=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 00:44:05 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Eryque Gleason <eryque@ACMENET.NET>
Subject: Re: writing through
chax wrote:
>eryque, I think it would be an entrapment of the body to demand that it be
>"written through" from any particularl or limited point of view or
>perspective.
yes, i'm not intending to actively limit anything, just wishing to explore
what the limits have tended to be, if anything.
>responding to Michael Coffey:
>
>> clearly, some writing involves the body more than other writing; henry
>> miller vs henry james, for example.
>
>writing *about* the body is not what's meant, I think
yes, fred, i think that's exactly it. er, not it.
>mouth, and/or feeling language rhythms as body rhythms,
>is one way to write to my body; not the only one, I
see, here's where all this starts to get very, very tricky. is "writing
through the body" ala cixous the same as "to write my body"? seems to me
that there is a very subtle and very important difference that i can't
quite figure (hence my original question) between writing through the body
and writing the body.
emily:
> So, is
>there anyone out there willing & able to articulate the distinctions between
>these 2 or 3 phrases? And possibly give examples? My body would be
>grateful, or else I would.
i second the question.
eryque
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 00:44:14 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Eryque Gleason <eryque@ACMENET.NET>
Subject: music, man
(?) michael wrote, then fred wrote, and again from the top:
>> I suppose the musicalilty of certain prose and poetry
>> affects the body more than certain other examples do, but could that be
>> considered writing through he body, or simply very rhythmic or sensual
>> writing?
>
>what is "musicality" of writing?
i second the question.
>what conception of music
>underlies this comparison? which music, in whose experience of
>it?
i'm not sure that there is any particular music(/s) at stake here, but i
think we have to accept the fact that the music will be lost on some
people, which is why i think some folks like the music in creely (it had a
beat & i could dance to it) and some just don't see it.
the blues is a form(/s) that comes naturally to me, but try playing john
lee hooker at a bunch of kids from sri lanka that've never heard anything
close before. (they wrinkled their noses considerable, were much less
polite to a late howlin wolf recording). conversely, some of the
traditional music they played at me was a bunch of incoherent noise. to
me.
eryque
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Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 16:29:10 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark Roberts <M.Roberts@ISU.USYD.EDU.AU>
Subject: Re: XXXX.
>For a while they were selling those yellow cans of XXXX over here, but I
>havent seen it lately. I guess everyone here found out what everyone there
>knows.
>
>I prefer Cooper's Real Ale. And that beer from Tasmania with the weird
>animal on the label.
>
Cascade. Though Tasmania is not a happy place to be at the moment. In fact
the whole country seems to be in state of shock.
__________________________________
Mark Roberts
Student Systems Project Officer
Information Systems
University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia
M.Roberts@isu.usyd.edu.au
PH:(02)351 5066
FAX:(02)351 5081
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 02:24:34 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mary Rising Higgins <HigginsMR@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: Jouissance, schmouissance, Stein
Have you read Diana Souhami's, GERTRUDE & ALICE? (bio--Pandora, 91)
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 02:36:26 -0500
Reply-To: landers@vivanet.com
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: landers <landers@VIVANET.COM>
Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company
Subject: Re: writing through -Reply -Reply
I'd like to focus this a bit more. Almost all poetry is musical, so
that's not a good word, i think for the distinction that was wanted.
As far as the musical resemblences go, Taggart uses sound like Phillip
Glass while Creeley uses sound like Pierre Boulez. I'll keep all four of
them, thank you. :)
I have no idea what "writing through the body" means. I'm inclined to
the talking head approach myself, projecting ideas in one respect, and
sculpting sound and diction in another.
Peter Landers
landers@vivanet.com
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Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 02:42:56 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mary Rising Higgins <HigginsMR@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: creeley through th'
Creeley's rythmic reading & exquisite line endings w/ unstressed syllable are
music to this listener's ears!!!!
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 03:13:40 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joshua N Schuster <jnschust@SAS.UPENN.EDU>
Subject: Re: writing through -Reply -Reply
I haven't read Cixious but I'd like to take a brief gestural crack at the
notion of "writing the body" from the philosophical context, the
discipline which I have a hunch Cixious is most likely referring to.
So just a guess, but I think Cixious is trying to consummate the critique
set in motion by Nietzsche. Arguing against the will-less, body-less
tradtion of metaphysics, Nietzsche calls for an embodied, explicitly
will-full theory, one in which the seer is seen. While the "will"
rhetoric has been dropped historically (partly due to Heidegger's
assessment that will is too metaphysical), the "body" notion was picked
up next, most significantly, by Merleau-Ponty (in part to flesh out
Heidegger's rather disembodied notion of Being). So by mid-50's writing
the body would have meant something like Niet.'s "dwelling resolutely in the
fullness of being" which was in full existential crisis and committment
(so it's "writing the crisis"--strange revisionism on my part).
So since I haven't read any Cixious I have a glaring hole here, but, for
a contemporary take on bodily writing, I'd suggest Peter Sloterdijk's
example of the Greek anti-philosopher Diogenes. The crux of Sloterdijk's
argument is that one can write the body without remaining
subject-centered. That is, one can embody anti-subjectivity and take
physical pleasure in dissidence. Diogenes writes with his cheeks (i.e.
he's "cheeky"). So writing the body can or could be a way of writing
through or against the subject. (I remember last time the issue came up
Cixious was hinted at having the bias of feminist essentialism,perhaps true,
but perhaps she's calling for a tradition of embodied feminism, or as
French Fourierist Claire De Mar wrote in 1830's, a "rehabiliation of the
flesh".)
But that's just a blind shot since I haven't read Cixious nor am I a
philosopher.
bests,
Joshua
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 09:28:31 +0100
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: R I Caddel <R.I.Caddel@DURHAM.AC.UK>
Subject: Creeley/music etc
In-Reply-To: <199605010407.FAA22737@hermes.dur.ac.uk>
Must come in with those who rate the musicality of Creeley: the
compositional element, to me, is evident. Shaped sound. And yes, when he
reads it (or when it's read), it becomes a physical thing. "Reading in
silence is the source of half the misconceptions that have caused the
public to distrust poetry" - Bunting.
I first heard the name Martha Stewart on this list, and had no idea who
she was (tho I got the general idea) - now, I learn she's being hyped in
the UK, so pretty soon we'll all know the correct way to stuff an
aubergine, sorry, eggplant. In this context I've enjoyed parts of the
my-place-is-better-than-your-place thread: regional bickering certainly
beats cultural uniformity. But did you notice how all the UK voices went
quiet during the regional exchanges? I mean, we Northerners would never
say anything critical about life in the South, or vice versa...
Richard Caddel
email: R.I.Caddel@durham.ac.uk
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 08:27:14 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Kellogg <kellogg@ACPUB.DUKE.EDU>
Subject: writing through Creeley's body
Two points, first: Creeley's musicality is obvious but tempered both by
speech (hence not reaching its 'upper limit music'-- this is not a bad
thing) and by attention to visual design of words on the page (which may
have musical effects in reading but is not the same as music at least in
my head). The poetry-as-music metaphor has its limitations.
Second, on "writing through the body" -- are people here reading that as
always good? Its attractiveness makes me suspicious. Seems to me that
this idea (which I guess some here are reading as deriving from Cixous and
others) is complicated b/c of the confounding ideological status of the
body in American poetics at least since Olson and in some ways before.
Quote-mainstream-unquote poetics has sometimes found solace in a
somatically articulated poetics for its own relentless individualism.
Which leads me to ask what an embodied poetics might mean to do. For my
own part, I'd like the theoretical base to be broadened a bit, to include
not only Cixous but also Foucault and Elaine Scarry, for both of whom the
body is socially produced and in no way a ground or origin.
Cheers,
David
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
David Kellogg Duke University
kellogg@acpub.duke.edu University Writing Program
(919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708
FAX (919) 684-6277
There is some excitement in one corner,
but most of the ghosts are merely shaking their heads.
-- Thomas Kinsella
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 08:59:24 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark Wallace <mdw@GWIS2.CIRC.GWU.EDU>
Subject: all this OPEN LETTER BUSINESS
Thanks to Bob Holman, Al Nielsen and others for their responses to my
letter--your points are well taken. I just had several matters I wanted
to clarify:
To Al: the issue, I guess, when one is talking about "community" is
probably less what sort of poetry one writes as it is often LITERALLY a
matter of where one hangs out--there are variances of poetic practice
within every community, but people choose to be active in certain social
areas rather than others. In that sense, my division between a
"performance/slam" crowd and an "avant garde" group sometimes is less a
matter of actual poetic differences than it is of social grouping. So I
don't really see that there was some attempt in my letter to narrowly
label what any particular poetry was doing, other than to talk about the
environments where they tend to gather as poets.
Bob, on one other point you made, at least three of the poets I mentioned
in my open letter are either tangentially or not associated with the
"avant garde" reading series at Ruthless Grip--in that sense, I
definitely WAS mentioning poets who are not particularly a part of my own
scene. I think the point you made about mentioning people from various
groups was important--but I wanted you to understand that I had already
done so in my previous letter.
Thanks for your good work on the program, and for responding to my concerns.
Mark Wallace
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 09:06:43 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark Wallace <mdw@GWIS2.CIRC.GWU.EDU>
Subject: one last bit of OPEN LETTER
I just left this last point out: Bob, I do see the point of sending
letters to the Washington Post, and I have actually done so about six
months ago on a really annoying article by Jonathan Yardley. I then also
sent a letter to the Washington City Paper on an article they wrote about
some novelist (I forget his name) who was attacking all poetry as "easy",
except for the recent work of Frederick Turner.
This is less to toot my own horn (a preposterous idea anyway) than to ask
you this: do you think that a letter sent to the Post about a three
paragraph letter that's a response to an article would actually get
published in the Post? My own assumption in this case was that it
wouldn't--hence my choice of sending you a letter this way. But if you
think it would, I'll certainly adjust my choice of location next time. It
just seemed to me that my concerns were too tangential to the original
debate to find their way into the Post.
I'd be interested to know what anybody thinks.
Mark Wallace
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 09:16:12 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gwyn McVay <gmcvay1@OSF1.GMU.EDU>
Subject: Washington Post/open letter
In-Reply-To: <Pine.3.89.9605010936.A9338-0100000@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu>
Not to argue that poetry and its debates should be further marginalized
or shunted away from the mainstream, but it would be really cool if the
Washington CITY PAPER could tear itself away from following Marion Barry
long enough to provide a showcase for the perf-po crowd, or the language
crowd, or the inter-crowd debates...
Gwyn McVay
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 08:58:27 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: writing through Creeley's body
In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 1 May 1996 08:27:14 -0400 from
<kellogg@ACPUB.DUKE.EDU>
On Wed, 1 May 1996 08:27:14 -0400 David Kellogg said:
>this idea (which I guess some here are reading as deriving from Cixous and
>others) is complicated b/c of the confounding ideological status of the
>body in American poetics at least since Olson and in some ways before.
>Quote-mainstream-unquote poetics has sometimes found solace in a
>somatically articulated poetics for its own relentless individualism.
>Which leads me to ask what an embodied poetics might mean to do. For my
>own part, I'd like the theoretical base to be broadened a bit, to include
>not only Cixous but also Foucault and Elaine Scarry, for both of whom the
>body is socially produced and in no way a ground or origin.
An embodied poetics would start by acknowledging that both poets & readers
are responding to effects & powers originating in language & nowhere else;
that these effects can be symbolized by analogy to the body or the reactions
poetry creates, but that if we are talking poetics perhaps we should
focus on specifically poetic effects. It seems to me that evaluating
mainstream or other poetries in terms of what camp of critical sociology
they are perceived to fall into is putting the cart before the horse.
This may sound like blindered vision or neanderthal politics, but I for
one am sceptical of the critical presumption that always subsumes poetry
to some master discourse. This holds true even if your definition of
language includes silence, deed, nonverbal communication, gesture.
- Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 09:53:36 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gwyn McVay <gmcvay1@OSF1.GMU.EDU>
Subject: a sudden fit of stupidity
In-Reply-To: <POETICS%96050109172460@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Dumb question #517.
Being at George Mason, me, personally, I should know this. But I don't.
What is the name of the conference here next week at which Charles
Bernstein and a host of other cool people are speaking, and can admission
still be bought for any price, or do I have to listen thru the door with
a water glass?
McVay, abashed
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 10:03:33 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Bill Luoma <Maz881@AOL.COM>
Subject: rread
quickie notus:
scott bentley & bill luoma will read at ed/katie/adam\s house @ 503 page st
#2 8:00pm wed yes.
(sf,ca)
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 10:38:33 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Kellogg <kellogg@ACPUB.DUKE.EDU>
Subject: Re: writing through Creeley's body
In-Reply-To: <POETICS%96050109172460@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
On Wed, 1 May 1996, henry gould wrote:
> An embodied poetics would start by acknowledging that both poets & readers
> are responding to effects & powers originating in language & nowhere else;
> that these effects can be symbolized by analogy to the body or the reactions
> poetry creates, but that if we are talking poetics perhaps we should
> focus on specifically poetic effects. It seems to me that evaluating
> mainstream or other poetries in terms of what camp of critical sociology
> they are perceived to fall into is putting the cart before the horse.
> This may sound like blindered vision or neanderthal politics, but I for
> one am sceptical of the critical presumption that always subsumes poetry
> to some master discourse. This holds true even if your definition of
> language includes silence, deed, nonverbal communication, gesture.
Wow. As good a definition of writing-through-the-body as I've seen on
this list -- didn't somebody ask for one? Should we start here, or
somewhere else?
I didn't mean to open the poet-vs.-theorist debate again, being both
myself. Nor am I interested in subsuming poetry to anything (which to me
is as ridiculous as subsuming other things to poetry). Shouldn't have
used the term "base," I suppose. But I question whether anybody is
capable of fencing off "specifically poetic" from other effects. (Your
own rather territorial phrasing, Henry, makes me think otherwise). After
all, this discussion, if I remember, started off with somebody asking
whether writing-through-the-body required writing in the first or second
person.
Cheers,
David
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
David Kellogg Duke University
kellogg@acpub.duke.edu University Writing Program
(919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708
FAX (919) 684-6277
There is some excitement in one corner,
but most of the ghosts are merely shaking their heads.
-- Thomas Kinsella
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 07:47:43 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Herb Levy <herb@ESKIMO.COM>
Subject: Re: Creeley::Boulez??
Comments: cc: landers@vivanet.com
Peter Landers writes:
>I'd like to focus this a bit more. Almost all poetry is musical, so
>that's not a good word, i think for the distinction that was wanted.
>
>As far as the musical resemblences go, Taggart uses sound like Phillip
>Glass while Creeley uses sound like Pierre Boulez. I'll keep all four of
>them, thank you. :)
I think I understand the distinctions you're drawing here, but it's hard
for me to imagine hearing Creeley's rhythms in relation to Boulez. He
(Creeley) is just too American (in terms of rhythm & vocabulary) to seem as
European as Boulez. Perhaps Elliott Carter (though he seems a lot more
interested in John Ashbery's work) would be more appropriate, or Milton
Babbitt.
I'm not complaining about Boulez' work as such, though there are other
composers I'm far more interested in (more than Carter or Babbitt, too, for
that matter). If I were to make this kind of comparison, I'd probably
compare Creeley to one of the more idiosyncratic jazz players, say, Herbie
Nichols or Sonny Clark, in the fifties, or Steve Lacy today (if you want to
call that jazz).
But that's if I were to make this kind of comparison.
Bests
Herb
Herb Levy
herb@eskimo.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 08:01:34 +0100
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Kevin Killian <dbkk@SIRIUS.COM>
Subject: Re: rread
At 10:03 AM 5/1/96, Bill Luoma wrote:
>quickie notus:
>
>scott bentley & bill luoma will read at ed/katie/adam\s house @ 503 page st
>#2 8:00pm wed yes.
>
>(sf,ca)
CORRECTION: It's 530 Page Street (#2), at least that's what Eddie wrote in
my address book.
