TVSC Book Club @ The Remedy Diner

The next book in the TVSC Book Club is Kind by Gretchen Primack.

Poetry Book Review: Kind by Gretchen Primack

Review by Ashlee Piper

Kind by Gretchen Primack (http://www.gretchenprimack.com/books.php?). Cover design by Susan Siegel.

Activism takes on many forms. And while advocates often get caught up in quibbling about which is the most effective form of activism, there are those whose crusade is cloaked in art, art that delicately broaches topics that sometimes even the most overt activism cannot.

In her most recent book, Kind, award-winning author Gretchen Primack demonstrates that even the smallest of stanzas can wield an everlasting wallop of consciousness. Kind is exactly the sort of art that changes people.

And when I say “people,” I don’t just mean the select folks who identify as vegan. I mean the collective us – the us riding the subway, the us waiting in line at the store, the us who sometimes need a message that we know is true to be wrapped in a beautiful poem, so it feels safe enough for us to allow it through the door of our heart.

You might remember Primack from her featured video on Our Hen House’s Art of the Animal Series (http://www.ourhenhouse.org/2011/01/art-of-the-animal-gretchen-primack/) (in which she reads several of the poems featured in Kind), or from her previous works, The Slow Creaking of Planets and The Lucky Ones: My Passionate Fight for Farm Animals (which she coauthored with Jenny Brown (http://www.ourhenhouse.org/2012/09/episode-141-do-it-with-kindness/)). Much like Audre Lorde or Wilfred Owen, Primack is a master of crafting infinitely readable literature with a message.

Kind is a slim compendium of poems encased in the most charming, coffee table-worthy cover you’ve ever seen. Inside the book, cover artist Susan Siegel’s (http://susanlsiegel.com/) moving sketches add depth to Primack’s words. By all appearances, this is the type of book you could give as a gift to your omnivorous aunt, and she’d delight in its glossy beauty and sumptuous verse.

The author has posted on her facebook page that for this week only she is offering a two for one option on her book! A Kind gift for the word lovers and/or animal lovers in your life: Just this week, I'm doing a two-for-one special on KIND. Just order one (gretchenprimack.com/kind) and I'll pop two signed copies in the mail to you!

As a courtesy, please consider your RSVP carefully and only RSVP yes if you plan to be available to attend and can get to the event on time. If you think you may want to take leftovers home, please consider bringing your own container(s). Finally, please remember that everyone is expected to order vegan food at TVSC events.