Saturday, November 8, 2003, from 3-8 p.m.
Nine Lives – SPT’s 9th Annual Literary Soiree & Auction

$10 admission for a full day of

SURVIVING, THRIVING and JIVING at NINE LIVES

It’s our ninth annual soiree event and what better trope to employ in the copy than the nine lives of the cat? We’re an organization that lives like a cat, on kindness, dexterity and dumb luck, but we reward you with so much affection!

Food * Music * Cash Bar--featuring the Meow Mix cocktail! * Celebrity Appearances * Raffle for Fabulous Prizes * Poet’s Theater * Presentation of SPT’s 2nd annual Book Awards, the best books of poetry published all of last year . . . and our 2003 Lifetime Achievement Award goes to Barbara Guest

OUR BIG ANNUAL AUCTION OF LITERARY MANUSCRIPTS, MEMENTOS, AUTOGRAPHS, SIGNED BROADSIDES, LETTERS, PHOTOS, ARTWORK AND EPHEMERA
You’ll claw your way to the front. Highlights of this year's CAT-alogue include:
Michael Cunningham, alarm clock, yes, alarm clock signed by the author of "The Hours" for our auction
Gertrude Stein "How to Write," Allen Ginsberg’s copy annotated by him
1963 San Francisco Poetry Festival broadsides MINT (Helen Adam, Blaser, Duncan, Lew Welch, Ferlinghetti, LaVigne, Jess, and many more) thanks to Donald Allen’s generosity
Early US modernists Lola Ridge, Waldo Frank, Marianne Moore, the whole Cary Nelson crowd!
Robert Creeley, unpublished poem
Barbara Walters ALS to Ann Landers
Rare double display manuscripts by Karl Shapiro and David Shapiro
Manuscript material, signed books et cetera, graphic works by—Anne Rice, Anne Carson, Ted Berrigan, Josephine Miles, Barbara Guest, Terry Eagleton, Andre Maurois, William Plomer, Jamaica Kincaid, Ian McEwan, Jamie O’Neill, William Meredith, Isabel Allende, Christopher Fry, Leslie Scalapino, Philip Whalen, Rosmarie Waldrop, too many in fact to mention! Come and gawk, come and bid, it’s all for a good cause.

WORLD PREMIERE OF "THE SMITH FAMILY,"
A NEW PLAY BY CRAIG GOODMAN AND KEVIN KILLIAN
A tornado’s heading toward Fort Smith, Arkansas, where the Smith family is hosting their annual reunion. Barometer’s falling, pressure’s mounting, Jack Smith is up on the roof filming "Flaming Creatures," Wayne Smith torn between his devotion to his wife Liz Smith and her sister, former Angel Jaclyn Smith. Patti Smith conducts a secret Romeo and Juliet affair with one of the Jones family (Tommy Lee), while Anna Nicole Smith struggles with demons of her own. Kiki Smith has made a 500-ton vagina for the Venice Biennale, while Will Smith ponders his floundering career. Meanwhile an interloper’s moving on in, and the ghost of tall, elegant Alexis Smith prowls the plantation with her spectral dog. Susan Smith looks at her two kids in the back seat and then looks at the lake and then—As Morrissey (from the Smiths) croons in the background, Heaven knows we’re miserable now. When you’ve got a big family, who’s to blame for all the problems of the world? With Taylor Brady, Gerald Corbin, Margaret Crane, Kota Ezawa, Clifford Hengst, Scott Hewicker, Tanya Hollis, Karla Milosevich, Yedda Morrison, Rex Ray, Laurie Reid, Jocelyn Saidenberg and Wayne Smith (as himself).

Soiree opens 3:00 p.m.
Auction Preview 3:30--5:30 p.m.
Presentation of Book Awards 5:00 p.m.
Auction 5:30 p.m.
Raffle drawing 7:00 p.m.
Play 7:00 p.m.
Continuous food, drink, entertainment and stupid pet tricks, it’s the 9 Lives of the Cat at Small Press Traffic!

held at:
California College of Arts and Crafts
1111 Eighth Street, San Francisco (just off the intersection of 16th & Wisconsin)