--Dodie
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 08:08:15 +0100
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Kevin Killian <dbkk@SIRIUS.COM>
Subject: Oppen: magazine appearances
This is Kevin Killian. I lost the original thread of this discussion . . .
but there's a contribution by George Oppen in "The Four Zoas" #3 (the "Too
Insane" issue) in 1976. This citation is probably far too late to assist
Burt Kimmelman or whoever it was who was asking. And besides he was asking
if I remember right about earlier magazine appearances? Ach! Forget I
ever spoke!
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 11:03:18 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Pierre Joris <joris@CSC.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: a sudden fit of stupidity
In-Reply-To: <Pine.OSF.3.91.960501095158.1030G-100000@osf1.gmu.edu>
On Wed, 1 May 1996, Gwyn McVay wrote:
> Dumb question #517.
>
> Being at George Mason, me, personally, I should know this. But I don't.
> What is the name of the conference here next week at which Charles
> Bernstein and a host of other cool people are speaking, and can admission
> still be bought for any price, or do I have to listen thru the door with
> a water glass?
>
> McVay, abashed
>
Gwyn -- it's The International Association for Philosophy an Literature
(IAPL)'s 20th anniversary conference called DRAMAS OF CULTURE, taking
place from May 7 to 11 right where you are. The program is too thick to
type up, feels like a mini-MLA, but you should be able to get one right
there & I doubt that it's booked up or out. (for more information you
could call Campus Information [703 993-2090] or the Conference
Coordinator, John Foster at 703 993-2774 or email him: jfoster@gmu.edu.
Note, however, one of the panels, meeting on Thursday 9-12 a.m. in the
Movie Theatre (inneresting place!) on the Ground Floor, & moderated by
yours truly: THE ECHO OF THE ORIGINAL: TRANSLATION AS ARENA FOR THE DRAMA
OF CULTURE with Charles Bernstein, Ann Leatherwood, Suzanne Jill Levine,
Howard Norman & Andrew Schelling.
Also, for those in DC area, the previous evening, Wednesday at 8 pm,
Bernstein & Joris will be reading at Rod Smith's bookshop.
Pierre
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 10:26:02 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: Creeley's Orpheus
If you are interested in defining writing through the body in the
manner that Charles Alexander suggests, one that is multi-valent, I
would suggest _Just Whistle_ by C.D. Wright. If you find language to
be an artifice, as Henry Gould suggests, or at least artificial enough
to deem an acknowledgement necessary then I'd start out with Toril
Moi, preferably Sexual Textual Politics as a primer for some of the
universal definitions inherent in the word body's semiotic screen.
Be Well.
David Baratier
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 10:12:47 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: Shindig
AWP benefit reading, with a suggested donation of any amount you feel
comfortable with. Readers will include:
Susan Stewart
Kabi Hartman
Valerie Hanson
David Baratier
Keith Gummery
Rachael Blau DuPlessis
Robert Watts
Jason Marks
William Van Wert
and at least 9 other readers to be scheduled. The reading is at 8 pm
on Thursday May 2nd in Philadelphia at Temple University, 1619 Walnut
Street, fifth floor. If any one needs directions or more information
mail me at dave.baratier@mosby.com
Thanks.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 11:17:53 EST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Burt Kimmelman -@NJIT" <kimmelman@ADMIN.NJIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: Oppen: magazine appearances
Kevin,
No, no. Love to hear about it all. Gimme more (if you got any)!!
Burt
kimmelman@admin.njit.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 12:14:29 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: all this OPEN LETTER BUSINESS
Mr. Wallace raises a good point about social scene vs. aesthetic "bent"--
I think the former causes a lot of walls that are often attributed to
the latter (more than the other way around, it seems).
For instance, Jeff McDaniel. When I became aware of Jeff, it was through
meeting him in a bookstore and a shared enthusiasm about people like BILL
KNOT (hardly a slam poet, though he has tangential social connections with
the NY SCHOOL--zavatsky, etc.) and even more MFA types like James Tate.
Such affinities are evident in his book. And since I've never seen him
perform, I can't say much about his SLAM side. But, I'm told he does that
way (Bob Holman---I still haven't got to a friend's to watch USOP on TV.
so I don't know if McDaniel is there "represented". It will be soon).
Anyway, so I consider him a crossover, or a straddler in that sense.
So, I don't know if people actually choose "scenes" or if scenes choose
people......more later, chris
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 09:22:24 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gary Hawkins <ghawkins@HALCYON.COM>
Subject: Tasmania
From Laura at GHawkins@halcyon.com.
Mark,
I can't believe what happened at Port Arthur, send deep condolensces-- I
had tea at that little cafe a couple of years ago (w/ TT.O, Lauren
Williams, Eric Beach as tour guides during the Salamanca fest.), walked
around the prison, was mortified by the kitschy little sailboat in the
museum-- "Port Arthur, place of misery." I remember Hobart and Tasmania on
the whole as a safe place to travel , the last place on earth where
hitchhiking is fun not terrible. So I'm sad about the shooting.
They're calling this the first massacre to happen there. But it isn't at
all, as any Koori or half-decent historian can tell us.
This stuff happens here more often than not (I walk into Mac Donalds
expecting to get shot, actually); I hope it doesn't become common to
Tassie.
Regards,
Laura
P.S. Got 24 Hours as well as Southerly. Both are great!
Chris Mann's coming to Seattle May 21, will perform "I don't hate America,
I regret it" at Speakeasy (I expect that's the
piece he'll do).
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 12:34:08 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Alan Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Re: Tasmania
In-Reply-To: <v01530501adad3b9ae9cd@[198.133.235.9]>
I'm not surprised at all about Tassie. I taught there, married a woman
from there, fled from there. I found more hatred there than just about
anywhere I've been - hatred even in the wake of the genocide of the
aboriginals - hated against gays that was close to unbelievable - hatred
against punks, against the new romantics, against anyone different -
hatred against Americans. They liked poofter-bashing as relaxation,
drinking themselves into oblivion, and the Queen. I have no fond memories
from the colonizing colony; I know too many people who were knived.
Alan
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 13:49:58 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Pierre Joris <joris@CSC.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Another Lit-web-page
In-Reply-To: <Pine.3.89.9604290947.A28465-0100000@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu>
this may interest some on this list -- came via the PEN-list -- haven't
checked it out myself -- Pierre
The Literary Menagerie
Links for various authors online
http://sunset.backbone.olemiss.edu/~egcash/
=======================================================================
Pierre Joris | "Form fascinates when one no longer has the force
Dept. of English | to understand force from within itself. That
SUNY Albany | is, to create." -- Jacques Derrida
Albany NY 12222 |
tel&fax:(518) 426 0433 | "Poetry is the promise of a language."
email: | -- Friedrich Holderlin
joris@cnsunix.albany.edu|
=======================================================================
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 13:22:40 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: writing through Creeley's body
In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 1 May 1996 10:38:33 -0400 from
<kellogg@ACPUB.DUKE.EDU>
On Wed, 1 May 1996 10:38:33 -0400 David Kellogg said:
>
>I didn't mean to open the poet-vs.-theorist debate again, being both
>myself. Nor am I interested in subsuming poetry to anything (which to me
>is as ridiculous as subsuming other things to poetry). Shouldn't have
>used the term "base," I suppose. But I question whether anybody is
>capable of fencing off "specifically poetic" from other effects. (Your
I opened the bait can, though. Effects are effects, but theory
is something else. Theory is reasoned discourse. Poetry reaches
for something further (not all poetry, but poetry in essence).
Silence measures human discourse, not the other way around.
Word is primordial, sometimes appears as poetry, sometimes as
"poetry". Truth-manifestation not subject to argument (though
the sceptic is allowed to scratch where it itches). This shows
the real value of reasoned discourse. When words reach the
inexpressible they are humbled into truth (i.e. our human
words are incapable of "arguing" with it). Mayday, Mayday...
the letter killeth. The revolutionary was a poet until
the explanations came easy. The machinery was all in
place. Body language - just can't say - HG
people talkin but they just don't know
.... and why I love you so <prattle>
...let the good times roll <gossip>
mayday, mayday...
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 14:11:36 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Michael Friedman in the lab
but poetry in essence).
That reminds me of Michael Friedman's poem about creating.. what? a new
fragrance?
Tomorrow at Poetry City (35 blocks or so from Radio City)
Juliana Spahr & Cathy Bowman
Juliana's great. She shows up on this list from time to time. A book of
hers will be published by S&M soon as part of the National Poetry Series.
Cathy's great. She has two books from Gibbs-Smith. From time to time she
hosts the poetry spots on NPR's "The All Things Considered Show." She's the
auteur-teacher behind what may be the best poetry video ever, "The Great
American Roller Coaster Poem."
It's at Teachers & Writers, 5 Union Sq W, NYC, at 6:30 on Thursday. It's
free, and we'll have food and drink.
--Jd
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 14:17:16 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Michael Coffey <MCOFFEY@PW.CAHNERS.COM>
Subject: sestina here goes -Reply
thanks, henry, for you kind comment about the sestina; and you're right,
that penultimate line is weak. i shld change it, and will.
and yours i liked ("raise a glass to the dizzzy city"!), but like my first
transmission, it was received in paragraphs, with no evident line
endings. did yours come back to you in proper six line stanzas?
perhaps it's just something my system does to text. to fix it, I made
double returns after every line, and sent again, and it came through, to
me, properly line-broken.
this is just to you, i think, not system wide, though god knows i dont'
know my way around this universe, but He ain't helpin'.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 16:01:08 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "k.a. hehir" <angelo@MUSTANG.UWO.CA>
Subject: blocking poems
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SOL.3.91.960501081110.13060A-100000@godzilla1.acpub.duke.edu>
hello,
in response to another thread David Kellogg made passing mention of the
"visual
design of words on a page". i would appreciate any directions to work
done on this. i have a vague memory of a movie i saw in high school
about WCW and his idea of page as canvas.
thanks,
kevin
ps. the visual design of this page was not to illustrate a point but rather
the result of a callow typist
"for such a smooth dreaming boy,
eighteen and buttocks like sleeping kittens" Dawn MacDonald
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 10:05:26 +1200
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Daniel Salmon <dpsalmon@IHUG.CO.NZ>
Subject: should be on back of xxxx can
Did anybody see this. A reuter piece from london in the NZ Herald or local raag.
Abridged by me.
Title "POETS TOO CRAZY TO GET SO BLUE'
POets are crazier than authors or playwrights, but less likely to becamo
depressed or alcoholics, a British psychiatrist reported yesterday.
It could be because of the way their imaginations work, Dr Felix Post...said.
Dr POst examined 100 famous MALE brit & US writers and poets by looking at
their biographies. Many good bio's provide enough detail to do an accurate
psych. analysis - "They've got to be really good biographies" Post sd.
His previous study found writers more likely to have mental or emotional
probs. than other people like scientists or POLITICIANS.
BUT POETS did not follow the trend "the poets were less unstable and had
fewer depressions than others"
He said poets had more mood swings and manic depressions requiring
hospitalisation.
But they were less likely than writers... to die young or become promiscuous.
Only 31% of the poets were alcoholics compared to 54% of playwrights.
...writing of any sort is linked to poor mental health... psychosis or
depression evident in 80% of poets 80.5% novelists & 87.5% playwrights.
HALF THE POETS FAILED TO EVER ACHEIVE "COMPLETE SEXUAL UNION", while 42% of
playwrights known for promiscuity...
Dr Post sd it could be down to personality differences or the way writers or
poets work.
"I speculate that it is the imagination of novelists and playwrights, who
are far more concerned with intimate human fate - they've got to identify
and empathise with they're characters", DR POSt said "They have greater
stress in their writing."
AS FOR THE POETS "they don't deal with human fate. They JUST DESCRIBE THEIR
REligious feelings or their love."
DR POst said his study did not include women writers as women tend to have
different patterns of mental illness from men and his study period STARTING
IN 1840, HAD TOO FEW WOMEN WRITERS. (would there have been more had it
started earlier)
END.
i wonder there will soon be a POet box to tick on medical insurance forms.
Just though you might be amused / or something.
Dan. NZ.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 15:26:49 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steve Carll <sjcarll@SLIP.NET>
Subject: Re: blocking poems
At 04:01 PM 5/1/96 -0400, Kevin Hehir wrote:
>hello,
>in response to another thread David Kellogg made passing mention of the
>"visual
>design of words on a page". i would appreciate any directions to work
>done on this. i have a vague memory of a movie i saw in high school
>about WCW and his idea of page as canvas.
Milton A.Cohen has a book out called _Poet and Painter: The Aesthetics of
E.E. Cummings' Early Work_, that explores Cummings' lifelong fascination
with intertwining the two (he did both quite well).
*************
Steve Carll
sjcarll@slip.net
"--A sound of waters bending astride the sky
Unceasing with some Word that will not die...!"
--Hart Crane
**************************************
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 15:26:57 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steve Carll <sjcarll@SLIP.NET>
Subject: Re: Poets and Writers: A Definitive Scientific Study (fwd)
Hmmm is right, Gab. If they only studied "famous" poets, how do they know
it's not fame itself, or something associated psychologically with fame,
that causes these problems? And what's that about poets not dealing with
human fate?
Steve
At 04:44 PM 4/30/96 -1000, Gab wrote:
>Hmmm. Chuckle? Poets not writers as well? Gab.
>
>>
>> ^Poets less depressed than writers, study finds@
>> LONDON, April 30 (Reuter) - Poets are crazier than authors
>> or playwrights, but less likely to become depressed or
>> alcoholics, a British psychiatrist reported on Tuesday.
>> It could be because of the way their imaginations work, Dr
>> Felix Post, who wrote the study in the British Journal of
>> Psychiatry, said.
>> Post examined the cases of 100 famous British and American
>> writers and poets by looking at their biographies. Many good
>> biographies, he said, provided enough detail to do an accurate
>> psychiatric analysis.
>> ``They've got to be really good biographies,'' Post, a
>> retired psychiatric consultant, said in an interview.
>> He found in a previous study that writers, as a group,
>> tended to have more mental and emotional problems than other
>> people -- politicians or scientists, for example.
>> But poets did not seem to follow the trend. ``The poets were
>> less unstable and had fewer depressions than the others.''
>> Careful analysis confirmed this. The poets, including Edgar
>> Allan Poe and Robert Graves, had more mood swings and manic
>> depressions requiring hospitalisation.
>> But they were less likely than the writers, who included
>> Ernest Hemingway and Jack London, to die young or be
>> promiscuous. Only 31 percent of the poets were alcoholics,
>> compared to 54 percent of playwrights.
>> It seems writing of any sort is linked to poor mental
>> health. Psychosis or depression was evident in 80 percent of
>> poets, 80.5 percent of novelists and 87.5 percent of
>> playwrights.
>> Half the poets failed to ever achieve ``complete sexual
>> union,'' while 42 percent of playwrights were known for their
>> sexual promiscuity.
>> Post said it could be down to personality differences, or
>> the way writers and poets work.
>> ``I speculate that it is the imagination of novelists and
>> playwrights, who are far more concerned with intimate human fate
>> -- they've got to identify and empathise with their
>> characters,'' Post said. ``They have greater stress in their
>> writing.''
>> As for the poets: ``They don't deal with human fate. They
>> just describe their religious feelings or their love.''
>> Post said his study did not include women writers as women
>> tend to have different patterns of mental illness from men and
>> his study period, starting in 1840, had too few women writers.
>> ^REUTER@
>> Reut10:30 04-30-96
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
*************
Steve Carll
sjcarll@slip.net
"--A sound of waters bending astride the sky
Unceasing with some Word that will not die...!"
--Hart Crane
**************************************
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 10:12:18 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark Roberts <M.Roberts@ISU.USYD.EDU.AU>
Subject: Re: Tasmania
>I'm not surprised at all about Tassie. I taught there, married a woman
>from there, fled from there. I found more hatred there than just about
>anywhere I've been - hatred even in the wake of the genocide of the
>aboriginals - hated against gays that was close to unbelievable - hatred
>against punks, against the new romantics, against anyone different -
>hatred against Americans. They liked poofter-bashing as relaxation,
>drinking themselves into oblivion, and the Queen. I have no fond memories
>from the colonizing colony; I know too many people who were knived.
