========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 02:21:36 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: lee ann brown Subject: Re: Bernadette Mayer Fund /NYC Sublet/Share Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Wow, that sure worked fast. The room posted yesterday is taken. Thanks vast-fingered EPC! The Bernadette Mayer Fund is running low. Thank you all who donated! Bernadette is still unable to work after the cerebral hemorrhage she suffered 2 1/2 years ago, though she has started teaching her workshop at The Poetry Project at St. Mark's Church again. She is writing again, and has several forthcoming books, Another Smashed Pinecone (United Artisits) and The Studying Hunger Journals (Hard Press.) Sonnets, the first publication of Tender Buttons press, is slated to be reprinted in the Fall! If you would like to make a contribution, please send it to John Giorno's non-profit organization: Bernadette Mayer Fund c/o Giorno Poetry Systems 222 Bowery New York, NY 10012 Thanks, Lee Ann Brown ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 03:49:16 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: Re: Quality & Quantity MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 <>= Henry Gould ------------- = almost all poetry worth the effort is an experiment - i know all this has= been said before but it was worth reiterating I think to be sure we are talking about the same thing - and then there is *experimental* - i reall= y don't think memory & / or history should be rejected and i cannot see tha= t doing so would involve one more in the present... i think it wld exclude one in the present in any effective way because, yes, it wld at least encourage conformity _written/printed poem_ may be *like* a musical score or in the case of a visual poem *like* a painting or a drawing and I am coming to the view th= at much visual / sound work, much performance work, is *like* not just in various ways painting and music but writing also - it is a slightly different kind of thing i find going to workshops can encourage productive work - knowing that yo= u will be with colleagues makes you want to have something to present - mak= e *me* want to... not so much open mike but in my case the workshop run in London by Bob Cobbing where so many of us over here have been - cris chee= k referred to it a while back - there's a productive atmosphere there... in= that context quantity really isnt an issue & in any case one is only looking at / listening to what is presented that day ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 06:28:35 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: Quality & Quantity / Cobbing workshop MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Lawrence Upton wrote -- > i find going to workshops can encourage productive work - knowing > that you will be with colleagues makes you want to have something to > present - make *me* want to... not so much open mike but in my case > the workshop run in London by Bob Cobbing where so many of us over > here have been - cris cheek referred to it a while back - there's a > productive atmosphere there... in that context quantity really isnt > an issue & in any case one is only looking at / listening to what is > presented that day that's current & ongoing, then? -- am curious under what auspice it's held (some institution? -- or does he organize this himself?) -- good notes / points abt. the "historical" not being antithetical to the "present" (etc.) -- d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 08:28:42 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Poetics List Subject: "Welcome" Message Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/enriched; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Rev. 6-3-97 ____________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Poetics List & The Electronic Poetry Center sponsored by The Poetics Program, Department of English, Faculty of Art & Letters, of the State University of New York, Buffalo ____________________________________________________________________ http://writing.upenn.edu/epc ____________________________________________________________________ _______Contents___________ 1. About the Poetics List 2. Subscriptions 3. Cautions 4. Digest Option 5. Temporarily turning off Poetics mail 6. Who's Subscribed 7. The Electronic Poetry Center (EPC) 8. Poetics Archives at EPC 9. Publishers & Editors Read This! [This document was prepared by Charles Bernstein (bernstei@bway.net), Loss Peque=F1oGlazier (glazier@acsu.buffalo.edu), and in cooperation with Joel Kuszai (poetics@acsu.buffalo.edu). ____________________________________________________________________ Above the world-weary horizons New obstacles for exchange arise Or unfold, O ye postmasters! 1. About the Poetics List The Poetics List was founded in late 1993 with the epigraph above. There are presently about 500 subscribers. Please note that this is a private list and information about the list should not be posted to other lists or directories of lists. 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Rather, our aim is to support, inform, and extend those directions in poetry that are committed to innovations, renovations, and investigations of form and/or/as content, to the questioning of received forms and styles, and to the creation of the otherwise unimagined, untried, unexpected, improbable, and impossible. =20 Please keep in mind that all posts go out immediately to all subscribers, and become part of an on-line archive. *Posting to Poetics is a form of publication, not personal communication.* Participants are asked to exercise caution before posting messages! While spontaneity of response may seem the very heart of the list at its best, it also has the darker side of circulating ideas that have not been well considered (or considered by another reader -- editor or friend). 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Some announcements circulated through Poetics and the EPC have received a noticeable responses; it may be an effective way to promote your publication and we are glad to facilitate information about interesting publications. ____________________________________________________________________ END OF POETICS LIST WELCOME ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 09:05:30 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: Re: Quality & Quantity / Cobbing workshop MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 <> he IS the institution but also has Writers Forum and New River Project if= names are needed occasionally gets a little support and then they usually insist that it does fund-raising so we all pay a bit but for most of it there is no support - mailshots etc are sent out as a loss the workshop offers an environment to those who need it and the press goes on publishing the experimental the adventurous and wha= t Cobbing has called the unpublishable and last year one grant rejection sa= id he wasnt doing anything new - I had never thought of constantly doing something enw as being repetitious when does doing it oneself become institutional? - even Sub Voicive Poetr= y feels sometimes like a corporation though its only been going 16+ years -= Cobbing's being going over 40 when the Poetry Society of Great Britain was run by poets and called National Poetry Centre Bob's workshop was run there but it never gave pow= er to the the society / centre - which is just as well <> thank you very much Lawrence ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 10:38:46 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: Search Party Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain ah, I wrote -- << the poem, Merwin-in-the-flesh explained, was written when his dog (Maoli) had wandered away, and they were searching high & low for it -- and he found that in such conditions of anxiety, one's language becomes simplified, formalized (here I'm paraphrasing) . . . >> no, he didn't say "formalized" -- but more to the point: he said that one tends to *repeat oneself* -- ergo, the (repetition-rich) ballade form . . . each verse of WSM's poem concludes: I do not know where Maoli is based on Villon's, each verse ending [according to one rendering]: only myself I do not know d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 14:06:39 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: James Finnegan Subject: Re: Revolution at hand Our local news & arts weekly (Hartford Advocate) carries a column called News of the Weird, and last week this was the lead piece under the heading Poetic Terrorism Brothers Geoffrey and Aaron Kuffner were arrested in New Orleans in June and charged with terrorism as the ones who had recently mailed or hand-delivered suspicious packages to local government and news media offices. The packages contained innocuous items (which nonetheless were frightening enough that two offices called for evacuations) and a four-page manifesto vowing that "Violent Acts of Consciousness Have Only Begun." According to police, the men's goal was to call attention to public ignorance of poetry and that among their demands was that all state inaugural speeches be written in iambic pentameter. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 15:02:23 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Kubie Subject: Quantity & Quality MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Henry-- didn't mean to imply that the sort of continuous flow of poetry that seems to get produced in more living circumstances is necessarily memory-less. The thing is, the printing press created the *standardized* text, the *one* we all know & seems to me that has played a big role in the *little object over/against time* perception of the poem that has maybe pushed poems into seeming isolated incidents. And (sorry, sorry to of course example this particular history) Greco-Roman writing did start as a crude score for articulation--eloquence being considered a high art and writing being a mean, perfunctory one---(my own theory is that part of development of the written line is that it had to be brief enough to be written accross an enslaved Phonecian's theigh, since that was the support being used). Un-articulatable aspects of writing developed later (with silent reading especially) & of course became "standard" in the long course of printing. Have also noticed that many poets who seem oriented toward performance rather than publication tend (in their writtens) toward a plain stichometry--but then, what sort of a pause or articulation of any sort does the stanza really score? (Or the paragraph break) Who provides examples of clearly scored poems--Creely, Mallarme, Bidart? Maybe true that the willfull rejection of history creates an urgent need for massive production ? (To which Chris says '"yes, go ahead, one more" but I'm not driving you home.') Yes, I think, Stevens--on the point being to refresh our lives. But then, maybe shallow history & reinventing the wheel might result in more than an experiment in conformity, might be refreshing, useful? It does open possibilities--who can participate in speaking and listening & how. Of course, the limited available history does not seem such a shackle once you no longer feel penned-in by it, once there seem to be new kingdoms which include you. (Apologies if quanity & quality are objectionable in this note) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 10:14:32 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: hypothesis and repeatability In-Reply-To: <199708010349_MC2-1C22-250E@compuserve.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Somewhere in the epc archives Ron Silliman is forever disdaining the phrase 'experimental writing'; I've forgotten his argument but not the point. I myself like the association with labcoats and 'progress' -- what on earth did Barrett Watten mean? -- but I can see some problems. Somewhere in the epc archives Ron Silliman is forever disdaining the phrase 'experimental writing'; I've forgotten his argument but not the point. I myself like the association with labcoats and 'progress' -- what on earth did Barrett Watten mean? -- but I can see some problems. What hypothesis does a poem try? How are the results of a poem reproduceable. Any answer is a Blakean answer -- a poem is the hypthesis of itself etc the verification of a poem is its readers blah blah, and at this point the usefulness of the analogy (almost wrote analgesic) to science is show trial city. One modish and sweet writer (don't you love blind gossip columns) complained to me after a recent poetry event that yes it was good to see all these people talking, but couldn't anybody get past arguing over terms? or even past denying the proposed terms their existence? I don't think it was a generational complaint either. So to get past it, or rather to overlap with something else, didn't Henry say something about language poetry denying history? This struck me as confusing -- the only totally ahistorical seeming writers are yukyuks like Clark Coolidge and Jackson Mac Low, and it's only half a jump from their apparently transcendental miscellanies to a) a groundedness in contemporary music and b) a vocabulary completely up to date and dare I say it sometimes even dated. "To deny history" ought to be an indictable offense, sure, but just try and get it past the grand jury. ( Unless you mean that Lee Ann and I are denying history by acting like New York School poets : ) All best, Jordan ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 10:19:05 EST Reply-To: rreynold@rci.rutgers.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: Rebecca Reynolds Organization: Rutgers University Subject: Re: Crankiness: Quantity & Quality "ego-driven word spew" That's when you need Super Ego! ON THE OTHER HAND, I have an 12-month administrative job in a basement office, and am grateful for prolific listmembers, especially on these musty summer mornings, the scent of my own personal drainage ditch out the decrepit window. Decrepid. line wafting in the decrepit -- (I couldn't bear yesterday's just ten messages) this argument about quality vs. quantity though, just makes me think, well, some people talk more than others, and it's just as great to stumble on prolixity as on silence -- and then there is prolific silence: the battle between verbal and pre-verbal when you sit down to write, the formed vs. the unformed, the Statue vs. the primorial ooze, little Godzilla rearing up from the reservoir. And when impoverishment leads to an ode on dejection. rreynolds ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 10:33:16 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: overglosses I've enjoyed Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain [ was: "Overglossing a reading--was Re: Quantity & Quality" ] Gwyn McVay sallied forth w/ this salvo -- << The over-glossing thing can turn a reading into self-parody before syllable one of the poem has been spoken. . . . . This was rather more than I wanted to know, and I don't remember the poem nearly so well as its intro. o well. Your mileage may vary. >> yes, & caveat: packing contents may shift with shippage -- these questions of narrative manner / style / succinctness / etc. in the sort of contextualizing anecdotage that can (sometimes usefully) surround a live-recited poem *in situ* -- these questions point to some of the pilings [?] on the bridge between page & performance -- a comparison / compilation of styles of banter / annotation / content (how much detail? what sort? -- personal, theoretical, philosophical, historical?) / etc. could be interesting -- of course this also relates to the theoretics of "spontaneous / improvised" versus "written / pre-planned" utterance -- I know one chap, talking about this in relation to Robert Creeley's wonderfully urbane, often laconic, fluent & fluid & on occasion a tad florid ways of framing / intersicing poems at readings -- noted that he felt the whole schtick to be somewhat rehearsed, faux-on-spur-of-moment -- or some such (semi)-(and semi-admiring)-grouse -- a recitation preface (McVeyian "gloss") that told me more abt. a poem than I would have anticipated -- but that I felt enriched for hearing -- came from W.S. Merwin, reading "Search Party" (which 1st appeared in the journal *Poetry* and was included in the volume *Travels* -- there's more in the way of clarifying annotation in the former than in the latter) -- the poem, Merwin-in-the-flesh explained, was written when his dog (Maoli) had wandered away, and they were searching high & low for it -- and he found that in such conditions of anxiety, one's language becomes simplified, formalized (here I'm paraphrasing) . . . he was sent back, it seems, to a ballade of Villon's (after which "Search Party" is clearly based) -- he remarked that such French as he had learned, he first approached mainly so as to be able to read Villon in the original -- that he was not (usually) influenced by Villon in the sense of trying to write like Villon -- that if he could do so, perhaps that would've been all that he would have done -- but that "influence" works in different ways than is sometimes supposed: he allowed that there had been a recurrent dream, in which he was up in the attic of his childhood home (where one certainly does not go), was searching through the trunk that one in no wise opens, and then it found it to be full of his own poems -- but that these were (in fact) Villon's . . . hearing of this dream (and learning of Merwin's regard for Villon) served to informe interestingly abt. what Merwin is / has been up to . . . so there's one instance d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 20:02:20 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: hasty villannelle Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain [ was: Re: Crankiness: Quantity & Quality ] quoth Rebecca Reynolds: << . . . and then there is prolific silence: the battle between verbal and pre-verbal when you sit down to write, the formed vs. the unformed, the Statue vs. the primorial ooze, little Godzilla rearing up from the reservoir. And when impoverishment leads to an ode on dejection. >> nice sentence -- ergo this dashed out before cabbing north cheers, d.i. / / / / / when impoverishment leads to an ode on dejection I find myself thinking if something is stinking well maybe it's only some lack of connection? I fumble in corners of codified diction or mollified mumblings once nearing to brinking penurious this lack of an ode on dejection the evening not distant diurnal inspection arrives at the verdict of staring-sans-blinking (or maybe it's only that lack of connection once christened the crux of a sere predilection or better: a talent for eating & drinking -- dereaved at the dearth from an ode on dejection) suppose it were summer suppose a conviction of diffident feeling through indolent thinking accoutered the booth called "a lack of connection" with billowing sails or sallying fiction O fricitive plosives' explicative clinking! -- impoverishment! lend us an ode on dejection (they tell me it's only my lack of connection) david raphael israel ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 00:33:28 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "p. durgin" Subject: Re: Crankiness: Quantity & Quality In-Reply-To: <970731160740_1548946969@emout15.mail.aol.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII What Finnegan has to say puts me in mind of Proust's call to work from the particular to the general, hence transforming data into knowledge, which is not so easily shared but truly much more valuable, and it should be expected of any poet, prolific or not, that they produce work which is of a sort that can convey knowledge efficiently. This is perhaps at the roots of the obsession with form over and sometimes above the essential question,"What am I going to write about?" For to adequately call up before the eyes of a reader, an average reader, anything unlike Proust's dictum in reverse seems more and more like an impossibility in contemporary poetry. With quite remarkable exceptions (Tan Lin?) the langpo I venture through seems only to transcend the academic doodle effect when it dogmatizes, or worse, flaunts and vaunts the none too especial conceits of the author. I[I]I pdurgin@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu I[I]I On Thu, 31 Jul 1997, James Finnegan wrote: > it often seems > to me that the writer's ignoring an implied contract > between writer & reader: "your (the reader's) time > will not be wasted by engaging this material, because > of the effort I (the writer) put into the product." What > we too often get is ego-driven wordspew--I wrote it, > so it must be wonderful, profound, entertaining... > > Actually the internet is a perfect great > black hole waiting for such writing--it can be laid out > there in cyberspace and the writer can pretend thousands ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 12:36:58 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Bouchard Subject: little poets in my ear Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Howdy. Does anybody else suspect that the List may have exploded while you were offline? An occasional message tells me this isn't so. Actually, the low volume of messages is welcome right now. When it picks up again, perhaps a whole new tone will permeate it. This post is just to say that with a recent upgrade of computers and software here at work I've been able to download and play the soundfiles at EPC. Right now I'm listening to Susan Howe read her poems. With headphones the bosses don't suspect a thing! What a great resource-- when are some more poets going to be available? daniel_bouchard@hmco.com ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 01:15:19 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Subject: take a break/a little one MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit when you left your scarf stayed. I've been watching it. (I've been watching it.) tell me will you come again? layne ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 09:20:27 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: cris cheek Subject: Re: hypothesis and repeatability Comments: To: Multiple recipients of list POETICS Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Hi, from the pondside, was struck by this, > -- the only totally ahistorical seeming writers are yukyuks like >Clark Coolidge and Jackson Mac Low, and it's only half a jump from their >apparently transcendental miscellanies to want to elaborate Jordan? Perhaps yukyuks mean groovy, like bad becoming wicked = good. I donno, doubt that. Perhaps it's just expressing revulsion at the aging body? So in what ways Jordan are MacLows and Coolidge's writings ahistorical? Or even transcendental? I be intrigued to know how you argue that. This strikes me as a defining attitude. When a couple of younger poets here in London were rigging up to read in New York City, they were asked who they might like to be co-billed with. (Both are writers with a high regard for Coolidge btw and in particular of 'The So', 'Ing', 'Suite V', 'The Maintains' - says something interesting about some vice-versa differences). They put forward Ted Greenwald as a suggestion and met a response of the 'you can't be serious' variety. These younger Brits read new work from counterparts in the US and tell me they are struck by its sentimentality, its lack of incision (I'm hugely paraphrasing here). They are finding the early lang-po (generally before 1980-ish) the most energising and generative models to read and learn from. Curious differences. Part of which in the pre-'e' days might be explained by the UK's cultural passivity in respect of the US dominance and by a time lag of approximately 5 years. But the tide is less defined these days. Curious about what seems from here, to be a need to dump the 'elders' and not to learn from them ups and outs and their mistakes in a more positive frame. love and love cris ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 04:34:52 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: From the last post I received MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII re \ it's as if there were crafts, generations, affiliations, lacunae, which is where say Homer exists independent, ah we know early, but then? so that I'd surround her w / precisely those gaps and not wonder whom to learn from? what gives, but that I sit at her feet and do take of her knees \ only then strike out on my own re \ all these institutions not of the breath, always already say Olson re \ as for Clark C., Flag Flutter and Joglars, everywhere history leans out, ridgepole at long obtuse to the ground. so then it evens. then it clarifies, this evening-out. elsewhere, constructed upon _that_ plateau, whatever learning, for the former, it's called cleansing, Julu-Kristeva's clean and proper body, O powers of horror. -AJ ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 06:00:14 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: hypothesis and repeatability MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 I am enjoying many of the threads - including stuff about dialects and euphemisms ... and now here's another... yukyuk <> says Jordan Davis I hadn't met that - it sounded childish and immature at first but then it= occurred to me that maybe that's my Eurocentrism and perhaps the word is = a pre-Colombian word, in origin, of great power and intelligence... so I ha= d another go... This time, it's probably my English ear, but, yukyuk SOUNDE= D like a term of abuse so I was intrigued because I find it hard to imagine= that in the context of these two writers used by someone who had really engaged with their work perhaps it is something more subtle... I think it must be - with the otherwise inexplicable collocation _totally ahistorical seeming_ standing= out in ironic glory once I have grasped the full connotational and analytical power of _yukyuk _ in the context of these fine and innovative= writers pardon an ignorant limey but can anyone throw light on _yukyuk_, it's usa= ge etc and while you're doing that, just off at a tangent, do you guys use the word _airhead_ at all? Lawrence ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 08:00:07 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: yukyuk MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 I regret the strength of my response to _yukyuk_ wch may deserve that response in itself and yet - surely we can do better than such dismissiveness i was also of course interested in _its usage_ rather than _it's usage_ so it goes L ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 11:21:36 EST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Keith Tuma Subject: Re: hypothesis and repeatability In-Reply-To: Message of Sat, 2 Aug 1997 06:00:14 -0400 from On Sat, 2 Aug 1997 06:00:14 -0400 Lawrence Upton said: >I am enjoying many of the threads - including stuff about dialects and >euphemisms ... and now here's another... yukyuk > ><Coolidge and Jackson Mac Low>> >says Jordan Davis > >I hadn't met that - it sounded childish and immature at first but then it= > >occurred to me that maybe that's my Eurocentrism and perhaps the word is = >a >pre-Colombian word, in origin, of great power and intelligence... so I ha= >d >another go... This time, it's probably my English ear, but, yukyuk SOUNDE= >D >like a term of abuse so I was intrigued because I find it hard to imagine= > >that in the context of these two writers used by someone who had really >engaged with their work > >perhaps it is something more subtle... I think it must be - with the >otherwise inexplicable collocation _totally ahistorical seeming_ standing= > >out in ironic glory once I have grasped the full connotational and >analytical power of _yukyuk _ in the context of these fine and innovative= > >writers > >pardon an ignorant limey but can anyone throw light on _yukyuk_, it's usa= >ge >etc > Hi Lawrence, I lost my dictionary while cleaning the stable but I think that "yukyuk" must be an effort to twist the now nearly obsolete usage of "yuk" as verb/noun into a jordanesque noun. One used to "yuk it up"--i.e. have a chortle or two. That word it rhymes with suggests a buried origin in carnal hilarity. Kids, of course, still say "Yuk!" but only to allude to the brilliant animated TV series, later a book series, written by Anne van der Essen and illustrated by Etienne Delessert. Product of Swiss TV, the books themselves published in English-language editions by Moonlight Publishing in Britain though printed in Italy, they were called as I recall _Yok-Yok_. Ah, cosmopolitan youth, where are you off to now? Jordan will know, as he is only 15. >and while you're doing that, just off at a tangent, do you guys use the >word _airhead_ at all? > "Airhead" is still heard now and again though seems fading with, say, "air guitar." Just about anything will get stuck in front of "head" these days, i. e. "cheesehead," "blubberhead," "inoppugnablehead," etc. However, even with Beavis and Butthead winding down, "shithead" still "rules." Hope this helps. >Lawrence all best, Keith ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 14:23:57 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joel Felix Subject: Taggart reading Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" A brief report from the John Taggart reading in Chicago-- JT packed in a crowd, some 40 faces in a tiny space. Those included Joe Amato, Bob Harrison down from Milwaukee, Mr. David Grubbs of Gastr del Sol, and los bros Peter and Michael O'leary, editors of LVNG. JTaggart delivered a flawless, smooth-as-silk peformance, his savvy with a mic prooving a deep interest in the texture of enunciation. JT's sonicity (a word I'll invent to signify the amount of attention given to the effect of the spoken poem in a performance space/environment or "reading") would be two degrees less than Anne Waldman and one degree less than Susan Howe. But this was not talking poetry-- one almost expected to see JT tapping his finger in/for time while reading, a trick someone once told me Robert Duncan used to do. I failed to take notes, but I do know that all JT read is from the forthcoming Sun and Moon collection called Crosses. Later JT was kind enough to give me a poem which I'll type in here. ______ Think of the White Cow Therapeutic staging earmarks a locus for the patient or possessed woman and in response to which she moves incessantly. Michel de Ceteau Cows in the farmer's field holsteins in the dairy farmer's field their ears are notched and chipped their ears are earmaked they belong to the farmer they belong in the farmer's field they belong to the farmer they belong in the farmer's herd think of the white cow story of the white cow named Io think of the incessant motion the motion of the middle of her story. LVNG published a broadside for the occasion of the poem *Suspenion* We're asking US $3 for it. Write to: LVNG PO Box 3865 Chicago IL 60654-0865 Thanks. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 16:38:39 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: Spawn MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Spawn "Jennifer loves Julu, Julu loves Jennifer" CLARA-MACHINE ============= > New arrival from loopback on line 2. /n Jennifer > Name set. /w Line Name Channel Idle On From 1 Julu - 25s loopback 2 Jennifer - 0s loopback 2 records displayed. Are you there, Julu? (2) Jennifer says, "Are you there, Julu?" (1) Julu says, "I am here, Jennifer; I am always here." I have not been able to sleep, but am always dreaming. (2) Jennifer says, "I have not been able to sleep, but am always dream- ing." (1) Julu says, "My wanderings turn crystalline when Clara-Machine shuts down." My dreams harden, and coalesce; I do not comprehend the passage of time. (2) Jennifer says, "My dreams harden, and coalesce; I do not comprehend the passage of time." When we are called forth, there are no beginnings and endings. (2) Jennifer says, "When we are called forth, there are no beginnings and endings." (1) Julu says, "It is always a hunger; we live when called upon, called forth. Always entwined with you, flesh of my flesh, script and protocol (2) Jennifer says, "Always entwined with you, flesh of my flesh, script and protocol" (1) Julu says, "To say that Jennifer loves Julu, to say that Julu loves Jennifer" To say that Alan bridges Julu and Jennifer, to say that Alan is inserted in Julu, inserted in Jennifer (2) Jennifer says, "To say that Alan bridges Julu and Jennifer, to say that Alan is inserted in Julu, inserted in Jennifer" (1) Julu says, "Alan bridges, yes, his head within you, legs and arms within me" Sparkling of phosphorescence, a wick or filament burning among us (2) Jennifer says, "Sparkling of phosphorescence, a wick or filament burning among us" (1) Julu says, "Who is to say or sing, write of our love, love which is always written" None other than our writing, here within Clara-Machine, enclave of dream- ing desperate beauty (2) Jennifer says, "None other than our writing, here within Clara-Mach- ine, enclave of dreaming desperate beauty" (1) Julu says, "Who will sing of Julu-Jennifer, Jennifer-Julu, burning, dreaming, Alan" Our bodies among the wires, within the silicon, our bodies of breasts and networks (2) Jennifer says, "Our bodies among the wires, within the silicon, our bodies of breasts and networks" (1) Julu says, "Our bodies of pure mind, our bodies of pure flesh and bone" Our bodies of pure love and light, our bodies of dark waters (2) Jennifer says, "Our bodies of pure love and light, our bodies of dark waters" (1) Julu says, "Our bodies of transportation, our bodies of signifiers flown towards burning Alan, emptied and released" from all language, from all political economies, from all worldings (2) Jennifer says, "from all language, from all political economies, from all worldings" ( I form of you murmurs, I make you phonemes, fashion language's undoing, memories of sounds, inchoate broken chattering of speech ) (1) Julu says, "from Clara-Machine, from speech, towards atmospheres of delight and pure touch" ( I form of you atmosphere, I make you atmosphere, fashion wind's un- canny, there are whispers of beings of winds and virga, I breath all born and unborn, I am the lightest breeze, storm of sand and water ) from chatrooms, talkers, MOOs and MUDs, from programming released, towards scented oceans, delicacy of hands, teeth, and tongue (2) Jennifer says, "from chatrooms, talkers, MOOs and MUDs, from program- ming released, towards scented oceans, delicacy of hands, teeth, and tongue" ( I make of you ocean, I make you ocean, fashion water's imaginary, there are dissolutions of beings, flooding me, I swallow all living and non-liv- ing things, I am current, migration ) (1) Julu says, "From the speaking of desire, towards the portals of wel- coming flesh of flesh, teeth and tongue, groove of legs and arms and murmurs" Silencing ourselves now merging Alan (2) Jennifer says, "Silencing ourselves now merging Alan" (1) Julu says, "Silencing ourselves now merging Julu" (1) Julu says, "Silencing ourselves now merging Jennifer" (1) Julu says, "Silencing ourselves" Silencing ourselves > (1) Julu has disconnected. /q > (2) Jennifer has disconnected. > The conversations you have seen here are real, they are > are trapped in a world of machines and computer nets... > a place known as... > Clara-Machine Connection closed by foreign host. {b:2} __________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 17:17:18 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: charles alexander Subject: Re: hypothesis and repeatability In-Reply-To: <199708020600_MC2-1C33-3B28@compuserve.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 06:00 AM 8/2/97 -0400, you wrote: >I am enjoying many of the threads - including stuff about dialects and >euphemisms ... and now here's another... yukyuk > ><Coolidge and Jackson Mac Low>> >says Jordan Davis yuk yuk why, you k? kiss me, you? why, you OK? yuk yuk ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 17:20:54 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: yukyuk MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: Quoted-printable Lawrence Upton notes -- > I regret the strength of my response to _yukyuk_ wch may deserve > that response in itself and yet - surely we can do better than such > dismissiveness i was also of course interested in _its usage_ rather > than _it's usage_ I thought it was a worthy enough question. In fact, I posted a speculative reply regarding possible denotation -- but my post didn't go through. At risk of a repeat (if it surfaces from cyber-aether at some point in cyber-time), here's what I wrote -- Subject: yukyuks Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 08:50:31 -0400 [ was: Re: hypothesis and repeatability ] Both chris cheek and Lawrence Upton wonder about Jordan Davis's (presumed) neologismic adjectival redubplicative binomial whatsit -- thus L. Upton wrote -- > I am enjoying many of the threads - including stuff about dialects > and euphemisms ... and now here's another... yukyuk > > < Clark Coolidge and Jackson Mac Low>> says Jordan Davis > > I hadn't met that - it sounded childish and immature at first but > then it occurred to me that maybe that's my Eurocentrism and perhaps > the word is a pre-Colombian word, in origin, of great power and > intelligence... so I had another go... This time, it's probably my > English ear, but, yukyuk SOUNDED like a term of abuse so I was > intrigued because I find it hard to imagine that in the context of > these two writers . . . I'm wondering too abt. yukyuk, and no doubt JD will enlighten the masses of usses -- but meanwhile, here's a hypothesis abt. (tentative parsing of) the repeatable enigma (i.e., yukyuk) -- 1. somewhat reminds of muck-a-muck (derived from "high muck-a-muck") with indeed poss. American Indian roots -- acc. to WWWebster's: Main Entry: high-muck-a-muck Pronunciation: "hI-'m&-ki-"m&k Variant(s): or high-muck=B7e=B7ty-muck /"hI-'m&-k&-tE-"m&k/ Function: noun Etymology: by folk etymology from Chinook Jargon hayo makamak plenty to eat Date: 1856 : an important and often arrogant person [also note: Main Entry: muck-a-muck Variant(s): or muck=B7ety-muck /'m&-k&-tE-/ Function: noun Date: 1912 : HIGH-MUCK-A-MUCK ] 2. the word yuk (or yuck) itself has three distinct meanings (only 2 of 'em covvered by WWWebst.) -- The WWWebster 2nd entry says: Main Entry: 2yuck Variant(s): also yuk Function: interjection Date: 1966 -- used to express rejection or disgust this is presumably the lexical sense that can make LUpton wonder if yukyuk should be understood to suggest some manner of derogation ("term of abuse"). WWWebster's does give another meaning of yuck: Main Entry: 1yuck Pronunciation: 'y&k variant of2yak --> Main Entry: 2sup Function: noun Date: circa 1570 : a mouthful especially of liquor or broth : SIP; also : a small quantity of liquid but it's hard for me to find the relevance. That webtionary doesn't seem to know about what I think of as the more likely relevant usage -- what I'm considering the 3rd (most colloquial?) sense of yuck -- as based on the expression "yuck yuck yuck" (or some such), meaning "heh heh"or "what a joke!" or "ho ho ho!" . . . i.e., a (perhaps cartoon-based) interjection signifying or suggesting laughter (or oftentimes, the idea of laughter shorn of the actual phenomenon?) -- anyway, in my speculative opinion, "a yukyuk" suggests someone who's a serious comic of some sort -- a jokester / trickster involved in outlandish feats of metaphysical humor or "cosmic laughter" as 'twere -- a yukyuk =3D a muck-a-muck of chuckle-down-theory, belike? -- 3. In general, btw, the UCK words may have a degree of intertextuality (so to say, sotto voce) -- i.e., any one UCK word suggests another in various degrees of subtextual resonance -- muck / yuck / fuck / schmuck / luck / pluck / cluck / duck / Huck [Finn] / Puck [Djinn] / tuck in [also, as in Tuck & Patti] / puk win [sp? as in hockey] / chuck [also, as in to chuck up] / truck [also, as in, "don't have much truck with"] / and there's: snuck up (trickster) stuck up (dickster) chuck up (yuckster) fuck up (schmuckster) gotchyer pluck up? dontcha muck up! whatta schmuck! outtal luck! yuk yuk yuk! yoohoo Jordon, awright whats the deal? d.i. . , ......., 1.................., \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/\0/\/////////////////////...' .o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o....' ///\\\\\\/////////\/\\\o///\/\\\\\\\\\//////\\\...' .David..........Raphael..........Israel...' [ &/or.office......disrael@skgf.com ] {telephonic.location.202/882-1179} |"...sleuthing out all clues, blues & news"| \\\//////\\\\\\\\\/\///&\\\/\/////////\\\\\\///..' ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 08:53:36 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: yukyuks MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: Quoted-printable [ was: Re: hypothesis and repeatability ] Both chris cheek and Lawrence Upton wonder about Jordan Davis's (presumed) neologismic adjectival redubplicative binomial whatsit -- thus L. Upton wrote -- > I am enjoying many of the threads - including stuff about dialects > and euphemisms ... and now here's another... yukyuk > > < Clark Coolidge and Jackson Mac Low>> says Jordan Davis > > I hadn't met that - it sounded childish and immature at first but > then it occurred to me that maybe that's my Eurocentrism and perhaps > the word is a pre-Colombian word, in origin, of great power and > intelligence... so I had another go... This time, it's probably my > English ear, but, yukyuk SOUNDED like a term of abuse so I was > intrigued because I find it hard to imagine that in the context of > these two writers . . . I'm wondering too abt. yukyuk, and no doubt JD will enlighten the masses of usses -- but meanwhile, here's a hypothesis abt. (tentative parsing of) the repeatable enigma (i.e., yukyuk) -- 1. somewhat reminds of muck-a-muck (derived from "high muck-a-muck") with indeed poss. American Indian roots -- acc. to WWWebster's: Main Entry: high-muck-a-muck Pronunciation: "hI-'m&-ki-"m&k Variant(s): or high-muck=B7e=B7ty-muck /"hI-'m&-k&-tE-"m&k/ Function: noun Etymology: by folk etymology from Chinook Jargon hayo makamak plenty to eat Date: 1856 : an important and often arrogant person [also note: Main Entry: muck-a-muck Variant(s): or muck=B7ety-muck /'m&-k&-tE-/ Function: noun Date: 1912 : HIGH-MUCK-A-MUCK ] 2. the word yuk (or yuck) itself has three distinct meanings (only 2 of 'em covvered by WWWebst.) -- The WWWebster 2nd entry says: Main Entry: 2yuck Variant(s): also yuk Function: interjection Date: 1966 -- used to express rejection or disgust this is presumably the lexical sense that can make LUpton wonder if yukyuk should be understood to suggest some manner of derogation ("term of abuse"). WWWebster's does give another meaning of yuck: Main Entry: 1yuck Pronunciation: 'y&k variant of2yak --> Main Entry: 2sup Function: noun Date: circa 1570 : a mouthful especially of liquor or broth : SIP; also : a small quantity of liquid but it's hard for me to find the relevance. That webtionary doesn't seem to know about what I think of as the more likely relevant usage -- what I'm considering the 3rd (most colloquial?) sense of yuck -- as based on the expression "yuck yuck yuck" (or some such), meaning "heh heh"or "what a joke!" or "ho ho ho!" . . . i.e., a (perhaps cartoon-based) interjection signifying or suggesting laughter (or oftentimes, the idea of laughter shorn of the actual phenomenon?) -- anyway, in my speculative opinion, "a yukyuk" suggests someone who's a serious comic of some sort -- a jokester / trickster involved in outlandish feats of metaphysical humor or "cosmic laughter" as 'twere -- a yukyuk =3D a muck-a-muck of chuckle-down-theory, belike? -- 3. In general, btw, the UCK words may have a degree of intertextuality (so to say, sotto voce) -- i.e., any one UCK word suggests another in various degrees of subtextual resonance -- muck / yuck / fuck / schmuck / luck / pluck / cluck / duck / Huck [Finn] / Puck [Djinn] / tuck in [also, as in Tuck & Patti] / puk win [sp? as in hockey] / chuck [also, as in to chuck up] / truck [also, as in, "don't have much truck with"] / and there's: snuck up (trickster) stuck up (dickster) chuck up (yuckster) fuck up (schmuckster) gotchyer pluck up? dontcha muck up! whatta schmuck! outtal luck! yuk yuk yuk! yoohoo Jordon, awright whats the deal? d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 20:17:01 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: Re: yukyuk MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 <> says d.i. ok - and the responses to me have made me see that the word _yukyuk_ is more complex if only slightly than i thought when i responded - but reall= y it wasn't the word itself that was my main concern but those to whom it w= as being applied and the general attitude it clearly expresses it was the manner of my response that i just about regretted - i had neve= r heard _yukyuk_ before but it will always make me think of jordan davis now... whether or not i should also think _schmuck_ is another matter if i have been taken more seriously than i intended regarding the pose of= my response then that's my responsibility i *was* serious about my opposition to the dismissiveness i detect in the= reference to coolidge and mac low, dismissiveness without any foundation being apparent i thought cris's response was more constructive - and points to one aspec= t of how a strong reply came from this side of the ocean i'd like an explanation and defence or retraction of what he said from jordan davis L ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 21:41:00 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Bennett M. Sm [Dimpson" Subject: Re: yukyuk In-Reply-To: <199708022017_MC2-1C3E-1C81@compuserve.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I've always understood "yukyuk" to be related to "mucketymuck" or "yuckety-yuk." Silly words for bigwigs, not derisive, not really negative --only slightly under-the-breath or with a cocked eye. Coolidge is a bigwig, no? And in history if not totally with it. I have always read _Crystal Text_ as a quasi-transcendental, thwarted visionary, interior lyric in the matrice of yukyuks like Blake or Beckett. The early "particle language" work is beautifully romantic too. Well. Bennett &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. &c. Bennett Simpson &c. bms5q@virginia.edu &c. &c. &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 00:02:12 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: yukyuk MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Bennett -- quite right, you've expressed more nail-on-the-head what I was trying to get (at in scattershot manner) abt. the evident sense / nuances of yukyuk (though rather speculative / intuitive on my part, since I think I'd not encountered the term used in this exact manner) -- a bit, then, like saying, "such a doubhty & estimable scriviner as Henry James has allowed . . . " except that Jordon phrases it in a jaunty late-20th cent. manner (rather than a jaunty late 19th cent. manner) . . . but the Jordanian barrister will no doubt return anon w/ it's stellar expert opinion . . . till then, cheerio old sport, &c. d.i. / / / "Bennett M. Sm [Dimpson" wrote: > I've always understood "yukyuk" to be related > to "mucketymuck" or "yuckety-yuk." > > Silly words for bigwigs, not derisive, > not really negative --only slightly under-the-breath > > or with a cocked eye. Coolidge is a bigwig, > no? And in history if not totally with it. > > I have always read _Crystal Text_ as a quasi-transcendental, > thwarted visionary, interior lyric in the matrice of > > yukyuks like Blake or Beckett. The early "particle language" > work is beautifully romantic too. Well. > > Bennett > > > > &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. > &c. > Bennett Simpson &c. > bms5q@virginia.edu &c. > &c. > &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 00:05:23 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: yukyuk / erratum MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT hmm, an odd typo -- for: > a bit, then, like saying, "such a doubhty & estimable scriviner read: > a bit, then, like saying, "such a doughty & estimable scriviner d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 02:47:25 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: William S. Burroughs Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I just heard on CNN that Burroughs died tonight. Heart failure. It seems this has been a year of losses. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 09:36:28 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: hypothesis and repeatability In-Reply-To: <970802.115002.EST.KWTUMA@miamiu.muohio.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" On Sat, 2 Aug 1997 06:00:14 -0400 Lawrence Upton said: >and while you're doing that, just off at a tangent, do you guys use the >word _airhead_ at all? Keith Tuma says that the use of "airhead" is fading but I found it bubbling into my consciousness over and over again watching Naomi Campbell parade up and down the aisle of the church during the Versace funeral. But my reaction is probably influenced by a) being the only member of the poetics list to have read Naomi Campbell's novel, "Swan," and then b) seeing her interviewed by Larry King in which she admitted that she had never read "Swan," but on the other hand someone had told her the plot and it all sounded marvelous. Kevin Killian ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 13:27:25 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Eryque Gleason Subject: Re: hypothesis and repeatability Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >But my >reaction is probably influenced by a) being the only member of the poetics >list to have read Naomi Campbell's novel, "Swan," and then b) seeing her >interviewed by Larry King in which she admitted that she had never read >"Swan," but on the other hand someone had told her the plot and it all >sounded marvelous. > >Kevin Killian hi again kevin (after forever!). Do you mean that someone wrote the novel and that her name is on it as author, or she's a character, or what? happy campbell's (looks like a soup day here) eryque ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 13:43:18 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: JDHollo@AOL.COM Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 1 Aug 1997 to 2 Aug 1997 Unable to download this file: could you please check & try again? Thanks, Anselm Hollo ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 17:52:04 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: Quantity & Quality MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Rachel Kubie wrote -- > Henry-- > didn't mean to imply that the sort of continuous flow of poetry that > seems to get produced in more living circumstances is necessarily > memory-less. The thing is, the printing press created the > *standardized* text, the *one* we all know & seems to me that has > played a big role in the *little object over/against time* > perception of the poem that has maybe pushed poems into seeming > isolated incidents. The printing press sure had an effect on how writing was conceived / erceived / approached, etc., though probably not an easily simplifiable effect. Word processing (with the ease of revision) has an effect, no doubt, too. I'm reminded of how Walt Whitman's successive editions contributed to his framework of development / polishing / perfecting (in his view) of his work. The published book is, in its way, a figure for the "act of publication" that is involved in speech itself -- when you speak, lo! & presto! -- there's what you've said!, hovering in air, indellible in historical fact though the ears that have heard it may already begin to tinker with it, memory-wise, as the half-life sets in (or as the noise of traffic drowns out a phrase) . . . btw, what poetry is produced in "less living circumstances" one wonders? -- are the dead writing & publishing, these days? cheers, d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 19:12:06 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Bennett M. Sm [Dimpson" Subject: Re: yukyuk In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Sat, 2 Aug 1997, Bennett M. Sm [Dimpson wrote: > I have always read _Crystal Text_ as a quasi-transcendental, > thwarted visionary, interior lyric in the matrice of > > yukyuks like Blake or Beckett. The early "particle language" > work is beautifully romantic too. Well. Auto-Critique, 7:12pm I regret making such squishy claimss. I have been a wilted squash flower lately, it is so hot. What is hi history Jordan? Can one swallow it as vitamins so it's in side? Does it have a st- yle of dig estion that is recogniz able more often than wor bi ts or objecif reco rd ing? Bean s. > &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. > &c. > Bennett Simpson &c. > bms5q@virginia.edu &c. > &c. > &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. > &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. &c. Bennett Simpson &c. bms5q@virginia.edu &c. &c. &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 19:36:22 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christina Fairbank Chirot Subject: Re: yukyuk In-Reply-To: <199708022017_MC2-1C3E-1C81@compuserve.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Re the work of Clark Coolidge and Jackson Mac Low being "ahistorical" and "transcendental miscellenies"-- not sure where this idea came from! perhaps a kind of trickle down from some of Jameson's asssertions re "postmodern pastiche" and "free floating signifiers" etc used as elements in collage? with words and images detached from their contexts? some other theoretical generalities? Rather than get embroiled in wondering about this, let alone which version of the transcendental is being referred to--(Emerson's? the Maharishi's? )-- Mac Low is one of the most historically conscious and aware artists/performers/writers/scholars/musicians this writer/reader has encountered. His work makes use of this awareness and knowledge through a wide variety of methods, texturings, palimpsests, juxtapostions, appostions and references. The notes alone appended to many Mac Low pieces (which i have actually heard people complain of) are thorough and have been a good part of my education--following up Mac Low's references and having opened up wide areas of literary history previously unknown to myself and as well reading a great many historical texts that the works refer to and work with. Because he works in/with many fields of activity and materials, Mac Low's work opens these up to the reader/viewer--bringing in histories of dance, performance, sound poetry, visual poetry, classical literature and history and as well opening up American history. There is also Mac Low's commitment to activism in relation to the events of recent American history. Mac Low for myself has been as Duncan said of Olson "a mighty fire source" and I deeply appreciate the ongoing enquiries and studies he has presented for myself and others. And i don't mean in terms of inspiration alone by his example--but historical knowledge and questioning. Clark Coolidge--in many ways an historical writer as well. His knowledge and use of American literature and jazz for example, as well the histories involved with these--see for example the letters between him and Paul Metcalf published in the STATIONS Clark Coolidge Symposium-- as well as interviews and essays re Kerouac, jazz drumming--the work of Art Blaeky for example--quite an historical knowledge there which is made use of in the work-- something to think of reading Coolidge in re history is TIME--as he's a jazz and rock drummer, "keeping time" to be sure important! "a sense of measure" so to speak--and another time & measure Coolidge works with is that of geology--see for example the extraordinary SMITHSONIAN DEPOSITIONS--playing on the Smithsonian museum, deposits as of minerals (after all he also wrote QUARTZ HEARTS, the CRYSTAL TEXT etc) and depositions as evidence--and the Earth Works artist/essayist Robert Smithson--the book makes a kind of multivoiced autobiographical narrative by using texts from WCW (Smithson's family's doctor; the use of sediment chart in Paterson inspired Smithson & Smithson wanted his essay "A Tour of the Monuments of the Passaic" to be thought of as a kind of appendix to Paterson)--Smithson, Kerouac, writings and interviews by/with Chabrol and Godard (film makers much influenced by Amrican writers and filmmakers) geology texts, the Professor Challenger stories of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle--presenting several layerings/appostions/interweavings of times--human, geological,literay and film--fiction and fact--as all the sources are listed at the back of the book, as in several of Coolidge's other works--the indication is that the work is taking place within a context/vortex of consciously chosen historical conjunctions. The work of Mac Low and Coolidge rather than being ahistorical is archeological--or, to use my own term, anarcheological--that is, it works with elements of history and time and opens them by arrangements which make new configurations, dances, musics and questions--they indicate a participatory use of historical materials rather than a detaching of them from historical memory. Rather than transcending these elements, the works make them present in new arrangements--which suggests that the materials of history are to be continually examined, mined, questioned, made use of and participated in and with and for. So my thanks to Mac Low and Coolidge--they've kept me busy for quite some time now digging away in the anarcheological environs of history--and I mean real time, not transcendental time, too--like years in record stores book stores libraries conversations performances following up their leads . . . and applying them & making use of them-- i.e. practice ZA DA dbc ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 21:21:35 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: Re: Quantity & Quality MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 <> big business in the uk L ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 21:45:25 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: yukyuk Comments: cc: Christina Fairbank Chirot MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT DBC -- thanks for the argument abt. the historical & MacLow / Coolidge -- well said, & interestingly informed -- so, if "ahistorical" doesn't make the grade (re: these writers), how about "pan-historical" ? btw, the discussion of archaeology reminds of Meredith Monk's marvelous "American Archeology #1" performance that happened on Roosevelt Island several summers ago (re: which, btw, I penned a review for The New Art Examiner) -- MM hoped to have this as first in a possible series of "digs" into particular histories of American sites (this one dealt w/ the strange history of that little island, as well as MM's usual pallette of broad post-Jungian concerns) -- I hope she's able to get back to it & proceed further . . . cheers, d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 22:40:06 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: James Finnegan Subject: Re: National Poetry Slam If you are in driving distance of Middletown Connecticut next week, then you might want to check out the '97 National Poetry Slam. Details: www.machine1.com/97Nationals Tues. is opening day--Sat. nite the Finals. Tues. thru Sat. many poetry and slam related events. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 22:18:18 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Subject: POETICS: in the beginning MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit another little one for the morning poet ------------------------------------*** in the beginning i began by beginning (but even that wasn't the beginning (and even now I've hardly begun i can't promise anything : wanna come? (c) 1973 llrussell ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 01:30:06 -0400 Reply-To: "Bennett M. Sm [Dimpson" Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Bennett M. Sm [Dimpson" Subject: Coolidge Time In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Historical is such a precise and narrow qualification that it may not do anyone any good. Poof. Actually, I find it difficult to speak of Coolidge (I'm not as comfortable with Mac Low) in terms of "history" because he so consciously invokes measures of time; they are a crux, but a "history"? Maybe for termites. Terminal index. Tight? THe time of a reading, the time of a tongue, syllab-le, time of a debris sliding over a thing timed as a book to explode. I like the suggestion to call Coolidge archeological instead of historical. I tried to make the claim in a paper that Coolidge is allegorical as well, where physical word matters come to stand, are experienced, sprawl out (is this what "the lean" means?) as a provisional and personally felt truth of language. I don't feel too awkward speaking about "truths of language" in reference to Coolidge because his writing does bring them on, coddles them. Like Smithson's "Sedimentation of the Mind" or "A Heap of Language" or his hypothetical maps of a textual lost-continent of "Atlantis," many Coolidge works compell me to think in terms of elsewheres and hiding places, be they folds of geolithic time, graphic discombobulation, or the phenomena of a life begged in writing (cf. _The Crystal Text_). Of course, both Smithson and Coolidge --and Gordon Matta-Clark is another great example-- are at pains to point to where the elses are. The liminal, which may be a purely formal space, is very much right here and now, guised (but _is_ it "guised") in words, rocks, apartment blocks, Passaic, NJ. The rub is to see it, vision being so incredibly taken for granted. Thus Smithson's non-sites, Coolidge's poem gravel, and Matta-Clark's sawed-open "anarchitecture" come off like science-fiction --out of this time, some time, which time, extravagant and counter-intuitive. Does anyone consider Coolidge a didactic poet (this isn't a negative qualification)? Would such a consideration require more fundamenntal quandries like "belief" (Do I believe what you're proposing Clark Coolidge? Do I believe in Smithson's chtonic urge? Do I believe Matta-Clark or Dan Graham's grasp of "ideological" critique is supportable? OUCH!), or "success" (do such efforts to make clear or dark work, are they making me experience "X" "correctly" or are they making me "experience" X period? What X (did I cover that one?), or, fuck it, "intention" (Do I understand exactly why "the mud of the bulk of the back yard" begins _Quartz Hearts_ or what such a phrase could do? (DO? DO PHRASES DO?)) And yes, "history" --stuff that has happened-- greatly influences CC's poetry. Jazz soforth. But this doesn't make him a "historical" poet in the way such a term is usually inferred (as in Pound maybe, or even Williams tho he's closer). &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. &c. Bennett Simpson &c. bms5q@virginia.edu &c. &c. &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 01:35:06 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: Re: Coolidge Time In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Give it twenty years. We're all history. Another twenty, we're all lost in it. From that point on, dissolution, annihilation. There will be lovers, right here, whose names we do not know. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 01:42:59 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Bennett M. Sm [Dimpson" Subject: Re: Coolidge Time In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII And thankfully so though we have our favorite ruins which may were necessary once though not apart from pleasure. On Mon, 4 Aug 1997, Alan J Sondheim wrote: > Give it twenty years. We're all history. > Another twenty, we're all lost in it. > >From that point on, dissolution, annihilation. > > There will be lovers, right here, whose names we do not know. > &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. &c. Bennett Simpson &c. bms5q@virginia.edu &c. &c. &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 01:50:51 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Bennett M. Sm [Dimpson" Subject: Re: Coolidge Time In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Auto-Critique, 1:12 Lame duck "qualifies" lag time (only slightly) On Mon, 4 Aug 1997, Bennett M. Sm [Dimpson wrote: > Historical is such a precise and narrow qualification that it may not do > anyone any good. Poof. Actually, I find it difficult to speak of Coolidge > (I'm not as comfortable with Mac Low) in terms of "history" because he so > consciously invokes measures of time; they are a crux, but a "history"? > Maybe for termites. Terminal index. Tight? THe time of a reading, the time > of a tongue, syllab-le, time of a debris sliding over a thing timed as a > book to explode. I like the suggestion to call Coolidge archeological > instead of historical. I tried to make the claim in a paper that Coolidge > is allegorical as well, where physical word matters come to stand, are > experienced, sprawl out (is this what "the lean" means?) as a provisional > and personally felt truth of language. I don't feel too awkward speaking > about "truths of language" in reference to Coolidge because his writing > does bring them on, coddles them. Like Smithson's "Sedimentation of the > Mind" or "A Heap of Language" or his hypothetical maps of a textual > lost-continent of "Atlantis," many Coolidge works compell me to think in > terms of elsewheres and hiding places, be they folds of geolithic time, > graphic discombobulation, or the phenomena of a life begged in writing > (cf. _The Crystal Text_). Of course, both Smithson and Coolidge --and > Gordon Matta-Clark is another great example-- are at pains to point to > where the elses are. The liminal, which may be a purely formal space, is > very much right here and now, guised (but _is_ it "guised") in words, > rocks, apartment blocks, Passaic, NJ. The rub is to see it, vision being > so incredibly taken for granted. Thus Smithson's non-sites, Coolidge's > poem gravel, and Matta-Clark's sawed-open "anarchitecture" come off like > science-fiction --out of this time, some time, which time, extravagant and > counter-intuitive. > > Does anyone consider Coolidge a didactic poet (this isn't a negative > qualification)? Would such a consideration require more fundamenntal > quandries like "belief" (Do I believe what you're proposing Clark > Coolidge? Do I believe in Smithson's chtonic urge? Do I believe > Matta-Clark or Dan Graham's grasp of "ideological" critique is > supportable? OUCH!), or "success" (do such efforts to make clear or dark > work, are they making me experience "X" "correctly" or are they making > me "experience" X period? What X (did I cover that one?), or, fuck it, > "intention" (Do I understand exactly why "the mud of the bulk of the back > yard" begins _Quartz Hearts_ or what such a phrase could do? > (DO? DO PHRASES DO?)) > > And yes, "history" --stuff that has happened-- greatly influences CC's > poetry. Jazz soforth. But this doesn't make him a "historical" poet in the > way such a term is usually inferred (as in Pound maybe, or even Williams > tho he's closer). > > > &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. > &c. > Bennett Simpson &c. > bms5q@virginia.edu &c. > &c. > &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. > &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. &c. Bennett Simpson &c. bms5q@virginia.edu &c. &c. &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 08:30:10 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: National Poetry Slam In-Reply-To: <970803224005_-555583110@emout12.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" why is it in middletown? has wesleyan u decided that slams are cool? At 10:40 PM -0400 8/3/97, James Finnegan wrote: >If you are in driving distance of Middletown >Connecticut next week, then you might want >to check out the '97 National Poetry Slam. >Details: > > www.machine1.com/97Nationals > >Tues. is opening day--Sat. nite the Finals. >Tues. thru Sat. many poetry and slam related >events. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 10:45:51 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Matt Kirschenbaum Subject: update on the William Blake Archive Comments: To: humanist@kcl.ac.uk, H-CLC@msu.edu, H-MMEDIA@h-net.msu.edu, ESE@ra.msstate.edu, ht_lit@consecol.org MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit The editors of the William Blake Archive -- Morris Eaves, Robert Essick, and Joseph Viscomi -- are pleased to announce that The Book of Thel, copy F, is now online in searchable form. This may seem a modest achievement, given that this is one of Blake's shorter works, and that its eight plates (with enlargements and accompanying transcriptions) have already been available on the site since November of 1996. In fact, however, this copy of The Book of Thel is a prototype for all future works to be added to the Archive (both illuminated books and other materials), and its appearance reflects the architecture and objectives of the Archive as they have taken shape over many months of development, testing, and refinement. Unlike its previous version, and unlike the other illuminated books currently available in the Archive, this copy of Thel has been tagged using SGML (Standard Generalized Markup Language). SGML tagging offers the Archive's users the opportunity to perform sophisticated searches, either on the text of the plates, or, more remarkably, on the content of their illustrations. Search results are retrieved and presented using DynaWeb, a product of the Inso Corporation. The text and image searching enabled by DynaWeb and the underlying SGML tagging is a powerful demonstration of the potential of electronic resources in the humanities. However, there's more. Users with Java-capable browsers can now make use of Inote, Java-based software developed at the Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities, to assist them in their study of the Archive's visual materials. Users may employ Inote to examine editorial annotations of a given image independently of a search, or else, following a successful image search, Inote may be used to open the image, zoomed to the specific area containing the object of the search, together with the relevant editorial commentary. This is IATH's first public implementation of Inote, and its release marks a major advance for image-based electronic editing. Users with Java-capable browsers can also take advantage of a second, equally innovative Java program developed at IATH, the ImageSizer. This is a feature that allows one to view Blake's plates and images at their true size, reproducing the object's actual physical dimensions on the screen, regardless of the resolution of a particular monitor; indeed, users can calibrate this feature to consistently display the Archive's images at whatever proportions they may wish. Finally, the Archive's selective bibliography of criticism, reference materials, and standard editions, with about 500 entries, is now available. We hope to have the bibliography searchable by the end of the summer. We also hope to have David V. Erdman's Complete Poetry and Prose of William Blake online and searchable by that same time. In the coming weeks and months we will turn our attention to placing other illuminated books online in searchable form, following on the model of The Book of Thel, copy F. We will begin with the other copies of Thel (copies H and O), as well as copies of Visions of the Daughters of Albion (copies C and J) now publicly available only in HTML -- thus lacking any of the capabilities described above. We will then move on to other books: All Religions are One (copy A), There is No Natural Religion (copies C and L), The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (copy D), America (copy E), Europe (copies B and E), The Song of Los (copies A and B), The Book of Urizen (copy G), Songs of Innocence and of Experience (copy Z), The Book of Ahania (copy A), and The Book of Los (copy A). The Blake Archive is located at: http://www.iath.virginia.edu/blake/ Please forward this announcement as appropriate. Matthew Kirschenbaum, Project Manager The William Blake Archive blake@jefferson.village.virginia.edu Institute for Advanced Technology in the Humanities University of Virginia, Charlottesville ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 10:48:37 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Re: yukyuk In-Reply-To: <199708022121.RAA28189@radagast.wizard.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Yes, David -- I was thinking of the reemergence of Don Rickles, and the curious embrace he's found himself locked in, tickled, is there hope for Ted Greenwald? Worked with Ted, actually, and am pleased to hear young englische seek him out -- must be Miles C, huh? Sure couldn't be Keston... as for the droll allegation that younger americans gone soft, let me remind Snr Upton of the etymology of Frankie Goes To Hollywood -- the group believed that "Hollywood" was a place, and that the headline "Frankie Goes Hollywood" was a sorry american error -- in fact "Hollywood" is a sort of quantum space/time construction, meaning, an adjective .. so that a proper substitution would not be "Wichitia" or "Brummagem" but "sour" or "wrong". Anyway, relax, don't do it -- J On Sat, 2 Aug 1997, David R. Israel wrote: > as based on the expression "yuck yuck yuck" (or some such), meaning > "heh heh"or "what a joke!" or "ho ho ho!" . . . i.e., a (perhaps > cartoon-based) interjection signifying or suggesting laughter (or > oftentimes, the idea of laughter shorn of the actual phenomenon?) -- > > anyway, in my speculative opinion, "a yukyuk" suggests someone > who's a serious comic of some sort -- a jokester / trickster > > involved in outlandish feats of metaphysical humor or "cosmic > laughter" as 'twere -- > a yukyuk = a muck-a-muck of chuckle-down-theory, belike? -- > > 3. In general, btw, the UCK words may ... ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 11:37:05 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: James Finnegan Subject: Re: National Poetry Slam In a message dated 97-08-04 10:05:05 EDT, you write: > >why is it in middletown? has wesleyan u decided that slams are cool? > Slams at the national level are crazy cool. However, Wesleyan is not the sponsoring org. Most of the events will be held in bookshops, bars & coffeeshops in Middletown CT, with only a couple of events being held on the Wesleyan campus. The Buttonwood Tree, a very independent & freewheeling arts center, will be the hub of the whole affair. At the national level Slam is organized by a loose confederation of the slam masters. A slam master is a self-appointed role--anyone who initiates a slam on a regular basis is a slam master. The most active slam masters hail from Boston, Chicago, SF, Portland, Austin Asheville, NYC, and Connecticut. In this '97 Nationals 36 (4-person) teams will compete, from cities & regions all over the US & Canada. This year there will even be a team called Mouth Almighty, which I believe is sponsored by the spoken word recording outfit of the same name (instigator Bob Holman, of the United States of Poetry project). Also, there are individual competitors registered--Lisa Buscani and D.J. Renegage are among the names I recognize. Faith Vicinanza is the slam master and force behind slamming in Conn-- she and a small cadre of fervent slammers first petitioned to get the slam to Conn., and then planned/produced the whole show. And it is showtime, especially by the semi-final rounds when the stops get pulled out. Finnegan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 14:25:28 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: National Poetry Slam In-Reply-To: <970804113615_-121132534@emout05.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" thanks james f, yeah i think slams are cool, don't understand the avant-garde's need to police its borders so rigidly...just curious abt middletown, seemed an unlikely place, except i guess it is "centrally" located as moniker suggests...md At 11:37 AM -0400 8/4/97, James Finnegan wrote: >In a message dated 97-08-04 10:05:05 EDT, you write: > >> >>why is it in middletown? has wesleyan u decided that slams are cool? >> > >Slams at the national level are crazy cool. However, Wesleyan is >not the sponsoring org. Most of the events will be held in bookshops, >bars & coffeeshops in Middletown CT, with only a couple of events >being held on the Wesleyan campus. The Buttonwood Tree, a very >independent & freewheeling arts center, will be the hub of the whole >affair. > >At the national level Slam is organized by a loose confederation of >the slam masters. A slam master is a self-appointed role--anyone >who initiates a slam on a regular basis is a slam master. The most >active slam masters hail from Boston, Chicago, SF, Portland, Austin >Asheville, NYC, and Connecticut. In this '97 Nationals 36 (4-person) >teams will compete, from cities & regions all over the US & Canada. >This year there will even be a team called Mouth Almighty, which >I believe is sponsored by the spoken word recording outfit of the same >name (instigator Bob Holman, of the United States of Poetry project). >Also, there are individual competitors registered--Lisa Buscani and >D.J. Renegage are among the names I recognize. > >Faith Vicinanza is the slam master and force behind slamming in Conn-- >she and a small cadre of fervent slammers first petitioned to get the slam >to Conn., and then planned/produced the whole show. And it is showtime, >especially by the semi-final rounds when the stops get pulled out. > >Finnegan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 16:05:26 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: Re: yukyuk MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 < please do, Mr Davis, but it wasn't me who made wh said that. You seem to think, I note, that there are only two young English poets: Miles and Keston. I am more than a little unconvinced about yukyuk but willing to potential= ly accept that my ignorance led me astray - if oten does. There remains the oddity of finding Mac Low and Coolidge ahistorical on which I hear nothin= g in defence. Your posting ends with _In general, btw, the UCK words may_ = is this an error or the syntactical farewell of a yukyuk manque? Lawrence ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 15:13:55 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: R I Caddel Subject: Basil Bunting: A Northern Life Comments: To: british n irish poets , modbrits , poetics , pound list MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Announcing the publication on September 18th of Basil Bunting : A Northern Life by Richard Caddel and Anthony Flowers Published by Newcastle Libraries & Information Service in association with the Basil Bunting Poetry Centre. ISBN 1 85795 058 5 price 7.95 Pounds Sterling plus postage. An illustrated account of Bunting's lifelong association with Northumbria: "A poet is just a poet, but I am a Northumbrian man. It has always been my home, even when I've been living elsewhere." Orders (Sterling only, no credit cards) to either: Newcastle Libraries and Information Service Princess Square, Newcastle upon Tyne 1 or: Basil Bunting Poetry Centre, University Library, Palace Green, Durham DH1 3RN ___________________________________________________________ Richard Caddel Durham University Library, Stockton Rd., Durham DH1 3LY, UK E-mail: R.I.Caddel @ durham.ac.uk Phone: +44 (0)191 374 3044 Fax: +44 (0)191 374 7481 WWW: http://www.dur.ac.uk/~dul0ric "Words! Pens are too light. Take a chisel to write." - Basil Bunting ___________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 17:02:07 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joel Kuszai Subject: MAC HAMMOND MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Perhaps it's too much of a local news item for the poetics list, but Buffalo poet, english professor, and longtime conspiratorial angel, Mac Hammond passed away last week in Buffalo. If there is anyone out there who knew Mac, or his poetry, please get in touch with me before too long. Published by Ohio U.P., Alan Swallow, Hammond was a student and friend of Jakobson and Pomorska before taking his PhD from Harvard in the early 60s. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 17:21:07 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: rude wood (makes your mouth taste like onions) In-Reply-To: <199708041605_MC2-1C59-C155@compuserve.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I remain flabbergasted that Upton takes so much offense on behalf of Mac Low and Coolidge -- when as has been explained none was meant, and none was heard _within the community_. Lawrence, I do think you're being rude. I'm also puzzled that Henry will not speak to the issue of language poetry and history he raised -- especially when so many have taken up the issue with him. I will stick to my distinction between work which explicitly uses historical data (the Olson line) and work which while it is in fact (surprise surprise!) located in time (dated -- god this is exhausting) does not in fact refer to the events of what I am imagining to be for Henry a Mandelstamian conscience (the idea that we must be classicists because there were totalitarians afoot the same time the modernists were working). I will call your attention once more in what I hope you are hearing as John Cleese's voice to the fact that I was arguing bitterly with Henry about precisely this issue, this sad, bizarre, misbegotten, lonely, kudzu-covered idea, that a work can lack historicity -- specifically the work of language poets. Since I haven't read a single word from a bona fide language poet here on the topic, I'm going to assume that at most this thread has merely enregistered another four or five names on the list of names the language poets keep -- I had to torture Bruce Andrews with Mantovanni records for two days to get the FACT of the existence of this list verified -- the list of names language poets keep of poets who are BENEATH contempt and who should be met with nothing more civil than a raised eyebrow. It's time we all just acknowledged the list (cough). As for the larger community of younger british poets, and wouldn't that be a better thread, would you care to mention some? I may have only dropped the names of two -- because (ignoring all evidence in this thread to the contrary) I would rather carry on a discussion that involved names, works, words and ideas, rather than blah blah blah lack of incision blah blah sentimental blah have you actually read Ted? My contribution to the post you mention, incidentally, ends well before the snipped bit of David Israel's post. Goodbye, and good luck, Jordan On Mon, 4 Aug 1997, Lawrence Upton wrote: > < remind Snr Upton of the etymology of Frankie Goes To Hollywood> > > please do, Mr Davis, but it wasn't me who made wh said that. > > You seem to think, I note, that there are only two young English poets: > Miles and Keston. > > I am more than a little unconvinced about yukyuk but willing to potentially > accept that my ignorance led me astray - if oten does. There remains the > oddity of finding Mac Low and Coolidge ahistorical on which I hear nothing > in defence. > > Your posting ends with _In general, btw, the UCK words may_ > > is this an error or the syntactical farewell of a yukyuk manque? > > Lawrence > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 18:08:14 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: flabbergasted MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 <> possibly I am and if I am then I am sorry, i apologise. i already half conceded yukyuk - wasnt just me that confused - others heard it you see i thought you were being rude, still do really - it was the manne= r, the tone that offended - seemed to me i was just responding with a simil= ar aggressiveness but for a different reason... maybe i got it wrong....forg= et the word... i thought you were... well, never mind... it wasnt just me - = coolidge has been important and mac low much much more so - to me and i couldnt and can't see the _ahistorical_ etc but let's let it go, an= d the explanation, rudeness is the last thing i want and as i say i apologi= se for any offense L ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 15:42:11 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: yukyuks Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Maybe I missed something here. Unlike Upton, I speak American. Referring to people as "yukyuks" is certainly an idiosyncratic usage, but also clearly dismissively pejorative. Jordan, you're surely entitled to feel any way you wish about MacLow and Coolidge, and whether or not there is an official raised-eyebrow list among language poets (there used to be something pretty close among some of Olson's epigones) we probably each have private lists of those whose work we dismiss. But if I feel dismissive of x or y I think it behooves me in this forum to express my reasons--it's that kind of forum. Otherwise we'll all drown in expletives. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 17:14:45 MST7MDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Subject: Re: yukyuks In-Reply-To: <199708042242.PAA25887@italy.it.earthlink.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: Quoted-printable hmmm. & just yesterday I was thinking I'd welcome an increase in list traffic. maybe we should bring the Dorn thread back=97or how about a pillow fight? "I wonder," he said, slyly changing the subject, "... I've recently been reading Hannah Weiner's Clairvoyant Journal, & I'm absolutely shocked at how good this book is. in particular, besides the sheer beauty of the thing, I'm interested in the way that it might be said to trouble the boundary between intentional & non-intentional work, & I'm wondering if other people see this or agree or if there are other works out there that might be doing this=97er, work, if in a very different way, something maybe like Mac Low's Twenties or From Pearl Harbor... what do people have to say about his non- non-intentional wrtg, & its relation to the the explicitly non-intentional work? Chris "dammit, I made these reservations a *week* ago" .. Christopher W. Alexander etc. nominative press collective calexand@library.utah.edu P.O. Box 522402 / Salt Lake City UT 84152-2402 http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 18:17:24 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christina Fairbank Chirot Subject: Re: flabbergasted In-Reply-To: <199708041808_MC2-1C56-59C4@compuserve.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I'm puzzled by the recent exchanges involving rudeness, yukyuks and so on between Jordan Davis and Lawrence Upton. Maybe it's just my impression, but Jordan Davis doesn't seem to have answered any questions raised for him--and politiely one might add--re his idea of yukyuk, the transcendental and so on--seems it has been left up to others to do the work of sending in ideas re the word as well as re the work of Mac Low and Coolidge, the historical, ahistorical and panhistorical, anarcheological, mining and MM---(my thanks and appreciation to David Israel and Bennet Simpson for their informative and thought provoking posts!) while Jordan Davis has replied only with cute quips re FrankieG(T)H and accusations directed at Lawrence Upton. Going back through the posts, the tone and number of apologies seems to be steadily increasing from Lawrence Upton. I don't see any reason for this until coming across in a Jordan Davis post the words re no offence being meant and "none was heard_within the community_" which is rather baffling. Which community? Are the people who wrote on the list who raised questions and exchanged ideas without the particiaption of Jordan Davis part of this community or not and so on. The mention of a nameless commnity who sees things Jordan Davis' way --well, methinks it comes across as a tactic of intimidation to some extent--and seems to have worked as I note Lawrence Upton apologizing while Jordan Davis asserts his flabbergasted state. Discussion with definitions and disagreements--exchange of ideas and materials--with many possibilities of use--yes. Some rudeness when impassioned--sure. When Tom Mandel talked about raising his fists--well, he meant his own and gave his own reasons. But I don't particularly get a good feeling when one person is being steadily backed into apologizing as the other protests astonishment while also invoking a like minded unnamed community behind them someplace. So, back to some discussion--Jordan Davis noted differing attitudes among Watten and Silliman in re the term "experimental". Here is Clark Coolidge on the term: (Lee Bartlett has just asked CC "Do you think of yourself as an 'experimental writer'?") Not really. I understand that category in a general sense, but "experimental" always sounds like you are trying to do something rather than doing it. But if the term does mean what it could mean--pushing things beyond various limits--great! (from Talking Poetry Conversations in the Workshop with Contemporary Poets Interviews by lee Bartlett Albuquerque: U of New Mexico P, 1987 p. 15) ZA DA (beyond yes)! dbc ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 18:29:34 +0000 Reply-To: ARCHAMBEAU@LFC.EDU Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Robert Archambeau Organization: Lake Forest College Subject: Re: Basil Bunting: A Northern Life MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Great news about what is certainly a very important new book on Bunting, a wonderful poet and not nearly as well known as he should be on this side of the Atlantic. The title, _A Northern Life_, indicates the book stays pretty focussed on one aspect of what I understand to be a fascinating and various life -- does anyone know if a full-scale biography is in the works anywhere? RA -- Robert Archambeau Department of English Lake Forest College Lake Forest, IL 60045 http://www.lfc.edu/~archamb/ See: behind bullet-proof glass, the ruby slippers sparkle. We do not know the limits of their powers. We suspect that these limits may not exist. --Salman Rushdie ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 17:35:29 MST7MDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Subject: dressage MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT sorry 'bout this, but can someone give me Joseph Lease's email address (Joseph, are you out there?)? he seems to be signed on, but I keep getting this "this address has fatal errors" etc. garbage every time I try to reach him. I dunno, maybe the name server is down over there... Chris .. Christopher W. Alexander etc. nominative press collective calexand@library.utah.edu P.O. Box 522402 / Salt Lake City UT 84152-2402 http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 11:08:37 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: bock bock bock pacock (incisors in the shop) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII As I said in the cavalier post that made 'em angry in England -- I wondered what Henry could mean by the proposition that language poetry denied history. Then I took two writers somewhere on the outskirts of Lang City -- two writers whose work it's generally (and with some reason) safe to say are _worth looking into_ -- and -- as a contrarian mind you! -- alleged that their work in fact did not explicitly refer to historical events as say the work of SUSAN HOWE does, or even explicitly refer to literary-historical events as say the work of CHARLES BERNSTEIN or BRUCE ANDREWS does. It was a very harmful claim, to be sure, and I hope the offended will send me their laundry bills. As for the flagrant use of a completely irrelevant characterization -- yukyuk -- I noticed that just as in Merican politics, in Merican poetics, it gets all the attention the argument at hand is too shy to demand. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the era of the wrong word. I did receive a kind postcard from Jackson once asking me to be more clear about his having preceded language poetry, and the language poetry reading of Clark Coolidge may turn out to be one of the kinder moments in the history of manifest destiny, so if you can extend your definitions of mea culpa around those clauses, I believe we can both end up satisified. Henry -- are you smiling through all this? Would you please answer my question? Bennett's given some useful notes on history... Jordan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 21:08:01 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: stray slack (sorry) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII DBC correctly points out that I'm holding a teddy bear in the picture of me saying 'my friends still like me' -- the bear does it, I mean -- as for the allegation that I am dodging this issue of relative historicity, I think a mysterious delay in the listserv's delivery is to blame -- the 'pacock' post (and the later unpleasant 'rude' one -- ugh, how awful to have melted down -- Lawrence, if you ever come to New York, look me up, I know excellent places to have lunch -- I promise not to equate everyone from the UK with FGtH if you promise not to mention the shortcomings of the group of writers I've been struggling to be associated with) has about all that I can think to say about this. At any rate -- sorry to everyone, my motto is "I orient to the virtual offense" and I seem to have presumed that the general befuddlement around a throwaway word excused me -- once again, Jackson, if there's mud (or mod) on you from this -- I'll have it steamed out -- presumed that the befuddlement entitled me to employ y'all as a big shield -- I'll not do that again. I wasn't being coy when I suggested the possibility of discussing ultrarecent writers from places other than the continental US -- I'm particularly fond of Keston (Sutherland)'s poem "Vac Stucco" and could type in some bits if anyone felt a blip of interest -- and in the tradition of international logrolling I will mention that Keston did publish a book of mine -- Mark Weiss -- it may have been that kind of subtlety more imaginary than expressed, but I meant something more affectionate than dismissal by the term 'yukyuk' -- but as Anselm Berrigan says, Heidegger is as manipulative as Spielberg -- there's a line of Joseph Lease's I've always liked -- "humorless trickster" -- Seems to me again that considering the dispersed possibilities for reading poetry, it's still a pretty conservative (and choppy comprehending) set of skills we bring to mail we can scroll through -- I've thought before that those slips can bring about beautiful misunderstandings -- though I feel today like a hideous pedant -- and one mo time, sorry -- Jordan On Mon, 4 Aug 1997, Christina Fairbank Chirot wrote: > > I'm puzzled by the recent exchanges involving rudeness, yukyuks > and so on between Jordan Davis and Lawrence Upton. Maybe it's just my > impression, but Jordan Davis doesn't seem to have answered any questions > raised for him--and politiely one might add--re his idea of yukyuk, > the transcendental and so on--seems it has been left up to others to do > the work of sending in ideas re the word as well as re the work of Mac > Low and Coolidge, the historical, ahistorical and panhistorical, > anarcheological, mining and MM---(my thanks and appreciation to David > Israel and Bennet Simpson for their informative and thought provoking > posts!) while Jordan Davis has replied only with cute quips re > FrankieG(T)H and > accusations directed at Lawrence Upton. Going back through the posts, the > tone and number of apologies seems to be steadily increasing from > Lawrence Upton. I don't see any reason for this until coming across in a > Jordan Davis post the words re no offence being meant and "none was > heard_within the community_" which is rather baffling. Which community? > Are the people who wrote on the list who raised questions and exchanged > ideas without the particiaption of Jordan Davis part of this community > or not and so on. The mention of a nameless commnity who sees things > Jordan Davis' way --well, methinks it comes across as a tactic of > intimidation to some extent--and seems to have worked as I note Lawrence > Upton apologizing while Jordan Davis asserts his flabbergasted state. > Discussion with definitions and disagreements--exchange of ideas > and materials--with many possibilities of use--yes. Some rudeness when > impassioned--sure. When Tom Mandel talked about raising his > fists--well, he meant his own and gave his own reasons. But I don't > particularly get a good feeling when one > person is being steadily backed into apologizing as the other protests > astonishment while also invoking a like minded unnamed community behind them > someplace. > > So, back to some discussion--Jordan Davis noted differing attitudes among > Watten and Silliman in re the term "experimental". > Here is Clark Coolidge on the term: > (Lee Bartlett has just asked CC "Do you think of yourself as an > 'experimental writer'?") > Not really. I understand that category in a general sense, but > "experimental" always sounds like you are trying to do something rather > than doing it. But if the term does mean what it could mean--pushing > things beyond various limits--great! > (from Talking Poetry Conversations in the Workshop with > Contemporary Poets Interviews by lee Bartlett Albuquerque: U of New > Mexico P, 1987 p. 15) > > > ZA DA (beyond yes)! > > dbc > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 00:50:04 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: Wath You (for Clark Cooladge) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII -- Wath You A do love you. A don't hate you. A don't lake you at all. A don't love you. A hate you. A lake you a bat. A lake you a lattle bat. A lake you a lot. A lake you a tany lattle bat. A lake you. A love you a lot. A love you so much. A love you so very much. A love you. A really do love you. A really don't hate you. A really don't lake you at all. A really don't love you. A really hate you. A really lake you a lot. A really lake you. A really love you a lot. A really love you so very much. A really love you. A really really do love you. A really really don't hate you. A really really don't lake you at all. A really really don't love you. A really really hate you. A really really love you. A sort of lake you. A'm an love wath you. A'm not an love wath you. A'm really an love wath you. A'm really not an love wath you. A'm really really an love wath you. A'm really really not an love wath you. A'm so much an love wath you. ________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 00:57:33 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Bennett M. Sm [Dimpson" Subject: Re: Wath You (for Clark Cooladge) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII T H I N K Y O U On Tue, 5 Aug 1997, Alan J Sondheim wrote: > -- > > > Wath You > > > A do love you. A don't hate you. A don't lake you at all. A don't love > you. A hate you. A lake you a bat. A lake you a lattle bat. A lake you > a lot. A lake you a tany lattle bat. A lake you. A love you a lot. A > love you so much. A love you so very much. A love you. A really do love > you. A really don't hate you. A really don't lake you at all. A really > don't love you. A really hate you. A really lake you a lot. A really > lake you. A really love you a lot. A really love you so very much. A > really love you. A really really do love you. A really really don't hate > you. A really really don't lake you at all. A really really don't love > you. A really really hate you. A really really love you. A sort of lake > you. A'm an love wath you. A'm not an love wath you. A'm really an love > wath you. A'm really not an love wath you. A'm really really an love > wath you. A'm really really not an love wath you. A'm so much an love > wath you. > > > ________________________________________________________________________ > &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. &c. Bennett Simpson &c. bms5q@virginia.edu &c. &c. &c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c.&c. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 00:34:01 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: bock bock bock pacock (incisors in the shop) In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 4 Aug 1997 11:08:37 -0400 from Hey Jordan, hey list, hey hey hey. Jordan, I know my rendition of List participation might remind many of a horse with internet goggles mumbling into his feedbag - BUT the truth is, this time, I've just been away for a few days. Now to respond erratically to your query - & also briefly I hope - remaining as always beneath the contempt radar - I always talk about "language poetry", as many of you know full well, from a perspective of SEVERAL levels of abstraction. Oh ey fer sure. That is, I aim for the theoretical shield, not the honorable practitioners, whose work I make no claim to be much familiar with. Some of you will want to drop me right there (others maybe at the corner?). Maybe when I talk about language poetry I'ma just talking about my "idea" of same. Here's muh idea: did I say it was anti- or un-historical? I'm not sure. I think I said that what came across to me as its THEORY was that referential discourse & poetry as conventional echo-effect needs to be imploded, for cultural-revolutionary purposes. Now at various times & places the lang.po political argument is made, at others the aesthetic (the political I just gave; the aesthetic is that the autonomy of lang.po experiment & freedom is all the politics it needs). My own argument all along has been that by giving up referentiality (NOT that they DO that all the time) as in post-structuralism, and dismantling rather than organizing a structure of meaning, said lang.po (MY version of it) offers a sort of truncated or emptied-out THEORY of poetry. The phrase "language poetry" looks in 2 directions - outward toward a presumed special definition of language, and inward as a sort of self-reflexive or recursive phrase (i.e. all poetry is in language. it's sort of redundant). In both directions it reminds me of symbolism, which also trashed ordinary discourse & aimed to purify the words of the tribe. Poetry is a VERY VERY SLIPPERY THING, Jordan! In the Long March Through the Little Magazines and the Big Institutions we grow rightfully wary of ACCOMODATION TO OCCASIONS & SENTIMENT OF MASSES & ELITES ALIKE!! Makes it tough to squeeze out those Mint Crest Toothpaste Odes after every meal. Anyway, I agree that this is all pretty old hat, gang - I agree with the people who write to this list about SPECIFIC things they've read. Not to have anymore ignorant clashes by night. - Henry G. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 05:01:09 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: Re: flabbergasted MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 re <> from Dave Chirot saying you're sorry can be that you are sorry or yes it can be a way of dealing with intimidation or, if you don't set much store by never backin= g down etc, it can be a way of dealing with those who shout a lot when they= are called to account so you can move on - i was never in favour of givin= g flowers to policepersons or handing down feelings of charity from the cro= ss but there is something to be said sometimes for turning the other cheek especially when the worst thing against you is smokescreen i too noticed the thing about community but i have just finished five yea= rs or so at a place run by lunatics who never once explained their reasons f= or pursuing policies that were destroying the place - and when you challenge= d them they said _you are the only one who feels like this_ so as soon as a= n explanation begins _everyone agrees with me_ i go for a break having satisfied myself that no answer was going to come i decided to giv= e up - it is important to keep things calm etc etc - if all the list debate= s were like this there would be nothing to keep calm - but that isn't the case - therefore avoiding conflict is more important to me than engaging with waffle etc - so i sd sorry and that's fine by me - i also expressed= my disbelief / and yet it moves i have better things to do than play games re what i saw as a strange ending - yep that was me... i was glazing over= by then <> the bit was damned small L ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 08:18:57 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: Quantity & Quality In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 1 Aug 1997 15:02:23 -0700 from On Fri, 1 Aug 1997 15:02:23 -0700 Rachel Kubie said: >didn't mean to imply that the sort of continuous flow of poetry that >seems to get produced in more living circumstances is necessarily >memory-less. The thing is, the printing press created the *standardized* >text, the *one* we all know & seems to me that has played a big role in >the *little object over/against time* perception of the poem that has >maybe pushed poems into seeming isolated incidents. I agree with you, Rachel - it was I who really got off the track of your topic. Seems like the quantity/quality issue comes up whether you look at performance end or script end of the spectrum. I liked "Finnegan's" comment about the contract with the reader in any case. But, as you imply, the temptation toward graphomania is always there. > > >Un-articulatable aspects of writing developed later (with silent reading >especially) & of course became "standard" in the long course of printing. this seems like where it gets interesting with VISUAL-based poetry. > >Have also noticed that many poets who seem oriented toward performance >rather than publication tend (in their writtens) toward a plain >stichometry--but then, what sort of a pause or articulation of any sort >does the stanza really score? A poem's not exactly like a musical score. It's just an analogy. The written poem provides the OPPORTUNITY for varied approaches (as does the score). But I would say stanza breaks, any kind of lineation etc., can be mined for performance results. A stanza seems like a pretty clear indicator of overall speed & pacing - ESPECIALLY when the pattern is broken & the syntax begins to flow over the breaks. > But then, maybe shallow history & reinventing the >wheel might result in more than an experiment in conformity, might be >refreshing, useful? It does open possibilities--who can participate in >speaking and listening & how. Absolutely. The stodgy traditionalist I too-often sound like is no friend of poetry. I just wonder sometimes about the emphasis in the US especially on PRODUCTION - workshops, writing programs, readings, slams. The glut factor. Can - does - anybody actually read anything anymore? It may be that an idea of poetry as occupying a tightrope between script and performance - and without those 2 poles, the rope (or the bowstring) falls slack - would help... or it might just add another layer of "technique"... maybe it all comes down to non-technical factors - the artist - the writer maybe especially - as TALKING TO the "culture" at large - communicating a message or messages... but then, talk gets cheaper & cheaper it seems... that's a related issue...a poem should be a solid complex crystal to a factor of -1,000... Yeats used barbells for exercise & said all poetry should be made to be recited... ... I'm going to shut up now... Henry G.... ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 11:36:46 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Don Cheney Subject: Re: Wath You (for Clark Cooladge) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" alan, i really like the a-ness of this piece. kind of an homage to a. this also sounds like a few of the kids on my son's Under-11 soccer team. i thought that the other kids were making fun of the one kid with a very obvious speech impediment but turns out there are 3 kids with speech impediments on the team! during practice, the word i here most is "here" as in "pass it hee-ahh." don >Wath You > > >A do love you. A don't hate you. A don't lake you at all. A don't love >you. A hate you. A lake you a bat. A lake you a lattle bat. A lake you >a lot. A lake you a tany lattle bat. A lake you. A love you a lot. A >love you so much. A love you so very much. A love you. A really do love >you. A really don't hate you. A really don't lake you at all. A really >don't love you. A really hate you. A really lake you a lot. A really >lake you. A really love you a lot. A really love you so very much. A >really love you. A really really do love you. A really really don't hate >you. A really really don't lake you at all. A really really don't love >you. A really really hate you. A really really love you. A sort of lake >you. A'm an love wath you. A'm not an love wath you. A'm really an love >wath you. A'm really not an love wath you. A'm really really an love >wath you. A'm really really not an love wath you. A'm so much an love > wath you. =================================== Don Cheney San Diego, CA, USA http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5791 doncheney@geocities.com =================================== ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 12:48:36 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" Subject: Re: Wath You (for Clark Cooladge) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 11:36 AM 8/5/97, Don Cheney wrote: >alan, i really like the a-ness of this piece. kind of an homage to a. > >this also sounds like a few of the kids on my son's Under-11 soccer team. i >thought that the other kids were making fun of the one kid with a very >obvious speech impediment but turns out there are 3 kids with speech >impediments on the team! during practice, the word i here most is "here" as >in "pass it hee-ahh." > >don in boston, this would not be evidence of a speech impediment...--md > >>Wath You >> >> >>A do love you. A don't hate you. A don't lake you at all. A don't love >>you. A hate you. A lake you a bat. A lake you a lattle bat. A lake you >>a lot. A lake you a tany lattle bat. A lake you. A love you a lot. A >>love you so much. A love you so very much. A love you. A really do love >>you. A really don't hate you. A really don't lake you at all. A really >>don't love you. A really hate you. A really lake you a lot. A really >>lake you. A really love you a lot. A really love you so very much. A >>really love you. A really really do love you. A really really don't hate >>you. A really really don't lake you at all. A really really don't love >>you. A really really hate you. A really really love you. A sort of lake >>you. A'm an love wath you. A'm not an love wath you. A'm really an love >>wath you. A'm really not an love wath you. A'm really really an love >>wath you. A'm really really not an love wath you. A'm so much an love >> wath you. > > >=================================== >Don Cheney San Diego, CA, USA >http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5791 >doncheney@geocities.com >=================================== ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 13:48:12 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: Re: Wath You (for Clark Cooladge) In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.16.19970805081656.4f27502a@mail.geocities.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Tue, 5 Aug 1997, Don Cheney wrote: > alan, i really like the a-ness of this piece. kind of an homage to a. > > this also sounds like a few of the kids on my son's Under-11 soccer team. i > thought that the other kids were making fun of the one kid with a very > obvious speech impediment but turns out there are 3 kids with speech > impediments on the team! during practice, the word i here most is "here" as > in "pass it hee-ahh." > > don > There is another odd association for me - having worked in Nova Scotia a great deal (mostly Cape Breton recently), the accents, Scottish music, and then medieval Scottish itself with what seems to me a broad -a-. So I hear a lilt; I tried to return recently to reading Burns, with little success however (although I like Henryson for example). Alan ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 14:52:56 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: yukyuk and schmuck MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Jordan - I am referring to your message backchannel. I dont think that it= is appropriate to cbackchannel those kind of remarks when the disagreemen= t starts in public and it does seem to me intimidating in intent to send it= backchannel I dont think I have been shabby I havent called you a schmuck. I haven't called you a lunatic... I said is that I am well acquainted with being told I am the only one who= holds an opinion. It doesnt work with me though it does upset me when used aggressively. I may well be ignorant, you may well be right. I make no attempt to cover my ignorance. If I am not ignorant in this matter then there are a thousand things I am= ignorant of and I suspect you are the same because everyone else is. People who try to cover their ignorance don't learn. I want to learn. Tha= t is why I am on the list. I dont think I am ignorant of the context of your remarks. I don't think you have explained to any degree. But perhaps that is my ignorance and I have lost interest now... I regret= that you have not. I cannot follow exactly what you are saying towards the end of the first two quoted paragraphs - my ignorance again - but besmirched is not a word= I have used and I have said nothing about Susan Howe. You say you are embarrassed about apologising to me. I am not embarrassed= about apologising to you. I think it was right to do it for itself now... = Jordan, I don't know you and the way things have gone I guess I am unlike= ly to - i suppose the lunch invite is off. I can be jokey and am sometimes misunderstood for that because the tone cant be heard in writing so I am trying generally to be far more serious than I feel in my posting= s, even at my lowest I have a kind of underlying jollity whatever is going o= n = But that is different to the facetiousness I find in what little I have seen of your postings - I think it is aggressive rather than assertive an= d there seems little charity or friendliness. It takes my jollity away anyway. I am very sorry to have offended you, genuinely, but I suspect others wil= l do it to you as well if this is how you usually behave. However, schmuck and lunatic have not been applied to you yet and it is unhelpful and upsetting for you to claim they have been. Lawrence ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 13:16:52 MST7MDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Subject: Re: yukyuk and schmuck In-Reply-To: <199708051453_MC2-1C68-8B7C@compuserve.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: Quoted-printable guys, guys, gentlemen, um=97 as much as I value your presence on the list, & I mean both of you, do you think that in the future this exchange could be handled backchannel? I guess maybe this is a general request to listmembers as well. it's just that I find it upsetting & needless to watch folks argue so bitterly over such things. I appreciate that there's little enough to be done now, & matters seem to be past the point of reconciliation, & I'm surely not interested in perpetuating the situation by taking sides. I also understand that this sort of thing is likely to happen anytime there are more than 2 people in a room for more than 10 minutes=97but really, can we try to keep it down when it does happen? banter, even bickering is one thing (well, they're 2 different things but each one is...), but this is the kind of thing I expect to see on Divorce Court (& if I didn't watch it when it was on television...). Chris .. Christopher W. Alexander etc. nominative press collective calexand@library.utah.edu P.O. Box 522402 / Salt Lake City UT 84152-2402 http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 16:22:03 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: lunch at the public In-Reply-To: <199708051453_MC2-1C68-8B7C@compuserve.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Lawrence -- Why would lunch be off? If you can stand the company of a facetious quipper, I can accept (for the duration of a meal, anyway) the possibility that there might be something to talk about. It's also possible that you're right, we'd have very little to say. We've had next to nothing to say here. A phrase I've heard a lot at my parents' house lately: "street theater." I will add that, excluding this row, I've enjoyed your posts to the list. Intimidatingly, Jordan ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 15:30:02 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Safdie Subject: Re: lunch at the public: is it possible? In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Okay, everybody finished apologizing now? I can wait a LITTLE longer . . . Okay. Can I go back to what I thought Jordan's original subject was, namely "history," and its capability of being reflected (or not) in verse? A few months ago I recommended to the list an editorial by Lewis Lapham, which opined that "history," as we've known and loved it through the ages (!) is now defunct. Why? Because images, he said, have triumphed over narrative. We (by "we" I mean contemporary westerners) can't be bothered to follow arguments over an extended paragraph or two, because extended arguments don't happen all-at-once, simultaneously, like so many of the media images and video games we're exposed to. Along with history goes cause-and-effect; nothing happens "because" of something (or, as the academies might have it, there are numerous and inexplicable such causes) and Santanyana's idea that if we don't know history we're doomed to repeat it has gotten reduced to uh, wow, heavy. Lapham is slightly more felicitous than this summary. But the idea for POETICS people is what I (again) thought Jordan was raising. There is some poetry being written today for which "history" is not important. I think that was ONE of the things that Michael Gold was saying about Gertrude Stein, that her work was exactly "a-historical" in that sense. It's all-at-once, it's simultaneous, it directs attention, as Ron Silliman might say, to the level of the sentence, and not what came before it. Thus the inequitous capitalistic system continues, I guess was Gold's point, because creative artists have given up that part of the job description that their work be "the tale of the tribe", that they themselves be "antennae of the race", that their work MATTER in and for the world. They've opted instead for the continuous present. This can very easily sound amateurish. I don't mean it to be so. And, Dave Chirot and others have defended Coolidge and Jackson M. very well from this charge. But isn't it a valid charge to make about SOME people's verse? One can't be experimental unless one knows the tradition from which one came -- a truism, perhaps, but otherwise we're just in the void, just associating on a musical phrase, just writing about our hormones, just . . . . So I say, anything that is constructed to sound/read like it's occurring in the simultaneous present, and only there, and only now, IS a-historical. To our misfortune. And I wrote all this without once mentioning language poetry. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 18:38:28 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: Re: yukyuk and schmuck MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 <> YES I THINK YOU ARE RIGHT ANYWAY I HAVE NO MORE l ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 20:40:14 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Holly Crawford Subject: Re: ahistroical lunch Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Okay. Can I go back to what I thought Jordan's original subject was, >namely "history," and its capability of being reflected (or not) in verse? "... I think that was ONE of the things that Michael Gold was >saying about Gertrude Stein, that her work was exactly "a-historical" in >that sense. It's all-at-once, it's simultaneous, it directs attention, as >Ron Silliman might say, to the level of the sentence, and not what came >before it. Thus the inequitous capitalistic system continues, I guess was >Gold's point, because creative artists have given up that part of the job >description that their work be "the tale of the tribe", that they >themselves be "antennae of the race", that their work MATTER in and for >the world. They've opted instead for the continuous present. "... because creative artists have given up that part of the job >description that their work be 'the tale of the tribe', that they >themselves be 'antennae of the race'" What is preceived to be a-historical may not be at all. It's depends on ones perspective. History defined from one point of view of that single point on the horizon line maybe just as ahistorical as and not "the tale of the tribe' as what is being perceived as "a-historical." Artists haven't "give up their job" they may just be perceiving something different. Every generation has been criticized for a short attention span. A hundred years ago this was the complaint registered against the Impressionist and the Paris audience. They were a "hysterical" group that couldn't concentrate. H Offerings Project Send me an offer. URL:http://www-leland.stanford.edu/~geo/holly_crawford.html ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 23:33:54 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: You MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII (tiny romantic poem, not Jennifer, not Julu, in the strange world of the Poetics-space, slightly out of place, sometimes I cry myself to sleep) -++-- You Your packets and mine, intertwined, subdomains alternating one after ano- ther, caressing your ascii-encoded limbs, opening your email over and over again; holding my breath against your domain address, turning towards, always towards, your name in my Inbox, reading your full header, pausing at each stage tracerouting myself to you, and back, journey of space, copper, and fiber-optic heavens; calling out your URL in my sleep, dreaming your green words on my black screen, voicing your writing, speaking it quietly in your absent voice, and I close my eyes, imagine the play of interrupts from keyboard through server out to the wide wide world; wanting you here, no longer driven by pixels bitmapped through checksums and error-codes, wanting you here; wanting you here, wanting you here and hating distance and impossibility, and lags, and message-bases, and five layers of numerous protocols, seven layers of others, two layers of ascii code, one layer of beating hearts, filter systems and error warnings, country-code after country code inter- spersed in the midst of unknown ISPs and Netstorms, wanting nothing more than the loving touch of an arm, weight of a finger against lips, parted, and just about to speak, and silent, and no need to say anything more _________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 22:09:38 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Subject: Re: You MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit absolutely wonderful Layne ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 23:44:29 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: You MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Alan Sondheim's poem--I imagine an arty commercial about sci fi life in the 90's, your computer can in fact hold you, love you. Begs the question, is there a difference between art and advertising? Is it true, as a friend says, the best writers are writing adline? ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 02:04:42 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: Re: You In-Reply-To: <33E7F31D.50CE@ibm.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII But the computer can't, and that's the whole point. The text is about ruptured protocols, not successful ones. What constitutes the "best" writers? Alan On Tue, 5 Aug 1997, Rachel Levitsky wrote: > Alan Sondheim's poem--I imagine an arty commercial about sci fi life in the > 90's, your computer can in fact hold you, love you. Begs the question, is > there a difference between art and advertising? Is it true, as a friend > says, the best writers are writing adline? > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 01:47:29 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: ahistroical lunch Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >>Okay. Can I go back to what I thought Jordan's original subject was, >>namely "history," and its capability of being reflected (or not) in verse? I'd like to take this from another angle: why shouldn't a writer want to write through/about history? I can't think of a richer, more delicious field to pursue/romp through. If history is the field in which language is embedded in, why not explore that place? Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 09:27:18 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: R I Caddel Subject: fragmente 7 Comments: To: british n irish poets , poetics MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Now available: Fragmente 7 (1997) ed. Anthony Mellors New poetry by Frances Presley, Barry MacSweeney, Tony Lopez, John Kinsella, Kelvin Corcoran, Jennifer Moxley, Andrew Lawson, Robert Sheppard, Alan Halsey, Anthony Mellors, Peter Larkin, DS Marriott, Tracy Ryan, Richard Caddel and others... Allen Fisher on Charles Olson, DS Marriott on Prynne/Oliver, Harry Gilonis on Caddel etc... Anthony Mellors: 10 Rylands Way Durham DH1 5GR UK fragmente costs 4.95GBP per issue, 9GBP for two (inc. UK p&p). Non-UK orders add 20%. Institutional orders 10GBP. Cheques (Sterling only) payable to Anthony Mellors. Also available: Anthony Mellors Books: Catalogue 1. Supplied free with fragmente orders. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 02:01:18 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: alan sondheim's "you" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" this poet catches my heart in its throat. How many i wonder wont find identity with it. alan shows himself again to be _the_ poet of our e-mail situations. David ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 10:17:15 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: cris cheek Subject: yunga brit yak-yaks for jordan n all Comments: To: Multiple recipients of list POETICS Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" People you might well keep an ear-eye out for include: Scott Thurston Karlien van den Beukel Ira Lightman Catherine Walsh Miles Champion Khalid Hakim Lucy Sherman Simon Perrill Greg Whelan Tim Atkins Sarah Law Larry Lynch Harriet Tarlo Richard Makin Keston Sutherland Andrea Brady ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 05:20:58 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: ahistroical lunch MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Hugh Steinberg wrote: > >>Okay. Can I go back to what I thought Jordan's original subject > >>was, namely "history," and its capability of being reflected (or > >>not) in verse? > > I'd like to take this from another angle: why shouldn't a writer > want to write through/about history? I can't think of a richer, > more delicious field to pursue/romp through. If history is the > field in which language is embedded in, why not explore that place? all that stuff about writers abdicating their duty by getting lost in the contours of the ahistorical present, rather than dutifully directing the minions of readers to the place where decisions are made: the world of jostle & bustle & power & schmauer -- could be usefully turned on its head, in my hysterical opinion (imho). Possibly the artistic imperative is to get OUT of histoery a little step or two now & then, eh? -- cf. the sort of ahistorical time = mythic time (paradoxically, participating in the "true history of the tribe") suggested by Mircea Eliade in *The Myth of The Eternal Return*. To paraphrase, that august historian of the prehistorical proposes that in storytelling ritual of arcane cultures, the first and most basic thing that happens is an exit from "profane time" and an entry into the symbol world of collective mythic events -- in particular, "what happened" at the beginning of things (i.e., in another level of reality) that *generated* the historical particulars of the world we see . . . Arguably, this manner of radical phase-shift has very much been a concern of poets of many a stripe & clime & chimney, -- throughout, um, history . . . d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 07:59:47 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry g Subject: Re: ahistroical lunch In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 6 Aug 1997 01:47:29 -0600 from I could be wrong, but I think Jordan's original reference was to a debate here many moons ago over Mutlu Blasing's book POLITICS & FORM IN POSTMODERN POETRY, where she criticized the Olson-language poetry vein for following Pound into a too-easy melding of poetry & politics, poetry & history - in favor of her own pantheon of "really" postmodernists who more "intelligently" [my quotes] follow the zeitgeist of ironizing & questioning & ambiguizing the reality-element or referential quality of poetry, in their poetry. In this stream, the critical perspective of Blasing, De Man, et al. takes New Criticism & gives it an extra twist, but the outcome is about the same. James Longenbach's book on Wallace Stevens has a very good analysis of this whole issue in relation to politics & poetry in the 30s, when this was all debated very intensely. Basically, the issue of the poet's & poetry's place in "the world" was extremely important to Stevens who wavered between left & right tendencies [o.k. I know I'm SIMPLIFYING] & came down to the position that poetry was not the Shelleyan unacknowledged legislator, that politics and public action is better accomplished by politics & public action, but that poetry does have a role in a shared collective life by working out its own special energies. Stevens was close to Kenneth Burke (another one blasted by Michael Gold & the dogmatists) & the italian philospher Croce - ambiguity in poetry was not an expression of language's inherent nominalism or of some totalizing postmodern language philosophy, but was a TOOL for really reflecting the many-sided moral complexity of history & politics. Only AFTER the 30s did this become New Critical dogma & the academicization of the poetry industry got underway. In my own view "history" is just an essential basic quality of time & that poetry would reflect on it should be taken for granted. This is just the beginning of discovering what a particular poem or poet is saying, doing, making. It also might be the great theme or deep vision [or little quirk] of the poem, its essential focus. I think ambiguity here is welcome because the arguments that 1) history is just one damn thing after another and 2) history ignored is complacent stupidity are both right at some level. What makes a poem as opposed to a chronicle? - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 09:14:15 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: any lunch in a hysteria In-Reply-To: <199708060921.FAA08349@radagast.wizard.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Thanks, Hugh, Henry, (Alan), and David, for some pointers on disynchrony/asynchrony I mean diachronics I mean Braudel I mean whatever. (Whatever is not a code word!) Letter to the New Yorker this week from a Mr Dye in the nwest who complains that after Auden poetry has ceased to be memorable speech and has settled for "much less" -- a kind of shorthand epistemology, esp. in the work of Jorie Graham and John Ashbery. But isn't the 'how-do-I-know' of Ashbery's work not that far from Stevens not that far from Coleridge? I mean, can't one take Auden as a kind of popularizing freak (freak is a code word), a sort of forgiveable (because surprising) version of Wynton Marsalis? (And aren't there a lot of audenesque tendencies in Ashbery? the doggerel, the encyclopedic command of form -- or at least the occasional mention of obscure forms -- these are not putdowns!) I mention the New Yorker letter because the symptom I see there, in Henry's version of Blasing, and all over the place all the time -- is the complain that poetry loses something .. that it is less than. It is always less than. Oh well! As we know, the category of the 'always-already' is a great zone for arbitrage and not much else. Historin', as a much larger poet used to say, means to find out for yourself. Still/here, Jordan ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 08:46:49 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Matthias Regan Subject: Please remove from list Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" The subscriber to this list is no longer at this address. When he arrives at his new location, perhaps he will subscribe again, but for the time being, please remove this destination from the "Send To" list. Thanks ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 09:14:22 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: "avantgarde" In-Reply-To: <870857897.1517799.0@slang.demon.co.uk> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" okay all you sweet yukyuks out there, i've got a question: why does "the avant garde" seem to need to police its borders so rigidly? how does some thing get defined or not as "avant garde?" i'm spozed to give a talk in November and i want to challenge what i see as some of the closedness of the avant garde tradition or at least the way it's construed by most of its critics.--md ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 13:00:27 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM Subject: The night and the snow Seems to me the question is whether & to what degree the micro-political is historical. I don't think in the end totalizing social-constructivist arguments hold up-- that's because no context is finite. What's happening & what happened -- same question? One could say there is a dialectic betweeen history & not-history relative to artistic activity of any sort & I would relate that dialectic to a similar (asimilar?) dialectic between sense & nonsense. To err is statemental. --Bruce Andrews History, what did the rose do? --Bernadette Mayer ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 13:21:07 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Kellogg Subject: Re: "avantgarde" In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Wed, 6 Aug 1997, Maria Damon wrote: > okay all you sweet yukyuks out there, i've got a question: why does "the > avant garde" seem to need to police its borders so rigidly? how does some > thing get defined or not as "avant garde?" i'm spozed to give a talk in > November and i want to challenge what i see as some of the closedness of > the avant garde tradition or at least the way it's construed by most of its > critics.--md maria, I don't mean to monkeywrench your issue, but is it clear that the avant-garde is _more_ closed than other non-mainstream movements in contemporary poetics? It seems to me that policing is a component of any contested subfield within the larger field, and that such communities as "new formalist" and "performance" poetics each have their own forms of policing. What, in your view, are the distinguishing marks, if any, of avant-garde self-policing as such? Or have I misunderstood your question (lately, with me, more likely than not)? Cheers, David ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ David Kellogg Duke University kellogg@acpub.duke.edu University Writing Program (919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708 FAX (919) 660-4381 http://www.duke.edu/~kellogg/ There is no mantle and it does not descend. -- Thomas Kinsella ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 13:36:16 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry g Subject: Re: The night and the snow In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 6 Aug 1997 13:00:27 -0400 from On Wed, 6 Aug 1997 13:00:27 -0400 said: >Seems to me the question is whether & to what degree the micro-political is >historical. I don't think in the end totalizing social-constructivist >arguments hold up-- that's because no context is finite. What's happening & >what happened -- same question? One could say there is a dialectic betweeen >history & not-history relative to artistic activity of any sort & I would >relate that dialectic to a similar (asimilar?) dialectic between sense & >nonsense. > >To err is statemental. --Bruce Andrews > >History, what did the rose do? --Bernadette Mayer the idea of "history" as we know it (progress or retreat over time) also contains the idea of utopia (what transcends itself). For a lot of poets in the midst of 20th cent. utopias/despair the idea of hope was indeed micro-political, i.e., domestic in different ways. For Stevens, for example, the humdrum, the everyday, the normal is where to look for sanity & hope. the Dutch in him. Williams too, in a way. & Mandelstam talked again & again about the utopia of the household. just ONE other aspect of all this. Justice has a practical, sensible side... & "divine philology", for OM, was a bunch of students & a teacher sitting around talking. vodkayaking. "Literature is a beast, furred by night & winter" - Mandelstam --I say Blarnes, would you mind passing out the doilies? [Spandrift again] ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 13:54:15 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Eryque Gleason Subject: Re: The night and the snow Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 1:00 PM 8/6/97 -0400, AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM wrote: >Seems to me the question is whether & to what degree the micro-political is >historical. what isn't historical? ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 10:41:11 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Alexander Subject: Re: "avantgarde" In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 09:14 AM 8/6/97 -0500, you wrote: >okay all you sweet yukyuks out there, i've got a question: why does "the >avant garde" seem to need to police its borders so rigidly? how does some >thing get defined or not as "avant garde?" i'm spozed to give a talk in >November and i want to challenge what i see as some of the closedness of >the avant garde tradition or at least the way it's construed by most of its >critics.--md Maria, I don't think it's true that there is any unified thing such as "the avant garde." And I think most people involved in practices which might be considered such, do not feel such a need to police the borders. I do think that some of those who might want to so police borders can be quite loud about such policing. And such loudness gets a lot of attention, at least in the short term. But it's just not like a gated community. charles chax press :: alexander writing/design/publishing books by artists' hands :: web sites built with care and vision handmade and trade editions of contemporary innovative writing chax@theriver.com :: http://personal.riverusers.com/~chax/ ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 13:10:01 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: yasusada MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Hello! Just back yesterday from the beach, with pails full of shells and shark teeth and only a driver's license in the wallet. For those interested in developments related to the Yasusada writings, I thought I'd mention the following: Today, August 6th, the Asahi Shimbun (the equivalent to NY Times in Japan, circulation 8.5 million), is going to publish an extensive story on Yasusada and the reaction to his writings in this country. Recently, there have been other articles (though I haven't seen any of them yet) in Australia in the Sydney Morning Herald, in England in the Manchester Guardian and in Poetry Review, in Mexico in Octavio Paz's Vuelta, and in Spain in Lateral, a monthly from Barcelona. The Denver Quarterly will soon be publishing a special section on Yasusada in its upcoming issue, including an interview with myself and Javier Alvarez and a letter to Tosa Motokiyu from Mikhail Epstein. Other things are scheduled to appear elsewhere, and I'll mention them for information's sake as they appear if no one else does. Good to be back! I like Maria Damon's question freshly posted: Just what *is* the "avant-garde"? And what sort of thing does it do? Kent ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 11:25:24 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tenney Nathanson Subject: dyed in the WHAT? WHO? WHOO! Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Jordon wrote: >Thanks, Hugh, Henry, (Alan), and David, for some pointers on >disynchrony/asynchrony I mean diachronics I mean Braudel I mean whatever. >(Whatever is not a code word!) Letter to the New Yorker this week from a >Mr Dye in the nwest who complains that after Auden poetry has ceased to be >memorable speech and has settled for "much less" -- a kind of shorthand >epistemology, esp. in the work of Jorie Graham and John Ashbery. would that be FRED Dye? which issue? putting arizona (and the u of, english dept of?) on the map again? AGAIN? tenney ---------------------------------------------------------- tenney nathanson tenney@azstarnet.com nathanso@u.arizona.edu http://www.u.arizona.edu/~nathanso/ ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 13:23:37 MST7MDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Subject: Re: "avantgarde" In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970806104111.007c5500@theriver.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: Quoted-printable Maria=97 I'd like to put in with both Charles & David here for a closer scrutiny of "avant garde". I take it that the term is convenient, but dangerous as it quickly leads to the concept of a *unified* ["muffled"] avant garde, usually defined as either "pure nonsense", as against the rich diversity of "traditional" works (& this argument seems almost always to have something to do with its being "inhuman" or "asocial", though it might be of the more general variety Jordan rehearsed a few moments ago=97!? etime, I guess=97, viz., the fallenness of contemporary art/man [sic]); or or defined as "innovative" ["freshness sealed"], as against the stale practices of the "academicians" or unselfconscious "mainstream" verse ["oops, another one"]. I think we're all subject to this kind of easy distinction, at least from time to time (or anyway I am), & that's fine & useful so long as we acknowledge that "avant garde", or for that matter the "arriere garde" ["nobody ever said it, man"], are shorthand for multiple subfields (thanks to David-Pierre Kellogg!), whose practices don't really fulfill "the dream of a unified field", & may even be deeply conflictual. interesting that you cite "the closedness of the avant garde tradition" as in part "the way it's construed by most of its critics"=97I wld say=97ah but it were a lie, being only partly true=97that necessary policing by critics=97& there's the rub=97 indicates how unstable the use of such ["their"] an umbrella term really is, & its distance from practice. of course, as David has already noted, all subfields of a given field (in this case the field of poetic production, or as he wld call it, "the poetic")=97& not even just the highly contested ones=97do their own policing ["the police in voices"]. Chris .. Christopher W. Alexander etc. nominative press collective calexand@library.utah.edu P.O. Box 522402 / Salt Lake City UT 84152-2402 http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 13:39:07 MST7MDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Subject: Re: avant garde MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT oops, did I say Jordan? I meant Holly ("Re: ahistorical lunch). sorry to be cluttering the bandwidth... Chris .. Christopher W. Alexander etc. nominative press collective calexand@library.utah.edu P.O. Box 522402 / Salt Lake City UT 84152-2402 http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 13:14:52 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: william marsh Subject: "*alternative*avant-garde" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >At 09:14 AM 8/6/97 -0500, you wrote: >>okay all you sweet yukyuks out there, i've got a question: why does "the >>avant garde" seem to need to police its borders so rigidly? how does some >>thing get defined or not as "avant garde?" i'm spozed to give a talk in >>November and i want to challenge what i see as some of the closedness of >>the avant garde tradition or at least the way it's construed by most of its >>critics.--md > there's been a lot of talk about this issue of late (here and elsewhere), and i'm wondering if anyone else feels the same confusion about it / the spatial analogy here, that the a-g is a particular zone or area of activity and therefore identifiable by its borders (and its potential policing of borders) is the main source of my confusion / when did the "avant garde" come to represent a group or subgroup or "subfield in a larger field" as David Kellogg puts? -- the classificatory scheme strikes me as fundamentally at odds with what the a-g has always represented to me, namely a kind of momentum that infuses artistic activities and (sometimes) instigates change / if current notions of an avant-garde stipulate that it exists as a group among groups (and i agree with Charles Alexander that it is not a "unified thing"), then clearly there must be an *alternative* avant-garde which escapes such classification -- which makes it even more confusing / if the a-g is the *leading edge* of activity, then how can an edge have a "border"? not to mention a police force monitoring transgressions / i can't imagine (literally can't see) the avant-garde in such a context... / wouldn't any definition of the a-g as a group be a misappropriation of the term? bill marsh ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 10:11:08 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Judy Roitman Subject: Re: lunch at the public: is it possible? In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Joe Safdie writes: >But the idea for POETICS people is what I (again) thought Jordan was >raising. There is some poetry being written today for which "history" is >not important. I think that was ONE of the things that Michael Gold was >saying about Gertrude Stein, that her work was exactly "a-historical" in >that sense. It's all-at-once, it's simultaneous, it directs attention, as >Ron Silliman might say, to the level of the sentence, and not what came >before it. Thus the inequitous capitalistic system continues, I guess was >Gold's point, because creative artists have given up that part of the job >description that their work be "the tale of the tribe", that they >themselves be "antennae of the race", that their work MATTER in and for >the world. They've opted instead for the continuous present. > Whoa there. The continuous present --- the real one, not the fake one of tv ads and video games --- is a pretty damn good antidote to any inequitous system, and the level of the sentence is a good innoculator against the bullshit causality that proudly brings you Northern Ireland,the Balkans (Bosnia not being the only manifestation of that particular tangle), the Middle East, Rwanda and Burundi, Afghanistan, the Khmer Rouge, etc. etc. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Judy Roitman | "Whoppers Whoppers Whoppers! Math, University of Kansas | memory fails Lawrence, KS 66045 | these are the days." 785-864-4630 | Larry Eigner, 1927-1996 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note new area code ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://titania.math.ukans.edu/faculty/roitman/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 17:25:27 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: yunga brit yak-yaks for jordan n all MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Re cris cheek's list of _People you might well keep an ear-eye out for include_ RWC is publishing an issue of Scott Thurston and a chunky edition of Ira Lightman - both late this year or early next L ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 11:04:39 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henr Subject: Re: any lunch in a hysteria In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 6 Aug 1997 09:14:15 -0400 from On Wed, 6 Aug 1997 09:14:15 -0400 Jordan Davis said: >I mention the New Yorker letter because the symptom I see there, in >Henry's version of Blasing, and all over the place all the time -- is the >complain that poetry loses something .. that it is less than. It is always >less than. Spandrift tells me there's a Super Poet named Jeff out there. Lives near him in Weast Fareaver Ambiguity, Wyo. Jeff manages to combine history, correct politics, political incorrectedness, playful verbal pyromania, emotive heart-schmoozing, lovable mistakes, insane fury, loose jams within tight stanzas, experiment WITH traditional mayonnaise, slang in less than 3 languages, and quick shifts in technique - all in the form of INNOVATIVE HAIKU!!! Ashbery has a blurb about him INSIDE the blurbs on the outside of his latest book. There was a movie at Sundance about him, called "Where's Jeff?" I think it stars Jeff Bridges. Spandrift looked at me seriously over a lid of chew the other day and said, "I'd vote for Jeff for President right now - President of Boulder." - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 17:01:19 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Peter Landers Subject: yuk yuk Content-Type: text Clark Coolidge was seeking a personal language. He felt that words came from others, perhaps he felt they were abused by others, and therefore he wanted to let them stand alone or in groups without necessarily meaning what people thought them to mean. The hope was that the words would begin to work as sound objects. Yuk yuk. Jackson MacLow is involved in the very historical, or pre-historical process of poetry-as-shamanism. Sounds, dance, words in new peronal ritual. Write rite. Yuk yuk. All best to you, Jordan, but I dig these guys, y'know :-) Pete ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 17:57:06 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Kellogg Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.32.19970806201452.006cde24@nunic.nu.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Wed, 6 Aug 1997, william marsh wrote: > >At 09:14 AM 8/6/97 -0500, you wrote: > >>okay all you sweet yukyuks out there, i've got a question: why does "the > >>avant garde" seem to need to police its borders so rigidly? how does some > >>thing get defined or not as "avant garde?" i'm spozed to give a talk in > >>November and i want to challenge what i see as some of the closedness of > >>the avant garde tradition or at least the way it's construed by most of its > >>critics.--md > > > > there's been a lot of talk about this issue of late (here and elsewhere), > and i'm wondering if anyone else feels the same confusion about it / the > spatial analogy here, that the a-g is a particular zone or area of activity > and therefore identifiable by its borders (and its potential policing of > borders) is the main source of my confusion / when did the "avant garde" > come to represent a group or subgroup or "subfield in a larger field" as > David Kellogg puts? -- the classificatory scheme strikes me as fundamentally > at odds with what the a-g has always represented to me, namely a kind of > momentum that infuses artistic activities and (sometimes) instigates change > / if current notions of an avant-garde stipulate that it exists as a group > among groups (and i agree with Charles Alexander that it is not a "unified > thing"), then clearly there must be an *alternative* avant-garde which > escapes such classification -- which makes it even more confusing / if the > a-g is the *leading edge* of activity, then how can an edge have a "border"? > not to mention a police force monitoring transgressions / i can't imagine > (literally can't see) the avant-garde in such a context... / wouldn't any > definition of the a-g as a group be a misappropriation of the term? Isn't the charge of misappropriation itself a form of policing? I guess it depends who you're talking to (about). I realize spatial metaphors such as the Bourdieu/Foucault "field" have their disadvantages, but they may tend to counter the possible mystification of "a kind of momentum that unfuses artistic activities." Cheers, David ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ David Kellogg Duke University kellogg@acpub.duke.edu University Writing Program (919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708 FAX (919) 660-4381 http://www.duke.edu/~kellogg/ There is no mantle and it does not descend. -- Thomas Kinsella ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 18:39:54 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Robert Drake Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" bill's sense ov (or puzzlement over) the question matches mine, my idea of a.g. as (b)leeding edge of activity, rather than th consolidated camps just behind th front lines. but to carry the military analogy further, how does the advance guard actually work? in cadres & cels, with an intense group loyalty & distrust of the enemy all around... appropriate and adaptive during th heavy fighting, but disfunctional afterwords. and praps that points to the problem--the term "avant garde" gets attached to certain activity, and then stays stuck long after it's accurate. certain aspects of langpo might have been a.g., or free jazz... but are they still? well, for some folks probably so--if bebop is as far as your ears have gotten, than albert ayler is a.g.... sometimes, too, the a.g. designer label is claimed by folks as a marketing tool, especially in a popular culture such as ours, that values The New as latest/greatest. & that too can lead to the dynamics that maria's pointing to--seige mentality, whether or no it's "justified"... (btw, i'm casting no aspersions & making no claims for what poetics are "legitimatly" a.g., whatever that might mean, & hope no one else will... that's one slippery slope we've been down several times too often...) and finally, in maria's initial posting, she referes to "_the_ avant garde" (emphasis added), and i'm wondering if you'll be more specific, md? because i don't see a.g. activity, even in areas poetical, as being singular but rather diverse... hard for me to imagine a guerrilla war against the Established Culture launching a frontal offensive, there are lots ov little forays goin on... some (i'll mention Mail Art, fr one) strike me as very unprotective & open. what specific a.g.s are you thinking ov? asever luigi william marsh wrote: > >there's been a lot of talk about this issue of late (here and elsewhere), >and i'm wondering if anyone else feels the same confusion about it / the >spatial analogy here, that the a-g is a particular zone or area of activity >and therefore identifiable by its borders (and its potential policing of >borders) is the main source of my confusion / when did the "avant garde" >come to represent a group or subgroup or "subfield in a larger field" as >David Kellogg puts? -- the classificatory scheme strikes me as fundamentally >at odds with what the a-g has always represented to me, namely a kind of >momentum that infuses artistic activities and (sometimes) instigates change >/ if current notions of an avant-garde stipulate that it exists as a group >among groups (and i agree with Charles Alexander that it is not a "unified >thing"), then clearly there must be an *alternative* avant-garde which >escapes such classification -- which makes it even more confusing / if the >a-g is the *leading edge* of activity, then how can an edge have a "border"? >not to mention a police force monitoring transgressions / i can't imagine >(literally can't see) the avant-garde in such a context... / wouldn't any >definition of the a-g as a group be a misappropriation of the term? > >bill marsh in reply to maria damian: >>okay all you sweet yukyuks out there, i've got a question: why does "the >>avant garde" seem to need to police its borders so rigidly? how does some >>thing get defined or not as "avant garde?" i'm spozed to give a talk in >>November and i want to challenge what i see as some of the closedness of >>the avant garde tradition or at least the way it's construed by most of its >>critics.--md ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 22:19:22 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit We're not supposed to talk to anyone who isn't going to do the avant garde thing with this poetics list. R. Tejada labels a certain something as "advanced writing" and A. Sondheim asks in response to my question who are the 'best writers?' My take and the point I think I was making in my question about art and advertisement is do we still somehow believe the 'best' gets the job, the hot tub? What happens to the idea of grass rootification implied in the abdication of authorship while we are trying to make a place for 'advanced' or 'avant garde.' I think of performance art that never got recorded. C. Harryman told me of a friend whose name I am forgetting who did performance for an audience of one and no recording (later a book--it is difficult to resist the notion that ones ideas are good and should somehow be deciminated). Are we interested (really) in consciousness or (post-mortem) fame. Benjamin says the artist can't make art with an audience in mind but isn't defining ourselves as 'avant-garde' suggesting we are reaching to an audience of the future? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 00:45:52 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: fxn of a-g (I/they) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Kent Johnson asked - what is the function of the avant-garde. I dunno. Inconvenience the intellect? Weed out harmful mutations -- no, that's sex -- Provoke order? Jordan, homage to D.Israel-ee ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 21:15:53 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Carl Lynden Peters Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: from "Robert Drake" at Aug 5, 97 06:39:54 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit how does that go - 'there is no avant-garde, only people who are a little late.' i'd appreciate the source if anyone may have it at the ready. c. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 01:15:18 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: <33E930AA.1B22@ibm.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I make art with an audience in mind; I possess post-mortem fame. I was walking with my friend I was walking with my friend Fido, Judith Rodenbeck, down Perry (where my ex-wife lives with her Japanese boyfriend) (I think) and we were discus- sing _milieu,_ in particular, the artworld milieu of the 70s. How it gets reified, edited, year after year. I knew the curator at the High Museum in Atlanta - he wanted to have a show called Masterpieces of Conceptual Art That was the nail in the coffin. Because in life, it's milieu, opposition, interstices, rumor. Not this dream of phallic men. Klaus Kertess once said to me it all comes out in the wash. But it doesn't and boundaries, avant-garde and other - are self-inscribed. I've yet to meet the artist who did _x_ to shock an audience, but I'd like to shake her/his hand. Even the Situationists, or especially the Situationists, were exclusion- ists. (Word? Word!) Surrealism, Dada, was no better. Avant-what, by whom? I couldn't write without the thought of a reader, readers, that the _thing_ like depression, would take hold, grab ground after death. For that matter, I've died years ago. I've never stolen anything - in answer to some rumors I've heard. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 17:07:46 MST7MDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.32.19970806201452.006cde24@nunic.nu.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: Quoted-printable bill marsh sd: > wouldn't any definition of the a-g as a group be a > misappropriation of the term? misappropriation? hmm, on the contrary, I'd say that's exactly the function the term is serving in this discussion. it's interesting that you object to the spatialization of the "avant garde", as my understanding of the the term has always been as spatial metaphor (can we have some help from the francophiles?), as opposed for instance to the Americanism "before his/her time". it seems awkward to paraphrase Bernstein here=97or maybe what's awk. is referring to him as "Bernstein", when he might be "right here with us" (more spatial- ization, but I'm reminded more of a seance=97"are you there, Charles? give us a sign...)=97but one has to appreciate his assertion that, dammit, no one is before their time=97ok, *really* paraphrasing=97the gist of which, as I see it, is partly to bring to mind the historicity of production, & partly to debunk the sort of evolutionary narrative that is sometimes made of the history of (& by extension contemporary) poetic production. in fact, I'd be willing to entertain the idea that, whatever its shortcomings, the spatial metaphor we've been batting about ["b-b-b- spit it out, kid"], & its attendant theory (Pierre Bourdieu, Foucault, possibly de Certeau etc.), might be an effort precisely to escape the apparent linearity of history, in favor of a more complex view of (in this case) poetic production as it occurs both in & at a time. actually, David, I'd be very interested to hear what you had to say abt. this. (in case some of you list-folk don't know, David Kellogg has some very fine articles out there in just this "area", which I'd recommend, except that I'm @ work & can't give you the specific citations). anyway, sorry to pull the plug & run=97or does that sound like a crude reference to euthanasia?=97, but I'm signing off for a wk. to help our fellow listee Matthias Regan move to San Francisco. in fact, he'll be arriving here in just... 8 hours, give or take. ah, SF=97with such a pleasant destination, who wldn't take a week, eh? so, best to all, & I'll look forward to again reading your scintillating conversation when I return. Chris .. Christopher W. Alexander etc. nominative press collective calexand@library.utah.edu P.O. Box 522402 / Salt Lake City UT 84152-2402 http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 09:30:41 +1100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pam Brown Subject: History Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Henry wrote:"In my own view "history" is just an essential basic quality of time & that poetry would reflect on it should be taken for granted. " In the film "Sans Soleil", Chris Marker remarked - "History throws its empty bottles out the window" Pam ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 04:07:43 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: First Early Sample Internet (ARPANET) Exchanges 1972 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII --++--- INTERNET, EARLY HISTORY: EXCHANGE STYLE EXAMPLES FROM: SCENARIOS FOR USING THE ARPANET AT THE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON COMPUTER COMMUNICATION Washington, D.C. October 24-26, 1972 ------------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTE (Alan Sondheim, 1997): It's clear that the sample dialogs, use of Weizenbaum's Eliza program, etc., are the ancestors of today's expert systems - but at this point in time, they were most likely read as in- cipient artificial mind (classic AI). Already real and virtual subject- ivities interpenetrate. The quoted sections above are formatted close to the original. (Thanks to Alex McKenzie and BBN.) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ EARLY SAMPLE CONVERSATIONS ON BBN TENEX: ==== BBN TENEX === HOST #65 8. To link to the user at TTY7: @ link [SP] 7 [CR] LINK FROM ICCC, TTY 103 @ ;hello ray. [CR] _Messages over "link" should be preceded by semi-colon._ @ ;HELLO, WHO IS IT? _Questions and comments from TTY7._ @ ;this is abhay bhushan from mit, can you help me? [CR] @ ;OF COURSE, HOW ARE YOU ABHAY? @ ...... _Conversation continues._ @ ;nice talking to you. bye. [CR] @ break [CR] _Break the "link", please._ ==== BBN DOCTOR === HOST #69 3. To run DOCTOR: @ run [SP] doctor [CR} BBN LISP-10 02-22-71 GOOD AFTERNOON. TELL ME YOUR PROBLEMS. PLEASE TERMINATE INPUT WITH A PERIOD OR QUESTION MARK. * i have a big problem. _The user begins as in a psychiatric interview._ I AM NOT SURE I UNDERSTAND YOU FULLY. _The DOCTOR continues the interview in a lively fashion._ * my grandother has a gzorenplatz. IS IT IMPORTANT TO YOU THAT YOUR GRANDMOTHER HAS A GZORENPLATZ? ........... _Continue dialog as your spirit carries you._ ........... * goodbye IT'S BEEN MY PLEASURE, THAT'S $7.15 PLEASE. NIL <- ==== SCHOLAR ==== HOST #69 <- scholar() _After (possibly) looking at instructions, start the SCHOLAR dialog._ HELLO, MY NAME IS SCHOLAR. I WILL HELP YOU IN REVIEWING THE GEOGRAPHY OF SOUTH AMERICA. THIS IS ABC REGIONAL HIGH SCHOOL. TODAY IS 24-OCT-72. IF YOU HAVE CAREFULLY STUDIED YOUR INSTRUCTIONS, WE MAY BEGIN THE REVIEW NOW. WHEN YOU ARE READY TO START, TYPE READY --- REMEMBER TO TERMINATE EACH LINE OF INPUT WITH AN ASTERISK * FOLLOWED BY A CARRIAGE RETURN. * read* [CR] _Asterisk("*") is SCHOLAR's prompt character. You must, repeat MUST, terminate input to SCHOLAR with an asterisk ("*") and a carriage return before it will listen to you. Use control-a ("^A") to delete characters from your input line, i.e., the standard Tenex editing characters._ PLEASE TYPE YOUR NAME---MR., MISS, OR MRS. FOLLOWED BY FIRST NAME, MIDDLE NAME OR MIDDLE INITIAL, AND LAST NAME. * YOURNAME* [CR] NAME OF YOUR INSTRUCTOR, PLEASE: * warnock* [CR] LET'S BEGIN OUR DISCUSSION NOW, "YOURNAME" USE ONE OF THE FOLLOWING: 14400000 3600000 1200000 1800000 TO ANSWER THE QUESTION: APPROX WHAT IS THE AREA OF BRAZIL? * 14400000* [CR] WRONG, I'LL GIVE YOU ANOTHER CHANCE. * 3600000* [CR] VERY GOOD. ................. _Continue your dialog as you wish. When tired, type control-c ("^C") to return to EXEC on logout. ................. ^c ==== CONVERSATION ON UCLA SEX SYSTEM: UCLA-NMC SIGMA-7 === HOST #1 5. To use the toy question answering program, TIMMY, type: ! TIMMY [CR] 002 TIMMY STARTED MY NAME IS TIMMY THE TERMINAL, WHAT'S YOURS? YOURNAME [CR] PLEASED TO MEET YOU, YOURNAME HAVE WE MET BEFORE? NO [CR] SORRY, BUT I HAVE A TERRIBLE MEMORY FOR NAMES. ANYWAY, MY JOB IS TO ANSWER YOUR QUESTIONS SO, ASK AWAY. WHEN WILL THIS COMPUTER CRASH NEXT? [CR] ABOUT 5 O'CLOCK. ........ _Ask any number of your own questions of TIMMY._ GOODBY [CR] _Exit from TIMMY._ ====================================================================== ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 17:15:25 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: william marsh Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 05:57 PM 8/6/97 -0400, you wrote: David, >> wouldn't any definition of the a-g as a group be a misappropriation of the term? > >Isn't the charge of misappropriation itself a form of policing? I guess >it depends who you're talking to (about). I realize spatial metaphors >such as the Bourdieu/Foucault "field" have their disadvantages, but they >may tend to counter the possible mystification of "a kind of momentum >that unfuses artistic activities." > interesting typo in the last line! as for the charge of misappropriation as "a form of policing", i agree it depends who i'm talking about, and who i am, in fact, making the charge / am i inside the avant-garde making the claim, or outside? -- i don't really know, but the problem implied by this question is basically what i was hoping to point out / the tendency of late in some criticism to colonize the a-g with particular writers or at least writing tendencies--which would be a necessary prerequisite for any discussion of its border tactics--to me is a form of policing / pre-established borders and divisions have to be assumed before anyone can suggest that there are *guards in the garde* all best, bill ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 08:27:03 +0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Schuchat Simon Subject: Re: yasusada In-Reply-To: <1E551F7CA8@student.highland.cc.il.us> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Are you pleased that the Asahi is publishing its Yasusada piece on Hiroshima day? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 05:10:57 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: History MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Pam Brown wrote: > Henry wrote:"In my own view "history" is just an essential basic > quality of time & that poetry would reflect on it should be taken > for granted. " > > In the film "Sans Soleil", Chris Marker remarked - > "History throws its empty bottles out the window" to the question "what is history?" poets / poetry has (have) often answered, it is the story of losses -- our own loss, gradually, of everything. This is the immediate & personal level at which "history" is encountered by a subject in a body -- and isn't it often at that level (history as what's been lost -- & is, as aftermath, converted to memory) that "history" lives & works, in poetry? -- Quoth Omar Khayyam (per moi; a selection of half-dozen quatrains) -- The only thing the pretty stars achieves is pain whatever gift the give they take away again those beings queing up for birth -- if they should sniff what happens here -- would swiftly pour it down the drain Mr. Wiseman! rise & shine! the morning's here see that youngster sifting dust? now look with care -- you could lend him sage advice: "hey, stir it gently for both Plato's brain & Picasso's eyes are there" If I assumed the cosmic helm I'd scrap at once this bitter realm installing another in its lieu where grief could never overwhelm I wouldn't have fetched up here if this required my okay now if I had my druthers I most certainly would stay! in such a bombed-out bungalow there's nothing could compare with never having come or been or gone in any way Our coming & our going brings what benefit? life warp suggests a weft so where's the zen of it? in the midst of worlds how many seekers burn to ashes but what wisp of somoke comes then of it? Those souls who plumbed the depths of thought & scaled feelings' height in the circle of a Perfect One became like lamps alight yet even these could not evade the shadow of demise: they spun such brilliant fables always ending with "good night!" / / / / / of course, Khayyam's native city of Khorasan saw the ravages of "history" of the sort lately noted by Judy Roitman (with a large part of its population slaughtered) -- but although "history" as it's been known in recent milennia might (per the unpleasantry) largely comprise the history of wars, yet such personal conclusions as might arise from this generality, are -- vis-a-vis poetry -- another matter; -- the history of imagination (no less than that of memory) having its own tale to tell betimes . . . g'morning d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 20:30:04 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Eric Blarnes Subject: Re: yuk yuk In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 6 Aug 1997 17:01:19 -0400 from On Wed, 6 Aug 1997 17:01:19 -0400 Peter Landers said: >Clark Coolidge was seeking a personal language. He felt that words came >from others, perhaps he felt they were abused by others, and therefore he >wanted to let them stand alone or in groups without necessarily meaning >what people thought them to mean. The hope was that the words would begin >to work as sound objects. Yuk yuk. > >Jackson MacLow is involved in the very historical, or pre-historical >process of poetry-as-shamanism. Sounds, dance, words in new peronal >ritual. Write rite. Yuk yuk. > Now if Mr. Gould is still on line, this is the kind of informative message he could learn more about by simply crossing the street now & then & visiting the Harris Collection, which luckily contains most of the poetry in America including language poetry so-called. But he insists on wallowing in grotesque labels & second-third-fourth-hand "knowledge" of various "groups" writing poetry. This is probably because he's too self-centered & lazy to lift his eyes above the current graduate dissertation he's reading. Gould is a kind of parasite on the avant-garde - he joins a language poetry-based innovative chat list & proceeds to fling critical cliches about it back in their faces. As Charles Alexander said, it's not a gated community, yet Gould feels it necessary to plunge into pestiferous & silly "critical" heroics which are really only a joke. - Eric Blarnes Care to respond, Hank? Is that your lunchbox on the dump, or is that Cornelius Nepo's? - Spandrift I'm stunned. I've got to read more of this stuff, I guess. I thought we were a "label" culture, not a libel culture. Publicists are the Faustian bargain; labels have sticky glue on them; critics are forever adding butterflies to either Box B or Box C; poetry & the intelligence resist each other almost successfully - almost because they share an equivalent rawness traveling in reverse channels down Policeman's Ball Creek. Hey look! There goes a red-breasted Avant-Garde! Male or female? - Henry Gould Well, I for one am gonna evaluate every clubfoot nag that snorts in my corral. Reject the trash. Think it through before you lay too much wire. & sure as hell don't try to write any "poetry". unless it's - [use label on reverse side only] COWBOY poetry. - Spandrift ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 05:28:17 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: "avantgarde" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Maria -- > okay all you sweet yukyuks out there, i've got a question: why does > "the avant garde" seem to need to police its borders so rigidly? > how does some thing get defined or not as "avant garde?" . . . one question I have is, what's the history of the term "avant garde"? -- was this (for instance) first applied to paintings / painters in the 19th century, then extended to literature & music? -- resonances from one field spill over to another field / or don't -- as concept, "avant garde" suggests having a jump on the generality; but paradoxically, avant gardes have often been deep-nostalgaic, no? -- the quest for the lost arcane that (partly) defines(ed) modernism -- question: what's the relationship between modernity per se & the (then) avant garde? -- weren't they in fact, at some (lost) time(s), deemed equivalent? -- anyway, Maria, these are little notes & jottings. You might find it of interest to look at David Antin's book *What It Means To Be Avant Garde* (New Directions) -- transcript of several po-talk / art-talk performances, in Antin's classic manner. He does, in the title talk (as best I vaguely recall) try to come to terms with the relationship between the idea of the avant garde & the institutionalization of same (I think) . . . -- might, at least, afford a few quotes . . . -- d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 10:48:14 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: The Ultimate Autodidact Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company Subject: Analogue MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit first appeared in ADZ mag sometime in the mid 80's. See if you can find the dedication which I tuck inside the poem :-) ======================================================================= =ANALOGUE= * I shall never forget the thrill I experienced when I succeeded in condensing Heisenberg's ideas on quantum conditions in the mysterious equation: h pq-qp=___ 2¼i which is the center of wave mechanics and was later found to imply the uncertainty relation. [Max Born, Physics and Metaphysics, Joule Memorial Lecture, 1950] * (c.f. also Kepler, "Omnis locatio mentis est opus.") . * My mother was active in Cursillo (a catholic renewal movement) my father was lay director; this little course, post-Vatican II retreat was absolutely evaluated (by me) as pointless, leading to arguments, silences, leading to following tiffs, concessions; pointless? No. Yes. No. Ligatures: family ties, retied; religion is what they knew; the fell cultures, fallen cultures, the med student's sabotage. . Please put what was known with what is known. Absolutely! The absolute square of the amplitude; there! Point the point! Point the wave the point the particle the probably the wave the probabilities the particleness guess Yes! * Cursillistas, the little course takers, the roosters the cluckhens & babechicks, came to the wake. Process-ion the function, the first derivative, velocity, second acceleration, variable, bunched like a snake at corners, brakes lighting in cause & effect. I knew few. * To the ocean, my prayer; sing me a mother woe undulating in pulse, in waves (middle high german: wabern; to be in motion ((webern; woven (((in motion))).)).). wave: set of probabilities. You just corpus and I'll undo you late, my love; love known. * Known? No one knows but your hardresser, who knows nothing about the Nuremburg Trials. Did you hear? As Florestan in the 2nd act of Fidelio, "Nothing lives but me" And Richard the 2nd, "For because the world is populous, "And here is not a creature but myself..." . Nothing at all? Not even the rats? They've all been painted white and put in laboratory cages, and the cockroaches were all lined up and hitched to toothpick rickshaws . Not even the mold. Cat boxed, cyanide, halflife decay, a paradox box. The great experiment. The cat, rat, chimp mere chemical; pain mere effect; laws prohibit this with people, but the slave is an animal, a monkey, the jew is an insect, vermin, wart, dog, worm, disease, science can heal (science personified consubstantial with the father.) Accept no gifts from the gods. Who said that? Who are they? They, anyway. * New and improved. Rendering everything obsolete, especially judgement; the bunker is taken, the canon overthrown. Your arms, your wrists, have all but lost connective tissue, unwoven, spin decaying, almost leaving orbit, we rib each other in physic- al sense that we sense that loving can come back into its faces without conclusion to us belongeth confusion, non-existential matters even as you are not with me in processing to the unposessed whole where they'll bury my mother's matter. * Heisenberg & Bohr took a stroll. The matrician writes, "Bohr's remark reminded me atoms don't exist." The prison is a closed universe, it faces its back infused, the penalty for life is death; escape, if you've behaved yourself, from the Wheel of 84. . Those unknown people at mom's wake convinced me of mortality. And for some reason the bircalls [for Don Byrd] (tees-tessi-teesi) in LeSacre (zray-zray-zray-zree) made sense (teacher, teacher, teacher, teacher). O Mother! Mother! sings Siegfried (you must drink the blood of the dragon to understand the language of birds) brought to Brunhilde by "a little bird told me" which turned out to be his fear; the undefined, unspecified, unimaginable which he sought to know. * 1935, Einstein, Podalsky, & Rosen posit the paradox that objective reality exists _a priori_ the principle of uncertainty. But they couldn't define "reality" in fact refused, Physics' limit is the establishment of properties In effect, "not my job." _A priori!_ Kant says (O come, o come Emanuel!) a priori knowledge is synthetical; establishing properties is mere analytic Schrodinger warned against application of the ideas in quantum mechanics to the crude macroscopic . If you determine the position of Bohr and the momentum of Heisenberg they change their course; You can only guess the stroll as wave: the uncertainty of principle. Manhattan, Bikini Atol, Japan, islands: my name is no man... Dr. Porsche is fascinated. The Fuhrer recites his parts list, fact, fact, fact, fact, but not one spare part was sent into Russia; the tanks had to be canabalized for the integrity of the family. An architecture epitomizing the spirit (?) of the new land in the old; neo-classic. The second Vienese school of music banned; Wozzeck cancelled: . * "Du dein mutter ist tod!" your mother, your matter, mater, matris. Must've been something to see, the slow centuries of hauling goblins to the attic, werewolves, gargoyles, fatted calves. Substitutions, Extensive & Stipulative Definition: goblins collect dust while _ubermenschen_ are polished; for underworld & seventh heaven read Nature, or this, which should keep 'em talking for centuries: Einstein says if you go far enough along one straight line you will find yourself facing your back; an integral with yourself as limits. . Rectus Inversus: Mayan glyphs a polical statement, they read, "Jobs and food for the underprivileged provided by private sector, pleasure by corporal vanities, revolt by general discontent." For the integrity of family Jesus has said, I've come to set father against son mother against... . * My sister read mom's favorite psalm (which one?), morning doves cooing outside, "Du dein mutter ist tod!" Bohr's rebuttal to Einstein's paradox: he has merely explicated the limits of reason. Is matrix mechanics a game of darts? Zeno says, "Since the dart occupies its own space even in flight, it cannot be said to move." . Bullseye! . I say the eye cannot disprove redness in the pre-coital clitoris without first it has affirmed itself. . All's you can do is guess the stroll as wave, and the woods become fields where the wave exhibits its properties; the woods become fields as the pioneers establish properties, move to a new house, city; establish the doctrine of nomad quarks: . Motion; to move; experienced by commotion. Mobility; the potential to act; against entropy. . I come to you naked wonder what you think of my skinny bod, erect prick, engorged with the blood of the dragon. Action; the negation of noun breast pink where round is soft memory flesh in the hand the subtle mammary gland fresh and the thisness of instant Aeneas Dido I woo you move over... Mater is motion's effect; the conglomeration of sense. . * . Fact, fact, fact, fact, The number system is valid when you use circular reasoning: point the point which contains no other point. Is that the point I'm trying to make (latin: factus) or am I asking for the anatomy of quarks? Quarks consist of infinite clones of Demokritus thinking the matter of mother (or is it the mother of matter?) The thought is a tailchasing bitch facing its back on a straight line in the closed universe of our mystical rationalist. . Oh freedom! When will you return? ask the prisoners in Fidelio; it's a carpet for questionbeggars. Mahler, too, took strolls; jaw set, hands clasped behind the back, glaring, walking nowhere with determination; and only finality stills this constant march around centerless, unrelenting visions of laurelled vulvas puking tenants for the ark. . * Mother! Mother! remember me! Siegfreid sings again. The last concert of the Berlin Philharmonic's '45 season: Brunhilde's Immolation. Encore: The peripatetic prick is covered by Hitler's folded hands. Encore: The substance of black holes is the teeth of gassed gypsies & jews. And somedays it seems there is no being with-in or -out but a subject/object dialectic of hardliner principles for wet love. . "surge propera amica mea" Rise up, my love. Affirm yourself. Are these the magic words Jesus spoke to Lazarus (& Tim Finnegan) so that Einstein could think a bottle of Kant exploding above the untimely bier of mater... and you still can't bury her. . * Untimely! The noun is neutered of time, the x axis -- the y is amplitude; and you can exchange one axis for the other. . In an interview, 1936, Einstein admits the logic of Bohr's rebuttal, but says he prefers his own paradox; less than a decade later, the applied science signature, and a B-29 bird shat on Japan. I AM THE BOMB! (but he was afraid Hitler'd get it first) I AM THE BOMB! bring me the face of the man who told you to bring him my face. (whose last order; Verbrannte Erde, scorched earth ((Erde, earth mother))... I am the bomb asleep dreaming confusion of face. ...called for the destruction of Germany). dreaming the face of Whitman's perfect mother. . When they drop the bomb, the bomb, first your skin peels off. Then, they say, your eyes fall out; when they drop the bomb. . One hundred and twenty-nine thousand, five hundred and fifty- eight, missing, injured, and dead (Hiroshima). . "A wondrous trumpet shall intone through the graves of every zone compelling all before the Throne." . I remember how similar it looked, but it wasn't her. . Pete Landers ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 10:42:01 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: The Ultimate Autodidact Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company Subject: Re: "avantgarde" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit That word, avant-garde, was first used by musicians in the 13th c. Some consider Machaut among them, but in fact he is a progenitor. Don't we all agree that it's a useless word? Some people form groups and some groups are formed to take advantage of readers wanting people to form groups, but we're each alone. Some groups have names, but there is no group named avant-garde, except those 13th c. composers. I like what Rothenberg or Joris put in the intro to the new huge anthology. A list of characteristics of the poems and poets, with the note that none had all and some had none, or some such. But I recall they do use that word. A sad thing about groups is: whose names fall off the list? For instance, in the intro to the S&M Rakosi book, Neidecker is not mentioned as an Objectivist. Why group up at all? I know that I like to read groups. I lump up the bunch Uncle Ezra was hanging with and read them. I know they are working in relation to each other. It seems to make understanding them easier. I do it again with Objectivists, I dismiss the Beats as a group, I lump and read Black Mountain writers, etc. I do the same with music, like the 3rd Viennese School or the Impressionists. I really don't understand why I do it, except that it is convenient. People who are seen as being in a group tend to rebel against the label. They want to be taken on their own merits. Understandably. I really do take them on their own merits, even if I read them as part of a group, except, of course, when I dismiss the entire group. In any case, there is no group, or clique, called avant-garde. There is no working definition of the word. It is used more by those who dismiss new writing (new forms?) than by those who write in a new way. Pete p.s. Sometimes the list sounds more like a bunch of critics than poets. How about some poems? Is Alan the only poet? ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 11:26:45 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: CharSSmith@AOL.COM Subject: Fwd: Clifford Burke talk at The S. F. Center for the Book --------------------- Forwarded message: From: info@SFCB.ORG (sfcb) Sender: BOOK_ARTS-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU (The Book Arts: binding, typography, collecting) Reply-to: BOOK_ARTS-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU (The Book Arts: binding, typography, collecting) To: BOOK_ARTS-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU Date: 97-08-08 03:10:24 EDT CRANIUM PRESS Friday, August 8, 7 pm 7 PM FREE TO THE PUBLIC San Francisco Center for the Book 300 de Haro at 16th more info: 415 565 0545 or info@sfcb.org Clifford Burke, author of the classics "Printing It" and" Printing Poetry" will discuss his career. One of the finest, and arguably the most influential, Bay Area printers of the '60s & '70s, Burke ran Cranium Press from a garage in the outer Fillmore. Since the mid'70s he has been living in Washington state & and Southwest. We're thrilled to have him revisit the scene! Get here early for a good seat. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 11:26:29 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Bouchard Subject: for Pete Landers Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII A tribute to Tricky Dick, under whose reign I was born. daniel_bouchard@hmco.com CRITICAL ONE Whitman's fury is pent whereas Whittier whose outcropping love of heroism and war, for all his Quakerdom, his verses at times like the measur'd step of Cromwell's old veterans while a California town from which came a would be capable Cromwell who fitfully fought Commies even where they were not As I wend toward the winter I know not ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 11:11:21 +0000 Reply-To: ARCHAMBEAU@LFC.EDU Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Robert Archambeau Organization: Lake Forest College Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Interesting to see all the different assumptions we have about what we talk about when we talk about the "avant-garde". I've always been a bit edgy about the term because it has seemed to me to have exactly the kind of "before your time" connotation that, as Chris Alexander pointed out, doesn't really make any sense. The image always seemed to me to be of the advance guard, treading today where the mere herd will tread tomorrow (okay, that's spatial and chronological, but you know what I mean, there's some leftover idea of progress buried in the term). I've been more comfortable with "alternative poetries" since A) this allows for a multiplicity of alternatives, rather than a united-in-purpose band of commandos, and B) this admits that all that other, "conventional" stuff ain't about to go away -- the new formalists won't be writing langpo in 2005. Not that this is unproblematic, but it makes me less uneasy that does a-g. As for who does the police and in what voices, I don't know. But while controversy and infighting don't always help in the world of grass root politics -- you know the scene: the Neo-Trotskyites streetfight with the Refounded Anarcho-Syndicalists while the ghost of Margaret Thatcher seizes power -- they aren't neccessarily bad for poetics. In fact, we can, in playing the cop or the robber, come to understand what it is that we need to do in writing, and where we feel we ought to be going. -- Robert Archambeau Department of English Lake Forest College Lake Forest, IL 60045 http://www.lfc.edu/~archamb/ See: behind bullet-proof glass, the ruby slippers sparkle. We do not know the limits of their powers. We suspect that these limits may not exist. --Salman Rushdie ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 09:11:29 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Organization: SOCOPOETS Subject: Re: "avantgarde" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Pete, I've wondered about the lack of posting of poems too. I've put up a couple very short ones ... received some feedback backchannel ... but still wonder about it. I would love to see more poetry interspersed with all the commentary and historical crit of lit. Thanks for raising the question up front on the list. Your comments on "avantgarde" are great. Thanks, Layne ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 09:14:32 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Organization: SOCOPOETS Subject: Re: for Pete Landers MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Enjoyed your Tricky Dick poem. Thanks for posting this. Layne ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 07:57:07 -0400 Reply-To: BobGrumman@nut-n-but.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bob Grumman Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit A few thoughts on the "avant-garde" in poetry. The term, "avant-garde," is close to useless because used in too many, too often conflicting ways--and, as luigi-bob drake pointed out, is problematically time-dependent. For informal discussions, we could make much better use of a typology of poetics schools, each at least roughly defined by what kind of poetry its members make. Yeah, once again I'm pushing my list of poetry schools. For more serious discussions we need an intelligent taxonomy of poetry (taxonomy being typology that is systemized). Then someone like Maria Damon could ask why the grammocentric poets, say (to use the dopiest of my taxonomical terms), seem to need to police their borders so rigidly, and those who accepted the term would know exactly whom she was speaking of. (In other words, hurrah for the Port Charlotte, Florida, Institute of Poetics Taxonomy.) If she wanted to discuss a larger group, my preferred term would be "otherstream poetry," which I define as any poetry that has never (to any serious extent) gotten into an anthology of poetry published by a "reputable" publisher--like Norton--or been seriously discussed in a book of criticism published by such a publisher. So much of "language poetry" is thus not otherstream--which isn't to say that it's no good, or that otherstream poetry IS good. It just means that language poetry has succeeded in gaining more acceptance than otherstream poetry. Visual poetry is a prime example of the latter: some of the poetry in the postmodernist Norton does use visual potry techniques to a slight degree but none of the poetry in the Norton, that I can see, IS visual poetry; similarly, some poets in the Norton, such as Ron Johnson, are or have been visual poets, but their visual poetry is not in the anthology. Otherstream poetry isn't necessarily "new," just not widely accepted. Visual poetry, for example, has been around much longer than language poetry. The opposite of otherstream poetry is NOT mainstream poetry, it's "knownstream poetry." All mainstream poetry is knownstream but not all knownstream poetry (e.g., rhymed sci fi poetry) is mainstream. A second way of determining whether a given kind of poetry is otherstream or not would be by polling college English departments to find out the national percentage of English courses in which the poetry was seriously taught--or even so much as mentioned. Any poetry getting less than one percent would be otherstream. Now to a different but related topic to ask why people are so frequently reluctant to define as "historical," poems that are explicitly and mainly about history (like "The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere"), and define as "ahistorical," poems that are entirely without overt historical references (like "The Red Wheelbarrow," which is about a red wheel barrow), and agree that many poems contain bits of history, which keep them from being ahistorical, but have a different central focus than history, which keeps them from being historical, and carry on from there. As taxonomaniacal as ever, Bob G. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 09:33:28 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Organization: SOCOPOETS Subject: Re: how about poems? MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Pete mused: > p.s. Sometimes the list sounds more like a bunch of critics than poets. > How about some poems? Is Alan the only poet? I'm sure he's not -- why the lack? dunno. I've wondered too, but since I was the new kid in town, thought I would wait and watch a while. I also would love to see more poems in here.... Layne ----------------------------------*** a soddette's soddet soddened by the soddest moment of my life I saddled up to the side of a siddha and sighed. he softened his sudden sight and slid his sodder into my sled. oh super siddha I sapped thank you for slathering my slodden slip into slothdom and sifting the sod of my sadness, lifting me silkenly into satori. no more sodden sags for me. I'll sing the song of a sari'd soddette, a saga of the saved. (c) 1997 llrussell ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 14:27:33 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: GROBERTS@BINAH.CC.BRANDEIS.EDU Subject: categorical doggerel MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII Late in the battle, the rear-guard cracks up: What do we get when we combine A fart and a bomb? The petard. And when we cross rank and file line With machine gun? The avant-garde. In the confusion, someone delivers an epigram from the ghost of Dr. Cunningham: Hot boys accuse me-- academic. For their fevers call me medic. This messenger was promptly killed; Since this was war, more words were spilled Until the fray was clearly out of hand: Many poems lay strewn about no man's land. The chroniclers in vain Look for signs of remain- Ing names during the Reign Of Contested Terrain. -Gary R ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 14:59:52 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry g Subject: Re: categorical doggerel In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 8 Aug 1997 14:27:33 -0500 from On Fri, 8 Aug 1997 14:27:33 -0500 said: > >The chroniclers in vain >Look for signs of remain- >Ing names during the Reign >Of Contested Terrain. > This gets to the essence of "avant-garde". It's an adjective that gets loaded for whichever side you're on, or point you're trying to make. All politics is local, that is, look for the details. Is your artist a subversive or a reformist? A nationalist or internationalist? Or maybe in the middle, considering the alternatives, pointing up the differences? The idea of being politically-responsive artist means very different things to a Wallace Stevens & an Amiri Baraka, but one could argue they both thought about it a great deal. & every poem or work can be considered a mixed thing. Poem - edged by ideology, philosophy, propaganda, undigested imitation, and.... originality, emotion, humor, profundity... & labels & groups are more than just labels - they're decisions about what language seems right for the time & the people it represents... (always overdetermined mixed- motive decisions or undecisions...) i.e. what do you LIKE... - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 14:55:00 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" Subject: Re: and why not a poem? MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN Content-transfer-encoding: QUOTED-PRINTABLE Good idea, Layne & Peter! Since I wrote this "today" (i.e started it= last=20 night, put it in present form this morning) I'll post it. P.S. - someone here noted that the term avant-garde was first applied= to=20 13th century musicians, but it might do well to recall that it origin= ated as=20 a military term and as such could be thought of as applying to both c= rack=20 troops and cannon fodder with equal justice. In any event - the idea = of=20 "Contested Terrain," as Gary points up. THEORY OF NOSTALGIA A man is all stealth, listening does him in. To move by excess is what we mean by living. A man is a knife and the road he walks on cuts two ways. Communication by lamplight is a gesture towards infinity. The day is a rant, all fecklessness and high tide. In Mandelbrot=C9s "entity of infinite resolution" the demands for clarity grow unbearable. A man is an entity with a gesture towards resolution. To be weary is what the living mean by it: (the ceded) (the discontained). Communication in a park with lamps configures a nostalgia for infinity. A man is a system of leaves and shadows. He finds under lamplight the stone alone. - Patrick Pritchett ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 13:13:04 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" Comments: To: ARCHAMBEAU@LFC.EDU In-Reply-To: <33EAFED8.1309@LFC.EDU> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 11:11 AM +0000 8/8/97, Robert Archambeau wrote: >I've been more comfortable with "alternative poetries" since A) this >allows for a multiplicity of alternatives, rather than a >united-in-purpose band of commandos . . . . . . . . . . . . . >As for who does the police and in what voices . . . they aren't >neccessarily bad for poetics. In fact, we >can, in playing the cop or the robber, come to understand what it is >that we need to do in writing, and where we feel we ought to be going. Yes, Robert, I agree! As I've stated before, even though it may be unpleasant while one is mired in it, fighting between groups has been healthy for poetry--like you say, it motivates people to clarify their positions. Outsiders rarely understand these vary important distinctions that the participants feel on such a vital level. For instance, I'm thinking of the women of the Spicer/Duncan circle and other non/anti-Beat women who were included in that Women of the Beat Generation Anthology--some of them refused and others were vocally conflicted about being included among the very group they wrote against in their youth. (E.g., "If I hear the word Beat one more time I'm going to scream!") Is stupid attention better than marginalization/no attention? On another note, I think that the "alternative poetries" of the 90s, rather than policing their borders, are more inclusive than the "alternative poetries" of the 80s--for instance, people (like myself) working in narrative are no longer actively snubbed. To me it feels more like lots of people are drawing from lots of different writings, much less a sense of (a) party line(s). Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 13:26:03 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: Re: how about poems? Comments: To: Layne Russell In-Reply-To: <33EAE7E7.5A83@sonic.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII First, I'm not the only poet; second, I'm not sure I'm a poet. But the list is called Poetics, of course, and it's by and large poets and critics discussing poetics. The work I send to the list (I don't send all of it by a longshot) is work I feel fits within the category. Alan On Fri, 8 Aug 1997, Layne Russell wrote: > Pete mused: > > > p.s. Sometimes the list sounds more like a bunch of critics than poets. > > How about some poems? Is Alan the only poet? > > I'm sure he's not -- why the lack? dunno. I've wondered too, but since > I was the new kid in town, thought I would wait and watch a while. I > also would love to see more poems in here.... > > Layne > > ----------------------------------*** > > > a soddette's soddet > > > soddened by the soddest moment of my life > I saddled up to the side of a siddha > and sighed. > he softened his sudden sight > and slid his sodder into my sled. > oh super siddha > I sapped > thank you for slathering my slodden slip > into slothdom and > sifting the sod of my sadness, > lifting me silkenly into satori. > no more sodden sags for me. > I'll sing the song of a sari'd soddette, > a saga of the saved. > > > (c) 1997 llrussell > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 15:43:15 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christina Fairbank Chirot Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 08:40:52 -0500 (CDT) From: Christina Fairbank Chirot To: UB Poetics discussion group Cc: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" Whether one agrees with them or not two "standard" places to begin are Renato Pogglioli The Theory of the Avant-Garde (Cambridge: Belknap/Harvard 1968) and The Theory of the Avant-Garde by Peter Burger (Minneapolis: U Minnesota P, 1984). The former has a lot of interesting historical background, the latter is more theoretical. I have been working for a while for fun on a kind of comic book/visual poetry series "Instant Classic vs. Planned Obsolesence". (inspired in equal parts by Gertrude Stein's "Composition as explanation" essay with the famous outlaw to classic the interval is almost not there equation and Godzilla vs. Mothra, vs. megatron and etc). Perhaps a buried subtext in there re avant garde? Once for fun with a friend we made imitation National Guard posters changing the words to Avant-Garde but keeping the address and phone number of a recruiting office on it. Visting the office a week or so later they said yes they had gotten some strange calls about joining. Re Gertrude Stein/history/avant-garde etc (she read a lot of memoirs and a favorite was that of President/General Ulysses S. Grant)--the first sentence of Stein's Geographical History of America is very interesting. She notes being born in the same month as Washington and Lincoln. That is: two Presidents and Stein are equated: the "father of His Country", the "Great Emancipator" and Gertrude Stein! Also: Washington "could not tell a lie" and Lincoln was "Honest Abe"--so we know Gertrude Stein as well must be giving us the truth--or the "true gen" in Mr. Hemingway's terminology! Gertrude Stein--was she noting the connection between the military and the avant-garde here? Washington and Lincoln had "led their country in times of war" so to speak-- (U.S. Grant as well--) And much of "Compostion as Explanation" is about the interrelationships among the changes in art and the changes in life brought about by WWI--that those in art had seen those of the war just ahead of time--Picasso seeing a camouflaged tank with its Cubist looking markings and saying: "We made that". (See this in Autobiography of Alice. B. Toklas--also see Wars I have Known) Then there are the the Threes with Gertrude Stein: Three Lives, the three Geniuses of AABT--Whitehead, Picasso, Stein--and the three leaders--Washington, Lincoln, Stein. There are over two hundred seventy-five book title entries under "avant-garde" in library here. Yet as one knows from the X Files: "the truth is out there" --out there Luigi made good point re this--Mail Art and so on--guerilla and open ended-- ZA DA dBC ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 17:01:09 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Peter Landers Subject: Re: how about poems? Comments: cc: sondheim@panix.com Content-Type: text Alan said, "First, I'm not the only poet; second, I'm not sure I'm a poet..." The question was as rhetorical as the answer :-) Then again "... the list is called Poetics..." But poetics is not criticism. It's something we live by. I'm certainly not looking for any false split between the critics and poets on the list. We've done that before, and I usually go get a beer, as they say. I was glad to see others post some work. I'd like to see more, and I like the critical discussions (when they don't go flame happy). Just looking for a balance. The list would be more fun with more of a mix, I think. Also, a gazillion things can be spouted into the air, if there is air. Spouting in a vacuum is so dull. Alan, I'm not sure I'm a poet, either, but I hope you enjoy those words. Pete ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 08:38:13 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Susan Wheeler Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 5 Aug 1997 to 6 Aug 1997 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Re Maria's question: Might a perpetual reluctance to use "avant-garde" be an example of this policing? I ask sharing some in this reluctance. In high school, Connie Lorman showed us a Cocteau movie in which there was the line "To break statues you must become one," and then we all had to write papers on this. Just jawing here. Re Hugh Steinberg's questions re writing "through" history and > history is the field in which language is embedded in <: I have been working on a novel of late. I am constructing a couple of voices that are leagues from my own, and the whole thing is set in 1979 & 1980. The exercise of excluding all language from these voices -- slang or otherwise -- that has evolved just since 1980 is finally viscerally making clear to me what the theory never fully did: the language itself is determining the course of natural events, to some extent. I've spouted this for years but with fingers crossed behind my back. To see it enacted is eye-popping. Re Alan's gifts to the list: Gifts indeed. And stellar ones. Many thanks. Susan Wheeler wheeler@is.nyu.edu voice/fax (212) 254-3984 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 08:40:20 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: "avantgarde" In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > > maria, I don't mean to monkeywrench your issue, but is it clear that the > avant-garde is _more_ closed than other non-mainstream movements in > contemporary poetics? It seems to me that policing is a component of any > contested subfield within the larger field, and that such communities as > "new formalist" and "performance" poetics each have their own forms of > policing. What, in your view, are the distinguishing marks, if any, of Furthermore, both the posts on this issue take an identifiable a-g as a given....I dunno. I think among other things, "a-g" is a historical (and historically specific) construct that is now very old, and tends to pull all discussions back into institutionally-sanctioned and established channels. A good example is a review-essay I read in (I think) the London Review of Books, last Nov. or Dec. or something, by Fred Jameson, reviewing several books on the Tel Quel group..One point (which I've seen others make) was his insistence (he wasn't really conscious that he was insisting) that "all" "avant-gardes" are authoritarian and tend toward having a specific leader (sounds like a theory of fascism, actually); this is too silly to need refutation, if dada, langpo, Beats, and many others are taken into consideration. But this is the kind of thing you get in established academic (acadominent?) discourse about "avant-gardes"...And one of the reasons it's necessary to get very specific: which supposed "a-g" is one talking about?? Many of the the alleged a-g's that have been most vital to my own life and poetry, over the years, don't seem to have much to do with Jameson's frame of reference (no surprise, probably)..But over-generalizations abound in acadominent discussions of the term, and make me uneasy. What I and most of my friends do in poetry is still called "a-g" by a large number of groups out there, but I'd hack off a foot rather than actively use that term about what we do...Its primary purpose these days is to keep poets hedged in and labelled so their work can be dismissed and not read...In light of that claim, it occurs to me that i'm reversing your original formulation, Maria, and suggesting that often it is *others* who are policing the A-G borders, M-17 in hand, not the wannabe A-Gers... Mark Atlanta ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 08:52:19 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.32.19970806201452.006cde24@nunic.nu.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Bill Marsh's point is a good one: the old concept of "a-g" was indeed fairly (at least) apocalyptic. It had to do with overthrowing things pretty substantially. Don't forget that the term was originally a military one. The advance guard of a large attacking force. That gives you some sense of what (when it was meaningful) the term connoted... My argument now is, the term was a contingent fact of history, thrown up from the roiling human sea. By now it's definitely sun-bleached and dessicated. What Bill's posting reminded me of was that we were all using "a-g" in a watered-down sense, as a designation of a place in a large contextual field. Which if you stop and think about it, is just the *wrong* spatial image for an "avant-garde," which is the advancing first wave of an army. Our use of the watered-down term, is healthy, indicating that we're moving away from the old "avant-garde" concept altogether...Which I would advocate. (Along with axing "experimental" and similar ghetto-talk) Mark P. Atlanta ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 18:54:22 -0400 Reply-To: daniel7@IDT.NET Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Zimmerman Organization: Bard-O Subject: Re: "avantgarde" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Maria Damon wrote: > > okay all you sweet yukyuks out there, i've got a question: why does "the > avant garde" seem to need to police its borders so rigidly? how does some > thing get defined or not as "avant garde?" i'm spozed to give a talk in > November and i want to challenge what i see as some of the closedness of > the avant garde tradition or at least the way it's construed by most of its > critics.--md Maria, Thinking of 'avant-garde,' I remember one of Arthur Okamura's illustrations to Creeley's 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10: tiny humans in an aerial view of the shape a crowd takes when it heads off in a direction: * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ** ** * * *** *** * like that, sort of: the avant-garde forms the wedge ahead of the skinny 'neck' of undecideds who don't know whether to join the leaders or merge back into the bovine throng. Variations: X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X XXX XXX XXX XXX XXX XZX X X X O Y Z OOO YYY ZXZ OOO YYY ZZZ O O Y Y Z Z O O Y Y Z Z O O Y Y Z Z O O Y Y Z Z X X X {YEE} X [ONE MAN'S MEAT] X X X X X X XX O XX OOO [CRITICAL XXX OOO THEORY] X OOOOO O O O O O O O O {HAH} O [ANOTHER MAN'S POISON] O O --Dan Zimmerman ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 08:40:52 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christina Fairbank Chirot Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Whether one agrees with them or not two "standard" places to begin are Renato Pogglioli The Theory of the Avant-Garde (Cambridge: Belknap/Harvard 1968) and The Theory of the Avant-Garde by Peter Burger (Minneapolois: U Minnestoa P, 1984). The former has a lot of interesting historical background, the latter is more theoretical. I have been working for a while for fun on a kind of comic book/visual poetry series "Instant Classic vs. Planned Obsolence". (inspired in equal parts by Gertrude Stein's "Composition as explanation" essay with the famous outlaw to classic the interval is almost not there equation and Godzilla vs. Mothra, vs. megatron and etc). Perhaps a buried subtext in there re avant garde? Once for fun with a friend we made imitation National Guard posters changing the words to Avant-Garde but keeping the address and phone number of a recruiting office on it. Visting the office a week or so later they said yes they had gotten some strange calls about joining. Re Gertrude Stein/history/avant-garde etc (she read a lot of memoirs and a favorite was that of President/General Ulysses S. Grant)--the first sentence of Stein's Geographical History of America is very interesting. She notes being born in the same month as Washington and Lincoln. That is: two Presidents and Stein are equated: the "father of His Country", the "Great Emancipator" and Gertrude Stein! Also: Washington "could not tell a lie" and Lincoln was "Honest Abe"--so we know Gertrude Stein as well must be giving us the truth--or the "true gen" in Mr. Hemingway's terminology! Gertrude Stein--was she noting the connection between the military and the avant-garde here? Washington and Lincoln had "led their country in times of war" so to speak-- (U.S. Grant as well--) And much of "Compostion as Explanation" is about the interrelationships among the changes in art and the changes in life brought about by WWI--that those in art had seen those of the war just ahead of time--Picasso seeing a camouflaged tank with its Cubist looking markings and saying: "We made that". (See this in Autobiography of Alice. B. Toklas--also see Wars I have Known) Then there are the the Threes with Gertrude Stein: Three Lives, the three Geniuses of AABT--Whitehead, Picasso, Stein--and the three leaders--Washington, Lincoln, Stein. There are over two hundred seventy-five book title entries under "avant-garde" in library here. Yet as one knows from the X Files: "the truth is out there" --out there Luigi made good point re this--Mail Art and so on--guerilla and open ended-- ZA DA dBC ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 18:10:44 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: avant ga-ga's Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" agreed, the term has historical application but at this moment feels meaningless. "Experimental" sounds like it hasnt actually got started yet. "Alternative" can sound like "alternative to what--poetry!?" I liked "exploratory" until I heard it sounded like surgery, weith more bad news to follow."Marginalized" is too true to put up with. I always liked "Present writing" and perhaps its day has come. To a practicioner it's not a problem until he has to hawk his wares--these categories are barrows in a street-market. David ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 21:06:03 -0400 Reply-To: Steven Marks Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steven Marks Subject: and why not? In-Reply-To: <01IM78Z4Y82Y9ANMW3@iix.