Cape Ann Museum presents lecture on Charles Olson

The Cape Ann Museum presents Polis is What?: Finding One’s Way in Charles Olson’s Maximus Poems, a lecture by James. W. Cook, poet and Gloucester High School English teacher on Saturday, January 3 at 3:00 p.m. This program is free and open to the public.

Many Gloucester readers are interested in Charles Olson but are intimidated by what they perceive to be the difficulty of the work. James Cook will place the Maximus Poems in a historical and poetic context that provides readers with a way into the poems’ beauty, insights, and relevance.

James Cook is a teacher at Gloucester High School. He is also a poet, and his work has appeared in Process, Polis, Eoagh, the Sunday Morning Anthology, and elsewhere. In 2006 Somerville’s Openmouth Press published a chapbook of his poems called Some Arguments, and Boston’s Pressed Wafer Press published a fold-out called from Arguments and Letters. He has a BFA in Creative Writing from Emerson College and an MA in Teaching English from Tufts University. James lives in Gloucester with his wife, Amanda, and two Children, Samuel and Abigail.

The Cape Ann Museum is located at 27 Pleasant Street in Gloucester. Hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., and Sundays from 1:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. The Museum is closed during the month of February, on Mondays, and on major holidays. Admission is $8.00 6.50 adults, $6.00 Cape Ann residents, seniors and students. Children under 612 and Museum members are free. Admission for Cape Ann residents is free during the month of January. The Museum is wheelchair accessible. For more information please call: (978) 283-0455. Additional information can be found online at www.capeannmuseum.org