You can marvel over the writerly courage that resulted in "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich" and "The Ballad of Reading Gaol." But to me, ANY artist is noble when they break out a free wine and cheese reception!

Such refreshment, though, is only a small part of the reward on Monday, at Noah's in Stonington, when a reception takes place for biographer, critic, translator, poet and novelist James Reidel. The 2013 Spring Fellow at the James Merrill House, Reidel is focusing on the completion a second volume of poetry while he's in the Borough.

His work has been published in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, TriQuarterly, Verse, The New Criterion, Ploughshares and Conjunctions - a sort of Murderer's Row of verse.

- RICK KOSTER

Reception for Merrill House Fellow James Reidel, 5-7 p.m. Monday, Noah's, 113 Water St., Stonington, jamesmerrillhouse.org.