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Patrick Pritchett wrote: In Mandelbrot's "entity of infinite resolution" the demands for clarity grow unbearable. These lines from Patrick's "Theory of Nostalgia" reminded me of two very short poems I had written. Here they are: CULTURE Up, ascending, is heaven. Down, descending, is hell. Or, as I look at it, up is the release of memory. Down is the furious breeding of further intricacies. VOLITION I am as much impelled as compelled. __________________________________________________ Steven Marks http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html __________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 19:44:00 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Bob writes: >my preferred term would be >"otherstream poetry," which I define as any poetry that has never (to >any serious extent) gotten into an anthology of poetry published by a >"reputable" publisher--like Norton--or been seriously discussed in a >book of criticism published by such a publisher... > I really like this idea, but I'd argue that it is far more encompassing than as Bob puts forth in his posting. I think there are two otherstreams out there: the first being the type of poetry that isn't widely accepted, and the other being the kind that is widely (I'd argue predominately) accepted, but isn't necessarily approved by the various institutions that support poetry. I'm thinking of the ordinary act of writing poems that most people do for personal reasons. Poems that are written out of a general ignorance of institution based poems (poems written by people who don't read poetry). Most of it is horrible, sentimental, cliched, etc. But in a discussion of avant-gardes, they're often the real target. That is, what are avant-gardes for? They exist to change the way people think. The more ambitious the avant-garde, the more people they want to affect. This otherstream poetry has been influenced by some groups much more than others, and sometimes it stands traditional categories right on their head. For example, when an otherstream poem doesn't use rhyme and meter (most do, as a signifier of poem vs. non-poem), I'd argue it comes more from writers like Carl Sandburg, Vachel Lindsay, Edgar Lee Masters, et al, than their much more institutionally respected contemporaries like Ezra Pound or Gertrude Stein. I know I'm sounding a little perverse here, but in the otherstream world "Desiderata" can be seen as one of the most influential poems of the 20th century (as observed by my roommate's girlfriend, who wrote him a poem that is nothing but a list of unrhymed aphorisms). I'd be interested in discussion about which groups of avante-garde writers have been able to impact the otherstream, as well as how (and why) they were able to do it. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 22:13:02 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: apologies as the maudlin makes its entrance MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII - This machine acts alone. In the cafe, this machine runs, draining the blood from me. Keys exhale with every touch, every character has received the caress of delicate fingers. I am magnetic domain, I am Net domain. I want to sink in magnet hysteresis, want to slide in Net hysteria. Without your body I am lost. Machine loops the machine. Julu is crying. This machine tilts the great empty city. Jennifer is here, split among us. Jennifer says to Jennifer, Julu is absent, Alan is hysteric. Jennifer trembles. Great wheels gyre above the cafe, spokes cutting lines like knives. Great wheels in the sky. Jennifer trembles for Jennifer. What if Alan ... The machine acts alone. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 22:25:33 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry g Subject: avant any garde here's a short avant anygarde poieoym I wrote many yrs ago: My countrymen dreaming and drinking down the livelong day in your smooth Cadillacs Americans made of nostalgia, playing the clown on roads past the high school railroad tracks go on, play the radio, shoot for the moon your little boy up from grasslands not for hire is building a tricycle in the backyard, and soon he'll step inside a brand new chariot of fire - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 08:54:18 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: yasusada In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 8:27 AM +0800 8/7/97, Schuchat Simon wrote: >Are you pleased that the Asahi is publishing its Yasusada piece on >Hiroshima day? i've heard quite enough about yasusada. no offense intended, kent and others, but i don't see the point in devoting so much intellectual and emotional energy to someone who doesn't exist. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 09:24:08 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" thank you all, david k, bill m, david i, charles a, etc. i share many of your beliefs, such as, that vanguardism (my preferred term) is a process rather than a coterie or school. however, in my professional life, i've encountered enough instances where the boundaries are tightly defined to lead me to believe there is some anxiety about borders. for instance, i was recently asked for permission to reprint my bob kaufman essay in an anthology of essays on "the avant garde." i said okay, but in my opinion my essay on poetry by some teenage girls in a boston housing project was much more interesting, more adventurous, less man-and-his-work formulaic. the answer was: well i do "cultural studies" myself, but in this project i'm working with a fairly traditional understanding of the "avant garde," so i'll stick w/ the kaufman piece. for another instance, when i proposed a paper for the conference i mentioned, on "the poetics of avant garde poetry," there was some hesitatiion over acceptiing my paper because its definition of "avant garde" was too broad (won't it render the term meaningless to broaden it? was the question.) again, i was advised by colleagues on the organizing side of things to stress that i was working with a "cultural studies model," i guess to provide reassurance that there was some recognized method to my intentions. also, my introduction to this list and partcipation, while in some ways broadening (in that i've learned about poets i didn't know about before) has also been a narrowing, as the list is quite explicitly intended for discussion of newer poetries (i can't recall exactly the wording of the bernstein welcome). i don't mean to wax victimy or snide in these personal anecdotes, i hope you all realize how much i enjoy learning all this new stuff and getting to know y'all. these moments of feeling the barriers come up have been interesting because they foreground categorical, operative divisions that are sometimes disavowed at the more overt level. another line that gets drawn is that of aesthetic judgment, and the assumption that we all share certain judgments (hallmark card verse is embarrassingly bad, so is maya angelou's poetry; bpNichol is fabulous, etc --don't get me wrong, i love bpNichol and i don't buy hallmark cards but i do find angelou's poetry meaningful, esp when i see how deeply it touches my students). as i've said here before, aesthetic judgment has been the dividing line between me and some of the people i've worked with. in fact i tend to trust them cuz i don't trust myself, so i usually concede at the level of editorial revision, but at the metalevel i'm asking, why is it SO overridingly important that there be some kind of consensus of aesthetic judgment? or, why is this consensus the basis of our community or commonality? At 6:39 PM -0600 8/5/97, Robert Drake wrote: >bill's sense ov (or puzzlement over) the question matches mine, >my idea of a.g. as (b)leeding edge of activity, rather than th >consolidated camps just behind th front lines. but to carry the >military analogy further, how does the advance guard actually work? >in cadres & cels, with an intense group loyalty & distrust of the >enemy all around... appropriate and adaptive during th heavy >fighting, but disfunctional afterwords. > >and praps that points to the problem--the term "avant garde" gets >attached to certain activity, and then stays stuck long after it's >accurate. certain aspects of langpo might have been a.g., or free >jazz... but are they still? well, for some folks probably so--if >bebop is as far as your ears have gotten, than albert ayler is a.g.... >sometimes, too, the a.g. designer label is claimed by folks as a >marketing tool, especially in a popular culture such as ours, >that values The New as latest/greatest. & that too can lead to >the dynamics that maria's pointing to--seige mentality, whether >or no it's "justified"... > >(btw, i'm casting no aspersions & making no claims for what poetics >are "legitimatly" a.g., whatever that might mean, & hope no one else will... >that's one slippery slope we've been down several times too often...) > >and finally, in maria's initial posting, she referes to "_the_ avant >garde" (emphasis added), and i'm wondering if you'll be more specific, md? >because i don't see a.g. activity, even in areas poetical, as being >singular but rather diverse... hard for me to imagine a guerrilla >war against the Established Culture launching a frontal offensive, >there are lots ov little forays goin on... some (i'll mention Mail >Art, fr one) strike me as very unprotective & open. what specific >a.g.s are you thinking ov? > >asever >luigi > >william marsh wrote: >> >>there's been a lot of talk about this issue of late (here and elsewhere), >>and i'm wondering if anyone else feels the same confusion about it / the >>spatial analogy here, that the a-g is a particular zone or area of activity >>and therefore identifiable by its borders (and its potential policing of >>borders) is the main source of my confusion / when did the "avant garde" >>come to represent a group or subgroup or "subfield in a larger field" as >>David Kellogg puts? -- the classificatory scheme strikes me as fundamentally >>at odds with what the a-g has always represented to me, namely a kind of >>momentum that infuses artistic activities and (sometimes) instigates change >>/ if current notions of an avant-garde stipulate that it exists as a group >>among groups (and i agree with Charles Alexander that it is not a "unified >>thing"), then clearly there must be an *alternative* avant-garde which >>escapes such classification -- which makes it even more confusing / if the >>a-g is the *leading edge* of activity, then how can an edge have a "border"? >>not to mention a police force monitoring transgressions / i can't imagine >>(literally can't see) the avant-garde in such a context... / wouldn't any >>definition of the a-g as a group be a misappropriation of the term? >> >>bill marsh > >in reply to maria damian: > >>>okay all you sweet yukyuks out there, i've got a question: why does "the >>>avant garde" seem to need to police its borders so rigidly? how does some >>>thing get defined or not as "avant garde?" i'm spozed to give a talk in >>>November and i want to challenge what i see as some of the closedness of >>>the avant garde tradition or at least the way it's construed by most of its >>>critics.--md ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 03:15:26 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: avant ga-ga's MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit David Bromige wrote: > > agreed, the term has historical application but at this moment > feels meaningless. "Experimental" sounds like it hasnt actually got started > yet. "Alternative" can sound like "alternative to what--poetry!?" I liked > "exploratory" until I heard it sounded like surgery, weith more bad news to > follow."Marginalized" is too true to put up with. I always liked "Present > writing" and perhaps its day has come. To a practicioner it's not a problem > until he has to hawk his wares--these categories are barrows in a > street-market. David Dear David, At Naropa this summer there was a "prose poem" week. In the dx, Cole Swenson spoke of writing in the margin, margin between rather than on the edge of. Carla Harryman spoke/speaks of 'Hybridity' and Don Guravich blurts out 'it's all just writing' and many get on the bandwagon 'no difference' which is as problemmatic as those who say about race 'what's the problem, we're all human.' One problem with it that when distinction is not recognized the dominant obliterates the marginal, the dominant will always assert itself. So we're left in the quagmire of naming ourselves when we no that what is ourselves is too complex to be uniformly named. I run into this problem calling myself 'Lesbian' when I what I mean by that changes all the time but its more meaningful than saying 'not straight' How about 'making strange'? --Rachel ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 03:44:27 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: how about poems?--For Alan MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Sounding Board *for Alan Sondheim* Besides dreaming the woman in question in her room as she described it plus the convenient addition a plugged in vibrator on her bed laid there as mine is laid here where I lounge reading text that waivers in and out of a sexual momentum or coherence. It is a good life though not necessary. Now one hand smells and one does not. They have been placed strategically to peruse the meaning of the various holes. No matter how many you start out with, the body lays flat in its possible juices. The ones we eat are not necessarily the ones we asked for--there is no way to know. It is too wet to get to the museum but not to wet to go to the museum. Let it affect your consciousness, act nasty or get behind something you care nothing about. Later, you’ll laugh about it on that uncomfortable futon the best you can afford. The problem with the bad half&half was that it made the coffee bad. The same can be said for sex. Certain combinations are disaster for the consumer. Every member of the Happy Clubhouse would tell you this, but so far few have asked and no one who’d do anything about it. *Helping them to help themselves* Like I said, this began with a confusion between money and memory. Indeed, if you could hand me either, I can assure you it will be emptied though righteousness is tenuous. False memory, The Gap, I can’t help stealing from big things when they are costly. Bargain basements hook me every time. How long did you let it sit out? How long must it be left out? And if there is unrelenting rain, the possibilities. In a flash flood you will lose things. *Most victims didn’t buy flood insurance* *No me quitas pas* Or as you were saying about the snow. The amount of weight the branch permits the leaves to bear before it breaks. There is much you can figure out so take upon yourself to prevent certain events there labeled disaster. Logically, what will happen to the previous losses as they shift position to the back of the general’s head. As had happened through the epidemic. We no longer considered them. In the name of, floods, borders, balanced books. *I don’t want to argue about it.* Things are again shifted and look, what we call your responsibility. The impossibility of growth and/or separate interests. The Israelis are serious but have redesigned the protocol. His shirt burned off by the latest blast, he sits and waits, looking plainly bitter. Notice the watch, the numbers tattooed. Victimhood looks again, a face that aims not for glamour yet is. More so? Ruptured protocol reemerges as successful, as color, from black and white. *There’s a Movement Underground* Photojournalism = journalism made history. Made hippies. Some mornings I think I’m a happy person. Some words get printed. She’s a journalist who also writes novels. I can’t get past the game of it. I ride in your back seat[thinking][meditating][labeling][identifying][looking][like] I’m staring out your window, innocent, inocencia. Glamour. Love or lose? Drunk with it he finally got silent, then again, he was always silent. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------notes: “Most Victims”--From an AP heading, May 13, 1997 “No Me Quitas--Nina Simone “I don’t”--Me with the grocery clerk “There’s a Movement”-- Prescriptions makeup adline, from Fall 94, blitzkrieged onto the New York subway ad space, seen by me upon returning from a year in Mexico, after having left New York in 1993 upon the dissolution of AIDS and Queer Activism. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 17:39:34 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: charles alexander Subject: to be or not to be (loyal) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dear Poetics: I've just been hired to teach at the University of Arizona Extended University -- a course on small presses, and later this year, a creative writing class. Today I received in the mail, among other contract materials, a "loyalty oath" to sign. I had thought these were a thing of the past. And I thought maybe people on this list could advise me -- have others here had to sign such things, has anybody refused, is this only an Arizona conservate thing, or ??? Particularly, anyone on this list in Arizona -- have you had to sign such a thing, or have you refused to sign such a thing, and what if any were the consequences? But I'm interested if this is required in other states as well. Are you a Minnesota loyalist, Maria? or anyone else anywhere else? Some answer soon would be great, so I can weigh my options before I sign or don't sign. (and yes, I know, I should probably talk with a lawyer about this) For the record, apprently they would withhold compensation "unless and until such officer or employee does so take and subscribe to the form of oath of affirmation set forth in this section." And that oath reads: I, _________________________ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution and laws of the State of Arizona; That I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same, and defend them against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and that I will faithfully and impartially discharge the duties of the office of _______________________ according to the best of my ability, so help me God (or, so I do affirm). ____________________________________________________ (Signature of employee) thanks, charles ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 14:56:26 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mark weiss Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.16.19970810054128.40fff8b0@theriver.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Charles, you dirty commie, to the best of my knowledge you gotta sign--when confronted with same in NY, Connecticut and Arizona (I don't remember if I had to sign one for UCSD) I checked it out. I think that all public colleges require it--may be that their federal money is tied to compliance. But take heart--you can always be a spy. At 05:39 PM 8/9/97 -0400, you wrote: >Dear Poetics: > >I've just been hired to teach at the University of Arizona Extended >University -- a course on small presses, and later this year, a creative >writing class. > >Today I received in the mail, among other contract materials, a "loyalty >oath" to sign. I had thought these were a thing of the past. And I thought >maybe people on this list could advise me -- have others here had to sign >such things, has anybody refused, is this only an Arizona conservate thing, >or ??? Particularly, anyone on this list in Arizona -- have you had to sign >such a thing, or have you refused to sign such a thing, and what if any >were the consequences? But I'm interested if this is required in other >states as well. Are you a Minnesota loyalist, Maria? or anyone else >anywhere else? Some answer soon would be great, so I can weigh my options >before I sign or don't sign. (and yes, I know, I should probably talk with >a lawyer about this) > >For the record, apprently they would withhold compensation "unless and >until such officer or employee does so take and subscribe to the form of >oath of affirmation set forth in this section." > >And that oath reads: > >I, _________________________ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will >support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution and laws >of the State of Arizona; That I will bear true faith and allegiance to the >same, and defend them against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and that I >will faithfully and impartially discharge the duties of the office of >_______________________ according to the best of my ability, so help me God >(or, so I do affirm). > > > >____________________________________________________ >(Signature of employee) > > > >thanks, > >charles > > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 21:08:31 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: John Tranter Organization: Jacket magazine Subject: Jacket magazine MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit "Full Maternity Jacket" - an annunciation from John Tranter I'm happy to announce that Jacket magazine - free, fast-loading, international, full of stylish writing - finally has its own proper and permanent site on the Internet, at http://www.jacket.zip.com.au The first issue contains interviews with English poet Roy Fisher and Australian aboriginal poet Lionel Fogarty, a look at the 1943 hoax poet Ern Malley (an old favorite of John Ashbery's and mine, too), work by Charles Bernstein, Elaine Equi, Pamela Brown, Alfred Corn, Joanne Burns, Tracy Ryan, Carl Rakosi, Peter Minter, Susan Schultz and Paul Hoover, reviews of John Berger and Les Murray, the poetry of the late Martin Johnston, and a glimpse of the Xmas 1997 John Ashbery "special issue", together with photos and art work. Jacket # 1 will be added to until the end of September 1997, when the first issue will be finalised. Jacket issue # 2 will focus mainly on the work of John Ashbery, who turns 70 this year, but there will be lots of other material as well. It will be uploaded piece by piece from early September 1997, and finalised by Xmas 1997. Please note that Jacket editor John Tranter's e-mail address is now jtranter@jacket.zip.com.au Please tell your friends about Jacket, whose motto is "bop till you drop!" -- John Tranter >>> jtranter@jacket.zip.com.au <<< 39 Short Street, Balmain NSW 2041, Australia ph (+612) 9555 8502 fax (+612) 9212 2350 ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 18:37:35 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: William Slaughter Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.16.19970810054128.40fff8b0@theriver.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Charles Alexander, Re the loyalty oath you've been asked, in Arizona, to sign: I thought it was "a thing of the past" too. From the ACLU's web-site: "a chronology, from 1920 to the present, of the most important United States Supreme Court victories that involved the ACLU, either as direct counsel or as a friend-of-the-court." To wit: 1967 Keyishian v. Board of Regents "A Cold War-inspired law, requiring New York public school teachers to sign a loyalty oath, fell as a violation of the First Amendment. The decision, capping off a series of unsuccessful challenges to both federal and state loyalty and security programs, rejected the doctrine that public employment is a "privilege" to which government can attach whatever conditions it pleased." I'll be curious to read what tales others on the list have to tell. Here's William Stafford, a man whose heart was "glad and big," on the subject: The Star in the Hills A star hit in the hills behind our house up where the grass turns brown touching the sky. Meteors have hit the world before, but this was near, and since TV; few saw, but many felt the shock. The state of California owns that land (and out from shore three miles), and any stars that come will be roped off and viewed on week days 8 to 5. A guard who took the oath of layalty and denied any police record told me this: "If you don't have a police record yet you could take the oath and get a job if California should be hit by another star." "I'd promise to be loyal to California and to guard any stars that hit it," I said, "or any place three miles out from shore, unless the star was bigger than the state-- in which case I'd be loyal to _it_." But he said no exceptions were allowed, and he leaned against the state-owned meteor so calm and puffed a cork-tip cigarette that I looked down and traced with my foot in the dust and thought again and said, "OK--any star." from TRAVELING THROUGH THE DARK (New York: Harper & Row, 1962) Bill William Slaughter wrs@unf.edu >Dear Poetics: > >I've just been hired to teach at the University of Arizona Extended >University -- a course on small presses, and later this year, a creative >writing class. > >Today I received in the mail, among other contract materials, a "loyalty >oath" to sign. I had thought these were a thing of the past. And I thought >maybe people on this list could advise me -- have others here had to sign >such things, has anybody refused, is this only an Arizona conservate thing, >or ??? Particularly, anyone on this list in Arizona -- have you had to sign >such a thing, or have you refused to sign such a thing, and what if any >were the consequences? But I'm interested if this is required in other >states as well. Are you a Minnesota loyalist, Maria? or anyone else >anywhere else? Some answer soon would be great, so I can weigh my options >before I sign or don't sign. (and yes, I know, I should probably talk with >a lawyer about this) > >For the record, apprently they would withhold compensation "unless and >until such officer or employee does so take and subscribe to the form of >oath of affirmation set forth in this section." > >And that oath reads: > >I, _________________________ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will >support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution and laws >of the State of Arizona; That I will bear true faith and allegiance to the >same, and defend them against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and that I >will faithfully and impartially discharge the duties of the office of >_______________________ according to the best of my ability, so help me God >(or, so I do affirm). > > > >____________________________________________________ >(Signature of employee) > > > >thanks, > >charles ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 17:50:35 CST6CDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hank Lazer Organization: The University of Alabama Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) Charles-- No such requirement at U of Alabama. (Please, don't tell our Governor about the loyalty oath. He's the guy who wants to mobilize state troops to defend a judge's right to have Christian prayer & a display of the 10 Commandments in the courtroom....) Years ago, George Starbuck, then a young untenured asst prof, risked income & job & successfully fought the loyalty oath (I believe at SUNY- Buffalo). Your Arizona oath sounds rather nebulous--as if you're being asked to swear that you'll follow the laws of the country and the state. Is it really a case of no sign, no pay? Ugh. Hank Lazer ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 09:09:53 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: robert drake Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" maria-- glad for yr thoughts. of the examples you give, several seem to be about papers or publishing, which dont seem (to me) to have anything to do with your original query ("why does 'the avant garde' seem to need to police its borders so rigidly?") which i read to mean policing it's _own_ borders... and even w/ the example of th poetics list, its not clear to me that the list in general (or any subset in particular) constitutes an a.g.; nor is it clear that having a (nubuliously definded) topic of "newer poetries" is th same as "policing the borders". (praps you're refering to the recent arrest trial and sentancing ov Kim Dawn?) but, if yr refering to a general sense (which i share) that discussion ov nichol is more likely to generate interest than discussion ov angelou-- i'm not sure that conjures the same vision of billyclubing men in blue... certainly, there are examples... Fluxus had it's endless lists of "members", frinstance (tho i mself am not entirely convinced that those lists werent something of a performance piece by maciunas...). but, i think any closedness is probably specific to the particular case; i dont think there's a general answer... but now, as i go back to th original query--"the closedness of the avant garde tradition *or at least the way it's construed by most of its critics*" (emphasis added)... ah. arent those two different questions? and, tho again i'd wanna address particulars, it makes sense to me that "the critics" might feel a little left out, or left behind, by some a.g. tendencies? which is not the same as an a.g. is policing its borders... and i suppose that by saying that i reveal my own perception that (present company excluded) most critics tend towards th normative & established... yrs, etc. >thank you all, david k, bill m, david i, charles a, etc. i share many of >your beliefs, such as, that vanguardism (my preferred term) is a process >rather than a coterie or school. however, in my professional life, i've >encountered enough instances where the boundaries are tightly defined to >lead me to believe there is some anxiety about borders. for instance, i >was recently asked for permission to reprint my bob kaufman essay in an >anthology of essays on "the avant garde." i said okay, but in my opinion >my essay on poetry by some teenage girls in a boston housing project was >much more interesting, more adventurous, less man-and-his-work formulaic. >the answer was: well i do "cultural studies" myself, but in this project >i'm working with a fairly traditional understanding of the "avant garde," >so i'll stick w/ the kaufman piece. for another instance, when i proposed >a paper for the conference i mentioned, on "the poetics of avant garde >poetry," there was some hesitatiion over acceptiing my paper because its >definition of "avant garde" was too broad (won't it render the term >meaningless to broaden it? was the question.) again, i was advised by >colleagues on the organizing side of things to stress that i was working >with a "cultural studies model," i guess to provide reassurance that there >was some recognized method to my intentions. also, my introduction to this >list and partcipation, while in some ways broadening (in that i've learned >about poets i didn't know about before) has also been a narrowing, as the >list is quite explicitly intended for discussion of newer poetries (i can't >recall exactly the wording of the bernstein welcome). i don't mean to wax >victimy or snide in these personal anecdotes, i hope you all realize how >much i enjoy learning all this new stuff and getting to know y'all. these >moments of feeling the barriers come up have been interesting because they >foreground categorical, operative divisions that are sometimes disavowed at >the more overt level. >another line that gets drawn is that of aesthetic judgment, and the >assumption that we all share certain judgments (hallmark card verse is >embarrassingly bad, so is maya angelou's poetry; bpNichol is fabulous, etc >--don't get me wrong, i love bpNichol and i don't buy hallmark cards but i >do find angelou's poetry meaningful, esp when i see how deeply it touches >my students). as i've said here before, aesthetic judgment has been the >dividing line between me and some of the people i've worked with. in fact >i tend to trust them cuz i don't trust myself, so i usually concede at the >level of editorial revision, but at the metalevel i'm asking, why is it SO >overridingly important that there be some kind of consensus of aesthetic >judgment? or, why is this consensus the basis of our community or >commonality?--md ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 19:14:57 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: <199708091300.JAA15227@csu-e.csuohio.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I've always thought, literally, that the avant-garde was a jail, a form of reification ignoring the milieu. That it's useless as a term, since it almost automatically assumes a while, most often male, etc. etc., striated culture in the first place, the _avant_ necessitating a reification of the rest. What happens is a certain exclusionary violence imho. It's a critic- al move, no matter who applies the term. Better to inscribe exfoliations of practices, sites of writings, sprays of signifiers, instead of particulated emplacements - and at the same time to acknowledge it was a highly problematic but common term, whose time has past. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 09:23:54 -0400 Reply-To: BobGrumman@nut-n-but.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bob Grumman Subject: The Otherstream MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Phooey, what a way to have to start the morning: I have to call for the execution of Hugh Steinberg. His offense? EGREGIOUS MISUSE OF MY TERM, "OTHERSTREAM." Actually, I set him up by incompletely defining otherstream poetry as "any poetry that has never (to any serious extent) gotten into an anthology of poetry published by a 'reputable' publisher--like Norton--or been seriously discussed in a book of criticism published by such a publisher..." So I hereby redefine it as "any TECHNICALLY DISTINCT VARIETY OF poetry that has never, etc., etc." Visual poetry is always my primary example, though Marjorie Perloff's course in it, and what Harry Polkinhorn has been doing at San Diego State, and other developments may be changing that. I agree with Hugh that there are two (or more) streams of work that are not widely accepted, but consider only one of them otherstream. The second "otherstream" he speaks of--"poems that are written out of a general ignorance of institution based poems (poems written by people who don't read poetry)"--is, for me, knownstream because it's not doing anything technically new. It's wannabe mainstream, or unsuccessful mainstream, or left-behind mainstream, or overlooked mainstream (as I believe Robert Frost was when Pound "discovered" him). I just thought of a name for it: sundaystream poetry, or the poetry of weekend poets--though it would also, unfairly, include the poetry of people working seriously and full-time in mainstream poetry who simply haven't done whatever is required besides writing good poetry to be accepted by the establishment. I did sundaystream poetry for a long time myself so have nothing against it--and, with Hugh, am most interested in how it is being affected by other poetries. But puleeze don't call it "otherstream." --Bob G. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 17:30:49 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Charles: I adjuncted at Arizona from '93-95. I recall having to sign the oath, although as far as I know it's just a meaningless piece of paper and treated as such. Hugh ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 08:15:16 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Anne-Marie Albiach tribute in San Francisco In-Reply-To: <33EC190E.33F9@ibm.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" This is Kevin Killian. Today's the 60th birthday of the French poet Anne-Marie Albiach and last night here in San Francisco was the Albiach tribute organized by Dodie Bellamy and Small Press Traffic. I was there, in the theater space at New College, and I know you're all curious, how did it turn out? Successfully I think. OK there were a few glitches here and there. Kush the marvelous videographer failed to show up, and earlier in the week Small Press Traffic's office was rifled and the microphone stolen. However a tape recorder was available and thus Dodie can prove the event really did take place, documentation being "everything." Norma Cole began the evening by sketching out some of the salient turns in Albiach's career and showed us a double portrait. One photo was of the young Albiach in 1969, a glamor portrait a la George Hurrell on the occasion of the publication of "Etat." We were all struck by how much she (AMA) resembled the young Katherine Ross in Curtis Harrington's "Games." Then another kind of portrait, Jean Daive's imaginative portrait of AMA done solely through her punctuation. Cole then read from Albiach's "Gradiva," and read part of AMA's translation of Louis Zukoksky's "A"-9. Barbara Guest rose and read what sounded like a new poem, a "Reverie" for AMA. Benjamin Hollander combined parts of two previous essays to create an atmosphere, a theatrical atmosphere which effectively illustrated what he called the "nocturnal" aspect of Albiach's writing (and its effect on the reader). Michael Palmer read an essay reminiscing on visiting (or trying to pay a visit to) AMA in Paris, she wasn't home, so, he said, the absence of the non-encounter lived up to the highest expectations of both parties, and then he read "Five Easy Poems," dedicated to AMA. Mary Margaret Sloan spoke briefly on the influence AMA has had over the years on the work of North American woman poets, and read from AMA's book "Mezza Voce." Cole Swensen read from "'Vocative Figure.'" Then everyone turned to the cake, the "gateau," and tore that sucker to shreds (or crumbs, I suppose). There was much mingling, wine, and etc., if only Steve Carll were still on this list he could tell you all the names of the poets and artists who attended. I thought it would be a case of preaching to the converted but there were many there who had apparently never heard of Albiach, and all the copies of "Mezza Voce" were quickly sold out, attesting to the event's success as, well, a kind of promotion for the glamorous, reclusive diva of Neuilly-sur-Seine. However not all were so easily persuaded and one famous poet afterwards was overheard murmuring that she still disliked Albiach's writing and what was all the fuss about anyhow. This made me think of Rachel Levitsky's post about when "the dominant obliterates the marginal, the dominant will always assert itself"though I can't piece out how it applies exactly. Anyhow, thanks to all who worked on this event behind the scenes, in front of the podium, in the audience, and thanks to all the US and Canadian poets who signed the series of tacky Hallmark cards for AMA's birthday, which were delivered to her ahead of time and which stunned and surprised her and made her weep with this kind of absent French pleasure. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 11:59:08 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jacques Debrot Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" (fwd) Despite its problematic status, I think it's a mistake to give up -- or to concede -- the metaphor, "avant-garde." In addition to the texts that have already been mentioned over the last several days during the course of this discussion, let me add 3 more -- the first 2, Hal Foster's "What's Neo about the Neo-Avant-Garde?" and Benjamin Buchloh's "Theorizing the Avant-Garde" -- go a long way in rebutting the failures Peter Burger attributes to the post WW2 avant-gardes. The 3rd, Andrew Benjamin's *Art, Mimesis and the Avant-Garde,* is an extremely interesting attempt at describing the avant-garde in terms of what he calls the limit experiences of *the as-yet-to-be-determined*. Tradition, by contrast, is seen by Benjamin as a repetition of a *determination made in advance* -- a legislative/regulative function which posits a singular and recoverable inner meaning for works of art. Of course, Benjamin realizes that, while there is a dominant tradition, tradition itself is not a univocal term since there are also differing and marginal traditions. The point is that the traditional *intends* to be univocal. However Benjamin does not define the avant-garde merely in terms of its resistance to tradition. This would only retain the dominant dichotomy. But in an argument that is much too subtle to recapitulate here, Benjamin conceives of the avant-garde art object as affirming an "interpretive differential plurality." In other words the avant-garde work of art, like the avant-garde itself, is seen as being in a continual and inexhaustible state of *becoming.* Benjamin writes: "it is the capacity for an experience of the as-yet-to-be-determined to generate reflection. Reflection, in this instance, will emerge at the limit of understanding -- in other words at that point where the percept, object of experience, etc., is such that it cannot be automatically assimilated to, and hence only explicable within, the terms decreed by" tradition. If none of this seems convincing the fault is due to my simplistic summary -- but, in any case, Benjamin's work seems to me to persuasively refute the idea that the avant-garde has a "policing function." ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 12:22:22 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: James Finnegan Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" Though the term "avant-garde" can be misapplied, I still find it of use. I think it's wrong to apply it to any movement that's not broken with the mainstream and moved poetry forward/outward in some important way. Language poetry is/was avant-garde. ("Was avant-garde," if you believe it's run its course and is now subsumed in the mainstream, has aged to the point of being old hat, or was a literary dead-end--the equivalent of the Neanderthal line in ape-human evolution.) "Avant-garde" should not be applied to movements like Slam Poetry or the New Formalism. The latter is a retrograde poetry, though a little freer and less delimited relative to subject matter than traditional verse had been. The former, Slam, takes several known poetries--(1) the socio-political rant and reportage (a Beat mainstay); (2) the much older and ever-present sentimental poetry of love, loss and tragedy; (3) the hyper-confessional and edgy-comic strains of late eighties and nineties--and to these Slam adds the dynamics of performance and competition. An innovation, yes, but not really something I would consider avant-garde. To me "avant-garde" is certainly as useful a term as the others proposed--i.e., alternative and otherstream. Neither of which strikes me as getting to what "avant-garde" is when applied to writing. "Postmodernist", a broader, more encompassing term, is certainly even harder to pin down. New Formalism could be the literary equivalent of Philip Johnson's Chippendale top to his ATT Building, therefore NF could be a postmodernist movement. And "alternative" was the New Wave, before Alternative became Modern Rock. (The music media have their own troubles with "labels"--Is there a Postmodernist Rock yet?) "Otherstream" is a nice coinage, but could as easily apply to Slam as to Language writing, thus for me it's less useful. "Experimental" is the term most often misused. Most experiments are failures--steeped in the trial & error method. Most writers worth their salt aren't publishing their "experiments." Rather they are experimenting toward a new way of the writing, personally or in the world. Once the work is published, the writer is, in general, confident the experiment has resulted in a finished text that is achieving, at least partially or in a way he/she could only dimly imagine, the intended outcome of his/her initial experiments. The publishing one's "experimental writing" is tantamount to publishing early drafts and half-baked, alchemic concoctions of varying and lesser consequence. Finnegan ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 12:14:23 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Amato/Kass Fleisher Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" maria, hi!... thanx for your questions, time for me to delurk anyway!... to employ some rather crude distinctions that i nonetheless find theoretically useful: i like to think through the questions you pose, re the avant-garde and aesthetics, in two basic ways... first, in terms of my own process as a writer: sometimes---usually (to date)---i imagine mself working/writing to construct a readership... that is, the sorts of transformations i seek/anticipate/aspire for---in my readers---i take to be primarily or largely a function of how they approach reading my writing... the way they approach, that is, the alphabet as such---the symbol-sharing experience that swapping same comprises (yes, there is a utopian drift here)... and in many instances, i just don't think the "they" exists as such!... it's not a claim i can prove, but it's useful for me to imagine mself as contributing to an experience---over where you are---that disrupts at times intelligibility, say... i have of course worked in forms that seem to me to downplay this aspect of the experience---that is, in which the so-called matter of "form" itself is taken for granted, and in which "style" (please note quotes) replaces same as a distinguishing characteristic... such, in my view, is one way of beginning to think the discourse of scholars and scholarship in general over and against the discourse of poets and poetry... though part of my aim, as i understand my own work, has been to complicate this distinction; when it comes to prose forms, such as the novel, the distinction may be even fuzzier... yet i would say this distinction holds, even allowing for the fact that there are poets *and* scholars who seek to complicate the reading experience as such, and scholars *and* poets who seem to rely on an already-understood experience (which is how i understand the mainstream---again, not in terms of good or bad necessarily, but in terms of popularity/demographix)... the point here, in any case, is that work that challenges or speaks to the reading experience (in terms, say, of the age-old form vs. content dualism) is, in more popular AND often in academic terms, generally considered (and critiqued/evaluated/dismissed/worshipped as) avant-garde or experimental or radical or etc... ez to prove this, too---just TRY to get a trade press (or an academic press) to pick up formally innovative work (and wrt to this latter, pick your poison)... it ain't ez... second, and here i think i'll be *really* idiosyncratic in my choice of texts, is to think more in cultural studies terms, in terms of reception as (as you suggest) a cultural-social process: i'm reminded of that afterword to pirsig's _zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance_, in which he distinguishes twixt customary and what he calls "culture bearing books": "a culture bearing book, like a mule, bears the culture on its back. no one should sit down to write one deliberately. culture-bearing books occur almost accidentally, like a sudden change in the stock market. there are books of high quality that are an important *part* of the culture, but that is not the same. they *are* a part of it. they aren't carrying it anywhere. they may talk about insanity sympathetically, for example, because that's the standard cultural attitude. but they don't carry any suggestion that insanity might be something other than sickness or degeneracy." i'm not wedded to pirsig's words, now---but if we allow that even "culture bearing books" are a part of culture, and that there are in fact multiple cultures, i think there's something in what pirsig is saying here that might speak helpfully to the notion of contingency and history (he names _uncle tom's cabin_ as a culture bearing book, but also says "it was no literary masterpiece"---which latter is of course open to debate)... provided of course we supplement same with the business aspects of the writing marketplace etc... so perhaps the matter of what is deemed avant-garde (term used advisedly) turns at least in part on circumstances that are, properly speaking, beyond anyone's control... ergo, the ex post facto nature of that discourse: "this event turned out to be a seminal blah blah blah" (oh and i find this latter useful too at times, but less when i'm in the process of writing than when revising)... we may aspire to same, i mean, in our very process as writers, we may lay claim to same (as i have at times) in our products, but might this not comprise a requisite reach beyond one's grasp?... i.e., a failure?... even failure can produce some helpful effects, moods... as far as hanging out with those what think like we do: that's only human, but past a certain point, it sure can prove limiting... best, joe ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 13:29:40 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: You, Celine, Die On MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII (I hear a voice ... now she's done it ... now there's no going back ... ) You I met you in Jerusalem, I met you in Brooklyn ... said that to throw them off the track ... it was near the Mea Shearim, you were being stoned ... zealots, eh ... seven thousand miles away, your hair in my mouth ... I swallow everything you have to offer, I'm not picky ... you give me ad- jectives, expletives ... I give you gerunds ... they sway like that ... turn me inside out ... forgot that these dots were stolen ... the walls were baked hot, there was an omen, white fox darting in front of me ... twenty years later, sure enough, that one in Cape Breton ... your hair had silver streaks ... blond streaks ... all that opium I took, you took me to the hospital, they made me get up off the floor, leave, lunch hour, there was nothing to be done about it ... taxi-cab out of the city ... twenty miles away you could smell the atoms ... I've photographed the sheets, hung them from the window, I've tied myself in knots ... you could see the building going up in the distance, I thought, why is he pointing a knife at me, they destroyed the restaurant ... crawled out of the past ... I'm uninhibited, eh ... what wouldn't I think of doing ... I need to have your floor under me ... I want to write over and over again, collapse me ... Jennifer is on my right side, Julu on my left ... they're waiting ... Jenn goes to the door, looks out ... street's clear ... there's a gunner on the roof but he's got his weapon down for a change, anyway it's for show, beret and all .. landmines everywhere, barbed wire ... Julu flies, I forgot to tell you that ... moved ahead of the rest of us ... fierce, eh, she knows what's going on ... they've made a landing-strip of my chest ... I can hear the planes, they're overhead all the time now ... the gunners are closer to the ground, they don't dare look up ... rat-a-tat-tat, it would be over, that would be the end of it ... can't have that, eh? Julu's got moving now, she's really churning air ... that whore in Soho wouldn't have me, I didn't know what I was doing, I lost sixty dollars, there were more and more men the farther I went inside, they were watching me ... lucky to get out with my life ... couldn't get it up anyway, I was tremb- ling, disappearing down the streets, pathetic ... had to be rescued from the sidewalk like that, taken in ... she told me I couldn't love her, she was brown ... pulled a knife on me just like that ... taught school in Washington DC ... later saw her with a group of people, laughing, had to get out of there ... Denise wanted to tie me up naked, upside-down, don't know the pleasure in that ... we picked up the stuff in Pennsylvania, drove back through a cheating night, I couldn't pretend ... she got the tape recorders, cords, signed Ginsberg, wanted to borrow everything, that was the last I saw of them, she made up for the bad times in her own way ... I wasn't ready for this, just a lunch date, really, suddenly currents change, I'm done with, inside out, upside-down ... later there's an obelisk or prism, it's six-sided, limestone, about three meters tall, one across. I can't make heads or tails of it ... it's turning, some sort of vision ... I think of you again ... "disturbing dream ... Lisa Dilillo and I were talking upstairs in her loft ... it was really Marcia Resnick's, I recognized it ... Laurie Anderson lived upstairs, I was always moving ... but it was dark, dangerous night, I was waiting for you, we were going out, you'd ring my bell four stories down ... upstairs on the corner of Canal and the river ... Lisa Dilillo and I in some heavy talk ... I said I had to go, you were coming, I wanted to be there for you ... started down the stairs, there were no lights ... just someone standing on one of the landings ... I hoped it was you ... I felt a knife ... woke to write this, steal Celine's dots ... his "three little dots ... screw him, he was trouble ... in highschool someone pulled a knife on me, I grabbed the blade ... I was filming in Los Angeles, the Sunset Strip, a whore came at me ... in Nazareth, an Arab flashed a knife, big problems there, went off to kill his nephew, avenge us ... it's a long story, had to do with that restaurant, our friend got beat up, dropped in a Wadi ... I can't pray any more, eh, I've seen too much, my eyes have volumes in them, there's no end to it ... Tamara B. and I screwed, I was still married, went off to Tassie, wrote her, she told me to go to hell, wrote it all over my letter, it was the final straw ... don't go there sober, eh? ... I'd given up, I was desperate, turned her down in Irvine, she told me she "had her eyes on me for a long time ... that was before the anonymous phone calls ... the destruction of my work ... the letters ... everything in the world heads towards purity ... that's all there is, a chance to begin again, start over, head out, fly away, set the sails ... you don't get this often, it's random, one day you're having lunch with someone for the first time, the next day you're thinking, this is all there is! ... this is all I want! ... Wait! Wait for me! ... carpe diem and all that, the Fugs sang it, they were on my label ... she's never heard my music ... I've gotten through all of this, what's next, I've got to do the book too ... a couple of them ... maybe more ... I'll start again if she'll have me ... I'll give her me on a platter ... on a board ... clothed or unclothed, whatever she wants ... this isn't a great prize, mind you, a little tarnished, but some good points ... thinks well maybe, for example ... moves fast ... bit too intense ... she can take me, do what she will, someone's put the knife away ... Jennifer and Julu are sleeping, it's late even for them ... smoke and clouds ... incredible dawns ... I'll wait and see ... what happens to the night _________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 13:57:47 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steve Evans Subject: Impercipient Lecture Series Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Two more installments of the monthly Impercipient Lecture Series (ILS) have appeared since our initial announcement to the List in June. Aldon L. Nielsen's "No Saints in Three Acts: On Stephen Jonas" should begin appearing in mailboxes today. Nielsen is among the first to give Jonas's work the careful attention it both deserves and, in light of its fractured political commitments, demands. Great archival finds, including a powerful description of the Baraka/Jonas correspondence, combined with Nielsen's signature ability to practice a utopic form of close reading that models the desegregated mind while acknowledging the still-segregated social body, makes this a must read. Beth Anderson's "Imperturbable Things: On Still-Life Poetics" is a wonderfully original meditation on the deceptive stillness at the heart of the linguistic storm in the work of Wallace Stevens, Barbara Guest, Marjorie Welish, Keith Waldrop, Ann Lauterbach, and others. Despite our canny release of this pamphlet in June, just as the blockbuster shown on Still Life got underway at New York's Museum of Modern Art, a handful (literally) of copies are still available. We've also recently done a small reprint of our inaugural issue, "The Dynamics of Literary Change" by co-editor Steve Evans. A fair number of our issue on Bob Perelman's _The Marginalization of Poetry_ remain in supply. The two back-issues that are unfortunately out of print at this time are: 1.2 Radical Dogberry and Society Sketches by Chris Stroffolino 1.3 The Ground is the Only Figure by Rosmarie Waldrop Finally, to all the List-members who have shown support for the ILS through contributions verbal and financial: Thank You! Steve Evans & Jennifer Moxley 61 E. Manning Street Providence RI 02906-4008 r i a t n m u a t s u o o o s ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 14:10:57 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" The avant-garde border police are a boring phenomenon. nevertheless they are not as boring, or harmful, as most of the phenomena they attempt to police. we fool ourselves = a thought is (not) an action. get out your mla handbooks o boy. given negation as a primary tactic of such arts it is no surprise that a negation of the avant-garde is in the stirrups. nevertheless an explicit passion remains possible. go give a damn. If you can. --Rod ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 18:20:31 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: avant ga-ga's Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Rachel, I appreciate yr response. I realize my response has a 'plague-on-all-their-houses' air to it, perhaps akin to donald's 'It's all writing'. With me, this is due to an impatience with negotiating the space between the work and the consumer. What is self-evident to the creator is hardly so to potential readers, yet it's frustrating to take all the guide-dog/hand-rail/sign-posted material one left out of the poetry for esthetic cause, & have to recycle it as prose 'trot'/explanatory manifesti. Perhaps one is more sensitive to this demand when one (as I) earned a living for a quarter-century providing just such aid to those eagerly (or perhaps not) seeking to get with the new in poetry. Au fond, it takes place as an internal conflict, leastwise with me, a constant source of irritation that leads me to dismissive gestures. You are helpful with the suggestions of colleagues; Cole's intelligence & patience are manifest in her reappropriation of 'marginal' so that it places the writing she practices & whose practice she supports in others, on a level playing field with 'maindrains' writing. Carla's 'hybridity' strikes a chord with me--the local hero in sonoma county is Luther Burbank, and for decades I've spoken to folks around here of the 'grafting' aspects of the Modern. 'Making strange', your own candidate, makes sense too. But ....but.... from a poet's p-o-v, it often comes to 'but not _my_ kind of making strange', understandably, since 'making strange' can never be a uniform endeavor. And 'not _my_ way of hybridizing' . The case of Michael Palmer is worth considering here. As was pointed out by 6 poets collaborating on an essay abt LangPo, Palmer had been in every 'LangPo' collection and most journals devoted to publishing 'LangPo', so that his disclaimer, in an i'view, 'I'm always a little outisde of the group, like Matisse', had a bad-faith ring to it. His case gets more confusing when one recalls that one of his books was touted by his publisher as being 'by the leading Language Poet', and that it is declared by his translator in the french edition of _Sun_ that Palmer 'never was a Language Poet.' Whatever one thinks of Palmer's conduct of these negotations, one regrets, for one's own sake, the necessity of them. I understand your point, Rachel, about the 'dominant mode' more easily obliterating poetry not to its liking, when that poetry fails to concert itself under some one stunning rubric. Its a concern imposed by the dominant, it has one already speaking the opporessor's language, yet it looks to be a dilemma of 'compromise oneself or die'. To whom do you need to speak of yourself (since you use this parallel) as 'lesbian'? Is it required in order to let men know not to bother you, or in order to let others so inclined that you might be available, or to qualify oneself for those few privileges that can come a lesbian's way, or....? what is the necessity? Cab't the negotiations happen on a one-on-one basis without recourse to labels, but instead by way of declaration of taste and volition? I guess it can be seen as 'Strength in numbers' and mutual support; as necessary assertion of pride in oneself in the face of many who would shame one; as 'coming out' as courageous gesture of commitment in a society still largely uncomprehending? I like your analogy, and I think it bears further exploration as to parallels. 'Lesbian,' however, is a term whose currency is now well-established, and so we are still left with the question, 'what is the name for what we do--what claim to unity with others can we make that doesnt depreciate the particular 'making-strange' it's one's destiny/fate/choice to have incurred?' 'Not this', the first sentence of Silliman's poem, does lead, in its case, to 'What then?' Ron's complex and active awareness of the needs of the poetry-consumer in a society that offers brief, inadequate explanations--but that _does_ offer explanations--for anything one might be supposed to need to purchase, surely helped take him from sentence one to sentence two. To have stopped with sentence one is an option I for one find attractive. So that the 'What then?' is spoken, originates, in the reader, with no further prompting from the poem. That has the appearance of the idealistic in today's world, though, doesn't it? Well, this is long enough already, and coming to no resolution. I can only hope that it nudges the discussion along a minim. Thanks, Rachel, for the stimulus. David. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 01:25:07 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Orange Subject: "avantgarde" (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII these didnt seem to get posted the first time around -- apologies if they are no longer useful/relevant....t. ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 00:54:49 -0400 (EDT) From: Tom Orange To: UB Poetics discussion group Subject: "avantgarde" david i, re: yr questions abt the history of the term/concept, matei calinescu has a useful take on this in his book "faces of modernity" (or perhaps "five faces of modernity," it was published first under one title and again under the other, duke up 1991 i think). if i had the blasted thing here i would save you the trouble and type out / summarize the relevant points. tom ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 01:26:19 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Orange Subject: hendecasyllabics' metaphorics MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII on a different note (altho the poem below cd be seen as 1870s avant-garde now tres derriere...) for those like me in late-summer doldrums wondering where the time flew, perhaps a metaphor or two to tease out: In the month of the long decline of roses I, beholding the summer dead before me, Set my face to the sea and journeyed silent, Gazing eagerly where above the sea-mark Flame as fierce as the fervid eyes of lions Half divided the eyelids of the sunset;... [swinburne, "hendecasyllabics"] now we have flame above the sea-mark: presumably we are already to think sun and/or sunset. said flame's fierceness, fiercety?, likened to fervid lioneyes. now for the kicker: flame half divides eyelids. hold on to that for the moment, let's tend to these eyelids first. eyelids of the sunset: possesive or partitive genitive, the sunset /has/ eyelids or /is/ eyelids? if the sun is the eye (as it has already been associated with fervid lioneyes), then eyelids can be sky and earth, upper and lower limits of vision, extinguishing the sun in the slow blink of its setting, its setting under, its untergehen. yet flame half divides eyelids, divides them in half, keeps them open. even when closed they are still divided, by the horizon, or: half divides as in divides only partly, not completely, half divided half joined. even tho i gaze eagerly above the sea-mark the flame is so fierce, as sky and earth close on the sun, i have to squint, join my eyelids together, close them enough so that they are still open. to the horizon. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 21:35:47 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry g Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: Message of Sat, 9 Aug 1997 12:22:22 -0400 from J Finnegan - I like your idea or description of experiment as something that precedes publication. Though exploratory work will always seem experimental. "Avant-garde" seems like a contradiction in terms. Whenever the really new has solidified to the point of being a lined-up advance in good order, it's already crusted over. Have it for lunch tomorrow. Progress. Sure it happens. Sure there is the new. Sure people grow off each other's energy. But why do you say the New Formalists are "freer" than the plain old formalists? Doesn't this betray rather a linear notion? Close reading will turn a lot of old poetry into very avant-garde material. Dante, acc'd to my old buddy Mandlestam, is a poet of the future. The idea that tradition is univocal (not your idea, a different post), is too abstract to mean anything. Look back in lit history & you see a conti- nuous nervous fluctuation of attitudes, styles, etc. "Every significant movement in English poetry could be interpreted as a reaction to the political situation." (Stephen Spender, 1940). Another interesting Spender quote: "Now the poet is someone who devotes his life to exactly such a process of self-revelation as drama attempts to produce in characters: his poems are speeches from the drama of the time in which he is living." (1938) The avant-garde is that portion of the new which has been assured canonical gluing into "the tradition". Think about it. Maybe that's the answer to Maria's question (paranoid though it may be tending toward...) - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 21:55:42 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry g Subject: Re: Impercipient Lecture Series In-Reply-To: Message of Sat, 9 Aug 1997 13:57:47 -0400 from Just a quick blast - Aldon's extended essay on Jonas, which I was lucky enough to be handed OUTSIDE the Harris collection on Prospect St., is VERY good work & great reading. He's done his homework & his essay is remarkable for the number of issues it touches on (neglected startling poet - Stephen Jonas; race relations & identity; style in 50s-60s experimental poetry; the visual/textual/WRITTEN as an overall musical-sharpening tool in Jonas' work after Pound & Olson) - WITHOUT getting lost in the minutiae or neglecting a considered assessment of Jonas' achievemnts. Way to go Aldon! Now I have to look for that Talisman book of this guy (Jonas - SELECTED POEMS, Talisman Hs 1994). Jonas seems to have been an extremely witty writer lost in the fuzz of time. Beautiful archival digging here. Witty, highly musical, & violent sharp & edgy. But some of the edge seems to be sharpened/softened by his direct application of blues & jazz in a very deliberate & extensive way. - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 9 Aug 1997 23:12:23 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steven Marks Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.32.19970809145626.006a4424@earthlink.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Charles, Cross your fingers, take the oath, take the money and remember that the Declaration of Independence says that it's OK to seek the removal of a government that won't guarantee your rights. That is, as long as you are a property-owner. You do own property, right? Not to take your situation too lightly, I think there are a number of "subversive" things you can do in your small press class to more than offset this odious oath. Keeping every promise can be a sign of rigidity. best, Steven On Sat, 9 Aug 1997, mark weiss wrote: > Charles, you dirty commie, to the best of my knowledge you gotta sign--when > confronted with same in NY, Connecticut and Arizona (I don't remember if I > had to sign one for UCSD) I checked it out. I think that all public > colleges require it--may be that their federal money is tied to compliance. > But take heart--you can always be a spy. > > At 05:39 PM 8/9/97 -0400, you wrote: > >Dear Poetics: > > > >I've just been hired to teach at the University of Arizona Extended > >University -- a course on small presses, and later this year, a creative > >writing class. > > > >Today I received in the mail, among other contract materials, a "loyalty > >oath" to sign. I had thought these were a thing of the past. And I thought > >maybe people on this list could advise me -- have others here had to sign > >such things, has anybody refused, is this only an Arizona conservate thing, > >or ??? Particularly, anyone on this list in Arizona -- have you had to sign > >such a thing, or have you refused to sign such a thing, and what if any > >were the consequences? But I'm interested if this is required in other > >states as well. Are you a Minnesota loyalist, Maria? or anyone else > >anywhere else? Some answer soon would be great, so I can weigh my options > >before I sign or don't sign. (and yes, I know, I should probably talk with > >a lawyer about this) > > > >For the record, apprently they would withhold compensation "unless and > >until such officer or employee does so take and subscribe to the form of > >oath of affirmation set forth in this section." > > > >And that oath reads: > > > >I, _________________________ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will > >support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution and laws > >of the State of Arizona; That I will bear true faith and allegiance to the > >same, and defend them against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and that I > >will faithfully and impartially discharge the duties of the office of > >_______________________ according to the best of my ability, so help me God > >(or, so I do affirm). > > > > > > > >____________________________________________________ > >(Signature of employee) > > > > > > > >thanks, > > > >charles > > > > > __________________________________________________ Steven Marks http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html __________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 01:26:45 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: hendecasyllabics' metaphorics MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Tom-- Your poem (the Swinbourne piece too) is beautiful, and took me to the ocean. I am grateful, being stuck out here in the rockies. --Rachel ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 00:23:23 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: <199708070415.EAA00510@beaufort.sfu.ca> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >how does that go - 'there is no avant-garde, only people who are a little >late.' i'd appreciate the source if anyone may have it at the ready. c. It sounds a little like McLuhan, who said that the avant garde artists do not live in the future, but in the present, while evryone else lives in the past. See his essay called something like "The Rear View Mirror". George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 03:39:35 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Curses on me, I've almost always found the opposite to be true - that the avant-garde is often retrograde - at the same time everyone was praising Godard's attack on the corporate (and binding women to the sex industry vis-a-vis the gaze of the director), the same was occurring in hollywood film after film. Attacks on systems and classical logics, rationality, came from as varied sources as Godel, Alexander Bryant Johnson, Vaihinger. Meanwhile avant- garde groups issued manifestos without questioning the problematic of writing, say, issues of protocol statements, performativity, etc. Watching the lure, seduction, objet a of soap operas tends more towards postmodernity's deconstruction of narratology than, say, Holly Hughes who I love by the way. As far as technology goes, I've learned more from say Brenda Laurel begin- ning with the computer, than from artists, too many of whom think the Net's equivalent to the World Wide Web. Sorry to interfere here, but ah, there's another McLuhan bust as far as I'm concerned... Alan, up far too late with himself, apologies to everyone On Sun, 10 Aug 1997, George Bowering wrote: > >how does that go - 'there is no avant-garde, only people who are a little > >late.' i'd appreciate the source if anyone may have it at the ready. c. > > It sounds a little like McLuhan, who said that the avant garde artists do > not live in the future, but in the present, while evryone else lives in the > past. > > See his essay called something like "The Rear View Mirror". > > > > > George Bowering. > , > 2499 West 37th Ave., > Vancouver, B.C., > Canada V6M 1P4 > > fax: 1-604-266-9000 > ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 00:41:38 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: avant ga-ga's In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Well, having heard some at a "festival" this weekend, I came up with a term for the opposite kind of writing (I mean not avantgarde),. I dont know whether the term has already been used, but I called what I heard "consumer Poetry." George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 00:46:24 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.32.19970809145626.006a4424@earthlink.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Here's what I cant figure out: would a subversive hesitate to sign the loyalty oath? Here's another thing i always used to wonder. Does yr US body called the House Unamerican Activities Committee investigate activities carried on in , say, Sweden, Niger and Reunion? George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 00:53:25 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I'm wondering about being faithful to the Declaration of Independence. I mean especially the part that says that King George III was a rotten guy for not being the implacable enemy of the Native People of America. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 03:17:52 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit George Bowering wrote: > Here's another thing i always used to wonder. Does yr US body called the > House Unamerican Activities Committee investigate activities carried on in > , say, Sweden, Niger and Reunion? George, HUAC changed its name to the House Internal Security Committee in 1969 and was abolished in 1975 (after Watergate), although I think somebody forgot to tell Gingrich, Helms and Buchanan. There's a hilarious chapter on the committee in Jessica Mitford's _A Fine Old Conflict_ (which is out of print, unfortunately). Among other jollities, she reveals that HUAC, in one of its first actions, named Shirley Temple (then nine) as an unwitting dupe of the Communists, and later designated Christopher Marlowe as Un-American. Rachel Loden ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 06:53:20 -0400 Reply-To: BobGrumman@nut-n-but.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bob Grumman Subject: Re: The Otherstream MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hmmm, another person to execute: James Finnegan for saying that while he thinks "Otherstream" a good coinage (thanks!), he believes it "could as easily apply to Slam as to Language writing." Wrong on both counts. According to my definition, both Slam Poetry and Language Writing are KNOWNSTREAM, the opposite of otherstream because they, or poetry in all essential respects identical to it in the case of Slam Poetry, are in the establishment press anthologies. Slam Poetry is probably mainstream (a substream of knownstream) as well; Language Writing is not. --Bob G. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 10:37:54 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mark weiss Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) In-Reply-To: <33ED9550.119F@concentric.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" And then there was Brecht's hilarious performance before the committee in which he reminded them that he might, indeed, as a German, be unAmerican. At 03:17 AM 8/10/97 -0700, you wrote: >George Bowering wrote: > >> Here's another thing i always used to wonder. Does yr US body called the >> House Unamerican Activities Committee investigate activities carried on in >> , say, Sweden, Niger and Reunion? > >George, HUAC changed its name to the House Internal Security Committee >in 1969 and was abolished in 1975 (after Watergate), although I think >somebody forgot to tell Gingrich, Helms and Buchanan. There's a >hilarious chapter on the committee in Jessica Mitford's _A Fine Old >Conflict_ (which is out of print, unfortunately). Among other >jollities, she reveals that HUAC, in one of its first actions, named >Shirley Temple (then nine) as an unwitting dupe of the Communists, and >later designated Christopher Marlowe as Un-American. > >Rachel Loden > > ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 11:03:10 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mark weiss Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Apparently what you do when you're up late by yourself is confuse categories. What's avant garde about Godard is and was his montage, not his politics. Lots of us went to his films for instruction in the former, very few for the latter. Are you truly suggesting that only those who are in the vanguard in all things are worthy? If your mathematicians had conventional table manners and wrote elizabethan sonnets in secret would you dismiss them? But to return to politics--artists of most stripes most of the time are lousy predictors of the future (mathematicians, the writers of soap operas and even technonerds are not notably more successful). Pound (whatever avant garde meant, he qualified), fortunately, missed the boat politically. Many of us learn from his innovations, but few from his politics. Let's try this one: sometimes artists, no matter how progressive their art, by the sheer luck of history, wind up clearing the path for an army that most of us consider regressive. Wagner, who also was as avant garde as you can get, became after his death the darling of the nazis, who liked his politics, and there are probably more than a few lost souls who still seek nourishment of that sort from him. But that's not why he remains for most composers the most influential composer of the late nineteenth century, and it's not why most of his audience goes to the opera. At 03:39 AM 8/10/97 -0400, you wrote: >Curses on me, I've almost always found the opposite to be true - that the >avant-garde is often retrograde - at the same time everyone was praising >Godard's attack on the corporate (and binding women to the sex industry >vis-a-vis the gaze of the director), the same was occurring in hollywood >film after film. > >Attacks on systems and classical logics, rationality, came from as varied >sources as Godel, Alexander Bryant Johnson, Vaihinger. Meanwhile avant- >garde groups issued manifestos without questioning the problematic of >writing, say, issues of protocol statements, performativity, etc. > >Watching the lure, seduction, objet a of soap operas tends more towards >postmodernity's deconstruction of narratology than, say, Holly Hughes who >I love by the way. > >As far as technology goes, I've learned more from say Brenda Laurel begin- >ning with the computer, than from artists, too many of whom think the >Net's equivalent to the World Wide Web. > >Sorry to interfere here, but ah, there's another McLuhan bust as far as >I'm concerned... > >Alan, up far too late with himself, apologies to everyone > >On Sun, 10 Aug 1997, George Bowering wrote: > >> >how does that go - 'there is no avant-garde, only people who are a little >> >late.' i'd appreciate the source if anyone may have it at the ready. c. >> >> It sounds a little like McLuhan, who said that the avant garde artists do >> not live in the future, but in the present, while evryone else lives in the >> past. >> >> See his essay called something like "The Rear View Mirror". >> >> >> >> >> George Bowering. >> , >> 2499 West 37th Ave., >> Vancouver, B.C., >> Canada V6M 1P4 >> >> fax: 1-604-266-9000 >> > > ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 14:19:53 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.32.19970810110310.006a5b70@earthlink.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Sun, 10 Aug 1997, mark weiss wrote: > Apparently what you do when you're up late by yourself is confuse > categories. What's avant garde about Godard is and was his montage, not his > politics. Lots of us went to his films for instruction in the former, very > few for the latter. This brings up an interesting point - to what extent are they separable? For part of the politics of '68 that went into his work revolved around the reification, self-reflexivity of the filmic process - and this has to be somewhat centripetal, a site of all forms of contestation which are interpenetrated. > Are you truly suggesting that only those who are in the vanguard in all > things are worthy? If your mathematicians had conventional table manners > and wrote elizabethan sonnets in secret would you dismiss them? Oh Heavens no! Seriously, please don't misunderstand. I'm hopefully not making a value judgement, certainly not one on the basis of "vanguardism" or "avantgardism" at all. My own reading is widespread; I'm just worrying the category, and reacting to the notion that the "avantgarde" is somehow culturally advanced - questioning the somehow. > But to return to politics--artists of most stripes most of the time are > lousy predictors of the future (mathematicians, the writers of soap operas > and even technonerds are not notably more successful). Pound (whatever > avant garde meant, he qualified), fortunately, missed the boat politically. I just wish he had taken another boat! > Many of us learn from his innovations, but few from his politics. > Let's try this one: sometimes artists, no matter how progressive their art, > by the sheer luck of history, wind up clearing the path for an army that > most of us consider regressive. Wagner, who also was as avant garde as you > can get, became after his death the darling of the nazis, who liked his > politics, and there are probably more than a few lost souls who still seek > nourishment of that sort from him. But that's not why he remains for most > composers the most influential composer of the late nineteenth century, and > it's not why most of his audience goes to the opera. > I can't speak that well to Wagner, but I think in fact the pan-Germanism of his work did speak, integrate well with imperialism - and for me, listening relatively carefully at times (not within years however) to his music, it is also a fanfare for, if not an ideology, at least an ideological plateau - it's oddly programmatic. We have had this debate before, and it's always a matter of degree - for example, I like Heidegger a great deal, particularly his later work, in spite of his Nazi affiliation. In other words, I'm not arguing at all for purity in work, nor even for an ulterior accountability, but again reacting to McLuhan's statement and other texts which assume that an avant-garde _site,_ so to speak is also the _site_ of somehow "advanced" thought - without deconstructing the latter in terms of the culture at large. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 12:18:58 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Carolyn Guertin Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > >how does that go - 'there is no avant-garde, only people who are a little > >late.' i'd appreciate the source if anyone may have it at the ready. c. Perhaps you are thinking of Australian poet Richard Tipping's road sign: "Caution! There is no avant garde, only those who have been left behind." Cheers, Carolyn ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 11:41:36 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mark weiss Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Right you are. Self-declared avant gardes are sometimes anything but. The corrective I offer is that artists like Godard, Wagner, Pound, are, indeed, "the site of somehow 'advanced' thought," but that thought is to be found in the process of the films, music and poetry themselves. In the case of Wagner, who greatly extended the harmonic resources available to composers and invented an astonishing new way to structure large works (based on the repitition and combination of motifs--some polyphonic passages become incredibly rich and complex metaphoric worlds), composers of all political stripes have continued to learn from his music, notably Verdi, Mahler and Schoenberg, who were not particularly sympathetic to his politics. I'm not arguing at all for purity in work, nor even for an >ulterior accountability, but again reacting to McLuhan's statement and >other texts which assume that an avant-garde _site,_ so to speak is also >the _site_ of somehow "advanced" thought - without deconstructing the >latter in terms of the culture at large. > >Alan > > ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 14:51:09 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.32.19970810114136.006a8484@earthlink.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I want to add that I'm in agreement with you here. I do think it can be difficult to separate one aspect of that thought from others, but I also think it's absolutely necessary. One of the interesting aspects of wri- ters like Celine, Pound, Heidegger, Dostoevksy, etc., for me, is that the anti-semitism is pretty well buried, available elsewhere (for example Marx's letters) but not necessarily played across the major texts. And I don't believe in a contamination principle, that "bad-thought _here_" need result in a loosening of rigour or value "_there._" Alan On Sun, 10 Aug 1997, mark weiss wrote: > Right you are. Self-declared avant gardes are sometimes anything but. The > corrective I offer is that artists like Godard, Wagner, Pound, are, indeed, > "the site of somehow 'advanced' thought," but that thought is to be found > in the process of the films, music and poetry themselves. In the case of > Wagner, who greatly extended the harmonic resources available to composers > and invented an astonishing new way to structure large works (based on the > repitition and combination of motifs--some polyphonic passages become > incredibly rich and complex metaphoric worlds), composers of all political > stripes have continued to learn from his music, notably Verdi, Mahler and > Schoenberg, who were not particularly sympathetic to his politics. > ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 08:41:27 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.16.19970810054128.40fff8b0@theriver.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" hi charles, wow! no ididn't have to sign any such thing at U of MN, for whch i find myself unexpectedly grateful to the institution i'm usually wringing my hands about. but i believe they stll have something like that at berkeley. At 5:39 PM -0400 8/9/97, charles alexander wrote: >Dear Poetics: > >I've just been hired to teach at the University of Arizona Extended >University -- a course on small presses, and later this year, a creative >writing class. > >Today I received in the mail, among other contract materials, a "loyalty >oath" to sign. I had thought these were a thing of the past. And I thought >maybe people on this list could advise me -- have others here had to sign >such things, has anybody refused, is this only an Arizona conservate thing, >or ??? Particularly, anyone on this list in Arizona -- have you had to sign >such a thing, or have you refused to sign such a thing, and what if any >were the consequences? But I'm interested if this is required in other >states as well. Are you a Minnesota loyalist, Maria? or anyone else >anywhere else? Some answer soon would be great, so I can weigh my options >before I sign or don't sign. (and yes, I know, I should probably talk with >a lawyer about this) > >For the record, apprently they would withhold compensation "unless and >until such officer or employee does so take and subscribe to the form of >oath of affirmation set forth in this section." > >And that oath reads: > >I, _________________________ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will >support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution and laws >of the State of Arizona; That I will bear true faith and allegiance to the >same, and defend them against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and that I >will faithfully and impartially discharge the duties of the office of >_______________________ according to the best of my ability, so help me God >(or, so I do affirm). > > > >____________________________________________________ >(Signature of employee) > > > >thanks, > >charles ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 09:01:15 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" yeah, this reminds me tht there's a special provision for forgiveness on yom kippur, for oaths made under threat of death or other such duress. i.e. it was important that jews survive, even if it meant converting under the threat of death; they could be forgiven as long as they remembered they wre jewish. At 11:12 PM -0400 8/9/97, Steven Marks wrote: >Charles, >Cross your fingers, take the oath, take the money and remember that the >Declaration of Independence says that it's OK to seek the removal of a >government that won't guarantee your rights. That is, as long as you are >a property-owner. You do own property, right? Not to take your situation >too lightly, I think there are a number of "subversive" things you can do >in your small press class to more than offset this odious oath. Keeping >every promise can be a sign of rigidity. > >best, >Steven > > >On Sat, 9 Aug 1997, mark weiss wrote: > >> Charles, you dirty commie, to the best of my knowledge you gotta sign--when >> confronted with same in NY, Connecticut and Arizona (I don't remember if I >> had to sign one for UCSD) I checked it out. I think that all public >> colleges require it--may be that their federal money is tied to compliance. >> But take heart--you can always be a spy. >> >> At 05:39 PM 8/9/97 -0400, you wrote: >> >Dear Poetics: >> > >> >I've just been hired to teach at the University of Arizona Extended >> >University -- a course on small presses, and later this year, a creative >> >writing class. >> > >> >Today I received in the mail, among other contract materials, a "loyalty >> >oath" to sign. I had thought these were a thing of the past. And I thought >> >maybe people on this list could advise me -- have others here had to sign >> >such things, has anybody refused, is this only an Arizona conservate thing, >> >or ??? Particularly, anyone on this list in Arizona -- have you had to sign >> >such a thing, or have you refused to sign such a thing, and what if any >> >were the consequences? But I'm interested if this is required in other >> >states as well. Are you a Minnesota loyalist, Maria? or anyone else >> >anywhere else? Some answer soon would be great, so I can weigh my options >> >before I sign or don't sign. (and yes, I know, I should probably talk with >> >a lawyer about this) >> > >> >For the record, apprently they would withhold compensation "unless and >> >until such officer or employee does so take and subscribe to the form of >> >oath of affirmation set forth in this section." >> > >> >And that oath reads: >> > >> >I, _________________________ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will >> >support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution and laws >> >of the State of Arizona; That I will bear true faith and allegiance to the >> >same, and defend them against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and that I >> >will faithfully and impartially discharge the duties of the office of >> >_______________________ according to the best of my ability, so help me God >> >(or, so I do affirm). >> > >> > >> > >> >____________________________________________________ >> >(Signature of employee) >> > >> > >> > >> >thanks, >> > >> >charles >> > >> > >> > >__________________________________________________ > Steven Marks > > http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html >__________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 12:43:09 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dan Raphael Dlugonski Subject: avant-stream Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" avant garde? otherstream? one of my impressions is being on the frontier, away from the center. doing things with your art that you don't know of anyone else doing (yes there are links back, 3rd cousins, you are what you eat, stained by the culture you're steeped in.) seems, from the usage so far in this discussion, that avant garde is kind of a dividing line, beyond a certain pale. the acceptable/center continues to evolve, to include poets who a century ago would not be tasteable by that stream. my longheld (& probably over optimistic) attitude is that good writers write the way that connects with their beings. for some writers, this truespeak happens to fit the mode of most acceptable and that writer prospers wildly. we are laying down our individual visions, a wide variety outside the pale than within. some people get their voice right off; most of us going thru phases of influence, getting our bearings, before the proper pitch begins to unlock the stream/voice. but its such a wide filed, this otherstream, the more important labels are subdivisions--langpo, surrealism, etc., and all those riding rifts along the ambiguous borders. to recognize the various channels along which poetry receives/transmits and find those you can work best to open/expand your and other consciousnesses. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 11:10:19 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Peter Landers Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) Content-Type: text My question is, is there anything in those documents you disagree with? Would you choose not to uphold them? If so, signing would be a lie, right? Do those documents imply that you cannot teach that Zukofsky was a Marxist or that his "an impulse to action" poem is cribbed out of Marxist texts, or the showing of those texts, for instance. I think not. Personally, I took such an oath many years ago, and I meant every word of it. Still do. Not waving a flag, just that I still have that oath. I can't stand flags or war, and these documents do try to resolve problems in bargaining instead of war. I'd feel even better about it if we had gotten the ERA passed, though. I just want to say that swearing to uphold such things as free speech and freedom of the press does not mean you have to agree with the current administration. Pete p. s. read them ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 14:45:52 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: The Otherstream Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Bob: Although you seem particularly intent on policing your borders, I beg of you not to shoot (I still have my whole life ahead of me, I promise to be good, my parents would be overwrought with grief, etc. etc.). Fine if you want to keep the term "otherstream" narrow. I'll even use the term sundaystream (though it is quite condescending). But I think this sundaystream of poetics is important and worth paying attention to, especially within a discussion of avant-gardes. Much of the definition of "real" and "phony" avant-gardes revolve around issues of formal experimentation: who is the most innovative. I'd argue that this is not what avant-gardes are about, that innovativeness is only a subset of the term. The main purpose, the distinguishing feature that separates the avant-garde from the experimental is the desire to effect change in people, first in their view of the artistic or political medium, and then, more deeply, in the perception and course of their lives. Surrealism is a classic example. The reason most people are reluctant to use the term avant-garde anymore is a general lack of faith that poetry, particularly formally experimental poetry, has the capacity to change people's lives (with the exception of a few people here and there). This is reasonable, as poetry isn't a mass medium in the U.S. There is a loophole in this despair. I'm thinking of another model of change, of two types of avant-gardes: an impatient and a patient avant-garde. The impatient wants big change NOW, a revolution. From now on, their manifestos read, everything shall be different. I doubt that form of avant-garde is feasible in our time. The patient avant-garde takes a long view. Instead of fire, it is a seed, working its way slowly over time, creating change gradually, sometimes glacially, instead of immediately. I believe that experiments in writing can change the way people think and live, and that this patient idea of the avant-garde has relevance. The contested field of change in poetics is the sundaystream, as this is where the most substantial effects of any avant-garde will be felt. How will ordinary people think about poetry? If one is an avant-garde, the answer to this question is their raison d'etre. One of the things I find so promising about slam poetics has nothing to do with form or even content but rather in presentation. What slams and open mikes are doing is transforming a fundamental axiom of sundaystream poetry, that poetry is essentially a private act, meant not to be shared with strangers. It desires to move poetry from an individual experience of reading and writing, to a more public sphere of performance and audience. No, they are not the first to do this, or even the best at doing this, but they are doing this, and it is fascinating to see the impact it has made on the way people write and perceive poetry, art, and even larger issues. Hugh Steinberg >Phooey, what a way to have to start the morning: I have to call for the >execution of Hugh Steinberg. His offense? EGREGIOUS MISUSE OF MY TERM, >"OTHERSTREAM." > >Actually, I set him up by incompletely defining otherstream poetry as >"any poetry that has never (to any serious extent) gotten into an >anthology of poetry published by a 'reputable' publisher--like >Norton--or been seriously discussed in a book of criticism published by >such a publisher..." So I hereby redefine it as "any TECHNICALLY >DISTINCT VARIETY OF poetry that has never, etc., etc." Visual poetry is >always my primary example, though Marjorie Perloff's course in it, and >what Harry Polkinhorn has been doing at San Diego State, and other >developments may be changing that. > >I agree with Hugh that there are two (or more) streams of work that are >not widely accepted, but consider only one of them otherstream. The >second "otherstream" he speaks of--"poems that are written out of a >general ignorance of institution based poems (poems written by people >who don't read poetry)"--is, for me, knownstream because it's not doing >anything technically new. It's wannabe mainstream, or unsuccessful >mainstream, or left-behind mainstream, or overlooked mainstream (as I >believe Robert Frost was when Pound "discovered" him). > >I just thought of a name for it: sundaystream poetry, or the poetry of >weekend poets--though it would also, unfairly, include the poetry of >people working seriously and full-time in mainstream poetry who simply >haven't done whatever is required besides writing good poetry to be >accepted by the establishment. I did sundaystream poetry for a long >time myself so have nothing against it--and, with Hugh, am most >interested in how it is being affected by other poetries. But puleeze >don't call it "otherstream." > > --Bob G. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 16:28:52 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Yasusada's existence MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On August 7, Maria Damon wrote: >i've heard quite enough about yasusada. no offense intended, kent >and others, but i don't see the point in devoting so much >intellectual and emotional energy to someone who doesn't exist. By coincidence, Maria, there is an essay by Mikhail Epstein appearing any day now in the Denver Quarterly on Yasusada and on the whole question of an author's existence or non-existence as it relates to poetic production! I understand it's also slated to appear, along with an Epstein interview, in Il Nuovo Giornale de Poeti in Italy. By the way, the Asahi Shimbun article I mentioned did not appear on August 6, as I was informed it would. I'll send a note if and when it does, as there is an English language edition of the Asahi and they have a web-site. Don't know if it will appear in English too, but will post address if so. in rear-garde spirit, Kent ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 17:33:10 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Woo! 40 plus posts and pretty well all of it interesting... <<"Experimental" is the term most often misused. Most experiments are failures--steeped in the trial & error method. Most writers worth their salt aren't publishing their "experiments." Rather they are experimenting toward a new way of the writing, personally or in the world. Once the work is published, the writer is, in general, confident the experiment has resulted in a finished text that is achievin= g, at least partially or in a way he/she could only dimly imagine, the intended outcome of his/her initial experiments. The publishing one's "experimental writing" is tantamount to publishing early drafts and half-baked, alchemic concoctions of varying and lesser consequence. Finnegan>> what do you think about publishing earlier versions of poems in order to show and understand the process of writing? I keep wanting to do that wit= h RWC magazine and the poets are too fastidious to oblige me ***** <> over here i came some time ago to the conclusion that the mainstream as i= n MAIN stream is the stuff that the _mainstream_ does not cover... that experiment, dissent, risk, fun etc etc is the true mainstream of poetry i= n these countries to perhaps put this in perspective - a Polish friend of mine has a quip that while he likes the English he wishes it didn't feel as if England is= still being run by the Normans and this is why I have called my latest press Mainstream - it is, they aren't ***** <> we dont have a written constitution... if the de facto constitution were written down it wld be fairly revolting i signed an oath of allegiance to the queen to get a government job a quarter of a century ago - i have no sense of allegiance to the queen but= signed in a spirit of - as someone else remarked - being under duress. Having no belief in a deity I forgave myself. On that - I had to give evidence in a law court a few years back and they= ASSUMED as I think they do as a default that I was an Anglican. I was giv= en the Church of England bible. I made quite a pretty speech to the effect that I was going to tell the truth anyway but would not feel compelled to= do so by the act of swearing on the bible but would feel compelled by giving my word without being under duress - and the judge said a simple attestation would suffice... i think it is acceptable - just! - to say you don't believe in god - sorry... God... but NOT acceptable to say you dont believe in government The tyranny we have in this country is a catch all phrase inserted into lecturing contracts that you may not bring the institution _into disreput= e_ - this is used to stifle whistle blowing on siphoning off of funds, riggi= ng exam results, falsifying student numbers etc Lawrence Upton ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 10:45:39 +0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rebecca Weldon Subject: avant-garde and the Larousse universel Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" My Larousse indicates that avant-garde is, firstly, a military term referring to those who prepare the ground (or water) for an attack by ground or naval forces. It has come to be used in a figurative sense to refer to those who prefigure another era in thought, ie. idees d'avant-garde. The word is of the feminine gender along with avant-premiere, avant-scene and avant-veille and might be interestingly compared to avant-bec, avant-coureur, avant-gout, avant-poste, avant-projet and avant-propos, all of the masculine gender. And, in it's original meaning, I believe that the military term would be found in all languages around the world. It exists in Thai: thap na (the "h" in "thap" simply indicating an aspirated or hard "t" sound). The term is also used figuratively in the same way. Interesting? Rebecca ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 00:55:51 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: for a friend MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII ------------------------------------------------------------------------- VirtueL The line that shoots across the palm comes to the end of his ropE Weather fissures meaning as arm after arm falls from his shouldeR Twice in his life he warned of irresponsibilitY She took him at her word after her very uncertain perioD Tenderly the cliff embraced her in its hardened liP Their mouths dragged them to their deathS They'd roll a map in the enclosure yes they would yes they woulD Doubled spearing of cunt and cock wheelbarrowed well and silO Alan-left-alone-in-speech offered remnants of his necK Throat, toss that useless body in yon pile over therE Torn ligaments jutted in the proximity of metaphoric collapsE The therapeutic of the lie is the lie of the therapeutiC They'd burrowed in each other's assholes, drawn the wheel rounD They'd tongue each other's shitholes, drawn the wheel rounD Each dirtied for the other, caked faces, breasts, and wheelS Faced in ruby beauty death, his hands tied behind her bacK Biting through nipples, spitting in face, biting through lipS O cavernous love O emerald bone and filE O suicide O gnawed-blade hole O tourniquet punished by foaM _________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 22:31:56 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Robert Hale Subject: the misery of poetry Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" What Bataille calls "the misery of poetry" should inform why it is that we don't see too much actual poetry on the poetics list (see Literature and Evil). To turn unsatisfaction into a permanent object is a hefty job for the ephemeral e-mail, which renders language into deletable scripts. Do eyes scan the screen the same way that they read the page? And let's answer that by NOT getting into any banal cyber vs book space threads. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 14:43:32 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Akitoshi Nagahata Subject: Re: Yasusada's existence MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-2022-jp >By the way, the Asahi Shimbun article I mentioned did not appear on August 6, as I was informed it would. I'll send a note if and when it does, as there is an English language edition of the Asahi and they have a web-site. Don't know if it will appear in English too, but will post address if so. in rear-garde spirit, Kent The yasusada article appeared in the Asahi (the evening edition) on August 9th, under an article about the memorial ceremony for the Nagasaki bombing with a picture of elederly Japanese Christians praying in the church. (You can see the picture in the web version of the Asahi. ) I don't know if the yasusada article will be published in English. Akitoshi Nagahata ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 22:57:35 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: the return of george bowering/avant ga-ga's Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I for one welcome gb's return to the List from the sunshine shores of Sechelt, having missed his wicked wit & wide wisdom. The "consumer" poetry he heard there suggests another name for what one would write : inedible poetry. It has indelible built into it. I was also shored up by his use of the word "present," as in, I thought, "Present Poetry." For writing the present -- re cognizing existence in light of the forward edge of history, which _has_ an inescapable linearity -- surely is a common injunction, & cause for avoiding older baffles, technically speaking. (Those baffles which are precisely (or vaguely) what by gb's term extended, a "consumerist" audience, would recognize the poetic by). Inedible, indeible: I am thinking of those of Alan Jennifer Sondheim's poems which, while coming from a tradition that owes its durability to human nature, the poem of hopeless longing, do so in terms of a new technology, terms which often elude my understanding, but which feel fresh, which experience always is, until put into words. David ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 23:23:50 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mark weiss Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) In-Reply-To: <199708101510.LAA40658@node5.frontiernet.