Each month, Literary Arts staff will round up news, events, and more happening in Portland and beyond. Let us know in the form below the blog if you have any events or news to share.
EVENTS
Ali Hazelwood Books — A Wine Flight (Pairings Portland)
Thursday, September 3 | Pairings, 455 NE 24th Portland, OR, 97232 | Reservation Required
He’s six foot four, he runs a lab, and he has been quietly in love with her for years without mentioning it once — she’s convinced he hates her, and there’s only one hotel room. Pairings Portland is pairing wines across the Ali Hazelwood catalog: the fake dating, the lab coats, the conference disasters, and the grovel that makes the whole book worth it. It’s a weeklong pairing timed to the tail end of summer reading season, with every pour matched to a trope instead of a grape. Reserve now or stop by.
“Revolution” Issue Launch and Vinyl Night (Oregon Humanities)
Thursday, September 3, 7:00 p.m. | Sonder Listening Bar 1925 NE 42nd Ave, Portland OR 97213 | FREE
To celebrate the publication of our summer issue, “Revolution,” Oregon Humanities is hosting a vinyl night at Sonder Listening Bar on September 3. DJ Velvet Ginger will be spinning tracks from 7 to 9 p.m. Come listen to songs inspired by protest, struggle, and resistance, and bring a favorite album or two to add to the mix. No RSVP required.
In-Person Watercolor Painting with Ronna: Flycatchers! (Bird Alliance of Oregon)
Saturday, September 5 | Heron Hall, 5151 NW Cornell Road, Portland, OR, 97210 | $55
Flycatchers bring joy and amazement when they’re spotted. They are amongst the most difficult birds to identify, so lets look at the details and paint these lovely little birds, learning along the way the slight differences among them.
Community Storytelling Fellowship Info Session (Oregon Humanities)
Thursday, September 10, 10:00 a.m. | Online via Zoom | FREE
Learn from Oregon Humanities staff about the Community Storytelling Fellowship and the application process. To register for the info session, please use this form. The session will be recorded and shared with everyone who registers, so please register even if you can’t attend live. The Community Storytelling Fellowship is awarded annually to Oregonians who belong to communities that are underrepresented in Oregon media. For more information about the Community Storytelling Fellowship, please visit this page.
Romeo + Juliet (Portland Art Museum)
Saturday, September 12, 2:00 p.m. | Portland Art Museum, 1219 SW Park Ave, Portland, OR, Whitsell Auditorium
Catch Romeo + Juliet—the hyper-kinetic Shakespearean romantic tragedy updated for a new generation, as part of ScreenPLAY!, a new series that invites kids, teens, and families of all ages into PAM CUT @ The Whitsell.
Immigrant Town Hall and Legislative Dialogue (Oregon Historical Society)
Wednesday, September 16, 5:30 p.m. | Oregon Historical Society, 1200 SW Park Ave, Portland, OR 97205 | FREE
Join us for a welcoming, community-centered conversation bringing together immigrant and refugee community members, elected leaders, and community partners to share experiences, discuss community priorities, and strengthen dialogue between community and government. We are excited to welcome Representative Andrea Valderrama, Representative Hai Pham, Representative Willy Chotzen, and Senator Kayse Jama, who have confirmed their participation.
Letitia Carson: Life and Legacy of Oregon’s Earliest Known Black Homesteader (Oregon Humanities)
Thursday, September 17, 11:30 a.m. | Jacksonville Community Center, 160 E Main St., Jacksonville, OR, 97530 | FREE
Learn from Oregon Humanities staff about the Community Storytelling Fellowship and the application process. To register for the info session, please use this form. The session will be recorded and shared with everyone who registers, so please register even if you can’t attend live. The Community Storytelling Fellowship is awarded annually to Oregonians who belong to communities that are underrepresented in Oregon media. For more information about the Community Storytelling Fellowship, please visit this page.
Open Mic: Ars Poetica (Rose City Book Pub)
Friday, September 18, 7:00 p.m. | Rose City Book Pub, 1329 Northeast Fremont Street, Portland, OR, 97212 | FREE
Past and Future Cultural Lifeways of Western Oregon Tribes (Oregon Humanities)
Saturday, September 19, 11:30 a.m. | Grants Pass Library, 200 NW C St., Grants Pass OR 97526 | FREE
Learn from Oregon Humanities staff about the Community Storytelling Fellowship and the application process. To register for the info session, please use this form. The session will be recorded and shared with everyone who registers, so please register even if you can’t attend live. The Community Storytelling Fellowship is awarded annually to Oregonians who belong to communities that are underrepresented in Oregon media. For more information about the Community Storytelling Fellowship, please visit this page.