>
>Alan
Alan & others
Of course Tasmania is a conservative state with a background similiar to
many other colonised areas (I mean the rest of Australia has a similiar
(hidden) history of open warfare against Aborignal people. But then I
recall a long running debate on this list about the certain mid western US
states which sound like they contain many of the same contradictions which
abound in Tasmania. Tasmania does have the most repressive anti gay laws in
Australia but they also have a strong and growing gay lobby group which
have openning challenged the laws. They have perhaps the strongest
conservation movement in the country and the Greens currently hold the
balance of power in State Parliment. There is also a thriving arts
community centred around Hobart which puts many larger Australian centres
to shame.
I wonder if the hatred you speak about is really more real than the hatred
that exists just below the surface in major centres (such as Sydney and New
York??).......Its a difficult question trying to come to terms with a
culture which results in such a tradegy as the Port Arthur shooting - at
the same time we have to question a media which allows such an event to
overshadow all the other ongoing tradegies around the world which result in
many more deaths than an isolated shooting...........
Anyway as you can tell I am still feeling numb.. the local media has been
full of the shooting for days. The gun control debate has resurfaced and
the gun lobby is running scared (at the same time there has been a rush to
buy semi automatic rifles in case there is a ban)................
__________________________________
Mark Roberts
Student Systems Project Officer
Information Systems
University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia
M.Roberts@isu.usyd.edu.au
PH:(02)351 5066
FAX:(02)351 5081
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 13:16:50 GMT+1200
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Wystan Curnow <w.curnow@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: English Dept. - Univ. of Auckland
Subject: Re: writing through Creeley's body
Comments: To: kellogg@ACPUB.DUKE.EDU
David,
yes. Speech is a mouth/ I hate speech. mmmmmmm.....
Projective Verse, as with projective painting, as with projective
jazz, bebop, was/is to be produced/received 'through the body.' And is
by those means and to that extent writing intent on refusing the
individualism you refer to, and Joshua Schuster's subject center. At
least that's what I've always thought, but I do constantly encounter
'misreadings' which state the opposite. Henry's 'clarification' makes
for a difference; for argument's sake there would be WRITING through the
body, or READING through the body. (I have to say,though, the whole
expression has worn out its welcome with me,'writing through the body'
sounds like some awful morphing activity, like what happened to smurfs
what got left on the electric fire.)
As to Creeley 'n jazz; he has himself over the years spoken, in
letters to Olson, in several interviews, at length and more to the point
with characteristic particularity about the relation of behop esp. to
his own writing. I recall discussions of the' body language' of the
musicians, close readings of Parker, of Monk and 4 beats, of the records
to which specific chapters of The Island were written to, and a long
section of the recent Sagetreib interview....
Wystan
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 23:01:11 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: JOEL LEWIS <104047.2175@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: Re: Creeley::Boulez??
An interesting place to go w/ the Creeley & music discussion is the album HOME
an ECM album recorded in the early 80's. Steve Swallow (an electric bassist then
associated w/ gary Burton & now w/ Carla Bley) took a series of poems and set
them to music. At at St. Amark's talk at that period, Creeley praised the
collaboration & noted that Swallow respected his line breaks and stanzas -- rare
when compsoers tackle poetry. There is also a long piece where Lacy set A
Creeley text to music(on hat Hut).Creeley's early poems provide a fascinating
take on a poet's responce to the burgeoning bop scene going round him (see his
letters to Olson at the time), this was a period of intense listening for
Creeley... as far as classical music connection, I often think of a link between
Cage's pre-aleatoric piano pieces (late 30's -early '40's) and Creeley's poetry.
Where they at Black Mountain at the same time???
Joel Lewis
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 21:30:32 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gary Hawkins <ghawkins@HALCYON.COM>
Subject: Re: Tasmania
>>I'm not surprised at all about Tassie. I taught there, married a woman
>>from there, fled from there. I found more hatred there than just about
>>anywhere I've been - hatred even in the wake of the genocide of the
>>aboriginals - hated against gays that was close to unbelievable - hatred
>>against punks, against the new romantics, against anyone different -
>>hatred against Americans. They liked poofter-bashing as relaxation,
>>drinking themselves into oblivion, and the Queen. I have no fond memories
>>from the colonizing colony; I know too many people who were knived.
>>
>>Alan
>
>
>Alan & others
>
>Of course Tasmania is a conservative state with a background similiar to
>many other colonised areas (I mean the rest of Australia has a similiar
>(hidden) history of open warfare against Aborignal people. But then I
>recall a long running debate on this list about the certain mid western US
>states which sound like they contain many of the same contradictions which
>abound in Tasmania. Tasmania does have the most repressive anti gay laws in
>Australia but they also have a strong and growing gay lobby group which
>have openning challenged the laws. They have perhaps the strongest
>conservation movement in the country and the Greens currently hold the
>balance of power in State Parliment. There is also a thriving arts
>community centred around Hobart which puts many larger Australian centres
>to shame.
>
>I wonder if the hatred you speak about is really more real than the hatred
>that exists just below the surface in major centres (such as Sydney and New
>York??).......Its a difficult question trying to come to terms with a
>culture which results in such a tradegy as the Port Arthur shooting - at
>the same time we have to question a media which allows such an event to
>overshadow all the other ongoing tradegies around the world which result in
>many more deaths than an isolated shooting...........
>
>Anyway as you can tell I am still feeling numb.. the local media has been
>full of the shooting for days. The gun control debate has resurfaced and
>the gun lobby is running scared (at the same time there has been a rush to
>buy semi automatic rifles in case there is a ban)................
>
>
>__________________________________
>Mark Roberts
>Student Systems Project Officer
>Information Systems
>University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia
>M.Roberts@isu.usyd.edu.au
>PH:(02)351 5066
>FAX:(02)351 5081
Alan,
Any American going abroad who does not have a knife held to the throat at
some point simply because they are American misses out on one of most
eye-opening experiences travel offers-- in Tasmania one bloke shouted he
was going to "kill an American (me) for Peace." I talked him out of it,
bought him a beer-- he'd been sent to Vietnam, I found out in our
conversation. An Australian in Vietnam. Of course they hate Americans.
An "ocker" can hold a candle to our own brand of bigot, yes, however the
American left and artists have a long way to go to even touch the coattails
of their Australian counterparts-- TT.O., thalia, Chris Mann, ACR, Jas
Duke, Lauren Williams, Eric Beach, Carmel Bird (to name a very very small
few!) and, in the music scene Penelope Swales (Alanis Morissette, eat yr
heart out). On Tasmania alone, that little heart-shaped detail at the
bottom of our maps, the number of active youth per capita far supercedes
that of the same in the USA. Living directly under the hole in the ozone
has its pressures.
So, Alan, maybe the wallaby rissoles didn't appeal, but I think America can
learn a lot from the Tasmanian, and the Australian, greens, feminists,
writers, artists, poets, and, in simple terms "LEFT."
I shouldn't be surprised that weird people with guns open fire anyplace
these days, yes, but the shock's always there.
Regards,
Laura
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 19:03:40 -1000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Susan Schultz <sschultz@HAWAII.EDU>
Subject: Re: Tasmania
In-Reply-To: <v01530504adade1d1f656@[198.133.235.9]>
I was in Tasmania last month and visited Port Arthur, a
stunningly beautiful place with an awful history. I met many kind,
generous, and rigorous folks, along with one rather nasty cab driver
(though not as nasty as the NYC scam artists I once fell for).
On a literary note, I highly recommend contemporary Australian
poetry. I was on a panel at the Salamanca Writers Festival with John
Kinsella, Philip Mead, Hazel Smith, and Joanne Burns, all of whom are
excellent writers (and performers). In Sydney: Pam Brown, Denis
Gallagher, John Tranter, Kate Lilley. There are lots and lots of
others. The main problem is that hardly any Australian poetry is
published in the USA. This is a real shame, especially since the people I
met
were all very knowledgeable about American poetry, and Frank O'Hara is
something of a cult figure there.
Susan Schultz
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 01:34:57 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joshua N Schuster <jnschust@SAS.UPENN.EDU>
Subject: Re: writing through Creeley's body
In-Reply-To: <75099FE292B@engnov1.auckland.ac.nz> from "Wystan Curnow" at May
2, 96 01:16:50 pm
Wystan Curnow wrote:
>
> David,
> yes. Speech is a mouth/ I hate speech. mmmmmmm.....
> Projective Verse, as with projective painting, as with projective
> jazz, bebop, was/is to be produced/received 'through the body.' And is
> by those means and to that extent writing intent on refusing the
> individualism you refer to, and Joshua Schuster's subject center. At
> least that's what I've always thought, but I do constantly encounter
> 'misreadings' which state the opposite. Henry's 'clarification' makes
> for a difference; for argument's sake there would be WRITING through the
> body, or READING through the body. (I have to say,though, the whole
> expression has worn out its welcome with me,'writing through the body'
> sounds like some awful morphing activity, like what happened to smurfs
> what got left on the electric fire.)
No wonder people hate speech, since speech has no taste, no sense, just
lingers dusty and dead in the casualty of vocality. But is speech
impossible to swallow?
I've been chewing on this idea of writing the body (which now, as Wynstan
notes, is sounding rather hollow) so I'll just throw up and out some
additional comments. But first, to save my theoretical butt I'll conjure
up some poetheory w/ Barthes: "One might call "poetic" (without value
judgment) any discourse in which the word leads the idea."
First it seems the body can be taken (abducted) as both singular and
plural. And if plural, there is a whole panoply of bodies, social,
political, perversive. Writing the body does quiver between the personal
and impersonal.
Again, I see writing the body as a possible way of embodying
anti-subjectivity, an assertion of one's congealing physical presence
without necessarily collaborating in self-service. So I find writing the
body a way to undermine writing the biography (writing the morgue).
Also re: projective verse and Olson, I just wanted to toss out a mere
idea without any extended evidence: I think there are striking
similarities between Olson's notion of proprioception and Heidegger's
disclosing and dwelling Being. But I have no warrant for that arrest.
(Also unrelated, I just remembered
McCaffery has a great extended passage in _Panopticon_ on the ecstatic
polysemic possibilities of writing the body/text, but haven't my copy w/ me.)
bests,
Joshua
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 23:31:45 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gary Hawkins <ghawkins@HALCYON.COM>
Subject: Re: Tasmania
> I was in Tasmania last month and visited Port Arthur, a
>stunningly beautiful place with an awful history. I met many kind,
>generous, and rigorous folks, along with one rather nasty cab driver
>(though not as nasty as the NYC scam artists I once fell for).
>
> On a literary note, I highly recommend contemporary Australian
>poetry. I was on a panel at the Salamanca Writers Festival with John
>Kinsella, Philip Mead, Hazel Smith, and Joanne Burns, all of whom are
>excellent writers (and performers). In Sydney: Pam Brown, Denis
>Gallagher, John Tranter, Kate Lilley. There are lots and lots of
>others. The main problem is that hardly any Australian poetry is
>published in the USA. This is a real shame, especially since the people I
>met
>were all very knowledgeable about American poetry, and Frank O'Hara is
>something of a cult figure there.
>
>Susan Schultz
Susan, did you stay at the writer's cottage up above the wharfs?
I read at the Salamanca Festival (fringe) in 91 so it's great to hear it
mentioned. I agree that the whole of Australian writing is ignored by the
States' distributors; Carmel Bird's name appeared on the back pages of Best
Short Stories of 91 but it's impossible to find her work in print over here
(few years back I did find "Woodpecker Point" but nothing since). Check
out Mark Robert's work on the Aus. Writers on Line (AWOL) webpage and
electronic bookshop. http://www.ozemail.com.au/~awol/bookshop1.html .
You'll find your mates there.
This may be the only way.
Best Regards,
Laura Hope-Gill @Halcyon.com
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 16:55:40 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark Roberts <M.Roberts@ISU.USYD.EDU.AU>
Subject: Re: Tasmania
>> I was in Tasmania last month and visited Port Arthur, a
>>stunningly beautiful place with an awful history. I met many kind,
>>generous, and rigorous folks, along with one rather nasty cab driver
>>(though not as nasty as the NYC scam artists I once fell for).
>>
>> On a literary note, I highly recommend contemporary Australian
>>poetry. I was on a panel at the Salamanca Writers Festival with John
>>Kinsella, Philip Mead, Hazel Smith, and Joanne Burns, all of whom are
>>excellent writers (and performers). In Sydney: Pam Brown, Denis
>>Gallagher, John Tranter, Kate Lilley. There are lots and lots of
>>others. The main problem is that hardly any Australian poetry is
>>published in the USA. This is a real shame, especially since the people I
>>met
>>were all very knowledgeable about American poetry, and Frank O'Hara is
>>something of a cult figure there.
>>
>>Susan Schultz
>
>
>Susan, did you stay at the writer's cottage up above the wharfs?
>
>I read at the Salamanca Festival (fringe) in 91 so it's great to hear it
>mentioned. I agree that the whole of Australian writing is ignored by the
>States' distributors; Carmel Bird's name appeared on the back pages of Best
>Short Stories of 91 but it's impossible to find her work in print over here
>(few years back I did find "Woodpecker Point" but nothing since). Check
>out Mark Robert's work on the Aus. Writers on Line (AWOL) webpage and
>electronic bookshop. http://www.ozemail.com.au/~awol/bookshop1.html .
>You'll find your mates there.
>
>This may be the only way.
>
>Best Regards,
>Laura Hope-Gill @Halcyon.com
Laura
Thanks for the plug (AWOL). In fact if anyone is hunting down an Australian
poet let AWOL know (awol@ozemail.com.au) even if they don't appear on the
bookshop page we might be able to track them down.
regards
Mark (posting from work - but going home soon)
AWOL awol@ozemal.com.au
http://www.ozemail.com.au/~awol
__________________________________
Mark Roberts
Student Systems Project Officer
Information Systems
University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia
M.Roberts@isu.usyd.edu.au
PH:(02)351 5066
FAX:(02)351 5081
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 00:23:16 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gary Hawkins <ghawkins@HALCYON.COM>
Subject: Re: blocking poems
>At 04:01 PM 5/1/96 -0400, Kevin Hehir wrote:
>>hello,
>>in response to another thread David Kellogg made passing mention of the
>>"visual
>>design of words on a page". i would appreciate any directions to work
>>done on this. i have a vague memory of a movie i saw in high school
>>about WCW and his idea of page as canvas.
>
>Milton A.Cohen has a book out called _Poet and Painter: The Aesthetics of
>E.E. Cummings' Early Work_, that explores Cummings' lifelong fascination
>with intertwining the two (he did both quite well).
>
>
>*************
>Steve Carll
>sjcarll@slip.net
>
>"--A sound of waters bending astride the sky
>Unceasing with some Word that will not die...!"
> --Hart Crane
>**************************************
Steve.
Sounds to me like you're talking about visual poetry but I may be mistaken.
If so, disregard this.
Few weeks back we had a chat about concrete poetry which spanned the last
week of March-- here's a lead from Bob Harrison which seems to suit yr
request.
>Hi Charles, yeah I'm still here.
>
>The poetry catalog for the Hermetic Gallery VP show is still available. Costs
>8 dollars. Anybody wants one send me an email with your street address. Has
>work by:
>
>Dick Higgins
>Irving Weiss
>Daniel Davidson
>Peter Balestrieri
>Steve McCaffery
>Spencer Selby
>Pete Spence
>Crag Hill
>Nico Vassilakis
>John Cayley
>Fernando Aguiar
>Karl Young
>Johanna Drucker
>Leroy Gorman
>John Byrum
>John M. Bennett
> & Susan Smith Nash
>Clemente Padin
>Steve Nelson - Raney
>Bob Grumman
>Hachivi Edgar Heap of Birds
>Karl Kempton
>Thomas Taylor
>Avelino de Araujo
>
>Thanks.
>
>Bob Harrison
>Robert.A.Harrison@JCI.com
Here's one from Ward Tietz.
>
>USA
>
>Generator
>John Byrum
>3203 W. 14th St., Apt. 13
>Cleveland, OH 44109
>
>Score
>Crag Hill
>1015 NW Clifford St.