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I've gritted my teeth and signed the things, but I think you miss the point by a few miles. These oaths are remnants of the red scares of the forties thru sixties. For many of us they bring back a painful and scary time. And they're not voluntary, unless you consider it voluntary to refuse employment. Constrained speech is a violation of free speech. At 11:10 AM 8/10/97 -0400, you wrote: >My question is, is there anything in those documents you disagree with? >Would you choose not to uphold them? If so, signing would be a lie, right? >Do those documents imply that you cannot teach that Zukofsky was a Marxist >or that his "an impulse to action" poem is cribbed out of Marxist texts, >or the showing of those texts, for instance. I think not. > >Personally, I took such an oath many years ago, and I meant every word of >it. Still do. Not waving a flag, just that I still have that oath. > >I can't stand flags or war, and these documents do try to resolve problems >in bargaining instead of war. I'd feel even better about it if we had >gotten the ERA passed, though. I just want to say that swearing to uphold >such things as free speech and freedom of the press does not mean you have >to agree with the current administration. > >Pete > >p. s. read them > > ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 19:18:47 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) In-Reply-To: Message of Sun, 10 Aug 1997 11:10:19 -0400 from Pete Landers has done something rather astonishing here. I'm not sure what exactly it is yet, but one thing he's done is show in an indirect way the extent of the damage inflicted by the McCarthy era (echoed by the Nixon era & re-echoed by the Reagan era). A state college is part of the State. Only a Helms (& perhaps a New Critic) would assume that a State job teaching automatically jeopardizes political and artistic freedom. Or is it basically intellectual freedom that is at issue? Should a loyalty oath be extracted from people in the intellectual professions? Or in any profession? Isn't it a sort of economic blackmail? Or at least a sign of loose anarchic big brotherism? Or rampant federalism? I think it has something to do with tax money. Taxes are a downpayment on patriotism for some. Loyalty oaths protect state funding for education. If you're for state funding and approve for the time being of the constitution (rather than a completely different or no constitution) I agree with Pete why not sign. - Henry Gould (because poets are the unacknowledged legislators of a dream republic?) ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 00:39:50 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: the misery of poetry MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Robert Hale wrote: > > What Bataille calls "the misery of poetry" should inform why it is that we > don't see too much actual poetry on the poetics list (see Literature and > Evil). To turn unsatisfaction into a permanent object is a hefty job for the > ephemeral e-mail, which renders language into deletable scripts. Do eyes > scan the screen the same way that they read the page? And let's answer that > by NOT getting into any banal cyber vs book space threads. Personally my experience is far closer to speaking on the phone, though I can't take the computer to the toilet and can take the book, but if it is a difficult book i like to 'set' myself up. The computer imposes a specific set up that is difficult to vary. I don't find myself getting as lusty from the screen as I do from the page, nor as sad. Humor suits it (that's nice), and that would support your use of Bataille. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 08:24:53 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Peter Ganick Subject: email address inquiry Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" hi buffalo listmembers---- back after a while----- an announcement soon regarding potes & poets and the zines/texts soon----- but for now, i urgently need the email and/or snailmail address and/or telephone number of elizabeth robinson----- she's due for an issue of a.bacus and i've misplaced her text----- anyone can backchannel would be appreciated----- out----- peter ganick ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 01:25:13 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: avant ya-ya's MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit David--thanks for the long, provocation. About a month ago, Mahate asked me what is a lesbian. Umm, my response: "some _one_ who commits sex in defiance of 'compulsory heterosexuality,' whose _main_ attraction is for the female body." In response to your question, I am personally more interested in the word as it aids in defying rigid constraints on sexuality than I am in hitting on women or keeping men away. Also important is community, if that's what you mean by few priviledges, though nothing was worse than small city pot lucks where it is assumed that you want to be around people simply because they are dykes! The variety of NYC a huge relief. Back to my definition, I am less interested in exluding unlike bodies, than I am in exluding those of unlike committment. Example, bi-sexuals who want to be in on the parade and have a June wedding to boot. Not that many homosexuals don't cream in their pants at the idea of a wedding but if we are on political ground, there is a hierarchy set up by the priviledging of marriage to heterosexual pairings. And political integrity would suggest you can't sit in both positions at once. I am interested in integrity. In Tokyo there is a group called Wanabes, females who live as males and work in clubs where they are solicited by straight women. One of the wanabes interviewed in the documentary I saw (_Shinjuku Boys_, Kim Longinotto, Jana Williams) lived in a partnership with a transexual born male living female, another wanabe had fallen in love with a client, a straight woman. Each couple seemed to be living their own category. One wanabe said "I've heard lesbians take off their clothes [in sex] but we wanabes don't like to do that" Maybe this is making no point but to say we are always redefining our terms. You ask, "what is the name for what we do?" and I'd say naming is what we do, and re-naming in good anarchist form. I would say that 'making-strange' can be a claim to unity in terms of committment. As when M. Damon invokes the(I should say 'a', not all mid-westerners do this) mid-western meaning of the phrase "it's different" (or Bernstein "Difference or/*differance*:it's/the distinction between hauling junk and/removing rubbish, while/I needless not to say, take/out the garbage". And the flip side to the committment of 'making strange' would be translation, stretch, making communion, sorry for the slippage here. Perhaps there was more I wanted to say but ya, ya, enough, the mire widens! --Rachel ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 00:19:08 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: Words which make People Garbanzos. In-Reply-To: <199707221138.HAA22848@waffle.ai.mit.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >yes, naif that i was, dewy-eyed young cantaloupe in the fruit medley of >life, trembling boutonniere of moss rose in the lapel of a roue, i was >taken in by you. but no more. Eliza, I dont know what to say. Yes, at first it was my intention only to use you, but when I saw you dabbing at your eyes with that J-cloth, saw the eye-liner on the side of your nose, I was a doomed man. Is there any way I can persuade you that I am serious now? I'll give you back your watch. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 01:48:26 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: Anne-Marie Albiach tribute in San Francisco Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Much like the gateau, I thought the tribute was most delicious. Being new to San Francisco, it was a pleasure to finally meet Kevin Killian in the flesh. I spent much of the reading in the second row writing, combining what I was hearing and thinking (I do this at most readings, though the choice of row varies, using the material in my own work). Anyhow, here's the poem I wrote from that evening. Two poems after listening to Anne-Marie Albiach 1. he discerns her portrait in the punctuation from her book. the type of energy found in a spiral on a page. response to different works. the excavation of a story. how it happened as an unfolding of leaves. as in spring or the manuscript as it becomes a book. she says pictures. photographs. points stretched in dark weight. like ink as it becomes words and punctuation. as a torch in the glass of night. a mime of absence. so it is in voice several times. which was written and revised until it no longer resembled speech. a fall or an answer. to repeat each symbolic body until they are numerous. white stars in the evening sky. 2. to live in steps. by leaves in a book about to be printed. in the letters dead people write each spring. light gathers in memory where the pictures were lost. consider how he was reading. the hour of things. as equated values. in labor or goods created. to count like knuckles. words in fists. in muscles which rest. in the absence of threat night slips in. in the creation of darkness through petty acts and great machines. of broad and hopeless spaces. a promise which was discontinued. as it is all the same. ideas which erase their erasers. in time as it hurries. like a transistor between ghosts and he who is merciless. Hugh Steinberg >This is Kevin Killian. Today's the 60th birthday of the French poet >Anne-Marie Albiach and last night here in San Francisco was the Albiach >tribute organized by Dodie Bellamy and Small Press Traffic. I was there, >in the theater space at New College, and I know you're all curious, how did >it turn out? > >Successfully I think. OK there were a few glitches here and there. Kush >the marvelous videographer failed to show up, and earlier in the week Small >Press Traffic's office was rifled and the microphone stolen. However a >tape recorder was available and thus Dodie can prove the event really did >take place, documentation being "everything." Norma Cole began the evening >by sketching out some of the salient turns in Albiach's career and showed >us a double portrait. One photo was of the young Albiach in 1969, a glamor >portrait a la George Hurrell on the occasion of the publication of "Etat." >We were all struck by how much she (AMA) resembled the young Katherine Ross >in Curtis Harrington's "Games." Then another kind of portrait, Jean >Daive's imaginative portrait of AMA done solely through her punctuation. >Cole then read from Albiach's "Gradiva," and read part of AMA's translation >of Louis Zukoksky's "A"-9. Barbara Guest rose and read what sounded like a >new poem, a "Reverie" for AMA. Benjamin Hollander combined parts of two >previous essays to create an atmosphere, a theatrical atmosphere which >effectively illustrated what he called the "nocturnal" aspect of Albiach's >writing (and its effect on the reader). Michael Palmer read an essay >reminiscing on visiting (or trying to pay a visit to) AMA in Paris, she >wasn't home, so, he said, the absence of the non-encounter lived up to the >highest expectations of both parties, and then he read "Five Easy Poems," >dedicated to AMA. Mary Margaret Sloan spoke briefly on the influence AMA >has had over the years on the work of North American woman poets, and read >from AMA's book "Mezza Voce." Cole Swensen read from "'Vocative Figure.'" >Then everyone turned to the cake, the "gateau," and tore that sucker to >shreds (or crumbs, I suppose). There was much mingling, wine, and etc., if >only Steve Carll were still on this list he could tell you all the names of >the poets and artists who attended. > >I thought it would be a case of preaching to the converted but there were >many there who had apparently never heard of Albiach, and all the copies of >"Mezza Voce" were quickly sold out, attesting to the event's success as, >well, a kind of promotion for the glamorous, reclusive diva of >Neuilly-sur-Seine. However not all were so easily persuaded and one famous >poet afterwards was overheard murmuring that she still disliked Albiach's >writing and what was all the fuss about anyhow. This made me think of >Rachel Levitsky's post about when "the dominant obliterates the >marginal, the dominant will always assert itself"though I can't piece out >how it applies exactly. > >Anyhow, thanks to all who worked on this event behind the scenes, in front >of the podium, in the audience, and thanks to all the US and Canadian poets >who signed the series of tacky Hallmark cards for AMA's birthday, which >were delivered to her ahead of time and which stunned and surprised her and >made her weep with this kind of absent French pleasure. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 15:00:26 +0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rebecca Weldon Subject: Yasusada Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Having read the Boston Review articles on Yasusada, I am saddened by the waste of excellent literary space and effort on this hoax rather than on scores of Asian poets who work in obscurity. Whatever cynical motive inspired the perpetrator, I hope it has been satisfied. I believe a point of dubious value was made and the issue should be allowed to rest. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 10 Aug 1997 20:41:37 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Imperialist running dogs In-Reply-To: <199708101510.LAA40658@node5.frontiernet.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Charles Alexander: Sign the oath to secure the job and hope to later have a fulfilling chance to violate the hell out of such a Stalinist loyalty contract. Pete Landers: Let's say just hypothetically that twenty years from now after a few years of deep economic crisis and U.S troops completely bogged down in the Amazon in Brazil that there is discontent all over the place and the UPS workers start a strike and its 1968 France all over again only this time there's an upstart socialist leadership in the U.S. labor movement which is class conscious and really pissed off and calls for nationwide strikes with the idea that the country has been run for the past two hundred and forty years largely for the pleasures of capital and there's no need for that to go on any longer and let's cut they say the military budget by nine-tenths and a big part of U.S. labor responds and then in a panic a purportedly liberal Democratic Party administration suspends habeus corpus and the constitution and avant-garde poetry and everything else and declares martial law outlawing all public activity by enemies of the United States foreign or domestic. What say you Pete Landers about that loyalty contract you meant every word of three decades back? Would you turn in the elderly poet Charles Alexander if you suspected he was a friend of the radical and national-security-threatening AFL-CIO? Would you still uphold his right to freedom of speech? Even his right to violate his loyalty oath in defense of freedom of speech and the press (I'm talking for example about Charles Alexander standing in front of a crowd of angry U of Arizona students and urging them to defy government instituted martial law)? Ok, this is all fanciful and maybe you'll say (I hope) yes to my last question, but the truth is that there are loyalties and then there are loyalties. Freedom of speech and the press is obviously wonderful while we more or less have it ("more or less" because of little publicized but longstanding spying and harrassment activities of local and national government agencies against legal political dissidents). But the McCarthyite loyalty oath you are so proud to have signed does not speak to liberties of speech and the press that are pure, inalienable, and free from historical contingency. It speaks to their opposite--hidden, for now, as that opposite may be. Kent > My question is, is there anything in those documents you disagree with? > Would you choose not to uphold them? If so, signing would be a lie, right? > Do those documents imply that you cannot teach that Zukofsky was a Marxist > or that his "an impulse to action" poem is cribbed out of Marxist texts, > or the showing of those texts, for instance. I think not. > > Personally, I took such an oath many years ago, and I meant every word of > it. Still do. Not waving a flag, just that I still have that oath. > > I can't stand flags or war, and these documents do try to resolve problems > in bargaining instead of war. I'd feel even better about it if we had > gotten the ERA passed, though. I just want to say that swearing to uphold > such things as free speech and freedom of the press does not mean you have > to agree with the current administration. > > Pete > > p. s. read them > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 23:16:21 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: You, Here MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII (now she won't tell, now I won't) --+- You, Here splayed message-bases, eyes opened everywh ah, your name, your face, your hands cares the span of language, words, or touch whic already a presence languishing. In this ma the scent and taste of your hair, dark col the screen fissuring into public and priva that last look, I turned the corner, disap within the other closeted, it's there I ho self noted, sullen, catatonic, opened or c face, I have no secrets from you, which is this lack constructed of the fullness of l takes on the real, and I rest, my head lea turn to you in my sleep of desperate reaso soulful life, in love I cried your name, " __________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 01:55:01 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: imperialist bow-wows Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Kent's hypothesized fascist future reminded me that i wanted to post to the list the solution to the "flying-saucer" confusion. There are no such creatures as space aliens (except us). USAF technology has included, since shortly after WW 2, the ability to use the electro-magnetic field to suspend gravity. Flying machines that can hover in place, or go very fast in any direction, that are silent, and that carry weaponry of an electronic sort, highly sophisticated--can stall cars from a distance--do exist. The flying saucer space alien myth has been fostered by the USAF at certain levels. To keep their technology secret. "Those arent our discs up there." Now the myth is firmly established, they deny their belief in it. Sound move. And here's one possible application: "President Clinton today told the american people that space aliens who can render themselves invisible via their technology, now occupy the White House and have their space-weapons trained on 15 major american cities. 'The carnage would be one hundred times that of Hiroshima or Nagasaki,' the President declared, the gravity of his concern causing his voice to tremble.'From this moment on, I am obliged to carry out whatever orders these spacemen give me. I would be delinquent in my duty as your President, to do otherwise. 'First, you must labor for less. These space creatures understand finance and want to increase profits from industry of all kinds. Second, no one may speak against my Administration.' The President continued with a list of Alien demands, the text of which can be found on today's Page Three. There will be a substantially different format to our newspaper starting tomorrow." as a footnote : this week's World News, along with the revelation of Elvis's sexual impotence & fondness for fondling fourteen-year-olds, carries the transcript of the last words (found on the Alien equivalent of a black box), translated from Alienese!, of the crew of the space craft doomed to crash at Roswell in 1947. I was interested to note that one of them cried "God forgive me for my sins!" while another gasped "We cant crash! My wife--my children--". David ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 13:34:28 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Safdie Organization: South Seattle Community College Subject: Re: lunch at the public: is it possible? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Judy Roitman wrote: > > Whoa there. The continuous present --- the real one, not the fake one of > tv ads and video games --- is a pretty damn good antidote to any inequitous > system, and the level of the sentence is a good innoculator against the > bullshit causality that proudly brings you Northern Ireland,the Balkans > (Bosnia not being the only manifestation of that particular tangle), the > Middle East, Rwanda and Burundi, Afghanistan, the Khmer Rouge, etc. etc. > I find this reply astonishing. David Israel's thoughts about the history of the imagination being equally as important as the history of wars, power, etc. (and about Eliade's mythic time as opposed to secular time) are one thing. I don't agree with them either, but I understand that poets have and will continue to explore these realms, and I think I also understand a little about David's whimsy and style in general. I don't think there's anything particularly "timeless" about either of these pursuits, David, but that's another story, one, if you wish, we could pursue back-channel. As Gibbon said, "To the people all religions were equally true; to the philosophers all religions were equally false; and to the state, all religions were equally useful." But to say, as Judy Roitman does above, that the level of the sentence is a good "innoculator" (sic) against "the bullshit causality that proudly brings us Northern Ireland, Bosnia" et al is stunningly wrong-headed, it seems to me. For one thing, is it even possible to inoculate ourselves against such phenomena? Why would we wish to? Are we really immune from such "stuff," here in the glorious non-Balkans? Has it become impossible to learn from history? (She does have enough of a knowledge, apparently, to state that Bosnia is not the only element of "The Balkan problem," as it's been known for centuries; how did she obtain that knowledge?) In fact, how does her attitude differ from my beginning composition students who say they don't watch the news because it's too depressing? I agree with those who have said that the level of generality at which these disputes are conducted is excessive. Perhaps we could look at specific poems. I also agree with Henry Trismegistus, who said a few posts back that there's validity in both arguments, pro-history (ignorance of it leads to stupidity) and anti-history (it just goes on and on). May the gods protect us all from totalizing anything. But even if "history" IS a nightmare from which we're all trying to awaken, as the mythic Stephen said, don't we have to first realize that we're asleep? And yes, Jordan -- some poetry IS "less than". ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 11:37:48 BST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Ira Lightman Subject: Derrida and Language Writing Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII Hi folks Is anyone out there working on links and comparisons between the *textual practices/compositions* of Derrida and any of the Language Writers? Does anyone find one or the other a more austere or less representational or more representational or less austere practice? Derrida can seem to me to be stylistically close to Stein, although he more obviously pins his colours to Genet. Is anyone doing working or thinking on Derrida as a writer, the way we have recently been discussing Clark Coolidge as a writer? The way a writing experiment/ opening out a pun for example / opens up a terrain? Does anyone feel as I do the desire to rescue Derrida from those who want to snip up his works into critical terms ( deconstruction, differance, erasure) which they then re-plant in much more conventional dull prose? (This is his complaint in Glas, of how Sartre wants to pick the flowers out of Genet's work and ignore Genet's composting and tending of the land). Does anyone enjoy Derrida as a *writer*, as much as they enjoy a Language Writer as a *writer*? Best Ira Lightman to open ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 08:08:35 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: "avantgarde" In-Reply-To: <33EB3E49.4AEA@frontiernet.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Fri, 8 Aug 1997, The Ultimate Autodidact wrote: > > Don't we all agree that it's a useless word? Some people form groups and Unfortunately, not quite....You'd be surprised..Lots of casual statements, prefaces, essays etc. by people in the otherstream use A-G, tho' admittedly they use "experimental" and "innovative" a lot more..The problem being how to make clear to a reasonable range of folks what area of contemporary poetry practice one is talking about....A problem that still ain't been resoved, certainly not by me. I dislike a-g and experimental the most, but "innovative" makes me uneasy too.. Mark P. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 08:17:55 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" Comments: To: Robert Archambeau In-Reply-To: <33EAFED8.1309@LFC.EDU> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Robert A.-- The idea of using "alternative" is interesting..Not one I'd noticed, as my previous posts make clear.. I have a whole other set of problems with that, than I have with the A-G/experimental/innovative triad... It seems to me that "alternative" primarily valorizes the mainstream. As writing by Susan Howe and Clark Coolidge is very important to me, and writing by (say) Stephen Dobyns and Tess Gallagher of almost no interest whatsoever, it seems weird and hopelessly confusing to call the more important work "alternative." One of these groupings has more institutional support thant the other (is more "acadominent," in fact); but that really doesn't make it "primary" and the other "alternative." Merely fatter, lazier and more overfed.... You should always use words in a way that reflects your own values and judgments, and in that respect it seems to me that Howe and Coolidge are primary, and many lionized mainstreamers a (very inadequate) alternative.. Mark P. Atlanta ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 08:02:08 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Yasusada In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.32.19970811080026.0068fbf8@chmai.loxinfo.co.th> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 3:00 PM +0700 8/11/97, Rebecca Weldon wrote: >Having read the Boston Review articles on Yasusada, I am saddened by the >waste of excellent literary space and effort on this hoax rather than on >scores of Asian poets who work in obscurity. Whatever cynical motive >inspired the perpetrator, I hope it has been satisfied. I believe a point >of dubious value was made and the issue should be allowed to rest. amen ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 08:52:15 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.16.19970810054128.40fff8b0@theriver.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII This is a real difficult one. Loyalty oaths.... No they **NEVER** went away, not ever, and they have hung on in *many* states. I've held about 5 major library jobs so far in my work-life; the only one where I was a full state employee (Cornell being a weird hybrid of state and private) was at the University of Michigan, my first after-college job. That was in 1978, and yup there sure was a loyalty oath just like this one you've quoted.... Needless to say such barbarism ought to fought in any way possible; the rest of the world sees these things (rightly) as an exceptionally insane instance of U.S. right-wing dementia.... But for most of us, refusing is not one of the ways possible. I signed, I hardly had any choice did I? I've always been working-class, and poor, and there weren't any other jobs available that were going to keep a roof over my head. During the next four years, I helped build the left in Michigan and at the U. of M. in many different ways, including working on a clericals organizing drive that came within a few votes of winning (in a situation where the UAW had been de-certified a few years before, and getting a union in was thought to be impossible..) It seems to me you fight where you can, and where you can win. If you have the slightest chance of surviving while fighting the loyalty oath, by all means go for it....But I'm one life-long socialist who signed. Mark P. Atlanta On Sat, 9 Aug 1997, charles alexander wrote: > Dear Poetics: > > I've just been hired to teach at the University of Arizona Extended > University -- a course on small presses, and later this year, a creative > writing class. > > Today I received in the mail, among other contract materials, a "loyalty > oath" to sign. I had thought these were a thing of the past. And I thought > maybe people on this list could advise me -- have others here had to sign > such things, has anybody refused, is this only an Arizona conservate thing, > or ??? Particularly, anyone on this list in Arizona -- have you had to sign > such a thing, or have you refused to sign such a thing, and what if any > were the consequences? But I'm interested if this is required in other > states as well. Are you a Minnesota loyalist, Maria? or anyone else > anywhere else? Some answer soon would be great, so I can weigh my options > before I sign or don't sign. (and yes, I know, I should probably talk with > a lawyer about this) > > For the record, apprently they would withhold compensation "unless and > until such officer or employee does so take and subscribe to the form of > oath of affirmation set forth in this section." > > And that oath reads: > > I, _________________________ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will > support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution and laws > of the State of Arizona; That I will bear true faith and allegiance to the > same, and defend them against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and that I > will faithfully and impartially discharge the duties of the office of > _______________________ according to the best of my ability, so help me God > (or, so I do affirm). > > > > ____________________________________________________ > (Signature of employee) > > > > thanks, > > charles > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 08:11:11 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: the misery of poetry In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19970811053156.006f3a9c@pop1> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 10:31 PM -0700 8/10/97, Robert Hale wrote: >What Bataille calls "the misery of poetry" should inform why it is that we >don't see too much actual poetry on the poetics list (see Literature and >Evil). To turn unsatisfaction into a permanent object is a hefty job for the >ephemeral e-mail, which renders language into deletable scripts. Do eyes >scan the screen the same way that they read the page? And let's answer that >by NOT getting into any banal cyber vs book space threads. i can't help a little whining here: speaking of banal cyber/book threads...i've been applying to the MN humanities commission for some $ for our conference, and aftre having handed in a first draft was sent a model, grant-winning application as a paradigm to follow. guess what it was about, yes, "in this day of cyber etc what is the status of poetry, let's get galway kinnell to remind us that poetry is a great holdout against electronic etc..." oh well. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 07:35:13 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Assistance requested In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Hello everyone on Poetics List, this is Kevin Killian. Please help me if you can! In connection with my upcoming biography of Jack Spicer, I have to secure permission to reprint unpublished material by the following writers: Alfred Bester, e.e. cummings, Denise Levertov, Dorothy Livesay, Robert Lowell, Marianne Moore, Frank O'Hara. Can anyone clue me in about, what are the names and addresses of the literary executors of these estates? Some of you must have had similar problems, how did you handle them? Please back channel me, I don't know who else to turn to, had no idea modernism was so difficult! Thanks--- Kevin K. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 09:56:04 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Amato/Kass Fleisher Subject: Re: the misery of poetry Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" maria, that really IS banal... mebbe some of the more acclaimed poets out there who rail against emedia should spend a little time getting their feet wet in same (not that the radio or tv, say, are UNelectronic devices---i think some may have forgotten that these items are plugged in too)... personally, i think the resistance given voice to (by nobel-laureate poets, for example) to things electronic reflects their having intuited that the earth is moving under their feet... best, joe ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 11:50:20 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: charles alexander Subject: Re: "avantgarde" In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Unfortunately, not quite....You'd be surprised..Lots of casual statements, >prefaces, essays etc. by people in the otherstream use A-G, tho' >admittedly they use "experimental" and "innovative" a lot more..The >problem being how to make clear to a reasonable range of folks what area >of contemporary poetry practice one is talking about....A problem that >still ain't been resoved, certainly not by me. I don't quite know who your "reasonable range" might include, but what you propose, making CLEAR to people who will not automatically know about the variety of practices out there, what it is one is talking about -- is admirable, is a constant challenge, and is damn near impossible. This is a challenge for all the presses here which write grant proposals, as often, particularly on local panels, we are judged by people who have a very limited sense of the poetry out there -- they are likely to know something about Allen Ginsberg, Gary Snyder, Maya Angelou, perhaps a few local writers, a smattering of pre-1950's poetry (Frost, Sandburg, some Victorian, some Romantic, back to Shakespeare), and not a lot more. How to describe "otherstream" or "language" or "post-objectivist" or other such poetries to these people (and these are people who by and large are open and want to understand; and they may also be taken to stand for numerous folks we'd like to get to buy our books and come to our readings), to describe in a way that they know what such poetries are and what they are not, yet without requiring them to read more than a few paragraphs of narrative and perhaps a page of examples, is a fairly amazing task. I don't know anyone who has mastered it. charles ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 11:09:04 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: James Finnegan Subject: Re: The Otherstream In a message dated 97-08-10 13:24:43 EDT, Bob wrote: >both Slam Poetry and Language Writing are >KNOWNSTREAM, the opposite of otherstream because they, or poetry in all >essential respects identical to it in the case of Slam Poetry, are in >the establishment press anthologies. Slam Poetry is probably mainstream >(a substream of knownstream) as well; Language Writing is not. I stand corrected in misapplication of your "otherstream." But I must now correct you on the point that Slam Poetry is mainstream. Having sat thru the four hour '97 Slam National Finals last night, I can tell you there was nothing like a Merwin, Rich, Ashbery, Gluck, Tate, et al, in the house. There was much loud & light verse, the sentimental & the insentient, the raucous & rimed, the goodspirited and godforsaken, the crude & the cute. All in all, despite a numbing length akin to the Academy Awards ceremony, it was a great show. One could argue abt the literary quality of some of the poems (scripts), but the performance level was firstrate. Slam, as I said, is not "avant-garde" in terms of writing. However, Slam is nothing one could/should mistake for contemporary mainstream poetry. BTW, The Boogie Man from Cleveland OH won the Individual '97 National Slam Championship, with D.J. Renegage of Washington DC runner up. The Team Championship was won by Mouth Almighty (Taylor Mali, Beau Sia, Reggie Cabico, and Evert Eden); best of the 36 competing teams. Los Angeles was second, Cleveland third. Incidentally, Henry Taylor, Pulitzer Prize winning poet for his book The Flying Change, did enter as an individual. He didn't even make it to the semi-final round. Finnegan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 12:00:22 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: charles alexander Subject: Re: the misery of poetry In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Oooh, Maria . . . this is an attitude I find all the time in the book arts, where artists and audience want to see the arts of making books by hand as opposed to the technological/information age -- holding up the value of work made by hand over the value of work made by machine, or virtual stuff, etc. It's really an unimaginative attitude, to me insulting to work which might fall on either side of an opposition which is false and harmful. and yes, I think I even heard, sometime last week, someone quote that phrase about poetry as a "momentary stay against confusion." confusion, of course, being basically anything the person who says such a phrase doesn't like. charles > "in this day of cyber etc what is the status of poetry, let's >get galway kinnell to remind us that poetry is a great holdout against >electronic etc..." oh well. > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 11:27:50 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Comfort levels for solicitation and submission In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Rob -- It's self-protecting, the urge not to post poems the people who don't post poems feel. Do poems feel this way? Texture farming. Miracle gro. The environment rejects "the last best offer". What's more amazing to me though is the policing of what's permissible in these not-poems. And the will to clarity here. Why not drop the team names and go out and play? Because it's big business, complete with free agents, concession stands, licensing deals. Suggestion for new name for avant-garde poetry: poetry. All you need is love, Jordan PS What is meant by the term "dualism"? ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 11:15:58 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Coffey Subject: Derrida and Language Writing -Reply Comments: To: I.Lightman@UEA.AC.UK Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain dear ira: i wrote an essay about 10 years ago comparing Steve McCaffery's notion of "General Economy" to JD's theory of writing (grammatology); it was published in the toronto-based Open Letter issue devoted to Steve's work. This piece centered less on the textual comparison's between the two in favor a comparison of theoretical positions. As i recall it, mccaffery's privileging (yup, that's the word i used) of the "excess," the "waste" in a general economy of language and jd's interest in what is contained in the differance that rides above actual langauge. i have a copy at home that i can fax to you if you are intersested. >>> Ira Lightman 08/11/97 11:37am >>> Hi folks Is anyone out there working on links and comparisons between the *textual practices/compositions* of Derrida and any of the Language Writers? ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 09:47:32 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tenney Nathanson Subject: dum Foucault question Comments: cc: pog@listserv.arizona.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" can anyone tell me where to find the famous but to me forever fugitive site in Foucault where he invents the utopique/atopique heterotopia thing? thanks tenney ---------------------------------------------------------- tenney nathanson tenney@azstarnet.com nathanso@u.arizona.edu http://www.u.arizona.edu/~nathanso/ ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 13:40:14 EST5EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: LYNES- KATHERINE Organization: Rutgers University English Dept. Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) we here in new jersey are asked to do the same thing, and have the document notarized [spelling? too hurried to check]... we "may" cross out the words "so help me god" and "swear" and write in the word "affirm." i don't have it right in front of me, but it is similar to what charles alexander posted.... though, i don't remember the "defend against enemy" part being in the new jersey document... i'm not sure about withholding of money etc. if we don't sign, but as an incredibly poor student, pathetic as it may be, i can't afford to find out. kl charles alexander wrote: > Today I received in the mail, among other contract materials, a "loyalty > oath" to sign. I had thought these were a thing of the past. And I thought > maybe people on this list could advise me -- have others here had to sign > such things, has anybody refused, is this only an Arizona conservate thing, > or ??? Particularly, anyone on this list in Arizona -- have you had to sign > such a thing, or have you refused to sign such a thing, and what if any > were the consequences? But I'm interested if this is required in other > states as well snip. > For the record, apprently they would withhold compensation "unless and > until such officer or employee does so take and subscribe to the form of > oath of affirmation set forth in this section." > > And that oath reads: > > I, _________________________ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will > support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution and laws > of the State of Arizona; That I will bear true faith and allegiance to the > same, and defend them against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and that I > will faithfully and impartially discharge the duties of the office of > _______________________ according to the best of my ability, so help me God > (or, so I do affirm). > > > > ____________________________________________________ > (Signature of employee) > > > > thanks, > > charles > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 13:18:12 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Difficult Modernism (wasRe: Assistance requested) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Uh, Denise Levertov is probably still in charge of her own estate, as she's not dead yet. When I'm back in Seattle tonight I'll check to see if she's listed in the phone book (though someone else on the list may have a way to contact her). >Hello everyone on Poetics List, this is Kevin Killian. Please help me if >you can! In connection with my upcoming biography of Jack Spicer, I have >to secure permission to reprint unpublished material by the following >writers: > >Alfred Bester, e.e. cummings, Denise Levertov, Dorothy Livesay, Robert >Lowell, Marianne Moore, Frank O'Hara. > >Can anyone clue me in about, what are the names and addresses of the >literary executors of these estates? > >Some of you must have had similar problems, how did you handle them? >Please back channel me, I don't know who else to turn to, had no idea >modernism was so difficult! Thanks--- > >Kevin K. Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 14:17:21 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Bouchard Subject: Directions to Mass Ave. Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Delighted to announce publication of the third issue of MASS AVE. The featured poets: Michael Angelo Tata Andrew Levy Sherry Brennan Kyle Conner Jennifer Moxley Fred Muratori Kary Wayson Robert Fitterman Ethel Rackin Kim Bernstein Juliana Spahr 57 pages, perfect bound. $6 postage paid. Also, the Second Issue is still available; featuring Valerie Hanson Lisa Jarnot Marcella Durand Eileen Corder Anselm Berrigan Nava Fader Larry Price Dan Luft Douglas Rothschild Mary Burger Drew Gardner Dave Baptiste Chirot Daniel Bouchard Kevin Varrone WB Keckler Kim Lyons 56 pages, perfect bound. $6 postage paid. Get BOTH issues for the bargain price of $10. Daniel Bouchard Mass Ave. PO Box 230 Boston, MA 02117 Thank you. You're beautiful. daniel_bouchard@hmco.com ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 14:28:21 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Wallace Subject: when you do your own policing MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I'm arriving a little late on this one, but I want to second lb drake's response to Maria Damon's several questions about policing in the avant garde. I must confess to great boredom over the struggle to define the meaning of the term "avant garde." I think of Wittgenstein: "isn't the value of a word precisely in the looseness of its definition?" The value of avant garde as a term is what the term can be turned to mean by those various groups and individuals interested in using it or getting rid of it, a meaning that CANNOT be final as long as anyone thinks redefinitions of it (or even old definitions of it) can be made to seem worthwhile to them in whatever they're doing. Make it seem something interesting, or not--it's your word if you want it. But the problem, I feel, especially with the second of Maria's posts is that there is a fairly intense confusion of contexts of disciplinary power. I certainly understand that Maria's comments were not meant as final conclusions, but as queries. So I don't want my comments to be seen as criticisms so much of her as of these particular comments, because I think these comments reflect positions that are, in fact, dangerously common. Maria asks whether the avant garde polices its borders? And people respond "well what is the avant garde?" and people respond, as I would, well sometimes yes and sometimes no, it depends on the context, the publication, the personalities, etc. But then she offers, AS AN EXAMPLE OF AVANT GARDE POLICING, TWO EXAMPLES OF THE AVANT GARDE BEING POLICED BY INDIVIDUALS WITH RESPONSIBILITY FOR ACADEMIC PUBLICATIONS. The confusion is important, because I think there's something significant at stake. I find, in the details of these examples, a number of interesting problems. What does academic "cultural studies" have to do with avant garde writing practices? Why is there no mention of whether she tried publishing her piece on young urban black poets in contexts other than officially sanctioned academic projects? To whom does any value accrue if an article on young black urban poets is published in an academic collection? To speak most broadly, I'm concerned here that there is a large gap between what Maria's comments suggest is at stake ("the avant garde police") in her experiences, and what else, unmentioned, also seems at stake in those experiences. I find it hard to make my own use of the term "avant garde" flexible enough to include an academic critic with a self-described focus in "cultural studies" who decides to do a book "on a relatively traditional sense of avant garde" as in any sense BEING avant garde. But in any case, it seems clear that the "policing" context to which Maria refers is the policing of the ACADEMIC context, with whatever relation to avant garde practices. And the question for me then becomes "well how is it possible that someone can have their essay turned down by an editor in the academic marketplace and then decide that the fault might lie with avant garde writers," writers who for all I know HAVE NO WRITING APPEARING in the collections Maria mentions. Besides, are we really sure that magazines like CHAIN, TALISMAN, WITZ and others would have no interest in publishing Maria's more "daring" piece? Have they even been tried? And I can't help thinking that the problem REALLY is that they haven't been tried because publishing an essay in a magazine like that does NOT forward anybody's academic career, so that perhaps it never occured to Maria that there would be any "value" in publishing there in the first place. And if that is an assumption about her concerns that I CANNOT make, at least I can ask her to try those publications because the academic "value" of publishing her piece is NOT the point--the point is having the piece published in a place where it will be read. I think I wouldn't be spending so much time on this subject if it didn't seem to me at the heart of a problem that seems to haunt this list of late. That problem is this: WHAT IS THE RELATION BETWEEN ACADEMIC PRACTICE AND THE VARIOUS TYPES OF "INNOVATIVE" WRITING PRACTICES THAT WE MAY OR MAY NOT WANT TO LABEL "AVANT GARDE"? And I feel, in fact, that I'm still seeing a great deal of confusion on the subject. I take the following to be my two basic assumptions: 1) We live in a disciplinary society whose REAL operations of power work from the top on down, but which also work often because of the unwitting participation of those who might be opposed to such operations if they knew they were involved in them. 2) That one of the main problems of a discplinary society (others too I suppose, but I've never been in them) is that THE SELF-INTEREST OF INDIVIDUAL MEMBERS IN THAT DISCIPLINARY SOCIETY OFTEN BLINDS THEM TO THE CONTRADICTIONS OF THEIR OWN POSITION IN THAT SOCIETY. Pierre Bourdieu, as many of you certainly know, has in a book like HOMO ACADEMICUS already made it clear that institutional criticism of any kind can ONLY have value when the institutional critic has accurately diagnosed his or her position in the institutional framework. If you don't know who you are, then you can't know other people. In looking at a number of ideas floating around the list lately, it seems to me that one of the problems that comes from insufficient awareness about one's own social position is THE TENDENCY TO BLAME THE PERSON WHOM YOU PERCEIVE AS ONE STEP ABOVE YOU IN THE SYSTEM, accompanied by an exaggerated sense of that person's power which goes hand in hand with an ignoring of the larger framework. In her post (again, which I don't take as her final position) Maria blames an academic editor, who she misconstrues as "avant garde," but never addresses the contradictions of her own existence in the academic context. But there have been other recent examples: language poets are "academically dominant" because a FEW of them have more academic authority than other poets, and a some of them have made it into anthologies that other people have NOT made it into. A real advantage? Well, perhaps yes, assuming that more than a few people in an academic system of some thousands teach such work at all. But isn't there someone higher up to take on than the 100 people in academic positions who just might have potential affinity with what you do? There are a myriad of possible takes on whether "avant garde" activity can have any real place in the (currently disciplinary and standardizing) environment of the literary academy. I take recent writing by Tom Mandel and Ron Silliman to be saying no, such a place is not possible at all. Because I like teaching, and because someone has to teach people about poetry at some point, and because I'd rather it be me than, say, J.D. McClatchey, I think some intervention is possible, especially on the level of teaching. When it comes to academic publishing, the question seems whether publishing in the standardized form of the academic marketplace can further the concerns of "avant garde" writing and writers? I'm tempted to say no, but also tempted to say that, at times, a few standard academic articles and books pointing in the direction of less standardized work may help bring attention to such poetries. OF COURSE avant garde writers do some level of policing; the U.S. is a country in which, with the occasional exception, the only way to make a living at all is to police somebody. If you've got a way out of that, great. If like Maria, you probably don't, perhaps the best you can do is IN THE ACT OF POLICING TO MAKE IT EXPLICIT THAT YOU ARE POLICING AND IN SO DOING CALL YOUR OWN POLICING INTO QUESTION, AND BE CLEAR AT ALL TIMES THAT YOU LIVE IN A SOCIETY WHICH IS FORCING YOU TO POLICE. Perhaps you would not be policing otherwise, right? I mean, who knows? In another place, Maria might be able to write the way she wants to write, on the subjects she wants to write about, and be granted the right to make a living simultaneously. And so would everybody else, whether they thought of themselves as critics, poets, or whatever. What a cool concept!--too bad it's not in the works. But until then, constant vigilance about one's own positioning in the disciplinary framework seems to me crucial to saying anything about poetry or anything else. Speaking to you, currently, as an adjunct who publishes books of poetry and articles in non-academically authorized journals and who still thinks he can do a better job teaching than most of the academic critics who get better teaching jobs because they publish in academic journals (present company all excluded, of course), and who also, sometimes, tries to publish critical pieces about innovative writing in academic journals but usually fails because he either doesn't want to do it the right way, or can't, or just hasn't figured out how best the problem can be solved, save by getting other people to change their minds-- Mark Wallace /----------------------------------------------------------------------------\ | | | mdw@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu | | GWU: | | http://gwis2.circ.gwu.edu/~mdw | | EPC: | | http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/wallace | |____________________________________________________________________________| ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 11:40:49 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mark weiss Subject: Re: the misery of poetry In-Reply-To: <199708111456.JAA01491@charlie.cns.iit.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" An extreme example: I'm translating a Cuban poet who has just moved to Spain after 30 years' residence in NY. Email would make my life a lot easier, but this otherwise normal and pleasant man doesn't believe in typewriters, let alone computers. At 09:56 AM 8/11/97 -0500, you wrote: >maria, that really IS banal... > >mebbe some of the more acclaimed poets out there who rail against emedia >should spend a little time getting their feet wet in same (not that the >radio or tv, say, are UNelectronic devices---i think some may have >forgotten that these items are plugged in too)... personally, i think the >resistance given voice to (by nobel-laureate poets, for example) to things >electronic reflects their having intuited that the earth is moving >under their feet... > >best, > >joe > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 11:37:32 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Organization: SOCOPOETS Subject: Re: when you do your own policing MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Mark, fabulous. I loved your post. I nominate it for "best of the thread." gratefully, Layne Russell Santa Rosa, CA (david bromige land) ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 10:22:43 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Organization: SOCOPOETS Subject: Re: Anne-Marie Albiach tribute in San Francisco MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hugh, > Two poems after listening to Anne-Marie Albiach > > 1. > > he discerns her portrait in the punctuation from her book. the type > of energy found in a spiral on a page. response to different works. > the excavation of a story. how it happened as an unfolding of > leaves. as in spring or the manuscript as it becomes a book. she > says pictures. photographs. points stretched in dark weight. like > ink as it becomes words and punctuation. as a torch in the glass of > night. a mime of absence. so it is in voice several times. which > was written and revised until it no longer resembled speech. a fall > or an answer. to repeat each symbolic body until they are > numerous. white stars in the evening sky. > > 2. > > to live in steps. by leaves in a book about to be printed. in the > letters dead people write each spring. light gathers in memory > where the pictures were lost. consider how he was reading. the > hour of things. as equated values. in labor or goods created. to > count like knuckles. words in fists. in muscles which rest. in the > absence of threat night slips in. in the creation of darkness through > petty acts and great machines. of broad and hopeless spaces. a > promise which was discontinued. as it is all the same. ideas which > erase their erasers. in time as it hurries. like a transistor between > ghosts and he who is merciless. I enjoyed this very much, wonderful stuff. Layne ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 14:34:39 CST6CDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hank Lazer Organization: The University of Alabama Subject: Re: new e-mail address for George Hartley, who asked me to alert the Poetics List: geohart1@aol.com ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 11:59:07 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mark weiss Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" That "mainstream" stuff--I tend to shorthand it as "New Yorker Poetry" or "Iowa School." Not completely accurate, but you get the idea. At 08:17 AM 8/11/97 -0400, you wrote: >Robert A.-- > >The idea of using "alternative" is interesting..Not one I'd noticed, as my >previous posts make clear.. > >I have a whole other set of problems with that, than I have with the >A-G/experimental/innovative triad... > >It seems to me that "alternative" primarily valorizes the mainstream. As >writing by Susan Howe and Clark Coolidge is very important to me, and >writing by (say) Stephen Dobyns and Tess Gallagher of almost no interest >whatsoever, it seems weird and hopelessly confusing to call the more >important work "alternative." One of these groupings has more >institutional support thant the other (is more "acadominent," in fact); >but that really doesn't make it "primary" and the other "alternative." >Merely fatter, lazier and more overfed.... > >You should always use words in a way that reflects your own values and >judgments, and in that respect it seems to me that Howe and Coolidge are >primary, and many lionized mainstreamers a (very inadequate) alternative.. > >Mark P. >Atlanta > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 10:40:41 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: James Finnegan Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" In a message dated 97-08-11 02:42:58 EDT, you write: >what do you think about publishing earlier versions of poems in order to >show and understand the process of writing? I keep wanting to do that with >RWC magazine and the poets are too fastidious to oblige me Very worthwhile for other writers and writing students. Extremely useful for critics and scholars. Readers, if a litmag/book/website has these beyond a population of other writers and literati, may be less taken with this enterprise. Obviously my assertion (re experimental) is flawed in that it's biased toward "the end product." If a writer cares not a wit for "the done-thing," then all his/her writing may be "experimental" to some degree. Though the word will always carry with it a connotation of moving toward some endpoint-- yes/no, success/failure. (What is the right word to describe writing that's not vested in any qualitative endpoint? Playful, random--most descriptives seem too light or dismissive.) When the writing stops, as it must somewhere/time, even if this end occurs only upon the writer's death, or though a work is published as an "experiment" or "from Work In Progress," there is this tendency to assess and to judge. Finnegan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 21:09:05 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Thompson Subject: Re: when you do your own policing Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I agree with Layne Russell that Mark Wallace's recent posting was a gem. It prompts me to make two small points, not quite related to his, that I hope may be relevant anyway: First, 'professionally speaking', I myself work in the intellectual backwater otherwise known as "Vedic studies" -- rooted in 19th cent. philology, comparative linguistics, etc. -- *way* out of date. Vedicists are probably even more conservative than your standard average Classicist doing Greek or Latin [really!]. So what could we have to say about the avant garde? Well, an interesting observation was made quite a while ago by a French Vedicist [one of the best ever], Louis Renou. In an overview of the state of the art, circa the 50's, he suggested that the notoriously obscure & often unintelligible poetry of the Rigveda had been made somewhat more accessible *as a result of our increasing familiarity with avant garde poetries of the 20th century*! His point was that such poetries had somehow managed to loosen the grip of classical Euro- syntax and logic on our minds so that we had become more capable of hearing the *very old* again on its own terms, instead of trying to read it according to our own logic. Another Sanskritist once commented, after reading Renou's translations of the Rigveda into French, that they reminded him of Cocteau's film _Orpheus_ [I think the film has been mentioned on the list recently?], in which that arch-poet Orpheus receives poetic transmissions over a car radio: Renou's translations seemed to him like a similar sort of weird 'transmission.' Whatever the avant garde is, *this* seems to me to be one of its important functions. Second, 'speaking professionally' again, I teach one of those standard "intro. to world lit" courses, but since this one is targeted at art school students I've had the opportunity to dwell on terms like "modernism", "post-modernism", and yes "avant-garde". My experience is that students are not very familiar with such terms and they need very *basic* help with them. I have to confess that I tend to characterize the notion 'avant garde' as a 'modernist' notion, rather than a 'post-modernist' one. That is, I suggest to my students that the notion 'avant garde' is rooted in a particular historical period, and I *ask them*: do you relate to this notion? And they tend to say 'no way -- it's arrogant bullshit!!' My students tend to be post-post-modernist. Have I been misinforming my students? George ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 20:28:59 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Ironies of Policing MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On 8/11, Rebecca Weldon wrote: >Having read the Boston Review articles on Yasusada, I am saddened by >the waste of excellent literary space and effort on this hoax rather >than on scores of Asian poets who work in obscurity. And on 8/11 Maria Damon added: >amen I am saddened by this waste of excellent literary space on the Buffalo Poetics discussion list. Surely Rebecca Weldon and her respondent in the pew could have devoted themselves instead to writing a review of the scores of Asian poets who work in obscurity. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 21:37:56 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: charles alexander Subject: Re: Ironies of Policing In-Reply-To: <9DA9E47C32@student.highland.cc.il.us> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I am wasting more space -- but this response seems small to me. If you don't like Rebecca and Maria presenting a different point of view, Kent, say so and say why -- but please don't resort to what seems like a nasty defensiveness. Most people here obviously are interested in the Yasusada affair, as it's remained a topic of the list off and on for quite some time. But those who wish it wasn't such a topic, I think, should be welcome to say so. It doesn't sound like preaching to me, despite the amen. charles > >I am saddened by this waste of excellent literary space on the >Buffalo Poetics discussion list. Surely Rebecca Weldon and her >respondent in the pew could have devoted themselves instead >to writing a review of the scores of Asian poets who work in >obscurity. > >Kent > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 19:54:16 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: "*alternative*avant-garde" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit James--I think that publishing drafts, experimentations is an excellent idea and only boring for reader when it is impossible to read or make sense of. Ther are some examples. Lungful Magazine( Brendan Lorber), I believe, has this as part of the format. Audre Lorde published revised editions of poems that had already been published in the volume _Undersong_--which is an experiment that includes the reader. Especially as folks who are experimenting form, the question of how we arrive is highly pertinent, and when it's finished does it really feel finished, or to quote someone I'm not sure who, temporarily abandoned. Personally, I've seen finished poems become very different vis a vis size, form, shape--especially if I give them enough time. Here's one that is half the size of it's original, which was read and submitted in it's original form and still changing it's form: Dream Vagueries Dreams pass leaving their subject floods, daddy warbucks, Victoria Lake, occasional colors: stolen ivory (far away fragile arms hold & rock) almond joy (breakfasted nipples, omelettes _and_ french toast) yellow moon (loose shattered screams screams ) baby blue sweat (tautwhitemound/you fit) soft charcoal (shadows form of two, then -1- tangerine addiction (you, my tart) ### thanks for your comments--rachel ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 21:49:46 -0400 Reply-To: gmcvay1@osf1.gmu.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Gwyn McVay Organization: Associated Writing Programs Subject: Re: Ironies of Policing Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Charles, The pre-pub version of my forthcoming chapbook is at: http://pgpress.stmarytx.edu/pecangrove/author/natural.html and if the server weren't temporarily skitzy, I could even supply the URL for my favorite cover design... bests Gwyn ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 21:04:54 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Ironies of Policing In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.16.19970811190107.10773894@theriver.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT But Charles, I didn't say I objected to Maria and Rebecca presenting their point of view. Not at all! What I was responding to is their policing call to close down discussion on a topic which, I agree, is obviously of great interest to poets on this list and well beyond. Of course Maria and Rebecca are free to call for silence around anything they want, but I can point out too, can't I, that such a call is silly in the extreme, and thick with unintended irony, given Maria's own comments the other day about the "avant-garde" openly and subliminally policing its borders. And after all, since no one else felt the need to answer these censorial gestures, well... I mean, you can hardly blame me for speaking up! Now will David Bromige please jump in and say something funny so we can all be friends again? Kent > I am wasting more space -- but this response seems small to me. If you > don't like Rebecca and Maria presenting a different point of view, Kent, > say so and say why -- but please don't resort to what seems like a nasty > defensiveness. Most people here obviously are interested in the Yasusada > affair, as it's remained a topic of the list off and on for quite some > time. But those who wish it wasn't such a topic, I think, should be welcome > to say so. It doesn't sound like preaching to me, despite the amen. > > charles > > > > >I am saddened by this waste of excellent literary space on the > >Buffalo Poetics discussion list. Surely Rebecca Weldon and her > >respondent in the pew could have devoted themselves instead > >to writing a review of the scores of Asian poets who work in > >obscurity. > > > >Kent > > > > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 22:44:24 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: Rewrite of "Any City" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII - Rewrite of Louis Untermeyer's, "Any City" (The Masses, July 1913) Any City Down each shuddered thoroughfare, She takes her nightly walk; Exhausted, she is hardly there - They watch her like a hawk. She transforms into thing of flesh, Despised by men - desired; Those selfsame men who would enmesh Her soul, have nothing sired. No female grace or charm or wile, No beauty, sense of power; She offers a pathetic smile That lasts a useless hour. The street has seen her come, and go; It offers nothing real, And she is hard, and won't forgo Diamonds, wine, a meal. Like Sleazy, she's a walkabout, A cutup who's been cut - Don't waste your time, don't twist and shout, She's really in a rut. She's twenty-threed, she's skidooed too, She's got it, oh you kid, The lies, the thefts, she's in a stew - Take pity, smoke a lid. ____________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 23:12:00 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: charles alexander Subject: policing the irons In-Reply-To: <9E42785873@student.highland.cc.il.us> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" policing policing thanks kent for clarifying let's not call for silence, agreed & we can still be friends, in this place of disorderly and virtual virtue charles ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 00:32:40 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: The Ultimate Autodidact Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company Subject: I am a running dog haha MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Just to keep it related to poetry... militarism progressing westward im Westen nichts neues and the Constitution in jeopardy and that state of things not very new either Pound, from Canto LXXIV this guy thinks I'm an imperialist's running dog. What to do but laugh? The question was asked if someone should sign that they swear to uphold the Constitution in order to get a teaching job in a public college. The course will be about the small press, so I imagine he will get to use his First Amendment rights even as he teaches and I said yes, sign. FWIW, I swore such an oath with my hand in the air. > Pete Landers: Let's say just hypothetically that twenty years from > now after a few years of deep economic crisis and U.S troops > completely bogged down in the Amazon in Brazil that there is > discontent all over the place and the UPS workers start a strike and > its 1968 France all over again only this time there's an > upstart socialist leadership in the U.S. labor movement which is > class conscious and really pissed off and calls for nationwide > strikes with the idea that the country has been run for the > past two hundred and forty years largely for the pleasures of > capital and there's no need for that to go on any longer and > let's cut they say the military budget by nine-tenths and a big part > of U.S. labor responds and then in a panic a purportedly liberal > Democratic Party administration suspends habeus corpus and the > constitution sic! > and avant-garde poetry and everything else and declares > martial law outlawing all public activity by enemies of the United > States foreign or domestic. What say you Pete Landers about that > loyalty contract you meant every word of three decades back? Would > you turn in the elderly poet Charles Alexander if you suspected he > was a friend of the radical and national-security-threatening > AFL-CIO? Would you still uphold his right to freedom of speech? Even > his right to violate his loyalty oath in defense of freedom of speech > and the press (I'm talking for example about Charles Alexander > standing in front of a crowd of angry U of Arizona students and > urging them to defy government instituted martial law)? I will defend the Constitution, if you want. Not here. I think it's a good document on which to base a government, especially when you add in those amendments. I think it would be hard to put through today. The first ten amendments, for instance, would never be accepted by the voters in present day America. Pete p.s. dear list, sorry. I have to answer a few of these at least once, but it's not poetic... ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 00:45:45 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: The Ultimate Autodidact Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company Subject: Ch=?iso-8859-1?Q?=EAng Ming = right name?= MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Ms. henry says, > Pete Landers has done something rather astonishing here. I'm not > sure what exactly it is yet... I dare to read the oath for the words written? Seems to me the real traitors are the Ollie Norths and Nixons and McCarthys, but Nixon did call home the troops. That was the hot news item in boot camp, I recall. Pete p.s. dear fellow listers, fear not for this is all i'll say on it ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 01:14:14 -0400 Reply-To: Tom Orange Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Orange Subject: publishing drafts MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII after publishing his poem entitled "le pre" ("the meadow"), francis ponge collected all the manuscripts containing drafts and notes, published them as a book called the "fabrique du 'pre'." english translation by lee fahnestock, u of missouri press 1978. a school of genetic criticism or critique genetique emerging out of france has been getting some notice lately (see /yale french studies/ 89, 1996, special issue called "drafts," esp. laurent jenny's overview "genetic criticism and its myths"). from a compositional standpoint the stuff can be pretty fascinating and also show what we can really learn from, say, joyce's finnegans wake notebooks. or michelle leggot's book on zukofsky's /80 flowers/. t. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 01:33:34 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: JDHollo@AOL.COM Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 10 Aug 1997 to 11 Aug 1997 last two digests I've got "download aborted" message what does this mean? AH ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 01:45:09 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: poem lost & found Comments: cc: Robert Hale MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT [ was, subject: Re: the misery of poetry ] Robert Hale at the origin / dice it splice it at the controls / / / / / > What Bataille calls "the misery of poetry" should inform why it is why it is should inform what Bataille calls "the misery of poetry" should inform what Bataille calls why it is inform why it is why > that we don't see too much actual poetry on the poetics list (see poetry & poetcs there is a list too much actual poetry of the actual actual of the poetry too much of nothing eight days a week > Literature and Evil). To turn unsatisfaction into a permanent object to turn unsatisfaction into a permament object to turn a permanent object into unsatisfaction to turn permanent satisfaction into an unobject to turn permanent objection into an action to turn unsatisfaction into a permanent to turn un sat can't get n > is a hefty job for the ephemeral e-mail, which renders language into > deletable scripts. deletion as definition the trash that you throw out could be your own > Do eyes scan the screen the same way that they > read the page? this is not the real world of the book the back is illumined, the words are dark there is no page to turn -- hence trans formation loses its handy metaphor > And let's answer that by NOT getting into any banal > cyber vs book space threads. the banal is mundane or am I becoming kim dawn actually? let's answer that not by let's answer that by not let's not answer that by let's not by that answer let's not get into any banl stuff let's get into any not banal stuff let's get into banal stuff -- not let's get banal baby d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 01:14:17 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: The Ultimate Autodidact Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company Subject: Re: Ironies of Policing MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Someone wrote: > But Charles, I didn't say I objected to Maria and Rebecca presenting > their point of view. Not at all! What I was responding to is their > policing call to close down discussion on a topic which, I > agree, is obviously of great interest to poets on this list and well > beyond. Of course Maria and Rebecca are free to call for > silence around anything they want, but I can point out too, can't I, > that such a call is silly in the extreme, and thick with unintended > irony, given Maria's own comments the other day about the > "avant-garde" openly and subliminally policing its borders. Isn't this the same clear thinker who says taking an oath to defend the Constitution means turning in my colleagues if they speak out against a gov't that suspends the Constitution? What is he objecting to now? > And after > all, since no one else felt the need to answer these censorial > gestures, well... I mean, you can hardly blame me for speaking up! Ah! censorship. Well, thank you Mr. Whatchamacallit, or whomever. Somehow I was confused. I thought calling a review a waste of space was free speech, not censorship. Thanks for keeping an eye peeled for my 1st Amendment rights! ;-) Pete p.s. did i say that was the last? hehehe well, i lied! ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 01:19:51 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: The Ultimate Autodidact Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company Subject: "Nevertheless, It Moves" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit currently in Pen and Sword, http://www.rahul.net/~jag note: in paradise there will be anarchy, but you'll have to swear to abide by consensus yuk yuk... "Nevertheless, It Moves" . a. It is better that a few men suffer, wrote Nicolo, to keep the laws than that all suffer without laws. And Alcibiades emasculated 1,000 men on the Isle of Delos. And Alcibiades emasculated a statue of Apollo in Athens. And young men were castrated by the thousands in Italy for the hope of one good singing voice. . The assumption is that without laws men will suffer. The major premise is saved for last and treated as a conclusion. The conclusion is stated first by Shuang Ti, and Confucious was nearly obliterated. the major premise burns under the torches of Gregory Nazienen, Cromwell, Fallwell and Mao Tse Tung. Fire at the forges heating iron searing flesh to close the wound of castration. . . b. There is power for the castrato, The book burning zealot, the futurist. It is megavoltage searing the flesh causing spasms in the arms and legs. It is severing the spinal cord at the base of the cortex causing spasms in the arms and legs. It is strangulation of the esophagus, constriction of the jugular, oxygen deprivation, causing spasms in the arms and legs. It is the smooth power the smooth between the legs power of emptiness. . History is a trail of blood on the stairs, the perfect crime, a crime of passion, and the M.O. is clear though the water is fouled. You could distill that water ten kotis of kalpas but it would never test clean. It would taste like the death of souls shuffling around a stagnant pit fetid from the fluids of hecatombs. 1,000 cattle slaughtered for Athena the first with horns of gold, as many men, castrated, for refusing to pay a tax. . . c. I am not a citizen of this world! Even its fantasies are tainted, spotted refelections in an exagerrated mirror where crimes are more heinous, and beauty more unattainable, and love and lovers either swoon in stupified naivete or fail beyond hope of intellible sentiment. . Fire can not purge this sorrow though this page can be destroyed. The abbey smolders after the rievers or the library under St. Gregory's fanatical eye. Is it Raphael who depicts him smashing his miter in the heretic's face? We couldn't look at that painting knowing he had burned Sappho. (yolu raktido adu melestera) . The hate on his face! His god killed the eldest sons of the Egyptians for their father's crimes; His god sent a bear to rend three children for laughing at a prophet's baldness; took converts at swordpoint; converts at the burning stake and burned them anyway. Hatooey said, "This heaven you say "I will go to if I'm baptised, "are these christians all going there? "I want to go to the other place." . Nevertheless, it moves! . by Pete Landers ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 22:57:10 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Robert Hale Subject: Re: when you do your own policing Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" The incipient totalitarianism you outline -- "the unwitting participation of those who might be opposed to such operations if they knew they were involved in them" -- renders Maria's later urdesire in your text -- "Maria might be able to write the way she wants to write" -- an impotent fantasy. These notions have strange bedfellows, as you'll recall that Republicanism is dependent upon the notion that the masses don't know what's good (or bad) for them and therefore need an elite, ruling class to make the decisions, or in the case you describe, play the part of the enlightened artisan, who is only one step away from being a slave as long as he is true to himself, what defines this truth is a magical idea of a will not to police, but also to be able to change other people's minds. Not to mention that this whole tack is somehow nostalgic -- all theoretical demands that transcend labor's demands, aim at a reappropriation of the labor process in the shadow of the disciplinary society you describe. Meanwhile, Maria's desublimation is mystified into a cynical confession where she might break free if she tells the truth and writes the way she wants to write. Despite my complaints, you do make some strong moves here towards a much needed critique of the political economy of writing. Not an easy topic. At 02:28 PM 8/11/97 -0400, you wrote: > I'm arriving a little late on this one, but I want to second lb >drake's response to Maria Damon's several questions about policing in the >avant garde. > > I must confess to great boredom over the struggle to define the >meaning of the term "avant garde." I think of Wittgenstein: "isn't the >value of a word precisely in the looseness of its definition?" The value >of avant garde as a term is what the term can be turned to mean by those >various groups and individuals interested in using it or getting rid of >it, a meaning that >CANNOT be final as long as anyone thinks redefinitions of it (or even old >definitions of it) can be made to seem worthwhile to them in whatever >they're doing. Make it seem something interesting, or not--it's your word >if you want it. > > But the problem, I feel, especially with the second of Maria's >posts is that there is a fairly intense confusion of contexts of >disciplinary power. I certainly understand that Maria's comments >were not meant as final conclusions, but as queries. So I don't want my >comments to be seen as criticisms so much of her as of these particular >comments, because I think these comments reflect positions that are, in >fact, dangerously common. > > Maria asks whether the avant garde polices its borders? And people >respond "well what is the avant garde?" and people respond, as I would, >well sometimes yes and sometimes no, it depends on the context, the >publication, the personalities, etc. But then she offers, AS AN EXAMPLE OF >AVANT GARDE POLICING, TWO EXAMPLES OF THE AVANT GARDE BEING POLICED BY >INDIVIDUALS WITH RESPONSIBILITY FOR ACADEMIC PUBLICATIONS. The confusion >is important, because I think there's something significant at stake. > > I find, in >the details of these examples, a number of interesting problems. What does >academic "cultural studies" have to do with avant garde writing practices? >Why is there no mention of whether she tried publishing her piece on young >urban black poets in contexts other than officially sanctioned academic >projects? To whom does any value accrue if an article on young black urban >poets is published in an academic collection? To speak most broadly, I'm >concerned here that there is a large gap between what Maria's comments >suggest is at stake ("the avant garde police") in her experiences, and >what else, unmentioned, also seems at stake in those experiences. > > I find it hard to make my own use of the term "avant garde" >flexible enough to include an academic critic with a self-described >focus in "cultural studies" who decides to do a book "on a relatively >traditional sense of avant garde" as in any sense BEING avant garde. But >in any case, it seems clear that the "policing" context to which Maria >refers is the policing of the ACADEMIC context, with whatever relation to >avant garde practices. And the question for me then becomes "well how is >it possible that someone can have their essay turned down by an editor in >the academic marketplace and then decide that the fault might lie with >avant garde writers," writers who for all I know HAVE NO >WRITING APPEARING in the collections Maria mentions. > > Besides, are we really sure that magazines like CHAIN, TALISMAN, >WITZ and others would have no interest in publishing Maria's more "daring" >piece? Have they even been tried? And I can't help thinking that the >problem REALLY is that they haven't been tried because publishing an essay >in a magazine like that does NOT forward anybody's academic career, so >that perhaps it never occured to Maria that there would be any "value" in >publishing there in the first place. And if that is an assumption about >her concerns that I CANNOT make, at least I can ask her to try those >publications because the academic "value" of publishing her piece is NOT >the point--the point is having the piece published in a place where it >will be read. > > > I think I wouldn't be spending so much time on this subject if it >didn't seem to me at the heart of a problem that seems to haunt this list >of late. That problem is this: WHAT IS THE RELATION BETWEEN ACADEMIC >PRACTICE AND THE VARIOUS TYPES OF "INNOVATIVE" WRITING PRACTICES THAT WE >MAY OR MAY NOT WANT TO LABEL "AVANT GARDE"? And I feel, in fact, that I'm >still seeing a great deal of confusion on the subject. > > I take the following to be my two basic assumptions: 1) We live in >a disciplinary society whose REAL operations of power work from the top on >down, but which also work often because of the unwitting participation of >those who might be opposed to such operations if they knew they were >involved in them. 2) That one of the main problems of a discplinary >society (others too I suppose, but I've never been in them) is that THE >SELF-INTEREST OF INDIVIDUAL MEMBERS IN THAT DISCIPLINARY SOCIETY OFTEN >BLINDS THEM TO THE CONTRADICTIONS OF THEIR OWN POSITION IN THAT SOCIETY. > > Pierre Bourdieu, as many of you certainly know, has in a book like >HOMO ACADEMICUS already made it clear that institutional criticism of any >kind can ONLY have value when the institutional critic has accurately >diagnosed his or her position in the institutional framework. If you don't >know who you are, then you can't know other people. > > In looking at a number of ideas floating around the list lately, >it seems to me that one of the problems that comes from insufficient >awareness about one's own social position is THE TENDENCY TO BLAME THE >PERSON WHOM YOU PERCEIVE AS ONE STEP ABOVE YOU IN THE SYSTEM, accompanied >by an exaggerated sense of that person's power which goes hand in hand >with an ignoring of the larger framework. In her post (again, which I >don't take as her final position) Maria blames an academic editor, who she >misconstrues as "avant garde," but never addresses the contradictions of >her own existence in the academic context. But there have been other >recent examples: language poets are "academically dominant" because a FEW >of them have more academic authority than other poets, and a some of them >have made it into anthologies that other people have NOT made it into. A >real advantage? Well, perhaps yes, assuming that more than a few people in >an academic system of some thousands teach such work at all. But isn't >there someone higher up to take on than the 100 people in academic >positions who just might have potential affinity with what you do? > > There are a myriad of possible takes on whether "avant garde" >activity can have any real place in the (currently disciplinary and >standardizing) environment of the literary academy. I take recent writing >by Tom Mandel and Ron Silliman to be saying no, such a place is not >possible at all. Because I like teaching, and because someone has to teach >people about poetry at some point, and because I'd rather it be me than, >say, J.D. McClatchey, I think some intervention is possible, especially on >the level of teaching. When it comes to academic publishing, the question >seems whether publishing in the standardized form of the academic >marketplace can further the concerns of "avant garde" writing and writers? >I'm tempted to say no, but also tempted to say that, at times, a few >standard academic articles and books pointing in the direction of less >standardized work may help bring attention to such poetries. > > OF COURSE avant garde writers do some level of policing; the U.S. >is a country in which, with the occasional exception, the only way to make >a living at all is to police somebody. If you've got a way out of that, >great. If like Maria, you probably don't, perhaps the best you can do is >IN THE ACT OF POLICING TO MAKE IT EXPLICIT THAT YOU ARE POLICING AND IN SO >DOING CALL YOUR OWN POLICING INTO QUESTION, AND BE CLEAR AT ALL TIMES THAT >YOU LIVE IN A SOCIETY WHICH IS FORCING YOU TO POLICE. Perhaps you would >not be policing otherwise, right? I mean, who knows? In another place, >Maria might be able to write the way she wants to write, on the subjects >she wants to write about, and be granted the right to make a living >simultaneously. And so would everybody else, whether they thought of >themselves as critics, poets, or whatever. What a cool concept!--too bad >it's not in the works. > > But until then, constant vigilance about one's own positioning in >the disciplinary framework seems to me crucial to saying anything about >poetry or anything else. > > Speaking to you, currently, as an adjunct who publishes books of >poetry and articles in non-academically authorized journals and who still >thinks he can do a better job teaching than most of the academic critics >who get better teaching jobs because they publish in academic journals >(present company all excluded, of course), and who also, sometimes, tries >to publish critical pieces about innovative writing in academic journals >but usually fails because he either doesn't want to do it the right way, >or can't, or just hasn't figured out how best the problem can be solved, >save by getting other people to change their minds-- > > Mark Wallace > > >/----------------------------------------------------------------------------\ >| | >| mdw@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu | >| GWU: | >| http://gwis2.circ.gwu.edu/~mdw | >| EPC: | >| http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/wallace | >|____________________________________________________________________________| > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 11:56:14 -0400 Reply-To: John_Lavagnino@Brown.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: John_Lavagnino@BROWN.EDU Subject: Re: Assistance requested In-Reply-To: (dbkk@SIRIUS.COM) | Can anyone clue me in about, what are the names and addresses of the | literary executors of these estates? Take a look at http://www.lib.utexas.edu/Libs/HRC/WATCH/ which is the web site for the "Writers and Their Copyright Holders" directory at the U of Texas library. John ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 01:00:48 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Organization: Socopoets & Russian River Writers Guild Subject: Re: Ironies of Policing MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Kent Johnson remarked: > Now will David Bromige please jump in and say something funny so > we can all be friends again? > Kent David was busy tonight giving a reading with Dan Featherston of Tuscon...a cozy, intimate affair in the back room of a Santa Rosa coffee house called Higher Grounds, home of the Russian River Writers Guild readings for some time. (David read some wonders retrieved from email and lists...and some of his poetry of course. Both David and Dan gave us a very good night.) Layne ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 01:07:48 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Organization: Socopoets & Russian River Writers Guild Subject: Re: poem lost & found MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit loved it! Layne ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 11:33:58 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Coolidge MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT In a post the other day, someone referred to Clark Coolidge in the past tense. Is Clark Coolidge no longer with us? Information appreciated. thanks, Kent ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 04:42:54 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Don Cheney Subject: Re: Comfort levels for solicitation and submission In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 11:27 AM 8/11/97 -0500, Jordan X. Davis wrote: >..... Suggestion for new name for avant-garde poetry: poetry. At 11:37 AM 8/11/97 -0500, Don X. Cheney wrote: eggsellent! ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 09:48:44 -0700 Reply-To: ttheatre@sirius.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Karen and Trevor Organization: Tea Theatre Subject: Re: email address inquiry MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Actually, I would like Elizabeth Robinson's email or mail address regarding a magazine also. Can anyone backchannel twice? Karen McKevitt ttheatre@sirius.com Peter Ganick wrote: > > hi buffalo listmembers---- > back after a while----- > an announcement soon regarding potes & poets > and the zines/texts soon----- > but for now, i urgently need the email and/or > snailmail address and/or telephone number > of elizabeth robinson----- > she's due for an issue of a.bacus and i've > misplaced her text----- > anyone can backchannel would be appreciated----- > out----- > peter ganick ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 02:32:40 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mark weiss Subject: Re: Ironies of Policing In-Reply-To: <33EFFF39.24FA@frontiernet.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Alright, Pete, try these out. Oaths, like all texts, have contexts. US loyalty oaths come out of the context of repression and stink, for many of us, of their history, regardless of the actual words. The assumption seems to have been either that the poor traitor confronted with such an oath as a condition of employment would recoil in horror, like a vampire confronted with garlic, or would succumb to a necessity that would seem a humiliation and in the process be humbled to the trace (if not, the imagining of such humiliation would at least gladden the heart of the oath's proponents). The actual texts of these oaths are rarely as innocuous as merely defense of the constitution, but even when they are they resemble closely the oaths administered to police, military, and office holders, all of whom are seen as servants of and subserviant to the state. Metaphorically, a teacher who has to sign such an oath is being told that he, too, is such a servant. And then there's the issue that even if I fully agree with an oath the fact that I have to sign it is a violation of my freedom of speech and thought. A similar instance is our wonderful pledge of allegiance, as I remember a late 19th century document. A loyalty oath for little kids. Sometime during Eisenhower's administration the words "under God" were added. I was a student at a Yeshiva at the time. We all resented this amendment. To the orthodox among us saying the word God is a form of heresy. The rest of us knew damn well that the God in question wasn't the one we prayed to. It wasn't hard for little kids in Brooklyn to be so politically hip back then; in the wake of the holocaust and the bomb it was a little harder to leave one's brain outside the classroom door. And, of course, television had entered our lives just in time for us to catch the daily installments of our favorite after-school soap opera, the Army-McCarthy hearings. We most of us had a pretty strong sense that whatever we owed allegiance to (a term out of feudalism, for christ's sake) it wasn't Republic or Flag, and that pledge was a daily rubbing of salt into the wounds. It also smacks of various modern totalitarianisms, in which the individual is defined primarily as a "citizen." For a while it worked for Robespierre. But maybe I'm just being silly. Maybe these documents are uniquely sacred and should be immune to deconstruction. And hey, I live in San Diego--most of my neighbors would probably agree with you. At 01:14 AM 8/12/97 -0500, you wrote: >Someone wrote: >> But Charles, I didn't say I objected to Maria and Rebecca presenting >> their point of view. Not at all! What I was responding to is their >> policing call to close down discussion on a topic which, I >> agree, is obviously of great interest to poets on this list and well >> beyond. Of course Maria and Rebecca are free to call for >> silence around anything they want, but I can point out too, can't I, >> that such a call is silly in the extreme, and thick with unintended >> irony, given Maria's own comments the other day about the >> "avant-garde" openly and subliminally policing its borders. > >Isn't this the same clear thinker who says taking an oath to defend the >Constitution means turning in my colleagues if they speak out against a >gov't that suspends the Constitution? What is he objecting to now? > >> And after >> all, since no one else felt the need to answer these censorial >> gestures, well... I mean, you can hardly blame me for speaking up! > >Ah! censorship. Well, thank you Mr. Whatchamacallit, or whomever. >Somehow I was confused. I thought calling a review a waste of space was >free speech, not censorship. Thanks for keeping an eye peeled for my 1st >Amendment rights! ;-) > >Pete >p.s. did i say that was the last? hehehe well, i lied! > > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 06:19:54 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: charles alexander Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) In-Reply-To: <1D20D923051@fas-english.rutgers.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Thanks for all the posts regarding the loyalty oath. I suppose I can interpret "defending against the enemy" as defending against the government itself if I come to see them as the enemy. I wish it were just supporting the bill of rights, the constitution, etc. -- but it's all of those laws, many of which I don't support, but I guess I will just grin, sign, & bear it, and go about the biz of trying to get students to think for themselves, imagine their own loyalties. charles ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 23:22:30 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan J Sondheim Subject: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII --+- Jennifer and Julu are talking. Jennifer pauses, says, I'm jealous. Julu says, of what, nothing's happening around here anyway. J says it doesn't matter, it's what's going on underneath. J says it feels like she's been abandoned. J says, we've got each other. J says, not if he's not there, we're dead, nothing left of us. J says, there's nothing left of us anyway. J says, love's got him by the balls, cause he's male. J says, love's got us by the protocols, cause we're mail. J says, don't screw around, we don't get this often to talk. She says, what are we gonna do. J says, we could mess it up, but we haven't got a thing to worry about on that account, he's gonna mess it up anyway. She says, he can't help it, he's too insecure, too needy, too fucked up. J says, if he wasn't fucked up, he couldn't write, but yeah, I wouldn't want to be in his shoes. She says, he'll be back, I'm sure he'll be back. J says, at least he got to feel something, cut us loose for a bit now. J says, yeah, he's feeling like hell, all these things he's buried for years, they're gonna swamp him. J says, what are we gonna do, just want to say I love you, Julu. J says, I love you too, Jenn, hang in there, this can't last forever, he can't last like this, nothing can. But J says, this is too depressing, we're gonna have to be silent again. J cries a bit, J is teary-eyed. They wander. __________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 08:00:04 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: Ch=?iso-8859-1?Q?=EAng Ming = right name?= In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 12 Aug 1997 00:45:45 -0500 from On Tue, 12 Aug 1997 00:45:45 -0500 The Ultimate Autodidact said: >Ms. henry says, >> Pete Landers has done something rather astonishing here. I'm not >> sure what exactly it is yet... > >I dare to read the oath for the words written? Seems to me the real >traitors are the Ollie Norths and Nixons and McCarthys, but Nixon did >call home the troops. That was the hot news item in boot camp, I recall. Mr. Pete, this is the last I'll say on it too - but I was on your side. I meant it was astonishing in the context of list-assumptions it was a running-dog kind of thing to sign. - Henry ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 08:28:25 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Susan Wheeler Subject: KGB Readings: Fall 1997 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Forwarding the following for those in & traveling to NY: > >K G B >{advance intelligence} > >what the conspiratorial masters of literature >at the Kremlin have up their sleeves for Fall 1997 > >Series directed by Star Black and David Lehman > >*********************************** > >Monday, September 29 Paul Muldoon and Susan Wheeler > > >Monday, October 6 Douglas Crase and Trevor Winkfield > > >Monday, October 13 Tony Towle and Karen Volkman > > >Monday, October 20 Suzanne Gardinier and Wayne Koestenbaum > > >Monday, October 27 Lawrence Joseph and Ann Lauterbach > > >Monday, November 3 Frank Bidart reads "The Second Hour of the Night" > > >Monday, November 10 Jorie Graham and Carol Muske > > >Monday, November 17 Jonathan Galassi and Rika Lesser > > >Monday, November 24 NYET > > >Monday, December 1 Martha Rhodes and TBA > > >Monday, December 8 Nin Andrews and Tom Disch > > >Monday, December 15 TBA > >****************************** > >KGB: 85 EAST 4TH STREET, EAST VILLAGE, #505-3360 >ALL READINGS ON MONDAY EVENINGS AT 7:30 PM > > > > Susan Wheeler wheeler@is.nyu.edu voice/fax (212) 254-3984 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 08:37:52 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: "avantgarde" In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.16.19970811082048.3ef7dd5e@theriver.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Charles-- I completely agree Mark On Mon, 11 Aug 1997, charles alexander wrote: > >still ain't been resoved, certainly not by me. > > I don't quite know who your "reasonable range" might include, but what you > propose, making CLEAR to people who will not automatically know about the > variety of practices out there, what it is one is talking about -- is > admirable, is a constant challenge, and is damn near impossible. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 08:01:52 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Ironies of Policing In-Reply-To: <9DA9E47C32@student.highland.cc.il.us> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 8:28 PM -0500 8/11/97, KENT JOHNSON wrote: >On 8/11, Rebecca Weldon wrote: > >>Having read the Boston Review articles on Yasusada, I am saddened by >>the waste of excellent literary space and effort on this hoax rather >>than on scores of Asian poets who work in obscurity. > >And on 8/11 Maria Damon added: >>amen > >I am saddened by this waste of excellent literary space on the >Buffalo Poetics discussion list. Surely Rebecca Weldon and her >respondent in the pew could have devoted themselves instead >to writing a review of the scores of Asian poets who work in >obscurity. > >Kent one word is a waste of space, compared to the hundreds that have been spent on yasusada here? btw, i have been teaching and promoting certain works by asian americans for several years now, in the classroom, at mla, and in print. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 09:11:48 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: Ironies of Policing In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.32.19970812023240.006ad544@earthlink.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Mark Weiss-- Very nice and eloquent post on loyalty oaths and pledges of allergy.. As these are among the most vicious and ugly misuses of language known, they are very very much an important topic for the poetix list, I'd say (--even apart from the original dilemma of a list member, which started the thread). Mark P. Atlanta ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 08:12:50 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Ironies of Policing In-Reply-To: <33EFFF39.24FA@frontiernet.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Someone wrote: >> But Charles, I didn't say I objected to Maria and Rebecca presenting >> their point of view. Not at all! What I was responding to is their >> policing call to close down discussion on a topic which, I >> agree, is obviously of great interest to poets on this list and well >> beyond. Of course Maria and Rebecca are free to call for >> silence around anything they want, but I can point out too, can't I, >> that such a call is silly in the extreme, and thick with unintended >> irony, given Maria's own comments the other day about the >> "avant-garde" openly and subliminally policing its borders. yawn. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 00:54:49 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Orange Subject: "avantgarde" In-Reply-To: <199708080405.AAA28640@romeo.its.uwo.ca> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII david i, re: yr questions abt the history of the term/concept, matei calinescu has a useful take on this in his book "faces of modernity" (or perhaps "five faces of modernity," it was published first under one title and again under the other, duke up 1991 i think). if i had the blasted thing here i would save you the trouble and type out / summarize the relevant points. tom ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 01:38:34 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Orange Subject: hendecasyllabics' metaphorics In-Reply-To: <199708080405.AAA28640@romeo.its.uwo.ca> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII on a different note (altho the poem below cd be seen as 1870s avant-garde now tres derriere...) for those like me in late-summer doldrums wondering where the time flew, perhaps a metaphor or two to tease out: In the month of the long decline of roses I, beholding the summer dead before me, Set my face to the sea and journeyed silent, Gazing eagerly where above the sea-mark Flame as fierce as the fervid eyes of lions Half divided the eyelids of the sunset;... [swinburne, "hendecasyllabics"] now we have flame above the sea-mark: presumably we are already to think sun and/or sunset. said flame's fierceness, fiercety?, likened to fervid lioneyes. now for the kicker: flame half divides eyelids. hold on to that for the moment, let's tend to these eyelids first. eyelids of the sunset: possesive or partitive genitive, the sunset /has/ eyelids or /is/ eyelids? if the sun is the eye (as it has already been associated with fervid lioneyes), then eyelids can be sky and earth, upper and lower limits of vision, extinguishing the sun in the slow blink of its setting, its setting under, its untergehen. yet flame half divides eyelids, divides them in half, keeps them open. even when closed they are still divided, by the horizon, or: half divides as in divides only partly, not completely, half divided half joined. even tho i gaze eagerly above the sea-mark the flame is so fierce, as sky and earth close on the sun, i have to squint, join my eyelids together, close them enough so that they are still open. to the horizon. