Acclaimed performance poet Jack McCarthy

begins New England tour at Daniel Webster College

March 15, 2005 -- Writing moving poetry, then performing it before live audiences is the passion of Jack McCarthy, who is known and loved on the national performance poetry circuit.  According to The Boston Globe, “In the poetry world, he's a rock star.”

McCarthy is kicking off his New England tour with a 90-minute reading of his poems on Wednesday, March 23 at 7:30 pm in the Collings Auditorium at the Eaton-Richmond Center of Daniel Webster College, 20 University Drive, in Nashua, NH.  The reading, co-sponsored by the DWC student activities board and the DWC president’s office, is free and open to the public.

 “There is a hunger out there for the particular delights of the spoken word,” McCarthy observed.  Performance poetry, he says, “is like the minstrels of old singing the news from town to town, or Homer doing the Odyssey in the taverns of Greece.”  He calls it “popular poetry – like popular and classical music, or the emergence of jazz in music.”  He recently learned that he is becoming popular with high school and college students who are performing his poems at local open microphone competitions.

Among his influences McCarthy numbers Robert Frost, Dylan Thomas, and Garrison Keillor. He doesn't think of himself as a "performance poet," but as a "standup poetry guy," a writer of poems that perform themselves.

McCarthy performs at “slams,” or performance poetry competitions across the country.  In 2002 he was the winner of the First New Hampshire Slam-O-Rama held at the NH Institute of Art in Manchester, NH.  McCarthy also was a member of the Worcester team at the 2000 National Poetry Slam, where he finished as the 10th ranked individual. The Boston Phoenix has named him “Best Standup Poet,” the Boston Poetry Awards “Best Love Poet,” and the Cambridge Poetry Awards “Best Spoken Word” and “Best Humorous Poet.”   

In addition to his appearance at Daniel Webster College, McCarthy will be keynote speaker and conduct workshops on Saturday, March 26, at the Young Writers Conference at Plymouth State University in Plymouth New Hampshire, and will move on to perform at Nantucket, Portland, ME, Connecticut and New York.

A long-time New Hampshire and Massachusetts resident and graduate of Phillips Exeter Academy and Dartmouth College, McCarthy now resides in Washington state. 

For more information on Jack McCarthy’s schedule and where to find his books, tapes and CDs, go to http://www.standupoet.net.  For directions to Daniel Webster College, go to www.dwc.edu .