Kibbitznest is a 501(c)3 organization. Kibbitznest, Inc is dedicated to the preservation of quality human interaction. Our ultimate objective is to promote a better understanding of the world and its people by coming together face-to-face to experience being human by teaching, by learning, by listening, by reading, by arguing, by discussing, and by inquiring. We encourage a balance between face to face and electronic communication.
Grandma’s House is a poetry show and open mic tucked in a corner of Kibbitznest Books, Brews & Blarney. Hosted by Chicago poet and self-proclaimed Grandma, Caroline M. Watson, Grandma's House is Chicago's coziest poetry show. Come on out to perform some of your work or to watch our featured poet. It’s just like being in your Grandma’s living room, only with less mothballs and more earth-shattering poetry.
J.W. BASILO is a guy who never learned how to shut up. As a writer, performer, and musician, his work lives at the intersection of the poignant and perverse, the hilarious and heartbreaking. Basilo hosts and curates the weekly Busted Mouth Radio, a live radio show and accompanying podcast. His stage act, a mash-up of music, poetry, comedy, and storytelling, has earned him a reputation as one of the more sought-after performing artists working in Chicago, where is he is a regular contributor to shows like Paper Machete, The Blackout Diaries, This Much is True, and Write Club. Basilo is a National and Individual World Poetry Slam finalist, Pushcart Prize nominee, former Artistic Director and founder of Chicago Slam Works Ensemble Theatre, and a company member with Red Theater Chicago. His work has appeared in local and national TV and radio, in numerous literary journals, and in hundreds of theaters, dive bars, prisons, and comedy clubs across the world. In 2015 Basilo was named to Newcity’s LIT 50, a yearly list of Chicago’s most notable literary figures. All things considered, he’s doing pretty well for a guy who failed Creative Writing in high school.