>Pullman, WA 99163
>
>O.ars
>Don Wellman
>21 Rockland Rd
>Weare, NH 03281
>
>Lightworks
>Charlton Burch
>P.O. Box 1202
>Birmingham, MI 48012
>
>
>Canada
>
>Rampike
>Karl Jirgens
>95 Rivercrest Rd.
>Toronto, Ontario
>M6S 4H7
>
>CURVD H&Z
>jw curry
>1357 Lansdowne Ave
>Toronto, Ontario.
>M6H 3Z9
>
>
>Austria
>
>Edition Neue Texte
>Heimrad Baecker
>In der Stockwiesen 13
>A-4040 Linz
>
>Press, publishes mostly concrete poetry (anthologies and some books).
>
>
>Germany
>
>Christian Scholz
>Gertraud Scholz Verlag
>Rothenberg, Weinbergstr. 11
>D-8501 Obermichelbach
>
>Press, publishes books and CDs of sound poetry.
>
>
>Australia
>
>Pete Spence
>4/27 Alma Grove
>St. Kilda 3182
>Victoria, Australia
>
>Curates visual poetry mail art show. Last year's show was in various public
>libraries.
>
>
>Hungary
>
>Laszlo L. Simon
>Mezo u. 12
>H-2484 Agard
>
>e-mail: sxs@ludens.elte.hu
>
>Curated an international visual poetry exhibition in '95, is about to start an
>electronic magazine. Their URL is http://ludens.elte.hu/~LIFT/
>
>
>France
>
>Doc(k)s
>Philippe Castellin
>20 rue Bonaparte
>F-20 000 Ajaccio
>
>
>
>Ward Tietz
If this is what you're looking for, these chaps put you in good stead.
Bests,
Laura
laurahopegill@halcyon.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 1 May 1996 21:23:26 -1000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Susan Schultz <sschultz@HAWAII.EDU>
Subject: Re: Tasmania
In-Reply-To: <v01510107adaed12474d6@[129.78.181.65]>
On Thu, 2 May 1996, Mark Roberts wrote:
> >> I was in Tasmania last month and visited Port Arthur, a
> >>stunningly beautiful place with an awful history. I met many kind,
> >>generous, and rigorous folks, along with one rather nasty cab driver
> >>(though not as nasty as the NYC scam artists I once fell for).
> >>
> >> On a literary note, I highly recommend contemporary Australian
> >>poetry. I was on a panel at the Salamanca Writers Festival with John
> >>Kinsella, Philip Mead, Hazel Smith, and Joanne Burns, all of whom are
> >>excellent writers (and performers). In Sydney: Pam Brown, Denis
> >>Gallagher, John Tranter, Kate Lilley. There are lots and lots of
> >>others. The main problem is that hardly any Australian poetry is
> >>published in the USA. This is a real shame, especially since the people I
> >>met
> >>were all very knowledgeable about American poetry, and Frank O'Hara is
> >>something of a cult figure there.
> >>
> >>Susan Schultz
> >
> >
> >Susan, did you stay at the writer's cottage up above the wharfs?
> >
> >I read at the Salamanca Festival (fringe) in 91 so it's great to hear it
> >mentioned. I agree that the whole of Australian writing is ignored by the
> >States' distributors; Carmel Bird's name appeared on the back pages of Best
> >Short Stories of 91 but it's impossible to find her work in print over here
> >(few years back I did find "Woodpecker Point" but nothing since). Check
> >out Mark Robert's work on the Aus. Writers on Line (AWOL) webpage and
> >electronic bookshop. http://www.ozemail.com.au/~awol/bookshop1.html .
> >You'll find your mates there.
> >
> >This may be the only way.
> >
> >Best Regards,
> >Laura Hope-Gill @Halcyon.com
>
> Laura
>
> Thanks for the plug (AWOL). In fact if anyone is hunting down an Australian
> poet let AWOL know (awol@ozemail.com.au) even if they don't appear on the
> bookshop page we might be able to track them down.
>
> regards
>
>
> Mark (posting from work - but going home soon)
> AWOL awol@ozemal.com.au
> http://www.ozemail.com.au/~awol
>
>
>
>
> __________________________________
> Mark Roberts
> Student Systems Project Officer
> Information Systems
> University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia
> M.Roberts@isu.usyd.edu.au
> PH:(02)351 5066
> FAX:(02)351 5081
>
And when you DO contact Mark, ask for the John Tranter and Philip Mead
anthology of modern Australian poetry (including the entire oeuvre of Ern
Malley), published by Penguin. It's a great introduction.
Susan
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 08:26:01 -0500
Reply-To: landers@vivanet.com
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: landers <landers@VIVANET.COM>
Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 30 Apr 1996 to 1 May 1996
> From: Herb Levy <herb@ESKIMO.COM>
> Subject: Re: Creeley::Boulez??
>
> Peter Landers writes:
>
> >
> >As far as the musical resemblences go, Taggart uses sound like Phillip
> >Glass while Creeley uses sound like Pierre Boulez. I'll keep all four of
> >them, thank you. :)
>
> I think I understand the distinctions you're drawing here, but it's hard
> for me to imagine hearing Creeley's rhythms in relation to Boulez. He
> (Creeley) is just too American (in terms of rhythm & vocabulary) to seem as
> European as Boulez. Perhaps Elliott Carter (though he seems a lot more
> interested in John Ashbery's work) would be more appropriate, or Milton
> Babbitt.
>
> I'm not complaining about Boulez' work as such, though there are other
> composers I'm far more interested in (more than Carter or Babbitt, too, for
> that matter). If I were to make this kind of comparison, I'd probably
> compare Creeley to one of the more idiosyncratic jazz players, say, Herbie
> Nichols or Sonny Clark, in the fifties, or Steve Lacy today (if you want to
> call that jazz).
>
ok. so long as you see the point i was making, which is that creeley's music is of a
different esthetic from taggart's, as boulez or carter is from glass. Both are very
musical to my ear. i don't see the need to restrict parallel's by nationality. and
also, to my ear, the long melodic lines of jazz are a lot different from what i hear
coming off creeley's page, but i don't know the specific people you mentioned. carter's
lines are longer than creeley's, too. olson's more like carter ... this is going
nowhere ... ack!
this is an artificial distinction anyway. each is deliciously unique.
enjoy,
Peter Landers
landers@vivanet
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 10:15:08 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: I Think of Can; US reception of Aus/NZ writing
Yogi,
What little Australian-New Zealand writing that has gotten through to my
benighted suburb of poetry got through in the pages of the magazine
Scripsi. John Tranter crossed over briefly in the late 80s early 90s, some
sad amazing poems in the Paris Review I think. Michael Heyward, too. These
two though it seems to me are the closest to the New York School of the
Australian-NZ scene, n'escafe? A. Curnow's selected pops up from time to
time.
DISTRIBUTION! DISTRIBUTION!
and its rhythmic mistress
I THINK I CAN I THINK I CAN,
Droopy
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 12:18:42 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: SHMOUISSANCING STEIN
emily:
karin cope has a book forthcoming from minnesota (i believe) on stein and
difference/queerness. it is so anti-identitarian that it doesn't address
stein as a lesbian or a "husband," but simply as someone transgressive in
every way, "queering" every angle. she's at ===is it u. of montreal? mcgill?
not sure. somewhere around there. call u of mn press and find out when the
book is due out?--md
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 09:43:08 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steve Carll <sjcarll@SLIP.NET>
Subject: Re: Creeley::psych guitar madman??
Then there's New York guitar freakout band Mercury Rev's collaboration with
Creeley--what's the name of that EP again, Jordan?
Steve
At 11:01 PM 5/1/96 EDT, Joel Lewis wrote:
>An interesting place to go w/ the Creeley & music discussion is the album HOME
>an ECM album recorded in the early 80's. Steve Swallow (an electric bassist
then
>associated w/ gary Burton & now w/ Carla Bley) took a series of poems and set
>them to music. At at St. Amark's talk at that period, Creeley praised the
>collaboration & noted that Swallow respected his line breaks and stanzas --
rare
>when compsoers tackle poetry. There is also a long piece where Lacy set A
>Creeley text to music(on hat Hut).Creeley's early poems provide a fascinating
>take on a poet's responce to the burgeoning bop scene going round him (see his
>letters to Olson at the time), this was a period of intense listening for
>Creeley... as far as classical music connection, I often think of a link
between
>Cage's pre-aleatoric piano pieces (late 30's -early '40's) and Creeley's
poetry.
>Where they at Black Mountain at the same time???
*************
Steve Carll
sjcarll@slip.net
"--A sound of waters bending astride the sky
Unceasing with some Word that will not die...!"
--Hart Crane
**************************************
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 13:10:17 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: I Think of Can; US reception of Aus/NZ writing
Scripsi yes. Also, an early NEW AMERICAN WRITING (I think #4--I don't
know if one can back order it) had an interesting Australian section.
I think edited by Tranter. Featuring Gig Ryan and others. Cs
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 13:10:37 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Kellogg <kellogg@ACPUB.DUKE.EDU>
Subject: Re: blocking poems
In-Reply-To: <Pine.3.88.9605011523.A29408-0100000@mustang-a.uwo.ca>
On Wed, 1 May 1996, k.a. hehir wrote:
> hello,
> in response to another thread David Kellogg made passing mention of the
> "visual
> design of words on a page". i would appreciate any directions to work
> done on this. i have a vague memory of a movie i saw in high school
> about WCW and his idea of page as canvas.
Kevin,
There's lots of work done on this kind of writing, including several books
on Williams. A book that's part anthology and part critical study is
Jacqueline Vaught Brogan, *Part of the Climate: American Cubist Poetry* (U
of California P, 1991). Of course, that's limited to American poetry, as
the title says. There's also Wendy Steiner's *The Colors of Rhetoric*; I
forget the publication information, but I remember it as strong if overly
jargon-ridden. The first other anthologies to look at are Rothenberg's,
from *Technicians of the Sacred* to the present *Poems for the Millenium*
(with Pierre Joris), which in my view provides the broadest anthology
context ever put together for the intersection of poetry and other art,
including painting.
Cheers,
David
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
David Kellogg Duke University
kellogg@acpub.duke.edu University Writing Program
(919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708
FAX (919) 684-6277
There is some excitement in one corner,
but most of the ghosts are merely shaking their heads.
-- Thomas Kinsella
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 13:14:10 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Kellogg <kellogg@ACPUB.DUKE.EDU>
Subject: Re: writing through Creeley's body
In-Reply-To: <75099FE292B@engnov1.auckland.ac.nz>
On Thu, 2 May 1996, Wystan Curnow wrote:
> Projective Verse, as with projective painting, as with projective
> jazz, bebop, was/is to be produced/received 'through the body.' And is
> by those means and to that extent writing intent on refusing the
> individualism you refer to, and Joshua Schuster's subject center. At
> least that's what I've always thought, but I do constantly encounter
> 'misreadings' which state the opposite.
It's those misreadings which I was trying to raise, misreadings which make
the language of writing thru the body available for such a wide range of
writing practices that (tho I am attracted greatly to the idea and the
rhetoric) I find it hard to understand it as meaningful. Maybe I read in
Jed Rasula's book that William STAFFORD, of all people, thought of
"Projective Verse" as obvious. If *that* can happen, then the idea of
writing through the body needs to be seen in terms of its flexibility and
its broad attractions, and questioned on that same ground.
A personal note: several years ago (1991) I published a piece in Sagetrieb
on Olson & the body. It retrospect it doesn't seem very strong for a
bunch of reasons, some of which I've alluded to here. So I'm basically
torn on the whole damned issue.
Cheers,
David
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
David Kellogg Duke University
kellogg@acpub.duke.edu University Writing Program
(919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708
FAX (919) 684-6277
There is some excitement in one corner,
but most of the ghosts are merely shaking their heads.
-- Thomas Kinsella
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 07:28:04 -1000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Cynthia Franklin <cfrankli@HAWAII.EDU>
Subject: MELUS call for Papers
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
C A L L F O R P A P E R S
First International and Eleventh National MELUS Conference
Multi-Ethnic Literatures Across the Americas and the Pacific:=20
Exchanges, Contestations, and Alliances
The University of Hawai'i at Manoa =A5 April 18-20, 1997=20
Hosted by the College of Languages, Linguistics, and Literature;=20
the Center for Pacific Island Studies; the East-West Center;=20
and the Department of Ethnic Studies
The Society for the Study of the Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United=20
States (MELUS) will hold its first international conference at the=20
University of Hawai'i in 1997, in acknowledgement of both Hawaii's=20
central location between East and West and the increasingly complex=20
relationship between the Pacific and the Americas. We invite proposals=20
for papers, panels, etc. (less than 500 words). In addition to papers on=20
the multi-ethnic literatures of North America, we welcome comparative=20
perspectives that address the growing cultural or textual connections =20
between America and the Pacific, as well as comparative perspectives=20
on postcolonial and American ethnic literatures.=20
possible topics:
new frontiers?
american ethnic literatures * immigrant literatures * border identities *=
=20
critical regionalism * new directions in feminism =A5 what about europe? *
multiculturalism =20
emerging literatures & languages
pacific island literatures * literatures of hawai'i * creole languages =20
cultures * protest & resistance literatures * why standard english? *=20
theorizing asian/pacific literature * cultural nationalism * the=20
languages of dance * non-u.s. ethnic literatures=20
narrating north america & the pacific
oral literatures & popular traditions * film & theater * representations=20
of indigenous culture * colonialism, neo-colonialism, post-colonialism *=20
transnationalism & cultural production * representations of hong kong=20
1997 * tourism & homo ludens * sovereignty & first nation movements * the=
=20
black atlantic and the asian pacific =20
reconfiguring american literary & cultural studies
african american literature * asian american literature * chicano/a=20
literature * euro-american literature * native american literature * the=20
critique of nation & nationalism * cnn, www, & capitalist world culture *=
=20
cultural transmigrations & transformations=20
The conference will advertise internationally. Special sessions scheduled=
=20
for K-12 teachers. Reduced registration rates for high school teachers,=20
students, and international scholars. Presenters should be members of=20
MELUS.=20
For conference information, contact 1997 MELUS Conference Chair,=20
University of Hawai'i, Manoa Department of English, Honolulu HI 96822;=20
fax (808) 956-3083; e-mail: rhsu@hawaii.edu
For MELUS membership information, contact Dr. Arlene Elder, English=20
Dept., University of Cincinnatti, Cincinnatti, OH 45221 (513)=20
556-5924.
DEADLINE FOR PROPOSALS: October 15, 1996
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 13:30:22 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Emily Lloyd <emilyl@EROLS.COM>
Subject: Re: Cope's Stein/Rod? Gwyn?
At 12:18 PM 5/2/96 -0400, Maria Damon wrote:
>emily:
>karin cope has a book forthcoming from minnesota (i believe) on stein and
>difference/queerness. it is so anti-identitarian that it doesn't address
>stein as a lesbian or a "husband," but simply as someone transgressive in
>every way, "queering" every angle.
Great! that's *exactly* the kind of thing I'm looking for. Thanks.
Rod, think you might get Cope's book in at Bridge St.? If so, I'd love to
reserve one...otherwise, anyone got the number for U of MN press?
Gwyn, I accidentally deleted the mailing address for your chapbook..will you
be at the Yak reading on Friday? or can I buy one from you in person some
other soon time? I certainly still want one--& hadn't realized we were so
geographically close when I asked for the address (sudden fits of stupidity
abound)...e
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Emily Lloyd emilyl@erols.com
"Fist my mind in your hand"--Rukeyser
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 13:51:23 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Michael Coffey <MCOFFEY@PW.CAHNERS.COM>
Subject: Re: Cope's Stein/Rod? Gwyn? -Reply
Comments: To: emilyl@EROLS.COM
university of minnesota press: 800-388-3863
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 13:06:34 -0500
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From: Charles Alexander <chax@MTN.ORG>
Subject: visual & poetic
>>At 04:01 PM 5/1/96 -0400, Kevin Hehir wrote:
>>>hello,
>>>in response to another thread David Kellogg made passing mention of the
>>>"visual
>>>design of words on a page". i would appreciate any directions to work
>>>done on this. i have a vague memory of a movie i saw in high school
>>>about WCW and his idea of page as canvas.
