In Conversation: Cynthia Marie Hoffman & Sarah Kain Gutowski
March 18, 2025 @ 7:30 pm – 9:00 pm EDT
Poets Cynthia Marie Hoffman and Sarah Kain Gutowski will read from their collected works, with an emphasis on their newest respective collections, both of which are cohesively themed (Cynthia’s is a memoir in prose poems, Sarah’s is a fabulist narrative in poems).
Sarah and Cynthia first met more than 20 years ago in London, where they were both active in the open mic scene. In this In Conversation event they’ll talk about both creativity and process: the structures of their respective collections as book-length “projects,” how their own journeys with OCD/anxiety have impacted their work; form and the relationship of form to writing in other genres (specifically how their recent collections opened the door for prose), and the benefits of joining forces this past year on book tour and book promotions.
About Cynthia
Cynthia Marie Hoffman is the author of four collections of poetry, most recently Exploding Head, an OCD memoir in prose poems. Essays in TIME, The Sun, Lit Hub, and elsewhere. Poems in Electric Literature, The Believer, The Indianapolis Review, and elsewhere. Cynthia lives in Madison, WI. www.cynthiamariehoffman.com.
About Sarah
Sarah Kain Gutowski is the author of The Familiar, a fabulist narrative-in-poems about female existential crisis, and Fabulous Beast: Poems. Her poetry has appeared in various print and online journals, including The Threepenny Review, Painted Bride Quarterly, and The Southern Review. With interdisciplinary artist Meredith Starr, she is co-creator of Every Second Feels Like Theft, a conversation in cyanotypes and poetry, and It’s All Too Much, a limited-edition audio project. A member of the National Book Critics Circle, her criticism has been published by Colorado Review, Calyx: A Journal of Art and Literature by Women, and New York Journal of Books. http://www.sarahkaingutowski.com.