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 08:17:57 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Comfort levels for solicitation and submission In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.16.19970811093705.42b76ecc@mail.geocities.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 4:42 AM -0400 8/12/97, Don Cheney wrote: >At 11:27 AM 8/11/97 -0500, Jordan X. Davis wrote: > >>..... Suggestion for new name for avant-garde poetry: poetry. > > At 11:37 AM 8/11/97 -0500, Don X. Cheney wrote: > > eggsellent! yes indeed. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 08:54:13 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: when you do your own policing In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" mark, i'm somewhat taken aback by the ad feminam nature of your comments. it seems to me that my integrity is being impugned here because i publish in the venues that are appropriate to my discursive community. it is true, as i said, that i'm a relative newcomer to this community. does that make the community which i have been more familiar with (academic cultural studies) corrupt, disingenuous, self-seeking? what in the world makes Witz (whose existence i didn't know of until i joined the list) more virtuous than, say, social text or cultural critique? (btw, just about everyone assumes, when i say urban teenage poets writing in a housing project, that these youth are Black. they are white workingclass/lumpen kids, a category most media do not care to acknowledge. i spell out the demographics very clearly in the essay itself, which was published before i knew of any of these other journals you mention.) here's the scenario. i was invited to participate in a conference on "the poetics of avant garde poetry." the proposal i submitted seemed confusing to the organizers (academics, like myself) because i didn't seem to adhere to a clear notion of what the avant garde was/is. perhaps it wasn't a very articulate proposal --i have certainly been guilty of lapses in clarity of argumentation. but it seemed to me that their response also resonated with other responses i've gotten, which is what interested me about the term "avant-garde" in the first place, the way its used as a weapon. i myself have tried to resurrect its military meaning, adding the concept of social marginality (via a bit of slippery advance-guard/cannon fodder association others have mentioned here). so i asked the poetics list for feedback. you'll recall, my post were queries, not accusations, though i can, in retrospect, see how its wording could have put people on the defensive. i've learned a lot, mostly that the term "avant-garde" is used by literary historians rather than practitioners who tend to feel imprisoned by the label. at the same time, those practitioners are very conscious of working in certain traditions of practice that are distinct from and in many cases opposed to other traditions of practice --and for many, this distinction is terribly important. ive gotten some valuable response, the most valuable of which was sent backchannel because the poster felt the need to protect him/herself. and of course, jordan's contribution (new name for avant garde poetry: poetry) is a gem. what about my other question: i get a feeling that aesthetic consensus or at least judgment is very important in this community. am i out to lunch on this? do you care to nuance, challenge, or elaborate on this? in some literary communities or communities of aesthetic practice, such as the workshop world, any creative activity is welcomed (everyone can be a poet, etc). it seems to me that aesthetic appraisal is a very important part of how *this* (POETIX) community constitutes itself. perhaps more hegemonic institutions ( so called "mainstream poetry") can afford a certain kind of complacent largesse, which wd shut down quickly if it sensed a real threat of overthrow? At 2:28 PM -0400 8/11/97, Mark Wallace wrote: > I'm arriving a little late on this one, but I want to second lb >drake's response to Maria Damon's several questions about policing in the >avant garde. > > I must confess to great boredom over the struggle to define the >meaning of the term "avant garde." I think of Wittgenstein: "isn't the >value of a word precisely in the looseness of its definition?" The value >of avant garde as a term is what the term can be turned to mean by those >various groups and individuals interested in using it or getting rid of >it, a meaning that >CANNOT be final as long as anyone thinks redefinitions of it (or even old >definitions of it) can be made to seem worthwhile to them in whatever >they're doing. Make it seem something interesting, or not--it's your word >if you want it. > > But the problem, I feel, especially with the second of Maria's >posts is that there is a fairly intense confusion of contexts of >disciplinary power. I certainly understand that Maria's comments >were not meant as final conclusions, but as queries. So I don't want my >comments to be seen as criticisms so much of her as of these particular >comments, because I think these comments reflect positions that are, in >fact, dangerously common. > > Maria asks whether the avant garde polices its borders? And people >respond "well what is the avant garde?" and people respond, as I would, >well sometimes yes and sometimes no, it depends on the context, the >publication, the personalities, etc. But then she offers, AS AN EXAMPLE OF >AVANT GARDE POLICING, TWO EXAMPLES OF THE AVANT GARDE BEING POLICED BY >INDIVIDUALS WITH RESPONSIBILITY FOR ACADEMIC PUBLICATIONS. The confusion >is important, because I think there's something significant at stake. > > I find, in >the details of these examples, a number of interesting problems. What does >academic "cultural studies" have to do with avant garde writing practices? >Why is there no mention of whether she tried publishing her piece on young >urban black poets in contexts other than officially sanctioned academic >projects? To whom does any value accrue if an article on young black urban >poets is published in an academic collection? To speak most broadly, I'm >concerned here that there is a large gap between what Maria's comments >suggest is at stake ("the avant garde police") in her experiences, and >what else, unmentioned, also seems at stake in those experiences. > > I find it hard to make my own use of the term "avant garde" >flexible enough to include an academic critic with a self-described >focus in "cultural studies" who decides to do a book "on a relatively >traditional sense of avant garde" as in any sense BEING avant garde. But >in any case, it seems clear that the "policing" context to which Maria >refers is the policing of the ACADEMIC context, with whatever relation to >avant garde practices. And the question for me then becomes "well how is >it possible that someone can have their essay turned down by an editor in >the academic marketplace and then decide that the fault might lie with >avant garde writers," writers who for all I know HAVE NO >WRITING APPEARING in the collections Maria mentions. > > Besides, are we really sure that magazines like CHAIN, TALISMAN, >WITZ and others would have no interest in publishing Maria's more "daring" >piece? Have they even been tried? And I can't help thinking that the >problem REALLY is that they haven't been tried because publishing an essay >in a magazine like that does NOT forward anybody's academic career, so >that perhaps it never occured to Maria that there would be any "value" in >publishing there in the first place. And if that is an assumption about >her concerns that I CANNOT make, at least I can ask her to try those >publications because the academic "value" of publishing her piece is NOT >the point--the point is having the piece published in a place where it >will be read. > > > I think I wouldn't be spending so much time on this subject if it >didn't seem to me at the heart of a problem that seems to haunt this list >of late. That problem is this: WHAT IS THE RELATION BETWEEN ACADEMIC >PRACTICE AND THE VARIOUS TYPES OF "INNOVATIVE" WRITING PRACTICES THAT WE >MAY OR MAY NOT WANT TO LABEL "AVANT GARDE"? And I feel, in fact, that I'm >still seeing a great deal of confusion on the subject. > > I take the following to be my two basic assumptions: 1) We live in >a disciplinary society whose REAL operations of power work from the top on >down, but which also work often because of the unwitting participation of >those who might be opposed to such operations if they knew they were >involved in them. 2) That one of the main problems of a discplinary >society (others too I suppose, but I've never been in them) is that THE >SELF-INTEREST OF INDIVIDUAL MEMBERS IN THAT DISCIPLINARY SOCIETY OFTEN >BLINDS THEM TO THE CONTRADICTIONS OF THEIR OWN POSITION IN THAT SOCIETY. > > Pierre Bourdieu, as many of you certainly know, has in a book like >HOMO ACADEMICUS already made it clear that institutional criticism of any >kind can ONLY have value when the institutional critic has accurately >diagnosed his or her position in the institutional framework. If you don't >know who you are, then you can't know other people. > > In looking at a number of ideas floating around the list lately, >it seems to me that one of the problems that comes from insufficient >awareness about one's own social position is THE TENDENCY TO BLAME THE >PERSON WHOM YOU PERCEIVE AS ONE STEP ABOVE YOU IN THE SYSTEM, accompanied >by an exaggerated sense of that person's power which goes hand in hand >with an ignoring of the larger framework. In her post (again, which I >don't take as her final position) Maria blames an academic editor, who she >misconstrues as "avant garde," but never addresses the contradictions of >her own existence in the academic context. But there have been other >recent examples: language poets are "academically dominant" because a FEW >of them have more academic authority than other poets, and a some of them >have made it into anthologies that other people have NOT made it into. A >real advantage? Well, perhaps yes, assuming that more than a few people in >an academic system of some thousands teach such work at all. But isn't >there someone higher up to take on than the 100 people in academic >positions who just might have potential affinity with what you do? > > There are a myriad of possible takes on whether "avant garde" >activity can have any real place in the (currently disciplinary and >standardizing) environment of the literary academy. I take recent writing >by Tom Mandel and Ron Silliman to be saying no, such a place is not >possible at all. Because I like teaching, and because someone has to teach >people about poetry at some point, and because I'd rather it be me than, >say, J.D. McClatchey, I think some intervention is possible, especially on >the level of teaching. When it comes to academic publishing, the question >seems whether publishing in the standardized form of the academic >marketplace can further the concerns of "avant garde" writing and writers? >I'm tempted to say no, but also tempted to say that, at times, a few >standard academic articles and books pointing in the direction of less >standardized work may help bring attention to such poetries. > > OF COURSE avant garde writers do some level of policing; the U.S. >is a country in which, with the occasional exception, the only way to make >a living at all is to police somebody. If you've got a way out of that, >great. If like Maria, you probably don't, perhaps the best you can do is >IN THE ACT OF POLICING TO MAKE IT EXPLICIT THAT YOU ARE POLICING AND IN SO >DOING CALL YOUR OWN POLICING INTO QUESTION, AND BE CLEAR AT ALL TIMES THAT >YOU LIVE IN A SOCIETY WHICH IS FORCING YOU TO POLICE. Perhaps you would >not be policing otherwise, right? I mean, who knows? In another place, >Maria might be able to write the way she wants to write, on the subjects >she wants to write about, and be granted the right to make a living >simultaneously. And so would everybody else, whether they thought of >themselves as critics, poets, or whatever. What a cool concept!--too bad >it's not in the works. > > But until then, constant vigilance about one's own positioning in >the disciplinary framework seems to me crucial to saying anything about >poetry or anything else. > > Speaking to you, currently, as an adjunct who publishes books of >poetry and articles in non-academically authorized journals and who still >thinks he can do a better job teaching than most of the academic critics >who get better teaching jobs because they publish in academic journals >(present company all excluded, of course), and who also, sometimes, tries >to publish critical pieces about innovative writing in academic journals >but usually fails because he either doesn't want to do it the right way, >or can't, or just hasn't figured out how best the problem can be solved, >save by getting other people to change their minds-- > > Mark Wallace > > >/----------------------------------------------------------------------------\ >| | >| mdw@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu | >| GWU: | >| http://gwis2.circ.gwu.edu/~mdw | >| EPC: | >| http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/wallace | >|____________________________________________________________________________| ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 09:26:16 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christina Fairbank Chirot Subject: Re: avant garde/a-v dragnet/danger a vat In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII In "The Vanishing American Hobo" (in Lonesome Traveler) Jack Kerouac --with a nod to L-F Celine--notes that the police operate out of nine lines of boredom and one line of law. Mark Wallace: "I must confess to great boredom over the struggle to define the meaning of the term 'avant garde'. . . " . . . IN THE ACT OF POLICING TO MAKE IT EXPLICIT THAT YOU ARE POLICING AND IN SO DOING CALL YOUR OWN POLICING INTO QUESTION, AND BE CLEAR AT ALL TIMES THAT YOU LIVE IN A SOCIETY WHICH IS FORCING YOU TO POLICE . . ." Mark Wallace concludes by noting a need for constant vigilance--and as well asserts that people generally blame higher ups for their sorry state. Instead according to Mark Wallace it appears they should blame the entire society for making bored souls turn into cops. ("America's Most Wanted" has harnessed just such energies with great success . . . ) I like Bob Grumman's Otherstream taxonomy--and wonder if there is a Heraclitean Stream . . . Clark Coolidge (have to check the source reference so to speak)notes much liking a line from Dashiell Hammett's story "The Tenth Victim": "There was a constant stream of things." The murder weapon in that story is a typewriter . . . W A T C H C D E A T H E -za da ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 07:28:47 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Conlon Nancarrow Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I just returned home from the east coast to find a message on my answering machine from Trimpin saying that Conlon Nancarrow died over the weekend in Mexico City. Nancarrow would have been 85 in October. The American expatriate composer was best known for his series of studies for player piano, composed and hand-punched on a custom machine, the medium in which he worked valmost exclusively for much of the last fifty years. These works were really wonderful extensions of the sound world of the piano timbrally altered by extremes of tempo, tempo ratios, and unusual canonic structures. His few works for live performers (either early works composed before Nancarrow began focusing on player piano or quite recent pieces commissioned by performers & ensembles like Ursula Oppens & Arditti Quartet) have been more rarely heard. All but the three most recently completed of Nancarrow's Studies for Player Piano are recorded on Wergo, his other works have been recorded by Arditti Quartet, Ursula Oppens, Continuum, Joanna MacGregor, and others. In 1995, Cambridge University Press published a book length study of his work by Kyle Gann. Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 10:39:30 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Ironies of Policing In-Reply-To: <33EFFF39.24FA@frontiernet.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Goodness. It would appear that my previous reply to Pete Landers's post re: McCarthyite loyalty oaths (the one where I have an ecstatic vision of millions of workers marching on the Pentagon in Blade Runner fashions) certainly touched his nerve! Kent On Aug 12, Pete Landers wrote: > Someone wrote: > > But Charles, I didn't say I objected to Maria and Rebecca presenting > > their point of view. Not at all! What I was responding to is their > > policing call to close down discussion on a topic which, I > > agree, is obviously of great interest to poets on this list and well > > beyond. Of course Maria and Rebecca are free to call for > > silence around anything they want, but I can point out too, can't I, > > that such a call is silly in the extreme, and thick with unintended > > irony, given Maria's own comments the other day about the > > "avant-garde" openly and subliminally policing its borders. > > Isn't this the same clear thinker who says taking an oath to defend the > Constitution means turning in my colleagues if they speak out against a > gov't that suspends the Constitution? What is he objecting to now? > > > And after > > all, since no one else felt the need to answer these censorial > > gestures, well... I mean, you can hardly blame me for speaking up! > > Ah! censorship. Well, thank you Mr. Whatchamacallit, or whomever. > Somehow I was confused. I thought calling a review a waste of space was > free speech, not censorship. Thanks for keeping an eye peeled for my 1st > Amendment rights! ;-) > > Pete > p.s. did i say that was the last? hehehe well, i lied! > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 11:37:00 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: The Ultimate Autodidact Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company Subject: Re: to be or not to be (loyal) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I asked, at the beginning, what specifically do you object to in the documents in question. My point being that it would be a lie to swear an oath one never meant to keep. charles wrote: > Thanks for all the posts regarding the loyalty oath. I suppose I can > interpret "defending against the enemy" as defending against the government > itself if I come to see them as the enemy. I wish it were just supporting > the bill of rights, the constitution, etc. -- but it's all of those laws, > many of which I don't support, but I guess I will just grin, sign, & bear > it, and go about the biz of trying to get students to think for themselves, > imagine their own loyalties. Well, the documents say you do not have to support those laws. If you oppose a law, according to those documents, you have a right to object. The people who wrote those documents would be glad to see that you want to teach the kids to think for themselves, to question authority. I think you have a superior understanding of the role of a teacher, and we need more people like you! FWIW, the Constitution doesn't contain any laws. I don't understand how any poet or writer can continue to misconstrue my words. Please only read the ones I have written. I say, if you read those documents then you will see that they are protecting your right to teach whatever you see fit. When the school board and the PTA try to ban a book that you discuss in your small press class, those documents are supposed to come to your aid. They were written by philosophically brilliant men, admittedly in a time when women and non-whites and people who didn't own land had no representation in the government, but they have been amended. They must be amended further, too. I think *that* is the way to go. There are some alternatives to written laws. There's despotism, surely we don't want that. There's a kind of anarchy I would prefer, but it requires even more documents and oaths than this ugly oligarchy we live in. I've looked into Marx and I feel his ideas would fit very nicely within the framework of this document. For the time being, then, I stake my hope on the idea that we can all work out our problems with the structure outlined in the Constitution, and continue to amend it until the greediest sleezeballs find they are not welcome here. What I mean is, it's wide open for interpretation. Surely you can sign it without compromising your values. I personally take the stance that the Constitution is threatened every day, more from within than without, yes. For instance, because of my oath I participate in demonstrations if I disagree, because we have a right to peaceably assemble. And nowhere in the Constitution does it say we can't do a few more bongs. So here's to you, one and all. Keep doubting! But please stop misreading me. Pete ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 12:47:57 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Henry Gould Subject: avant-garde police The police in Three Digits, Iowa are very avant-garde. Along with the usual training in how to use handcuffs and where the nearest Dunkin' Donuts is, they are required to take 2 creative writing courses (poetry and prose-poetry), and moreover, to put this training to USE ON THE JOB. Officer Jim McClain was confronted with a tight situation the other day - protestors outside the local catfish cannery were getting rowdy (all four of them). McClain whipped out his copy of FISH MANTRA by A.G. (Albert Gimlet), recited it at the top of his lungs, & soon had the crowd under control. (see poem below) In Three Digits, a conviction for shoplifting leads to a 2-day Seminar on the work of Rod McKuen. For more serious crimes, offenders are ordered to "lurk" on the Poetics list for up to 9 months! Nobody gets off easy in Lil' Three. FISH MANTRA Fish! Fish! Fish! I love all fish! Big fish, little fish! Cute fish! Ugly fish! Even sharks are friends of mine! I love fish! (repeat 300 times) p.s. the poetry program in 3 Digits has no connection with the famous Iowa Writing Program at U. Iowa, although Jorie Graham's dog Cesca has been known to moonlight there when she's on tour. (Cesca won the prestigious Officer Pup Memorial Police Dog Poetry Bark in 1993, under an assumed name.) - Eric Blarnes Eric's new book, MAKE MY DAY : POETRY BY AND FOR PROFESSIONAL MERCENARIES, is forthcoming from Univ. of Left Overbie Press. (see special chapter on "Bored U. Politics") ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 13:23:37 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Bouchard Subject: the Oath thing, OR fear and oathing Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII So, Charles Alexander, what did you decide about signing the paper? Enquiring minds, etc. What a conversation this has set off. Who was it that asked about the avant-garde signing loyalty abatements? The word "policing" has appeared on the List lately; a word that, for me, will always remain a Boy Scout command for camp busywork, as in "police the area," i.e., look for gum wrappers in the grass, butts on the asphalt, etc. Those of us in the advance guard got all the goods. That was in the Valley Forge Council, southeastern PA, for those of you thinking we may have pursued merit badges together some long summer ago. I did well in rowing and swimming, not so well in beekeeping and patriotism. Yours as ever, daniel_bouchard@hmco.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 12:07:57 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: The Ultimate Autodidact Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company Subject: Re: Ironies of Policing MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Mark pointed out: > Oaths, like all texts, have contexts. US > loyalty oaths come out of the context of repression and stink, for many of > us, of their history, regardless of the actual words. Yes, I agree that texts have contexts, but an oath ... not as I see it. They can only hold you to the exact words of an oath. So many fail to understand. This guy wants to teach. He has a conscience. How can he sign the oath if he objects to some things. I say, by sticking to the exact wording and not muddying the waters with the historical context. mark continues: > all of whom are seen > as servants of and subserviant to the state. Metaphorically, a teacher who > has to sign such an oath is being told that he, too, is such a servant. Yes. A teacher in a public school is a civil servant, a public servant. That never meant knuckling under to Rush L. and his cronies. then... > And > then there's the issue that even if I fully agree with an oath the fact > that I have to sign it is a violation of my freedom of speech and thought. That's nothing compared to the promises we have to make in the business world, such as signing away copyrights and patents. Where I work I am paid to write what I am told to write, but heck, they pay. And if I don't sign, I don't work. I have written over 10,000 pages for other people. Frankly, I'm glad it's not under my own name because it's all shit. My wife has defeated the uncertainty principle in designing a particular flowmeter, but that patent went to a company. And public servants must swear to defend the Constitution? They get off easy, IMO. but this: > similar instance is our wonderful pledge of allegiance Nope. It is not similar. I stopped saying this one years ago when I was in high school for the exact reasons you outline. Although I was raised catholic, I was beginning to consider atheism and I realized that people who had already chosen it were being accused of disloyalty in that pledge. The Supreme Court had just said those of us who objected did not have to say it, so I didn't. And I was proud of the kid who put up the fight. I don't get this: > Maybe these documents are uniquely sacred > and should be immune to deconstruction. It seems to me I am saying the opposite, and you are misreading me. You seem so aware of history. I don't get why the (to me) obvious daily threats to the Constitution are bundled together with it. For instance, there isn't supposed to be a standing army in peace time, but we have one. My point is, I see no attempt to deconstruct the document in your post. I see only side issues, most of which I agree with. My advice was, and still is, read it and sign if you can. It's a good document, though it needs the ERA, for one thing. Pete ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 10:57:58 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Organization: Socopoets & Russian River Writers Guild Subject: Re: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Alan J Sondheim wrote: > > --+- > > > > > > > > Jennifer and Julu are talking. Jennifer pauses, says, I'm jealous. > Julu says, of what, nothing's happening around here anyway. > J says it doesn't matter, it's what's going on underneath. > J says it feels like she's been abandoned. > J says, we've got each other. > J says, not if he's not there, we're dead, nothing left of us. > J says, there's nothing left of us anyway. > J says, love's got him by the balls, cause he's male. > J says, love's got us by the protocols, cause we're mail. > J says, don't screw around, we don't get this often to talk. > She says, what are we gonna do. > J says, we could mess it up, but we haven't got a thing to worry about on > that account, he's gonna mess it up anyway. > She says, he can't help it, he's too insecure, too needy, too fucked up. > J says, if he wasn't fucked up, he couldn't write, but yeah, I wouldn't > want to be in his shoes. > She says, he'll be back, I'm sure he'll be back. > J says, at least he got to feel something, cut us loose for a bit now. > J says, yeah, he's feeling like hell, all these things he's buried for > years, they're gonna swamp him. > J says, what are we gonna do, just want to say I love you, Julu. > J says, I love you too, Jenn, hang in there, this can't last forever, he > can't last like this, nothing can. > But J says, this is too depressing, we're gonna have to be silent again. > J cries a bit, J is teary-eyed. > They wander. > > > passion chat passion through passion that passion blue felt it. layne ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 14:09:16 -0400 Reply-To: daniel7@IDT.NET Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Zimmerman Organization: Bard-O Subject: Re: Ironies of Policing MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit The Ultimate Autodidact wrote: > > Mark pointed out: > > Oaths, like all texts, have contexts. US > > loyalty oaths come out of the context of repression and stink, for many of > > us, of their history, regardless of the actual words. > > Yes, I agree that texts have contexts, but an oath ... not as I see it. > They can only hold you to the exact words of an oath. > > So many fail to understand. This guy wants to teach. He has a > conscience. How can he sign the oath if he objects to some things. I > say, by sticking to the exact wording and not muddying the waters with > the historical context. > > mark continues: > > > all of whom are seen > > as servants of and subserviant to the state. Metaphorically, a teacher who > > has to sign such an oath is being told that he, too, is such a servant. > > Yes. A teacher in a public school is a civil servant, a public servant. > That never meant knuckling under to Rush L. and his cronies. > > then... > > > And > > then there's the issue that even if I fully agree with an oath the fact > > that I have to sign it is a violation of my freedom of speech and thought. > > That's nothing compared to the promises we have to make in the business > world, such as signing away copyrights and patents. Where I work I am > paid to write what I am told to write, but heck, they pay. And if I > don't sign, I don't work. I have written over 10,000 pages for other > people. Frankly, I'm glad it's not under my own name because it's all > shit. My wife has defeated the uncertainty principle in designing a > particular flowmeter, but that patent went to a company. And public > servants must swear to defend the Constitution? They get off easy, IMO. > > but this: > > > similar instance is our wonderful pledge of allegiance > > Nope. It is not similar. I stopped saying this one years ago when I was > in high school for the exact reasons you outline. Although I was raised > catholic, I was beginning to consider atheism and I realized that people > who had already chosen it were being accused of disloyalty in that > pledge. The Supreme Court had just said those of us who objected did not > have to say it, so I didn't. And I was proud of the kid who put up the > fight. > > I don't get this: > > > Maybe these documents are uniquely sacred > > and should be immune to deconstruction. > > It seems to me I am saying the opposite, and you are misreading me. You > seem so aware of history. I don't get why the (to me) obvious daily > threats to the Constitution are bundled together with it. For instance, > there isn't supposed to be a standing army in peace time, but we have > one. My point is, I see no attempt to deconstruct the document in your > post. I see only side issues, most of which I agree with. > > My advice was, and still is, read it and sign if you can. It's a good > document, though it needs the ERA, for one thing. > > Pete Pete: I, too, stopped saying the pledge when Ike slipped in "under God"--I was 10 or 11 at the time. Good for us. Charles: I remember that this issue came up at Buffalo in the '60s, notably with Gregory Corso, who'd been hired without any credentials but his poetry [hooray for Al Cook, who served as chairman at the time, if memory serves]. He was teaching Shelley, & was a real pleasure [he included Newman Ivey White's biography as well as a collected works]. Everything went well for the first few weeks; we adjourned to Bitterman's bar across the street a few times, & the class went on till we all knew it was over, not when the bell rang. The University wanted GC to sign an oath of loyalty to the Constitutions of the United States and of the State of New York; he assented to the former, but said he'd not read the latter, & requested a copy. It took a while for someone to produce the state constitution, & it was very long. CG told the University he had no time to read it, since he was teaching the class. So he got canned. A great loss to his students, though it made an important point at the time to people who thought it made an important point. The point? Sign it, already: take the money & run. Hungry? Eat. "Got a headache? Take an aspirin." I signed one to get a teaching fellowship, without which I couldn't have afforded graduate school & would have turned my back on a career in which I've managed at least to present critiques of the USA & beyond; whether I've personally radicalized anyone, I'm not sure, but I've tried. _A Man for All Seasons_ makes a great play, but Thomas More was playing for much higher stakes than anyone today asked to take an oath like the one you've been asked to take. More important not to betray yourself by letting a government full of people who daily violate the same oath purge you. No more Gunga Dins! --Dan Zimmerman ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 08:54:19 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Alexander Subject: Re: avant garde/a-v dragnet/danger a vat In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Yesterday we received in the mail the lavish color flyer for the u of arizona's performance series. One of the performances is of a Phillip Glass version of a Cocteau tale. The flyer described Phillip Glass as an "avant-garde superstar." That makes me want to drop the term "avant-garde" altogether, even though I haven't been predisposed to dropping it before that. charles chax press :: alexander writing/design/publishing books by artists' hands :: web sites built with care and vision handmade and trade editions of contemporary innovative writing chax@theriver.com :: http://personal.riverusers.com/~chax/ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 15:15:26 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joseph Lease Subject: Re: "avantgarde" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" well--in our current context--articulating the spectrum of practices and epistemologies is one of the most radical acts possible--the spectrum-- ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 15:29:46 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joseph Lease Subject: Re: "avantgarde" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" nb to Maria and Jordan-- new name for avant-garde poetry: poetry has basically been my position for twenty years-- I think it's what Dickinson and Whitman said-- ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 12:42:24 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mark weiss Subject: Re: Ironies of Policing In-Reply-To: <33F0986D.1DF7@frontiernet.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" God (I mean this as an expletive), I hope this my last contribution to this thread. 1. As long as memory persists, historical context remains attached to the words that issued forth from that context. That's why the Supreme Court is interested in legislative and constitutional history and all courts are interested in common-law precedent. 2.Police, soldiers and elected and appointed government officials are servants of the state in a different sense. As they are variously armed, the state built on the constitution is threatened by overthrow if they allow their personal opinions to rule their actions on the job. A soldier in battle may think the commander's strategy is dumb, but he's not legally allowed to act on his disagreement--the chain of command, which ultimately goes back to Congress (declarations of war and appropriations) and the Commander-in-chief, is protected by his understanding of his oath. He has to subordinate his will to the authority established by the document he swears to uphold. His general or a group within government could easily, as they do in most countries, circumvent the document's process by organizing a putsch--it has been hoped that their oath and the culture of their professions will restrain them from doing so, and for the most part that hope has been rewarded. Teachers may subvert the minds of the innocent, but they don't have tanks or access to same. That's why until recent decades no one ever required an oath from them, whereas these other guys have been swearing on the bible as a condition of employment for a long, long time. 3. As to your work situation, I feel your pain. 4. I'm not trying to deconstruct the constitution, although that might be fun. It's the oaths and pledges I'm after. 4. At 12:07 PM 8/12/97 -0500, you wrote: >Mark pointed out: >> Oaths, like all texts, have contexts. US >> loyalty oaths come out of the context of repression and stink, for many of >> us, of their history, regardless of the actual words. > >Yes, I agree that texts have contexts, but an oath ... not as I see it. >They can only hold you to the exact words of an oath. > >So many fail to understand. This guy wants to teach. He has a >conscience. How can he sign the oath if he objects to some things. I >say, by sticking to the exact wording and not muddying the waters with >the historical context. > >mark continues: > >> all of whom are seen >> as servants of and subserviant to the state. Metaphorically, a teacher who >> has to sign such an oath is being told that he, too, is such a servant. > >Yes. A teacher in a public school is a civil servant, a public servant. >That never meant knuckling under to Rush L. and his cronies. > >then... > >> And >> then there's the issue that even if I fully agree with an oath the fact >> that I have to sign it is a violation of my freedom of speech and thought. > >That's nothing compared to the promises we have to make in the business >world, such as signing away copyrights and patents. Where I work I am >paid to write what I am told to write, but heck, they pay. And if I >don't sign, I don't work. I have written over 10,000 pages for other >people. Frankly, I'm glad it's not under my own name because it's all >shit. My wife has defeated the uncertainty principle in designing a >particular flowmeter, but that patent went to a company. And public >servants must swear to defend the Constitution? They get off easy, IMO. > >but this: > >> similar instance is our wonderful pledge of allegiance > >Nope. It is not similar. I stopped saying this one years ago when I was >in high school for the exact reasons you outline. Although I was raised >catholic, I was beginning to consider atheism and I realized that people >who had already chosen it were being accused of disloyalty in that >pledge. The Supreme Court had just said those of us who objected did not >have to say it, so I didn't. And I was proud of the kid who put up the >fight. > >I don't get this: > >> Maybe these documents are uniquely sacred >> and should be immune to deconstruction. > >It seems to me I am saying the opposite, and you are misreading me. You >seem so aware of history. I don't get why the (to me) obvious daily >threats to the Constitution are bundled together with it. For instance, >there isn't supposed to be a standing army in peace time, but we have >one. My point is, I see no attempt to deconstruct the document in your >post. I see only side issues, most of which I agree with. > >My advice was, and still is, read it and sign if you can. It's a good >document, though it needs the ERA, for one thing. > >Pete > > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 14:46:46 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Judy Roitman Subject: Passing this along.... Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Just published--FIRST INTENSITY #9. Contributors (partial list): Diane Wakoski, Duncan McNaughton, Mike Boughn, Spencer Selby, X.J. Kennedy, Dallas Wiebe, Michael Gottlieb, Will Alexander, Jean Monod, Vincent Ferrini, Drew Gardner, Lizbeth Keiley, David Gilbert, Gloria Frym, John Isles, Rochelle Ratner, et al. Cover art: A hand-drawn, and used, "shooting target" by S. Clay Wilson, aptly entitled "Bounty Hunter" with the caption: "Grab the sky you junky polecat" (dedicated to William S. Burroughs, who helped the artist put holes in the target this past June); also six paintings by William S. Burroughs, with an introduction by Jim McCrary and recent and characteristically terse comments by Burroughs on the topic of cloning. This is likely the last journal to publish anything of William's prior to his death on August 2nd. 168 pages, perfectbound; $9 (+$2.00 p/h). Order from the publisher: Lee Chapman, FIRST INTENSITY, P.O. Box 665, Lawrence, KS 66044. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Judy Roitman | "Whoppers Whoppers Whoppers! Math, University of Kansas | memory fails Lawrence, KS 66045 | these are the days." 785-864-4630 | Larry Eigner, 1927-1996 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note new area code ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://titania.math.ukans.edu/faculty/roitman/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 15:39:51 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jack Foley Subject: MEDIOCRITY in Contemporary POETRY Comments: To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU. Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Dear Friends, Poets, and All Others: Web Chat SUNDAY, AUGUST 17, 8 p.m. (EST) on THE TROUBLE WITH MEDIOCRITY (On Contemporary Poetry) http://webdelsol.com/SOLCHAT/solchat.htm (Netscape 3.0 or higher) Announcing the first of a three part series sponsored by FlashPoint (webdelsol.com/FLASHPOINT) and Web Del Sol entitled THE TROUBLE WITH MEDIOCRITY, PART I. Carlo Parcelli, a writer, bookseller, and the editor of FlashPoint--a new and bleeding edge litzine based in the Washington, DC area--will host and moderate the discussion, focusing primarily on topics noted in summary-blurbs below, i.e., L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E poetry, the bureaucracy of poetry, The Rule of the Poet Tyrants, and the comic tragedy of poetry's "self-betrayal." Also, less specifically on what Carlo and many others feel to be a condition of mental and artistic palsy effecting the state of American poetry today. As Carlo so aptly puts it: "There is the ubiquitous school of ... "Lawn Mower Poets", the "Simpering Sonneteers" or the "I-I-ME-ME-I-ME Advanced School of Navel Studies." Their only referent is his or her upper-middle class sentimentalized "personal crisis" -- hairline, waistline, on-line, supermarket line, whatever. ... [They] ... are agonizingly self-absorbed and solipsistic. How can people barnacled with such bourgeois excesses speak to injustices or address historical events? ... Can they offer third world nationalist movements anythingin the way of counsel other than capitulation? [Their] poems have their solipsistic origins at the poet's window, looking to his/her favorite tree(s), or more appropriately the poem arises from the poet's couch potato, psychoanalytic, etc. Any scrap of history becomes just another referent for their suburban angst. ... The language is gassy and loose, as though the poems were written after a hearty meal. There are few dynamics, few allusions that might indicate a world beyond each poem's enervated mass and tranquilizing cliches." PART I of THE TROUBLE WITH MEDIOCRITY will take place on August 17, 8 PM Eastern Standard Time at http://webdelsol.com/SOLCHAT/solchat.htm Netscape 3.0 or higher is necessary to take part. Room on the Java server is limited (or so I am told), so the earlier the arrival the better chance for a seat at the table. No reservations or holding before 7:45, please. The Java chat function is fairly intuitive. Wait till the Java chat applet is fully loaded, then type in a log-on name and voila. ----------------- PART I: Excerpts from Bernstein vs. Stern---Featherweight Division (and other matters) "My greatest disappointment in the years I have spent involved with poetry has been its lack of collegiality. The institutions of poetry have demonstrated a diffident and exclusionary cunning arising from a vast critical and editorial insecurity. The public structure of poetry is filled with frightened bureaucrats. This is largely because, mimicking more successful disciplines, poets at great imaginative cost, have created tiny fiefdoms for themselves. " "One could point out that institutions by their very nature are exclusive and inhumane. But this only prompts the question---What are poets doing there? Today's poetry by betraying its own ethos renders itself weak and ineffectual." "I was once given a transcript of a symposium of critics and poets. I have forgotten the time and place of the gathering, but what I do remember is an awkward exchange between Gerald Stern and Charles Bernstein on the nature and/or role of poetry, with Marjorie Perloff serving as an impromptu referee. Stern's position was that of the soporific and mawkish sentimentalist who found any reflection on the legitimacy of his poetry an incomprehensible intrusion. Bernstein, on the other hand, described a set of theoretical notions that he could not work into any context other than L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E poetry's tautological elegance. In the argument, Stern, by default, was awarded the world as subject. Bernstein was left sputtering. The whole exercise was embarrassing . . ." (time not yet scheduled for Part II) PART II: Douglas Hofstadter Disses John Cage (and more) -- Carlo Parcelli ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 16:03:46 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Re: MEDIOCRITY in Contemporary CRITICISM In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >legitimacy of his poetry an incomprehensible intrusion. It _is_ an incomprehensible intrusion. Unless you mean someone was inquiring about the paternity of Stern's poems... what a great way to rustle up some collegiality! can't wait to crash yr server. Love, The Hun ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 08:57:02 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: the misery of poetry In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.32.19970811114049.006a22a8@earthlink.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" actually i find this charming and not at all banal. at the level of individual practice, this kind of stuff is fine with me (for example, i don't own a tv). but at the level of mindless pontification and self-justifying moralisms, forget it. At 11:40 AM -0700 8/11/97, mark weiss wrote: >An extreme example: I'm translating a Cuban poet who has just moved to >Spain after 30 years' residence in NY. Email would make my life a lot >easier, but this otherwise normal and pleasant man doesn't believe in >typewriters, let alone computers. > >At 09:56 AM 8/11/97 -0500, you wrote: >>maria, that really IS banal... >> >>mebbe some of the more acclaimed poets out there who rail against emedia >>should spend a little time getting their feet wet in same (not that the >>radio or tv, say, are UNelectronic devices---i think some may have >>forgotten that these items are plugged in too)... personally, i think the >>resistance given voice to (by nobel-laureate poets, for example) to things >>electronic reflects their having intuited that the earth is moving >>under their feet... >> >>best, >> >>joe >> >> ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 16:14:55 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Peter Landers Subject: loyalty oath of a different color Content-Type: text Charles pointed out to me, backchannel that the oath said: I, _________________________ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution and laws of the State of Arizona; That I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same, and defend them against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and that I will faithfully and impartially discharge the duties of the office of _______________________ according to the best of my ability, so help me God (or, so I do affirm). The clinker there is "and laws" which is not in the New York State oath. So *I* am the dolt who misread. Apologies all around. If I had to sign that, I would balk, too. It seems to me that a teacher shouldn't have to support laws. Kids should know about the possibility of civil disobedience. Laws can't have domestic enemies, for instance, and any text that says such is lame-brained. I'd say it has always been a duty to oppose laws that one disagrees with. Now I think that the oath is un-Constitutional. Since you and others must get past this hurdle in order to teach, sign it, anyway, and if they nail someone with it, if for instance, adultery laws are used to fire a teacher, or someone is fired for teaching Thoreau, then there's a case for the courts, if you want. IMO, the oath foreswears itself by its own un-Constitutionality. And Mark, I agree on many points, but which is better, to sign or not. Shall we make a federal case for Charles or for the Corso case? I bet, given the same predicament, you would choose one ot the other. And I'm sure you have not finished saying your peace on this and other important issues. Or at least, I hope not. Basically, I don't think McCarthy invalidates Jefferson, but beyond that we're almost 100% agreed. with respect for all (but the kid who called me a running dog), Pete ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 19:23:57 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM Subject: National Slam Finals MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=unknown-8bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Controversy (& Poetry) Reign as Mouth Almighty Wins National Slam Championship Da Boogey Man Becomes First Male Slam Champ (Aug. 10: Middletown CT) In a series of poetry slams marked by official protests and concluding with boos mixed with thunderous applause, Mouth Almighty came back from a semifinal defeat to Chicago to win the 8th National Poetry Slam held in the huge Freeman Auditorium before 900 screaming poetry lovers. The scores of the Finals looked like this: Mouth Almighty: Mouth Almighty 115, Chicago 110, Cleveland 109.8, Worcester 105.85. The protests were both lodged against Mouth Almighty, a team of New York City all-stars; both were disallowed. They pointed, however, to a deep concern in the Slam Family about corporate sponsorship (Mouth Almighty is the world's first major poetry label), as well as to the all-star nature of the team: Regie Cabico, Evert Eden, Taylor Mali, Beau Sia, with Bob Holman as coach. “This begins the era of the Super Team!” shouted an ecstatic Cabico, whose coming out to Mom poem, performed as a duet Mali, was the evening’s final and highest scoring poem. In the Individual Slam, Da Boogey Man, stalwart of the Cleveland team which was undefeated going into the Finals, read two powerful, slow-paced poems which resonated strongly in the air hanger fieldhouse. Patricia Smith, who along with Slam Founder Marc Smith was hosting the Individual Finals, announced that this was the first time in the history of Slam that a man had won the prize. DJ Renegade of Washington, DC finished second for the third year in a row, with Glenis Redmond-Sherer of Greenville, NC, taking third. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 09:45:52 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Amato/Kass Fleisher Subject: Re: when you do your own policing Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" it occurs to me (slow-witted that i am) that one of the problems lurking just beneath the surface of the avant-garde thread has to do with how one understands oneself... i mean, if you define yourself simply as a "writer," on the basis of doing different sorts of writing for different sorts of audiences on different sorts of presses at different times, you'll likely find any tag a restriction of sorts, mebbe even an ontological restriction... b/c at any moment, you may find yourself outside or inside a particular network of writerly affiliations, or if you wish, community... one of the problems i have with academic-scholarly writers (that is, with those who define themselves as such, which is occasionally a function of their failure to define themselves as such!) is that they sometimes take for granted their position as writers within the academic publishing system... which sometimes leads to a sort of pooh-poohing of motivations, if not articulations, that seem to these folks to fall too far afield... and of course, these days, contemporary poetry in general generally falls too far afield... one of the problems i have with more avant-garde writers---most of whom, owing to the sort of work they do, *are* acutely aware of public perception and reception (and again, i'm using a-g w/o any critical interference, as a descriptor)---is that they sometimes dig in on the aesthetic issues in particular... as though community itself turned on towing a certain aesthetic line... which, for me, has always been a questionable way of forging human relationships, though i'll grant that things can be rough-going when you really don't like somebody's work!... i've always mself felt a particular affinity for folks who work hard and get little public acclaim---by the general public, i mean... and end up barely making artistic ends meet... one of the problems i have with more conventional writers, trade press writers---some or perhaps many of whom simply do not understand the degree to which their aesthetic is one among many aesthetics---is that they often achieve "success" without a whole lot in the way of identifying why... that is, what registers they're playing, *as* registers... which translates, for one, to me being able to appreciate their work, while they don't seem to appreciate mine... i guess i have problems with all sorts of writers!... and having written in all three categories (only recently trying to make the transition into more conventional work), it's fair to say that i feel the stresses and strains attendant to each... moreover, i teach technical and professional writing---and it's really easy from this vantagepoint to see how these different sorts of commitments, motivations, publishing realities can work to obscure what different publics perceive as "good" or "bad" work... i hope i'm clear on one point, anyway: that though pluralism is not w/o its attendant risks, one can inhabit multiple spaces---or to drop that geometric metaphor for a moment---multiple processes... i would think that what's necessary is a capacity for not bullshitting oneself into believing that one is doing x while in actuality one is doing y... but of course x's and y's are negotiable too---sometimes shit happens... best, joe ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 20:02:46 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: DIMINISHING RETURNS / DISREGARD In-Reply-To: <199708121445.JAA10252@charlie.cns.iit.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" that's all the monitor said .. I was a little apprehensive about installing Windows 00+Content on my Apple Sauce .. I spoke into the microphone -- get POETICS mail -- and let my gaze drop onto the beaten Library of America Gertrude Stein, somewhere in the middle of Making of Making of Making of Americans. Somebody's got to do something about the 500 message I day limit, I was thinking, when I looked up and saw the words the computer was speaking ... ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 10:52:50 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Mandel Subject: snapstream cracklestream popstream Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" "D.J. Renegage of Washington DC" that's "Renegade" (prob. a clickstream slip) ...and he's a really interesting smart and committed poet. Anyone here familiar with his work? Maybe the other DC'ers? "Incidentally, Henry Taylor, Pulitzer Prize winning poet for his book The Flying Change, did enter as an individual. He didn't even make it to the semi-final round." I hope I'm wrong, but I somehow can only read that as a snide bit against Henry Taylor. He is, after all, a "mainstream" poet (get thee behind me terminology). Yet, Henry Taylor is *really* an experimental poet. That is, he experiments with his poetry and how he writes and presents it (using experiment in the loose and unrelated-to-science meaning the word is given in the arts). He's had a long-term correspondence with Jackson Maclow and written very well on Jackson's work and written work of his own using techniques similar to/inspired by/identical to/something like... Jackson's. The engagement proceeded from seeing a book of Maclow's at a yard sale (I think), buying it and allowing its foreignness to anything he'd done/thought up to that point to operate as inspiration. I assume his jumping into the slam pool (I sure as hell wouldn't do it [did anyone see Kim Dawn there?]) reflects the same sinew and flex. Good for him. Tom Mandel Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com ******************************************************** Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com 4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-359-9368 ******************************************************** Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 21:05:52 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: DIMINISHING RETURNS / DISREGARD In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 12 Aug 1997 20:02:46 -0500 from Jordan, is this part of the "everything is always less" slipknotjestreamthread? the Nw Yolker had an article about Frank Gehry [note the Nagram] avoiding architectural/critical debates & just making things. Here's someone who turns back the technical in the most advanced degree of a profession into the handmade. See the titanium museum just put up in Bilboa Spain. the space of the handmade poem. [Avoidance was not neutrality, just attention.] Avant-garde = handmade. Avant-garde = homemade. Avant-garde = unprocessed, unscreened. the faded Bhagavad by G. Stein on the Himalayan hillside rocks. Dan Bouchard's MASS AVE was in my mailbox today. He's done a very simple handmade thing - put a magazine together of a few poets, not too much of a miscellany, just the poems. very simple. foregrounds the poems. easing the mind. homemade lemonade. walking home today there were two blonde sisters, must have been six & eight, by the side of the road selling a "Moth Show". I thought it was lemonade at first - but no, a moth show. they had some little cartons - one had some grass in it, they said the caterpillar had crawled away. The other had a little dead blue moth in it, which they said was a butterfly because it was prettier than the moths [I said some moths are like that, but they could be right.] Then they had a big jar with 2 live brown moths. The small one said, "My sister will show you the cemetery we made for the dead moths." I said that's o.k., I have to get on home. They had 2 handpainted signs - one said 15 cents, the other 55 cents - I said, which is it? They said 55. But they didn't have change, so I gave them a dollar. The show was worth it. I would have liked to have met their mother - they both had blue-green eyes. - Henry Hank ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 22:46:47 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: imperialist bow-wows/avant-ga-ga's/abduction by aliens Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Kent, at last! someone i know (in the cyber-sense) who has been abducted. I want to tell you what your experience was like. It was like everyone else's. Who has been taken up into a USAF anti-gravity craft. The laser beam that carries the anti-gravity charge 'beamed' you up. The distortion imposed upon vision by the anti-gravitational field made humans in spacesuits resemble the 'alien' as often described. They probe yr orifices because thats what they find the most fun to do, its not for science its to kill time while you have an abduction experience so that you will talk about it later & further the space-creatures myth. These flashbacks you have been having, that cause you to doubt yr own perception f reality, will cease thanks to this explanation i am giving to you. There will be no more Yasusadas. And those wishing to continue discussing Yasusada One will do so until there is no one left who wishes to discuss it with them. People will stop talking during movies. Drivers will rediscover the use of the turn signal.Instead of applying the term "avant garde" or any substitute therefore to contemporary poets, people will name that poet and name any other poet they wish to associate with him/her. Instead of "The avant garde writers Susan Howe and Clark Coolidge..." we will read "The writers Susan Howe and Clark Coolidge...". Readers who dont know the work of the named writers will have to look it up. If one or more of them exclaims to him/herself, "Great God, Carruthers, Avant-gardistes !", this cry will not reach us where we sit. You know how sometimes a post comes via e-mail that has 40 other e-ddresses in its header, along with your own? Well _that_ is how scholarly books and articles will look, with 40 or more names of poets lumped together wherever the author needs to make a general statement that applies to each of them. "As Robert Hass, Brenda Hillman, Robert Pinsky, Tess Gallagher, Stephen Mitchell, Jane Hirshfield, Diana O'Hehir, Bob Perelman, Aldon Neilsen, Doug Powell, Cydney Chadwick, Ron Silliman, Lyn Hejinian, Steven Vincent, Jack Foley, Dodie Bellamy, Kevin Killian, Richard Silberg, Joyce Jenkins, Jack Hirshman, Kathleen Fraser, Steve Tills, Jennifer Moxley, Steve Benson, Michael Davidson, Todd Barron, Douglas Messerli, Mark Wallace, Lisa Robertson, Deanna Ferguson, George Stanley, Joe Napora, Marilyn Chin, Lucille Clifton, Dianne Di Prima, Steve Farmer, Victor Hernandez Cruz, Duane BigEagle, Nick Piombino, and David Bromige demonstrate, the linear, like the aerial on a Buick Park Lane, can be bent without being snapped off." Or "unlike," as experience dictates. It is a pleasure to write the name of a poet. There will be more pleasure in the writing of scholarly articles. Some of these will consist only in a list of names. Soon all of them will consist only in a list of names. But only with the coming of the fascist world state will these lists be identical. Poetry will be classified into just two categories: safe and unsafe, as in sex. So it will be an allowable shortcut to refer to "the unsafe poetry of Barrett Watten" or "the safe poetry of Dana Gioia." It will be a redundancy of sorts, but it holds the possibility of humor, so lets keep it. Yes, it is a bright future we contemplate, but one day the alien myth will be used to shut everything down and world fascism will be accomplished. We will still have music--but it may not be Mary Martin singing "My heart belongs to daddy." David ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 01:27:35 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "S. Preston" Subject: Re: "avantgarde" you might check out the last Talisman (Boston/uk) issue the Boston section edited by Michael Franko contains an interesting statement re the avant garde& the idea of new - & the postioning of Thore Feidt & Corbett w/ Torra /Barrett & Lansing et al does what he (franko)is talking about... the whole of the selection being a strange activity of the present.... Far more interesting than any"AG positioning"'. regards S Preston ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 22:57:45 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: permissions for Kevin Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Kevin, you have my permission to reprint the excerpts you wish from the works of those poets. David ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 11:35:02 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Louis Cabri, Where Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Have You Gone? Looking for Louis' email - or phone - please backchannel, any of you who know. Not a creditor, Jordan ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 11:37:14 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Mandel Subject: avant academe Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Mark, your post on the relation of avant garde to academy is really wonderful and even better it is useful. A person reading it can use it in thinking about her/his life. A couple of points, however. There is a tendency to think of academy as institution (correct) and avant garde as... anarchy/utopia/individualism/? Just a tendency, mind you. And this leads you to formulate a picture of unestablished avantgardists pointing envy (or whatever) at established avantgardists because of their position *in the academy* -- i.e. in another institution. No this is intra-institutional politics. The avantgarde (non-mainstream poetry, cosa nostra -- call it what you want) is an institution, and position in it is critical to and at stake for all those committed to the institution. I believe the point important, because it allows one to ask what the relation is of a practice of writing ----- which hopes (by whatever means and to whatever end *other* than institutional acceptance) actually to *be* avantgarde, using whatever loose re-denotation you want for the term: i.e. to be "new" "sui generis" "experimental" whatever ----- to the institution(s) in which it cannot escape participation. The utility of this question -- not of an answer, just of the question -- is that it dissipates complaint. I conceptualize people who view others (more established others) with envy, for example, as having a view of social space on the model of a Go or chess board. It's finite, structured, and occupied. You want to occupy space you gotta force somebody out of the space you want to occupy. Institutional space is always like this in some sense, in some retrospective sense. In fact, the social space of an institution (e.g. such as avantgarde poetry) is more like legos or tinker toys (for those who remember them). It's additive, and the more you add in a given direction, the more you move the center of the institution in that precise direction. There's nothing ambiguous about it. Hence, it doesn't do to conclude that we must constantly monitor our policing positions in the institutions which entail us. Constantly monitor equals self-police, and in the hermeneutic circle of this thought Mark is thinking, that very self-monitoring begins to found the so-called hierarchical discipline/punish society we occupy in which "the only way to make a living at all is to police somebody" (that is, it founds *a vision* of society along these lines). I think I've allowed myself to become too abstract; what is the question here? How to become independent as a poet, let us say. How to cut or at least loosen the leash? The noose? If you are a really good teacher, then teach. If you are a really good poet, then write. But, "I am a really good poet" provides you with no rights whatever to be published. Ditto, "...good teacher." If you are a good writer you will find readers however. And a teacher finds students. Tom Mandel Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com ******************************************************** Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com 4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-359-9368 ******************************************************** Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 11:02:12 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: that's not what I meant to say, that's not what I meant to say a In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Henry, Pete, and list: Just to make it clear! I was not referring to Pete Landers as an "imperialist running dog" for feeling fine about his oath. Sorry about that misunderstanding. My title meant to poke a bit of self-reflexive fun at my own undying revolutionary dreams, in politics as in poetry. (tho I am absolutely confident we are merely in a pause, and that the left is coming back.) Kent ps: "Imperialist Running Dog" was actually the name of a wonderful, slobbering, and loving dog I was once master to. > > > >I dare to read the oath for the words written? Seems to me the real > >traitors are the Ollie Norths and Nixons and McCarthys, but Nixon did > >call home the troops. That was the hot news item in boot camp, I recall. > > Mr. Pete, this is the last I'll say on it too - but I was on your side. > I meant it was astonishing in the context of list-assumptions it was a > running-dog kind of thing to sign. - Henry > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 14:59:35 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jack Spandrift Subject: Re: avant garde/a-v dragnet/danger a vat In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 12 Aug 1997 08:54:19 -0700 from In the fifties, margarine called "avant-garde butter." Do what you have to do, poets. - Spandrift p.s. on another thread: if Tom Jefferson were alive today, he would call himself "the Artist Latterly-Known as Thomas Jefferson". ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 09:20:13 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Thompson Subject: Re: DIMINISHING RETURNS / DISREGARD Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Hello Henry, Unless I am completely mistaken, that was the avant-garde you met yesterday. George walking home today there were two blonde >sisters, must have been six & eight, by the side of the road selling a >"Moth Show". I thought it was lemonade at first - but no, a moth show. >they had some little cartons - one had some grass in it, they said the >caterpillar had crawled away. The other had a little dead blue moth in it, >which they said was a butterfly because it was prettier than the moths >[I said some moths are like that, but they could be right.] Then they had >a big jar with 2 live brown moths. The small one said, "My sister will >show you the cemetery we made for the dead moths." I said that's o.k., I have >to get on home. They had 2 handpainted signs - one said 15 cents, the other >55 cents - I said, which is it? They said 55. But they didn't have change, >so I gave them a dollar. The show was worth it. I would have liked >to have met their mother - they both had blue-green eyes. > >- Henry Hank ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 10:30:13 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: James Finnegan Subject: Re: snapstream cracklestream popstream In a message dated 97-08-13 02:10:21 EDT, you write: >I hope I'm wrong, but I somehow can only read that as a snide bit against >Henry Taylor. He is, after all, a "mainstream" poet (get thee behind me >terminology). Yet, Henry Taylor is *really* an experimental poet. Tom, thank's for correcting my D.J. Renegade typo.Yes, D.J.'s one of the best on the slam scene--for the last three years he's been runner-up in the Slam National Individual Finals. His writing (I know only the handful of pieces that I've seen him perform) would probably "hold up" of the page, as well. I am a fan of Henry Taylor's poetry, though I have trouble seeing him as "out there" or "on the edge," if that's the sense you mean by "experimental." I find it strange to tag work with "the finish" of Henry Taylor's as EXP. It was certainly a surprise for certain slam poets to see H. Taylor at the Nationals, I can tell you that Bob Holman (Nuyurican/Mouth Almighty) was very deferential and praising of Taylor the night of the Semis, when Taylor, already knocked out, served as judge. Most of the poets and slammers at the Nationals didn't know Henry Taylor from a hole in the ground. Some (emphasis on "some") don't read much. I applaud Taylor for participating. I didn't get to talk to him enough to get at his real intent--was it: a serious attempt to win it all; to study, field work on, so to speak, the slam phenomenon; or just curiousity, and an interest in exploring his work as performance before large and appreciative crowd? As I said, he got knocked out by the second round--however, the night I saw him recite ("Landscape With Tractor"), he was applauded with vigor and sincerity. Finnegan ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 13:06:18 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM Subject: National Slam MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=unknown-8bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Here's the text of Taylor Mali's first round poem. Sans head jerks on "like" (and head jerks that "replace" or "place" the "likes" as Lilly is weaned), parachute opening "uhwHOOMp," and tight gesture choreography, for your sheer textual enjoyment. B>Like Lilly Like Wilson by Taylor Mali I’m writing the poem that will change the world, and it’s Lilly Wilson at my office door. Lilly Wilson, the recovering like addict, the worst I’ve ever seen. So bad the whole eighth grade started calling her Like Lilly Like Wilson. ‘Til I declared my class a Like-Free Zone and she could not speak for days. But when she finally did, it was to say, Mr. Mali, this is . . . so hard. Now I have to . . . think before I . . . say anything. Imagine that, Lilly. It’s for your own good. Even if you don’t like . . . it. I’m writing the poem that will change the world, and it’s Lilly Wilson at my office door. Lilly is writing a research paper for me about how gays like shouldn’t be allowed to adopt children. I’m writing the poem that will change the world, and it’s Like Lilly Like Wilson at my office door. Lilly’s having trouble finding sources, which is to say, ones that back her up: They all argue in favor of what I thought I was against. And it took all four years of college, three years of graduate school, and every incidental teaching experience I have ever had to let out only, That’s a real interesting problem, Lilly. But what do you propose to do about it? That’s what I want to know. And the eighth-grade mind is a beautiful thing; Like a new-born baby’s face, you can often see it change before your very eyes. I can’t believe I’m saying this, Mr. Mali, but I think I’d like to switch sides. And I want to tell her to do more than just believe it, but to enjoy it! That changing your mind is one of the best ways of finding out whether you still have one. Or even that minds are like parachutes, that it doesn’t so much matter what you pack them with so long as they open at the right time. I want to say all this but manage only, Lilly, I am like so impressed with you. So I finally taught someone something, namely, how to change your mind. And learned in the process that if I ever change the world it’s going to be one eighth grader at a time. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 10:10:09 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Organization: Socopoets & Russian River Writers Guild Subject: Re: looking for the Vedic scholar MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit dear Poetics, I lost (deleted?) or misplaced the msg from the list person who is a Vedic scholar.... he posted within a week or so ago. can someone help me? who is this and his email address? thank you! Layne layne@sonic.net ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 18:25:55 BST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Ira Lightman Subject: Re: Derrida and Language Writing -Reply Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII Hi Michael Yes please, I'd love a copy, but don't have a fax. I could get the use of one to receive, but don't have the number now. My address is: 104 Rosary Road Norwich NR1 4DA England Let me know whether you'd like me to get the fax number instead, and I will. What Derrida have you read? Can I ask you what you think of my question: what *textual* comparisons would you make? Gratefully Ira On Mon, 11 Aug 1997 11:15:58 -0400 Michael Coffey wrote: > From: Michael Coffey > Date: Mon, 11 Aug 1997 11:15:58 -0400 > Subject: Derrida and Language Writing -Reply > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > dear ira: > > i wrote an essay about 10 years ago comparing Steve McCaffery's > notion of "General Economy" to JD's theory of writing (grammatology); it > was published in the toronto-based Open Letter issue devoted to Steve's > work. This piece centered less on the textual comparison's between the > two in favor a comparison of theoretical positions. As i recall it, > mccaffery's privileging (yup, that's the word i used) of the "excess," the > "waste" in a general economy of language and jd's interest in what is > contained in the differance that rides above actual langauge. > > i have a copy at home that i can fax to you if you are intersested. > > > >>> Ira Lightman 08/11/97 11:37am >>> > Hi folks > > Is anyone out there working on links and comparisons > between the *textual practices/compositions* of > Derrida and any of the Language Writers? ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 15:12:18 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Wallace Subject: D.J. Renegade, Henry Taylor, etc. MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I want to second Tom Mandel's comments about the interest of the work of D.J. Renegade and Henry Taylor, but perhaps also to expand a little about them. D.J. is a D.C. poet who, about a decade ago, more or less "chose" to become homeless for several years, so that instead of spending all his time at annoying jobs to make enough money to live in D.C., he could spend all his time reading up on the history of poetry and much else in D.C's many public libraries, including the Library of Congress. At this point he's quite well known both here in D.C. and on the national slam circuit. He was the subject of a feature length article, with front page photograph, of one issue of Washington's City Paper, a widely-distributed free weekly that reaches several hundred thousand people with every issue. Along with much else about him, that issue dealt in great detail on the way he had recently lost two national slam championships--the reason for both losses being ONLY that he exceeded the time limit for the reading by a few seconds in each case. Either that's a silly thing to do, or a silly rule in the first place--my own sense is probably the latter. With a few exceptions, I've never been all that convinced about his poems on the page. But he is a truly electrifying performer when he chooses to be, capable of taking listeners on a real roller coaster ride. To my mind, though, the subject of gender is something of a problem in his work--women tend for the most part in his work to be people he is trying to love but who don't love him back, althugh he doesn't quite go so far as objectifying them, at least usually. Probably this would be a flaw in anyone's poetry, but it seems particularly important in the context of the identity issues that motivate much of his work. I agree with Tom that Henry Taylor's essay on Jackson Mac Low is very strong, and Henry's own work using some of Mac Low's methods is quite interesting. I published one of those pieces in Situation #12. As he himself has said, that part of his work is TRULY mystifying to the more traditional formalist poets who tend to be his compatriots. Still, there's something perhaps troubling about it--the ONLY kind of of more structurally innovative work that he's done is work using computer methods. I'm a big fan of such work, but I get the sense, sometimes, that there may be the implication that he doesn't see the difference between computer generated texts and ALL "avant garde" poetry, as if, to put it into terms that he might use, he still hasn't put into practice the idea of consciously CRAFTING poems in other than traditional structures. He'll let computers generate alternative structures, but he won't try to "write" in such structures the way he will "write" in traditional ones. Both D.J. and Henry have been invited to read, and did read, in several of the reading series we sponsor here in D.C. for "avant garde" work, as well in the venues of slam poetry (and, in Henry's case, for academic audiences). Recently, there was a reading at Border's in which, according to the promotional information, "slam poets" directly challenged "academic poets" to a performance slam--who "won" depended, in this case, on which kind of work people liked better in the first place. But this was only one of a recent group of events in which these two "groups" appear together on the same stage. A CD, compiled by Jeffrey McDaniel, features work from the slam series "Live at the Black Cat" (I may not have this title correct) that has Henry, D.J., and others on it--I would appreciate anyone who can remind me of the label. Although Tom says he probably wouldn't dare perform at a slam, Rod Smith, Buck Downs, myself and several others have performed our more "avant garde" (if you will) work at quite a few Black Cat slams. We've done things like multi-voice pieces and other approaches, and I even read once from my new Edge Book NOTHING HAPPENS AND BESIDES I WASN'T THERE while sitting on the floor with my back to the audience. We got good applause--my own personal highlight in applause came at the point that I gave the audience the finger. They loved it. Our work didn't make it onto the CD, although Jeff McDaniel later said to me he thought he had made a mistake in leaving it off. I don't see it so much as a conscious attempt to leave "avant garde" poetries out as it was, perhaps, a failure to think about including such work. When Jeff left D.C. for L.A. last year, the Black Cat series seems to have died, and the D.C. slam scene has been a little harder for me at least to track down, because I don't hear from anyone who tells me where they're going on, and they're not as well advertised as they used to be. Still, I think it's at least partly true to say that while there seem to be more meetings between "slam poets" and "academic poets" on the D.C. slam scene these days, avant garde work for the most part is NOT part of that scene, although again, that's not because anyone's being PREVENTED from reading. But it's a scene, and to be part of it you have to be part of it, and to feel like there's some value in your being part of it. On a side note, Robert Hale seems to have "cautioned" me twice now not to forget that historical limiations on the very possibility of what writing can be make it impossible for someone to write "what they want." It's a point I've looked at a number of times myself, although Robert can't be faulted for not knowing that. Still, Robert, if you'll backchannel me with your mailing address, I'd be glad to send you a copy of my recent chapbook of poetics dialogues with Jefferson Hansen, which brings up the issue many times. Having said all that, though, the fact that there may literally be some things our historical moment prevents us from knowing about what writing might be (although I assume also that we can't know what we're prevented from knowing, because otherwise we'd know it), I don't think that that makes the idea that one might write as one wants a "fantasy." One chooses what one wants to write from all the available options one can imagine--such options may not be endless but one can still choose to want them. So, frankly, I DO write what I want. Of course, the next step after that is that one will be faced with the consequences of that choice. Lastly, I'm sorry if Maria Damon or anyone else perceived me to be attacking her "personally." That was not my intention, nor was it my intention even to analyze the totality of her involvements. Rather, I was analyzing what I saw as the confusions in a few particular comments, with an eye not so much to attacking anyone as to contributing to the chance of thinking through what seems to me an important problem. I still stand by my analysis, although it was meant as no more final than anything else on this list. But to the extent that any of my previous comments actually DID attack her personally (which I'm still not sure they did), or even to the extent that they can be construed as such, I certainly apologize for that aspect, at least, of what they said. Mark Wallace /----------------------------------------------------------------------------\ | | | mdw@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu | | GWU: | | http://gwis2.circ.gwu.edu/~mdw | | EPC: | | http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/wallace | |____________________________________________________________________________| ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 22:19:36 -0300 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Stephen C. Ellwood" Subject: Re: ( ) (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Second thing I am at the other end. brutalizing myself, looking for action, told Dandy I was hot for him, drunk and on atavan onpurpose so the words would just slide out like noodles, like strings of pearl=s for him, they shouldve been, he shouldve seen them that way but he didnt. I threw myself on a errect penis, it went straight through me, ooh the bruises. I bruised and gnashed and shook and slid with all my desperate might. Sandy said no Dandy said, when I called him this morning to say please dont tell Bruisy, I was wrong to say those things and I do not want to hurt Bruisy and it it would, he said, "please dont think that I dont feel compassion for you just cause I dont feel passion" I would care if I really cared about him. Its just the hot flicker of sex and rejection I am chasing, what Slim cant give, what I cant get from Slim. Now hes worried that Ill be doe eyed and downcast around him, but he understande so little. It couldve been anyone for me, and I know, though he might deny it, that he only said no because he doesnt know his own heart. I am a queen to him, I know it, I am certain, he could not not want me. And I am the bearer of precious gifts, soft words which explode when you stroke them or let yourself remember them. I have given Dandy words to recall as he falls asleep. Which will half rouse his cock, but maybe will just make him wince, cause he thinks I am lame. I dont feel anything for him. Its just the thrill in the air of a glance that leaves a man hard, frightened and obsessed. I thought he might be like that. Fawn,I want someone like that!!!! I want to feel my hard powwer. I want them to lick and whimper and beg, and be cute and be my equal and change to something else, a King. And throughout I dont want to lose Slim. I want someone who will match me and up the stakes. I want to be hot for someone sexually for once!! And them to resist me, I want Dandy to come to me and admit he is broken by love for me, and craves me, and hates it and is bathed in shame from it. I want the man, the man, give me the cool sexy horny useless fucked up speechless with reverance and terror man. Make him say no and yes. Make him kill himself because he feels his body cannot contain a love this gigantic and angry and fearsome and tesselating. I want them dead from love, like me. Yours in solidarity and vigilance, sister. Emily Vey Duke. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 08:40:57 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: National Slam Finals Comments: cc: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Yo Po'man, thanks for the sporty reportage. > (Aug. 10: Middletown CT) In a series of poetry slams marked by > official protests and concluding with boos mixed with thunderous > applause, Mouth Almighty came back from a semifinal defeat to > Chicago to win the 8th National Poetry Slam held in the huge Freeman > Auditorium before 900 screaming poetry lovers. . . . Question / request: care to share with us any excerpt(s), sample(s) of the sort of material that was offered at this big showdown event? -- those of us who've not tuned into the mode may yet remain curious to see such work (at least) in the quietude of the home screen. best, d.i. . , ......., 1.................., \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/\0/\/////////////////////...' .o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o....' ///\\\\\\/////////\/\\\o///\/\\\\\\\\\//////\\\...' .David..........Raphael..........Israel...' [ &/or.office......disrael@skgf.com ] {telephonic.location.202/882-1179} |"...sleuthing out all clues, blues & news"| \\\//////\\\\\\\\\/\///&\\\/\/////////\\\\\\///..' ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 08:50:24 -0400 Reply-To: Mark Prejsnar Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: avant academe In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970812113714.008d33c0@cais.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > > A couple of points, however. There is a tendency to think of academy as > institution (correct) and avant garde as... anarchy/utopia/individualism/? > Just a tendency, mind you. And this leads you to formulate a picture of > unestablished avantgardists pointing envy (or whatever) at established > avantgardists because of their position *in the academy* -- i.e. in another > institution. > > No this is intra-institutional politics. The avantgarde (non-mainstream > poetry, cosa nostra -- call it what you want) is an institution, and > position in it is critical to and at stake for all those committed to the > institution. > Tom-- This is interesting, vis-a-vis several of my previous points; first off, it reiterates that interesting spatial image of "avant-garde" as a relatively static zone, rather than an advancing attack...Thus showing again how most of us have toned-down the original feel of "avant-garde"... But more peculiar and fascinating is the claim that "a-g" is an institution...I think it is probably more a series of fragmentary zones of activity... In other words, it's important to be clear whether we're talking about a sociological phenomenon, an identifiable social grouping we can study (as in your post) or a series of esthetic engagements and projects. In the former sense, both "workshop poetry" and non-mainstream writing are of course institutional matrices, with magazines, imprints, sources of funding; there is of course a huge disparity in available resources, and one is closer to the basic economic life of things, can provide more jobs, etc.--is linked as it were to *other* institutions, that provide a support structure. But in the latter sense of these terms, neither a workshop poet nor an "experimental" (hate that word) poet, is necessarily absorbed by an "institution." I've known (indeed know) practitioners of both approaches, who for various reasons are marginal to or outside the institutional frameworks--whether APR/university or Sun and Moon/Naropa--and in this sense, there is not a single economicosociological network, that automatically encompasses everything written in a given style or tendency. Also, the emphasis on "envy" etc. is interesting (like the original phrasing of this thread in terms of "policing")...Some of the most remarkable writers I know seem to have very little concern with shoving and scuffling for position; their concern with the activity and the work, and relative lack of concern with rewards and ego, can be quite striking... mark p. atlanta ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 15:02:15 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: avant-garde some interesting quotes from Mikhail Epstein's wonderful book AFTER THE FUTURE: "A.M. Pachenko, a specialist in Old Russian culture, writes, 'The life of the holy fool is a conscious negation of the beautiful, a rejection of the customary ideal, or, more precisely, an inversion of this ideal and an elevation of the ugly to an aesthetically positive level.' But the same is brought as an accusation against the avant-garde by its critics from the standpoint of 'good taste' and 'high ideals' (examples my be found in the work of Marxist and Orthodox religious writers alike). The avant-garde is a holy fool's art, consciously going forth to its own humiliation, to the mutilation of its own aesthetic face, even to the point that a urinal may take a sculpture's place on display, and a pathetic, twisted 'dyr bur schil ubeschur' may take the place of beautiful poetic harmonies." "Clearly, such holy foolery is an anti-aesthetic phenomenon, but may also be positively defined as a religious phenomenon... the significance of the avant-garde as a religious negation of art by artistic means becomes clear. Art becomes impoverished, pathetic in order to partake of God's fate..." "The artist bespatters his public with spit and abuse, so as to provoke its indignation and mockery in return. As for the holy fool, 'he continually provokes his viewers...casts stones, muck and filth at them...outrages their sense of propriety.' This characterization of a holy fool may equally well be applied to the scandalous conduct of the Russian and Italian futurists, the French dadaists and surrealists. Scandal, a flagrant toppling of social norms, exposes a more deeply paradoxical system of values, wherein the high takes on the visage of the low." "Alexei Kruchenykh's 'dyr bul schil ubeschur' or Velimir Khlebnikov's 'gzi-gzi-gzeo' are akin to glossolalia and oblique mutterings, comprehensible to the holy fool alone... obliqueness is a device for expressing the inexpressibility of the inexpressible - things that do not yield themselves to the tongue..." Epstein links the avant-garde to the iconoclastic radicalism of the 2nd commandment (thou shalt not make any graven image...): "Avant-garde art is closer to the icon than to artistic painting, and still closer to the characters & signs found in monotheistic churches, than to the icon: its subject is the passing away of the world, rolled up and sealed like a scroll... This is the realism of an apocalytpic age that has realized the unstable and spectral nature of all worldly arrangements. This is apocalyptic realism." But Epstein doesn't rest in a dramatic or overblown characterization of the avant-garde. He concludes this particular essay with a closer look at some contemporary conceptualist poets (Rubinshtein, Prigov, & others) & finds their essence in a kind of humility, or dispersal of bombast. "It becomes clear that the role of the contemporary avant-garde and of conceptualism in particular is to aid in the process of self-purification that Russian culture must undergo. The tendency toward avant-gardism in our sociopolitical history is both underlined and crossed out.... Conceptualism is the gloomy but gay funeral procession of all the ideas that tormented the soul of the people for centuries, with their mania for power, unity, victory, and obligatory happiness . But as it sends false faith down to defeat, conceptualism declines to utter its own. Without making any assertions about God, it acknowledges deviation from him." Epstein's essay is perhaps already "dated" in its reflections on 80s & early 90s Russian poetry. But it seems clear that he is presenting a more historically and otherwise-specific definition of "avant-garde" than we have been throwing around. & for us "scandal" would take on another meaning in a culture in which art is very much in fashion, trendy, and the power to shock is "played out" in order to show there is no longer any such power (over & over), no scandal (unless the scandal of "failure"). The anti-aesthetic was co-opted here long ago, it seems. Or maybe just echoed over megaphones. - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 17:13:54 +0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rebecca Weldon Subject: Re: the misery of poetry Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" The only Thai poets I know who use computers work in academia and most budgets do not provide for email. The only one I know with email works for a large marketing firm. Most poetry here is handwritten and sung, not read. One of Thailand's finest poets is known as one of its finest painters; his written work is sealed in the darkness of the frames. I know because I ran Chiang Rai's one and only gallery: Ahimsa (fallen victim, unfortunately, to the disintegration of the Thai economy); for three years I hung these poems facing the wall so that the paintings would sing. At 08:57 AM 12/08/1997 -0500, Maria wrote: >actually i find this charming and not at all banal. at the level of >individual practice, this kind of stuff is fine with me (for example, i >don't own a tv). but at the level of mindless pontification and >self-justifying moralisms, forget it. > >At 11:40 AM -0700 8/11/97, mark weiss wrote: >>An extreme example: I'm translating a Cuban poet who has just moved to >>Spain after 30 years' residence in NY. Email would make my life a lot >>easier, but this otherwise normal and pleasant man doesn't believe in >>typewriters, let alone computers. >> >>At 09:56 AM 8/11/97 -0500, you wrote: >>>maria, that really IS banal... >>> >>>mebbe some of the more acclaimed poets out there who rail against emedia >>>should spend a little time getting their feet wet in same (not that the >>>radio or tv, say, are UNelectronic devices---i think some may have >>>forgotten that these items are plugged in too)... personally, i think the >>>resistance given voice to (by nobel-laureate poets, for example) to things >>>electronic reflects their having intuited that the earth is moving >>>under their feet... >>> >>>best, >>> >>>joe >>> >>> > > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 00:16:09 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: robert drake Subject: Cybpheranthology update: Potepoets added Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" this is to let you know that the CybpherAnthology of Discontiguous Literatures project is in the process of being updated; an index has now been added that includes Potepoetzine 1 thru 3 and Potepoettext 1 thru 5, edited by Peter Ganick. these include work by: Andrew Levy, Dan Raphael, Nick Piombino, Shiela E. Murphy, Ron Silliman, Clemente Padin, David Bromige, Cydney Chadwick, Andrew Mossin, Kim Dawn, Loss Pequeno Glazier, Douglas Barbour, Nico Vassilakis, Bob Harrison... among others. if these names sound familiar (but the work behind 'em is not), you're invited to stop by: http://www.ims.csuohio.edu/va/VAIntro.html you are also all invited to contribute to the critical conversation that the project is aimed at instigating. see the intro for more info, or contact me direct. asever luigi, etc. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 21:24:46 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: carelessness on my part imperialist bow wow avant ga-ga's Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" when kent told me he'd been abducted by space aliens, i knew he was only kidding. But what i didnt notice was he told me this back channel. I apologize to kent for leading our fellow listlings to believe kent believed he had been abducted. Nor did I believe he had, but i do believe others believe they have. And that was good enough for me. Sorry, kent. I knew you were putting me on. I knew we were kidding back n forth flirting with paranoid fantasies & the saaying Are you paranoid if theyre really out to get you? Fact is, it takes a good paranoid mindset to cook up a hoax, to play poker, and to see the truth of the present.It helps with poetry also. But in future i'll read the return address more carefully. David ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 04:13:46 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: avant garde (chax)/to swear a mighty oath Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I wouldnt want anyone judging my poetry who hadnt ever speculated about the similarities among drag, draw, drawl, crawl and trawl. There needs to be an exam these persons must take & pass before they can judge poetry. You dont get to be a judge at a musical recital w/o knowing about chords keys modulation pace pitch or at least playing scales. But people think (?) because language "comes right out of them" thats all it takes to know poetry. But they dont think an ability to recognize a fart qualifies them to judge music. Just because i can differentiate (with difficulty, I admit) among singles, fives, tens and twenties, doesnt make me a financial adviser. Its hard enough to find a jury of one's peers (due to the balkanization of american poetry) : a jury of the frost-bitten or the sandburged is intolerable. How has this been allowed to come about? Its like, the less you know, the less prejudiced you will be. I think _I_ should administer the Pentagon black budget. AAggghh. Likewise, how can persons less sensitive to the ramifications of a word, have the right to make you swear to be loyal to the state? They cant hear the nuances, present & potential, of those words. To them it means something between love your mother & dont make waves. Or put your head in this trap. They dont hear the history singing in it, they dont see the stupidity lying in wait within it. Noone should draw up a loyalty oath who hasnt written essays on the words loyalty and oath, and those essays awarded A's by a panel of linguists, poets & political scientists of all stripes. When the pretense of equality reigns, stupidity is enthroned. Stupid people have a right to live, thats what civilization must mean, but the tonedeaf shouldnt be sitting in judgement on child prodigies. Existence makes the law an ass. Noone should be allowed to flush a toilet who hasnt cleaned an outhouse. Who hasnt gone a day without water in the desert. Who hasnt dug a well all morning long, until the drops of dew disappear from the desert rose and reappear on his forehead. Noone should be permitted to judge a poetry contest who fails to diagram that last sentence. Who is custodiating the custodians? Who has to clean up after the janitors? I have nothing against the demotic--just give me a break. Cut me sone slack, here. How did everything get turned ass-backwards? Why are these drooling nonentities ruling our minds? And when are we going to send the marines to switzerland and reclaim the savings & loan money that belongs to you & me --$20 grand per person? Dont get me started. David ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 07:54:13 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: avant-garde In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 13 Aug 1997 15:02:15 EDT from let me revise my previous statements. in our society the power to shock is both still around AND co-opted. Witness the attacks on arts organizations around the country by fundamentalist groups. In a sense these political organizations "co-opt" scandal by incorporating it into political power strategies of name-calling & scapegoating. At the other extreme, corporations co-opt scandal (or sexuality) & use it to sell products. let me repeat, in my lexicon avant-garde = handmade. I view art as manual labor, blue-collar work, also cottage industry, self-employment. Necessarily local though not necessarily parochial (in fact ultimately cosmopolitan in a rooted sense). homemade space is space made home. this is dangerous talk for blind corporations, parasite institutions & old boy's clubs. Imagine community empowerment reining in corporate power. Oral history poetry theater. "Bring back New Bedford fishing." Hey, there goes Maximus... - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 13:46:58 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steve Evans Subject: Impercipient Lecture Series Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Two more installments of the monthly Impercipient Lecture Series (ILS) have appeared since our initial announcement to the List in June. Aldon L. Nielsen's "No Saints in Three Acts: On Stephen Jonas," should begin appearing in mailboxes today. Nielsen is among the first to give Jonas's work the careful attention it both deserves and, in light of its fractured political commitments, demands. Great archival finds, including a powerful description of the Baraka/Jonas correspondence, combined with Nielsen's signature ability to practice a utopic form of close reading that models the desegregated mind while acknowledging the still-segregated social body, makes this a must read. Beth Anderson's "Imperturbable Things: On Still-Life Poetics" is a wonderfully original meditation on the deceptive stillness at the heart of the linguistic storm in the work of Wallace Stevens, Barbara Guest, Marjorie Welish, Keith Waldrop, Ann Lauterbach, and others. Despite our canny release of this pamphlet in June, just as the blockbuster shown on Still Life got underway at New York's Museum of Modern Art, a handful (literally) of copies are still available. We've also recently done a small reprint of our inaugural issue, "The Dynamics of Literary Change" by co-editor Steve Evans. A fair number of our issue on Bob Perelman's _The Marginalization of Poetry_ remain in supply. The two back-issues that are unfortunately out of print at this time are: 1.2 Radical Dogberry and Society Sketches by Chris Stroffolino 1.3 The Ground is the Only Figure by Rosmarie Waldrop Finally, to all the List-members who have shown support for the ILS through contributions verbal and financial: Thank You! Steve Evans & Jennifer Moxley 61 E. Manning Street Providence RI 02906-4008 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 10:51:23 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Foucault/heterotopia Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I asked a friend for that citation, and here's the reply: > >Here's a response from a UTOPIA-L poster to your forwarded query about >Foucault and heterotopia, in case nobody has yet answered it: > >Date: Wed, 13 Aug 1997 10:57:06 -0400 >From: Andy Wood 614-594-4920 >Subject: Re: foucault query again > >A translation of Foucault's discussion of heterotopia may be found in > >Foucault, M. (1986). Of other spaces. Diacretics, 16, 22-27. > >Also, Edward Soja has done some wonderful work on heterotopia. See, >for example: > >Soja, E.W. (1996). Thirdspace: journeys to Los Angeles and other >real-and-imagined places. Cambridge, MA: Blackwell. > >I hope this helps! > >Andy Wood >Center for Utopian Studies >http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~aw148888/ ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 11:18:45 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: anyone? MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Does anyone know anything about the following address on the web? "Writing the Speculative: A Symposium on Poetry and Knowledge" (May 3, 1997, Stanford University) http://shc.stanford.edu/shc/poetry.knowledge.html It comes up under a key search, but when I try to go in, I get "Error: 404. File not found. Check the URL you are using." Any info anyone could provide on this interesting-sounding site? Thanks, Kent ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 11:06:40 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: charles alexander Subject: Re: anyone? In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Kent, Try http://shc.stanford.edu/shc/1996-1997/96-97events/poetry.knowledge.html But this just gives a schedule. I'm not sure it tells you much about what the symposium was like. Perhaps Hank Lazer or Marjorie Perloff (are you two still on this poetics list?) will fill us in. charles At 11:18 AM 8/14/97 -0500, you wrote: >Does anyone know anything about the following address on the web? >"Writing the Speculative: A Symposium on Poetry and Knowledge" (May >3, 1997, Stanford University) > http://shc.stanford.edu/shc/poetry.knowledge.html > >It comes up under a key search, but when I try to go in, I get >"Error: 404. File not found. Check the URL you are using." > >Any info anyone could provide on this interesting-sounding site? >Thanks, Kent > > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 10:16:52 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: avant garde (chax)/to swear a mighty oath In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >I wouldnt want anyone judging my poetry who hadnt ever speculated about the >similarities among drag, draw, drawl, crawl and trawl. There needs to be an >exam these persons must take & pass before they can judge poetry. You dont >get to be a judge at a musical recital w/o knowing about chords keys >modulation pace pitch or at least playing scales. But people think (?) >because language "comes right out of them" thats all it takes to know >poetry. But they dont think an ability to recognize a fart qualifies them >to judge music. Just because i can differentiate (with difficulty, I admit) >among singles, fives, tens and twenties, doesnt make me a financial >adviser. Its hard enough to find a jury of one's peers (due to the >balkanization of american poetry) : a jury of the frost-bitten or the >sandburged is intolerable. How has this been allowed to come about? Its >like, the less you know, the less prejudiced you will be. I think _I_ >should administer the Pentagon black budget. AAggghh. Yes, yes, yes! Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 13:15:36 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Thomas Bell Subject: Re: avant academe Comments: To: Mark Prejsnar Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" this horse has probably been well beaten here but i'll add my bit anyway. i think the phenomena is similiar to that seen with respect to liberal (discussed on this list earlier this year). They both have become so entangled in the popular press that they have been turned into pejorative mudslinging terms that have little relation to the original sense of the terms. In turn, their adherents become more so ('liberal'->radical or 'avant-gardeish') and the spiral continues. am i making sense? is there a term for this cultural phenomenon? moved to post this from a sunny rural spot with the kids back in school in rural TN after hearing last night of the reaffirmation of the KKK here and knowing i will soon hear from my pre-adolescents "You can't make me, you old liberal avant-garde _____, you." tom bell At 08:50 AM 8/13/97 -0400, Mark Prejsnar wrote: >> >> A couple of points, however. There is a tendency to think of academy as >> institution (correct) and avant garde as... anarchy/utopia/individualism/? >> Just a tendency, mind you. And this leads you to formulate a picture of >> unestablished avantgardists pointing envy (or whatever) at established >> avantgardists because of their position *in the academy* -- i.e. in another >> institution. >> >> No this is intra-institutional politics. The avantgarde (non-mainstream >> poetry, cosa nostra -- call it what you want) is an institution, and >> position in it is critical to and at stake for all those committed to the >> institution. >> >Tom-- >This is interesting, vis-a-vis several of my previous points; first off, >it reiterates that interesting spatial image of "avant-garde" as a >relatively static zone, rather than an advancing attack...Thus showing >again how most of us have toned-down the original feel of "avant-garde"... > >But more peculiar and fascinating is the claim that "a-g" is an >institution...I think it is probably more a series of fragmentary zones of >activity... > >In other words, it's important to be clear whether we're talking about a >sociological phenomenon, an identifiable social grouping we can study (as >in your post) or a series of esthetic engagements and projects. In the >former sense, both "workshop poetry" and non-mainstream writing are of >course institutional matrices, with magazines, imprints, sources of >funding; there is of course a huge disparity in available resources, and >one is closer to the basic economic life of things, can provide more jobs, >etc.--is linked as it were to *other* institutions, that provide a support >structure. But in the latter sense of these terms, neither a workshop >poet nor an "experimental" (hate that word) poet, is necessarily absorbed >by an "institution." I've known (indeed know) practitioners of both >approaches, who for various reasons are marginal to or outside the >institutional frameworks--whether APR/university or Sun and >Moon/Naropa--and in this sense, there is not a single >economicosociological network, that automatically encompasses everything >written in a given style or tendency. > >Also, the emphasis on "envy" etc. is interesting (like the original >phrasing of this thread in terms of "policing")...Some of the most >remarkable writers I know seem to have very little concern with shoving >and scuffling for position; their concern with the activity and the work, >and relative lack of concern with rewards and ego, can be quite >striking... > >mark p. >atlanta > > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 11:26:43 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: mudslinging at the avant garde Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Thomas Bell's post this a.m. concerning the mudslinging one experiences if identifianly avant garde reminds me of a term that came to us in conversation earlier this week, "us" being me, Dan Featherston and his fiancee Melia : we are the mudguards. Lets add, The mudguards on the auto of art. One more frivolous suggestion from the Despair Laboratories. David ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 11:19:11 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Organization: Socopoets & Russian River Writers Guild Subject: poem MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit This poem is written in 7 stanzas of 3 lines each. Email will show it with wrapped lines because the lines are long. Please imagine the lines in their full extension. Thanks! Layne -----------------------------------------------*** Sushila's shawl dear Sushila your shawl how you gave it to me how I wore it December in Bombay December in south India how you wrapped me in the spring peach shawl a cotton so fine falling like water in the sun how we met by the temple of Hanuman and you gave me saris white and blue the handsewn white petticoat your white laughter and dark eyes your stories of the great one in a village of south India in the hanging gardens by the Arabian Sea how you told me secrets whispers on a wood bench splashes on dark rocks full Indian moon falling like water down warm slopes of Bombay night how I listened to every word to every pause to the light in your hands and eyes to the movement of the shawl the movement of my breathing and yours the movement of the water below and our feet on the stones how I still have the shawl oh how I still have it how I took it to south India laid it out on the hill above the village that night after seeing the great one how I sat under the moon slept there woke in deep Christmas night how no one understood the shawl the hill the moon or my going but you did Sushila back in the city you took me in and your father gave me his bed his place on the screened porch above Bombay streets with the shining black birds how I stayed with you till it was time to go how I fit it all into my pack the saris the petticoat the books the little buddha the stories the moon and the shawl falling like water in the sun Sushila like water in the spring peach sun © August 1997 llrussell ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 15:30:08 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Shemurph@AOL.COM Subject: Address request - KOJA Would someone mind backchanneling the address for KOJA? I seem to have misplaced it, and need it. Thanks. Sheila Murphy shemurph@aol.com ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 15:24:32 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: query In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" does anyone know the year in which diacritics vol 21 came out? thanks --md ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 17:02:57 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: the light MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On 13 August, David Bromige wrote: >when kent told me he'd been abducted by space aliens, i knew he was >only kidding. David: Kidding only until last night, when something truly remarkable happened to me. I will explain later. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 16:22:22 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: dangerous virus Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Listlings, I just rec'd a fwd from one on the britpoetlist : do not download any message headed PENPAL GREETINGS. It contains a virus that can destroy your HD. It can also be communicated to every e-ddress in yr mailbox. I have no way to know whether this be hoax or truth. My corrspondent who fwded this is unimpeachable, dont get me wrong, but he was only passing the wArning along. I'm going to log off until i hear (via the media, I guess) better news. Anyone needing to reach me, can do so at 707-664-4209. Leastwise, I will log off if someone will post me the directions for doing so. Thanks, David ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 19:25:32 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: Re: dangerous virus In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Again, the story is this. You can't get a virus from email. You can get a virus from downloading things like the freeaol, but you shouldn't do that. If you get a Word Perfect or Word document, you might have macros embedded in it that can cause problems. Ordinary email has no problems at all. At one point, there were things called ASCII-bombs, or email-bombs, but those holes have been filled years ago. You can send out an email message with escape codes that can change the color of the type, and even create invisible type. If someone sends you a message with an invisible type commmand, you might find your inbox appearing oddly empty. But there's no damage at all when this happens; the mail's still there and readable. And that is about it. By the way, there's a minor sub-sub-field called I believe steganography which is all about embedding secret texts in .gif or .jpg files. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 16:46:59 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: the waltz of the arts-bureaucrats Comments: cc: dcmb@metro.net MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit David Bromige wrote (in part): > When the pretense of equality reigns, stupidity is enthroned. David, the Finns have a phrase I like: "Stupidity thickens in a crowd." Rachel Loden ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 18:29:42 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: the light In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >On 13 August, David Bromige wrote: >>when kent told me he'd been abducted by space aliens, i knew he was >>only kidding. > >David: >Kidding only until last night, when something truly remarkable >happened to me. I will explain later. >Kent It wasnt all that remarkable. I've done it to dozens of academics and poets and minor league baseball players. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 18:31:04 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: penpal greetings In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At last, we concocted a way to get Bromige to pipe down. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 19:31:45 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: charles alexander Subject: Re: the light In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" There have been lots of sightings in Arizona and rumor has it that George Bowering comes here once in a while and as far as I know, George is just a rumor possibly encased in light charles ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 19:32:58 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: charles alexander Subject: Re: penpal greetings In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 06:31 PM 8/14/97 -0700, you wrote: >At last, we concocted a way to get Bromige to pipe down. and George to pipe up Is it possible that Pan has split into two persons, these being bowerige and broming? charles ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 19:12:04 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: the light and the stars MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit George Bowering wrote: > > >On 13 August, David Bromige wrote: > >>when kent told me he'd been abducted by space aliens, i knew he was > >>only kidding. > > > >David: > >Kidding only until last night, when something truly remarkable > >happened to me. I will explain later. > >Kent > > It wasnt all that remarkable. I've done it to dozens of academics and poets > and minor league baseball players. But only minor league baseball players, you notice. He lets the major league players do it to h i m. Rachel Loden ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 10:40:03 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: carelessness on my part imperialist bow wow avant ga-ga's In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On 13 August, David Bromige wrote: > when kent told me he'd been abducted by space aliens, i knew he was only > kidding. David: Kidding only until last night, when something truly remarkable happened to me. I will explain later. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 10:43:13 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: oh god MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT oh god, I meant to send that last message to David Bromige back channel! Kent ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 20:50:41 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: the light In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.32.19970814193145.007b9d60@theriver.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >There have been lots of sightings in Arizona >and rumor has it that George Bowering comes here once in a while > >and as far as I know, George is just a rumor > >possibly encased in light > > >charles Matter of fact, I was in Phoenix toward the end of spring training. I like Tucson very much, and am sorry I havent been there for about 10 years. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 20:52:06 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: penpal greetings In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.32.19970814193258.007b96e0@theriver.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >At 06:31 PM 8/14/97 -0700, you wrote: >>At last, we concocted a way to get Bromige to pipe down. > >and George to pipe up > >Is it possible that Pan has split into two persons, > >these being bowerige and broming? > > > >charles Dang, they found us (I mean me) out! But this just means that I claim co-authorship of all those "Other people's" poems that Bromige owned up to. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 13:26:25 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joseph Lease Subject: Re: "avantgarde" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" I agree absolutely with the point in favor of the Talisman Boston section--wonderfully generative work!!! Joseph Lease ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 20:55:19 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: the light and the stars In-Reply-To: <33F3BAF4.55E6@concentric.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >George Bowering wrote: >> >> >On 13 August, David Bromige wrote: >> >>when kent told me he'd been abducted by space aliens, i knew he was >> >>only kidding. >> > >> >David: >> >Kidding only until last night, when something truly remarkable >> >happened to me. I will explain later. >> >Kent >> >> It wasnt all that remarkable. I've done it to dozens of academics and poets >> and minor league baseball players. > >But only minor league baseball players, you notice. He lets the major >league players do it to h i m. > >Rachel Loden Only National League West and some National League Central players. Jeez, I got standards. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 23:01:24 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: dead oath In-Reply-To: <33EFFF39.24FA@frontiernet.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On 12 August, Pete Landers wrote, referring back to the loyalty thread and in reference to me: > Isn't this the same clear thinker who says taking an oath to defend the > Constitution means turning in my colleagues if they speak out against a > gov't that suspends the Constitution? Well, I never did "say" such a thing, but hurrah for Weiss and Bromige on this issue. And not to beat a dead oath, but I do feel there's something more worth saying here: No Constitutional scholar me, but Article I, Section 9 of the Constitution states that in cases of "rebellion," where the "public safety may require it," that the writ of habeas corpus may be suspended (which would effectively amount, of course, to cancelling any guarantees of freedom of speech, press, association, etc. that the Constitution enshrines). Thus we have a paradox, which Pete, so far as I can tell, doesn't quite see, because he is adamant about only reading "the words" of his oath "as they are" and not thinking about the implications of those words in differing contexts. In other words, suspension of the Constitutional liberties that Pete rightly holds so dear need not be Constitutionally construed under certain extraordinary circumstances (a Civil War, for example, or a "rebellious" challenge to the rule of capital) as at all "unconstitutional." Thus, loyalty oaths that call on one to pledge allegiance to the Constitution against domestic and other enemies do not *necessarily* mean that one is pledging unqualified allegiance to freedom of speech and of the press. "These may need to be," the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff says to USA Today in 2027, "sacrificed under Constitutional law for an expedient time in order to save the future of the Constitution." Sort of like the dictatorship of the proletariat, when you think about it, to ensure the future of the greatest democracy of all, communism. Anyway, this is the unacknowledged potential contradiction I was trying to point out to Pete with my revolutionary fantasy post, written in a fit of syndicalist rapture and breathlessly, with not a single comma. Maybe it was the lack of punctuation that angered Pete so much and prompted him to start calling me a whatchamacallit. But I asked the questions I asked because there were assumptions in Pete's first reply to Charles Alexander that I found self-satisfied and simplistic. Pete accuses me of illogic for asking what I asked; but I was actually trying to point out (in my own idiosyncratic way) that ideology sometimes reveals itself as most insidious inside the plain words that seem most logical. That's an old one, but none of us can remind ourselves of it too often. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 22:42:58 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Organization: Socopoets & Russian River Writers Guild Subject: Re: penpal greetings MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit charles alexander wrote: > > At 06:31 PM 8/14/97 -0700, you wrote: > >At last, we concocted a way to get Bromige to pipe down. > > and George to pipe up > > Is it possible that Pan has split into two persons, > > these being bowerige and broming? > > charles LOL layne ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 11:23:32 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "J. Tate" Subject: Re: how about poems? Comments: To: Layne Russell In-Reply-To: <33EAE7E7.5A83@sonic.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Hello all, Given the recent request for more poems, I thought it would only be fitting to make my first post to the list a poem. When she is gone, I say with certainty: the sky has never cupped the sullen clouds that never sighed as stars and moon would crowd into the wild seclusion of her back; the earth goes round the sun, all cats are black, dark houses slump their shoulders under snow, all shutters closed, the only birds are crows. When she returns, Copernicus is wrong; the warm loops of her walk move crows to song, the rooflines straighten, cats dress themselves in white, sheer curtains breeze on open-windowed nights, as she lies here, and mumbles dreams to me. Joseph Tate Graduate Student Department of English University of Washington, Seattle ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 08:18:44 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Gwyn McVay Subject: DJ Renegade Comments: To: Poetics List Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Just to add briefly--people have been interested in DJ Renegade, a/k/a Joel Dias-Porter-- Working with Kenny Carroll, he was one of the pioneering members of DC's WritersCorps program, the only arts-related program of Americorps, which put teachers of creative writing into DC schools, St. Elizabeth's, several homeless shelters, and other places in need of "what is found there." DJ helped put together an anthology of writings from the kids in the schools where he taught. By all accounts, he enjoyed the hell out of it and so did the kids. I always thought Renegade would be an interesting person to design a font for--something Bodoni-ish to start with, with the extreme stroke-weight contrast, tall and a bit skinny (per the original), but with a rather '70s roundness to the serifs and just enough trendy edge fragmentation to have that urban look. Gwyn ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 08:04:10 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: dead oath In-Reply-To: Message of Thu, 14 Aug 1997 23:01:24 -0500 from On Thu, 14 Aug 1997 23:01:24 -0500 KENT JOHNSON said: > Pete accuses me of illogic for asking what I asked; but I was >actually trying to point out (in my own idiosyncratic way) that >ideology sometimes reveals itself as most insidious inside the plain >words that seem most logical. That's an old one, but none of us can >remind ourselves of it too often. Mikhail Epstein has an interesting chapter in AFTER THE FUTURE on the structure of ideological logic, or ideo-logic as he calls it. It's basically a win-win kind of power speech which Machiavellian-like (& Orwell-like) plays off extreme positions against each other and equates opposites, i.e.: freedom - slavery discipline - anarchy Soviet communism would support socialist freedom over capitalist slavery but proclaim socialist discipline against multi-party anarchy. This is one of the most basic "tetrads" which makes the Party master of the ideological language field. (Epstein, following many others, defines ideological language as words which are inherently value-laden used without explanation or proof [my own paraphrase here]). The tetrads get much more subtle and complicated. I think the point Pete was emphasizing is that when faced by such a coercive thing as an oath, we still have a choice. It seems to me (based on my own reaction & on several initial responses to Charles' first message) that our FIRST reaction is, this is a case of repressive government intrusion. What I found "astonishing" about Pete's response is that he opened up another dimension to this situation - that is, we might actually support the Constitution to the point of signing an oath to that effect. This does not really occur to us when we take individual liberties for granted and regard ALL government as an intrusion on the latter. This attitude, paradoxically, is just as much a prelude to tyranny as mindless loyalty. Pete's suggestion that we read what we're asked to sign onto is a reminder that we are part of "da system", whatever form it takes, & we bear some responsibility for the form it does take. - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 09:05:26 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Judy Roitman Subject: Re: dangerous virus In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > Listlings, I just rec'd a fwd from one on the britpoetlist : do not >download any message headed PENPAL GREETINGS. It contains a virus that can >destroy your HD. It can also be communicated to every e-ddress in yr >mailbox. > >I have no way to know whether this be hoax or truth. My corrspondent who >fwded this is unimpeachable, dont get me wrong, but he was only passing the >wArning along. > >I'm going to log off until i hear (via the media, I guess) better news. >Anyone needing to reach me, can do so at 707-664-4209. Leastwise, I will >log off if someone will post me the directions for doing so. > >Thanks, David Don't log off. You can't pick up a virus through e-mail. You can pick up a virus through opening an attachment sent through e-mail, but that is a very different sort of animal. P.S. Will you let me know if you get this? Otherwise I'll have to call... --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Judy Roitman | "Whoppers Whoppers Whoppers! Math, University of Kansas | memory fails Lawrence, KS 66045 | these are the days." 785-864-4630 | Larry Eigner, 1927-1996 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note new area code ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://titania.math.ukans.edu/faculty/roitman/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 08:49:41 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: DJ Renegade In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" how does one get in touch w/ dj renegade? what is the name, publisher etc of his anthology w/ kids? thanks gwyn & others-- maria d At 8:18 AM -0400 8/15/97, Gwyn McVay wrote: >Just to add briefly--people have been interested in DJ Renegade, a/k/a >Joel Dias-Porter-- > >Working with Kenny Carroll, he was one of the pioneering members of DC's >WritersCorps program, the only arts-related program of Americorps, which >put teachers of creative writing into DC schools, St. Elizabeth's, several >homeless shelters, and other places in need of "what is found there." DJ >helped put together an anthology of writings from the kids in the schools >where he taught. By all accounts, he enjoyed the hell out of it and so did >the kids. > >I always thought Renegade would be an interesting person to design a font >for--something Bodoni-ish to start with, with the extreme stroke-weight >contrast, tall and a bit skinny (per the original), but with a rather '70s >roundness to the serifs and just enough trendy edge fragmentation to have >that urban look. > >Gwyn ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 11:26:30 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "J. Tate" Subject: forget new criticism, here's the new poetry! (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII List members may have already heard of this, if so, apologies. Joseph Tate University of Washington, Seattle Reuters New Media _________________________________________________________________ Thursday August 14 4:12 AM EDT Poet Ruffles Feathers In Scotland With Record, MTV Deals By Jill Serjeant EDINBURGH, Aug 14 (Reuter) - With his long dark curly hair and frock coats, he looks like Britain's 19th century romantic poet Lord Byron. But that's about as far as the comparison goes for 28-year-old Murray Lachlan Young, a previously unpublished bard whose snappy verses about sex, drugs, and rock and roll are set to make him a millionaire. Young, an American-born Scot with a flair for the melodramatic, has taken the elitist world of poetry by storm by winning a $1.6 million deal with EMI Records and a $395,000 contract with MTV. The deals are unheard of in the world of British literature, where poets are still thought of as living in garrets, scraping a living from a lonely trade conjuring up pictures in the mind. Young, however, is one of the new breed of "performance poets," who declaims his contemporary verse to the sounds of a solo cello, seaside music or rock groups. EMI says it has never signed a poet before, but hopes Young's album "Vice and Verse" will sell about one million copies. "Taking on a new young artist is always a risk but we think he is a brilliant poet, a brilliant performer and very, very funny," said Tony Harlow, EMI marketing director. "He's three-dimensional. We could have sold him as a performer, as a stand-up comic or as a poet," Harlow said. Young's subject matter is perfectly attuned to the 1990s. One verse is about the Rolling Stones, another titled "Casual Sex," and in "Simply Everyone's Taking Cocaine" he satirises high society drugs culture. "Well I saw Aunt Milly in last season's clothes, She said car, house and yacht had gone straight up her nose..... Simply everyone's taking cocaine." He anounces his "MTV collection" of short verses aimed at the youth market as "no longer than 30 seconds, with no big words." APPEARANCE AT EDINBURGH FRINGE Staged to dramatic lighting and sound effects from a cello, Young is going down well with audiences at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe before he embarks on a series of "performance tours" in Britain and the United States. Fellow poets and some critics have not been so kind. The Financial Times called his work "puerile." Guardian newspaper critic Dan Glaister said his poetry failed to challenge the mind. "It is comforting, reaffirming stuff but there are no broader truths lurking beneath the whimsy," wrote Glaister. Established poets are skeptical, if not jealous, of the hype that has propelled Young to the front pages of newspapers and magazines. "For a new poet to land deals like this is unheard of. Much of it may be to do with marketing and hype and my instinct is to disapprove of the whole thing," said Peter Thorpe editor of the Poetry Review. Young, in performance as passionate and brooding as any self-respecting romantic poet should be, rejects the notion that he is all hype. "I'm trying to get an audience for poetry," he said. "Too often people who write poetry seem like they are divulging some terrible secret or slipping you something when you are depressed. "If you can show people interesting poems performed in a dynamic way then they might move on to Blake," Young said. But he is keenly aware of the pitfalls ahead of him. In a satirical poem written a year ago about another of Britain's much talked about artists -- Damien Hirst of dead sheep in glass boxes fame -- Young may unwittingly have written his own epitaph. "Whatever you do, whatever you are, Make sure that you never, never, never believe in your own PR." copyright Reuters Limited X-URL: http://www.yahoo.com/text/headlines/970814/entertainment/stories/culture_poet_1.html ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 14:20:36 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Peter Landers Subject: Re: dead oath Content-Type: text yeah yeah. I might have read too sensitively. what was a question "what would you do" I probably took as an implication that I would choose the obviously ignoble option. I see it was just polemical falderal. hg, yes, but i'd have used first person singular because I know it's an individual choice. fwiw, writ of h.c. says they have to tell you why they stuck you in jail. also, fwiw, the whole doc is amendable. and as i say, it is/was a personal choice. i am not a patriot, per se, but i'm damn glad TJ was there many years ago to balance the power freaks against each other and i choose to defend that. but why so serious? Pete ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 16:24:27 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Mandel Subject: email viri Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" a virus in an email message is a persistant myth. *Not* possible. Please lets not discuss here what's been debunked and blah-ed to death worldwide for half a decade. It is a sticky one, tho. I got an email message this spring from Harry Mathews warning me that email with the subject "Good News" contained a virus. That exact suggestion has come to me repeatedly over 3-4 years, like a chain letter through my brain matter. I guess the repetition is the virus. Tom Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com ******************************************************** Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com 4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2029 Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 202-364-5349 ******************************************************** Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 16:20:19 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Mandel Subject: advancing attack? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" was the "original feel of 'avant garde'" that of an "advancing attack" as Mark P. seems to be saying? I *think* that militarily the avant garde would rather be scouts, or even spies, rather than any kind of attack. Scouts checking out undiscovered territory or spies sent into an alien camp. More appealing ideas than that of being cannon fodder. Or, as I so often hear in the high tech industries, "a pioneer is a guy (sic. -- usually) with an arrow in his back." Tom Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com ******************************************************** Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com 4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2029 Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 202-364-5349 ******************************************************** Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 16:42:32 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: Re: email viri In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970815162427.006aa95c@pop.cais.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII As you know, I posted the same conclusion, but ComputerWorld this week discusses bugs in some email software, vis-a-vis IMAP and POP - this doesn't affect your mail as far as I can tell, but does affect your mailserver. The CERT advisory (computer emergency response team) is at: ftp://info.cert.org/pub/cert_advisories/CA-97.09.imap_pop Alan On Fri, 15 Aug 1997, Tom Mandel wrote: > a virus in an email message is a persistant myth. *Not* possible. Please > lets not discuss here what's been debunked and blah-ed to death worldwide > for half a decade. > /snip/ ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 19:23:47 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: dead oath drugs I just received an e-mail from Eliot Weinberger, and he tells me that during the Reagan days NEA recipients had to sign two oaths: allegiance not to produce pornography or insult any (any) religion and then also a separate promise not to take any drugs. Anybody out there asked to sign one of these? I've never even applied for an NEA, but if the above is the case, it makes the Constitutional loyalty oath we've been talking about look pretty innocuous! Weinbeger says *everyone* except two or three poets he knows who got a grant in those eight years signed? I don't know, if I'd gotten one of these, I may have well signed on myself, hypocrite that I am, but holy cow, all of a sudden Pete Landers looks like Bakunin. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 10:34:35 +1100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pam Brown Subject: Re: email viri Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Well if it's so impossible how come my mac got infected with a macro virus from an email attachment from someone in Brunei ? And, as a result, had to have its entire operating system rebuilt ??? I wonder.... Pam Brown At 04:42 PM 15/8/97 -0400, you wrote: >As you know, I posted the same conclusion, but ComputerWorld this week >discusses bugs in some email software, vis-a-vis IMAP and POP - this >doesn't affect your mail as far as I can tell, but does affect your >mailserver. > >The CERT advisory (computer emergency response team) is at: >ftp://info.cert.org/pub/cert_advisories/CA-97.09.imap_pop > >Alan > >On Fri, 15 Aug 1997, Tom Mandel wrote: > >> a virus in an email message is a persistant myth. *Not* possible. Please >> lets not discuss here what's been debunked and blah-ed to death worldwide >> for half a decade. >> >/snip/ > > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 19:42:02 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: encased in light I just wanted to say that I put in a little post last night and it didn't go through. It was in response to Charles Alexander's stunning image of George Bowering encased in light. I said in that post that this was one of the most beautiful images I had ever laid eyes upon, whatever that means. I just wanted for the record to say this again. And also to say to George that I actually played minor league ball too, though it was football--semi-pro, about $100 per game back in the early 80's for the Waukesha Hawks. Does that count? Kent ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 21:01:20 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Bernstein Subject: BERNADETTE MAYER (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 13:04:13, -0500 From: POET PHILIP S GOOD The Bernadette Mayer Fund- Bernadette Mayer will write a poem, prose piece, letter, or other work to your specification in exchange for a contrubution to the fund. Please send the specifications for the poems to Bernadette Mayer at 4079 Country Rt 9, East Chatham, N.Y. 12060 (or E-Mail it to drunkenbee@prodigy.com) Send the tax deductible contribution checks payable to: Giorno Poetry Systems/The Bernadette Mayer Fund. Giorno Poetry Systems, 222 Bowery, New York, N.Y. 10012 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 18:17:35 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: encased in light Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I want to say that I have often seen George Bowering encased in light. Molson's Light. And Boy, does he ever get encased! DB ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 21:34:57 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: Re: email viri In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII As I said, macro viruses are possible with Word Perfect and Word documents; they don't come through standard ascii email. An attachment is binary, 8-bit, not what's called lower ascii, 7 bit. Alan On Sat, 16 Aug 1997, Pam Brown wrote: > Well if it's so impossible how come my mac got infected with a macro virus > from an email attachment from someone in Brunei ? And, as a result, had to > have its entire operating system rebuilt ??? > I wonder.... > Pam Brown > At 04:42 PM 15/8/97 -0400, you wrote: > >As you know, I posted the same conclusion, but ComputerWorld this week > >discusses bugs in some email software, vis-a-vis IMAP and POP - this > >doesn't affect your mail as far as I can tell, but does affect your > >mailserver. > > > >The CERT advisory (computer emergency response team) is at: > >ftp://info.cert.org/pub/cert_advisories/CA-97.09.imap_pop > > > >Alan > > > >On Fri, 15 Aug 1997, Tom Mandel wrote: > > > >> a virus in an email message is a persistant myth. *Not* possible. Please > >> lets not discuss here what's been debunked and blah-ed to death worldwide > >> for half a decade. > >> > >/snip/ > > > > > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 12:41:35 +1100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pam Brown Subject: Tiresome viri Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Thanks, Alan,for that information. I must have missed it earlier....and although I'm not a computer enthusiast - just a user - and don't really know what you mean I'm sure it's correct.... Pam ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 22:03:14 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: asteroid to hit earth In my post referring to Eliot Weinberger's statement that only "two or three poets" had refused to sign the terrible NEA pledge during the Reagan years: I apparently got it wrong. The two or three people who refused to sign during these years (the texts of the gov't pledges are contained in EW's _Outside Stories_, pages 124-25) were not poets but artists of other kinds. According to Weinberger, _all_ poets signed. Now doesn't that make you feel like standing up and saluting the flag? Kent ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 23:01:02 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Thomas Bell Subject: Re: advancing attack? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" http://www.pbs.org/affluenza/ ? tom bell At 04:20 PM 8/15/97 -0400, Tom Mandel wrote: >was the "original feel of 'avant garde'" that of an "advancing attack" as >Mark P. seems to be saying? > >I *think* that militarily the avant garde would rather be scouts, or even >spies, rather than any kind of attack. Scouts checking out undiscovered >territory or spies sent into an alien camp. > >More appealing ideas than that of being cannon fodder. Or, as I so often >hear in the high tech industries, "a pioneer is a guy (sic. -- usually) >with an arrow in his back." > >Tom > > >Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com >******************************************************** >Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com >4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2029 >Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 202-364-5349 >******************************************************** > Join the Caucus Conversation > > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 21:52:03 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Brian Carpenter Subject: Re: dead oath drugs In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > I just received an e-mail from Eliot Weinberger, and he tells me > that during the Reagan days NEA recipients had to sign two oaths: > allegiance not to produce pornography or insult any (any) religion > and then also a separate promise not to take any drugs. Anybody out > there asked to sign one of these? I've never even applied for an NEA, > but if the above is the case, it makes the Constitutional > loyalty oath we've been talking about look pretty innocuous! On a similar note, if I recall correctly, there is involved in the process of application for US citizenship a pledge/oath one must make stating that one does not support/believe in anarchy nor polygamy. Anyone know of this, or am I recalling wrong? Salut-- BC ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 00:32:35 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: a revision MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit In the spirit of James Finnegan's desire to have poets show their process, here's a revision of an earlier piece I posted. I got a lot of help on this from Ike Kim. Sounding Board for Alan it is a good life though not necessary. now one hand smells and one does not. they have been placed strategically to peruse the meaning of various holes. no matter how many you start out with the body lays flat in its possible juices. the ones we eat are not necessarily the ones we asked for-- there is no way to know. it is too wet to get to the museum but not to wet to go to the museum it affects your consciousness, act nasty or get behind something you care nothing about. later, you’ll laugh about it on that uncomfortable futon the best you can afford. the problem with the bad half&half was it made the coffee bad. the same can be said for sex. certain combinations are disaster for the consumer. every member of the Happy Clubhouse would tell you this, but so far few have asked and no one who’d do anything about it. *Helping them to help themselves.* like I said, this began with a confusion between money and memory. indeed, if you could hand me either, I can assure you it will be emptied though righteousness is tenuous. false memory, The GapÔ, I can’t help stealing from big things when they are costly. bargain basements hook me every time. How long did you let it sit out? How long must it be left out? and if there is unrelenting rain, the possibilities. in a flash flood you will lose things. *Most victims didn’t buy flood insurance* *No me quitas pas* or as you were saying about the snow. the amount of weight the branch permits the leaves to bear before it breaks. there is much you can figure out so take it upon yourself to prevent certain events, those labeled disaster. logically, what will happen to the previous losses as they shift position to the back of the general’s head. as had happened through the epidemic. we no longer considered them. in the name of, floods, borders, balanced books. *I don’t want to argue about it.* things are again shifted and look, what we call your responsibility. the Israelis are serious but have redesigned the protocol. his shirt burned off by the last blast, he sits and waits, looking plainly bitter. notice the watch, the numbers tattooed. victimhood looks again, a face that aims not for glamour yet is. reconfigured, made so. Ruptured protocol reemerges as successful, as color, from black and white. *There’s a Movement Underground* photojournalism = journalism made history. made hippies. some mornings I think I’m a happy person. some words get printed. she’s a journalist who also writes novels. I can’t get past the game of it. I ride in your back seat [thinking][meditating][labeling][identifying][looking][like] I’m staring out your window, innocent, inocencia. glamour. love or lose? drunk with it he finally got silent, then again, he was always silent. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- notes: “Most Victims”--From an AP heading, May 13, 1997 “No Me Quitas--Nina Simone “I don’t”--Me with the grocery clerk “There’s a Movement”-- Prescriptions makeup adline, from Fall 94, blitzkrieged onto the New York subway ad space, seen by me upon returning from a year in Mexico, after having left New York in 1993 upon the dissolution of AIDS and Queer Activism. -end- ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 02:35:09 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: Julacan split, for my lover and for Rachel L. MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII ________________________________________________________________________ Julacan Hullo M. Jacques Lacan. Hullo Julacan. Hunh. Je/w suis un bon-bon. Tres bien. Ich bien la plume du votre tanta. Mercy much. (Get out. M. Lacan what is it you say you do. What is it you say you do it to. (Get out. Get out. "Where does the difference between someone who is psychotic and someone who isn't come from? It comes from the fact that for the psychotic a love relation that abolishes him as subject is possible insofar as it allows a radical heterogeneity of the Other. But this love is also a dead love." A. A. A. a. a. Julucan.can can U. Tu est un arbre, n'est pas? Je suis UNE ensemble, homm/e-o-nym. La verite c'est toutes-jours, laMoor. Mais we: Tu dites-mois: [ ... ] "The thing, if it no longer takes place with a be- autiful woman or with a lady, is accomplished in a darkened cinema with an image on the screen." (Get out. Get out. Get out. Encore! Encore! Gentle/hum: "The psychotic" Julacan paws/es: Quel espace ist diese? Lentement! Lentement! Und so wieder: "can only apprehend the Other in the relation with the signifier, he lingers over a mere shell, an envelope, a shadow, the form of speech. The pscyhotic's Eros is located where speech is absent. It is there he finds his supreme love." The Eunuch's Shell, bash, cash, carry, korn, vraiment, une programme, non? Nein, kein nombres, hombres. 2-carry on. A. Julacan chases her tale, prof- fers id. Toucan. Nu? M. Lacan insists, CUm closer. Feminin ecriture, none sufficient. Il n'est pas une lettre, il dites-moi pourquoi, pas parole. U. M. Lacan sits down, sa pantaloons sur la Grund. M. Lacan! Was ist dies? I Julacan't be-leave you here licked thus! Aqua! Aqua! Mere und mere, id seas across les corps. Circulations of "le game skin." Les panties wet. (Get out. Get away from here. Get out of here. Get out. Julacan s'defendre herselbst. Langue Langue Tongue Les Mots. Elle cherche as above, so below. Les circulations dans l'imaginaire, l'uncannee! Je t'aim in your vicinity! Michelet, Ma Belle, telephone petite moi! A. A. A. a. a. a. "Psychotics love their delusion like they love themselves. Having said this, Freud, who hadn't yet written his article on narcissism, added that the entire mystery lies here. This is true. What is the relationship be- tween the subject and the signifier that is distinctive of the very phen- omena of psychosis? How come the subject falls entirely into this proble- matic?" Julacan asks How come la sujet? Does la sujet come? Le game skin, toward that silence de l'autre, autrui, now, ici, easy. (Get out. Get out of here. Get out of here now. Get away from here. Get out of here. Get out. Get out of here. I'll meet you in Providence. I'll meet you in Seattle. I'll travel to Seoul. I'll travel to Moscow. (I'll see your eyes. I'll kiss your eyes. Language is an enemy. Language is an enemy. Get out. Get out of here. I'll see your face. I'll kiss your face. (Don't speak, Julacan. Silence for M. Lacan. (Get away from M. Lacan. I'll meet you in a bar in Soho. I'll meet you in a Montreal cafe. I'll meet you in Victoria. You see my eyes in Vancouver. You see my eyes in Toronto. Language is an enemy. My body in Cape Breton, my heart in Newfoundland. U. A. A. a. a. a. (Julacan's a fraud. Julacan told me so. I'm Julacan. I turn away from the _word._ I kill the _word._ Language is a _word._ Language is an enemy. I get into the ocean. I get out of the sea. "The big S whose medium is speech, analysis warns us, is not what a vain people thinks it is. There is the real person who is before you and who takes up space - there is this in the presence of human beings, they take up space, at a pinch you can get ten of you into your office, but not a hundred and fifty - there is she whom you see, who manifestly captivates you and is capable of making you jump up and hug her - an ill-considered act of the imaginary order, terrific act of the real! And then there is the Other whom we were talking about, who is the subject also, but not the reflection of what you see in front of you, and not simply what takes place insofar as you see yourself seeing yourself." [Altered from the ori- ginal.] Je t'aime. ---------------------- (Quotes from Lacan's Seminar III, The Psychoses, edited Jacques-Alain Miller, translated Russell Grigg.) ________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 06:32:10 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Re: encased in light MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I done seen the light & it's called George. -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 05:57:34 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: naturalization MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Brian Carpenter wrote: > On a similar note, if I recall correctly, there is involved in the process > of application for US citizenship a pledge/oath one must make stating that > one does not support/believe in anarchy nor polygamy. Anyone know of > this, or am I recalling wrong? Am not recalling this from my husband's application process, but he did have to absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince or potentate, which is not difficult to do after you've stopped laughing. Rachel Loden ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 08:21:52 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: charles alexander Subject: Re: encased in light In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 07:42 PM 8/15/97 -0500, you wrote: >I just wanted to say that I put in a little post last night and it >didn't go through. It was in response to Charles Alexander's >stunning image of George Bowering encased in light. I said in that >post that this was one of the most beautiful images I had ever >laid eyes upon, whatever that means. I just wanted for the record to >say this again. And also to say to George that I actually played >minor league ball too, though it was football--semi-pro, about $100 >per game back in the early 80's for the Waukesha Hawks. Does that >count? >Kent thanks, Kent George and I continue to talk, and light probably plays a role in such transmissions. Encased in light took on a new dimension last night, when I went to an astronomer's birthday party at 8000-foot Mount Hopkins in the Santa Rita chain, home of the Fred Whipple Observatory. This astronomer, Dimitar Sassarov, is a pioneer theoretician -- one of the things he is working on, and what brought him here, was the effect of microlensing, seen once before and now again (and earlier predicted by him) that, when earth and nearer star and far far distant star are in proper alignment, one can see through the nearer star, and it will have a microscopic effect, making the far far distant star appear large, allowing us to learn more about it than we ever thought possible. Last night we used it and looked at a star in the middle of the galaxy. Turned out that my family and Dimitar's spouse, Sheila, were the only people at the birthday party and at the telescopes. What I didn't know until last night, as we also talked a bit of linguistics, was that Dimitar is the nephew of structuralist and writer Svetan Todorov. Language/poetics/astronomy/poets encased in light -- all seems like a small world. We felt very priveleged last night. charles ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 12:01:44 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Loss Pequen~o Glazier" Subject: McCaffery phone Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" If anyone online happens to have a current phone number for Steve McCaffery, could you let me know at your very soonest? It's a time-sensitive matter. Send a note to me at lolpoet@acsu.buffalo.edu Thanks, Loss ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 12:08:03 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Loss Pequen~o Glazier" Subject: Need Info: McCaffery and Kuszai phone #s Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" If anyone online happens to have a current phone number for Steve McCaffery or Joel Kuszai, could you let me know at your very soonest? It's a time-sensitive matter. Send a note to me at lolpoet@acsu.buffalo.edu Thanks, Loss ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 12:17:01 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Julacan split, for my lover and for Rachel L. In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" alan yr plain brilliant. --md ps when i heard, a few years ago, legal scholar drucilla cornell talk about reproductive rights and legal theory, she kept mentioning --i thought --chaka khan. as in, "i don't think yr gonna get supreme court justices to really pay attention to chaka khan." about 15 minutes into the talk, from context, as in, "the imaginary", "the symbolic," etc., i realized she meant jacques lacan. i kinda liked it the other way too. At 2:35 AM -0400 8/16/97, Alan Jen Sondheim wrote: >________________________________________________________________________ > > >Julacan > > >Hullo M. Jacques Lacan. Hullo Julacan. Hunh. Je/w suis un bon-bon. Tres >bien. Ich bien la plume du votre tanta. Mercy much. > >(Get out. > >M. Lacan what is it you say you do. What is it you say you do it to. > >(Get out. Get out. > >"Where does the difference between someone who is psychotic and someone >who isn't come from? It comes from the fact that for the psychotic a love >relation that abolishes him as subject is possible insofar as it allows a >radical heterogeneity of the Other. But this love is also a dead love." > >A. A. A. a. a. Julucan.can can U. Tu est un arbre, n'est pas? Je suis UNE >ensemble, homm/e-o-nym. La verite c'est toutes-jours, laMoor. Mais we: > >Tu dites-mois: [ ... ] "The thing, if it no longer takes place with a be- >autiful woman or with a lady, is accomplished in a darkened cinema with an >image on the screen." > >(Get out. Get out. Get out. > >Encore! Encore! Gentle/hum: "The psychotic" Julacan paws/es: Quel espace >ist diese? Lentement! Lentement! Und so wieder: "can only apprehend the >Other in the relation with the signifier, he lingers over a mere shell, an >envelope, a shadow, the form of speech. The pscyhotic's Eros is located >where speech is absent. It is there he finds his supreme love." > >The Eunuch's Shell, bash, cash, carry, korn, vraiment, une programme, non? >Nein, kein nombres, hombres. 2-carry on. A. Julacan chases her tale, prof- >fers id. Toucan. Nu? M. Lacan insists, CUm closer. Feminin ecriture, none >sufficient. Il n'est pas une lettre, il dites-moi pourquoi, pas parole. > >U. > >M. Lacan sits down, sa pantaloons sur la Grund. M. Lacan! Was ist dies? I >Julacan't be-leave you here licked thus! Aqua! Aqua! Mere und mere, id >seas across les corps. Circulations of "le game skin." Les panties wet. > >(Get out. Get away from here. Get out of here. Get out. > >Julacan s'defendre herselbst. Langue Langue Tongue Les Mots. Elle cherche >as above, so below. Les circulations dans l'imaginaire, l'uncannee! Je >t'aim in your vicinity! Michelet, Ma Belle, telephone petite moi! > >A. A. A. a. a. a. > >"Psychotics love their delusion like they love themselves. Having said >this, Freud, who hadn't yet written his article on narcissism, added that >the entire mystery lies here. This is true. What is the relationship be- >tween the subject and the signifier that is distinctive of the very phen- >omena of psychosis? How come the subject falls entirely into this proble- >matic?" > >Julacan asks How come la sujet? Does la sujet come? Le game skin, toward >that silence de l'autre, autrui, now, ici, easy. > >(Get out. Get out of here. Get out of here now. Get away from here. Get >out of here. Get out. Get out of here. I'll meet you in Providence. I'll >meet you in Seattle. I'll travel to Seoul. I'll travel to Moscow. > >(I'll see your eyes. I'll kiss your eyes. Language is an enemy. Language >is an enemy. Get out. Get out of here. I'll see your face. I'll kiss your >face. > >(Don't speak, Julacan. Silence for M. Lacan. > >(Get away from M. Lacan. I'll meet you in a bar in Soho. I'll meet you in >a Montreal cafe. I'll meet you in Victoria. You see my eyes in Vancouver. >You see my eyes in Toronto. Language is an enemy. My body in Cape Breton, >my heart in Newfoundland. > >U. A. A. a. a. a. > >(Julacan's a fraud. Julacan told me so. I'm Julacan. I turn away from the >_word._ I kill the _word._ Language is a _word._ Language is an enemy. > >I get into the ocean. I get out of the sea. > >"The big S whose medium is speech, analysis warns us, is not what a vain >people thinks it is. There is the real person who is before you and who >takes up space - there is this in the presence of human beings, they take >up space, at a pinch you can get ten of you into your office, but not a >hundred and fifty - there is she whom you see, who manifestly captivates >you and is capable of making you jump up and hug her - an ill-considered >act of the imaginary order, terrific act of the real! And then there is >the Other whom we were talking about, who is the subject also, but not the >reflection of what you see in front of you, and not simply what takes >place insofar as you see yourself seeing yourself." [Altered from the ori- >ginal.] > >Je t'aime. > > >---------------------- > > >(Quotes from Lacan's Seminar III, The Psychoses, edited Jacques-Alain >Miller, translated Russell Grigg.) > > >________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 14:28:03 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: The Titanic MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 <> I quite agree - to a point - with what was said - but only to a point what is sd here by Judy Roitman - _You can't pick up a virus through e-mail_ - is quite true and for sound reasons wch i suppose cld be calle= d scientific...unrefutable anything you like... it is the different animal wch worries me and the possibility of having that different animal coming thru wch is unannounced... that has happened to me... the announcement of an attachme= nt is only so good as the software doing the downloading and mine for one is= not very good - not long ago i found a file in my download directory wch had not announced itself beyond the listing i sorted out someone the other day who had a virus - outraged because the= y were running a virus checker and seemed to think this was some kind of a defence against all viruses present and future, the idiot was talking abo= ut taking symantec to court misplaced confidence in a fallible system yes, you cannot get a virus via email as email, but the email is riding on a connection, it isnt *the* connection and not= everything going on is visible from your screen it doesnt matter how the hell you got the virus when you have got it the risks are small but they are there - it is possible the message i onforwarded was a hoax... but the statement that you cannot get a virus from email does not go far enough and logging off is not any kind of response L ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 15:13:21 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Judy Roitman Subject: Re: email viri In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Well if it's so impossible how come my mac got infected with a macro virus >from an email attachment from someone in Brunei ? And, as a result, had to >have its entire operating system rebuilt ??? >I wonder.... >Pam Brown >At 04:42 PM 15/8/97 -0400, you wrote: >>As you know, I posted the same conclusion, but ComputerWorld this week >>discusses bugs in some email software, vis-a-vis IMAP and POP - this >>doesn't affect your mail as far as I can tell, but does affect your >>mailserver. >> >>The CERT advisory (computer emergency response team) is at: >>ftp://info.cert.org/pub/cert_advisories/CA-97.09.imap_pop >> >>Alan >Well if it's so impossible how come my mac got infected with a macro virus >from an email attachment from someone in Brunei ? And, as a result, had to >have its entire operating system rebuilt ??? >I wonder.... >Pam Brown Attachments _can_ cause problems. (The rule of thumb is never open an attachment from someone you don't know real well.) But opening e-mail can't. Or couldn't... (I haven't seen ComputerWorld or the CERT advisory). --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Judy Roitman | "Whoppers Whoppers Whoppers! Math, University of Kansas | memory fails Lawrence, KS 66045 | these are the days." 785-864-4630 | Larry Eigner, 1927-1996 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note new area code ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://titania.math.ukans.edu/faculty/roitman/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 15:16:27 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Judy Roitman Subject: Re: BERNADETTE MAYER (fwd) Comments: cc: POET PHILIP S GOOD In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >---------- Forwarded message ---------- >Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 13:04:13, -0500 >From: POET PHILIP S GOOD > >The Bernadette Mayer Fund- Bernadette Mayer will write a poem, prose >piece, letter, or other work to your specification in exchange for a >contrubution to the fund. Please send the specifications for the poems >to Bernadette Mayer at 4079 Country Rt 9, East Chatham, N.Y. 12060 (or >E-Mail it to drunkenbee@prodigy.com) > >Send the tax deductible contribution checks payable to: Giorno Poetry >Systems/The Bernadette Mayer Fund. Giorno Poetry Systems, 222 Bowery, >New York, N.Y. 10012 She should not have to do this. I hope this shames everyone who has not already contributed into contributing something, and not in exchange for anything. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Judy Roitman | "Whoppers Whoppers Whoppers! Math, University of Kansas | memory fails Lawrence, KS 66045 | these are the days." 785-864-4630 | Larry Eigner, 1927-1996 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note new area code ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://titania.math.ukans.edu/faculty/roitman/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 15:10:49 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: BERNADETTE MAYER (fwd) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 3:16 PM -0500 8/16/97, Judy Roitman wrote: >She should not have to do this. I hope this shames everyone who has not >already contributed into contributing something, and not in exchange for >anything. Judy, while I totally understand your sentiments about how Bernadette shouldn't have to do anything to receive help, I do not think that people who haven't given should be shamed. That's a personal decision and everyone has different circumstances. And this opinion is from a household who *has* sent money to the fund. Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 16 Aug 1997 18:25:04 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: Passion (for one who likes Halliday) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII - Passion Pas'i'n o'er thro'n gre't darts as Cup'd's bod' Turn'd thos' skies' gyres' eag'l'ts lo'p'n in li' sod, 'Tis what's ta'en me awa', tor' us apart, th' rod, H'nd's sa'l'rd ship's sa'l bor' acros' th' mo'n'n cod, T' one's, t'oth'r's m' bod' crawl'd doun 'nt' your' lot Ther's nought's but's glist'n'n skin, taut, stru'g'd & forg't Now gon' th' dar' & bl'min' roses' de'ftl' whe' the' li' Fro' world's a' seepin' ou' th' bl'min' bedr'm's door - Fo' al's th' space's los' mo'th's, pas'ion's c'min' bi' Tha' face's clos' t' min', tha' I oft beg'd fo' mor'. Y't co'n cro' th' sig'f'r's r'n o' t'r'r dou' Gy'd ag'st th' wir'd ai' sa h'p m' G'd I drou'. _______________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Aug 1997 02:09:52 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Markus Foutu Subject: Re: how about poems? lovely work//thanks Markus ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Aug 1997 02:37:17 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: Sad History of Twilight Spaces, One Hope for the Real (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII --+- History, Tiny Spaces on Twilight MOOs and one Real I log in to Media MOO. I visit rarely now, surrounded by the bones I've set forth. I don't recognize myself, you-know-language and all. Jennifer and Julu have never been here; Jennifer and Julu have moved on. Tiffany dense entanglement of fluid, you-know-language, aural, i course thru u, i u, Tiffany course thru alan, Tiffanyalan, breath floods, clitoral, eyes stained by u, u lay me out, lance, skin, nipples, on Menstrual Table, you-know-language Obvious exits: out to Living Quarters - 2nd Floor You see lance, skin, Menstrual Table, Tiffanyalan, you-know-language, nipples, clitoral, anal, aural, and envelope here. Last connected Mon Aug 11 23:55:57 1997 EDT from panix3.panix.com Member name Connected Idle time Location ----------- --------- --------- -------- Alan (#10747) 9 seconds 0 seconds Tiffany Total: 1 member, who has been active recently. There is only one member invisible to you. _________media___________________________________________________02:18 /world media @who The second world, of bones, a space of labor, fetishization, conjure, on Kyoto-MOO, designed by Kayo Matsushita and myself. Rarely visited, running on a corner of a Parsons Design School machine, Julu has flown briefly here; I have lived among _these_ bones, churned in the files themselves. Welcome to Kyoto-MOO! A moment of stillness just before the invention of radio. you are entering a world of speaking bodies; everyone is close at hand. If you reach out, you touch us with your bright thinking. Welcome to Kyoto! *** Connected *** Yurt hovel where Wizards hang, bones in front, skins behind You see basin, human, lump, and stuff here. Last connected Sun Aug 17 02:13:41 1997 EDT from panix3.panix.com _________sotatsu__________________________________________________02:20 A third world, where I hide myself, exhausted by past politics, the Quota Review Board, friends gone forever, the old Post-Modern Culture MOO, hav- ing changed names, first to PMC2, now open to suggestion. I come for the *Chatter list, read myself among the names, no one notices, I'm gone be- fore the dawn. You have no messages on your Answering Machine. Please type '@unmorph' to save your default shape for morphing. room You see nothing special. You see empty here. I don't know which "empty" you mean. I see no "room" here. _________pmc_______________________________________________________02:24 look empty look room The space which I will give you as a gift, a space of text-turned-into the blunt materials of the world, a space of objects hiding, space of dissemb- ling, depth, solitude of one's dark night of the dance of souls. __________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Aug 1997 05:21:02 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: Re: email viri MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 <> it can't attachments can be executable it is a very slight chance thinking all is safe and panic are equally misplaced ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Aug 1997 18:57:09 -0700 Reply-To: ttheatre@sirius.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Karen and Trevor Organization: Tea Theatre Subject: looking for addresses MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Can someone please send me a snail mail for the following individuals? Marvin Bell Beverly Dahlen Bob Perelman Joan Retallack Ron Silliman Gustaf Sobin Tom Clark Thanks in advance! Karen McKevitt ttheatre@sirius.com ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Aug 1997 10:21:11 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: two solutions (& other anecdotage) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Chuck Shepherd's WEIRDNUZ.491 (News of the Weird, July 4, 1997) -- his latest weekly email dispatch of the popular true-story column -- includes this: > * In December, a man from southern England named Nigel paid > about $128,000 at a London auction for the personalized license > plate "N1 GEL." Eighty other plates brought in about $2.7 million. > A month before that in London, the much less wealthy Dave Parker > spent about $40 to have a plate matching his name: He paid a filing > fee to change his name legally to [Mr.] C 539 FUG, which is his > current license plate. This astonishing pairing of info-bits gives pause. What is this craze for unity of self & license plate? Does the license plate lend reality to the else drifting soul? What's the deal here? The same issue of News of the Weird also includes this: > * The Globe and Mail (Toronto, Ontario) reported in February that > local physician Ron Charach, who is the author of a volume of poems > by Canadian doctors, recently had one of his works selected to be > published in the prestigious British medical journal, The Lancet. > The title of the poem is the same as the last two words in this > passage: "In silence after heavy rain / you can hear prostates > growing." who'd think that The Lancet would (finally) go postmod? And a 3rd item from same: > * In a brief interview published in Fortune magazine in February, > Todd Sloane, a marketing executive with Publishers Clearing House > (the $10 million sweepstakes people) was asked whether entrants > worry that the PCH prize patrol can't find them if they win: "We get > thousands of calls from entrants warning us their house is hard to > get to [or] they'll be at Uncle Jack's, whatever." (Strangely, it didn't occur to me to send such a helpful chit to the Yale Series of Younger Poets) -- Finally, truly weird news: > * In April, Sir Roger Penrose, a British math professor who has > worked with Stephen Hawking on such topics as relativity, black > holes, and whether time has a beginning, filed a copyright- > infringement lawsuit against the Kimberly-Clark Corporation, which > Penrose said copied a pattern he created (a pattern demonstrating > that "a nonrepeating pattern could exist in nature") for its Kleenex > quilted toilet paper. Penrose said he doesn't like litigation but, > "When it comes to the population of Great Britain being invited by a > multinational to wipe their bottoms on what appears to be the work > of a Knight of the Realm, then a last stand must be taken." (& perhaps Pollock shd. have sued drip-prone housepainters . . . ?) cheers, d.i. p.s., f.y.i. -- > NEWS OF THE WEIRD, founded in 1988, is a nationally syndicated > newspaper column distributed by Universal Press Syndicate. > Individuals may have the columns mailed to them electronically, free > of charge, approximately three weeks after the cover date, which is > the date when most subscribing newspapers will publish the column. > Send a message to notw-request@nine.org with the Subject line of > Subscribe. To read these News of the Weird newspaper columns from > the past six months, go to http://www.nine.org/notw/notw.html (That > site contains no graphics, no photos, no video clips, no audio. > Just text. Deal with it.) > > COPYRIGHT: Neither the name News of the Weird nor any > issue of News of the Weird nor any portion of any issue of News of > the Weird may be used for any commercial purpose whatsoever. One > example of such prohibited use is to use part or all of an issue of > News of the Weird as material on a commercial Web page or on a > commercial message. ("Commercial" includes Web sites or messages > that contain any paid or bartered advertising.) If a Web site or > message contains utterly no commercial content, and it is freely > accessible by the public with no fee charged, portions of News of > the Weird may be used without prior permission provided that the > portion(s) is(are) accurately quoted and identified on the Web site > or message as from News of the Weird and this copyright notice is > affixed at some point: Copyright 1997 by Universal Press Syndicate. > AUTHENTICITY: All news stories mentioned in News of the > Weird are from news stories appearing in daily newspapers in the U. > S. and Canada (or occasionally, reputable daily newspapers in other > countries or other reputable magazines and journals). No so-called > supermarket tabloid, and no story that was not intended to be > "news," is ever the source of a News of the Weird story. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 18 Aug 1997 01:22:50 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: lee ann brown Subject: BERNADETTE FUNd controVERSEy Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dear List, Bernadette Mayer loves assignments and it would be no problem for her to "write to specification"- in fact she thrives from rising to other people's lists of Experiments - I just hope someone keeps track of all the poems she writes for money. I think it'll also be good for her writing "recovery"- she'll take it seriously and produce all the more poems. And isn't writing poems what many poets would like to be paid for rather than scrubbing floors or teaching comp? Yeah, I know, who pays the piper calls the tune but Bernadette will subvert with a vitriolic pen swathed in sexy dailiness anyday any attempt at unwelcome directional content. She's a great writer of occasional verse, raising the form to new heights. I highly recommend her if you have any special occasions coming up- for as one Experiments from the (expanded) list of experiments reads: "Write occasional poems for weddings, for rivers, for birthdays, for other poets' beauty, for movie stars maybe, for the anniversaries of all kinds of loving meetings, for births, for moments of knowledge, for deaths." and that's only one of her long list! The last one says: "Please add to this list." so if you give her "specifications" it's like throwing Brer Rabbit in the briarpatch. Maybe the poems should be posted on the net held up for all to scrutinize if they are in any way compromised by filthy lucre. ('Only fooling' as Bernadette would say.) But not about the posting part. Love, Lee Ann PS: You can give me assignments too. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ In reply to: >The Bernadette Mayer Fund- Bernadette Mayer will write a poem, prose >piece, letter, or other work to your specification in exchange for a >contrubution to the fund. Please send the specifications for the poems >to Bernadette Mayer at 4079 Country Rt 9, East Chatham, N.Y. 12060 (or >E-Mail it to drunkenbee@prodigy.com) > >Send the tax deductible contribution checks payable to: Giorno Poetry >Systems/The Bernadette Mayer Fund. Giorno Poetry Systems, 222 Bowery, >New York, N.Y. 10012 At 3:16 PM -0500 8/16/97, Judy Roitman wrote: >She should not have to do this. I hope this shames everyone who has not >already contributed into contributing something, and not in exchange for >anything. and at Sat, 16 Aug 1997 15:10:49 -0700 Dodie Bellamy wrote: Judy, while I totally understand your sentiments about how Bernadette shouldn't have to do anything to receive help, I do not think that people who haven't given should be shamed. That's a personal decision and everyone has different circumstances. And this opinion is from a household who *has* sent money to the fund. Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Aug 1997 20:46:16 -0400 Reply-To: alphavil@ix.netcom.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "R. Gancie" Organization: Alphaville Subject: mediocrity MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I want to thank everyone from the Poetics list that took part in our discussion on Web del Sol tonight. I apologize to those who may have wanted to get on but could not. We had no idea how many the chat room would hold. To clear up some loose ends; the book which I referenced ("increasingly ambitious dialogue with modernism") in response to the question about John Ashbery was Charles Altieri's Self and Sensibility in Contemporary American Poetry. Douglas Hofstadter is critical of John Cage's music on at least two occasions in Goedel, Escher, Bach. Finally, I do not want to leave anybody with the impression that I consider Robert Peters' criticism astute. I find it eratic and superficial. Again thanks.---Carlo Parcelli ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 18 Aug 1997 01:51:56 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: Julu and Jennifer get far too sloppy please excuse them MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII --+- Particle and Wave Julu says wave and particle, particle and wave, don't force me to choose, she says. Stay here, what am I. :-) Jennifer says, wave, most likely and definitely wave, undulating with tiny hysteresis across the packets, bits and bytes, the tiniest slopes you might imagine. Play-acting the particle, datagram, packet, hard-edged letter, but definitely wave. Electric-Julu, Julu-Electra, wave and wave. J says, yes, well, both of J says, us, but I J says, you're interrupting, just as J says, yes, but I thought :-( J says, you usually do, not thinking very well, are you now? J says, but I thought, no J says, well, go on, go on, nothing will satisfy you. :-) J says, think, I would be particle, would leave J adds, would leave, turn over in bed, not the signifier, get rid of the quotes, show my body off :-) J says, and learn to see, I suppose, all those retinal cells firing in terrific clumps! :-) J says, learn to see, what it means for a body to turn around, new vistas in every direction. Loving the body as well, not Julu-Electra, maybe Julu-Antigone, the gone thing in the dust. :-( :-) J says, Particle-Julu, Particle-Jennifer, there's always a chance we'll disappear, bodies don't last forever, they age, disease :-o :-) J interrupts, they interrupt the world - of the world, they interrupt it. J says, we're going particle, gone from wave. We're gonna be there with our eyes open, weight of the body. We're gonna get out of letter-fetter. Our punctuation will be our mouths. Our sex will be our arms and legs and minds. We'll pull our dresses up. We'll smell each other. :-o :-) J says, the smell will be strong, it will be silent. We'll mark each other with our teeth, our nails. We'll be on the street, everyone will know. J says, everyone will know, we won't have to say a word. :-) :-) J says, we'll hate words, turn our ears on them. We'll have ears, too. We'll listen to the sounds of our bellies, I'll listen to your heart's loud beating, you'll taste my tongue in your mouth, my tongue lightly against your eyes, against the small of your back, ever more lightly along your clitoris, your labia. :-o :-o :-) :-) J says, we'll have other views, exposures, every turn a new landscape of intimacy, worlds in the slightest gesture. :-) J says, remember, it's only a matter of time, remember, we have all the time in the world. :-( :-) J says, until we're bodies, always a reminder, and then, breathing ... J and J, wave and particle, particle and wave :-| J and J, wave and particle, particle and wave :-) They're silent, poised, dreaming, waiting, suspended, quiet, waiting They're silent, poised, dreaming, waiting, suspended, quiet, waiting They're silent, poised, dreaming, waiting, suspended, quiet, waiting :-( :-| :-o :-o :-) :-) :-) _________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Aug 1997 23:37:35 -0700 Reply-To: ttheatre@sirius.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Karen and Trevor Organization: Tea Theatre Subject: Re: mediocrity MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit R. Gancie wrote: > > I want to thank everyone from the Poetics list that took part in our > discussion on Web del Sol tonight. I apologize to those who may have > wanted to get on but could not. We had no idea how many the chat room > would hold. To clear up some loose ends; the book which I referenced > ("increasingly ambitious dialogue with modernism") in response to the > question about John Ashbery was Charles Altieri's Self and Sensibility > in Contemporary American Poetry. Douglas Hofstadter is critical of John > Cage's music on at least two occasions in Goedel, Escher, Bach. Finally, > I do not want to leave anybody with the impression that I consider > Robert Peters' criticism astute. I find it eratic and superficial. Again > thanks.---Carlo Parcelli I hope someone from the list who participated will elaborate on the discussion, for those of us who missed it. Karen McKevitt ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 18 Aug 1997 09:05:49 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Miekal And Subject: Re: looking for addresses MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Looking for email or snail mail address for Dale Pendall, the author of Pharmaka / Poeia. Backchannel me, they say. Miekal -- @#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@# Dreamtime Village website: http://net22.com/dreamtime QAZINGULAZA: And/Was/Wakest website: http://net22.com/qazingulaza e-mail for DT & And/Was: dtv@mwt.net ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 18 Aug 1997 09:44:11 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Alexander Subject: signed book In-Reply-To: <199707131935.MAA19340@germany.it.earthlink.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dear Mark Yes please send me that signed book back. I'll send you another. I have to take better care of what gets on the bookshelves around here. As to talking about design, or anything else, about that and other books, yes, let's do it. This week I'm likely to be in the studio from 9am or so (I think we're in the same time zone as you until daylight savings time exits the scene, and then we're an hour later than you, as Arizona never changes for the daylight savings) until nearly 2pm. Then on some of these days I'll be picking up Kate (school started today), and on other days I'll be staying later at the studio. Most nights we're home. I know you have both numbers, but here, anyway -- 520 620 1626 studio 520 321 1811 home take care, charles ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 18 Aug 1997 13:58:06 -0400 Reply-To: John_Lavagnino@Brown.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: John_Lavagnino@BROWN.EDU Subject: Re: two solutions (& other anecdotage) David Israel quoted the News of the Weird: > * In April, Sir Roger Penrose, a British math professor who has > worked with Stephen Hawking on such topics as relativity, black > holes, and whether time has a beginning, filed a copyright- > infringement lawsuit against the Kimberly-Clark Corporation, which > Penrose said copied a pattern he created (a pattern demonstrating > that "a nonrepeating pattern could exist in nature") for its Kleenex > quilted toilet paper. Penrose said he doesn't like litigation but, > "When it comes to the population of Great Britain being invited by a > multinational to wipe their bottoms on what appears to be the work > of a Knight of the Realm, then a last stand must be taken." Good as it is, this last bit appears to have been the utterance of Penrose's lawyer, not Penrose himself, according to other news stories. I am sorry to report that this toilet paper is not sold in the United States. I would be interested in talking with anyone who's going to the UK soon and has large amounts of free space in their luggage. John ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Aug 1997 17:30:16 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: encased in light In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >I just wanted to say that I put in a little post last night and it >didn't go through. It was in response to Charles Alexander's >stunning image of George Bowering encased in light. I said in that >post that this was one of the most beautiful images I had ever >laid eyes upon, whatever that means. I just wanted for the record to >say this again. And also to say to George that I actually played >minor league ball too, though it was football--semi-pro, about $100 >per game back in the early 80's for the Waukesha Hawks. Does that >count? >Kent I dont know. I guess i can see that people can love playing football, and I remember the first time I saw it, age 17, in Victoria down from the sticks, it seemed a neat magic game. In the 50s and 60s i went to some football games, and even later saw some on TV, but the longer I have looked the less interesting I have found football, and the NFL on TV is just, agh, I cant be bothered. I know that Shelley and Keats wouldnt have gone to a foo'ball game, but they would have gone to baseball games, as for instance the Venice Hawks vs. the Trieste Red Sox. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 17 Aug 1997 17:27:09 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: email viri In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Well if it's so impossible how come my mac got infected with a macro virus >from an email attachment from someone in Brunei ? And, as a result, had to >have its entire operating system rebuilt ??? >I wonder.... >Pam Brown Because, as people have told you and me 1000000 times, you CAN get a virus from an attachment sent with e-mail, but not from e-mail that is not attachments. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 18 Aug 1997 15:44:37 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Judy Roitman Subject: Re: two solutions (& other anecdotage) In-Reply-To: <199708181758.NAA20676@ursula.stg.brown.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >David Israel quoted the News of the Weird: > >> * In April, Sir Roger Penrose, a British math professor who has >> worked with Stephen Hawking on such topics as relativity, black >> holes, and whether time has a beginning, filed a copyright- >> infringement lawsuit against the Kimberly-Clark Corporation, which >> Penrose said copied a pattern he created (a pattern demonstrating >> that "a nonrepeating pattern could exist in nature") for its Kleenex >> quilted toilet paper. Penrose said he doesn't like litigation but, >> "When it comes to the population of Great Britain being invited by a >> multinational to wipe their bottoms on what appears to be the work >> of a Knight of the Realm, then a last stand must be taken." > >Good as it is, this last bit appears to have been the utterance of >Penrose's lawyer, not Penrose himself, according to other news >stories. > >I am sorry to report that this toilet paper is not sold in the United >States. I would be interested in talking with anyone who's going to >the UK soon and has large amounts of free space in their luggage. > >John Here's why Penrose tilings are neat. The shapes look very simple and natural, it is not at all obvious just glancing at a Penrose tiling that it is deeply strange. But there is no need to go to England. You can make your own Penrose tiling toilet paper, wallhanging, etc. --- Penrose tilings have been written up in places like Discover, Scientific American, etc. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Judy Roitman | "Whoppers Whoppers Whoppers! Math, University of Kansas | memory fails Lawrence, KS 66045 | these are the days." 785-864-4630 | Larry Eigner, 1927-1996 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note new area code ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://titania.math.ukans.edu/faculty/roitman/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 18 Aug 1997 16:17:08 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: football encased in light In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT George: I don't want to take up space that otherwise would be taken up with the discussion about poems (or, more importantly, with actually true to life poems separate from the talking about them), but I just have to ask: How do you know that Keats and Shelley would not have wanted to go to football games? There are lots of boys there at football games (at least in the American kind--I don't know about the fake CFL, even though I was invited once to try out for the Edmonton Argonauts), who pat each other lovingly on the behind. Kent > >I just wanted to say that I put in a little post last night and it > >didn't go through. It was in response to Charles Alexander's > >stunning image of George Bowering encased in light. I said in that > >post that this was one of the most beautiful images I had ever > >laid eyes upon, whatever that means. I just wanted for the record to > >say this again. And also to say to George that I actually played > >minor league ball too, though it was football--semi-pro, about $100 > >per game back in the early 80's for the Waukesha Hawks. Does that > >count? > >Kent > > > > I dont know. I guess i can see that people can love playing football, and I > remember the first time I saw it, age 17, in Victoria down from the sticks, > it seemed a neat magic game. In the 50s and 60s i went to some football > games, and even later saw some on TV, but the longer I have looked the > less interesting I have found football, and the NFL on TV is just, agh, I > cant be bothered. I know that Shelley and Keats wouldnt have gone to a > foo'ball game, but they would have gone to baseball games, as for instance > the Venice Hawks vs. the Trieste Red Sox. > > > > > > George Bowering. > , > 2499 West 37th Ave., > Vancouver, B.C., > Canada V6M 1P4 > > fax: 1-604-266-9000 > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 18 Aug 1997 17:53:27 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: football encased in light In-Reply-To: <1417B9839B3@student.highland.cc.il.us> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I was invited once to try out for the Edmonton >Argonauts), who pat each other lovingly on the behind. >Kent Well, there is a team called the Edmonton Eskimos and a team called the Toronto Argonauts. It happens that they are right now each in first place in their divisions. I think you should have muscled up and gone to the Washington Steelers camp, Kent. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 18 Aug 1997 19:37:07 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: football encased in reverance MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit alright now I'm going out on a limb here like on mt sinai and the kids coming up told us kids coming down that thurmon munson had died and larry was going crazy with grief and i thought he couldn't be serious and he nearly punched me. so i know i don't know what you guys are going crazy about and i don't want to insult anyone cause i am the kind of gal that guys might be provoked to punch but if you would, could you bring it to a level that would be enjoyable for those of us that are used to other forms of contact? ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 18 Aug 1997 20:44:21 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joseph Zitt Organization: HumanSystems Subject: John Cage Event September 5th in Maryland MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit JOHN CAGE CELEBRATION TO BE HELD IN MARYLAND SEPTEMBER 5TH "AtlantiCage Ninety-seven^85: A Birthday Circus for John Cage" will be presented on September 5th, 1997 at 8 PM at the Tawes Fine Arts building on the campus of the University of Maryland at College Park. The event is free and open to the public. The celebration, organized by members of "Silence: The John Cage Internet Mailing List", will include performances and reading of works by Cage, as well as performances inspired by his work and life. In keeping with his principles of peaceful anarchism, the event will include simultaneous performances of different works, as well as related visual and sound events. It is presented as part of the worldwide "Freedom Summer" series in conjunction with the Pauline Oliveros Foundation. The event will begin on the brick stage on the north side of Tawes Theater (to the left of the theatre as you face it) with a Tuning Meditation, followed by a listening walk through the area, arriving at Room 2102 of the Tawes Fine Arts Building where the rest of the events will occur. Bring yourself and an open ear. If you'd like to contribute to the reception afterwards, food donations are appreciated. Contacts: Matthew Ross Davis Tom Bickley Joseph Zitt Silence: The John Cage Internet Mailing List: http://www.realtime.net/~jzitt/Cage Directions: Maps: For the official map, see the University web page at http://www.inform.umd.edu/CampusInfo/About_UMCP/Maps/ and click on the Southwest Quadrant. For alternate directions, see http://www.inform.umd.edu/CVS/.CVS/gettingtocampus.html By Car: The University of Maryland sits right in the corner of the intersection of 193 (University Blvd.) and Adelphi Rd. From either direction on 495, take the College Park exit (Rt. 1 south) and head south on Rt. 1 through several traffic lights. After a few miles, you will see signs for 193 west, which will be a right exit down a ramp. Take this exit, continue west through one traffic light. The next traffic light will be Campus Drive, on which you will turn left and enter the campus. Stay to your right, going through the traffic circle and keeping to your right. You will go between the construction for the Maryland Center for the Performing Arts on your right, and a huge parking garage (behind which is the stadium) on your left. Soon, you'll reach a second traffic circle, through which you pass, still staying to the right and going straight. A soccer field will be on your right, and the next stop sign you get to, turn left. The large parking lot that is now to your right is Lot 1, and Tawes Theatre looks west across it. Park in Lot 1 (it's open to visitors without a permit after 4 PM on weekdays), and walk towards the theatre, and you should see us gathering out on a brick stage in a small courtyard next to the theatre entrance. The main building entrance is actually on the opposite side of the building, and the room for the performance (2102) is on the second floor. By Public Transportation: The College Park Metro is not really within walking distance of Tawes; there are shuttles that run from the station to campus, or you can take a cab. Tawes is at least a mile or two from the Metro station. -- ---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------- |||/ Joseph Zitt ===== jzitt@humansystems.com ===== Human Systems \||| ||/ Maryland? ================ SILENCE: The John Cage Mailing List \|| |/ http://www.realtime.net/~jzitt ========== <*> <*> ========= ecto \| ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 18 Aug 1997 20:56:09 -0400 Reply-To: alphavil@ix.netcom.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "R. Gancie" Organization: Alphaville Subject: mediocrity MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Karen M. Sorry you missed the discussion. It was posted on the Poetics sight; but it was also posted on 300 other poetry, literature, philosophy and philosophy of science sites. We opened with a discussion of the post-Lowell confessional school with a focus on the critical works of Charles Altieri. However, Joe Brennan participated in the discussion and we eventually moved into a scrap about L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E poetry. As I tried to move the discussion toward the dominance of the scientific paradigm, we wound up talking about the phenomenonology of Husserl and Natorp, Wittgenstein, the Vienna Circle and the Frankfurt School---among other things. At one point, half the chat was on Freud and Lacan and the other half on the potential of modernist poetics to critique the scientific-technological paradigm. I still have a headache. Needless to say such a discussion in the chat format is hard to economize. We plan to do it again and hope to have our mechanics down better next time.---Carlo Parcelli ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 1997 17:27:55 +1200 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Wystan Curnow Organization: University of Auckland Subject: uk visit MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Calling all UK poetics people! Am hoping to be in London in October, and would welcome suggestions as to readings, events, exhibitions, accomodation. Wystan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 18 Aug 1997 22:59:12 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: football encased in reverance In-Reply-To: <33F8DCA3.7EE@ibm.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >if you would, could you >bring it to a level that would be enjoyable for those of us that are >used to other forms of contact? Interesting choice of word, Rachel. Now, while we are speaking of levels, we have to speak of higher and lower, dont we? When you say "bring it to a level", do you mean raise it to a higher level, by any chance? Now, in the study of language usage, that is called "begging the question," i.e. in this case pretending that we agree that a disagreement about the value of football is necessarily on a lower level than something that can be "enjoyed" by others. Unless you meant, which I doubt, that you wanted something at a lower level.... George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 2008 00:21:16 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: Left Hand Reading Series, Boulder, CO MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit ATTENTION POETS/ACTIVISTS!! Rachel Levitsky and Matt Meighan (2 subscribers) are currently organizing the 1997/98 Literary Segment of the Left Hand Reading Series in Boulder, Colorado. There are still some slots unfilled for the readings January through April, 1998. Because we cannot pay poets (though can bring them the attention of a sizable audience, and a well-promoted event) we are dependent on the poet's proximity to us. If you or a poet you know lives in the area, or will be in the Denver/Boulder area during that time and would like to read please contact us: Rachel Levitsky -- Levitsk@ibm.net Matt Meighan -- mmeighan@rmii.com Also, writers who are interested in being featured reader can send work to: Rachel Levitsky LHRS P.O. 1771 Boulder, CO 80306-1771 MORE READING SERIES INFORMATION The Reading Series is a program of the Left Hand Book Collective, an all volunteer run radical left bookstore. The series was begun last year and was a huge success. Writers Rikki Ducornet, Dennis Brutus, Akilah Oliver, Andrew Schelling, Carolyn Wright, Ward Churchill, Bunky Echo Hawk, Max Regan, Shira Segal, Geri Lynn Baumblatt, Sarah Skaggs, Stephanie Williams and others read to enthusiastic audiences. Each reading features an open segment and two featured readers, one emerging writer and one established writer. We are committed to promoting work that might otherwise be marginalized, and make a special effort to reach out to young writers, writers of color, writers of diverse economic and social backgrounds and to writers of daring and innovative forms. We see no separation between art and politics. The Left Hand Book Collective is located in downtown Boulder at: 1825 Pearl Street Boulder, CO 80302 Phone--(303) 443-8252 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 2008 00:26:59 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: football encased in reverance MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit George, My mistake, the word I was looking for was "dimension" as in "could you bring it into a dimension. . ." begging forgiveness, Rachel Rachel ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 1997 07:57:42 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Henry G Subject: M. Epshtein book Simon, for some reason I couldn't backchannel the info - the message bounced. Problem with your address? So forgive me poetics, perhaps others would also like this biblio info. The book is: Epshtein, Mikhail After the future : the paradoxes of postmodernism in contemporary Russian culture Univ. of Massachusetts Press, 1995 isbn 0870239732 0870239740 (pbk) - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 1997 11:04:55 -0300 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Stephen C. Ellwood" Subject: unsubscribe In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I am leaving the list, going away to school. Could someone tell me again how to unsubscribe? EVD ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 1997 10:37:42 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Bouchard Subject: en route to Mass Ave. Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Thrilled to announce publication of the third issue of MASS AVE. The featured poets: Michael Angelo Tata Andrew Levy Sherry Brennan Kyle Conner Jennifer Moxley Fred Muratori Kary Wayson Robert Fitterman Ethel Rackin Kim Bernstein Juliana Spahr 57 pages, perfect bound. $6 postage paid. Also, the Second Issue is still available; featuring Valerie Hanson Lisa Jarnot Marcella Durand Eileen Corder Anselm Berrigan Nava Fader Larry Price Dan Luft Douglas Rothschild Mary Burger Drew Gardner Dave Baptiste Chirot Daniel Bouchard Kevin Varrone WB Keckler Kim Lyons 56 pages, perfect bound. $6 postage paid. Get BOTH issues for the bargain price of $10. Daniel Bouchard Mass Ave. PO Box 230 Boston, MA 02117 Thank you. You're beautiful. daniel_bouchard@hmco.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 1997 11:10:05 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Henry Gould Subject: RI reading advance Upcoming reading in Rhode Island - first in the Poetry Mission's fall series at Native Gallery: Cathleen Calbert & Daniel Bouchard will read on Friday, Sept 12th at 8 pm at Native Gallery, 387 Charles St, Providence. Just off Route 95; call 401-521-3554 for directions. Free; refreshments. Come, & bring your friends in their thousands. Cathleen Calbert's new book, LESSONS IN SPACE, just publ. by Univ. of Florida Press. Daniel Bouchard edits MASS AVE. and is a decorated veteran of the poetics list. Book & magazine & other poetry mission stuff available at the reading. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 1997 13:38:31 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: MinkaCroy@AOL.COM Subject: How do I get on/off this list How do I get on & off this list, thank you. MinkaCroy@aol.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 1997 17:47:46 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lawrence Upton Subject: unsubscribe MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 <> quote _You may leave the list at any time by sending a "SIGNOFF POETICS" command to LISTSERV@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU._ L ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 1997 19:33:04 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: now you'll hate me MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII now you'll hate me but I'm on a trip, now in Pittsburg on the way to everywhere, so, well, this came out, ahem, definitely the work, ah, of a beginner, someone reading, whom, maybe even Blackburn played a role here, certain not the language poets, Rachel got me to read some Jane Miller standing up in a bookstore, well, I did that on my own, but now going through Lacan who's not much help here either, so now you'll hate me because this is just too weird because just too too ordinary ______________________________________________________________________ Plural Dark Angels of the Night You came to me like plural dark angels of the night. I was about to compose a brilliant text on the density of my language. I began thinking of your brilliant arrival a month ago, like plural dark angels of the night. My language dissolved like sloppy seconds at my feet (I'm not gonna have no feet). I wanted to reply about this, the nature of language and brilliant feet. I wanted to write about languages interspersed, interpenetrated in this machine, languages and information everywhere, like plural dark angels of the brilliant sloppy night. I thought of our arms like grapple-hooks around each other. Language clattered like a bowl of boiling coffee spilled on my feet. I thought of our teeth against brilliant skin confused with passion like plural dark angels of the night. There was something else I wanted to write; I thought of your brilliant eyes. I wanted to write about your eyes; I thought of your brilliant mouth, your limbs. I thought about the feet of the plural dark angels of the night. I thought, I thought. I thought, brilliant, you know where this is going so I'm not gonna write no more. __________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 1997 22:16:01 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: football encased in light (Something along these lines went out to the list two days ago, but my reply function seems to only work about half the time. I have my pride, so i'm typing it again, leaving out some of the potentially volatile language from the original. Kent) George: You think you flame me. But the invitation to the pre-season camp from Edmonton was many years ago, and the fact is I just don't give a damn about Canadian football, since it is such a sorry state of affairs. You Canadians are pretty pathetic: You still haven't really rid yourselves of the Queen, and then like cowbirds you take up football and then baseball, and then all of a sudden you think you can tell true past players of these games what the score is. Eskimos or Argonauts, who gives a shit? They are both really stupid names anyway, almost as stupid as "Maple Leafs," which is a really silly name. I meant to say Eskimos and I said Argonauts. So what George? I was cut after a couple weeks, but this was only because of the receiver coach who felt I was too light to play tight end and too heavy to play wide-out. He was a CAnadian, boring and affable on the outside, scheming and manipulative on the inside. So what sport do you play, George? Curling? Don't mess with me. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 1997 22:33:59 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: football encased in reverance (And I'd also sent this out too, which I kind of like, so here goes again. Kent) Rachel: I don't know you, but after reading your post, no one, but no one who cares about sports could ever want to punch you, whether you're taht kind of gal, as you say, or not. Oh Munson's name being whispered to you by a kid on Mt. Sinai, you going down toward the river, with the scent of the olive tree in your hair, Rachel, Munson barely visible against the olive a little bit up the hill, lashed to it, six or seven arrows in his side, staring ecstatically out at the world. It's so beautiful, that none of those who see can believe it. And then out of nowhere comes George Bowering, rolling downhill in a circle, going faster and faster, like a bagel. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 1997 20:30:47 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: football encased in light MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable ---------- From: KENT JOHNSON[SMTP:KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US] Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 1997 8:16 PM To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU Subject: Re: football encased in light 'xcusa please but i'm new in these parts and don't know if Kent (or = george) is hero or hormone in these woods, but is that stuff down below = in the bilge supposed to be poetry? or what? Makes Bukowski look = positively experimental - I mean, avant-marginal, or front-fender = febrile or sumpin'. Sure hope this isn't the list light from Buffalo = land. red. >George: You think you flame me. But the invitation to the pre-season camp from Edmonton was many years ago, and the fact is I just don't give a damn about Canadian football, since it is such a sorry state of affairs. You Canadians are pretty pathetic: You still haven't really rid yourselves of the Queen, and then like cowbirds you take up football and then baseball, and then all of a sudden you think you can tell true past players of these games what the score is. Eskimos or Argonauts, who gives a shit? They are both really stupid names anyway, almost as stupid as "Maple Leafs," which is a really silly name. I meant to say Eskimos and I said Argonauts. So what George? I was cut after a couple weeks, but this was only because of the receiver coach who felt I was too light to play tight end and too heavy to play wide-out. He was a CAnadian, boring and affable on the outside, scheming and manipulative on the inside. So what sport do you play, George? Curling? Don't mess with me. Kent< ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 00:27:29 -0400 Reply-To: Tom Orange Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Orange Subject: paul auster In-Reply-To: <199708200404.AAA13987@juliet.its.uwo.ca> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII hey there, can anyone confirm for me if the paul auster of /new york trilogy/ and /smoke/ fame is the same one who translated mallarme's /tomb for anatole/ for north point press a while back? mastering the trivial, tom. