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The Tour Arrives in Chengdu

October 14th and 15th, 2017. After a successful opening leg in Beijing, the Spittoon Literary Tour arrived at the Chengdu Bookworm for two days of readings, panels, performances, and collaboration.

The tour had been two years in the making. Since 2015, Spittoon had grown from a single poetry night in Beijing into a multi-format collective with a literary magazine, a slam night, a fiction night, and its music-poetry collaboration Spittunes. Chengdu had joined the network in February 2017. The Literary Tour was the first time those two cities — and their communities — came together in one place.

Saturday Programme

The Saturday opened with a welcome event introducing Spittoon Beijing — led by founder Matthew Byrne — followed by readings from Beijing and Chengdu-based writers. A Poetry Reading Showcase brought together the best of Spittoon Chengdu’s reading nights, featuring both Chinese-to-English and English-to-Chinese poetry in translation, followed by a bilingual panel discussion with the authors and translators.

The evening closed with Spittunes — first introduced in Beijing, brought to Chengdu for the first time — pairing spoken word with live music for a night of collaborative performance.

Sunday Programme

Sunday opened with a literary translation talk by Professor Reggie Qin, Deputy Director of the English Department of Sichuan Agricultural University, on the art and challenges of literary translation. A Fiction Reading Showcase followed — Chengdu-based writers presenting creative stories from diverse backgrounds, with a bilingual panel discussion afterwards.

The weekend closed with Improv Storytelling, co-presented by Spittoon and Poetry Primates — a creative sprint blurring the line between audience and performer, inviting everyone in the room to contribute to a collectively built story.

About Spittoon

The Spittoon Collective organises a wide variety of events — poetry and fiction reading nights, workshops, and Spittunes, its music-poetry collaboration format. It is a platform supporting literary and artistic exchange between China and the world.

Originally published October 2017 on the Spittoon WeChat channel.