Since this conversation intersects with the one on visual poetry, I would
suggest that people with web access look at the marvelous Light & Dust site.
Its table of contents is at http://www.thing.net./~grist/l&d/lighthom.htm
Included there are visual poems by Paul Dutton (this one also a sound, in
printed form), Karl Kempton, Kajina Kyuyo, Philadelpho Menezes, Clemente
Padin, Carl Lynden Peters, Yamanaka Ryojiro, and others. Also criticism
present here, including Menezes's introduction & conclusion to Poetics and
Visuality; and Karl Young's Introduction to Karl Kempton's visual poems
which make up the book Rune: A Survey.
charles alexander
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Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 11:22:11 -0700
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From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: POMO
In-Reply-To: <199605020405.AAA08458@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
as one who loves nothing more than to stir up finally stilled waters, I
remind all readers of the following lines from Kerouac's possibly
postmodern novel _Desolation Angels_:
it's Gia Vlaencia, the daughter of the mad Spanish anthropologist sage
who'd lived with the Pomo and Pit River Indians of California, famous old
man, whom I'd read and revered only three years ago while working the
railroad outa San Louis Obispo--
(pg. 138)
Possible first instance of direct influence of Pomo culture on postmodern
culture?
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Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 11:24:56 -0700
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From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: City Papers
In-Reply-To: <199605020405.AAA08458@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
Ages ago as I was leaving D.C., _City Paper_ was just beginning to give
some modicum of attention to area poetry, largely through the efforts of
Rick Peabody -- Would I gather from recent remarks here that said paper
dropped said ball?
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Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 14:49:59 -0400
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From: Gwyn McVay <gmcvay1@OSF1.GMU.EDU>
Subject: Re: City Papers
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SOL.3.91.960502112221.26374C-100000@athens>
Aldon, the _City Paper_ dutifully lists Lib of Cong readings, slams, and
the gigs of the ubiquitous DJ Renegade in its calendars of events, but I
haven't seen a feature or sidebar or blurb about poetry in the 2 years
I've been in DC. Said ball done been dropped, I think.
Gwyn
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Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 11:57:56 -0700
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From: Carl Lynden Peters <clpeters@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: writing through Creeley's body
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SOL.3.91.960502125020.3347B-100000
@godzilla4.acpub.duke.edu> from "David Kellogg" at May 2,
96 01:14:10 pm
speaking of music and body, there's this piece of music by creeley
One and two and
one, two, three
what an extraordinary piece of minimalism and music --
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Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 15:14:18 -0400
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From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: May Bridge Street Readings
Two Readin's Real Soon:
Wed. May 8th @ 8 PM
Charles (a.k.a. "Charles") Bernstein
& Pierre Joris
Sun. May 12th @ 8 PM
Buck Downs
& Chris Mann
Buck Downs is the very snappy transplanted Floridian editor of _Open 24
Hours_. Buck's Berriganesque yet Coolidgean w/ a camouflage hat that says
BUCK on it & a voice to melt your heart. Chris Mann is an Australian composer
of I don't know exactly what. He's worked w/ Cage & received grants &
fellowships from oodles o' organizations.
Bridge Street Books, 2814 Pennsylvania Ave NW, Washington, DC phone 202
965 5200
(Across from the Biograph in Georgetown.)
Readings are free, sort of.
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Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 15:20:07 -0400
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From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Ear on Saturday
Sat. May 4th @ 2:30 (yes, PM)
Robert Mittenthal
& Rod Smith
Ear Inn, 326 Spring Street, NYC
ph 226 9060
Not free, sort of.
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Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 08:10:52 GMT+1300
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From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Reading at Alba
There will be a poetry reading at Alba Restaurant, 2,Lorne st,
Auckland, Tuesday May 7, 1996, 8p.m.
Readers:Wystan Curnow,Murray Edmond,Tony Green,
Roger Horrocks,Michele Leggott,Alan Loney,Di Nash,
Mark Wills, Elizabeth Wilson.
All welcome.
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
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Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 08:18:24 GMT+1300
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From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: should be on back of xxxx can
Re the NZ Herald Reuter report re-poet's. Dr Post's got a point. IF I
were writing to describe my feelings of love or religion I'd get
depressed too (resad More Depressed). I guess it's interesting that
he's got hold of a model of poetics there that probably persists in
the large scale public media, popular press, to work with.
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
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Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 16:27:02 -0400
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From: Michael Coffey <MCOFFEY@PW.CAHNERS.COM>
Subject: blocking poems -Reply
Comments: To: angelo@MUSTANG.UWO.CA
kevin o'hir wrote:
visual design of words on a page". i would appreciate any directions to
work done on this. i have a vague memory of a movie i saw in high
school about WCW and his idea of page as canvas.
Kevin:
not sure if this is of help, but Dick Higgins, former fluxus activist,
publisher (something else press), poet and scholar is THE authority on
pattern poems, or concrete poetry; he did a study of George Herbert's
pattern poems (he of "The Altar") and did a larger work on the history of
pattern poems, which i believe was published by Southern Illinois
University Press in paperback about six years ago.
michael coffey
mcoffey@pw.cahners.com
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Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 08:28:59 GMT+1300
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From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: Tasmania
Interesting to see Eric Beach surface in a list of Austrlian poets.
He got anthologized some years back as a young NZ poet.
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
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Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 21:48:11 GMT
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From: Tom Beard <beard@MET.CO.NZ>
Subject: word leading the idea
Joshua referred to Barthes' "One might call "poetic" (without value
judgment) any discourse in which the word leads the idea."
I like this idea, but wonder whether it's the word _leading_ the idea, or the
words conducting a discourse/dance that is separate from the idea. Could we say
that the 'poetic' is the dance of the signifiers, while the 'narrative' is the
dance of the signifieds? Though of course my use of the word 'separate' is too
reductive: there can (should?) be play or counterpoint (my metaphors now not so
much mixed as pureed) between the word-dance & the idea-dance.
& we read the 'poetic' as well as the 'narrative' (form never _less_ than an
extension of content?), though possibly in very different modes (musical/
analytical). & I wonder where the word might lead the idea, if we follow it
right down the garden path ... no ideas but in words?
Yours &c,
Tom Beard.
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Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 20:25:53 -0400
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From: Jennifer Ashton <ashto_j@JHUNIX.HCF.JHU.EDU>
Subject: Re: Cope's Stein/Rod? Gwyn?
Comments: To: Emily Lloyd <emilyl@erols.com>
In-Reply-To: <199605021730.NAA23505@smtp1.erols.com>
I tried to post an answer to your query about transgender criticism on
Stein once before and for some reason my post never appeared. I hope
this works. There are a couple of earlier accounts that you might
consult, if nothing else just to see how much more thinking still needs
to be done on this subject. A couple of not-so-recent essays by
Catherine Stimpson are "Getrice/Altrude: Stein, Toklas, and the Paradox
of the Happy Marriage" and another for which I am missing the title, but
I know the phrase "Lesbian Lie" or "Lies" is in there somewhere. Also,
you might look at "A Signature of Lesbian Autobiography" by Leigh
Gilmore, also not-so-recent.
Jennifer Ashton
Johns Hopkins University
ashto_j@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu
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Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 02:30:47 +0200
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From: Jondi Keane <jondi@IPROLINK.CH>
Subject: writing threw the body
In following the thread, "through", I found Joshua Schuster's history of the
take(s) on the body real good but more what we should read and not perhaps
what we might do, because poetics means that the body is also on the take.
Hence the addition by D. Kellog of Elaine Scarry and Foucault to which I
would add Anne Hollander's "Seeing through clothes". the "through" here
being that the depiction of bodies was/is in-formed by the current cut and
paste idea of clothes, and implies media and transmission, and so too
"through" the body.
H.Gould added:
<<An embodied poetics would start by acknowledging that both poets & readers
are responding to effects & powers originating in language & nowhere else;
that these effects can be symbolized by analogy to the body or the reactions
poetry creates, but that if we are talking poetics perhaps we should
focus on specifically poetic effects.>>
I would suggest that the opposite is more productive: that language,
discourses, formal systems and logics arose from the body finding/making
(pro-finding, profound-ing) a relation to its own thinking. This is a
question for Poetics: How do I work this thing. It is a question of
engagement and AEffection. The runnings back and forth (of discourse(s),
show an ORIENTATION, each discourse is an orientation of the body towards
its "expressions" (in the medical sense). Writing through the body
foregrounds the orientation that is aeffected and in-formed by the bodily.
Thinking produces experience, different discourses produce likewise
different aeffectations, the body produce experience that the brain thinks
about. The body also thinks for itself. The INTERESTING THING is that there
is a willful confusion of these, they approximate and overlap strongly and
because they do, they create the possibilities of other, 2nd, 3rd, and even
centered person(s). Giving voice (an interesting bodily problem considering
all the work that actors and singers do just on disposition, the fact that
over 200 muscles connect into the throat and controls the "lips of the
voice" means that the way the muscles are connected hold or flex, lengthen,
harden, walk sit, etc. effect the finding of the physical instrument of the
voice.) and then giving voice to a fictive, imagined, projected, physical,
internally isolated, prosthetic or socially constructed body, is the search
and research of that which shows up only as the poetic effects. It is true
this is all we see, but we read also through our sense of poetics, not just
through our sense of text.
POETICS IS NOT ABOUT POETRY, andit is this relation of body to its thoughts
that needs a Poetics. Discourse follows by "Writing through the body"or not.
Foregrounding (the body) does not have to be a prioritizing, it can, and in
this case does, imply loss or negligence as a source (real or other-wise)
w/o making it foremost. Our dispositions have grown acustomed and our taste
adjusted to theoretical, literary & scientific voices (re: D.Byrd post on
"taste for theory" some time ago) more than, for example, an all-flesh
(pancreatic) one. But,this is life in the eyes ears nose mouth and the
legacy of sensations produced by reflective values.
Jondi Keane
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Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 21:54:03 -0400
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From: Scott J Pound <spound@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: Re: writing threw the body
In-Reply-To: <199605030040.CAA19094@badboy.iprolink.ch>
I'm not sure I know what writing through the body is, yet, but i know
Nicole Brossard does:
Fictive theory: words were used only in the ultimate embrace.
The first word lips and sticky saliva on her breasts. Theory
begins there when the breast or the child moves away. Strategic
wound or suspended meaning. (_These Our Mothers_)
Ride astride grammar. I spread myself, eager, inconsequential and
desire.
* * *
Words get confused
So hotly used
(_French Kiss_)
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Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 22:24:06 -0400
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From: Eryque Gleason <eryque@ACMENET.NET>
Subject: Re: writing threw the body
>I'm not sure I know what writing through the body is, yet
i have a feeling that if any of us knew, i mean really knew, this thread
wouldn't take so many twists and turns.
but then it wouldn't be half as fun either!
eryque
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Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 23:04:58 -0700
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From: Thomas Bell <tbjn@WELL.COM>
Subject: Re: writing threw the body
In-Reply-To: <199605030040.CAA19094@badboy.iprolink.ch>
From babble and play to poetry: some philosophical reflections
on writing through the vocal cords:
"From the standpoint of articulation, phonic freeplay strips
the infant of the manifold benefits of political conversation.
In being not yet human, the infant is nonhuman. For the play
that (as yet) avoids the work of commanding the organs of speech
is the action of a creature imprisoned by its vital functions.
Infancy, for Hobbes, is retribution and imprisonment, a
repetition of the fall at Babylon. In that condition, being and
action, lacking rigor and retentiveness, are reduced to play...
As play, babble is a pleasure onto itself. The infant babbles
for no reason other than the fact that free sound production is
pleasing...the organism as vocal instrument plays and is played
upon pleasurably ...This is the instrument before tuning ...
Sound is process rather than production. (pp. 76 - 77)
"Figures and metaphors....serve to remove the ambiguous
sting of the poem hat cuts through our ordinary preoccupations
to the intense terror of the primordial question. not knowing
who we are nor why we exist, we raise voice in the poem in the
hope of eliciting a response....The poems voice, voice's voice,
destroys the illusions by which shame and self-deception deaden
thought, feeling, and sensate life.(pp. 112 - 113)"
_Voice_, David Appelbaum, SUNY, 1990.
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Date: Thu, 2 May 1996 23:26:25 -0700
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From: mikl-em <mike@KID-LINEAR.TAYLOR.ORG>
Subject: Re: blocking poems
> From: David Kellogg <kellogg@ACPUB.DUKE.EDU>
>
> There's lots of work done on this kind of writing, including several books
> on Williams. A book that's part anthology and part critical study is
> Jacqueline Vaught Brogan, *Part of the Climate: American Cubist Poetry* (U
> of California P, 1991). Of course, that's limited to American poetry, as
> the title says. There's also Wendy Steiner's *The Colors of Rhetoric*; I
> forget the publication information, but I remember it as strong if overly
> jargon-ridden. The first other anthologies to look at are Rothenberg's,
> from *Technicians of the Sacred* to the present *Poems for the Millenium*
> (with Pierre Joris), which in my view provides the broadest anthology
> context ever put together for the intersection of poetry and other art,
> including painting.
there is also the Emmett Williams edited section "Language Happenings" from
Ronald Gross & George Quasha's _Open Poetry_ (Simon & Schuster, 1973),
which includes the Brazillian Concretists, Germans, Frenchmen, E. Williams
own stuff and muchmuchmore. I'd also mention one more Rothenberg anthology
specifically, _Revolution of the Word_ (Seabury Press, 1974).
David, who all is covered in the Brogan book? Rexroth in all his
comments on Cubist Poetry pretty much said there was naught but his and
Yvor Winters' early stuff, and both of those bodies were rather small. So
are these more recent writers rediscovering cubism, or writers from the
first part of the century who are coming to light or what?
mike
@taylor.org
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Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 08:36:09 EDT
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From: Henry <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: writing threw the body
In-Reply-To: Message of Thu, 2 May 1996 02:30:47 +0200 from <jondi@IPROLINK.CH>
On Thu, 2 May 1996 02:30:47 +0200 Jondi Keane said:
>POETICS IS NOT ABOUT POETRY, andit is this relation of body to its thoughts
>that needs a Poetics. Discourse follows by "Writing through the body"or not.
>Foregrounding (the body) does not have to be a prioritizing, it can, and in
This entire post was very interesting; body-centered anti-theory theory.
The relation to performance (I'm thinking of Pindar & choruses & dramatic
poetry) might prove useful sometime. I think the point I was trying to
make is that poetry is a form of communication, i.e. a language; that
keeping this in mind might help interpreters & readers in navigating
various claims of "writing through the body" - between what is simply
playing out of metaphors & what is gesture & body-language etc. - and
might forestall simplistic value-judgements about repression/expression
etc. Whether coming from the groin or the groan or the grin I would
want to withhold calling it "poetry" until I was able to grasp to
some extent what is the poetic-communicative message/massage gestalt
or whatever. Poetics IS about poetry, that by gum I'll stand-by. - HG
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Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 10:10:58 -0400
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From: "Walter K. Lew" <WKL888@AOL.COM>
Subject: Ann Kong's Farm
Still catching up on old threads.
Yes, it's Ann Kong's pig farm not ant farm--her answering machine OGM even
throws in an "Oink, Oink": sorry for the typo. A year or so ago, Steve
Dickison of Small Press Distribution told me of his epiphanous feeling when
he connected the poems and contributor's note he'd just read in the
Premonitions galleys with the bleach bottle pigs surrounding him and the busy
cook or manager who was ordering people around. When Chris Daniels suggested
that the connection with poetry was perhaps "the sweet human ability to love
such a thing as a bleach bottle pig --- but i am speaking entirely of myself"
something connected for me. Recently I was obsessed with buying all
different sorts of stuffed toy rabbits (as well as books, calendars about
rabbits, etc.--but no chocolate bunnies) for a rabbit-adoring friend. It
helped, of course, that it was right before Easter, when thousands of rabbits
come out of their warehouse hutches to perch on retail shelves. This led me
to think more generally of toys and dolls again. Maybe one connection is
that poems are like "dolls" or miniature replicas of language (and therefore
inherently "unheimlich"/uncanny?) and here of course one means much more than
a "faithful" reproduction of it, but a prototype, put out in simulated
conditons (its relation to "the world", breath, etc.)--I recall also the
quotation that Pierre Joris uses in his posts to this list--poetry as the
promise of a language, although I wonder if Pierre could spare the time to
fill us in a little more on the type of promise being intimated here. I'm
sure it's related to why I titled my anthology "Premonitions."