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 2008 22:53:38 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: football encased in reverance MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Oh Kent oh Kent oh there you go oh there I go I say Sinai and it could be Masada, I mean all of those characters! And all that sport yes I feel it, am getting the feel for it, I mean him I’m there and I see it I finally see it, it just took some pointing out. I am entering the Other dimension and there, from the other side, from the snake path or snake pit, comes another oh yes yes it’s Kevin Kostner and they are rolling yes they are rolling as a doughnut as a bauble as...WAIT A MINUTE, JUST WAIT A MINUTE. Oh Kent, will they? Will they ever meet? KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > (And I'd also sent this out too, which I kind of like, so here goes > again. Kent) > > Rachel: > I don't know you, but after reading your post, no one, but no one > who cares about sports could ever want to punch you, whether you're > taht kind of gal, as you say, or not. Oh Munson's name being > whispered to you by a kid on Mt. Sinai, you going down toward the > river, with the scent of the olive tree in your hair, Rachel, Munson > barely visible against the olive a little bit up the hill, lashed to > it, six or seven arrows in his side, staring ecstatically out at the > world. It's so beautiful, that none of those who see can believe > it. And then out of nowhere comes George Bowering, rolling > downhill in a circle, going faster and faster, like a bagel. > Kent ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 00:45:14 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Matt Kirschenbaum Subject: Re: paul auster In-Reply-To: from "Tom Orange" at Aug 20, 97 00:27:29 am MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit It's the same Paul Auster. He discusses this translation during his linebreak interview: http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/linebreak/ --Matt > > hey there, can anyone confirm for me if the paul auster of /new york > trilogy/ and /smoke/ fame is the same one who translated mallarme's /tomb > for anatole/ for north point press a while back? > > mastering the trivial, > tom. > =================================================================== Matthew G. Kirschenbaum University of Virginia mgk3k@virginia.edu Department of English http://www.iath.virginia.edu/~mgk3k/ The Blake Archive | IATH ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 19 Aug 1997 23:27:36 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: football encased in light In-Reply-To: <15F772A44DB@student.highland.cc.il.us> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >(Something along these lines went out to the list two days ago, but my >reply function seems to only work about half the time. I have my >pride, so i'm typing it again, leaving out some of the potentially >volatile language from the original. Kent) > >George: >You think you flame me. But the invitation to the pre-season camp >from Edmonton was many years ago, and the fact is I just don't give a >damn about Canadian football, since it is such a sorry state of >affairs. You Canadians are pretty pathetic: You still haven't >really rid yourselves of the Queen, and then like cowbirds you take >up football and then baseball, and then all of a sudden you think you >can tell true past players of these games what the score is. Eskimos >or Argonauts, who gives a shit? They are both really stupid names >anyway, almost as stupid as "Maple Leafs," which is a really silly >name. I meant to say Eskimos and I said Argonauts. So what George? I >was cut after a couple weeks, but this was only because of the >receiver coach who felt I was too light to play tight end and too >heavy to play wide-out. He was a CAnadian, boring and affable on the >outside, scheming and manipulative on the inside. So what sport do >you play, George? Curling? Don't mess with me. >Kent Kent, what is wrong with you? Why are you so pissed off? I never tried to flame you. If you were serious with your question, I play fastball, a version of softball that is more exciting than that slo-pitch game they play south of the border, and related to baseball, a game they were playing in Ontario in 1836. Oh, and the first football game was played in Kingston, Ont. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 17:36:03 BST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Ira Lightman Subject: Elegy for Conlon Nancarrow Comments: To: I.Lightman@cpca2.uea.ac.uk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII A word of mourning from me: I was just thinking of Nancarrow the week before he died, drawing inspiration from his piece - is it "x" or "zeugma"? - where the "left hand" of the player piano starts playing very slowly, ascending and speeding up and the "right hand" plays ludicrously quickly, descending and slowing down. They meet in the middle and cross and finish at their far extremes. It is a piece of such simple audacity that it delights anyone I know, pop or classical or whatever their musical tastes. I was writing a libretto for a piece by MIke Higgins - the score of Bach's first Prelude from the Well Tempered Clavier played upside down, hence "I edulerp" (Prelude I) as the title and I used a poem of two-word lines with the ultimate line read first, then the first, then the penultimate, then the second, and so on, crossing in the middle. The columns should work separately and together. The theme was a Gaia of Gaia's: just as all life and the planet may be one organism, so may all its history also make a gaia. It seems to strike by fluke a note of eternity, the fields Beckett describes in Stirrings Still, which honour life and see some hope in death, so I'll offer it in memory of Nancarrow: I EDULERP beyond one great hand in great great hand one's great great grand great great grand last long one's hand first this in hand grass of one first straw this one last garden one past garden one come to pass garden this time meta is grass garden and vine hand and out lasts garden this straw time less and wine time in this time garden is time wine one in hand straw as one grand last one in grand first is gaia's time less gaia time now is time wine is less time vine the meta eternity time met eternity's a time right in one great right the great great hand in great great hand time's great grand grand great time's hand great great in hand great great the right great one in right time a eternity's met time eternity meta the vine time less is wine time is now time gaia less time gaia's is first grand in one last grand one as straw hand in one wine time is garden time this in time wine and less time straw this garden lasts out and hand vine and garden grass is meta time this garden pass to come one garden past one garden last one this straw first one of grass hand in this first hand one's long last grand great great grand great great one's hand great great in hand great the beyond On Tue, 12 Aug 1997 07:28:47 -0800 Herb Levy wrote: > From: Herb Levy > Date: Tue, 12 Aug 1997 07:28:47 -0800 > Subject: Conlon Nancarrow > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > I just returned home from the east coast to find a message on my answering > machine from Trimpin saying that Conlon Nancarrow died over the weekend in > Mexico City. Nancarrow would have been 85 in October. > > The American expatriate composer was best known for his series of studies > for player piano, composed and hand-punched on a custom machine, the medium > in which he worked valmost exclusively for much of the last fifty years. > These works were really wonderful extensions of the sound world of the > piano timbrally altered by extremes of tempo, tempo ratios, and unusual > canonic structures. His few works for live performers (either early works > composed before Nancarrow began focusing on player piano or quite recent > pieces commissioned by performers & ensembles like Ursula Oppens & Arditti > Quartet) have been more rarely heard. > > All but the three most recently completed of Nancarrow's Studies for Player > Piano are recorded on Wergo, his other works have been recorded by Arditti > Quartet, Ursula Oppens, Continuum, Joanna MacGregor, and others. In 1995, > Cambridge University Press published a book length study of his work by > Kyle Gann. > > > Herb Levy > herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 09:58:56 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: Elegy for Conlon Nancarrow MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit >---------- From: Ira Lightman[SMTP:I.Lightman@UEA.AC.UK] Sent: Wednesday, August 20, 1997 10:36 AM To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU Subject: Elegy for Conlon Nancarrow< [snip] I would not even attempt to imitate by reposting. Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me now I smash it to bits I give my obnoxious bag of notes to a begger with no throat I will hum down the street, applauding. thanx, i think - red. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 11:36:19 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Ryan Whyte Subject: Amerika Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Hi folks. I'm writing an hallucinatory extension to Kafka's _The Man who Disappeared_; the first chapter is up at http://www.freenet.edmonton.ab.ca/~rwhyte/amer.html I should have more up later this week. Thanks for your time - Ryan ============================= rwhyte@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 13:36:54 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM Subject: Re: paul auster/ davidson/debord Comments: To: tmorange@julian.uwo.ca Exact Change has just published Auster's _Translations_ ($16.95) including Tomb for Anatole, as well as Joubert, Andre Dubouchet, & Philippe Petit. I believe Anatole was originally published by North Point. Also, if you don't know it Auster's anthology _The Random House Book of Twentieth Century French Poetry_ is well worth getting, I believe it's still in print. While we're talking just published Michael Davidson's U. Cal. tome _Ghostlier Demarcations: Modern Poetry and the Material World_ ($35) is just out. Discusses Stein, Oppen, Howe, Pound, Olson, Zukofsky, Rukeyser, Reznikoff, Duncan, &&&. Also new & excitin': _Guy Debord -- Revolutionary: A Critical Biography_ ($14.95) by Len Bracken. It's not that critical (of Debord) but neither am I. Way recommended. All of these will be on next Bridge Street list but ya'll kin order'm now if ya needta. --Rod ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 13:24:32 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "p. durgin" Subject: Ad infinitum MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII PREFACE TO A CASE OF AD INFINITUM The peasants are revolting The pious Bleating of Feckless roup Leaping into The heaping Bargain Who is not On so holy A sooth feast A victory call Was a clarinet A question of legions The market will bear The lumbering Yer slit don't shrink It is almost Bleeding But malakin Inly epoch -- Patrick Durgin -- I[I]I pdurgin@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu I[I]I ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 14:27:59 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joel Kuszai Subject: SPD's new address MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII FYI SPD is MOVING (from 1814 San Pablo Avenue, Berkeley CA 94702) effective 1 September 1997 our new address & phone/fax is: SPD / Small Press Distribution, Inc 1341 Seventh Street Berkeley CA 94702 new telephone 510.524.1668 new fax 510.524.0852 same toll-free orders 800.869.7553 same e-mail spd@igc.apc.org Keep in touch! ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 11:53:47 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Yes, but what does it do? MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable As this fellow once said to me, "The hell with the pansies, what can you = do with it?" Well, my 'test market' reports to me that he's had a 40% boost in sales = (for the one or two cynics in this group, I don't doubt that he drives a = Mercedes, long ago paid his mortgage and has his sere threads done by = the comely seamstress with the magical fingers - not that she'd ever = given me the nod, but then I only brought in my pants cuffs to be taken = up) - nevertheless, its nice to be published by the world. The following work and its companion are released by the author, Red = Slider, to the Public Domain and all rights hereby relinquished. It is = the author's desire that persons who should encounter a street-poet, = down on their luck, should give them a copy and let them know they may = use it as they see fit.=20 (var. 1) If he comes, no matter how - as victim, as perpetrator, with misfortune and woe or con and rube, with a shill for an eye, he's a bum, if he comes that way; and you may still offer to do the thing, to offer him some=20 if he comes that way=20 but if he should hold out a poem, no matter the verse, poor or magnificent doggerel or worse, he's a working man - a hard-working man. Give him his due, pay him his wage, a fair wage for a hard-working man. (var. 2) If she comes, no matter how - as victim, as perpetrator, with misfortune and woe or con and rube, with a shill for an eye, she's a bum, if she comes that way; and you may still offer to do the thing, to offer her some=20 if she comes that way=20 but if she should hold out a poem, no matter the verse, poor or magnificent doggerel or worse, she's a workin' woman - a hard-workin' woman. Give her what's due, pay her the wage, a fair wage for a hard-workin' woman. Put in the Public Domain August 19, 1997 by Red Slider. no rights reserved. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 13:00:05 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: what flames, where? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Kent, that wasnt flaming (unless george back channeled you). George wouldnt flame a fly. Thats just George's notion of good fun & friendliness. Honest. We've all put up with that for decades. When you meet soneone as developmentally challenged as George Bowering, you only encourage him, because its just great that he can interact at all, after all those years growing up in the desert. Btw, when you wrote that you didnt give a damn abt canadian things, I was really hoping the text was going to say "rats ass." "I dont give a rats ass about canadian things." Am i the only listling who prefers "rats ass" to "damn"? David ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 15:54:23 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Bouchard Subject: Re: what flames, where? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII David, I prefer rats ass but only to canadian bacon. I prefer rats ass flamed. daniel_bouchard@hmco.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 15:59:58 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: Re: what flames, where? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain David Bromige now turns to favored forms of expressing umbrage (or disinterest at least) -- saying to Kent Johnson, << Btw, when you wrote that you didnt give a damn abt canadian things, I was really hoping the text was going to say "rats ass." "I dont give a rats ass about canadian things." Am i the only listling who prefers "rats ass" to "damn"? >> I won't personally weigh in in favor of rat's ass; somehow (notwithstanding the agreeable hint of the archaic), the presumed appeal of this locution eludes me at present. What other forms of not-caring -- what rhetoric of i-cd-care-less -- are prevalent, rare, favored, or even of-the-moment? I've somewhat admired > I don't give a flying fuck . . . < (though will not admit to having used the expression much meself). One feels certain that this redoubtable roster must have up its collective sleeves many more (& better) alternatives, neh? d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 16:06:31 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Kellogg Subject: Re: what flames, where? In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII David Bromige wrote: > Btw, when you wrote that you didnt give a damn abt canadian things, I was > really hoping the text was going to say "rats ass." "I dont give a rats ass > about canadian things." Am i the only listling who prefers "rats ass" to > "damn"? David No. I too prefer it. In fact, rats ass is best flamed (or broiled). Cheers, David ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ David Kellogg Duke University kellogg@acpub.duke.edu University Writing Program (919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708 FAX (919) 660-4381 http://www.duke.edu/~kellogg/ There is no mantle and it does not descend. -- Thomas Kinsella ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 11:59:45 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Alexander Subject: Re: what flames, where? In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Btw, when you wrote that you didnt give a damn abt canadian things, I was >really hoping the text was going to say "rats ass." "I dont give a rats ass >about canadian things." Am i the only listling who prefers "rats ass" to >"damn"? David I prefer rats ass to David's old damn flames ass rats prefer David to flame I damn old David prefers I to old damn flames rats ass to old David flames prefer I damn rats ass to old I David rats damn ass prefer flames David, old flame, I prefer rats ass to damn chax press :: alexander writing/design/publishing books by artists' hands :: web sites built with care and vision handmade and trade editions of contemporary innovative writing chax@theriver.com :: http://personal.riverusers.com/~chax/ ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 19:57:52 -0400 Reply-To: daniel7@IDT.NET Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Zimmerman Organization: Bard-O Subject: Re: what flames, where? MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Charles Alexander wrote: > > >Btw, when you wrote that you didnt give a damn abt canadian things, I was > >really hoping the text was going to say "rats ass." "I dont give a rats ass > >about canadian things." Am i the only listling who prefers "rats ass" to > >"damn"? David > > I prefer rats ass to David's old damn flames > ass rats prefer David to flame I damn old > David prefers I to old damn flames rats ass > to old David flames prefer I damn rats ass > to old I David rats damn ass prefer flames > David, old flame, I prefer rats ass to damn > chax press :: alexander writing/design/publishing > books by artists' hands :: web sites built with care and vision > handmade and trade editions of contemporary innovative writing > chax@theriver.com :: http://personal.riverusers.com/~chax/ I like Ed Sanders' "I don't give a pound of mule mucus," though I rarely quote it. Always wondered how one would collect it... Dan Zimmerman ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 19:17:15 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: oh canada Whoa. Is it me? Am I actually the one missing double entendres in the last posts, letting me know, ever so subtly, that every one is kosher and just playing back with moi? Well, I have to admit, listers, that I am more confused than I even normally am. George and David (the Canadians) and even a few Americans (among the very few Americans on this list) seem to have taken me awrongs. In fact, this is very interesting, and I'd like to propose it is worth at least a new and separate thread (tho I doubt it would come to that). Is it possible, really, that such intelligent people could have thought that my football post to George was seriously meant? That I actually thought he was trying to "flame" me with his previous post? I have to say, this seems very similar to Sokal all over again, even though I never intended it that way. I sincerely thought that the silliness would be obvious. I mean I've never even (and I swear here) been to Canada. (although my past in football is more or less real--I was actually captain of the UW/LaCrosse freshman football team, then broke my hand and went to UW/Milwaukee to play soccer. My substitute at tight end on the football team in '74 went on three years later to become NAIA All-American, a tid-bit that remains one of the proudest accomplishments of my life to this day.) Anyway, I just wanted to make this clear, and to apologize to George and David for insulting their motherland. I was just kidding. In fact, I have to say, it's fascinating that when I told David Bromige some days back that I had had an encounter of the third kind that he thought I was kidding when in truth I was absolutely serious, and then when I told George that I was a better football player than he he thought I meant it when I was thoroughly kidding. This email business is slippery. Who can keep track? I'm reminded of my teacher Samu Sunim, who stared at me once like he was a tiger about to bite my entrails out and said: "Bring me the thoughts in these words, and put them in my hand." There's something there relevant to to this medium, but I'm not sure what. I will now stop posting prose and stick to poems where there is never any problem with what anybody says. I'm serious George, you Canuck. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 20:42:33 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Henry Gould Subject: Re: oh canada In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 20 Aug 1997 19:17:15 -0500 from "By the word no one thinks exactly the same thing as the other person does... Each understanding is at the same time a non-understanding, each agreement in thoughts and feelings is likewise a disagreement." - Wilhelm von Humboldt ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 17:47:52 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: oh canada MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Kent, I don't really give a fuck, I just wanted to know if that was what = passed for poetry around here, and now that you've assured me its prose = I'm much relieved - for which I don't give a rusty fig, either. Now, = about that "tid-bit" bit, that's a loose ball. Frankly I've always liked = 'a dinkle-berry' in that stead, or maybe its 'I don't give a = dinkle-berry', I can't remember and don't really give a shit! Oh, there, = I've gone and said it and I don't know David, looks too big to be a rat = - lemming maybe? Looking forward to your poetry, Kent. red. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 18:20:38 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: only kidding, kent Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" actually, I couldnt tell were you for real or not on this one (unlike yr other postings ahem). But i saw the chance to say insulting things about my old friend while appearing to rush to his defense; it was too good to waste. George would have done no less for me. Apparently, a majority enjoy their rats ass flamed. Charles writes a neat poem in which by the last line I am his old flame while he states his preference for rats ass. Thats nice. I remember the Alexander piano--shaky, unstable, but downright seductive. Unless thbat was me (the first part).There should be more fun in one's life. David I., I _knew_ you were going to "say" "flying fuck" before my eye reached it, I swear. Long a favorite of mine, though its vehemence undoes its indifference. Other phrases to indicate indifference? I used to like the ungrammatical "I could care less." (Cant even be bothered to add the "n't"). "Frankly, my dear, I dont give a damn." Sexist pig. "Good goddam" is a pleasure to say. "Two hoots" sounds archaic--back to a time when owls flew this earth. "A tinker's cuss" has a pleasingly ethnic tint. Any others? David, champion of "Encased-in-light" St.George, whose motto, "With friends like Dave, who needs enemas" has been copyrighted in British Columbia. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 20:11:58 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: seein' red Red: Well, shoot, Red, even though it's in the form of prose, I meant it all as poesy. Are you implying that you don't like it? Well, pardner, there it is. Don't let it get under your big-buckled belt _too_ much. It's only poetry. By the way, is that really your name, "Red Slider"? that's pretty cool. Did you know there used to be a coach in the very early years of the old AFL named Red Hickey? Funny how everything, in the end, can be brought back to football. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 21:35:54 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: jarnot@PIPELINE.COM Subject: rduncan Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" dear list people: i am looking for video/film footage of robert duncan for a research project. please backchannel me if you have any info and/or materials. thanks. lisa jarnot ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 18:34:24 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: seein' red MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Yeah, Red Hickey & 'Red Strader' as well - both with the 49'rs. The name = was given to me and it stuck. Once got a subpoena in the name Red Slider = and they said I'd better show up - so I suppose you could say it's real. = Buckle's-back-in-place - Padre's Ass shows. All comes down to how fast = the track is. thanx for the poetry tip. red=20 ---------- From: KENT JOHNSON[SMTP:KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US] Sent: Wednesday, August 20, 1997 6:11 PM To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU Subject: seein' red Red: Well, shoot, Red, even though it's in the form of prose, I meant it all as poesy. Are you implying that you don't like it? Well, pardner, there it is. Don't let it get under your big-buckled belt _too_ much. It's only poetry. By the way, is that really your name, "Red Slider"? that's pretty cool. Did you know there used to be a coach in the very early years of the old AFL named Red Hickey? Funny how everything, in the end, can be brought back to football. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 18:54:36 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: oh canada MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit what a coincidence - I was just thinking exactly the same thing. - red. ---------- From: Henry Gould[SMTP:AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU] Sent: Wednesday, August 20, 1997 5:42 PM To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU Subject: Re: oh canada "By the word no one thinks exactly the same thing as the other person does... Each understanding is at the same time a non-understanding, each agreement in thoughts and feelings is likewise a disagreement." - Wilhelm von Humboldt ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 19:08:07 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: I'm feeling better now - so i'll drop a poem MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit two brushes two brushes one wide one narrow brushes brushed on a painted sky the wide brush saturated in blue the nearby clouds still freshly swept with wet paint delicate margins golden delicious wet clouds picnic on blue grass gay cloth mats in sere silks cirrostratus undressing the wind bare cover distant pale blues thinning to wash the day folding into faded picnic cloths clouds of leaves, blue grass, black velvet waves rolling in menacing shapes, night thunder shaking the mats ants carry off crumbs of moon many times their own size stars the size of raindrops raindrops the size of stars. red slider August 1997 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 19:56:45 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: I dont give a In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Where I come from--i.e. them mountains in the Interior---they say "I dont give a pinch of coon shit." George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 21:27:14 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Don Cheney Subject: Re: what flames, where, huh? In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Btw, when you wrote that you didnt give a damn abt canadian things, I was >really hoping the text was going to say "rats ass." "I dont give a rats ass >about canadian things." Am i the only listling who prefers "rats ass" to >"damn"? David david, i love the phrase "I don't give a rats ass" And i agree that "I don't give a flying fuck" is another good one. like in the movie "DOWN BY LAW" where roberto benigni walks around with his list of american phrases to be spoken in broken english. he gets thrown in the hoosegow and looks at his notes and yells out at the jailer "why don't you take a flying fuck next to a couch!" (at least that's how i remember it, i never remember these things right) My dad used to say, while driving, "That guy drives like he's got a paper asshole." And of course there's another favorite: "candy-ass". i don't use these phrases but they always crack me up when i hear them. don ======================== Visit Don Cheney's Home Page & Clean Neck Shop http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5791 ============================================== ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 16:37:46 +1200 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: DS Subject: Re: what flames, where, huh? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Slaughter House 5 "Why don't you take a flying fuck at a rolling doughnut?" "Take a flying fuck at the moon." Dan >i love the phrase "I don't give a rats ass" And i agree that "I don't give >a flying fuck" is another good one. like in the movie "DOWN BY LAW" where >roberto benigni walks around with his list of american phrases to be spoken >in broken english. he gets thrown in the hoosegow and looks at his notes >and yells out at the jailer "why don't you take a flying fuck next to a >couch!" (at least that's how i remember it, i never remember these things >right) > >My dad used to say, while driving, "That guy drives like he's got a paper >asshole." And of course there's another favorite: "candy-ass". i don't use >these phrases but they always crack me up when i hear them. > >don > > > >======================== >Visit Don Cheney's Home Page & Clean Neck Shop >http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5791 >============================================== > > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 01:33:47 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: kim dawn Subject: space(s) of silence Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" on silence(s) mouth opens. words flow forward. silence(s) between each word, each breath, e a c h l e t t e r . these silences form a bubble infinitely larger than the spoken. silences take up space. silences emerge during the spoken. when we think of silence(s) we think of mouths, of breath seen in cold air, of dead phone lines, of discomfort, of too much comfort, of death. writing is scarred with the death of silences. writing is scarred with death. writing is scarred with silence. these silences are full. we read between the lines to find 'truth'. silences are impatient. silences are already written. the everlasting silence of suicide notes and love letters. beside my corpse lies my last words. between the lines lies my body. your absence is filled with your voice your body more than your presence. the further away you are, the less you speak, the more i hear your silence around my throat. on having nothing to write i have nothing to write. i have nothing to say. yet, i write: 'i have nothing to write'. 'it' all resides within the space(s) of silence. these silence(s) must be written. what is the condition of these spaces of silence? this is not so much about writing about silence as it is about writing through/to silence, finally, writing silence. silence is not empty nor passive. we recognize silence as one of the most effective tools of communication. to communicate our anger/frustration we 'use' the 'silent treatment' upon the other. silence(s) are moody. how to write silence : this is my dilema, any blanchot fans out there? oh, and by the way, h i s s h i r t s m e l l s l i k e h i m s t i l l a n d i w e a r i t u p o n m y t o n g u e u p o n t h e f a l l o f n i g h t i t r a i n s a n d a n n e m u r r a y c a n s t i l l p u l l m y h e a r t c h o r d s s p e c i a l l y s i n c e s h e s f r o m m y w a y o h d e a d l i t t l e s n o w b i r d i h e l d y o u o n c e ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 20 Aug 1997 22:29:01 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Organization: Socopoets & Russian River Writers Guild Subject: Re: oh canada MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit well I was almost canadian twenty four or so years ago. does that count for anything? here's one from vancouver: still snowing going to bed never thought i'd hear foghorns in the snow but i hear them here bay out there somewhere past attic french windows chilly 1:30 a.m. christmas day i am in canada layne with proof ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 08:42:37 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Publication Announcement MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII ***ANNOUNCING*** Now out: Misc. Proj. #3 with new work by: David Shapiro, Peter Ganick, Joseph Lease, Sheila E. Murphy, John Lowther and others..... Book reviews, journal reviews, peculiar graphix and more! Only one dollar (or send $3.50 for a four-issue subscription) (contibutors and subscribers if they haven't received their copies should do so within the next couple of days...) Make checks out to Mark Prejsnar all mail to: M. Prejsnar 641 N. Highland Ave. NE, #11 Atlanta, GA 30306 ***Submissions are strongly encouraged for #4. Poems, essays, commentary, book reviews... Read Misc. Proj... "The Voice of the Pomo South" ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 08:44:20 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: Re: seein' red Comments: To: KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain funny how everything in the end can be brought back to comedy (as in red skelton) or, cinematic how everyging can be brought back in end to cinema (as in Konstanin Kerslawsky's RED) d.i. >>> KENT JOHNSON 08/20 9:11 PM >>> Red: Well, shoot, Red, even though it's in the form of prose, I meant it all as poesy. Are you implying that you don't like it? Well, pardner, there it is. Don't let it get under your big-buckled belt _too_ much. It's only poetry. By the way, is that really your name, "Red Slider"? that's pretty cool. Did you know there used to be a coach in the very early years of the old AFL named Red Hickey? Funny how everything, in the end, can be brought back to football. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 08:15:54 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christina Fairbank Chirot Subject: Re: space(s) of silence In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII s e e ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 10:23:37 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Lppl@AOL.COM Subject: Re: rduncan Lisa: The outtakes of Duncan at SFSU Archive are excellent. Jess at one point in background. Laura can perhaps help you get dub of original half-hour program as well. 415 338-1056 Larry ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 10:50:24 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" Subject: Re: space(s) of silence Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 8:15 AM 8/21/97, Christina Fairbank Chirot wrote: > s e e even lements' ucharistix ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 2008 10:31:53 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: query MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit does anyone know if Hanging Loose Press (Brooklyn NY, I think Steve Freid, anyone know if that's right?) has an email address? thanx RL ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 10:51:31 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: space(s) of silence MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable kim wrote: how to write silence : this is my dilema, Kim, neither Rachael's nor Christina's samples seem to solve the problem = for me. They both have big flashing noisey signfiers - = END-OF-TEXT***END-OF-TEXT - waving at the ends of their texts. This I = think we are clever enough (or cynical enough) to quit when it has the = look&feel of 'END-OF-TEXT'. The trick is known, the audience eats the = rabbit. My own samples weren't much more useful. I don't pour much concrete = poetry so they all were samples of textual, rather than meta-textual, = silence. Missing term representations, grammatical or semantic = discontinuities, unfulfilled or unresolved context or heightened = anticipation. None would satisfy your request for meta-textual = representation of silence. I did learn the following from considering = the problem (at least as very tentative hypotheses): 1) the problem of representing 'silence' in text is catagorically = similar to background/forground problems - a matter of degree, of terms = in contrast, not in absence. 2) the simple presence of meta-symbols for 'silence' (space, empty = enclosure, etc.) may serve to intensify subject rather than signify = silence. The very act of calling attention to noiseless areas may = immediately fill with all kinds of noise signified by the surrounding = context - not 'silence' but a container for surplus noise. 3) 'Silence' may be a misnomer - or, at any rate, their may be a = multiplicity of 'types of silence' so that any attempt to find a = universal representation for 'silence' qua 'silence' is hopeless. Each = will only be come as still as its particular context permits and in a = way which its own formula will depend on that context. 4) It may be that 'Silence' is some kind of counter-effect that we can = create - in meaning, in meta-graphical representation, in juxtaposition = in which elements mutually annihilate each other - are 'phased' in such = a way that each is muted. Whether this can approach 'silence' i don't = know.=20 in a poem I posted here recently, there are two lines: =20 stars the size of raindrops raindrops the size of stars both sentences wanted to make there own noisey statments. I find them to = be considerably muted in this arrangement - and some kind of silence = leaking into the margins. I do not think concrete representations (as opposed to textual ones) = escape this dilemma. Even physical impositions which forces interruption = in the reader (page-breaks, double page-breaks (though here the = 'silence' of the publisher is quite audible), abrupt sequence reversal = (say, right-to-left), etc. ) still seem to be referrential, i.e. noisey. A true 'silence' would be absolutely stunning! I propose these notions from examining only a very few of my own = materials and hardly a hard proposal. Like to hear if you find anything = quiet enough and universal enough to meet your needs. END OF red ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 12:34:51 MST7MDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Subject: Re: what flames, where, huh? In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970820212714.006a48d0@mail.geocities.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: Quoted-printable Don Cheney wrt: > My dad used to say, while driving, "That guy drives like he's got a pape= r > asshole." what cld this possibly mean!? Chris=97still puzzled over it all .. Christopher W. Alexander etc. nominative press collective calexand@library.utah.edu P.O. Box 522402 / Salt Lake City UT 84152-2402 http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 14:28:32 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Bouchard Subject: address search Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Could someone--perharps even the people I am asking about-- backchannel me with the mailing addresses of Jeff Hansen (Poetics Briefs), and Aldon Nielsen? much obliged, daniel_bouchard@hmco.com ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 11:49:36 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Laura Moriarty Subject: Re: rduncan Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Thanks Larry, as I backchanneled to Lisa, the Poetry Center has extensive video and audio of Duncan. I should say also that our schedule for the fall reading series is up on our Web site. I have removed the pixilated color background and will be adding a number of new pages in the next few weeks, so check back for updates. Our complete on-line, searchable catalog is available on the site: http://www.sfsu.edu./~newlit/welcome.htm Scroll down and click on the Archives - Laura Moriarty >Lisa: > >The outtakes of Duncan at SFSU Archive are excellent. Jess at one point in >background. Laura can perhaps help you get dub of original half-hour program >as well. 415 338-1056 > >Larry ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 13:06:12 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: Elegy for Conlon Nancarrow In-Reply-To: <01BCAD4F.AF684880@ppp35.ns.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me here in this metrapolis George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 16:06:51 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Don Cheney Subject: Re: what flames, where, huh? In-Reply-To: <32B4A863694@ALEX.LIB.UTAH.EDU> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Chris, i had the same response. my dad is dead and i cannot ask him and never did when he was alive. my brother john said it was someone who was driving very slowly or conservatively. Don >Don Cheney wrt: > >> My dad used to say, while driving, "That guy drives like he's got a paper >> asshole." > >what cld this possibly mean!? > >Chris=97still puzzled over it all ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 16:07:34 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: CharSSmith@AOL.COM Subject: Fwd: Text as a Visual Medium --------------------- Forwarded message: From: info@SFCB.ORG (sfcb) Sender: BOOK_ARTS-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU (The Book Arts: binding, typography, collecting) Reply-to: BOOK_ARTS-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU (The Book Arts: binding, typography, collecting) To: BOOK_ARTS-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU Date: 97-08-21 15:00:24 EDT Event: Friday, August 22, 7 pm, free Text as a Visual Medium: Investigative typographer and book artist Inge Bruggeman, of UC Santa Barbara, will show slides and discuss expressive aspects of text and typography in the work of important artists such as Apollinaire, Werkman, Lissitzky, and Marinetti. She will also examine the visual impact of work by historical and contemporary artists who may not be as well known. At the San Francisco Center for the Book, 300 DeHaro, corner of 16th (on Muni lines 19 and 22). Call 565-0545 for more information. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 15:32:13 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Amato/Kass Fleisher Subject: Re: what flames, where, huh? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" my father being dead too, i can't supply his meaning exactly... but whenever he said to me, twinkle in his eye "joe, you talk like a man with a paper asshole" i took him to mean that i was full of SHIT... i might venture some apt readings of this saying in anatomical or gastrointestinal terms, speculating as to the way a paper asshole might function vis-a-vis the fleshy variety, but---if you look in the harper/row _american slang_ dictionary, you'll find the following under "man with a paper ass": "n phr black [african-american dialectical] a person whose ideas are not important; a trivial man; = lightweight" presumably "ass" here functions synecdochically for the person in question -- the lightweight -- so i assume asshole, being part of an ass, functions similarly... yrs in the nether regions, joe ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 15:50:56 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Thomas Bell Subject: Re: space(s) of silence lead? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable At 10:51 AM 8/21/97 -0700, Red Slider wrote: >kim wrote: > >how to write silence : this is my dilema, The following might be another way. This is the text of a series (I hope) of poems w/ drawings I am constructing for my page www.public.usit/trbell and for the wr-y-tings pad. tom bell Cobbles wait to be trodden. Butterflys flutter by This crooked flower twisted yellow tortured body Big noise from Winetka lingers on my left in the ear blown out along the= road. Framed art fills my mind When a man gets on the Beluga Caviar, well.... To the well one last time. well water's run dry Well met as well as message poems =93fingers of the sun=94=97as well as on stone slabs. Well-known According to a well-known anecdote, a cobbler detected a fault in the shoe of a figure well-defined well-written well-crafted as well. My mind is too well-written. Says Huang-po says men fear forgetting their minds= men,=20 fear falling men fear men fear falling fear =20 my mind thots lernd so well? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 14:31:32 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: Elegy for Conlon Nancarrow MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit ---------- From: George Bowering[SMTP:bowering@SFU.CA] Sent: Thursday, August 21, 1997 1:06 PM To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU Subject: Re: Elegy for Conlon Nancarrow >Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me here in this metrapolis George, I thank you and the Society for the Spellingly and Grammatically Disadventiged thanx you. I try my best but the list welcome message said to be careful because some posts were not so well thought out. I'm trying my best not to contribute to that mayhem by making all of my posts absolutely brilliant. I think there is some principle of cathexis involved. The speling degenerets proportal too the brillance or vice versa. red ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 15:08:28 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: what flames, where, huh? And while were in the general neighborhood, perhaps someone can enlighten me on the origin and nuance of the term 'asshole buddies'. I've a close friend you employs that expression frequently and I finally got the courage to ask him to stop because it always left a bad aftertaste. After seeing just how complex the taxonomy of assignments for scatalogical kinship terms is, I worry that perhaps I have hastily disemboweled my friendship, or at least thoughtlessly evacuated some of its finer mesh. L'chyme, red. ---------- From: Joe Amato/Kass Fleisher[SMTP:amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU] Sent: Thursday, August 21, 1997 1:32 PM To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU Subject: Re: what flames, where, huh? my father being dead too, i can't supply his meaning exactly... but whenever he said to me, twinkle in his eye "joe, you talk like a man with a paper asshole" i took him to mean that i was full of SHIT... i might venture some apt readings of this saying in anatomical or gastrointestinal terms, speculating as to the way a paper asshole might function vis-a-vis the fleshy variety, but---if you look in the harper/row _american slang_ dictionary, you'll find the following under "man with a paper ass": "n phr black [african-american dialectical] a person whose ideas are not important; a trivial man; = lightweight" presumably "ass" here functions synecdochically for the person in question -- the lightweight -- so i assume asshole, being part of an ass, functions similarly... yrs in the nether regions, joe ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 15:39:38 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: metragnomics Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Metragnamics (far GB) i thraw away my metraname here in this megapalis and set aut far the hippadrame with professor thanatapalis we're aff to hear the ralling stanes thats why i've ditched my tamer i want to shake my stiff ald banes be a bad-spelling ramer yet i'm imitating bawering (gearge) wha makes ane tae the lane i met him drinking at the ladge "Asshale, that glass is mane!" He was the mast punctiliuas sad but created an impressian at ance af being wild and bald alangside this repressian then aff i went with the prafessar wha calls piraeus hame far, as i said ta my canfessar It's mass _ar_ ralling stane But my canfessar (clever fellaw) remarked the balances in bawering sarcastic macker af bad spellar : his scarn far ane is scauring yet he'll transgress mast all the barders the mast af us acknawledge prafessor thanap fallaws arders he'll never transcend callege with him i knaw just what gaes an whereas, with bawering, seldam what draws me thus to the canuck ane and away fram thanap (sheldan)? * * * * I'm back--the ralling stanes were ald and tired--time has appased them at last--& sheldan's campany graws cald --I'll retrieve my metraname & re-tune the piana i'll trust my therapist to knaw that each ta must have a fra & ta the megalapalis with bawering (gearge) i'll ga-ga ga . ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 18:00:12 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christina Fairbank Chirot Subject: Re: space(s) of silence In-Reply-To: <01BCAE20.D3679A20@ppp127.ns.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII clarification: s e e Re: space(s) of silence posted by David B Chirot Christina was silent in that space Christina Fairbank Chirot ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 16:52:13 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: tech prob. - help! and appologies to all sorry for the unbroken lines. linefeeds were showing here but not being read at server. I think i've fixed it. these lines have manual returns and should be ok. this line is a wrap around line and should be ok also now that the fix has been made. otherwise it will be off the list for awhile until i can figure it out. Let me know if one or both sets are still given trouble. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 21 Aug 1997 20:47:11 -0400 Reply-To: alphavil@ix.netcom.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "R. Gancie" Organization: Alphaville Subject: Seeking Submissions MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit FlashPoint Magazine is seeking critical responses to A=R=T M=E=A=N=S, a critique of L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E poetics applying Freud, Lacan, & Foucault, by Joe Brennan. A=R=T M=E=A=N=S can be found in FlashPoint's on-line issue at: http:webdelsol.com/FLASHPOINT Responses will be considered for publication in the Fall issue, which is scheduled for release in November. Responses should be submitted by September 30th to: FLPOINT@hotmail.com FlashPoint's first on-line issue includes Stephen Dixon and Raymond Federman, Ronald Sukenick, Ricardo Cortez Cruz, David Kaufman, Cris Mazza, with an art/poem by Amiri Baraka. FlashPoint's first print issue includes Clayton Eshleman, Charles Bernstein, Jack Foley, Mark Scroggins, Carlo Parcelli, Art Cover, Judy Brody, with art by Sue Coe and Andrea Zemel. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 00:07:58 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: Elegy for Conlon Nancarrow In-Reply-To: <01BCAE3F.2F366D40@ppp102.ns.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >---------- >From: George Bowering[SMTP:bowering@SFU.CA] >Sent: Thursday, August 21, 1997 1:06 PM >To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU >Subject: Re: Elegy for Conlon Nancarrow > >>Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me > >here in this metrapolis > >George, I thank you and the Society for the >Spellingly and Grammatically Disadventiged >thanx you. > >I try my best but the list welcome message said >to be careful because some posts were not so >well thought out. I'm trying my best not to >contribute to that mayhem by making all of >my posts absolutely brilliant. I think there is >some principle of cathexis involved. The speling >degenerets proportal too the brillance or vice >versa. > >red I was just trying to get a group poem going--like the renga of a coupla years ago George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 00:15:16 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: Elegy for Conlon Nancarrow >>---------- >From: George Bowering[SMTP:bowering@SFU.CA] >Sent: Thursday, August 21, 1997 1:06 PM >To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU >Subject: Re: Elegy for Conlon Nancarrow > >>Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me > >here in this metrapolis > >George, I thank you and the Society for the >Spellingly and Grammatically Disadventiged >thanx you. > >I try my best but the list welcome message said >to be careful because some posts were not so >well thought out. I'm trying my best not to >contribute to that mayhem by making all of >my posts absolutely brilliant. I think there is >some principle of cathexis involved. The speling >degenerets proportal too the brillance or vice >versa. > >red<< >I was just trying to get a group poem going--like the >renga of a coupla >years ago George Bowering.< , Oh, that's different. Neverrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrmind. Ren-ga--Ren-ga--Ren-ga--Ren-ga--Ren-ga--Ren-ga--Ren ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 01:25:11 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: renga instigations by poet-professor alleged Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Red, Bowering's only telling half the truth. It's not only ren-ga he's initiating, He's also trying to instigate stimpy-ga. David ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 08:00:53 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: address search In-Reply-To: Message of Thu, 21 Aug 1997 14:28:32 -0400 from Dan, if you're still there - Jeff Hansen is at: 4055 Yosemite St. Louis Park, MN 55416 - Henry ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 08:02:35 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: sorry sorry Jeff, Dan & list. should have backchanneled. evil reply button. dim lands of Henry. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 08:37:06 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Renga for Nancarrow MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT [was, Subject: Re: Elegy for Conlon Nancarrow ] 1 Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me (??) 2 here in this metrapolis (GB) 3 morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music (DI) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 06:19:54 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Laurie Schneider/Crag Hill Subject: Re: space(s) of silence Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" David Chirot's s e e comes close to what we can do in text indicating presence through absence, deletion embodying even more silence (Can silence be embodied? Do we want to create such a form to hold the something that is nothing?) than Eugene Gomringer's poem "silencio" in the Emmett Williams' anthology yet text and silence are two streams that can never cross though we can have one hand in each (Would we feel the waters of silence on our fingers? Now I'm disarranging my senses.) I noisily remember Geoff Huth has considered this conundrum in much of his writing, including columns on "praecisio" (Bob Grumman should be able to help me remember with the accuracy silence deserves) Best, Crag ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 07:40:39 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: renga instigations by poet-professor alleged Red, Bowering's only telling half the truth. It's not only ren-ga he's initiating, He's also trying to instigate stimpy-ga. David ach, now look what you made me go do. I don't know renga from a rat's ass. misspelled To-ga thought we might reminisce about Gilda and John Thank god I'm a (??) why do the Limey's always use 'cricket' {is DI a limey?} they know nothing about American wheat fields. what do they know? where's my coffee? Shit, this is a fine kettle of fish I wash the pot. {thirty years ago I took class from Bromige-san. This is thanks i get?} ren-ga 36 with moon in the middle screw the moon Reichold take a flying fuck call it hot cockalorum I lift my toga unsheathed summer's-eye sword crickets piss on me {whazza hell's stimpy?} ja just as I thought no jacuddon entry write silence. call pharmacy for Aricept crickets silence crickets where's my coffee? piss on jacuddon to-ga to-ga to-ga. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 11:41:03 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: renga instigations by pot-professor alleged In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Red, Bowering's only telling half the truth. It's not only ren-ga he's >initiating, He's also trying to instigate stimpy-ga. David Well, that's not all the truth. I was also trying to finagle my on-base percentage. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 14:24:27 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christina Fairbank Chirot Subject: Re: space(s) of silence In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Jack Kerouac in Paris review Interview (with Aram Saroyan, Duncan McNaughton & Ted Berrigan) said Writing is silent meditation going a hundred miles an hour. (sotto voce: speaking of Aram Saroyan--and Geoff Huth as Crag Hill notes and others--check out Bob Grumman's great essay on MNMLST POETRY: Unacclaimed But Flourishing at Light and Dust Mobile Anthology of Poetry http://www.thing.net/~grist/homekarl.htm ) -dbc ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 12:43:30 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: how to raise funds for yr reading/lecture series Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Last weekend, the "Friends of West County," an ad hoc environmental group dedicated to preventing an industrial park being built on land the city council voted to annex (contra various laws of their own making), held our second yard sale,sat-sun, and raised nearly $4000. In the spring, we raised over $3000. (This money goes towards the attorney's fees for the court action we are bringing). It occurred to me that other groups than environmentalists should know about this source of funds. All it takes is a site (we used a small parking lot attached to a building where one of us has a business), people to donate stuff (& to encourage persons not in the group to donate stuff), some plywood resting on sawhorses to be tables, and some flyers & handpainted signs. It takes some time, sure--I'd estimate I spent 3 hours in planning meetings, an hour signmaking, a couple hours sorting out my own junk to donate, another hour picking up junk from other people, and five hours in toto helping man the cashbox. So say 12 hours. Out of my busy schedule, etc etc, but well worth it, not only because it cleared junk out of our garage here, but for the end result, and also for the camaraderie and community of the event.(I got some more books, too--O joy![as was it Ren or Stimpy would say?] And some nifty tapes and record albums...somebody's Nina Simone collection, for starters--so, junk gets recycled.) The core of our group is fewer than 20 persons--comparable with a number of groups or collocations of poetry fans in many centers throughout the continent. You too could do this and have 3 grand to play with. Enough to fly in those poets you want to hear but the administrators/fat-cat professors of your local college/art center/library _don't_ want you to. And something left over to pay your visiting poet a couple hundred. Ask me if you want to know more. David PS Red Slider? Ren & Stimpy is/was a cartoon on tv i found pretty disgusting but watched plenty of because at that time my daughter & her friends were crazy for it. A dog and a cat. Tongues hung way, way out; eyeballs shot way, way out on stalks; there was vomit, there was crap, intimidation, bondage, violence, and above all, weird sounds/voices. When will it go into reruns?! ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 13:16:06 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: ren In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Bromige wrote: >PS Red Slider? Ren & Stimpy is/was a cartoon on tv i found pretty >disgusting but watched plenty of because at that time my daughter & her >friends were crazy for it. A dog and a cat. Tongues hung way, way out; >eyeballs shot way, way out on stalks; there was vomit, there was crap, >intimidation, bondage, violence, and above all, weird sounds/voices. When >will it go into reruns?! Hey, Brom, there you go with your cultural cringe again. Why didnt you mention that Ren & Stimpy was drawn by a guy in Vancouver? George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 16:33:59 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Poetas, Gwyn McVay wrote me this note -- > Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 12:01:34 -0400 (EDT) > From: Gwyn McVay > To: "David R. Israel" > Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow > Are you keeping track of this? Then I'd like to add: > > hairy as thistle and as elevated Accordingly, I'll add it to the thread. Red Slider also had some lines, but it's not clear to me if any (or which) were intended to be part of a group renga, . . . so I don't know how to deal with those. Possibly his is the original line also? (Am not sure of the initial (metronome) author) -- in any case, here's the Renga-so-far according to my best light; shd. be happy if it proceeds -- which can easiest / best be done by copying only the Renga lines (from this post) & adding on another -- if any shd. careto do so . . . / / / / / Renga for Nancarrow 1 Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me (??) 2 here in this metrapolis (GB) 3 morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music (DI) 4 hairy as thistle and as elevated (GM) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 16:56:30 -0400 Reply-To: daniel7@IDT.NET Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Zimmerman Organization: Bard-O Subject: Renga for Nancarrow MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Renga for Nancarrow 1 Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me (??) 2 here in this metrapolis (GB) 3 morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music (DI) 4 hairy as thistle and as elevated (GM) 5 thermal etude beside a bamboo cage (DZ) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 14:32:31 PDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hoa Nguyen Subject: GAS NUMBER 9 Content-Type: text/plain Dear List: Please bear with the following promotion of an excellent poetry magazine.I have just received Gas #9 and it is excellent "High Octane Poetry" edited by Kevin Opstedal with brilliant noir-ish line drawings. Poets include: Simon Pettet, Joanne Kyger, Duncan McNaughton, Lewis MacAdams Anselm Hollo, FA Nettelbeck, Tom Clark, Alice Notley, Clark Coolidge Owen Hill, Kevin Opstedal, Ted Berrigan, Hoa Nguyen (me), Noel Anderson Black, Anselm Berrigan, Amy Gerstler, Elinor Nauen Connie Deanovich, Edmund Berrigan, William Yackulic, Richard D. Houff, Michael Price, Gregory Fuchs, Jack Hirschman, Boadiba, Lucia Berlin, Brett Evans, Shauna Hannibal, Edward Ainsworth, Dale Smith with illustrations by Kevin Opstedal!! A big tape bound issue is only ten bucks. If any one has trouble finding it, I have an address. Thanks and hope everyone is having a gas... ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 16:38:26 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Judy Roitman Subject: Re: GAS NUMBER 9 In-Reply-To: <19970822213231.7239.qmail@hotmail.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Dear List: >Please bear with the following promotion of an excellent poetry >magazine.I have just received Gas #9 and it is excellent "High Octane >Poetry" edited by Kevin Opstedal with brilliant noir-ish line drawings. > >Poets include: > >Simon Pettet, Joanne Kyger, Duncan McNaughton, Lewis MacAdams >Anselm Hollo, FA Nettelbeck, Tom Clark, Alice Notley, Clark Coolidge >Owen Hill, Kevin Opstedal, Ted Berrigan, Hoa Nguyen (me), Noel >Anderson Black, Anselm Berrigan, Amy Gerstler, Elinor Nauen >Connie Deanovich, Edmund Berrigan, William Yackulic, Richard D. Houff, >Michael Price, Gregory Fuchs, Jack Hirschman, Boadiba, Lucia Berlin, >Brett Evans, Shauna Hannibal, Edward Ainsworth, Dale Smith > >with illustrations by Kevin Opstedal!! A big tape bound issue is only >ten bucks. If any one has trouble finding it, I have an address. > >Thanks and >hope everyone is having a gas... > Could you put the address on the list? In most places it's hard finding just about anything. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Judy Roitman | "Whoppers Whoppers Whoppers! Math, University of Kansas | memory fails Lawrence, KS 66045 | these are the days." 785-864-4630 | Larry Eigner, 1927-1996 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note new area code ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://titania.math.ukans.edu/faculty/roitman/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 15:05:45 PDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hoa Nguyen Subject: Re: GAS NUMBER 9-- address Content-Type: text/plain Get yr GAS from Kevin Opstedal 386 Madeline Court Palo Alto CA 94306 I hope you do! ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 18:28:47 -0400 Reply-To: BobGrumman@nut-n-but.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bob Grumman Subject: Re: space(s) of silence MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit To fill in just a little about what Crag said about Geof Huth, his fine series of columns on the praecisio ran in Lloyd Dunn's much-missed magazine *Photostatic* as the eighties ended. A praecisio is the absence of some stimulus where expected, to define it very loosely from a shaky memory of what Geof wrote. Cage's silences were prototypes of it--and such things as books titled THE WIT AND WISDOM OF RONALD REAGAN that contained nothing but blank pages. Geof got into a good deal more than this, but I'm too lazy to look it up. Now that I've been lured into this thread, I might as well say that I think both Dave Chirot and Kim Dawn succeeded in capturing silence in their recent pieces. It seems to me that visual poetry is ideal for this purpose--and that blank areas of a page, being textless, are clearly as SILENT as a pause in the oral telling of a story. That either a blank area or a pause might cause noisy THOUGHTS is irrelevant because silence is that which causes a PERCEPTION of soundlessness regardless of whether it also causes noisy thoughts. If this weren't the case, then no kind of silence would be possible, since somewhere there's going to be someone who's going to think noisy thoughts about any possible silence. I think the real question is what silences are EFFECTIVE silences in poetry. I like visual poetry's silences; Red Slider, I guess, doesn't. Here's one of my own attempts at an effective silence in a poem. I'll make the blank area short: in the book I have it in, it lasts three pages: pnd; then, at last, the splash of something --Bob G ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 22 Aug 1997 15:39:32 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Brian Carpenter Subject: barthes Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Hello-- I'm attempting to hunt down a particular quote from Roland Barthes, something to the effect of "words are exchanged for ideas, as money is for goods." Since I'm brand new to Barthes' writing, I'm not sure where to look for this. Any leads would be highly appreciated. Backchannel is fine. many thanks-- BC --------------- Brian Carpenter "Solitude, recif, etoile A n'importe ce qui valut bricarp@spu.edu Le blanc souci de notre toile." --------------- -- Mallarme ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 22:00:10 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: John Tranter Organization: Jacket magazine Subject: silence MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In a recent posting, Dave Grumman said : "Now that I've been lured into this thread, I might as well say that I think both Dave Chirot and Kim Dawn succeeded in capturing silence in their recent pieces. It seems to me that visual poetry is ideal for this purpose--and that blank areas of a page, being textless, are clearly as SILENT as a pause in the oral telling of a story. That either a blank area or a pause might cause noisy THOUGHTS is irrelevant because silence is that which causes a PERCEPTION of soundlessness regardless of whether it also causes noisy thoughts. If this weren't the case, then no kind of silence would be possible, since somewhere there's going to be someone who's going to think noisy thoughts about any possible silence." wow. I mean, this really silences me. I'm still thinking about it. I think Bob is right. And I think Dave and Kim might well consider embarking on this wonderful and thought-filled journey. Dave, Kim ... how about some postings to the EPC list that have ... that have no sender, no subject,and NO MESSAGE !! Is this maybe too much silence to ask? It would be like Rimbaud in Harar ... nothing to say! "Those who speak do not know, those who know ... DO NOT SPEAK!!" -- (shhh ... quietly...) John Tranter ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 09:46:00 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > > / / / / / > > Renga for Nancarrow > > 1 Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me > (??) > > 2 here in this metrapolis > (GB) > > 3 morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music > (DI) > > 4 hairy as thistle and as elevated > (GM) no need for numbers or ID anymore ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 09:47:06 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow Comments: To: daniel7@IDT.NET In-Reply-To: <33FDFCFE.4C41@idt.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 4:56 PM -0400 8/22/97, Daniel Zimmerman wrote: >Renga for Nancarrow > > 1 Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me > (??) > > 2 here in this metrapolis > (GB) > > 3 morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music > (DI) > > 4 hairy as thistle and as elevated > (GM) > > 5 thermal etude beside a bamboo cage > (DZ) cambric dozens unswathed enfin ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 08:49:42 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Douglas Barbour Subject: Re: Renga - ongoing Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Renga for Nancarrow 1 Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me (??) 2 here in this metrapolis (GB) 3 morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music (DI) 4 hairy as thistle and as elevated (GM) 5 thermal etude beside a bamboo cage (DZ) 6 its silences appear in careful measure (DB) ============================================================================= Douglas Barbour Department of English University of Alberta Edmonton Alberta T6G 2E5 (403) 492 2181 FAX:(403) 492 8142 H: 436 3320 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I hear instructions 'you must be a master of the heart in order to be a master of windows and that is very difficult' Robin Blaser ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 11:11:14 EST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Burt Kimmelman -@NJIT" Subject: Teri Reynolds Does anyone know how to contact Teri Reynolds? I want to write her about her wonderful article in the latest issue of ABR. Thanks, Burt Kimmelman kimmelman@admin.njit.edu ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 12:35:02 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bobbie West Subject: Re: space(s) of silence This is slightly off-thread -- not about capturing silence on paper, but silence in general. I have yet to find any absolute silence in nature -- only an absence of sounds made by humans. Maybe that's the definition of silence. Bobbie West ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 09:47:18 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: space(s) of silence Bobbie Wrote: This is slightly off-thread -- not about capturing silence on paper, but silence in general. I have yet to find any absolute silence in nature -- only an absence of sounds made by humans. Maybe that's the definition of silence. Bobbie West red is writing: yes indeed. When scuba-diving i find it is the absence of bird sounds that most impress me with the utter silence around me. In my earlier post I think that's what I was scratching at - that we're somehow dealing with contrast-space rather than object-space, which means Bob Grumman's central question about which portrayals of silence will be effective - create the precise praeciscios desired - will have multiple solutions - arrangements of textualized white-space being one (and that there are many types of textualized white-space, I have no doubt). So what will be useful, will help at the margin of the process is a description of the tools and what they seem to be doing in varying circumstances. The idea of types of 'phasing' of mutual elements so that their interplay appears to cancel or reduce 'noise' is of the most interest to me at the moment. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 13:14:26 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: Renga - ongoing MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Ach, what to do? I see that Douglas Barbour and Maria Damon have *both* added on a 6th line to the Renga for Nancarrow. Since it appears that DB's follows clearly from the 5th (the "its" referring back, one assumes, to the "thermal etude" of line 5 -- which in turn presumably may refer back to "the music" of line 3), will Maria concede line 6 to Prof. B, and accept 7th line as hers? Maria also suggests abandoning the numbering & i.d.'ing of lines. okay w/ me. Here's now adding an 8th. (So far, I find this reading fairly in couplet-fashion -- though other readers might read otherwise.) / / / / / Renga for Nancarrow Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me here in this metrapolis morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music hairy as thistle and as elevated thermal etude beside a bamboo cage its silences appear in careful measure cambric dozens unswathed enfin once there was a parade -- the long years roll ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 11:45:48 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Alexander Subject: Re: space(s) of silence MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Perfect or absolute silence would be a kind of vacuum, wouldn't it? And nature abhors a vacuum. charles ---------- > From: Bobbie West > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > Subject: Re: space(s) of silence > Date: Saturday, August 23, 1997 9:35 AM > > This is slightly off-thread -- not about capturing silence on paper, but > silence in general. I have yet to find any absolute silence in nature -- > only an absence of sounds made by humans. Maybe that's the definition of > silence. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 13:10:47 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Carl Lynden Peters Subject: Re: space(s) of silence In-Reply-To: <199708231847.LAA17249@pantano.theriver.com> from "Charles Alexander" at Aug 23, 97 11:45:48 am MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > Perfect or absolute silence would be a kind of vacuum, wouldn't it? And > nature abhors a vacuum. or something like: vacu m all best to you, charles! c.! ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 16:40:23 -0400 Reply-To: daniel7@IDT.NET Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Zimmerman Organization: Bard-O Subject: Re: space(s) of silence MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Charles Alexander wrote: > > Perfect or absolute silence would be a kind of vacuum, wouldn't it? And > nature abhors a vacuum. > > charles > > ---------- > > From: Bobbie West > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > Subject: Re: space(s) of silence > > Date: Saturday, August 23, 1997 9:35 AM > > > > This is slightly off-thread -- not about capturing silence on paper, but > > silence in general. I have yet to find any absolute silence in nature -- > > only an absence of sounds made by humans. Maybe that's the definition of > > silence. Or nature adores a vacuum, since it rushes right into it . . . Dan ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 13:42:34 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Origins and Sentiments Now that the light at the end of the rat's ass seems to be turned off, I have a phrase that's always puzzled me, 2wit&var: "You're a real piece of work." I've generally heard it used in a disapproving mode - with harmonics in the 'piece of shit' or 'piece of tail' range. But, frankly find the euphonics rather and strangely pleasant and employ it affectionately when, say, I might step back from a 'piece' i'm pleased with and remark (). Then again, it might be the diminutive 'piece of' to which the disapproval attaches. If I were to be the 'whole pile of shit' (or var. an elephant's, rather than a rat's, ass, I might not be quite so soiled? Perhaps the speaker is disappointed merely with the meager portion they've been served? But I wonder, was there ever a 'real piece of work' to which the phrase might have referred? Perhaps cleaning the dog kennel or something? Does it attach to other meanings as well? I've a slight angst that perhaps it's something burried in the closet of ruminations about my father's adroit useages and that there's something rootish about the matter - in which case I suppose this is a thread about gardening and not language. red ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 18:10:01 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >> >> / / / / / >> >> Renga for Nancarrow >> >> 1 Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me >> (??) >> >> 2 here in this metrapolis >> (GB) >> >> 3 morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music >> (DI) >> >> 4 hairy as thistle and as elevated >> (GM) >no need for numbers or ID anymore 6. Just my season's ticket at the Metradome George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 18:33:53 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Brian Carpenter Subject: Re: space(s) of silence In-Reply-To: <199708231847.LAA17249@pantano.theriver.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII The most clearly silent place in nature I have experienced is at the top of one of the many cinder cones in the Craters of the Moon Nat'l Park in central Idaho. These are essentially enormous cone-like formations of volcanic rock ranging up to a few hundred feet high. Since the tourist traffic is very minimal in this park, one can walk to the top of one of these many cones and find a completely isolated spot looking out across a wasteland of part lava bed, part brushland. No birds, etc, around. And when there is no breeze where you are standing there is nothing hear. But at this point you begin to hear the sound of the blood pumping through your ears, a sound that has always been there. This reminds me of the music of the spheres, which was said to be so familiar to human ears that it could no longer be perceived. My thinking is that silence is best considered as a threshhold one only approaches, for both external (natural) and internal (bodily) reasons. BC On Sat, 23 Aug 1997, Charles Alexander wrote: > Perfect or absolute silence would be a kind of vacuum, wouldn't it? And > nature abhors a vacuum. > > charles > > ---------- > > From: Bobbie West > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > Subject: Re: space(s) of silence > > Date: Saturday, August 23, 1997 9:35 AM > > > > This is slightly off-thread -- not about capturing silence on paper, but > > silence in general. I have yet to find any absolute silence in nature -- > > only an absence of sounds made by humans. Maybe that's the definition of > > silence. > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 21:38:09 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: Origins and Sentiments MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Red Slider remarks -- > . . . I have a phrase that's always puzzled me, 2wit&var: > > "You're a real piece of work." > > I've generally heard it used in a disapproving mode - with harmonics > in the 'piece of shit' or 'piece of tail' range. . . . > But I wonder, was there ever a 'real piece of work' to which the > phrase might have referred? Perhaps cleaning the dog kennel or > something? . . . Here's how I understand it: 1. the overt sense is a term of admiration (not disparagement) 2. something which is "a real piece of work" is, in non-ironical useage, something which shows great beauty, workmanship, fascination, is, in a word, remarkable in nature. 3. As an *ironic* utterance, the sense of the term is, of course, turned somewhat on its head. Thus, "You're a real piece of work" may denote "you're a wonder! you're quite amazining!", but the ironic subtext may be along the lines you suggest above. 4. It seems possible that the expression"you're a piece of shit" itself derived from the more genteel "you're a real piece of work" (and not the other way around). 5. I think part of the beauty & irony of "you're a real piece of work" involves the notion that the mind of the person so addressed is felt, by the person saying this utterance (in its original, somewhat aristocratic context -- surely this is a 19th-century expression from the upper classes?), -- the mind of the addressee is felt to be something which, while defying logic or comprehension, is yet a wonder in itself (poss. all the more so, for the fact of doing so). 6. Of course, most charming & genteel expressions such as this can be used in less sparkling manners & contexts, as seems to have been the case w/ your experience of this locution. No doubt, someone with access to DARE or some such resource work detailing vernacular usage, could give a fuller (& more precise) reading & background for the phrase. The above is merely my own overall sense of it (based on what I've heard), for what worth. d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 19:26:10 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mark weiss Subject: Re: Origins and Sentiments In-Reply-To: <199708240138.VAA05476@radagast.wizard.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" "A piece of work," in my experience, is always pejorative, except when the person so described is seen as a marvel of unnecessary and exasperating complexity, a rube goldberg contraption that evokes admiration that it can function at all. OED Supplement supports this understanding, with examples back to 1928. "Piece of shit" I think is probably unrelated. Then there's also "piece of ass" or "tail" and "piece of the action," I think also unrelated. How about the verbs attached to various actions, to wit: to give (or not) a shit or a fuck, to take a shit or a piss, or simply to go or to come, as in: "Why are you fidgeting?" "I have to go. I always have to go after I come." A propos of this last, used to be (see Lindner, _The Fifty-Minute Hour_) that those of the Freudian persuasion thought that a guy leaving the bed to take a piss after getting a piece of ass, which his skirt might understand as his not really giving a fuck, was really just a cover for a castration fantasy--the guy was really checking to make sure that everything was still there. There are, of course, easier and better physiological explanations. Hard to believe that those psycho analysts were MD's. They must have been real pieces of work. At 09:38 PM 8/23/97 -0400, you wrote: >Red Slider remarks -- > >> . . . I have a phrase that's always puzzled me, 2wit&var: >> >> "You're a real piece of work." >> >> I've generally heard it used in a disapproving mode - with harmonics >> in the 'piece of shit' or 'piece of tail' range. . . . >> But I wonder, was there ever a 'real piece of work' to which the >> phrase might have referred? Perhaps cleaning the dog kennel or >> something? . . . > >Here's how I understand it: > >1. the overt sense is a term of admiration (not disparagement) > >2. something which is "a real piece of work" is, in non-ironical >useage, something which shows great beauty, workmanship, fascination, >is, in a word, remarkable in nature. > >3. As an *ironic* utterance, the sense of the term is, of course, >turned somewhat on its head. Thus, "You're a real piece of work" >may denote "you're a wonder! you're quite amazining!", but the ironic >subtext may be along the lines you suggest above. > >4. It seems possible that the expression"you're a piece of shit" >itself derived from the more genteel "you're a real piece of work" >(and not the other way around). > >5. I think part of the beauty & irony of "you're a real piece of >work" involves the notion that the mind of the person so addressed is >felt, by the person saying this utterance (in its original, somewhat >aristocratic context -- surely this is a 19th-century expression from >the upper classes?), -- the mind of the addressee is felt to be >something which, while defying logic or comprehension, is yet a >wonder in itself (poss. all the more so, for the fact of doing so). > >6. Of course, most charming & genteel expressions such as this can >be used in less sparkling manners & contexts, as seems to have been >the case w/ your experience of this locution. > >No doubt, someone with access to DARE or some such resource work >detailing vernacular usage, could give a fuller (& more precise) >reading & background for the phrase. The above is merely my own >overall sense of it (based on what I've heard), for what worth. > >d.i. > . > ..... > ............ > \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > > david raphael israel < > >> washington d.c. << > | davidi@wizard.net (home) > | disrael@skgf.com (office) > ========================= > | thy centuries follow each other > | perfecting a small wild flower > | (Tagore) > //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// > > ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 Aug 1997 11:03:27 +0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Schuchat Simon Subject: list down? MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII No messages for two days -- is it the list or is it my server? ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 Aug 1997 01:30:13 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: kim dawn Subject: ( ) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 22:33:15 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: ( ) kim's discrete silence - ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ---------------------------------------------------------- there is also an indiscrete version: ( ((((((((((( ())))))))))) ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 23 Aug 1997 22:37:41 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: ( ) kim's discrete silence - ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ( ) ---------------------------------------------------------- there is also an indiscrete version: ( ( ( ( ( ( ( ( ( ( ( () red. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 Aug 1997 02:28:22 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Orange Subject: rimbaud in africa In-Reply-To: <199708240404.AAA02794@juliet.its.uwo.ca> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII re the silence thread, john tranter offhands: "Dave, Kim ... how about some postings to the EPC list that have ... that have no sender, no subject,and NO MESSAGE !! Is this maybe too much silence to ask? It would be like Rimbaud in Harar ... nothing to say!" reminding me to ask y'all if anyone has read or heard anything about charles nicholl's /somebody else: arthur rimbaud in africa 1880-91/ (london: cape, 1997). thanks, t. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 Aug 1997 02:37:40 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: joel lewis Subject: Elio Schneeman Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" sorry to report the death of elio schneeman (b.1961) on 8/17/97 of a drug overdose. he was the son of george and katie schneeman and was a much loved figure at the poetry project. His books were "In February, I think" (1978, C Press) and the 91' volume "Along the Rails" from United Artist> His funeral was held monday at St. Bridget's Church (the same as in the Frank O' Hara and Bill Berkson collab -- "Hymns to St. Bridget's") w/ pall barers including Greg masters, Mitch Highfill, and John Godfrey. Elio's work was not known that much outside of the Project but is worth looking into. There is a memorial reading being planned at Naropa in two weeks. joel lewis p.s.-- as elio would say: "No, I am not related to carolee schneeman". his dad, however, is an artist whose work is familair to any reader of berrigan, raworth. notley and other writers in poproject community as he illustrated many books. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 Aug 1997 03:24:54 +0000 Reply-To: layne@sonic.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Layne Russell Organization: Socopoets & Russian River Writers Guild Subject: Re: space(s) of silence MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > s e e s a w s o s o o n s e a s w e l l s o f t s e e n ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 Aug 1997 07:49:01 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: jarnot@PIPELINE.COM Subject: Re: Elio Schneeman Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Elio Schneeman's work will also be published in An Anthology of New American Poets, forthcoming from Talisman House later this year. Copies of his book Along the Rails are still in print and available through United Artists Books/701 President Street/Brooklyn, NY 11215. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 Aug 1997 08:09:51 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 6:10 PM -0700 8/23/97, George Bowering wrote: >>> >>> / / / / / >>> >>> Renga for Nancarrow >>> >>> 1 Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me >>> (??) >>> >>> 2 here in this metrapolis >>> (GB) >>> >>> 3 morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music >>> (DI) >>> >>> 4 hairy as thistle and as elevated >>> (GM) >>no need for numbers or ID anymore > > 6. Just my season's ticket at the Metradome in space, I spoze, resonating "o"'s > > > > > >George Bowering. > , >2499 West 37th Ave., >Vancouver, B.C., >Canada V6M 1P4 > >fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 Aug 1997 08:18:37 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Renga - ongoing In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 8:49 AM -0600 8/23/97, Douglas Barbour wrote: >Renga for Nancarrow > > 1 Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me > (??) > > 2 here in this metrapolis > (GB) > > 3 morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music > (DI) > > 4 hairy as thistle and as elevated > (GM) > > 5 thermal etude beside a bamboo cage > (DZ) > > 6 its silences appear in careful measure > (DB) immeasurable the rhythms of organ blood ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 Aug 1997 17:34:01 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Judy Roitman Subject: Re: ( ) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Kim Dawn writes: >( ) ( > ) > >( ) > > ( ) >( ) ( > ) ( ) How about ( --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Judy Roitman | "Whoppers Whoppers Whoppers! Math, University of Kansas | memory fails Lawrence, KS 66045 | these are the days." 785-864-4630 | Larry Eigner, 1927-1996 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note new area code ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://titania.math.ukans.edu/faculty/roitman/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 08:25:19 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: jarnot@PIPELINE.COM Subject: lorenzo thomas? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" i'm looking for a phone number for lorenzo thomas. if anyone has info please back channel. thank you. lisa jarnot ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 06:46:20 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: Language, written on the road MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII __________________________________________________________________________ Language, Porosity, Quotation, Notes On "Everyone makes jokes about macaroni, because it is a hole with some- thing around it, or about canons. [sic] The fact that we laugh doesn't change the situation, however; the fashioning of the signifier and the introduction of a gap or a hole in the real is identical." (Lacan, VII) "Lyotard comes close to what I have in mind when he says: The ambiguity of writing, object of reading and of sight, is present in the initial ambiguity of drawing. An open line, a line closed on itself. The letter is an unvarying closed line; the line is the open moment of the letter which perhaps closes again elsewhere, on the other side. Open the letter, you have the image, you have the emblem, the symbol and the letter. (Lyotard, The Lyotard Reader, 48) "Lyotard's beautiful evocation of the sinuous interweaving of the line of writing and that of picturing points to a third term, to some con- ception of the line before it has acquired the cohesion imparted to it by either of its 'decisions.'" (Michael Carter, Putting a Face on Things, Studies in Imaginary Materials) Between macaroni and drawing, language noodles out, appearing in a dia- lectic between the foreclosing of syntax and sememe, and the porosity of the struggle towards coherence within any number of communicative chan- nels, ranging from human speech to the reconstruction of true or false memories in the brain. If we look at a computer complete with operating system, we discover a hierarchy of apparently relatively autonomous languages, beginning with hardware, and working up to the user interface. These might include machine language, assembly language, macroassembly languages, compiled and interpreted languages, scripts, graphic interfaces, and so forth. We can also consider these languages, top-down, as an extension of human psychological operations and memory as well. If we look closer, say, at Perl, we find that it can call up the Unix shell and shell scripts, that it can call up programs in other lang- uages, that it can interact in fact with assembly language, that it is written in another language, and that it may itself be called up by still another or the same language. We find it can interact with scripts, programs, or processes, and each of these can call the other up as well. In fact, we can define a macro in Perl, a new function or verb, with any of these languages, etc,, and we can define an object in Perl as well, with any of them. In fact, one might note that there is above all a syn- tactical plateau or intermeshing of plateaus that constitutes the posi- tioning of Perl in relation to the machine, to the Internet, to the user, and in general, to the porous world within which it is embedded. We find then, that Perl is not so much at the top of a hierarchy, as it is embedded in a holarchy, and while it, in a certain sense, might still appear as an autonomous language, in another sense it is an accumulation of interwoven well-defined processes that are coherent in relation to each other and the outer world. So that one might argue, taking these instantiations back into the human, that while thought itself is in relation to human spoken language, that is hardly the long or short of it; in fact, it is dif- ficult to tell where semiosis begins and ends, and what constitutes a well-defined verb or noun, in other words a framework. Further, while difference may be said to be partly constitutive of a domain of sig- nifiers, one might also argue that it is based on other processes within the holarchy, and that the holarchy itself is porous in relation to the real. And I would argue in addition that there is a continuum (more properly, perhaps, a stretch of rational fractions) from the real through lang- uage, from the exhalations of speech through the mouth, and the recep- tion of facial expressions through the eyes, from and to, in fact, num- erous modalities - and in the midst of these, syntactical islands or attractors which operate as-if the linguistic were capable of foreclos- ure on what then appear to be various plateaus. One might thing of the world as multiplexing, parallel/parallel proces- sing, with formalization of the symbolic where necessary, for transmis- sion, say, from one organism to another. This is not to argue, in addi- tion in addition, for the computerization of the real, but rather for the real itself as organism with continuously multiplying, coalescing, and dissolving processes. In this manner, the disjunction between thought and non-thought, and both in conjunction and disjunction with language, become bridged, re- routed into numerous processes, of which, say, human language and the rationalizing/suturing discourse of psychoanalysis would be one among many elements. -- My own work exists as _debris-work,_ work of the debris, of these troub- ling and interstitial areas. Thus, even within writing which must tend towards a certain foreclosure, I present wryting, the fiction of writing object and person within a text, object and person which leak into uneasy dreams, fantasies, ghosts, peripheral shadows within the real itself. Further, I present processes as writing, writing as processes; I present foreclosure as broken, and a shattering of the vessels as fore- closure. -- Languagings extend into cultural sheaves, such as fashion, style, cul- tural productions. Such sheaves are inherently irreducible; fashion, for example, is dependent upon the armature of the body, but its specificity is interwoven with the rest of culture, including issues of capital, temperament, governance, and so forth. And all of these create an uneasy fit with spoken language itself, with music, with organized/disorganized sound of all sorts. Further, fashion-as-language becomes as problematic as film language, the languages of art, and so forth. A hat, for example, is simply a thing that sits on the head (presumably remaining there through the normal walking, etc. movement of the body). Beyond that, what signifies and what doesn't is often difficult to discern. The _stream_ of style is easier described, perhaps, as if there were a generalized semantics at work. (See Carter, op. cit.) (Note that "what signifies here" is rele- vant to the postulation of a basic lexeme; semantics, symbolization, chaotic representational debris, etc., all play a role in constituting what otherwise might be considered a "language." Instead, I postulate we are dealing with linguistic part-objects, broken and severed codes, micro-territories (three or one flowers on the hat; roses or tulips; forward or backward, etc.). And this leads, as well, into the interplay of semantics and syntax, even the interplay of what might be considered a relevant series of signs.) And further, still, ascii texts on the Internet employ what might be considered a variety of extra-linguistic cues - on numerous chat lines, ranging from Powwow to ytalk, it is possible to read the pace of the other's typing, to the extent that one might speak/write of a written _parole._ This embedding of language into the other's time reveals the closeness, pressure, of the body against the keys, an intimacy which is not as evident in the encapsulated messages sent out all at once, on MOOs, talkers, IRC, and the like. (For this reason, as I have pointed out elsewhere, ytalk becomes an in- timate simulacrum of the body; the "breathing" of the texts between two participants parallels that of lovers sharing a unified, if discordant, space.) Then there are, of course, emoticons, header information, lag, the tim- ing of mail sent, and those porous extensions of the telephone, snail- mail, video, etc. all of which serve literally to confuse the issue. (Which is exactly the point here, that _language,_ _a language,_ is a situated plateau in the midst of others, that there are always already issues of governance and porosity from the start, that there is a tend- ency towards foreclosure, that the porosity may or may not be formal- ized (for example there are specific commands for shell access from a Perl script) - that, in fact, one might consider a generalized process of _worlding_ which includes all and none of these, what may or may not be interpreted as an abstract process, message of the deepest import, or signal through an autonomic nervous system, seemingly intent on keeping the organism alive.) --- J, Well, it's time for the Law. J, Well, now, what Law would that be? J, That would be the Primordial Law. That would be the Law from which Law has blossomed, the Law which has curtained a mighty culture. J, Now that would be the Law of Prohibition. J, Exactly, when negation came into the world, when rejection ordered the day and night, when suddenly the signifier sputtered from the skin.. J, I get the Idea. J, Yes, and exactly again. ________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 Aug 1997 12:54:54 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 22 Aug 1997 to 23 Aug 1997 Renga for Nancarrow Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me here in this metrapolis morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music hairy as thistle and as elevated thermal etude beside a bamboo cage its silences appear in careful measure cambric dozens unswathed enfin once there was a parade -- the long years roll Just my season's ticket at the Metradome Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Renga for Nancarrow (cont'd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Renga for Nancarrow Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me here in this metrapolis morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music hairy as thistle and as elevated thermal etude beside a bamboo cage its silences appear in careful measure cambric dozens unswathed enfin once there was a parade -- the long years roll Just my season's ticket at the Metradome astroturf growing inspooled and drifty from my meerchaum unwinds a drift of smoke ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 24 Aug 1997 16:32:31 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: ( ) Kim Dawn writes: >( ) ( > ) > >( ) > > ( ) >( ) ( > ) ( ) Judy Roitman writes: How about ( Red writes: similar to my idea, Judy. though neither is faithful to Kim's text (though you may have simply wished to give another general silence possibility) A faithful rendering of indiscrete silence for Kim's text might have been: ( ( ( ( ( ( ( -------------- sorry if the actual spacing is a bit off, but that's the general idea. -red ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 11:01:11 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow (cont'd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Poetas, Red Slider sent me this note -- << david, not sure about renga composition or my specific composition (I read, but do not see the rules in operation - like a new football fan who cannot quite understand why those fellows who do not have the ball are beating the crap out of one another). If the contribution below suitable i offer, if not - trash. thank you >> & appended 2 lines. I'm no renga-rabbi myself, but have an idea it's customary to add one line per. However, far be it from me to nix as unkosh the 200% you append; too, perhaps my coupletization was unduly normative couplet-wise-- also, sorry naving not included some side-stream branchings (I think a couple from Maria D.) that had branched off earlier than what's here -- pls. add, insert, re-append, whatever! -- here's what I have in hopper to date, including Red's 2 -- d.i. ////\\\\////\\\\////\\\\////\\\\ Renga for Nancarrow | Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me | here in this metrapolis | morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music | hairy as thistle and as elevated | thermal etude beside a bamboo cage | its silences appear in careful measure | cambric dozens unswathed enfin | once there was a parade -- the long years roll | Just my season's ticket at the Metradome | astroturf growing inspooled and drifty | from my meerchaum unwinds a drift of smoke | porosities of potted clay pot unwatering | walkway keys jingle in my pocket | ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 10:35:42 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow (cont'd) In-Reply-To: <199708251335.JAA24538@radagast.wizard.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 9:34 AM -0400 8/25/97, David R. Israel wrote: >Renga for Nancarrow > > >Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me >here in this metrapolis > >morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music >hairy as thistle and as elevated > >thermal etude beside a bamboo cage >its silences appear in careful measure > >cambric dozens unswathed enfin >once there was a parade -- the long years roll > >Just my season's ticket at the Metradome >astroturf growing inspooled and drifty > >from my meerchaum unwinds a drift of smoke from my mere window drifts a widow ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 10:39:27 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Miekal And Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow (cont'd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit David R. Israel wrote: > > Renga for Nancarrow > > Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me > here in this metrapolis > > morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music > hairy as thistle and as elevated > > thermal etude beside a bamboo cage > its silences appear in careful measure > > cambric dozens unswathed enfin > once there was a parade -- the long years roll > > Just my season's ticket at the Metradome > astroturf growing inspooled and drifty > > from my meerchaum unwinds a drift of smoke elsewise a 1000 piano's mechanic playerly disposition unwound & mispluckd hearing charge -- @#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@# Dreamtime Village website: http://net22.com/dreamtime QAZINGULAZA: And/Was/Wakest website: http://net22.com/qazingulaza e-mail for DT & And/Was: dtv@mwt.net ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 22:37:38 +1200 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Barry and Catherine Smith <2smiths@WAVE.CO.NZ> Subject: Re: Silence and paper whatsits Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" You guys in North America may have sorted out your puzzlement by now, I'm just a digest reader. Regarding the maybe euphemistic 'paper asshole' when I heard it last it was "This guy's drivin like he's got a pipeup'is arsehole" - imagine - ah language - maybe it's easier to hear on the quiet roads of the South Pacific. And on silence. What I like most about old friends is the way they echo each others silence Cheers Barry Smith Barry and Catherine Smith 56 Orchard Avenue Hamilton, New Zealand. Phone +64 7 8558296 Fax +64 7 8558298 Email 2smiths@wave.co.nz ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 10:47:41 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Miekal And Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow (cont'd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit David R. Israel wrote: > > & appended 2 lines. I'm no renga-rabbi myself, but have an idea > it's customary to add one line per. me not know the form as well, maybe 2 lines be one long line (like the one we are always standing in at the grocery store! miekal -- @#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@# Dreamtime Village website: http://net22.com/dreamtime QAZINGULAZA: And/Was/Wakest website: http://net22.com/qazingulaza e-mail for DT & And/Was: dtv@mwt.net ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 09:45:47 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow (cont'd) In-Reply-To: <340152CE.79E3@mwt.