Fall for the Book pairs poetry with dance in collaboration with Mason School of Dance

Wednesday, October 8, 2025 10:30 AM EDT
Fenwick Library, Fenwick Reading Room

For the second time in Fall for the Book history, students from George Mason University’s School of Dance will be performing their original choreography set to poetry in “The Body Breathes Poetry: Call & Response." The poet collaborators include Liza Achilles, author of Two Novembers: A Memoir of Love ’n’ Sex in Sonnets, Sarah Audsley, author of Landlock X, Fairfax Poet Laureate Angelique Palmer, author of Also Dark, and current third-year Mason poet Martheaus Perkins, author of The Grace of Black Mothers. The poets and dancers will end the event by discussing their work and process. Mason’s School of Dance program focuses on modern dance and alumni have gone on to dance with Ballet Montreal, in the original production of Hamilton on Broadway, and to found their own dance companies as choreographers. This program brings together emerging choreographers with both emerging and established poets, uniting lyricism of movement and words.

Katey Funderburgh, third-year Mason poet, will moderate this conversation. The dancers choreographing original pieces are Kalen Simpson, Aleza Inman, Grace Fortune, and Hannah Freed.

This is the second collaboration between Fall for the Book and Mason’s School of Dance. In 2023, students from the School of Dance choreographed pieces to poetry in “Lyrical Motion.” You can view the previous collaboration below.