Stu Levitan welcomes  P. Carl, author of “Becoming A Man: The Story of a Transition,” his transition from the misgendered Polly Kathleen Carl to the man he always knew he was, and  the man he is today.

Writing in the Progressive magazine, our friend Bill Lueders calls Becoming A Man “a powerful blend of raw candor and tender vulnerability,” a “celebration of self-discovery” filled with “heartbreaking honesty” and fresh insights into gender, power and injustice. The New Yorker’s Elizabeth Kolbert calls it “Raw and honest, probing and skeptical, a thoroughly compelling and deeply moving meditation on love, loss, and what makes a self.” It is all that and more, and as I said you can hear about in person when P. Carl appears at Room, that’s of course the former Factory nightclub at 315 W Gorham St. next Monday February 24 at 6 pm.

P. Carl is a writer, director and dramaturg, the distinguished artist in residence at Emerson College in Boston, on leave this semester as the Anschutz Distinguished Fellow in American Studies at Princeton University.

Over the past few years he has been awarded fellowships from the Ford Foundation, the American Academy in Berlin, the Massachusetts Cultural Council and the University of Washington. He has served as Co-artistic Director of ArtsEmerson, Director of Artistic Development at Steppenwolf Theater in Chicago, Producing Artistic Director at The Playwrights’ Center in Minneapolis and a co-founder of the online theatre forum HowlRound. He was named Theater Person of the Year in 2015 by the National Theater Conference, following in the footsteps of such luminaries as Edward Albee, Wendy Wasserstein, Tony Kushner, Anna Deavere Smith, Tennessee Williams, John Housman and Joseph Papp. Heady company indeed. Carl holds a PhD in Comparative Studies in Discourse and Society from the University of Minnesota, where he is on the list of Alumni of Notable Distinction. He was born in Elkhart, Indiana, and now lives in Boston with his spouse, the writer Lynette D'Amico, and their dogs Lenny Obama and Sonny. He is currently working on the stage adaptation of Becoming a Man, commissioned by American Repertory Theater, in which he will be portrayed by seven actors, apparently getting the same treatment Todd Haynes gave Bob Dylan in the movie I’m Not There. Again, heady company indeed.

It is a real pleasure to welcome to Madison Bookbeat, P. Carl.