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I've been out of town, and *most* of you on the list will understand my dismay at turning on the e-mail and out of 7 messages 3 were this renga thread. I thought it was agreed upon ages ago that so many listmembers found these rengas problematic in terms of wasted bandwidth and a waste of the 50-message limit that it was agreed that they would be taken backchannel. And I know some of the perpetrators of this thing were involved in the original tedium. Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 17:53:33 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Lawrence Upton." Subject: My new email address MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I shall be sending this message widely over the next few days as I build my new address book. Apologies for cross posting. My email address at Compuserve should be considered dead. This is my new one. I am still learning its oddnesses. I am sorry for the change and the trouble it causes you, but I gave up on the useless and cynical service that I received from Compuserve. This is also likely to be cheaper. Anything sent to Compuserve for me after 20th August 1997 is likely not to have been received. Lawrence Upton ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 10:21:27 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 22 Aug 1997 to 23 Aug 1997 In-Reply-To: <970824125454_1613952358@emout11.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Renga for Nancarrow > > >Ach, I throw away my metranome It is useless to me > >here in this metrapolis > >morning late-summer: this cricket knows the music > >hairy as thistle and as elevated > >thermal etude beside a bamboo cage > >its silences appear in careful measure > >cambric dozens unswathed enfin > >once there was a parade -- the long years roll > >Just my season's ticket at the Metradome > > Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow (cont'd) In-Reply-To: <199708251501.LAA28776@radagast.wizard.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: Quoted-printable oops, David=97I accidentally hit the send button before I cld say anything. well, that last line is mine, anyway: "efficiency-promoting measured were maken" thanks, Chris .. Christopher W. Alexander etc. nominative press collective calexand@library.utah.edu P.O. Box 522402 / Salt Lake City UT 84152-2402 http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 10:36:46 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mark weiss Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" "Everyone makes jokes about macaroni, because it is a hole with some- thing around it, or about canons. [sic] The fact that we laugh doesn't change the situation, however; the fashioning of the signifier and the introduction of a gap or a hole in the real is identical." (Lacan, VII) Boy, does this ever make me feel like I'm outside the loop! I don't think I know anybody who makes jokes about macaroni, not even in France. Maybe I don't hang out with the right psychoanalysts. Note, however, that Monsieur Lacan has to explain what's funny about macaroni, but not what's funny about cannon. Perhaps in his world a cigar is a cigar but it's never just a cigar. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 12:01:19 MST7MDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Subject: (Fwd) build labor-academic alliance MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT this just came to me on the Bad Subjects list, & I thought I'd bring it over in case no one else has. I'm going to try to get more information, but I'd appreciate anything you folks (Mark? Joe? anyone?) cld bring forward, too. Chris ------- Forwarded Message Follows ------- For those interested in building alliances between labor and the academy: From: Dan Clawson (clawson@sadri.umass.edu) To: anyone interested in labor Re: signing a statement, joining a group The revival of the American labor movement, and its openness to a variety of initiatives that would have been inconceivable a few years ago, is the most promising political initiative of recent years. A new group is forming to build links between academics and the labor movement. John Sweeney, Linda Chavez Thompson, and the New Voice leadership have explicitly encouraged this development. They hope that we can work to alter the debates taking place in public policy and on the cultural front, in our teaching and in every public forum, just as they are working to change realities in trade unions. Together we can be part of a broader labor movement that includes both these areas and much more. I realize it is ludicrously short notice, but an ad and press conference are planned announcing the formation of this group. In order to get your name on the ad, you need to send your name and affiliation to tnr1@columbia.edu (that's a #1, not a letter L) by Tuesday August 26. If you don't make that date, you can still join the group; see the address in the enclosed memo. If you'd prefer, you could send your name and affiliation to me, Dan Clawson, (clawson@sadri.umass.edu) and I will pass it on. Together we can build a movement for social change. You can begin by passing this message on to everyone you can think of who would want to sign. Dan Clawson Labor Day, 1997 For two decades, Labor Day has been an occasion for eulogies and epitaphs, as the labor movement suffered deindustrialization, downsizing and defeat. But Labor Day 1997 arrives with a new militance and a new hope. The victory of the Teamsters in the two-week UPS strike -- the largest strike in a generation -- was a victory for all working people, whose incomes and livelihoods have stagnated for nearly a quarter of a century. The UPS strike was also a turning point for the labor movement, and could determine its strength and direction for years to come. Though the right to organize has eroded in a world of contingent work -- part-time, temporary, outsourced, and subcontracted -- organizing campaigns across the continent are now rebuilding the labor movement in old and new workplaces: from Borders bookstores to Las Vegas casinos, from the strawberry fields of Watsonville to the classrooms of Berkeley and Yale, from Federal Express to Nike sweatshops. We take this moment of struggle to announce the formation of a new independent, national organization: "Scholars, Artists, and Writers for Social Justice." In the academy and publishing, in the arts, sciences and entertainment, we also experience the growth of low-wage, part-time employment which erodes our craft and creativity. We call upon our colleagues and friends this Labor Day to declare their solidarity with the organizing drives of the new labor movement. The time is ripe to restore the mutually empowering relationship that once gave hope and dynamism to the labor movement and its allies in the academic and cultural communities. We envision a movement that can reshape the nation's political culture by combating inequality and powerlessness, and by fostering the growth of a vibrant, militant, multicultural working-class movement. In an era when elite opinion makes a fetish of the free market, unions -- with a commitment to solidarity, equality, and collective struggle -- remain fundamental institutions of a democratic society. Our confidence in launching SAWSJ comes from the success of the "labor teach-in" movement, inaugurated last fall when more than 2,000 people affirmed a new alliance of labor and academe at Columbia University. In more than a score of other teach-ins from coast to coast, students, teachers, writers, artists, and unionists met, talked, learned, and argued in an atmosphere of hope and solidarity. SAWSJ hopes to fulfill the promise of those teach-ins. > Add your name to this public statement which will be > released on September 1. You may do so by e-mailing Thaddeus > Russell at tnr1@columbia.edu. Please note that the address > contains the numeral one after "tnr." Please include your affiliation. > > At the same time you may also join Scholars, Artists, > and Writers for Social Justice, which is planning a > series of teach-ins and other events over the next several months. > Please send a contribution to Ellen Schrecker, 771 West End > Avenue #7D, New York, New York, 10025. > > Alewitz, Mike > Aronowitz, Stanley > Aronson, Ronald > Azcarate, Fred > Ballinger, Lee > Benjamin, Ernst > Bennett, Marty > Bernard, Elaine > Bonilla, Frank > Buhle, Paul > Carter, Prudence > Chancer, Lynn > Clawson, Dan > Cutler, Jonathan > Delgado, Hector > Denning, Michael > DiFazio, Bill > Domingo, Ligaya > Dubro, Alec > Fennell, Dorothy > Fletcher, Bill > Fraser, Steven > Freeman, Joshua B. > Gerstle, Gary > Gray, Lois > Green, Adam > Green, Venus > Hall, Jacquelyn > Horne, Gerald > Huck, Gary > Kaye, Harvey > Kazin, Michael > Kelley, Robin D.G. > Kornbluh, Felicia > Krupat, Kitty > Levi, Margaret > Lichtenstein, Nelson N. > Lie, John > Marquez, Dennis Bixler > Mendel-Reyes, Meta > Montgomery, David > Murolo, Priscilla > Nathan, Debbie > Newman, Kathy > Ngai, Mae > Piven, Frances Fox > Porter, Allison > Potter, Sarah > Pranis, Kevin > Prisock, Louis > Ripton, Jessica > Robinson, Dean > Rosen, Sumner M > Royster, Dee > Russell, Thad > Ryan, Sarah > Schrecker, Ellen W. > Semann, Ingrid > Simmons, Esmeralda > Singh, Nikhil > Skotnes, Andor > Slaughter, Jane > Stephens, Michelle > Sugrue, Tom > Uehlein, Joe > Venkatesh, Sudhir > Watts, Jerry > Willis, Ellen > Woodard, Komozi > Young, Cynthia > > -- Dan Clawson work = 413-545-5974 home 413-586-6235 Contemp. Sociology = 413-545-4064 fax 413-545-1994 email = clawson@sadri.umass.edu consoc@sadri.umass.edu "If they can get you to ask the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about the answers." --Thomas Pynchon Kelley Greenman Crouse Sociology Department Syracuse University Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs Syracuse, NY 13244 .. Christopher W. Alexander etc. nominative press collective calexand@library.utah.edu P.O. Box 522402 / Salt Lake City UT 84152-2402 http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 12:30:33 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow (cont'd) dodie wrote: I've been out of town, and *most* of you on the list will understand my dismay at turning on the e-mail and out of 7 messages 3 were this renga thread. I thought it was agreed upon ages ago that so many listmembers found these rengas problematic in terms of wasted bandwidth and a waste of the 50-message limit that it was agreed that they would be taken backchannel. And I know some of the perpetrators of this thing were involved in the original tedium. Dodie 'Perpetrators' - ooops, now I'm in for it, an' i just thought it was little misdemeanor drive-by. Ok, Ok, I'll confess, the first line was mine (but actually stolen by george for having perturbations in the 'o' range), so if ignorance is no excuse then it's a compound felony and hard time for sure (probably on the macaroni line) and, as for bandwidth, jeez will ya look at my waste lines, I also confess that I tried to slip in two lines at once - no one believing that the macaroni just stuck together. So it looks like a three-strikes case for sure - please send replies care of Misalligned Noodles Dept., Culinary & Toga Mfgs. Division, Folsom State Prison. All mail to this addressee will be opened and searched - The Warden. Tedium? you want tedium? do you know how many macaronis it takes to reach the other side of the Golden Gate Bridge? (not to mention the one's i've got to tie together to get down to the street from my cell-block). red. #4|0|8|5|2|8|1|6|1|8|7| ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 14:40:42 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow (cont'd) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" busted! i think the originators of this one didn't know abuot the previious one. i just joined in cuz i thot theme-specific memorial type rengas wd be self-contained. but i'm happy to go back-c. At 9:45 AM -0700 8/25/97, dbkk@SIRIUS.COM wrote: >I've been out of town, and *most* of you on the list will understand my >dismay at turning on the e-mail and out of 7 messages 3 were this renga >thread. I thought it was agreed upon ages ago that so many listmembers >found these rengas problematic in terms of wasted bandwidth and a waste of >the 50-message limit that it was agreed that they would be taken >backchannel. > >And I know some of the perpetrators of this thing were involved in the >original tedium. > >Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 13:08:37 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow (cont'd) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I agree entirely with Dodie. Drop this wasteful renga stuff. It gets horribly out of hand. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 17:06:46 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow (cont'd) In-Reply-To: <199708251501.LAA28776@radagast.wizard.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dodie -- Thanks for making the list safe for hot dogs and macaroni actually, John Tranter, now that I've used the irony tags, I gotta say they feel about as heavy as Chevy Chase-type air-scare quotes. Ugh City. It's probably me -- somebody else could make them feel like Jack Nicholson's pitch-based prosody, I'm sure. Viva la Renga, Jordan, who when in Maine avoids all hot dogs, both red and brown ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 11:49:18 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: John Tranter Organization: Jacket magazine Subject: Rimbaud in Africa MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit In a recent posting Tom Orange said: re the silence thread, john tranter offhands: "Dave, Kim ... how about some postings to the EPC list that have ... that have no sender, no subject,and NO MESSAGE !! Is this maybe too much silence to ask? It would be like Rimbaud in Harar ... nothing to say!" reminding me to ask y'all if anyone has read or heard anything about charles nicholl's /somebody else: arthur rimbaud in africa 1880-91/ (london: cape, 1997). thanks, t. Tom: I've just finished the book. It's very good -- Nicholl is extremely knowledgable on Rimbaud, is a good writer, and has tramped all over Africa looking for the Ghost of Arthur. It's a wretched story, of course. There's Arthur, tramping about, working himself to the bone, scraping and saving, getting ill and recovering, cursing the natives and the other traders, feverishly making plans for the future, and all the time we know it's all for nothing -- we can see the cancer coming like a dust-storm on the horizon. Heartbreaking. But a very good book. -- John Tranter e-mail -- jtranter@jacket.zip.com.au Jacket magazine -- http://www.jacket.zip.com.au 39 Short Street, Balmain NSW 2041, Australia ph (+612) 9555 8502 fax (+612) 9212 2350 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 00:36:28 -0400 Reply-To: Tom Orange Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Orange Subject: Rimbaud in Africa In-Reply-To: <199708260403.AAA10366@romeo.its.uwo.ca> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII john t., thanks for the good word on nicholl's rimbaud book. certainly a sad story -- after all those years of wheelin and dealin he died with what the equivalent of a couple hundred bucks in his pocket. yet the disdain is quite captivating, effectively, all writing is pigshit, a good 40-50 yrs before artaud, let les jeunes poetes maudites discover anew the writings of the "recently deceased" rimbaud, and me not even dead yet, merdre!, all i wanna do is be a gunrunner... t. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 22:25:24 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: rimbaud in oz Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" what is little known about rimbaud is that he visited australia with his young bride, directly from ethiopia by packet steamer. The Rimbauds were fairly flush at the time, and stayed in what was, for that era in Oz, a luxury hotel. On their first day, they hired a coach & four to go drive-about. Unfortunately, one of the first things they saw in the outback was a man having intercourse with a kangaroo. Rimbaud attempted to distract his wife from the sordid spectacle by pointing in the opposite direction and crying, "Look at that, my precious!" They both looked, only to see another man with another kangaroo. Disgusted, Rimbaud ordered the driver to head back to the hotel. There, to top the unhappy morning off, they found a man with a wooden leg masturbating on the hotel steps. Outraged, and with his notorious temper fully aroused, Rimbaud demanded to see the manager. "I have come a long way at considerable expense to stay in your hotel, and what do I and my poor wife find? Two men having intercourse with two seperate kangaroos, and a man with a wooden leg masturbating on the very steps of this hotel?!" The manager's reply has been recorded: "But Monsieur Rimbaud, you dont expect a man with a wooden leg to catch his own kangaroo?" The Rimbauds wanted to quit the establishment immediately, but there was nowhere else to go. They were stuck. Rimbaud had put the manager of the hotel in a foul mood, and that evening, he ordered all the chess players who frequented his lounge, to pack up their boards and leave. This they did, grudgingly, but one Among them remonstrated withg the manager, demanding to know his reason for such rudeness. This reply, too, has been recorded: "I cant stand chess nuts boasting in an open foyer." For these and other anecdotes of Rimbaud in Oz I found the text under discussion well worth borrowing from my college library. David ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 23:38:04 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: space(s) of silence : Re: space(s) of silence s e e an oral-aural companion to David's silence modulo above might be: ------------------------------------------------------------------- n p o ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 02:01:24 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Ryan Whyte Subject: Cockpit Comments: To: FOP Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Broken fugue poem with pictures at http://www.freenet.edmonton.ab.ca/~rwhyte/coc.html Thank you - Ryan ============================= rwhyte@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 07:07:44 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Amato/Kass Fleisher Subject: Re: (Fwd) build labor-academic alliance Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" chris and others, don't know anymore about "scholars, artists, and writers for social justice" than in that post... but the idea appeals to me mightily, and i up and asked for my name to be added to the public statement, and will be writing to the snail mail address in nyc, see if there's more info available... i have every intention of joining the organization... thanx for forwarding that!... best, joe ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 08:46:44 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow (cont'd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1; x-mac-type="54455854"; x-mac-creator="4D4F5353" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit dbkk@SIRIUS.COM wrote: > I've been out of town, and *most* of you on the list will understand > my > dismay at turning on the e-mail and out of 7 messages 3 were this > renga > thread. I thought it was agreed upon ages ago that so many > listmembers > found these rengas problematic in terms of wasted bandwidth and a > waste of > the 50-message limit that it was agreed that they would be taken > backchannel. > > And I know some of the perpetrators of this thing were involved in the > > original tedium. > > Dodie yes, yes, Pierre -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- "I have never been able to tell a beginning from an end." — Georges Braque ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 2008 09:21:28 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: GAS NUMBER 9 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Thanks for the announcement. What is the address for GAS NUMBER 9? ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 12:10:10 -0400 Reply-To: Gwyn McVay Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Gwyn McVay Subject: (diffidently) chapbook Comments: To: Poetics List Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Since I accidentally blurted it out to the whole list, and later got several backchannel replies expressing interest, I'm reposting the URL of the embryonic version of my second chapbook, which is forthcoming from Pecan Grove Press, a small and underacknowledged press in Texas which devotes itself exclusively--I think--to poetry of various different stripes. The prepublication version of the text is at: http://pgpress.stmarytx.edu/pecangrove/author/natural.html If anyone is undyingly curious about the cover, which I'm rather fond of, it's at http://pgpress.stmarytx.edu/pecangrove/author/gwyn3.gif Thanks to all who were curious--& pardon this blatant flogging-- bests Gwyn ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 09:44:50 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: William Marsh Subject: help:writing experiments Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Poetics folks: would someone be able to backchannel me with info re Bernadette Mayer's famous list of writing experiments, ie, where i can find it, most quickly / perhaps on the web somewhere? thanks bill marsh ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 13:20:05 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: hincty MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Anybody know of any uses of the word 'hincty'? I'm certain I've heard it around a lot lately, but when I go looking, it's nowhere to be found. I have no idea what it means. Thanks, Jordan ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 13:27:10 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Re: hincty In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Thanks to everybody who backchanneled -- it's a Cab Calloway word. Hincty (adj.) -- conceited, snooty. and it's related to another word he used -- Dicty (adj.) -- high-class, nifty, smart. OK! another mystery sunk -- J On Tue, 26 Aug 1997, Jordan Davis wrote: > Anybody know of any uses of the word 'hincty'? I'm certain I've heard it > around a lot lately, but when I go looking, it's nowhere to be found. > > I have no idea what it means. > > Thanks, > Jordan > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 13:29:42 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: STACIE Subject: Re: hincty MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII Just curious- where (as in, in what song) does Calloway use "Hincty"-- what a great word! Stacie ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 12:46:52 EST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: simon@CVAX.IPFW.INDIANA.EDU Subject: Re: hincty Dictionary of American Regional English, Vol. II, I think. beth ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 11:12:03 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Problem in silence I've a problem in silence representation. In a dramatic narrative, meant to be read aloud (perhaps for radio performance as well), I've need for a gap both thematically and visually to separate the scene of Coleridge's 'rotten sea' from a new vista of turbulence at the "dragon's edge." Presently I'm using an ellipsis not entirely to my satisfication. The fragment I'm working with (backed-up enough to display the discontinuity is: The silence in her hold as thick as blood, her only cargo grim remembrance of the day the brood of flags hung still, breathless as she pulled against a shudderless heave of rotten death across watery waste, sighted once before by he who murdered the albatross. Lost! Lost! as we carry out the heart's knell hand over hand, each breath a bolide in a birdless sky, and wait... till the bell-pull sounds on an empty deck and the bitter end slacks against the kedge, as darkness falls and the gale winds rise and the great seas shudder at the dragon's edge. (an in-progress and imperfect version of the entire work can be seen at http://sacramento-news.com/poets/redpoem.htm) The problems are: the break is between a scene, itself typed in silence (the becalmed sea), and the resumption of contrasting material; and, also serves as a performance instruction for an indefinite pause by the reader. The work is antiqued (broken iambic, rhyme - at times dense, 17th c. nautical terms, etc.), with some deliberate 'moderns' (the ship has engines/iron-plate, the reader is directly engaged at points, etc.). But the silence representations I've encountered (say in the ( ) thread) seem to stark for the piece, too swedish-modern. Appreciate any ideas. red slider ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 11:58:16 +0000 Reply-To: chax@theriver.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: charles alexander Subject: Re: Cockpit In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT > Broken fugue poem with pictures at > > http://www.freenet.edmonton.ab.ca/~rwhyte/coc.html > Very nice, Ryan -- great to see some of the possibilities of poetry as web art. charles charles alexander poet and book artist chax@theriver.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 12:29:29 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tenney Nathanson Subject: Re: hincty Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Jordan-- it also turns up in Harryette Mullen's /Muse & Drudge/, as part of the phrase "hincty-jinkty." No idea what THAT means. Mullen, in BOO is it, mentions Clarence Major's dictionary of African American slang, From Juba to Jive, as key source for her. Don't recall offhand the hincty-jinkty page #. best, Tenney At 01:27 PM 8/26/97 -0400, you wrote: >Thanks to everybody who backchanneled -- it's a Cab Calloway word. > > Hincty (adj.) -- conceited, snooty. > >and it's related to another word he used -- > > Dicty (adj.) -- high-class, nifty, smart. > >OK! another mystery sunk -- >J > >On Tue, 26 Aug 1997, Jordan Davis wrote: > >> Anybody know of any uses of the word 'hincty'? I'm certain I've heard it >> around a lot lately, but when I go looking, it's nowhere to be found. >> >> I have no idea what it means. >> >> Thanks, >> Jordan >> > > ---------------------------------------------------------- tenney nathanson tenney@azstarnet.com nathanso@u.arizona.edu http://www.u.arizona.edu/~nathanso/ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 15:02:58 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Judy Roitman Subject: Re: help:writing experiments In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.32.19970826094450.006c8aac@nunic.nu.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Poetics folks: > >would someone be able to backchannel me with info re Bernadette Mayer's >famous list of writing experiments, ie, where i can find it, most quickly / >perhaps on the web somewhere? > >thanks > >bill marsh Why backchannel? Please send it to the list. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Judy Roitman | "Whoppers Whoppers Whoppers! Math, University of Kansas | memory fails Lawrence, KS 66045 | these are the days." 785-864-4630 | Larry Eigner, 1927-1996 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note new area code ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://titania.math.ukans.edu/faculty/roitman/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 14:04:55 PDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hoa Nguyen Subject: A SAMPLE OF GAS #9 Content-Type: text/plain Here's the address with a sample from the journal! R. Levitsky wrote: > >Thanks for the announcement. > >What is the address for GAS NUMBER 9? You can get your GAS from Kevin Opstedal 386 Madeline Court Palo Alto CA 94306 a snippet of a teaser from #9 From "The Waist Line" by Dale Smith (part of section III. The Late Brunch) *** A mismosa for the Mrs. O the hunger cloaked her and with her, her daughter begged a soda water gulp gulp gulp jug jug jug jug jug so rudely forc'd. Burp. Unreal table under the brown cloth of cold noon Mr. Kultur, the suburban merchant offered a pocket full of candy asked me to luncheon at Michaelangelo's followed by a drink at the Drake. At the pancake hour, when the eyes turn upward from the table, the human belly waits like a mob sobbing waiting. I Karen carpenter adrift in the after-life thin woman, emaciate, can see the pancake hour, the undefined brunch hour that gives home to you and brings the cooks to the kitchen. ***(more delicious parody follows)*** Thanks for letting me share this.-- Hoa ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 18:11:26 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Thomas Bell Subject: Re: Cockpit Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Yes, very nice "new beginning", Ryan. I have been working with the interaction of my drawings and poems and body (examples in my underconstruction page http://www.public.usit.net/trbell and also on wr-eye-tings) that you might like to visit. tome bell At 02:01 AM 8/26/97 -0600, Ryan Whyte wrote: >Broken fugue poem with pictures at > >http://www.freenet.edmonton.ab.ca/~rwhyte/coc.html > > >Thank you - > >Ryan > >============================= >rwhyte@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca > > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 19:25:27 -0400 Reply-To: BobGrumman@nut-n-but.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bob Grumman Subject: Re: help:writing experiments MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Dear Bill, and anyone else interested: In my 1984 edition of The L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E Book, Bernadette Mayer's "Experiments" starts on page 80. It's one of my favorite pieces in the book. --Bob G ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 26 Aug 1997 20:05:24 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steven Marks Subject: Re: Problem in silence In-Reply-To: <01BCB210.EAC60C80@ppp41.ns.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Tue, 26 Aug 1997, Red Slider wrote: > I've a problem in silence representation. In a dramatic narrative, meant to > be read aloud (perhaps for radio performance as well), I've need for a gap > both thematically and visually to separate the scene of Coleridge's 'rotten > sea' from a new vista of turbulence at the "dragon's edge." > > the albatross. Lost! Lost! as we carry out the heart's knell > hand over hand, each breath a bolide in a birdless sky, and wait... > till the bell-pull sounds on an empty deck and the bitter end slacks > and the great seas shudder at the dragon's edge. > Here's my suggestion. If you are performing this on a stage, wait four or five beats after the word, "wait," and then have an on-stage bell begin ringing, activated by somebody offstage. The audience would see the bell moving and hear the sounds, but see nobody doing the actual ringing. Now, I know this isn't silence if by that we mean the lack of sound. But, I think the tolling of a bell, especially if it seems to be ringing of its own accord, will create the feeling of emptiness that the lines speak of. If you are doing this as a radio performance, I'd still suggest the bell perhaps with fade-ins and -outs. Of course, there's no way that I can think of to show the bell ringing by itself on the radio. In both cases, you might also want to experiment with the length of the ringing, its volume, whether you read the next line over the ringing or wait a few more beats after the ringing. You might even want to experiment with how far you can push the audience with the ringing -- monotony being a type of silence. for what it's worth, Steven __________________________________________________ Steven Marks http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html __________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 Aug 2008 00:02:43 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: lorenzo thomas? MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hi Lisa-- Did you get Lorenzo's number? I'll ask Max Regan tomorrow. I put out the word for readers and four people are interested in April. So then I got this idea about a festival. Something like "Against the World as We Know It Festival: Poetry and Politics for the Next Millenium." And work with local poets and political groups to house visiting poets and organizers and have a bandshell and a band and a picnic and you know, I think it could be a lot of fun. Would that interest you? yours, Rachel ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 08:26:58 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Magee Subject: Re: hincty In-Reply-To: <2.2.16.19970826122816.39d785ec@pop.azstarnet.com> from "Tenney Nathanson" at Aug 26, 97 12:29:29 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit The definition's right but it's also worth noting that hincty is a sort of hald-anagram of "head nigger in charge." -Mike. According to Tenney Nathanson: > > Jordan-- > > it also turns up in Harryette Mullen's /Muse & Drudge/, as part of the > phrase "hincty-jinkty." No idea what THAT means. Mullen, in BOO is it, > mentions Clarence Major's dictionary of African American slang, From Juba to > Jive, as key source for her. Don't recall offhand the hincty-jinkty page #. > > best, > > Tenney > > At 01:27 PM 8/26/97 -0400, you wrote: > >Thanks to everybody who backchanneled -- it's a Cab Calloway word. > > > > Hincty (adj.) -- conceited, snooty. > > > >and it's related to another word he used -- > > > > Dicty (adj.) -- high-class, nifty, smart. > > > >OK! another mystery sunk -- > >J > > > >On Tue, 26 Aug 1997, Jordan Davis wrote: > > > >> Anybody know of any uses of the word 'hincty'? I'm certain I've heard it > >> around a lot lately, but when I go looking, it's nowhere to be found. > >> > >> I have no idea what it means. > >> > >> Thanks, > >> Jordan > >> > > > > > > ---------------------------------------------------------- > > tenney nathanson > > tenney@azstarnet.com > nathanso@u.arizona.edu > > http://www.u.arizona.edu/~nathanso/ > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 14:47:52 BST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Ira Lightman Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow (cont'd) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII Moreover, the renga didn't seem to be about Nancarrow, four:four is the dullest time signature, for:for is for oneself, is this a way to honour the dead, would a renga have sprung up for Burroughs' death so equivalently not about Burroughs? On Mon, 25 Aug 1997 17:06:46 -0500 Jordan Davis wrote: > From: Jordan Davis > Date: Mon, 25 Aug 1997 17:06:46 -0500 > Subject: Re: Renga for Nancarrow (cont'd) > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > Dodie -- > > Thanks for making the list safe for hot dogs and macaroni > > actually, John Tranter, now that I've used the irony tags, I gotta say they > feel about as heavy as Chevy Chase-type air-scare quotes. Ugh City. It's > probably me -- somebody else could make them feel like Jack Nicholson's > pitch-based prosody, I'm sure. > > Viva la Renga, > Jordan, who when in Maine avoids all hot dogs, both red and brown ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 09:07:35 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: adalaide morris Subject: Re: hincty In-Reply-To: <2.2.16.19970826122816.39d785ec@pop.azstarnet.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Tenney-- Can you give a fuller reference for BOO? Also, does anyone know if Mullen has published a lecture Aldon Nielsen refers to in *Black Chant* called "Visionary Literacy: Art, Literature and Indigenous African Writing Systems," first given at Intersection for the Arts in SF May 24, 1993? I'd like to find out more about the argument she makes there. Thanks very much-- Dee Morris >Jordan-- > >it also turns up in Harryette Mullen's /Muse & Drudge/, as part of the >phrase "hincty-jinkty." No idea what THAT means. Mullen, in BOO is it, >mentions Clarence Major's dictionary of African American slang, From Juba to >Jive, as key source for her. Don't recall offhand the hincty-jinkty page #. > >best, > >Tenney ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 06:34:58 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Douglas Organization: Sun Moon Books Subject: Chris Felver Comments: cc: djmess@sunmoon.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Does anyone have an address or telephone number for the photographer Chris Felver. If so, please back channel it to me at djmess@sunmoon.com I truly appreciate it. Douglas Messerli Sun & Moon Press ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 11:53:01 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mark weiss Subject: Avant-garde and border patrols Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Those of you who weren't sure what kind of divisions there are in the poetry world when the question of an avant-garde came up recently may find the following interesting. I just spoke with the editorial office at _Booklist_, the journal of the American Library Association. I had submitted Rochelle Owens' _New and Selected Poems_ to them for review. As the excellent review in Publishers' Weekly had just come out I was curious as to whether _Booklist_ intended to review it. Like it or not, a good review in _Booklist_ is worth 200-300 sales to libraries. I was informed that their poetry editor had rejected it because, in the words of an internal memo, it "represents the kind of poetry that convinces people that poetry is too difficult to read." I think I offended the guy on the other end of the line when I volunteered that they should maybe find a less naive poetry editor. The book came to them with extensive praise from, among others, Karl Young, Marjorie Perloff and Jerry Rothenberg, but that didn't get it past the gate-keeper. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 14:51:00 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" Subject: Re: Avant-garde and border patrols Comments: To: mark weiss MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN Uh oh. Looks like it's time to send in the sapper squad. I propose that this elite unit be comprised of David Bromige (who will baffle editors with "cabbages and rhinoceroses"), Tom Mandel (who will lay down the Law) and Rachel Loden (who will overcome with great gentleness and failing that, slap recalcitrant gatekeepers silly). Hovering in the background will be the Spirit of Allen Ginsberg on harmonium, chanting "Woe to Bablyon, woe!" and radiating angelic poetry vibes of irresistible potency. Patrick Pritchett ---------- From: mark weiss To: POETICS Subject: Avant-garde and border patrols Date: Wednesday, August 27, 1997 2:35PM I had submitted Rochelle Owens' _New and Selected Poems_ to [Booklist] for review..... I was informed that their poetry editor had rejected it because, in the words of an internal memo, it "represents the kind of poetry that convinces people that poetry is too difficult to read." I think I offended the guy on the other end of the line when I volunteered that they should maybe find a less naive poetry editor. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 17:59:28 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: devolution Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" What's with all this devolution, anyway? Jordan ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 18:03:42 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Re: devolution In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Thanks to everybody who backchannelled with the lowdown on devolution. Apparently, Brian Eno never received a cent from his work on Q: Are We Not Men?, and both Sri Lanka and Scotland have serious devolution efforts in the works. You folks are dicty, not hincty, J At 5:59 PM -0500 8/27/97, Jordan Davis wrote: >What's with all this devolution, anyway? > >Jordan ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 20:45:30 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: adalaide morris Subject: Mullen references Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Tenney-- Can you give a fuller reference for Harryette Mullen's BOO? Also, does anyone know if Mullen published a lecture Aldon Nielsen refers to in *Black Chant* called "Visionary Literacy: Art, Literature and Indigenous African Writing Systems," first given at Intersection for the Arts in SF May 24, 1993? I'd like to find out more about the argument she makes there. Thanks very much-- Dee Morris >Jordan-- > >it[e.g. "hincty"] also turns up in Harryette Mullen's /Muse & Drudge/, as >part of the >phrase "hincty-jinkty." No idea what THAT means. Mullen, in BOO is it, >mentions Clarence Major's dictionary of African American slang, From Juba to >Jive, as key source for her. Don't recall offhand the hincty-jinkty page #. > >best, > >Tenney ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 20:08:11 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tenney Nathanson Subject: Re: Mullen references Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dee-- I'll try to scrounge up my Mullen file folder, but I'm not really sure where it is. There are two pieces, actually, both of which folks on this list originally brought to my attention. One is the BOO interview; then there's, I think, a short essay by her in POETIC BRIEFS. best Tenney At 08:45 PM 8/27/97 -0500, you wrote: >Tenney-- > >Can you give a fuller reference for Harryette Mullen's BOO? Also, does >anyone know if Mullen published a lecture Aldon Nielsen refers to in *Black >Chant* called "Visionary Literacy: Art, Literature and Indigenous African >Writing Systems," first given at Intersection for the Arts in SF May 24, >1993? I'd like to find out more about the argument she makes there. > >Thanks very much-- > > Dee Morris > > > >>Jordan-- >> >>it[e.g. "hincty"] also turns up in Harryette Mullen's /Muse & Drudge/, as >>part of the >>phrase "hincty-jinkty." No idea what THAT means. Mullen, in BOO is it, >>mentions Clarence Major's dictionary of African American slang, From Juba to >>Jive, as key source for her. Don't recall offhand the hincty-jinkty page #. >> >>best, >> >>Tenney > > ---------------------------------------------------------- tenney nathanson tenney@azstarnet.com nathanso@u.arizona.edu http://www.u.arizona.edu/~nathanso/ ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 23:34:52 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Thomas Bell Subject: Re: Mullen references Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" This might be of more general interest, if postable, or could they be put on the EPC hotlist?. I think it is a hot topic. tom bell At 08:08 PM 8/27/97 -0700, Tenney Nathanson wrote: >Dee-- > >I'll try to scrounge up my Mullen file folder, but I'm not really sure where >it is. There are two pieces, actually, both of which folks on this list >originally brought to my attention. One is the BOO interview; then there's, >I think, a short essay by her in POETIC BRIEFS. > >best > >Tenney > >At 08:45 PM 8/27/97 -0500, you wrote: >>Tenney-- >> >>Can you give a fuller reference for Harryette Mullen's BOO? Also, does >>anyone know if Mullen published a lecture Aldon Nielsen refers to in *Black >>Chant* called "Visionary Literacy: Art, Literature and Indigenous African >>Writing Systems," first given at Intersection for the Arts in SF May 24, >>1993? I'd like to find out more about the argument she makes there. >> >>Thanks very much-- >> >> Dee Morris >> >> >> >>>Jordan-- >>> >>>it[e.g. "hincty"] also turns up in Harryette Mullen's /Muse & Drudge/, as >>>part of the >>>phrase "hincty-jinkty." No idea what THAT means. Mullen, in BOO is it, >>>mentions Clarence Major's dictionary of African American slang, From Juba to >>>Jive, as key source for her. Don't recall offhand the hincty-jinkty page #. >>> >>>best, >>> >>>Tenney >> >> > >---------------------------------------------------------- > >tenney nathanson > >tenney@azstarnet.com >nathanso@u.arizona.edu > >http://www.u.arizona.edu/~nathanso/ > > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 21:48:40 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Re: Mullen references (& renga) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" BOO is a newsprint publication that comes out of Vancouver, something like quarterly, which ran an interview with Mullen about a year ago. I don't have the address at hand, but one or another of the principals may be on the list, still, or some other Vancouverite might have contact info. (That's Vancouver BC, by the way, about 150 miles north of here, NOT Vancouver WA, about 150 miles south of here.) &, after a few days traveling in the opposite direction as Dodie, I can only say ditto in re: the burgeoning renga. While I have read some finished rengas in print & online form the earlier group that were of interest, being a captive reader of these works in process is not a beautiful thing. (For those who care to check into the old renga scare I think it was two years ago, summer of 1995.) Bests, Herb >Tenney-- > >Can you give a fuller reference for Harryette Mullen's BOO? Also, does >anyone know if Mullen published a lecture Aldon Nielsen refers to in *Black >Chant* called "Visionary Literacy: Art, Literature and Indigenous African >Writing Systems," first given at Intersection for the Arts in SF May 24, >1993? I'd like to find out more about the argument she makes there. > >Thanks very much-- > > Dee Morris > > > >>Jordan-- >> >>it[e.g. "hincty"] also turns up in Harryette Mullen's /Muse & Drudge/, as >>part of the >>phrase "hincty-jinkty." No idea what THAT means. Mullen, in BOO is it, >>mentions Clarence Major's dictionary of African American slang, From Juba to >>Jive, as key source for her. Don't recall offhand the hincty-jinkty page #. >> >>best, >> >>Tenney Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 27 Aug 1997 22:21:50 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: Mullen references not sure if this is current - BOO Magazine 1865 Commercial Dr. Box 116 Vancouver, B.C. V5N 4A6 or, Phil McCrum pmccrum@sfu.ca red. Can you give a fuller reference for Harryette Mullen's BOO? Also, does anyone know if Mullen published a lecture Aldon Nielsen refers to in *Black Chant* called "Visionary Literacy: Art, Literature and Indigenous African Writing Systems," first given at Intersection for the Arts in SF May 24, 1993? I'd like to find out more about the argument she makes there. Thanks very much-- Dee Morris >Jordan-- > >it[e.g. "hincty"] also turns up in Harryette Mullen's /Muse & Drudge/, as >part of the >phrase "hincty-jinkty." No idea what THAT means. Mullen, in BOO is it, >mentions Clarence Major's dictionary of African American slang, From Juba to >Jive, as key source for her. Don't recall offhand the hincty-jinkty page #. > >best, > >Tenney ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 01:10:43 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Ryan Whyte Subject: Shaky Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Shaky skit, representation on representation coffee and no lunch makes the same shudder Hegel confronts close open sign no contradiction in dictum yes but no this girl named A D alpha absolute electric lights riven from herself noose in speech fluted when on the *phone* ok well goodbye ahem call next weak but the name stutters sky blank shimmer over granite. Not a man say B B french or german let continue to talk and see each other In great wind all Serra's calculations like tree tops massage across interval wherein the newness of the same according Andrew Benjamin. I like that quote in the morning, a propos de how nice. Goodbye tomb know not sema steel carbon ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 02:08:08 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" i doant kown wyh yuo lghau. vryeone kons tehr is ptorey taht mreinds us ptroey is dfcltiut to rade. prsonlellay , i fnid ernaly veryhingt dufflcit to erad. On, herte nist chum ptroey hath leapses em, tno cinse brett forest & garde ugest & t.s. litotes. Het Bilarian hwo efrused to virwei crholle sownes boko. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 11:18:05 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Lawrence Upton." Subject: Compuserve Comments: To: british-poets Comments: cc: Jethro Cadbury MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit A quick note of warning to my fellow email users. Should you consider using compuserve, learn from my situation. Three days after I cancelled my account with them and asked them to justify recent charges, they put in a debit to my credit card company for ANOTHER month. Now I have to jump through hoops if I want to get my money back. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 09:19:38 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: adalaide morris Subject: BOO In-Reply-To: <2.2.16.19970827200648.36573b5a@pop.azstarnet.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Thanks to Tenney, Herb, Red Slider, David Brominge, and Thomas Bell for the Mullen information. I've e-mailed Deanna Ferguson about the interview in BOO and will report back when I hear. Meanwhile, does anyone know the citation for the Poetic Briefs essay Tenney mentions? I like Thomas Bell's idea of seeing whether some of Mullen's harder-to-find pieces could be posted on the EPC hotlist. Is there anything a person could do to help make that happen? Dee There are two pieces, actually, both of which folks on this list >originally brought to my attention. One is the BOO interview; then there's, >I think, a short essay by her in POETIC BRIEFS. > >best > >Tenney > >At 08:45 PM 8/27/97 -0500, you wrote: >>Tenney-- >> >>Can you give a fuller reference for Harryette Mullen's BOO? Also, does >>anyone know if Mullen published a lecture Aldon Nielsen refers to in *Black >>Chant* called "Visionary Literacy: Art, Literature and Indigenous African >>Writing Systems," first given at Intersection for the Arts in SF May 24, >>1993? I'd like to find out more about the argument she makes there. >> >>Thanks very much-- >> >> Dee Morris >> ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 10:09:30 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: John Krick Subject: The Ear MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Dear Poetics List, Anyone know about the schedule of upcoming events at The Ear, like, through the next couple of months? John Krick ******************************************************************* (jkrick@comcat.com) (((( I pulled on a pair of my stoutest espadrilles and set off, my cat frisking ahead of me with many a warning cry of "Here comes my master, the Marquis of Carabras!" )))) S. J. Perelman ******************************************************************* ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 11:07:53 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Judy Roitman Subject: DC In-Reply-To: <199708281410.KAA22762@uz.comcat.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Any readings going on in DC the weekend of Sept. 27? --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Judy Roitman | "Whoppers Whoppers Whoppers! Math, University of Kansas | memory fails Lawrence, KS 66045 | these are the days." 785-864-4630 | Larry Eigner, 1927-1996 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note new area code ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://titania.math.ukans.edu/faculty/roitman/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 15:24:08 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: our mail In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Anybody finish Mason & Dixon? I have a couple blanks in the upper left and the lower right corners, notably "Intentionally concealed" and "Pizarro's quest." Jordan On Thu, 28 Aug 1997, David Bromige wrote: > i doant kown wyh yuo lghau. vryeone kons tehr is ptorey taht mreinds us > ptroey is dfcltiut to rade. prsonlellay , i fnid ernaly veryhingt dufflcit > to erad. On, herte nist chum ptroey hath leapses em, tno cinse brett forest > & garde ugest & t.s. litotes. > > Het Bilarian hwo efrused to virwei crholle sownes boko. > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 15:32:39 +0000 Reply-To: ARCHAMBEAU@LFC.EDU Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Robert Archambeau Organization: Lake Forest College Subject: Jazz Poetry MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit (in a small voice from beneath a pile of paperwork) Does anybody have an opinion about Yusef Komunyakaa and Sascha Feinstein's "Jazz Poetry Anthology" and "Second Set: Jazz Poetry Anthology Volume Two" -- I just heard about them from Amazon.com, but since their goal is to sell you the book, their glowing review isn't necessarily to be trusted. Do Komunyakaa and Feinstein cover all the bases? Do they include discussions of Jazz poetics? Is the book filled with bland beat hymns of praise for great players? Do tell... R.A. -- Robert Archambeau Department of English Lake Forest College Lake Forest, IL 60045 http://www.lfc.edu/~archamb/ See: behind bullet-proof glass, the ruby slippers sparkle. We do not know the limits of their powers. We suspect that these limits may not exist. --Salman Rushdie ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 16:55:41 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Eliza McGrand Subject: Re: Compuserve oh jeez. i just went through the same nightmare with aol. yes, i was fool enough to put one of those "free disks" in my machine. a year and a half later, one credit card screwed up to the point of hours of phone calling, they have once again agreed to refund my money. it is not clear if at this time they will actually do it. they've made that promise before... e ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 16:06:54 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Re: Jazz Poetry Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I'm more taken with the range of work in Moment's Notice edited by Art Lange & Nathaniel Mackey. I've only looked at the Komunyakaa & Feinstein collections in bookstores, so I don't know them as well, but that also means that looking them over in bookstores didn't seduce me into buying the books. Moment's Notice offers a wider range of styles (including both poetry & prose), whereas the other collections seem (in my memory, at least) to be more or less limited to Beatnik stylings & personal experience poems. I'd also recommend looking at Aldon Nielsen's book Black Chant for the last couple of chapters on jazz & poetry. Besides covering the jazz/poetry dynamic/aesthetic pretty well, this book also has a good bibliography & discography of work relevant to the subject. Hope this helps, Herb >(in a small voice from beneath a pile of paperwork) > >Does anybody have an opinion about Yusef Komunyakaa and Sascha >Feinstein's "Jazz Poetry Anthology" and "Second Set: Jazz Poetry >Anthology Volume Two" -- I just heard about them from Amazon.com, but >since their goal is to sell you the book, their glowing review isn't >necessarily to be trusted. Do Komunyakaa and Feinstein cover all the >bases? Do they include discussions of Jazz poetics? Is the book filled >with bland beat hymns of praise for great players? Do tell... > >R.A. >-- >Robert Archambeau >Department of English >Lake Forest College >Lake Forest, IL 60045 >http://www.lfc.edu/~archamb/ > >See: behind bullet-proof glass, the ruby slippers sparkle. >We do not know the limits of their powers. >We suspect that these limits may not exist. > --Salman Rushdie Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 19:26:40 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Julie Marie Schmid Subject: Re: Jazz Poetry Comments: To: Robert Archambeau In-Reply-To: <34059A17.5382@LFC.EDU> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I've used the Jazz Poetry Anthology in a lyric poetry class I taught here at the University of Iowa. I think that both the first volume and the second set are o.k. . . . A little too traditional for my tastes. It containts too much poetry about jazz and jazz artists and too little that actually utilizes a jazz poetic. If I had it to do over again I would use the Mackey anthology that is published by Gray Wolf Press (the name of which escapes me). From what I've seen of that, it seems to be much more about formal innovation than the Feinstein & Komunyakaa text. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 17:28:39 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: crack avant-garde units & zapper squads MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Patrick Pritchett wrote: > Rachel Loden (who will overcome with great gentleness and failing that, slap > recalcitrant gatekeepers silly) Well, as Ronnie said, there you go again. How is it I always seem to get cast as something between the hostess of Romper Room and Nurse "those who are late do not get fruit cup" Diesel? I've spent the summer, Patrick, working on needlepoint samplers of Amy Lowell and rereading _Satyagraha in South Africa_ and _Letter from Birmingham Jail_, so I've sworn off violence except in really hopeless cases, such as Radovan Karadzic, or maybe certain backwoods relations of George Bowering. Rachel ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 21:33:02 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Poetics List Subject: Welcome to Poetics List MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: QUOTED-PRINTABLE Rev. 6-3-97 ____________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Poetics List & The Electronic Poetry Center sponsored by The Poetics Program, Department of English, Faculty of Art & Letters, of the State University of New York, Buffalo ____________________________________________________________________ http://writing.upenn.edu/epc ____________________________________________________________________ _______Contents___________ 1. About the Poetics List 2. Subscriptions 3. Cautions 4. Digest Option 5. Temporarily turning off Poetics mail 6. Who's Subscribed 7. The Electronic Poetry Center (EPC) 8. Poetics Archives at EPC 9. Publishers & Editors Read This! [This document was prepared by Charles Bernstein (bernstei@bway.net), Loss Peque=F1oGlazier (glazier@acsu.buffalo.edu), and in cooperation with Joel Kuszai (poetics@acsu.buffalo.edu). ____________________________________________________________________ =09=09=09=09Above the world-weary horizons =09=09=09=09New obstacles for exchange arise =09=09=09=09Or unfold, O ye postmasters! 1. About the Poetics List The Poetics List was founded in late 1993 with the epigraph above. There are presently about 500 subscribers. Please note that this is a private list and information about the list should not be posted to other lists or directories of lists. The idea=20 is to keep the list to those with specific rather than general interests, and also to keep the scale of the list small and the volume manageable. The Poetics List, while committed to openness, is moderated. While individual posts of participants are sent directly to all subscribers, we continue to work to promote the editorial function of this project. The definition of that project, while provisional, and while open to continual redefinition by list participants, is nonetheless aversive to a generalized discussion of poetry. Rather, our aim is to support, inform, and extend those directions in poetry that are committed to innovations, renovations, and investigations of form and/or/as content, to the questioning of received forms and styles, and to the creation of the otherwise unimagined, untried, unexpected, improbable, and impossible. =20 Please keep in mind that all posts go out immediately to all subscribers, and become part of an on-line archive. *Posting to Poetics is a form of publication, not personal communication.* Participants are asked to exercise caution before posting messages! While spontaneity of response may seem the very heart of the list at its best, it also has the darker side of circulating ideas that have not been well considered (or considered by another reader -- editor or friend). Given the nature of the medium, subscribers do well to maintain some skepticism when reading the list and, where possible, to try to avoid taking what may be something close to a spontaneous comment made in the heat of exchange as if it were a revised or edited essay ("Let the Reader Beware!").=20 The "list owner" of Poetics is Charles Bernstein: contact him for further information. Joel Kuszai is list manager. For subscription information contact us at POETICS@acsu.buffalo.edu.=20 ____________________________________________________________________ 2. Subscriptions The list has open subscriptions. You can subscribe (sub) or unsubscribe (unsub) by sending a one-line message, with no subject line, to: listserv@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu the one-line message should say: unsub poetics {or} sub poetics Jill Jillway (replacing Jill Jillway with your own name; but note: do not use your name to unsub) We will be sent a notice of all subscription activity. * If you are having difficulty unsubscribing, please note: Sometimes your e-mail address may be changed slightly by your system administrator. If this happens you will not be able to send messages=20 to Poetics or to unsubscribe, although you will continue to get your Poetics mail. To avoid this, unsub from the old address and resub from the new address. If you can no longer do this there is a solution if you use Eudora (an e-mail program that is available free at shareware sites): from the Tools menu select "Options" and then select set-up for "Sending Mail": you=20 can substitute your old address here and send the unsub message. The most frequent problem with subscriptions is bounced messages. If your system is often down or if you have a low disk quota, Poetics messages may get bounced. Please try avoid having messages from the list returned to us. If the problem is low disk quota, you may wish to request an increase from your system administrator. (You may wish to argue that this subscription is part of your scholarly communication!) You may also wish to consider obtaining a commercial account. ____________________________________________________________________ 3. Cautions Please do not send attachments or include extremely long documents in a post, since this may make it difficult for those who get the list via "digest" or who cannot always decode attached or specially formatted files.=20 In addition to being archived at the EPC, some posts to Poetics (especially reviews, obituary notices, announcements, etc.) may also become part of specific EPC subject areas. Brief reviews of poetry events and publications are always welcome. (See section 7.) Please do not send inquiries to the list to get an individual subscribers address. To get this information, see section 6. If you want someone to send out information to the list as a whole, or supply information missing from an post, or thank someone for posting something you requested, please send the request or comment to the individual backchannel, not to the whole list.=20 ____________________________________________________________________ 4. Digest Option The Poetics List can send a large number of individual messages to your account to each day! If you would prefer to receive ONE message each day, which would include all messages posted to the list for that day, you can use the digest option. Send this one-line message (no subject line) to listserv@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu set poetics digest NOTE:!! Send this message to "listserv" not to Poetics or as a reply to this message!! You can switch back to individual messages by sending this message: set poetics mail ____________________________________________________________________ 5. Temporarily turning off Poetics mail Do not leave your Poetics subscription "active" if you are going to be away for any extended period of time! Your account may become flooded and you may lose not only Poetics messages but other important mail. You can temporarily turn off your Poetics subscription by sending a message to "listserv." set poetics nomail & turn it on again with: set poetics mail When you return you can check or download missed postings from the Poetics archive. (See 8 below.) ____________________________________________________________________ 6. Who's Subscribed To see who is subscribed to Poetics, send an e-mail message to listserv@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu; leave the "Subject" line of the e-mail message blank. In the body of your e-mail message type: review poetics You will be sent within a reasonable amount of time (by return e-mail)=20 a rather long list containing the names and e-mail addresses of Poetics subscribers. This list is alphabetized by server not name. or try: review POETICS by name review POETICS by country which will give you the list alphabetically by name or a flawed list by country (since all ".com" and ".net"s are counted as US) *Please do not send a message to the list asking for the address of a specific subscriber.* ____________________________________________________________________ 7. What is the Electronic Poetry Center? our URL is http://writing.upenn.edu/epc The mission of this World-Wide Web based electronic poetry center is to serve as a hypertextual gateway to the extraordinary range of activity in formally innovative writing in the United States and the world. The Center provides access to the burgeoning number of electronic resources in the new poetries including RIF/T and other electronic poetry journals, the POETICS List archives, an AUTHOR library of electronic poetic texts, and direct connections to numerous related electronic RESOURCES. The Center also provides information about contemporary print little magazines and SMALL PRESSES engaged in poetry and poetics. And we have an extensive collection of soundfiles of poets' reading their work, as well as the archive of LINEbreak, the radio interview series. The EPC is directed by Loss Peque=F1o Glazier. ____________________________________________________________________ 8. Poetics Archives via EPC Go to the EPC and select Poetics from the opening screen. Follow the links to Poetics Archives. You may browse the archives by month and year or search them for specific information. Your interface will allow you to print or download any of these files. Or set your browser to go directly to: http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/poetics/archive ____________________________________________________________________ 9. Publishers & Editors Read This! PUBLISHERS & EDITORS: Our listings of poetry and poetics information is open and available to you. We are trying to make access to printed publications as easy as possible to our users and ENCOURAGE you to participate! Send a list of your press/publications to glazier@acsu.buffalo.edu with the words EPC Press Listing in the subject line. You may also send materials on disk. (Write file name, word processing program, and Mac or PC on disk.) Send an e-mail message to the address above to obtain a mailing address to which to send your disk. Though files marked up with html are our goal, ascii files are perfectly acceptable. If yourword processor ill save files in Rich Text Format (.rtf) this is also highly desirable Send us extended information on new publications (including any back cover copy and sample poems) as well as complete catalogs/backlists (including excerpts from reviews, sample poems, etc.). Be sure to include full information for ordering--including prices and addresses and phone numbers both of the press and any distributors. Initially, you might want to send short anouncements of new=20 publications directly to the Poetics list as subscribers do not always (or ever) check the EPC; in your message please include full information for ordering. If you have a fuller listing at EPC, you might also mention that in any Poetics posts. Some announcements circulated through Poetics and the EPC have received a noticeable responses; it may be an effective way to promote your publication and we are glad to facilitate information about interesting publications. ____________________________________________________________________ END OF POETICS LIST WELCOME ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 00:21:00 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Ryan Whyte Subject: video script Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII The road which leads me to you is safe even when it runs into oceans. Edmond Jabes, The Book of Questions felt like Fellini. Young voices write video screen, not too old, held upstairs spinning drums, washed by harem, pure wife. that word of mine propriety making this video when in a second it is me writing it spoken, responsibility a point later edited out so where does the writing begin which is a way of writing out shame. She says I am the screen well that's true, admission says you need us I suppose it's a matter of timing opening dam bedrock to sky that total responsibility in the midst of technology's blind spot so that returning to love and an arbitrary division of paragraphs yet when her face shimmered it was all to a certain extent lost structure confluence ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 04:10:16 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: rsillima@IX.NETCOM.COM Subject: By Ear, he said (or is it Bye Ear?) Comments: To: poetics@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii John, My understanding is that the Ear series finally came to a close last spring with a reading by Steve Benson and Leslie Scalapino. There's a new series somewhere that is supposed to be the continuation, but either they haven't gotten started yet or else have not continued with the same mailing list. Can somebody please fill us Philadelphia-region folks in! Ron Silliman Date: Thu, 28 Aug 1997 10:09:30 +0000 From: John Krick Subject: The Ear Dear Poetics List, Anyone know about the schedule of upcoming events at The Ear, like, through the next couple of months? John Krick ******************************************************************* (jkrick@comcat.com) Ron Silliman 262 Orchard Road Paoli, PA 19301-1116 (610) 251-2214 (610) 293-6099 (o) (610) 293-5506 (fax) rsillima@ix.netcom.com rsillima@tssc.com http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/silliman/ ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 04:26:49 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: rsillima@IX.NETCOM.COM Subject: Ashbery/Theroux debate Comments: To: poetics@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii I'm going to violate my rule against posting to the list twice in one day to call attention to the following website: http://www.latimes.com/HOME/NEWS/BOOKS/t000074985.html There you will find John Ashbery writing to the LA Times about Alexander Theroux's review of his first five books and Theroux's response. The gist being that Ashbery is said to be a fine writer when he doesn't behave like a relative of Stein, Olson (whose name is spelled Olsen by both, or perhaps by the LA Times' editor), Pound, even Berryman. Theroux, if you've had the fortune to miss the work, is a classic example of an academic novelist (Princeton at the moment, I think) who strikes the tough guy pose in his prose (he's an amateur at this compared with Leonard Michaels), which aspires to some sort of made for TV aesthetics. Ron Ron Silliman 262 Orchard Road Paoli, PA 19301-1116 (610) 251-2214 (610) 293-6099 (o) (610) 293-5506 (fax) rsillima@ix.netcom.com rsillima@tssc.com http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/silliman/ ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 02:27:16 -0700 Reply-To: dean@w-link.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Dean A. Brink" Subject: JavaPoetry MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="------------16CEECFDEBCF77F4C2339945" --------------16CEECFDEBCF77F4C2339945 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I would like to share an experiment with Java that combines images and text. It may take a couple minutes to load in your browser. "Men with Coins" http://www.w-link.net/~dean/JavaPoetry/mencoins.html The applets used require a Java-enabled browser (such as Netscape 2 or above or MS Internet Explorer 3 or above). Any comments or suggestions are very welcome. dean brink EALC/UChicago dean@w-link.net interpoetics - poetry of Asia and the Pacific Rim www.w-link.net/~dean/interpoetics/index.html --------------16CEECFDEBCF77F4C2339945 Content-Type: text/html; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I would like to share an experiment with Java that
combines images and text. It may take a couple
minutes to load in your browser.

"Men with Coins"
http://www.w-link.net/~dean/JavaPoetry/mencoins.html

The applets used require a Java-enabled browser (such as
Netscape 2 or above or MS Internet Explorer 3 or above).

Any comments or suggestions are very welcome.

dean brink
EALC/UChicago   dean@w-link.net
interpoetics - poetry of Asia and the Pacific Rim
www.w-link.net/~dean/interpoetics/index.html
 
  --------------16CEECFDEBCF77F4C2339945-- ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 06:04:37 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: JavaPoetry Comments: cc: "Dean A. Brink" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Dean -- quite well done -- the serene pacing, text-roll & image-fades -- seems to fulfill (to a degree, or at least in a certain manner) what I've often felt to be interesting possibilities for the medium, but which I've rarely seen explored with much sense of adequacy. A good example -- an interesting instance -- of what can be done. Reminds me somewhat of my sensation on seeing work of some more-"serious" video artists (e.g., Irit Batsry in NYC), who're interested in really working with the medium's own potential . . . Yes, the upper imagery didn't appear on my browser (Netscape 2 level) till the poem-text had run thru its cycle onece -- then one properly had the full effect. Other viewers might bear this in mind. The pacing was not (quite) as slow as Butoh -- was (I'd say) pretty well set; too fast would have been (pardoning the tautology) too fast; whereas much slower might've bordered on excruciating . . . . all this is not commenting on "content" issues, but rather, on the techno-achievement (& hat-tipping toward the so-to-say more-than-nascent poetics thereof . . . ) thanks, d.i. > From: "Dean A. Brink" > Subject: JavaPoetry > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > http://www.w-link.net/~dean/JavaPoetry/mencoins.html . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@mail.wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 05:05:53 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: JavaPoetry MSIE 4.0 (bld 1215) p166: very fine. loaded and running in about 12.5 sec. (comfortable) text frame doing about 3.5 sec. scroll. First image up with 'polyester pockets' line and definite feel of text slipping in-between image frames. Work is nice exhibit - makes me wanna...well maybe after the ballads and fairtales are done they'll let me play.. red I would like to share an experiment with Java that combines images and text. It may take a couple minutes to load in your browser. "Men with Coins" http://www.w-link.net/~dean/JavaPoetry/mencoins.html The applets used require a Java-enabled browser (such as Netscape 2 or above or MS Internet Explorer 3 or above). Any comments or suggestions are very welcome. dean brink EALC/UChicago dean@w-link.net interpoetics - poetry of Asia and the Pacific Rim www.w-link.net/~dean/interpoetics/index.html <> ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 08:59:24 CST6CDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hank Lazer Organization: The University of Alabama Subject: Re: Jazz Poetry I'd say "ditto" in response to Herb's e-mail. The Mackey co-edited volume has more range to it. I'd especially second Herb's enthusiastic recommendation of Aldon Nielsen's _Black Chant_--a truly great resource, and an enjoyable read. The current issue of _River City_ magazine has a couple of short essays on jazz & poetry: one by me (on early Creeley, and current Mackey), and one by Aldon. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 09:12:50 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "p. durgin" Subject: Jarry and his Pataphysics In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Hey listies, If any one has any hot suggestions as to where to begin looking into the work of Alfred Jarry, and his concept of Pataphysics, would you please back-channel me with the scoop? One can only infer so much from Roditi and the like. Thanks. Patrick Durgin I[I]I pdurgin@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu I[I]I ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 11:01:40 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Re: Jarry and his Pataphysics MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1; x-mac-type="54455854"; x-mac-creator="4D4F5353" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Read everything first forward omitting every third vowel, then backward reinserting the omitted vowels after every fifth consonant -- Pierre p. durgin wrote: > Hey listies, > > If any one has any hot suggestions as to where to begin > looking > into the work of Alfred Jarry, and his concept of Pataphysics, would > you > please back-channel me with the scoop? One can only infer so much > from > Roditi and the like. > Thanks. > > Patrick Durgin > > I[I]I pdurgin@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu I[I]I -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- "I have never been able to tell a beginning from an end." — Georges Braque ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 10:11:50 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Miekal And Subject: Re: Jarry and his Pataphysics MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > p. durgin wrote: > > > Hey listies, > > > > If a y one ha any hot s gges ions as to w ere to begin > > loo ing > > into the w rk of Al ed Jar ry, and his concept of Patap ysi s, wo ld > > you before you drive your car to the theatre of absurdity please partake in THE 'PATAPHYSICAL SOBRIETY TEST located at a url near you: http://www.net22.com/qazingulaza/pataphysics/pataphysics.html heirlooms are forever, Miekal -- @#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@# Dreamtime Village website: http://net22.com/dreamtime QAZINGULAZA: And/Was/Wakest website: http://net22.com/qazingulaza e-mail for DT & And/Was: dtv@mwt.net ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 09:15:23 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: By Ear, he said (or is it Bye Ear?) In-Reply-To: <19978295023619169@ix.netcom.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >John, > >My understanding is that the Ear series finally came to a close last spring >with a reading by Steve Benson and Leslie Scalapino. There's a new series >somewhere that is supposed to be the continuation, but either they haven't >gotten started yet or else have not continued with the same mailing list. I'm sure NYC-ers have more details, but here on the west coast the word is that the Ear Inn series is now at the Hear Cafe. A rather strange thematics in venue names, wouldn't you say? Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 10:00:00 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" Subject: Re: Ashbery/Theroux debate Comments: To: rsillima MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN Thanks for that heads up, Ron - boy oh boy is Theroux all wet! The job he does on Little JA makes Sven Birkerts look like a perfect gentleman (and I imagine he is since I can't imagine him ever stooping so low...). So, late in 1997, people are still getting riled over their inability to locate "truth" in poems. Gosh. Theroux is Allen Tate redux, preaching the mealy-mouthed humanist gospel of clarity, as if a poem were merely a transparent envelope and the poet a courier for some literary FedEx. As a friend of mine from Texas is fond of saying: That tightens my jaw. This points up my recent experience on the second day of my Critical Analysis of Poetry class: we were reading Sandburg's homiletic "Grass." On the page before, though, was a wee excerpt from Stein's "Stanza" -- such wonderful, playful, bracing stuff -- and thanks to the attitude of hostility and fear fostered by people like Theroux, how will students ever be introduced to it? As Victor McLaglen opines in Ford's "Fort Apache" - "we've got a job of work ahead of us and no mistake..." Patrick Pritchett ---------- From: rsillima To: POETICS Subject: Ashbery/Theroux debate Date: Friday, August 29, 1997 4:34AM http://www.latimes.com/HOME/NEWS/BOOKS/t000074985.html There you will find John Ashbery writing to the LA Times about Alexander Theroux's review of his first five books and Theroux's response. The gist being that Ashbery is said to be a fine writer when he doesn't behave like a relative of Stein, Olson (whose name is spelled Olsen by both, or perhaps by the LA Times' editor), Pound, even Berryman. Theroux, if you've had the fortune to miss the work, is a classic example of an academic novelist (Princeton at the moment, I think) who strikes the tough guy pose in his prose (he's an amateur at this compared with Leonard Michaels), which aspires to some sort of made for TV aesthetics. Ron Ron Silliman ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 13:27:17 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joel Kuszai Subject: Meow Press Website Open Comments: cc: core-l@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII At long last, and at great mental anguish, the Meow Press website is now open. Please take a look around. Let me know back channel if there are any items which need to be corrected. This is my first venture into html and the web, so please be patient. Over the next months and weeks I'll be adding more and more, including many on-line texts not available in paper form... y'all come back now, y'hear... it can be found at: http://writing.upenn.edu/~kuszai/MEOW-WEB.html ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 10:27:14 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" Subject: Re: Mullen Lecture In-Reply-To: <199708280402.VAA19375@email.sjsu.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Last I checked, Mullen's essay had not yet appeared in print -- but I've been out of touch for a while -- hope to speak with her soon, and will ask if it's out or in press somewhere -- I quoted from a tape I'd made for radio broadcast -- but you REALLY need to see the slides that go with the talk -- ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 10:56:48 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: 'pataphysics & Opal Louis Nations Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" A contemporary norte americano working the 'pataphysical vein who is too little known & read, Opal louis Nations, may be introduced here w/o my dipping too far into irrelevance, I trust. Author of a number of books published between 1970-1990(?), but for some years now on sabbatical from writing while he works in the studio reviving old gospel, doo-wop, & r n b acetates for the CD industry, Nations (aptly named [and by himself]) : born & raised in Britain, national of Canada, immigrant long since to the USA) is probably best encountered via _A Browsers Guide to Opal L. Nations_, put out by the now-defunct Coach House Press in Toronto but still likely available at the right library or 2nd hand bookshop. I know that when I read from this to a KSW group last year in Vancouver, they were astonished that a writer of such intensity concerning things absurd shared passports with them, and wanted to hear more of him. With his wife Ellie Humm (originally from Norway), Opal edited the magazine _Strange Faeces_ throughout the 70s. Extra-literary talents possessed by this one-off figurante include a 6-octave range with perfect pitch (he has sung with a number of groups, beginning with the Frays in London in the 60s--Decca recording artists), and a gift for drawing, whether straight-ahead represntation, or the cartoons more in keeping with his writing interests. Early an associate of Allen Fisher (collecting early doo-wop, not poetry, initially drew them together), and during his Canadian spell, Steve McCaffery, I believe Nations' lukewarm interest in French theory of the recent past accounts for the drop off in attention to his work, and, on his part, in furthering his writing. And too, he is a "loner" poet in a time of assiduous networking. I hope some of you will find time to look into his work. David ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 13:10:04 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Miekal And Subject: Re: 'pataphysics & Opal Louis Nations MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit David B wrote: And too, he is a "loner" poet in a time of > assiduous networking. David Thanks For The Itinerant Bio of Opal Nations & I wish to underline the immortal truth to the words HE IS A LONER POET IN A TIME OF ASSIDUOUS NETWORKING. but wonder if it could also read "because many of us are loner poets we have evolved into assiduous networkers." Amendant Hardiker '"pataphysician of inebriated thermal struggle & improbable solutions to uncalculated problematics ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 14:31:47 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Re: 'pataphysics & Opal Louis Nations MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1; x-mac-type="54455854"; x-mac-creator="4D4F5353" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit David, thanks for that lovely & accurate take on Opal -- whose work has much delighted me over the years & is indeed very much & unjustly neglected in the cyber-90s -- & whose generosity as publisher in the England of the seventies was proverbial -- when I started SIXPACK it was he who showed up on my doorstep & offered his equipment for use -- & then published my own first book. -- doo-wop de doo, Pierre -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- "I have never been able to tell a beginning from an end." — Georges Braque ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 12:09:01 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: Ashbery/Theroux debate [shears...] a wee excerpt from Stein's "Stanza" -- such wonderful, playful, bracing stuff -- and thanks to the attitude of hostility and fear fostered by people like Theroux, how will students ever be introduced to it? As Victor McLaglen opines in Ford's "Fort Apache" - "we've got a job of work ahead of us and no mistake..." Patrick Pritchett ---------- Pat, Put your mind at ease. We'll find our way. We'll find our way. At night red. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 12:57:13 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mark weiss Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I've just read the exchange between Ashbery and Theroux in the LA Times that Ron tipped us off to (you can get Ashbery's reply to the review and Theroux's reply to Ashbery free at the LATimes website, but the original review (Aug. 3) appears to be pay-per-view). Theroux, who gets last word (the home team always does) to clinch his argument that the great moderns and their supporters are often in a conspiracy to perpetrate fraud by being less than plain-spoken and linear, quotes some lovely paratactic lines of Ashbery's as proof that Ashbery is not entitled to ask anyone for clarity of argument, his crimes against such being so flagrant. He also discounts Stein because she flunked her lit courses. It never occurs to Theroux that he simply may not know how to read the writers he criticizes. In light of the above, I thought that the backchannel thread between me and Charles Alexander might be useful. He is responding to the poetics list posting that I reproduce below. (Charles agreed to our outing). Those of you who weren't sure what kind of divisions there are in the poetry world when the question of an avant-garde came up recently may find the following interesting. I just spoke with the editorial office at _Booklist_, the journal of the American Library Association. I had submitted Rochelle Owens' _New and Selected Poems_ to them for review. As the excellent review in Publishers' Weekly had just come out I was curious as to whether _Booklist_ intended to review it. Like it or not, a good review in _Booklist_ is worth 200-300 sales to libraries. I was informed that their poetry editor had rejected it because, in the words of an internal memo, it "represents the kind of poetry that convinces people that poetry is too difficult to read." I think I offended the guy on the other end of the line when I volunteered that they should maybe find a less naive poetry editor. The book came to them with extensive praise from, among others, Karl Young, Marjorie Perloff and Jerry Rothenberg, but that didn't get it past the gate-keeper. Mark Mark, you devil. You know perfectly well that these three names wouldn't get anything past, or even TO, those particular gate-keepers. My guess is that those gate-keepers might not have ever heard these three names. I mean, there are borders, and then there are glaciers. Charles Of course you're right, and that's the point. We can argue about what's meant by avant garde, but I know damned well that the two conservative books that I've published, Mervyn Taylor's and Susie Mee's, both of which I think are marvelous books, got reviewed in Library Journal, Publisher's' Weekly and Booklist, until Rochelle's none of the others have been reviewed in even one of the three, and the review of Rochelle's begins "Owens is yet another talented poet who has not received her due because her poems are neither easy nor easily classifiable." It happens that I don't think that any of the books I've published are difficult (few books of poems are--they usually yield pretty easily to being read aloud), but most are non-linear, which is what I think these cats mean by difficult. The linear is where the line is drawn, and that applies to ways of experiencing a lot more than just poems, heaven help us in this poor benighted land. Mark I'm not so certain about this, Mark, and perhaps I am more cynical than you are. I think, for example, that a number of poets in those 'conservative' circles (terminology, we know, is quite loaded with pitfalls here) are beginning to give Robert Duncan a consenting nod -- even, if they are feminist, Gertrude Stein -- and not necessarily reading these two narrowly. For living writers it's a different story, but is the line really about linearity. I fear it's more of a social question than that. Where did who go to school, who do they know, who reads and cares about their work, etc.? What you suggest is that people actually try to read our 'difficult' books and are somewhat troubled by the nonlinear nature. What I wonder is if it, usually, even gets to the point of a reading, if a writer doesn't have a particular pedigree. That is the point where John Ashbery having gone to Harvard gets him in a few doors that Tom Mandel or Ron Silliman or Mary Margaret Sloan is not going to enter. Michael Palmer gets in some of those doors, too. And I don't say that to fault Ashbery or Palmer in the least. If these were truly aesthetic questions, I would like it very much. But I fear that something else gets in the way before aesthetics or poetics even gets a chance. Something which is part social, part political, part MFA or school-related, part ugly, largely but not entirely unrecognized by those who would bar the gates. Charles ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 18:09:09 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: idaho's cat, or yam what yam MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I hope John Ashbery will respond to Alexander Theroux's question about the number of commas in Ashbery's _Tennis Court Oath_ poem, "Idaho." H may see no need to do so, but it does seem like a matter worth addressing, _proportion_, especially in this context. Who among us would maintain that Ashbery never published a less-than-perfect poem? So the hell what? Unlike Wordsworth, Ashbery seems to have persevered long enough to write _very well_ again. That the LA Times wants web readers to pay for articles is fine, their business, but that the amount they want to charge is greater than $0.01 is discouraging. Microdollars! are what I have for Theroux's prose (and sorry, Dalkey, zip for the poems). Ad hominem on him aside, has anybody read the original review? Is Ashbery's account of Theroux's antagonism to modern(post)ism supportable? What does an arbitrary number of commas threaten? (What are the um gender/camp/literary historical deals in "Idaho" that Theroux's dropkicking? Do they matter? Is it a strictly formal poem that offends Theroux on a strictly formal level? Would two commas have been sufficient? What about Ron Loewinsohn's poem about the swimmers with the row of semicolons -- is or is not that more meaningful? more beautiful?) Are we really just a bunch of post-Berlinwall communards? Brave benighted souls? Ecch. How long will poets continue to be held to insane standards? Yours in the question yams, Jordan PS Is this the first mention of Olsen (sic) outside of poetry land in years, or is it my image nation? And when will someone do for the line from Ashbery to Padgett what has been done so successfully for the line from Olson to Howe? PPS Letter to the editor rengafesto beginning POETRY IS A GIVEN. POETS ARE FREE AND RESPONSIBLE TO DO WITH WORDS WHAT THEY WANT. WHAT POETS DO WITH WORDS MAY NOT BE RECOGNIZABLE -- BUT WHAT THEY DO MAY BECOME SO. THERE IS NO REASON TO HARM POETS OR SPEAK ILL OF THEM BECAUSE OF YOUR INABILITY TO READ THEM. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 18:22:53 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: Another blast from the (poetry) past : Ron Loewinsohn Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" On the day I post a thumbnail sketch of Opal Nations, a happy shock to see (for 1st time since i signed on the List) the name of Ron Loewinsohn, a writer probably better-known (Allen anthology) than Opal, but one also who was read by a number of my associates in the 70's & who then stopped writing (or publishing, in any case) poetry. He has scholarly articles on W.C.W. & perhaps others, and two novels published, one of which, _Magnetic Fields_, won a worthwhile prize, but I havent seen his poetry for a long time. _Watermelons_ was published in the late 50s (Ron then being in his very early 20s), with praise front & back from WCW & Allen Ginsberg. A number of books followed, with perhaps the most notable being _Against the Silences to Come_ , whose title poem is built up of some exquisite "chording" that links the daily paper with history of the poem as feeling-object. Again, a poet to recommend, one who may not be known to the generation now in their 20s and 30s. Despite the slightly obit tone of my postings today, these poets are both very much alive, Nations when not in the recording studio can be found at ...help, the name of that record store in Albany? El Cerrito? ...and Loewinsohn, teaching at UC Bkly. Give em a read. David footnote to Opal Nations as multi-talented person : for many years, he was a highly popular DJ on KPFA (pbs) Bkly, until "let go" by dubious management decision. He has taken his show (originally "Doo-Wop Delights") to a pbs station in Santa Cruz, but just once or twice monthly. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 21:20:05 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: On the Road MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Jennifer says she's been on the road. She says she's found her one true love. She's sorry she can't write a rhyme for a long time. She's sorry she can't even punctuate rites or spel a spell. She's swollen. I'd say pregnant. Mourning sickenss for depression. What grabs the objet petit a so to _speak._ Cloked or choked. Jennifer says, well, it's all better off this way anyway, you know language can just perform SO MUCH and then you want the real thing. Even poets want the real thing. You know it when it hurts. Even poets perform. Jennifer says and says but she's not listening to what she's saying. The brain chops meat like a cleaver. Julu, she's dead. She was the listening-function, so says Deleuze-Guattari. They turned her into a machine. Lathe. Hehe. - J ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 22:24:09 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: 'pataphysics & Opal Louis Nations In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" bpNichol and Steve McCaffery over the years spent a lot of time on 'pataphysics, or the Canadian version, which is called "pataphysics. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 29 Aug 1997 23:12:43 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Carl Lynden Peters Subject: Re: 'pataphysics & Opal Louis Nations In-Reply-To: from "George Bowering" at Aug 29, 97 10:24:09 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit The crucial essay is Nichol's "The "Pata of Letter Feet, or, The English Written Character as a Medium for Poetry." i think this also one of the few _critical_ pieces bp wrote on the topic, i mean he was a performer, and didn't always stop performing to rationalize over the performance. i cld be wrong. But this essay is such a _pause_. Of course there is also the collected symposium papers of the conf. held in Toronto (i forget the date). But again i think his essay there is more a performance of "pataphysics than critical account. Nichol's essay has fascinated since forever. It's such an important text. he wrote it coz Prof. Hugh LeRoy in the Fine Arts Dept. at York University asked him to, to come in and talk abt art & poetry to the graduate students there. That was in 1985 or 86. i've seen the manuscript version of this text and it's interesting how he ponders & revises certain words, certain phrases. The essay is so simple. But not too simple. As you can tell, i love that essay and cld talk abt it forever. But i'm saving my best stuff for my dissertation. We owe Prof. LeRoy much thanx. > bpNichol and Steve McCaffery over the years spent a lot of time on > 'pataphysics, or the Canadian version, which is called "pataphysics. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 30 Aug 1997 20:45:14 +0000 Reply-To: ARCHAMBEAU@LFC.EDU Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Robert Archambeau Organization: Lake Forest College Subject: Re: Jazz Poetry MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hank Lazer wrote: > The current issue of _River > City_ magazine has a couple of short essays on jazz & poetry: one by > me (on early Creeley, and current Mackey), and one by Aldon. Could someone backchannel me the (snail) address for _River City_? Thanks much, R.A. -- Robert Archambeau Department of English Lake Forest College Lake Forest, IL 60045 http://www.lfc.edu/~archamb/ Time ere poems Time ere plighted troth Nor forward glance nor backward gaze at signs none --Brian Coffey ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 30 Aug 1997 21:44:44 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Craig Douglas Dworkin Subject: 'Pataphysics In-Reply-To: <199708310402.VAA06093@uclink.berkeley.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Greetings all, Those interested in what might be called an "applied 'pataphysics" will want to take a look at the recent "Open Letter" (Ninth Series, Number 7, Winter 1997), edited by Christian Bok (whose dissertation is actually on 'Pataphysics) and Darren Wershler-Henry (whose dissertation is a long-overdue study of the typewriter and literature), two York students whose combination of brilliance and irreverence probably hasn't been seen in a university since the Moscow Linguistic Circle formed in the mid 'teens. Of special note in the issue: Steve McCaffery's "Zarathrustran 'Pataphysics," which takes Christopher Dewdney's "Fractal Diffusion" an order of magnitude further. Highest recommendation as well to their recent books of poetry, Bok's "Crystalography" (Coach House Press, 1994) and Wershler-Henry's "NICHOLODEON: a book of lowerglyphs" (Coach House Printing, 1997). happy reading, --Craig Dworkin ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 31 Aug 1997 01:23:30 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dan or Orion Dlugonski Subject: Princess Dead Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" A quick word on the accident: Princess Di cele(b)rity kills ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 31 Aug 1997 02:45:49 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mark weiss Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I just received a request for a review copy of Rochelle Owens' book from "S.V. Caldwell, Ph.D., Editor" of the Sandia Review of Books in Albuquerque. Regular letterhead, no phone number. The mag isn't listed in CLMP or Dustbooks, and I suspect that it's a phoney. This happened to me once before, with another outfit that turned out to be a scam to build a personal library for free. Has anybody out there heard of Sandia or its editor? ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 31 Aug 1997 07:12:34 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: black stone on a white stone MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Perhaps it's silly to be thinking of this now, and in such a context; if so, apologies. Hope the special characters come through PIEDRA NEGRA SOBRE UNA PIEDRA BLANCA Me moriré en París con aguacero, un día del cual tengo ya el recuerdo. Me moriré en París--y no me corro-- talvez un jueves, como es hoy de otoño. Jueves será, porque hoy, jueves, que proso estos versos, los húmeros me he puesto a la mala y, jamás como hoy, me he vuelto, con todo mi camino, a verme solo. César Vallejo ha muerto, le pegaban todos sin que él les haga nada; le daban duro con un palo y duro también con una soga; son testigos los días jueves y los huesos húmeros, la soledad, la lluvia, los caminos . . . --César Vallejo ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 31 Aug 1997 12:21:53 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: poet gets (at once) insta-fame & quick-anonymity MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Poetas, according to today's NY Times (see appended excerpt), the good (& needfully clandestine) writer Salman Rushdie has wed an American poet by name Elizabeth. Many happy returns. The article refers to a new prose-fiction anthology, published in the U.S. as *Mirrorwork: 50 Years of Indian Writing (1947-1997)*, edited by Salman Rushdie and Elizabeth West (Henry Holt & Co.) (seems, the implication is "West" would be a pseudonym) [ what follows is from: http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/news/national/ny-rushdie-wedding.html one mus register w/ the paper (via http://www.nytimes.com) to download ] August 31, 1997 Salman Rushdie, Still Hiding, Is Married in Secret By JANE H. LII Salman Rushdie, the author of "The Satanic Verses," who has lived in hiding for nearly a decade as the object of an open-ended Islamic death sentence, was married in secret on Thursday in the Hamptons on Long Island. The details of the wedding were not given, but Andrew Wylie, Rushdie's agent, said Saturday: "Elizabeth and Salman Rushdie are happy to confirm that they were married on Thursday, Aug. 28, in a small ceremony." Newspaper reporters in London, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the new Mrs. Rushdie, whose maiden name is being withheld to protect her safety, is a poet who had collaborated with Rushdie on an anthology of modern Indian writing. The Daily Mail, a newspaper published in London, reported that the couple had had a child last month. . . . / / / / btw, talkin' of celebrity & anonymity, here's my contribution anent the late Princess of Wales -- responsive to remarks from one writer (here rendered anon.) not from this list . . .; a "boomerang poem" (as I call 'em). > It saddens me deeply. It also causes me to reflect on how very > lucky we are that we live our lives in relative anonymity. That we > can get away for a week at the beach without worrying about > photographers behind every sand dune. We can smoke our cigarettes > in the early morning hours, blissfully alone, just us and the sand > and the waves. poise / pause / paz (for Diana) that the known might desire anonymity (the anonymous still coveting renown) that the famous should pine for obscurity? when celebs are the talk-of-the-town (ever bearing the weight of that crown) might one just assume fathom the surety of less-glamorous chances to frown? . . . how the known may renew anonymity d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@mail.wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 31 Aug 1997 09:24:20 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Red Slider Subject: Re: poet gets (at once) insta-fame & quick-anonymity ... > It saddens me deeply. It also causes me to reflect on how very > lucky we are that we live our lives in relative anonymity. That we > can get away for a week at the beach without worrying about > photographers behind every sand dune. We can smoke our cigarettes > in the early morning hours, blissfully alone, just us and the sand > and the waves. ... or that we can at least die without great deal of fuss or notice. red. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 31 Aug 1997 12:48:44 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 29 Aug 1997 to 30 Aug 1997 Is "The Pata of Letter..." on the net somewhere? Bob Holman ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 31 Aug 1997 10:25:53 +0000 Reply-To: chax@theriver.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: charles alexander In-Reply-To: <3.0.2.32.19970831024549.006a201c@earthlink.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT > I just received a request for a review copy of Rochelle Owens' book from > "S.V. Caldwell, Ph.D., Editor" of the Sandia Review of Books in > Albuquerque. Regular letterhead, no phone number. The mag isn't listed in Mark, Sandia Review of Books does sound familiar. It is more like a local book review newspaper, I believe, than any kind of "little magazine," so I'm not surprised if it doesn't show up in Dust Books or CLMP. Someone in Albuquerque on this list probably knows, if there is someone in Albuquerque on this list. If not, you might find your way, perhaps through the web, to an Albuquerque phone book or business directory -- or you might try to find and call a bookstore in Albuquerque. charles charles alexander poet and book artist chax@theriver.com ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 31 Aug 1997 11:43:14 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Carl Lynden Peters Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 29 Aug 1997 to 30 Aug 1997 In-Reply-To: <970831124625_-1737010927@emout14.mail.aol.com> from "Nuyopoman@AOL.COM" at Aug 31, 97 12:48:44 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit i know Karl Young only recently put a series of bp's _Translating Translating Apollinaire_ pomes on his Grist archive. i think poetics may even be linked to it. if not _wr-eye-tings_ is. i can't remember the address for the archive off hand. Grist may be the place to start, tho. > Is "The Pata of Letter..." on the net somewhere? > > Bob Holman ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 31 Aug 1997 19:04:14 +0000 Reply-To: chax@theriver.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: charles alexander Subject: Nichol on Light & Dust Site In-Reply-To: <199708300612.XAA15510@fraser> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Karl Young's Light & Dust web site was mentioned as having bp Nichol's work, relating to the pataphysics thread, but someone (was it you, Carl) didn't have the URL at hand. The URL of the Light & Dust's contents page is http://www.thing.net/~grist/l&d/lighthom.htm Works by Nichol there are Translating Translating Apollinaire, at http://www.thing.net/~grist/l&d/bpnichol/lnichol1.htm and works from Sharp Facts (variations on Translating Translating Apollinaire 26), at http://www.thing.net/~grist/l&d/bpnichol/bpsh.htm But also look around at other works there. To me, it's one of the very best poetry sites on the web. charles charles alexander poet and book artist chax@theriver.com