The Nelson Algren Committee hosts the 23rd annual Nelson Algren Birthday Party on Saturday, March 24, 8 PM, at the Wicker Park Arts Center, 2215 W. North Avenue in Chicago. The party celebrates the novelist and essayist who captured the reality of urban America with a cool eye and a compassionate heart, as seen in such masterpieces as The Man with the Golden Arm, Neon Wilderness and Chicago: City on the Make.
The party features a rich, eclectic and one-of-a-kind blend of presentations, poetry, music and performance, as well as Algren tributes and commentary. Guests presenters include:
- Award-winning Philadelphia-based writer/ photographer Linh Dinh
- Dissident psychologist and author Bruce Levine of Cincinnati
- Scholar Mike Jones of Connecticut
- Legendary boogie-woogie pianist Erwin Helfer
- Folksinger Bucky Halker
- Singer/songwriter Kristin Lems
- Guitarist John Garvey, backing up Warren Leming in a reading from City on the Make
- Photographer Ron Seymour, displaying rarely seen Algren pictures
- Poets Charlie Newman, Steve Schroeder, Wayne Allen Jones and Bob Katzman, proprietor of Skokie’s Magazine Museum
- Musician and critic Richard Wyszynski, talking about the Chicago of Algren and his buddy Studs Terkel, a founder of the Algren Committee
- Actor Richard Henzel, channeling Mark Twain
- Novelist Delphine Pontvieux, reading the work of Simone de Beauvoir, the love of Algren’s life
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The event also honors community members who display a “conscience in touch with humanity,” while flying under the media radar. This year’s recipients of the coveted Nelson Algren Committee Award are veteran scholar/activist Elliot Zashin and historical researcher and re-enactor extraordinaire Paul Durica.
Committee members Warren Leming and Hugh Iglarsh attempt to MC the madness, ably assisted by fellow members Nina Gaspich, Charlie Newman and Kurt Jacobsen.
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The event is also dedicated to the Occupy Chicago movement and the achievements of the now-shuttered Hull House, both of which, like Algren, serve to remind us that those who do the city's labor keep the city's heart.
We note with sadness that this is the swan song for the Algren Birthday Party at the Wicker Park Arts Center, as the historic St. Paul’s Church has been sold out from under the Near Northwest Arts Council (NNWAC), which operates the center. We are grateful for the longtime support of NNWAC Director Laura Weathered and of WPB, the Special Service Area for the Wicker Park and Bucktown neighborhoods.
Admission is $10 at the door, $7 for seniors and students with ID. Drink tickets are available to those wishing to toast Algren on the occasion of his 103rd birthday.