Weekend Work Party at NE 82nd Avenue Sanctuary (Bird Alliance of Oregon)
Saturday, September 19 | Bird Alliance of Oregon, 82nd Ave Property 8498 NE Siskiyou St Portland, OR, 97220 | $55
During these work parties, volunteers will tackle a wide variety of tasks around the Sanctuary including non-native species removal, restoration planting, debris clean up, and other tasks related to habitat restoration and improving wildlife habitat. This sanctuary will be the home for the new Wildlife Care Center, a nature park, an outdoor classroom, and native habitat for wildlife. The habitat restoration work is funded by grants from the Portland Clean Energy Fund (PCEF) and Department of Land Conservation and Development (DLCD).
An Evening with Jon Meacham: Hatfield Lecture Series (Oregon Historical Society)
Tuesday, September 22, 7:00 p.m. | Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, 1037 SW Broadway Avenue, Portland, OR, 97205 | $36+ Presidential historian and Pulitzer Prize–winning author Jon Meacham is one of America’s most prominent public intellectuals. A highly sought-after commentator and a skilled orator, Meacham has the unique ability to bring history to life and offer historical context to current events and issues affecting our daily lives.
Chosen Family Songwriter Circle (Rose City Book Pub)
Saturday, September 26, 8:00 p.m. | Rose City Book Pub, 1329 Northeast Fremont Street, Portland, OR, 97212 | FREE
David Lemieux: Grateful Dead Legacy Manager and Archivist In Conversation with Rob Vallance (Oregon Historical Society)
Monday, September 28, 7:00 p.m. | McMenamins Kennedy School, 5736 N.E. 33rd Ave. Portland, OR, 97211 | $36+ Join us for a deep dive into Grateful Dead history with David Lemieux, the Grateful Dead’s official audiovisual archivist and legacy manager. Lemieux will be in conversation with Rob Vallance, McMenamins director of brewing and a dedicated Deadhead, having seen 107 Grateful Dead shows between 1982 and 1995. Hear the behind-the-scenes stories from over 60 years of legendary live shows beloved by Deadheads across the globe. Bring your questions for the Q&A portion of the evening and learn how the timeless musical treasures within the Grateful Dead vault are archived, curated, shared, and preserved for future generations.
CLASSES AND WORKSHOPS
Resonate: A BIPOC Writing Circle (Write Around Portland)
2nd & 4th Thursdays of the month | 4:00–5:30 p.m. | Online via Zoom
Led by a Write Around Portland facilitator of color, Resonate consists of writing, sharing, and giving strengths-based feedback to each other. No preparation or experience in writing is required! Resonate is a great way to unlock your creativity, build or maintain a writing practice, and get some writing done! REGISTER HERE.
Ordinary Sorcery: The Everyday Magic in Resisting Metaphor with Julian Guy (McCormack Writing Center)
Sunday September 13, 12:00 p.m. | Online via Zoom | $75
Please join us for a monthly meditation and conversation on the practice of sitting or lying in meditation in a time of political, environmental, and personal crisis, especially drawing upon practices and teachings of Thich Nhat Hanh and Plum Village. This series is facilitated by Touk Keo and Janice Lee.
Raise Your Pen: A Benefit for Write Around Portland (Write Around Portland)
Saturday, September 19, 5:30 p.m. | Jupiter NEXT, 900 E Burnside St, Portland, OR 97214
Join us as we celebrate the journeys and discoveries made possible for our participants through the generosity of our volunteers, donors, and community of supporters. Elevate your expectations for this annual event with a catered meal from ¿Por Qué No? Taqueria and a bountiful selection of wine by A to Z Wineworks. Bid on a generous selection of local goods and adventures. Finish the night with stories from our Agency Workshop Participants and s’mores from Marsh & Mallow Co.