Finally, if Chris Daniels, Emily Lloyd, Maria D., Ron Silliman, and
"mikl-em" don't mind, I would like to copy the Ann Kong/Pig Farm thread and
send it as a greeting to Ann? Do any of you object? Back-channel me at
WKL888@AOL.com.
Thanks,
Walter K. Lew
8 Old Colony Rd.
Old Saybrook, CT 06475
(860) 388-4601
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Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 10:11:08 -0400
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From: "Walter K. Lew" <WKL888@AOL.COM>
Subject: Queer Comparisons
>walter, I was about an hour ahead of your pointing towards ann kong...just
got my copy of *Premonitions*, and yes, I enjoyed her work very much. (tho
curious: who do you have in mind when you say "better than most of the more
well-known US poets of Lesbos? not at all disagreeing, just wondering who
these are for you). seems as if asian voices have been particularly
silenced/absent/whatever from lesbian poetry (good to see inverse not true
here)<
Emily--Sorry for the late reply on this. At that instant I was thinking of
a few active white poets born after 1950 or so who have received some
prestigious mainstream prizes. Although the fact Kong's published so little
makes comparisons unfair, I just find the poignant/acerbic,
nostalgic/mystical, dark/ardent fresh nostalgia of her poems more vivid and
well sung. But, of course, there is as much diversity among "poets of
Lesbos" as there is among any other grouping and once one considers more
poets, it becomes less fruitful to say one is better than the other because
what they are doing is so different, sometimes contrary.
And where does the queerness reside, emerge? For there is also the
question of the difference between a queer poem and a poem seen queerly--how
the latter becomes a "critically" queer poem (brought to a "crisis")? (And
there are also, of course, queer poems seen straight.) I'm thinking on the
analogy of how queer film criticism un-represses Hollywood texts and the
Eliot-Pound analysis in Wayne Koestenbaum's _Double Talk, The Erotics of
Male Literary Collaboration_ (Routledge 1989). There are also a range of
texts in between, say, erotic queer poems and homophobic poems seen queerly:
a work like Theresa Hak Kyung Cha's DICTEE, for instance--and here I'm just
following up on a suggestion thrown at me one afternoon by the young
filmmaker and critic Quentin Lee (USC Film School) one day as he ran down a
hall to the next panel. DICTEE!, he said, if that's not a queer text, I
don't know what is! Its epigraph is stated as being from Sappho and each of
its nine chapters is devoted simultaneously to one of the muses and another
more "historical" female figure of adoration (e.g. Joan of Arc, the Korean
patriot martyr Yu Guan Soon); aside from passages of ecstatic appeals to or
invocations of Christ, heterosexual relations are almost completely neglected
or only ironically referred to (there is a criticism of conventional
matrimony). On the other hand, sexual attraction or acts are never a
narrative element in the book, the Sappho quotation is faked, and certainly
none of the growing literature on DICTEE has thought to view it as a Lesbian
or even erotic text. Maybe it's just a matter of time.
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Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 10:10:56 -0400
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From: David Kellogg <kellogg@ACPUB.DUKE.EDU>
Subject: Re: blocking poems
In-Reply-To: <199605030626.XAA00431@kid-linear.taylor.org>
> David, who all is covered in the Brogan book? Rexroth in all his
> comments on Cubist Poetry pretty much said there was naught but his and
> Yvor Winters' early stuff, and both of those bodies were rather small. So
> are these more recent writers rediscovering cubism, or writers from the
> first part of the century who are coming to light or what?
Brogan's book starts around 1910 and ends with the early 1940s. I'm not
nearly expert enough to judge its accuracy. One of the interesting things
about its arrangement is that it organizes poems according to their
original place of publication (magazine), so that Williams, for example,
appears in sections devoted to "Others," "Broom," "Secession," "The
Exile," "Hound & Horn," "Blues," and "New Directions in Poetry and Prose
1936."
Brogan's definition of cubist poetry is pretty loose, so Stevens seems
more prominent in this regard than he might be under a more narrow
classificaiton. Other prominent figures in the book are Loy, Stein,
cummings, Zukofsky (including "Poem beginning 'The'" (!!)), Winters,
Rexroth. Some reviews and editorials from the period are also included.
Cheers,
David
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
David Kellogg Duke University
kellogg@acpub.duke.edu University Writing Program
(919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708
FAX (919) 684-6277
There is some excitement in one corner,
but most of the ghosts are merely shaking their heads.
-- Thomas Kinsella
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 10:11:03 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Walter K. Lew" <WKL888@AOL.COM>
Subject: Other Asian American Lesbian Poets
Still trying to catch up before I head out of town...
re: Emily Lloyd's inquiry about >kitty tsui, who's not in
*Premonitions* but is highly anthologized & regarded in the queergirl
community.<
A good observation. One of the functions of _Premonitions_ was to question
the repeated anthologization of certain Asian American poets, according to
the criteria stated in its Afterword. You will note that the book does not
include a good number of poets that have become the standard "Asian American"
inclusions in mainstream and/or multiculturalist anthologies, ranging from
the Norton's to jazz poetry collections, if they did not send work that was
not already well-circulated or not significantly different from their
previously celebrated writing. Another frequently included queer poet who
does not appear in Premonitions is Nellie Wong, much of whose work I love.
It was time to give anthology space to willyce kim (the first openly Asian
American lesbian writer to publish whole volumes of poetry, she's also
published two very episodic novels, and is stacks supervisor at the UC
Berkeley library), Thelma Seto, Ann Kong, and work like the video "Red
Lolita" (which its artist, Gloria Park says is not queer, but I feel
nonetheless wonderfully evokes queer issues--do you agree?). It's good to
hear that Kitty is highly regarded in queergirl circles; I hope this will be
true of a wider range of poets in the near future and that it will encourage
them to publish more. But then this is beginning to sound so patronizing I
start to wonder why
Walter K. Lew
8 Old Colony Rd.
Old Saybrook, CT 06475
(860) 388-4601 (phone/fax)
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 11:18:33 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: Ann Kong's Farm
wally:
you say much.
re bunnies: 'member when priscilla's mod* (and yours?) bought you a pet
rabbit for -was it your birthday? lo these many years ago? i sstill remember
the look of bewilderment on your face as the rest of us evaporated into
giggles. (and remember when you and i dressed her cello case up as a blues
singer?
(*mod: hampshire college lingo for apartment).
sure, send greeetings to Kong and pigs.
re poems as miniature: a wonderful book is Longing, by Susan Stewart. I
teach it with elizabeth bishop. its about tourism, miniatures, giganticism,
souvenirs, etc. stewart is also a poet.
love, maria d
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 10:12:32 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: re; blocking poems
I would suggest going to the source: Mallarme's A throw of the dice
will never abolish chance. And then on to Selected Essays, Letters,
and Prose which is on Johns Hopkins (1956?). Whatever is to remain
sacred must be shrouded in mystery.
If the interest is in WCW specifically, try out _Cubism, Steglitz, and
WCW_ (Dykstra was the author I believe).
If your interest is in the formations of concrete poetry in the US,
check out Kenneth Patchen's Journal of Albion Moonlight, Sleepers
Awake, or the painting books especially the fairly recent color one
_What shall we do without us?_ After these I would check out an
anthology of concrete poetry that Richard Kostelanetz put together in
1972, there's a book on Illinois UP (or the Ann Arbor Writer's on
Writing Series book) that will give you the name of which anthology
deals with the subject
As far as criticism the best book I've read on the subject was a
recent one (1994) which traced the work of the painter, Francis Bacon,
with semiotic and linguistic theory. The book is wild, giving an
involved assessment of possible narratologies that are availiable to
painters. Here I am again sans library. It should be easy to find,
with the exception of David Sylvester's books there are only 2 or 3
others written that aren't purely art books.
Be Well
David Baratier
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 13:37:11 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Ward Tietz <100723.3166@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: Writing Threw the Brain
The recent discussion on writing through the body reminded me of a long quote
from Julian Jaynes' "The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the of the
Bicameral Mind" I used in a piece I wrote about a year ago. I used it to
emphasize how imagination and experience are often juxtaposed in descriptions of
form, but I think it's also a good example, in the extreme, of the tendency to
invoke biological determinism once the body is established as a locus or origin
of a given process or action, a condition which is probably a result, not a
cause, of what Jondi Keane called "the legacy of sensations produced by
reflective values."
"Poetry begins as the divine speech of the bicameral mind. Then as the
bicameral mind breaks down, there remain prophets. Some become
institutionalized as oracles making decisions for the future. While others
become specialized into poets, relating from the gods statements about the past.
Then, as the bicameral mind shrinks back from its impulsiveness, and as perhaps
a certain reticence falls upon the right hemisphere, poets who are to obtain
this same state must learn to do it. As this becomes more difficult, the state
becomes a fury, and then ecstatic possessions, just as happened in the oracles.
And then indeed toward the end of the first millennium B. C., just as the
oracles began to become prosaic and their statements versified consciously, so
poetry also. Its givenness by the unison Muses has vanished. And conscious men
now wrote and crossed out and careted and rewrote their compositions in
laborious mimesis of the older divine utterances" (Jaynes 374-375).
"Bicameral men did not imagine; they experienced. The beautiful Muses with
their unison "lilly-like" voice, dancing out of the thick mists of evening,
thumping on soft and vigorous feet about the lonely enraptured shepherd, these
arrogances of delicacy were the hallucinatory sources of memory in the late
bicameral men, men who did not live in a frame of past happenings, who did not
have 'lifetimes' in our sense, and who could not reminisce because they were not
fully conscious" (Jaynes 371).
Ward Tietz
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 14:35:20 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: Writing Threw the Brain
In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 3 May 1996 13:37:11 EDT from
<100723.3166@COMPUSERVE.COM>
On Fri, 3 May 1996 13:37:11 EDT Ward Tietz said:
>form, but I think it's also a good example, in the extreme, of the tendency to
>invoke biological determinism once the body is established as a locus or origin
>of a given process or action, a condition which is probably a result, not a
>cause, of what Jondi Keane called "the legacy of sensations produced by
>reflective values."
If the body writes, then if we define the body as some kind of separate
locus-organism, we simply create an old Descartian grid with new vocabulary.
What's the body? The body is part of a cosmos-body-thingum. But I will
admit - breathing sometimes helps writing.
>And then indeed toward the end of the first millennium B. C., just as the
>oracles began to become prosaic and their statements versified consciously, so
>poetry also. Its givenness by the unison Muses has vanished. And conscious
>men
>now wrote and crossed out and careted and rewrote their compositions in
>laborious mimesis of the older divine utterances" (Jaynes 374-375).
Nagy's book Poetry as Performance is again relevant here, where he
describes the Alexandrian codification & centralization of both the
Homeric poems and the Septuagint (a movement begun supposedly in both
cases by one person! Now what-th-body was his name...some Greek...)
into texts - the "descent" from script to scripture...
Invention of writing - techne - like the invention of a mammoth
mirror - suddenly we're bicameral - me & that chump in the glass -
but the way back isn't through breaking the mirror - text is tactile -
blind Milton, seeing fingers, visual poetry - open the scrypt - HG
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 3 May 1996 18:18:03 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Ken Edwards <100344.2546@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: poetry/music gig
Comments: To: cris cheek <cris@slang.demon.co.uk>
Ken Edwards will be performing his poem-with-music "Bruised Rationals" with the
COMA London & South East Ensemble (conductor: Simon Foxley) at a concert on
Monday May 6 at 7.30 pm at The Friends' Centre, Ship Street, Brighton.
The complete bill is:
Plain Harmony Michael Finnissy (conducted by the composer)
Olson III Terry Riley
From Blake's Milton Paul Burnell*
The Desire & Pursuit of the Whole is Called Love Patrick Morris
Bruised Rationals Ken Edwards*
The Glistening Sand, Sky and Sea John Alexander (conducted by the
composer)
Admission 3 pounds (concessions 1.50 pounds)
* World premieres
PS "Bruised Rationals" will also be performed by the COMA Ensemble as part of
the Spitalfields Fesitval, at Spitalfields Church, London, on Tuesday June 11.
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 4 May 1996 07:58:23 -0500
Reply-To: landers@vivanet.com
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: landers <landers@VIVANET.COM>
Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company
Subject: As Williams is to painting/photography
It seems to me that with all the parallels we drew between poets and
music, noone compared WCW to a musical type. Perhaps he, and Creeley,
are better compared to painters and photographers than to musicians. Not
that this is the only way to see them, but maybe it's a more appropriate
pair-'o-dig-'em.
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 4 May 1996 18:22:43 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mary Rising Higgins <HigginsMR@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: Williams & Painting
Many years ago I read an collection of essays called The Hieroglyphics of
Speech which gives anecdotal bio data regarding Williams early efforts at
painting followed by a preference for the rather lighter materials required
for poetry construction...perhaps the book is still in print. mrh
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 4 May 1996 19:22:28 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Brian McHale <BMCH@WVNVM.WVNET.EDU>
Subject: Re: re; blocking poems
In-Reply-To: Message of 05/03/96 at 10:12:32 from dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM
I suspect that the book on Francis Bacon, title of which Baratier was trying
to come up with, was "Francis Bacon & the Loss of Self," by Ernst van Alphen,
smart young Nederlandish literary scholar; UK edition, Reaktion Books, 1992,
don't know about the US edition. Good as it is, I'm not sure it's all that
relevant to the current thread: has more to do with narrative than with the
visual in poetry.
Brian
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 4 May 1996 19:15:48 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joe Amato <amato@CHARLIE.ACC.IIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: Writing Threw the Brain
wrt this question of the body, and ward tietz's intriguing response to
jondi keane's intriguing elaboration: i too have found mind vs. body
controversies to be reflected in the mind/brain couple, esp. given that
many cogsci researchers see the 90s as the "decade of the brain"... seems
to me one might look at related articulations to ascertain what they yield
in this context... chief among which, way back at the beginning of the 90s,
are mark turner's _reading minds: the study of english in the age of
cognitive science_ (princeton up, 1991) and what i would pose almost as a
retort to turner, francisco varela/evan thompson/eleanor rosch's _the
embodied mind_ (mit p, 1991)... i far prefer the varela et. al. text to the
turner treatment, albeit it too is not w/o its liabilities... note that
three of turner's chapters are entitled "the poetry of connections" (!)...
his is an attempt to reproduce the logic of cognitive science at the level
of language practice, incl. metaphor (through "cognitive rhetoric")...
extremely deterministic, yes, even an implied *genetic* gradient mebbe, yet
a measure of the sorts of reductions one might expect when looking to
science alone to furnish answers to questions that invoke
socially-constitutive practices...
i might in this context also mention richard powers' superb novel _the gold
bug variations_... i know of no book that goes as far in exploring
language/dna intricacies...
anyway, it's likely that any simple theoretical or scientific access to the
body will result in a reification... on the other hand, i can't quite
imagine how we're to understand the body as a language-organism without
recourse both to poetic and to (properly conceived)
scientific/technological thinking (such as, for example, maturana and
varela's "autopoiesis," which resonates well with olson's
"proprioception")... that is, my own predilection is for a more complex
understanding of language as it relates to the organism, and without (for
example) eliminating that social gradient... but that's just me...
joe
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 4 May 1996 22:37:15 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Thomas Bell <tbjn@WELL.COM>
Subject: Re: Writing Threw the Brain
In-Reply-To: <199605050015.TAA03904@charlie.acc.iit.edu>
intriguing comment. for some time i've been mulling the endlessly
repeated languageisallwecanknowdetermineseverything when it's in reality
the body (impulses, synapses, nerves, rhythms) isallwecanknow<-->deter-
mines everything?
On Sat, 4 May 1996, Joe Amato wrote:
> wrt this question of the body
i might in this context also mention richard powers' superb novel _the
gold bug variations_... i know of no book that goes as far in exploring
> language/dna intricacies...
