Distinguished Author Lecture: Sapphire, April 6

The Friends & Foundation of the Albany Public Library (FFAPL) presented the noted novelist & poet Sapphire as the Distinguished Author Lecture during National Library Week in a Zoom reading on April 6, 2021. 

Roger Green, from FFAPL, served as our host & the introduction to Sapphire was done by staff person Seyvion. Sapphire is best known as the author of the novels Push and The Kid, with Push having been made into the film Precious, but I recall first discovering her poems in poetry journals & zines years before that.

Sapphire began her reading with a short essay on the ruins of the pandemic titled “One Ventilator & 3 Patients, a Meditation on COVID-19 from Downtown Brooklyn,” then on to read some short early poems, & ended with a meditative look-back at Push on the 25th anniversary of its publication. As always, powerful confrontations with, against racism.

FFAPL also sponsors monthly “online literary salons” with the 2020 Literary Legend Elisa Albert — check the APL website for the events calendar of this & all APL events, & their Facebook pages.