Freewrite Virtual Writing Circle – Autumn Reflect & Reset (Write Around Portland)
Tuesday, September 22, 6:30 p.m. | Online via Zoom | FREE
Calling all spellcasters! Feeling stuck in a tiresome voice, genre, or writer’s block? In this generative writing intensive, we will challenge ourselves to write without metaphor by studying the ordinary and exacting language poet Marie Howe says, “hurts us.” Through in-class prompts and exercises accessible for all genres and levels, we will write to artworks in the public domain and works of contemporary poetry that reinvigorate and hone our language. A metaphor often averts our gaze from the very thing we seek to describe. In this craft intensive, we’ll dissect the nuance of metaphor and when it is a curse instead of a spell.
Seeing As Story: A New Angle on Plot with Jenny Xie (McCormack Writing Center)
Saturday, September 26, 9:00 a.m. | Online via Zoom | $75
A story has a way of seeing. It has a way of understanding and making meaning—an inherent logic that arises out of what happens, what is explained, and what is left unsaid. How does a writer construct story out of this way of seeing? How do you control the narrative voice, balance the views of individual characters, and guide the reader’s attention across scene and setting to construct a world that feels real and compelling? In this session, we’ll study how POV can open up new angles on plot—how zooming in and out, skipping ahead or drawing out, can create narrative energy that’s an implicit answer to the question: And then what?
I’m Tired of Talking About Place as Character with Mariah Rigg (McCormack Writing Center)
Sunday, September 27, 10:00 a.m. | Online via Zoom | $75
How might our practice grow if, instead of writing “about” place, we right “to” place in our prose? In this generative craft class, we will read, discuss, and write place as a living, breathing, active entity, not lived in or on, but with. Centering an Indigenous, Pasifika understanding of relational place making, we’ll talk story on craft essays from Teresia Teaiwa, Craig Santos Perez, and Epeli Hau’ofa to reach beyond the framework of place as character. Together, we will turn from the static cartographies of place mapped onto us by settler colonial expectations of craft to think and write toward a relational understanding of place.
RESOURCES & OPPORTUNITIES FOR ARTISTS AND WRITERS
Poetry Contest (One Page)
Deadline: September 30, 2026
Award: $2000
Fee: $25
One Page Poetry is dedicated to the art of expressing a poetic theme on a single page, whether your poem is four lines or forty, whether yours is a love poem, inspirational poem, philosophical poem, or just one that is fun or whimsical. We welcome any and all poetic forms, as long as they fit on a single page.
PEN/Faulkner Foundation: Award for Fiction (PEN/Faulkner Foundation)
Deadline: September 10, 2026
Award: $15,000
Fee: $90
The PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction honors the best published works of fiction by American permanent residents in a calendar year. Three writers are chosen annually by the Board of Directors of the PEN/Faulkner Foundation to serve as judges, ensuring that our awards selection process is free of commercial influence. These judges select an initial longlist of ten books, followed by five finalists, and finally one winner as the “first among equals.” The author of the winning book receives a $15,000 prize. The authors of each of the other finalists receive $5,000.
APR/Honickman First Book Prize (The American Poetry Review)
Deadline: October 1, 2026
Award: $3,000
The prize is open to poets who have not published a book-length collection of poems with a registered ISBN. Poems previously published in journals or limited-edition chapbooks may be included in the manuscript, but the entire manuscript itself must not have been published as a book-length work. Translations are not eligible nor are works written by multiple authors. The editors of The American Poetry Review will screen manuscripts for the judge. APR complies with the CLMP Code of Ethics in the administration of this contest. The judge will select a manuscript in an anonymous review process and will not award the prize to any writer whose personal relationship to the judge poses a conflict of interest.
FOR KIDS & TEENS
Children’s Storytime (Bold Coffee & Books)
Saturdays from 11:00–11:30 a.m. | Bold Coffee & Books, 1755 SW Jefferson St, Portland, OR 97205 | FREE
Whether an author is here to read their book or our staff is reading a favorite, we’ll feature stories that spread compassion, awareness, and positivity. Children will get a coloring page or sticker to take home too!
Rainbow Family Storytime (Bold Coffee & Books)
Saturdays from 11:00–11:30 a.m. | Albina Library, 205 NE Russell Street, Portland, OR, 97212 | FREE
Children from birth to age 6 (with a favorite adult) enjoy books highlighting LGBTQ+ families, along with songs, rhymes and movement activities building language, literacy, and community in an identity-supporting environment. Attendance is limited and available on a first come, first served basis.
