Belladonna Series

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Belladonna* (Belladonna Series/Belladonna Books)

[edit] History and Mission

Founded by the poet Rachel Levitsky in 1999 at NYC’s Bluestockings Women’s Bookstore (now Bluestockings (bookstore)) as a poetry series featuring avant-garde feminist writing, with an emphasis on hybrid and language-focused writing. Belladonna* quickly expanded to a multi-faceted matrix of readings, publications and informal salons. The poet Erica Kaufman joined Levitsky as co-curator/editor in 2002. In 2005 the series moved its events to the downtown performance venue Dixon Place. Now in its ninth year, Belladonna* has published over 120 women (and a few men) through its various publication series, which include a small run of commemorative 'chaplets' at each event, several 'book art' style chapbooks, and two perfect-bound books per year, including one that is bilingual. The series, though focusing on women of the avant-garde, is diverse and has published translations in French, Chinese, Spanish and Japanese.

The asterisk in its name refers to both a definition of the belladonna flower:

deadly nightshade, a cardiac and respiratory stimulant, having purplish-red flowers and black berries

and to the Belladonna Series mission statement:

a reading series and small press that promotes the work of women writers who are adventurous, experimental, politically involved, multi-form, multicultural, multi-gendered, impossible to define, delicious to talk about, unpredictable, dangerous with language.

[edit] Articles

Belladonna*: The Deadly Night Shades of Experimental Women’s Poetry” by Corinne Robins (American Book Review, Spring 2005)
“Bull Tongue” by Byron Coley and Thurston Moore (Arthur, January 2005)
“Made in the Nightshade” (Poetry Project Newsletter, October/November 2005)
“Celebrating Renegade Presses in America” (Poetry Project Newsletter, October/November 2004)
“Exotic flower, decayed golds, and the fall of paganism: The 2003 Poets House Poetry Showcase” by Rodney Phillips (Fence Magazine, Fall/ Winter 2003-04)