>
> anyway, it's likely that any simple theoretical or scientific access to the
> body will result in a reification... on the other hand, i can't quite
> imagine how we're to understand the body as a language-organism without
> recourse both to poetic and to (properly conceived)
> scientific/technological thinking (such as, for example, maturana and
> varela's "autopoiesis," which resonates well with olson's
> "proprioception")... that is, my own predilection is for a more complex
> understanding of language as it relates to the organism, and without (for
> example) eliminating that social gradient... but that's just me...
>
> joe
>
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 4 May 1996 22:10:45 -1000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Susan Schultz <sschultz@HAWAII.EDU>
Subject: Minnesota!
I'm writing to say that my good friend, Marie Hara, will be
reading at the Asian American Renaissance Center in St. Paul, Minnesota
on Thursday, May 9, at 7:30. She is the author of _Bananaheart_, a book
of short stories set in Hawai'i.
Susan Schultz
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 4 May 1996 22:18:47 -1000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Susan Schultz <sschultz@HAWAII.EDU>
Subject: TINFISH!
There will be a TINFISH reading on Tuesday, May 14, at 7:30 at
the Meeting Place Cafe on Kamakee Street in Honolulu. Readers will
include Joe Balaz, Richard Hamasaki, Rob Wilson and Sean MacBeth, Kathy
Dee Kaleokealoha Kaloloahilani Banggo, Tony Quagliano, and the editor,
Susan Schultz. Unfortunately, Eric Chock has other obligations. We are
hoping to tape the reading for the Electronic Poetry Center, despite the
presence (and noise) of a nearby construction site. Best wishes to
list members who have contributed to the journal; there's still time to
buy your airline tickets and read with us!
Susan Schultz
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 5 May 1996 11:23:46 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Loss Glazier <lolpoet@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: Cite Lines: Duncan/Olson
Here are two questions:
--> Does anyone have a *clue* where this quote from Robert Duncan might have
come from? It's a passage I'm very fond of. (My thought is it's from a
periodical but I can't seem to find it in that _Sulfur_ 35 with the special
Duncan stuff. So then I'm thinking - what other periodical might it be - if
it is in a periodical??)
"When poets were really jugglers, they got everything in the air and
bouncing around. In that period they wanted that out of poetry, they wanted
an amazing assortment of things."
--> "Form is never more than an extension of content". Of course Olson
refers to Creeley saying this in his "Projective Verse" essay. BUT - is this
a quote that exists anywhere? I've looked through the correspondence and I
do see some wording similar to this but I don't find this EXACT quote. (ie,
what Olson cites of Creeley in Creeley's own words) Did I miss this? Is it
common knowledge that Olson is rephrasing Creeley and I am simply unaware of
it???
You may of course, if you prefer - respond to me directly and not to the
list: lolpoet@acsu.buffalo.edu
Thanks!
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 5 May 1996 15:07:41 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Bob Holman <Nuyopoman@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: Poetry and Body
WHAT YOU CAN'T UNDERSTAND IS POETRY
IS CONNECTED TO THE BODY AGAIN
Jean allowed the body to drop
The beautiful face bluing so perfect
A fly buzzed by - but no one would believe it
She raced frantically to the offices of the National Enquirer
A reporter wrote up the story - it made the cover
Now she could get the attention of the radical newsweekly
That only told the truth
She just casually flipped it down on the desk
"Hey," an editor reading upside-down said,
"What if this story is true? It would certainly change
Our story - maybe we should look into this.
Hey! Stop those presses!"
Jean walked away. Horns were blaring,
It was a brilliant dusty sunset and the sirens were distorting.
She didn't hear em.
She was remembering her lover's face,
What they'd said about how you never know
If someone else's orgasm is better than yours
But that shoudn't stop you
From coming together
Even if it's not exactly
At the same time.
Bob Holman
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 5 May 1996 11:57:27 PDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: William Marsh - 3809183 <wmarsh@NUNIC.NU.EDU>
Subject: Re: creeley quote
In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.32.19960505152346.00698a20@pop.acsu.buffalo.edu>; from
"Loss Glazier" at May 5, 96 11:23 am
5/5
In Creeley's letter to O -- Monday / june 5 / 1950 (anniversary next
month!) -- "Anyhow, form has now become so useless a term/ that I blush to
use it. I wd imply a little of Stevens' use (the things created in a
poem and existing there . . .) & too, go over into: the possible casts or
methods for a way into/ a 'subject': to make it clear: that form is never
more than an extension of content. An enacted or possible 'stasis' for
thought. Means to."
You'll find it in _The Complete Correspondence_ Vol. I -- in the Black
Sparrow edition (1980) where i found it, on p. 79.
& just for fun: "Stevens' use" refers back to an earlier letter (April
28/50) in which Creeley: "Thinking of Stevens, who slipped into PR, with
this: 'Poetic form in its proper sense is a question of what appears
within the poem itself. . . By appearance within the poem itself one
means the things created and existing there. . .' Basic." -- A note
gives the Stevens quote from: a symposium on "The State of American
Writing, 1948," _Partisan Review_, 15 (Aug. 1948), 885.
I'd be obliged to anyone who can point me to something that investigates
this Creeley/Stevens connection re form/content -- or more generally on
Stevens' influence on C (and/or O).
bill marsh
wmarsh@nunic.nu.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 5 May 1996 16:47:44 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Book Announcement (forward)
From: IN%"chadwick@crl.com" "Cydney Chadwick" 5-MAY-1996 14:16:24.87
To: IN%"Ls0796@cnsvax.albany.edu" "Chris Stroffolino"
CC: IN%"chadwick@crl.com" "Cydney Chadwick"
Subj: Will you?
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Date: Sun, 05 May 1996 11:06:37 -0700 (PDT)
From: Cydney Chadwick <chadwick@crl.com>
Subject: Will you?
X-Sender: chadwick@crl11.crl.com
To: Chris Stroffolino <Ls0796@cnsvax.albany.edu>
Cc: Cydney Chadwick <chadwick@crl.com>
Message-id: <Pine.SUN.3.91.960505102935.16767C-100000@crl6.crl.com>
MIME-version: 1.0
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Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT
Will you please forward this post to the Poetics List? Your review copy
is going out tomorrow.
Thanks!
Cyd
New from Avec Books
Channel-Surfing the Apocalypse
(a day in the life of the fin-de-millennium mind)
by Susan Smith Nash
/Fiction/ Women's Studies/Cultural Studies
Channel-Surfing the Apocalypse is a collection of outrageously funny,
poignant and insightful no-holds-barred fictions from a writer who
characterizes them as,"stories about and from women driven mad by
dysfunctional relationships." And yet, the stories are more than installations
in the current soap-opera of
gender wars. They peel the armor off of the souls of men and women facing
the millennium and attendant apocalyptic madness. Like all fiction written
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These "furious fictions" are intensely sane and personal, and they leave
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"Susan Smith Nash's book Channel-Surfing the Apocalypse is very
interesting. It is certainly a new approach to an area of writing. . .can I call
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attention. She has created an up-to-the-minute post-AIDS statement."
--William S. Burroughs
"Insistently parochial, the voice in this book is Oklahoma unalloyed. The
apocalypse arrived early here, on television, and this fertile, lyrical,
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"Susan Smith Nash is a reporter commissioned by the muses, a kind of
higher intensity poet-version of Christiane Amanpour, reporting live from all
the intimate and mysterious combat zone that fill our world with
terror."--Robert Kelly
"The works of Susan smith Nash are fireworks, with much more than flash.
They are bold, funny, and brilliant, illuminating corners of the literary
landscape that have been dark for a long time." --Beth Joselow
Pub. Date: May 2, 1996. ISBN: 1-880713-06-3. Price $11.95. 192 pages.
Perfect Bound. Distributed to the trade by Baker & Taylor; Bookpeople and
Small Press Distribution. For Direct orders: Avec Books, P.O. Box 1059,
Penngrove, CA
94951 (please add $1.50 shipping).
Note to
booksellers: a
discount is
available
with
prepayment
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 5 May 1996 20:29:52 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: William Slaughter <wrs@UNF.EDU>
Subject: Small Press Distribution?
In-Reply-To: <01I4CQQGDTR6HV9BW3@cnsvax.albany.edu>
I used to be on SPD's mailing list, receive their catalog, order from
them, etc., but haven't in a while. I can't find an address for them and
would appreciate some one among you posting it. (There have been several
recent mentions of SPD on the Poetics List but I haven't seen the address.)
I'd appreciate phone and fax numbers for them too. E-mail? Thank you.
Bill
William Slaughter
_________________
wrs@unf.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 12:24:19 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark Roberts <M.Roberts@ISU.USYD.EDU.AU>
Subject: AWOL: ars poetica magazine (forwarded)
>Date: Fri, 03 May 1996 10:41:47 +1000
>From: awol@ozemail.com.au (awol)
>Subject: AWOL: ars poetica magazine
>Sender: LISTSERVER@banks.ntu.edu.au
>To: Australian Literature Discussion <AUSTLIT@banks.ntu.edu.au>
>Reply-to: AUSTLIT@banks.ntu.edu.au
>MIME-version: 1.0
>
>The following information has been posted by AWOL on behalf of ars poetica.
>Please address any enquiries to the contact address for the magazine listed
>below
>
>**************************************************************
>
>ars poetica
>
>New quality national poetry journal.
>
>VOLUME 2 NOW AVAILABLE
>
>Aust$7.00 per copy. Aust$20 one year subscription (3 volumes). Please make
>cheques out to ars poetica.
>
>SUBMISSIONS FOR VOLUME 3 NOW BEING SOUGHT
>Send submissions, brief bio and ssae to ars poetica PO Box 455 Bairnsdale
>Victoria Australia 3875
>
>Also seeking artwork (will consider any genre) for cover of ars poetica 3.
>Closing date for submissions for No. 3 is 20 July 1996.
>
>Payment to contributors is two copies of the volume in which their work
>appears. Please allow up to six weeks for response to submissions.
>
>
>ars poetica volume II' will be launched by Michael Dugan on 11 May, 1996.
>6-8pm with readings by: Earl Livings, Vera Urban, John Jenkins, Catherine
>Magree and Michael Crane at the Hawthorn Lower Town Hall 360 Burwood Rd,
>Hawthorn, as part of the Booroondara Literary Festival (formerly the
>Hawthorn Lit. Festival). Entry is free, and a light supper will be provided
>for what promises to be an excellent evening's poetry. ALL WELCOME!
>
>
>
>
>*******************************************************
>
>
>AWOL
>Australian Writing On Line
>awol@ozemail.com.au
>http://www.ozemail.com.au/~awol
>PO Box 333 Concord NSW 2137 Australia
>Phone 61 2 7475667
>Fax 61 2 7472802
>
__________________________________
Mark Roberts
Student Systems Project Officer
Information Systems
University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia
M.Roberts@isu.usyd.edu.au
PH:(02)351 5066
FAX:(02)351 5081
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 12:33:39 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark Roberts <M.Roberts@ISU.USYD.EDU.AU>
Subject: H/EAR WAS Re: Ear on Saturday
>Sat. May 4th @ 2:30 (yes, PM)
>
>Robert Mittenthal
>& Rod Smith
>
>Ear Inn, 326 Spring Street, NYC
>ph 226 9060
>Not free, sort of.
I was just wondering if anybody had heard of / or contributed to Kris
Hemnesly's wonderful magazine EAR IN A WHEATFIELD (I think) which latter
became a poetry gossip/correspondance magazineH/EAR?????
__________________________________
Mark Roberts
Student Systems Project Officer
Information Systems
University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia
M.Roberts@isu.usyd.edu.au
PH:(02)351 5066
FAX:(02)351 5081
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 5 May 1996 21:25:16 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Alexander <chax@MTN.ORG>
Subject: Re: Small Press Distribution?
Small Press Distribution Inc
1814 San Pablo Avenue
Berkeley, CA 94702
510-549-3336 (phone)
510-549-2201 (fax)
>I used to be on SPD's mailing list, receive their catalog, order from
>them, etc., but haven't in a while. I can't find an address for them and
>would appreciate some one among you posting it. (There have been several
>recent mentions of SPD on the Poetics List but I haven't seen the address.)
>I'd appreciate phone and fax numbers for them too. E-mail? Thank you.
>
>Bill
>
>William Slaughter
>_________________
>wrs@unf.edu
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 11:16:06 +0000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: cris cheek <cris@SLANG.DEMON.CO.UK>
Subject: Re: Cambridge Conference on Contemporary Poetry
Hi, re - CCCP 6, in Peter's wake, not a great deal to add. I was present
for all of it but the session on magazine editing during which I drove to
Norwich to pick up a poem that David Marriott had requested (first request
I've ever done) and also listen in on some electronic treatments of weaving
machines for a forthcoming installation by Sianed Jones called 'Carthen'.
SO my editing session was perhaps more lively and enjoyable than the report
backs I got from those who stayed on in the hall.
However, most of the readings were pretty packed. Of those that Peter
didn't make or mention. Simon Perrill described other unnamed poets as
producing work 'paling into significance'. He read strongly as did Mas Abe
who I enjoyed most when he read in Japanese and Adrian Harding whose work I
didn't known and will certainly try to follow, there being something coming
and going there in a ruminative everyday consciousness gardening that I
want to read more closely.
Lisa Robertson read very confidently from 'Debbie', measured and arrowing
thickets of irony / Les Murray was unprepossessing and jovial (he had a
pretty good bat poem which went off into giggling bat language) and there
seemed to be cattle all over his writing which has left a humane trace
without setting this particular bush on fire. Ian Patterson gave us the
best Duino Elegy translation I've heard to date (I've tried to encourage
him to do the whole series and get them published, terrific work).
As usual in England the gremlin was a lack of places to go eating late at
night (meaning any time after 11!), so post-reading get downs tend to
degenerate into scurries round emptying streets for fast food or even worse
after last orders and the bars tip out.
Sunday began in the afternoon (Brian Catling, Caroline Bergvall and myself
had all protested at being expected to perform in the morning). I read
'Skin upon sKin' which will be out on CD in about 6 weeks (I know the dates
keep fading, but it's really on the way - backed with a version of the
recently published 'stranger'), Caroline read two fine recentish pieces
'The Hungry Form' and 'Don't Push It' whilst Brian read from 'Cyclops'
material alongside rough edits of videos from various version of that. What
can I say - I though we were all terrific. It's worth noting here that
many of the poets at this year's conference read from long work. In mine
and Caroline and Brian's cases the writing is versioned in various ways so
as to become 'pieces' of multi-faceted performance writing through which
aspects of peritext are frequently exploded, exploited and re-situated into
version upon version.
Harry Gilonis performed a generous and breath-stretching tribute to Sorley
Maclean using pibroche (basically bagpipe form) musical constraints
effectively (I'm looking forward to the simultaneous English-Gaelic version
Harry if you're here). Rod Dickinson is a poet well worth checking out for
those who don't already know his work. Brilliant sonic elision's using
Gaelic to punch exquisite interferent holes into the scope of his writing.
The glosses also being cogent.
Finally we had a strange (for me) mixture of Kelvin Corcoran (who's just
not a confident presenter of his own work - you know, oh-oh, I really
think that there shouldn't be any expectation on poets to have to read or
to be able to read. I know it's a way of getting around and so on (and some
awkwardnesses can be utterly compelling, but . . . any thoughts anyone?),
Alan Halsey who chose, a misjudgement in my opinion, to read Robin Hood
stories. The grouping was lifted by Pascal Monnier who sounded intriguingly
elliptoid and discursive, through my so-so French (so I'm probably
completely wrong - those might just be the features of my processing) and
I could have listened for longer than she was given.
But a good conference all in all.
love and love
cris
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 11:15:57 +0000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: cris cheek <cris@SLANG.DEMON.CO.UK>
Subject: Re: H/EAR WAS Re: Ear on Saturday
>I was just wondering if anybody had heard of / or contributed to Kris
>Hemnesly's wonderful magazine EAR IN A WHEATFIELD (I think) which latter
>became a poetry gossip/correspondance magazineH/EAR?????
