wild Bill" Hickok, was born in Kansas City; he graduated from Southwest High School and the University of Missouri.

Former Kansas City Star columnist Bill Tammeus, who still blogs for the paper, recently released a memoir titled Woodstock: A Story of Middle Americans.

It's about his boyhood in the Illinois town of Woodstock, in the middle of the 20th century. Through critical reflection on his early experiences and observations, Tammeus arrives at a handful of truisms about life in the Midwest, offered without sentimentality or rose-colored glasses, but with measured fondness.

“I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel." For Maya Angelou, these words were a way of life. Her poetry and prose, even her off-the-cuff remarks during interviews, made people feel things deeply.

On Tuesday's Central Standard, local artist Peregrine Honig and writer Natasha Ria El-Scari join host Gina Kaufmann to share how Maya Angelou impacted their lives.

Dav Pilkey's Captain Underpants series recently received the dubious distinction of topping the American Library Association's list of most-challenged books of 2013. With the author on his way to Kansas City, Central Standard took a look at what makes some of the most-challenged books so controversial.

The worlds of creative writing and visual art are woven together for an upcoming First Friday event in Kansas City's Crossroads Arts District.

The University of Missouri System announced in May it would eliminate the University of Missouri Press, and that process officially started July 1st.

On this Monday's Central Standard, author Stephanie Powell Watts shares a collection of short stories inspired by the uneducated and the the aspiring. Many of her characters are based on her own life or the lives of someone she's encountered.

With March creeping up on us,  it’s time to start stocking up on those spring break reads.  Should you go for a bestseller or a lesser-known work?  Fiction or non-?  Mystery or biography?

At the beginning of May, a national art project started here in Kansas City.  This was first stop on a national tour for a conversation in the form of America Now and Here.  Here’s how a Renga works — more than 30 Kansas City poets were challenged to write ten lines each….the subject that emerged is Kansas City, with references to cattlemen, ghosts, prairie grass, and Troost.

At the beginning of May, a national art project started here in Kansas City.  This was first stop on a national tour for a conversation in the form of America Now and Here.  Here’s how a Renga works — more than 30 Kansas City poets were challenged to write tens lines each….the subject that emerged is Kansas City, with references to cattlemen, ghosts, prairie grass, and Troost.

Kansas City’s own Turner High School is carrying on the tradition of the Troubadours of old.  Teachers Marlee Stempleman and Jessica Kendall have fashioned a poetry project called the Troubadours Poetry Club where students express themselves by writing and reading their own works.  This morning on Central Standard, Marlee Stempleman and two club members stop in to share their craft.

Here are a few poems written by young Turner Troubadours:

I Remember
By Anna Stark