Poet Brian Turner. Photograph by Kim Buchheit.

An Army veteran whose service included a year in Iraq as an infantry team leader, poet Brian Turner reads from his work at Bates in a Language Arts Live event at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 27, in the Edmund S. Muskie Archives, 70 Campus Ave.

For more information, please call 207-786-6256.

The following evening, Turner reads at 6 p.m. Friday, Sept. 28, in Callahan Hall, Lewiston Public Library, 200 Lisbon St., in conjunction with Art Walk Lewiston Auburn. Both events are open to the public at no cost, and are supported in part by the Lewiston Public Library, the Harward Center for Community Partnerships and the Spanish department at Bates College, and the Maine Humanities Council.

Turner is the author of two poetry collections, Phantom Noise (Alice James Books, 2010) and Here, Bullet (Alice James Books, 2005), which won the 2005 Beatrice Hawley Award, the New York Times “Editor’s Choice” selection, the 2006 Pen Center USA “Best in the West” award, and the 2007 Poets Prize, among others.

Turner served seven years in the U.S. Army, including one year as an infantry team leader in Iraq with the 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division. He was deployed to Bosnia-Herzegovina 1999-2000 with the 10th Mountain Division.

Turner’s poetry has been published in Poetry Daily, The Georgia Review and other journals, and in the Voices in Wartime anthology published in conjunction with the feature-length documentary film of the same name.

Turner was also featured in Operation Homecoming, a documentary that explores the firsthand accounts of American servicemen and women through their own words. He earned a master’s of fine arts degree from the University of Oregon and has lived in South Korea. In 2009, Turner was selected as one of 50 United States Artists Fellows.

The poems in Here, Bullet reflect Turner’s experiences as a soldier with penetrating lyric power, compassion, sensitivity and eloquence, while deploring the violence and acknowledging the grief and terror of war.

In Phantom Noise, Turner tells us what happens to a person and a culture when a soldier brings the war home with him. Poet Louis McKee wrote, “Turner’s intention is neither to romanticize nor to protest the war but simply to bring its ironies and madness, its sad and difficult truths, into the light — a light that perhaps will exorcise the demons.”

Turner was selected as a featured poet for the L/A Arts poetry series The Poet As Art due not only to the quality of his work, but for his connection to other L/A Arts collaborative events surrounding veterans’ health and awareness. September marks a large undertaking of numerous community organizations to honor veterans in our community, with participants including Tri-County Mental Health, L/A Arts, Bates, the Lewiston Public Library, Aquila Theatre Company, the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Maine Humanities Council.
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The Aquila Theatre Company performs “Cyrano de Bergerac” at Bates on Sept. 27.

Bates and the local arts agency L/A Arts have been collaborators for years, jointly presenting arts and cultural events, but the partnership has gained a new intensity for autumn 2012.

In part, this higher level of activity is simply reflecting a new excitement and cooperative spirit in Lewiston-Auburn. And in part, it’s directly attributable to Odelle Bowman, executive director of the arts agency for 18 months.

“I’m a collaborator by nature and a community person,” says Bowman. “It’s my nature to want to bring people together, because we are stronger together than by ourselves.”

The college and L/A Arts are jointly hosting the Aquila Theatre Company in a three-day residency (Sept. 27-29). Dedicated to bringing the greatest works of the stage to the greatest possible number of viewers, Aquila is known for a robust touring program that takes in some 70 cities across the country each year. Learn more.

Coinciding with the Aquila visit are two readings, Sept. 27-28, by Brian Turner, known as a soldier-poet who served as an infantry team leader in Iraq, and has two published poetry to his credit. Learn more.

As if all that weren’t plenty, Bates’ Olin Arts Center and L/A Arts are also jointly presenting a return performance by jazz-gospel-blues singer Francine Reed, whose 2011 date at the college was one of the highlights of the concert season. Learn more.

Here are the specifics:

Aquila Theatre: All at 7:30 p.m., Aquila performs Cyrano de Bergerac on Thursday, Sept. 27, in Bates’ Schaeffer Theatre; Ancient Greeks / Modern Lives: Poetry-Drama-Dialogue*, which combines a community discussion with excerpts from ancient Greek drama about war, on Friday, Sept. 28, in Lewiston Public Library’s Callahan Hall; and Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew on Saturday, Sept. 29, back at Schaeffer.

Schaeffer Theatre is located at 305 College St., Lewiston, and the public library is downtown at 200 Lisbon St. Admission to Cyrano and Taming of the Shrew is $15, and discussions precede each of those performances at 6 p.m. in the college Chapel, 275 College St.

Ancient Greeks is open to the public at no cost. For tickets or more information, please contact 207-782-7228 or visit www.laarts.org.

Brian Turner: Both open to the public at no cost, Turner’s readings take place at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 27, at Bates College’s Edmund S. Muskie Archives, 70 Campus Ave., as part of the Language Arts Live series of literary readings at Bates; and at 6 p.m. Friday, Sept. 28, in Callahan Hall, Lewiston Public Library, 200 Lisbon St. This Poet As Art series reading coincides with the monthly Art Walk Lewiston Auburn.

Also supporting Turner’s appearances are the library, the Harward Center for Community Partnerships and the Spanish department at Bates, and the Maine Humanities Council.

For more information, please contact L/A Arts at 207-782-7228 or www.laarts.org.

Francine Reed: Reed takes the stage at the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St., at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 13, presented by the Olin Arts Alive concert series in collaboration with L/A Arts. Admission: $15 / $10, increasing to $20 /$10 on the day of the show. Available at batestickets.com. For more information, please contact 207-786-6135 or olinarts@bates.edu.

L/A Arts, the designated Local Arts Agency of the Twin Cities, has a 35-year history of arts and cultural initiatives, partnerships and performances. L/A Arts combines arts-centered educational programming, MainStage performance series, free summer concerts, gallery installations and more.

Frequently partnering with local community organizations, L/A Arts promotes the arts and culture in various forms — from benefit concerts for veterans to Art Walk Lewiston Auburn, the Auburn Art Wall to Arts in Education.

*Ancient Greeks/Modern Lives has been made possible by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities: great ideas brought to life. ancientgreeksmodernlives.org. Any views, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this program do not necessarily represent those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Poet Brian Turner Brian Turner, author of the Beatrice Hawley Award-winning poetry collection Here Bullet (Alice James Books, 2005), will read from his work at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 30, in the Benjamin Mays Center, Russell Street, Bates College. The public is invited to attend free of charge.

Turner earned an M.F.A. degree from the University of Oregon before serving for seven years in the U.S. Army. He was an infantry team leader for a year in Iraq with the 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division. Previously, he deployed to Bosnia-Herzegovina with the 10th Mountain Division in 1999-2000.

Publishers Weekly describes Turner’s work as “straightforward and direct. It highlights the violence and death of the war in a manner little seen elsewhere.” New York Times Sunday Book Reviewer Joel Brouwer writes: “His poems about his tour of duty have a hurried quality, as if they had been drafted not back home in tranquil recollection but on the ground, in spare moments between patrols. As a result, his lines can have a terrific immediacy.”

Turner’s poetry has been published in journals, including Poetry Daily and the Georgia Review, and in the Voices in Wartime: The Anthology (White Press, 2005), released in conjunction with the feature-length documentary film of the same name. He lives in Fresno, Calif.

Turner’s Bates reading is cosponsored by the English department and Maine Chapter 001 of Veterans for Peace.