Kids’ Storytime With Keith Negley (Powell’s City of Books)
Saturday, September 5, 10:30 a.m. | Powell’s City of Books 1005 W Burnside St. Portland, OR, 97209 | FREE
Attention, aspiring wizards! Grab your wands, capes, and geckos and dive into this hilarious and clever how-to guide by award-winning author-illustrator Keith Negley. So you want to become a wizard? Excellent choice. Magic, like everything in life, takes practice and patience. It’s important to know that you will make mistakes.
Spanish Story & Play Time with Adventures in Spanish (Adventures in Spanish)
Thursday, September 10, 10:00 a.m. | West Linn Public Library, 1595 Burns St, West Linn, OR, 97068 | FREE
Join us for a joyful hour of stories, songs, and play — all in Spanish! Our fun-filled sessions are designed for young children and families to explore language through movement, music, and imagination.
B-Side Records & Vintage Open Mic: All Ages, All Formats (B-Side Records & Vintage: Milwaukie)
Wednesday, September 16, 6:00 p.m. | B-Side Records & Vintage: Milwaukie, 10801 SE Main St, Milwaukie, OR, 97222 | FREE
Open mic gives performers an opportunity to get comfortable on the stage in our performance venue, The Riff. Booking for The Riff is done several months in advance but booking inquiries can be submitted through our website: bsiderecordsvintage.com A full calendar of events can also be found there if you’d like to see The Riff in action before performing!
Stephan Pastis and Will Henry in conversation (Powell’s City of Books)
Wednesday, September 16, 7:00 p.m. | Powell’s Books, 3415 SW Cedar Hills Blvd. Beaverton, OR 97005 | FREE
Skeletor Ate My Homework (Mattel) is the debut of a laugh-out-loud illustrated middle-grade adventure from #1 New York Times bestselling author Stephan Pastis (Timmy Failure and Pearls Before Swine) and award-winning cartoonist Will Henry (Wallace the Brave), launching a new Masters of the Universe era timed to the 2026 movie event.
Bridgeport Village Summer Kids’ Concerts (Bridgeport Village)
Saturday, September 19, 10:00 a.m. | Bridgeport Village, 7455 SW Bridgeport Rd, Tigard, OR, 97224 | FREE
Join Bridgeport Village for fun, free family entertainment! Dance and sing along to Portland’s Top Children’s Musicians – plus, enjoy special activities like hula hoops, ribbons, bubbles & more!
Beads & Brushes: Celebrating Black Hair (Multnomah County Library)
Sunday, September 20, 3:00 p.m. | Sellwood-Moreland Library, 7860 SE 13th Avenue Portland, OR 97202 | FREE
Join local author Michelle Sumovich as she reads her Oregon Book Award-winning picture book I Have Three Cats… and stick around to make a lost and found poster inspired by the story!
Teatro Milagro presents “Autoretrato de Fridita” (Walters Cultural Art Center)
Sunday, September 20, 2:00 p.m. | Walters Cultural Art Center, 527 E Main St, Hillsboro, OR, 97123 | FREE
Set during the Mexican Revolution, young Frida Kahlo becomes inspired by her father’s creativity, and with his support, uses her imagination and a box of paints to help her overcome challenges and create her own world. With the onset of Frida’s polio, her parents keep her away from bullies and other harm in the streets, making Frida feel lonely.
I Have Three Cats: Story & Craft w/Author Michelle Sumovich (Multnomah County Library)
Sunday, September 20, 3:00 p.m. | Sellwood-Moreland Library, 7860 SE 13th Avenue Portland, OR 97202 | FREE
Join local author Michelle Sumovich as she reads her Oregon Book Award-winning picture book I Have Three Cats… and stick around to make a lost and found poster inspired by the story!
IN THE NEWS
RECOMMENDED READING
Staff Picks | (The Literary Arts Bookstore)
Hispanic and Latiné Heritage Month | (Multnomah County Library)
Mes de la Herencia Hispana y Latina | (Multnomah County Library)
The Best Cozy Autumn Romances to Read in 2026 | (Book Riot)
New Historical Fiction in September: Horror and History | (Book Riot)
Community News Submissions
Let us know if you have any events, news to share, or opportunities for writers for the In the Community blog and we will consider adding it to the next blog post!
