Today we pay tribute to the fourth PennSound poet to have died in recent days — and hopefully the last for some time — Kass Fleisher, who passed away on January 6th at the age of 63.
A prolific writer of diverse talents, Fleisher's published work includes Dead Woman Hollow (a historical novel), Talking Out of School: Memoir of an Educated Woman, The Bear River Massacre and the Making of History (a nonfiction history), along with two hybrid works The Adventurous and Accidental Species: A Reproduction. Fleisher also co-edited, with Caitlin M. Alvarez, the anthology, Litscapes: Collected US Writings 2015, from her own Steerage Press, which she founded in 2011. As an obituary published in The Pantagraph observes, her myriad talents extended beyond the printed page: "Prior to pursuing her graduate degrees, she was Administrative Manager and Producer at Central Pennsylvania Youth Ballet, and while in grad school at Binghamton she became a champion country western line dancer." Fleisher also co-authored a number of lauded screenplays with her ex-husband and writing partner, Joe Amato.
We've created a new PennSound author page for Fleisher to house a handful of recordings that were previously scattered throughout our archives. They include a 1999 set for Boulder's Left Hand Reading Series, and "Personality to Configure" from the 2007 MLA Offsite reading in Chicago, along with "Lacrimae of the Medusa; or, Cixous (33 years later) and Cruci-Fictions: Let's Talk about Sex (Again)," a panel from the 2009 Belladonna* conference Advancing Feminist Poetics and Activism, which was chaired by Laura Jaramillo and also featured panelists Dodie Bellamy, Bhanu Kapil, and Laura Mullen. Click here to start listening.