Hi Mark, well mm yes. I was never in it but Kris was based in Britain where
the magazine first emerged before he split for Australia in the mid 1970s.
Other s here might be able to tell you more. I think its follow up magazine
was named 'the merry creek or nero' (?) of which I've got a copy somewhere,
but don't expect me to put a quick hand onto it. Kris was editing here at
the same time as the extraordinary Fluxshoe series / Paul Buck's excellent
'Curtains' / Allen Fisher's 'Spanner' (still in progress and about to go
net versions) / Pierre Joris' 'Sixpack' / Elaine Randall's 'Amazing Grace'.
Hey're all well worth checking out. STill exceptionally vibrant work -
in my humble estimation. Is Kris still active?
love and love
cris
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 5 May 1996 13:22:13 +0200
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jondi Keane <jondi@IPROLINK.CH>
Subject: body peotics
Henry Gould wrote <<Whether coming from the groin or the groan or the grin
I would want to withhold calling it "poetry" until I was able to grasp to
some extent what is the poetic-communicative message/massage gestalt
or whatever. Poetics IS about poetry, that by gum I'll stand-by.>>
perhaps peotics has been taken up into poetry the way testicles are taken up
into the martial artist. It is an activity which requires much learning and
dicipline but ultimately is a defensive posture based on a peculiar idea of
conservation, and from where not much productive can be done.
Thanks to Ward for the bicameral quote because we always need more ways to
think about the configurations of experience and imagination with structure,
but again I feel this book is a story, or description of how Discourse
interprets and sets up a model for understanding, and then tells it to
itself. Lyotard's "The Differend" is useful here in remembering that "A
Wrong results from the fact that the rules of the genre of discourse by
which one judges are not those of the judged genre or genres of discourse"
and states the problem as "the absence of a universal genre of discourse to
regulate..., to find, if not what can legimate judgement, the "good"
linkage, then at least how to save the honor of thinking". He is using the
legal language (the Wrong) which is a bit blown up but the point that the
terms of regimes of thought developed in discours of language with mind
brain or body are different and suffer from transportation/translation.
Texts which tell most in these matters I think are those which do not
necessarily speak of this issue, but issue from the places we have been
discussing. the extreme examples are perhaps best:
Writing from the brain, from an organ which organizes, interprets,
reticularly activtes, but also produes sounds, light and images inside
itself,observed and then set down in writing, would be Pantanjali.
Writing from the body, even from impossible places that require bodily
knowledge would be perhaps Franz Kamin's "Srcibble Death".
And Writing from a moment of crystalline indecision constructed from the
infintie possibilities of both would be the romantic moment, perhaps most
easily, Coleridge.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 13:30:47 +0000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: John Cayley <cayley@SHADOOF.DEMON.CO.UK>
Subject: Oisleand - New Cybertext
** Apologies for cross postings **
Oisleand
--- ---
Indra's Net IX
oilean is la brea lunasa do chorp
^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^
broad filling sails ocean heat island flesh
^ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^
'Oisle=E1nd' is an exploration of the
translation and transformation of one
written language into another. In its
cybertextual form (as computer software
encoding a literary object - specifically
a HyperCard stack and graphics files
which you may download as shareware) it
uses mesostic techniques to sow the text
of either original or translation within
the spelt words of the parallel text in its
corresponding language.=20
A set of 'Frozen & Painted Readings'=20
- colour screen shots which capture and make=20
clear the principles have been posted on
the Web at:
http://www.demon.co.uk/eastfield/in/oisleand.html
If you have not visited the 'Indra's Net' site
recently, please do so. There is a lot of new
material:
http://www.demon.co.uk/eastfield/in/
'Oisleand' (excuse the lack of diacritical marks
in this text announcement) was commissioned
as one contribution to a touring exhibition
of visual art / craft engagements with poetic
writing entitled 'Words Revealed'. (The
exhibition opens at the Midlands Art
Centre, Birmingham, UK, 11 May 1996.)
Apart from its visual content, the
exhibition was developed around a focus
on writing in Irish, or by Irish writers in
English.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 08:18:57 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: body peotics
In-Reply-To: Message of Sun, 5 May 1996 13:22:13 +0200 from <jondi@IPROLINK.CH>
On Sun, 5 May 1996 13:22:13 +0200 Jondi Keane said:
> Henry Gould wrote <<Whether coming from the groin or the groan or the grin
>I would want to withhold calling it "poetry" until I was able to grasp to
>some extent what is the poetic-communicative message/massage gestalt
>or whatever. Poetics IS about poetry, that by gum I'll stand-by.>>
>
>perhaps peotics has been taken up into poetry the way testicles are taken up
>into the martial artist. It is an activity which requires much learning and
>dicipline but ultimately is a defensive posture based on a peculiar idea of
>conservation, and from where not much productive can be done.
I take it this is a "slight". I'm not sure where it's issuing FROM, but I
see what it's writing TO: the solar plexus. Nevertheless, I don't think
Jondi at least in this post has addressed my previous remark: that the
idea that writing issues "from" some particular psycho-organic place
- whatever the new thrills of intellectual exploration it may seem to
provide - is already structured on some kind of unstated grid which, like
Descartes, divides body from mind. My point was that poetry takes as its
domain the "body" of the universe, and poetics is the study of what poetry
makes of it. Poetry might include toe-talk and martial arts, but toe-
talkology will not replace poetics in that field. The "talk" of the body
might be included in all the repressed or missed sensations which poetry
tries to bring to light, but once body starts talking in language it's
already entered the sphere of poetics. - Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 09:05:23 -0400
Reply-To: Robert Drake <au462@cleveland.Freenet.Edu>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Robert Drake <au462@CLEVELAND.FREENET.EDU>
Subject: visual poetry invite (forward)
<begin forwarded message>
Date: Mon May 6 00:23:02 1996
From: juanra@chasque.apc.org (Juan Ramos Alvite)
Subject: padin
AMERICAN VISUAL POETRY EXPOSITION
I am asked you to send me one or two visual poems (size 44x28 cm.
aprox. including white margins) for an exposition at the IV
Congress of the Brazilian Poetry.
This invitation is only for americans (other people are preparing
shows from other continents).
Visual poetry are works that primordially use the images of the
language-signs whatever its form or support may assume, with
semantic expression or not, with signs of other languages or not
etc.
Deadline: July 30, 1996.- Please, invite your friends
Send to: Clemente Padin-C.Correo Central 1211-11000-Montevideo
URUGUAY.
Fraternal Greetings:
Clemente PADVN.-
<end forwarded message>
lbd
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 10:04:19 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Tietjens <Tietjensc@AOL.COM>
Subject: peo ple apo ria
And Writing from a moment of crystalline indecision constructed from the
infintie possibilities of both would be the romantic moment, perhaps most
easily, Coleridge.
----
So poetics is the testicles of poetry?
----
'What has been done by people who have found themselves discussing Coleridge
has been, usually I think, to put a ring-fence round a very small part of his
thought, and say, "We will keep inside this and leave the transcendental and
the analytic discussions to someone else." But this practice results in what
is essentially a fraud.'
--I. A. Richards
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 09:22:13 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "M. Magoolaghan" <mmagoola@U.WASHINGTON.EDU>
Subject: Re: creeley quote
In-Reply-To: <199605051857.LAA23573@nunic.nu.edu>
On Sun, 5 May 1996, William Marsh - 3809183 wrote:
>
> I'd be obliged to anyone who can point me to something that investigates
> this Creeley/Stevens connection re form/content -- or more generally on
> Stevens' influence on C (and/or O).
>
> bill marsh
dear billiam:
nice to see you on the list! thanks for tracing down the form/content
quote. wrt stevens' influence on creeley, see the spring '93 special
issue of _the wallace stevens journal_, which contains an interesting
short piece by creeley called "in respect of wallace stevens" (it begins:
"i recall being very intent upon stevens in college days") as well as
responses to stevens by the likes of kathleen fraser, bob perelman,
charles bernstein, and many others.
not sure what olson thought of wally, though i'd be curious to find
out.
that's all for now--mo' later,
mm
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
I hear you say: "All that is not *fact*; it is poetry."
Nonsense! Bad poetry is false, I grant, but nothing is truer
than true poetry. And let me tell the scientific men that
the artists are much finer and more accurate observers than
they are, except of the special minutiae that the scientific
man is looking for.
--Charles S. Peirce, Collected Papers 1.316
Michael Magoolaghan
mmagoola@u.washington.edu
Webpage: http://weber.u.washington.edu/~mmagoola
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 12:41:32 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Comments: Converted from PROFS to RFC822 format by PUMP V2.2X
From: Alan Golding <ACGOLD01@ULKYVM.LOUISVILLE.EDU>
Subject: Visual page; Stevens and Creeley
Associate Professor of English, U. of Louisville
Phone: (502)-852-5918; e-mail: acgold01@ulkyvm.louisville.edu
Another anthology of interest for anyone pursuing questions of page design: L.
C. Breunig's *The Cubist Poets in Paris* (U of Nebraska P, 1995?)--first part
of the century, as you'd expect from the title, non-English language with
facing translations.
Bill Marsh: on Stevens and Creeley--Albert Gelpi edited an essay collection
some years ago, *Wallace Stevens: The Poetics of Modernism* (Cambridge, 1985),
in which Michael Davidson and I both have essays that touch on the
Stevens-Creeley connection in passing without pursuing in depth. Still, you
might find the general context of the essays relevant to your questions.
Michael's piece is on Stevens and contemporary poetics, mine is on
intersections between the allegedly opposed (or so they tended to be seen
then) Stevens and Objectivist lines, via a discussion of WS and Zukofsky
(something on which our listmate, Mark Scroggins, has done more recent and
fine work).
Alan
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 12:57:03 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: apopleptic in peoria, is not
so what then is not writing through the body.
I take it a natural history of the senses is not writing through the body
tho empire of the senseless might be.
that is [gestalt and] not compartmentality.
is not professional wrestling fixed.
--Jd
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 13:02:46 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: apoplectic in mississippi
sorry lost my dialeptic anybody seen her?--Jd
(I mean my diallel)
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 13:27:31 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: Re: blocking poems
Ernst Van Alphen, thats it, thanks.
From my understanding, this thread was not only asking about cubism,
concrete poetry and the like, but also about transferrence between the
visual experience and its subsequent translation onto the page. This
residue of activity apparent in the finished product is freshly
captured within the Alphen book. This text also seques into the "body"
thread, for Bacon believed the human body was in a sense a filter,
apart from its other attributes, abbreviating experience into
intensity.
Be Well.
David Baratier
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 14:16:08 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Matthew S Sackmann <msackma@MAILHOST.TCS.TULANE.EDU>
Subject: I'm sorry...
In-Reply-To: <Pine.A32.3.92a.960506091246.199331A-100000
@homer29.u.washington.edu>
could someone please take me off this list, im going home for the summer.
id still like to continue receiving the discussions so if someone could
send me the info to subscribe at lsackma@UOFT02.UTOLEDO.EDU it would be
greatly appreciated. Thanks A lot!!!!
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
matt
"Jesus was all virtue, and acted from impulse, not from rules."
-William Blake
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 12:42:14 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: beckett
Just back from the Beckett festival in Victoria. Saw 21 plays! Heard a lot
of papers, but the papers were not as interesting as the productions. For
me the highlight was Fred Neumann's performance in _Worstward Ho_. Of
course, one is lucky to see it, because he is so good, and because other
actors are afraid to do it because Neumann has sett his stamp on it.
Contorski was there with his Beckett haircut and too-short pants, nice
touch, that.
"Toujours est-il que je redoute le signal de l'horrible petite trompette."
-- Cocteau
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 19:45:46 -0400
Reply-To: pbeidler@epas.utoronto.ca
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Paul Beidler <pbeidler@EPAS.UTORONTO.CA>
Organization: University of Toronto
Subject: L E G A C I E S conference cfp
Comments: To: 18th Century Interdisciplinary Discussion <C18-L@PSUVM.PSU.EDU>,
aesthetics <aesthetics@indiana.edu>,
cfp <cfp@dept.english.upenn.edu>,
e-grad <e-grad%rutvm1.bitnet@pucc.Princeton.edu>,
nassr-l <nassr-l@wvnvm.wvnet.edu>,
phil-lit <phil-lit@tamvm1.tamu.edu>,
VICTORIA 19th-Century British Culture & Society
<VICTORIA@IUBVM.UCS.INDIANA.EDU>
Call for Papers:
L E G A C I E S
A cross-disciplinary conference hosted by the Nineteenth-Century Group
at the University of Toronto
September 27-29, 1996
Our keynote speakers are Sally Mitchell (Temple University) and Michael
Millgate (University of Toronto).
The theme of this year's conference is the cultural manifestations of
inheritance in the period 1780-1901. Possible topics might include, but
are not limited to:
* Narrative, Genre and Tradition
* Heredity and Genetics
* Initiation and Baptism
* History, Memory and Identity
* Patronage and the Arts
* Wills and Bequests
* Change, Stasis and the Law
* Convention and Invention
* Original Sin and Adamism
We encourage papers and panels that investigate literature, history,
drama, fashion, economics, music and the performative arts, theology,
philosophy, the law, technology and industrial design, politics and science
in the period from graduate students, faculty and independent scholars.
Please send 300-500 word abstracts (3 copies) postmarked no later than
June 1, 1996 to:
Legacies Conference Committee
Graduate Department of English
University of Toronto
7 King's College Circle
Toronto, Ontario
M5S 1A1
Abstracts and queries can also be e-mailed to Ann-Barbara Graff at
ann.graff@utoronto.ca or faxed to 416-978-5184.
Please see our web site for updates:
http://www.chass.utoronto.ca:8080/~pbeidler/legacies.htm
/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\/*\
"It is our nature to wish to continue our systems and thoughts to
posterity through our own offspring." (_The Last Man_, Mary Shelley)
"I have often thought that property, coming in such a way, was a curse,
and that the parties could have been far better off, had the parent had
merely a blessing to bequeath them from his or her lips, instead of a
will for them to dispute and wrangle over. " (_Advice to Young Men_,
William Cobbett)
"Women are generally thought to possess sweeter voices than men,
and as far as this serves as any guide we may infer that they first
acquired musical powers in order to attract the other sex. But if so,
this must have occurred long ago, before the progenitors of man had
become sufficiently human to treat and value their women merely as
useful slaves." (_The Descent of Man_, Darwin)
"The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn, and Egypt,
Greece, Rome, Gaul, Britain, America, lie folded already in one man."
("History," Emerson)
Outward respect of word and manner, may and must be shown even
though the parent be drunken and depraved. The girl should strive to
show respect. Father and mother are honourable names even though the
bearers thereof fail to act up to them.
Anonymous, _Girls: Their Work and Influence_
(1879)
(a religious tract for females of the lower
classes)
--
"I am uneasy to approve of one object and disapprove of another; call one
thing beautiful, and another deform'd; decide concerning truth and
falsehood, reason and folly, without knowing upon which principles I
proceed. I am concern'd for the condition of the learned world, which lies
under such a deplorable ignorance in all these particulars. I feel an
ambition to arise in me of contributing go the instruction of mankind, and
of acquiring a name by my inventions and discoveries. These sentiments
spring up naturally in my present disposition; and shou'd I endeavour to
banish them, by attaching myself to any other business or diversion, I
_feel_ I shou'd be a loser in point of pleasure; and this is the origin of
my philosophy." David Hume, _A Treatise of Human Nature_ I.iv.7.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 18:20:36 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Shaunanne Tangney <st@SCS.UNR.EDU>
Subject: Re: queery
In-Reply-To: <318E8F2A.6CB4@epas.utoronto.ca>
hello all--
i will be teaching creative writing in the fall, and would very much like
to take a look at june jordan's poerty for the people "textbook"--but i
can't find it in books in print--it isn't out of print, is it??! does
anyone out there know the exact title?--this might help my search!
thanks so much,
shaunanne
ps--i know this is a poetics list, but i also have to teach fiction in
this calss--anyone got any ideas for a "text" here?
st
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 22:20:14 -0400
Reply-To: knimmo@ic.net
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Kurt Nimmo <knimmo@MAIL.IC.NET>
Subject: Poetry website
Hi, folks...
I'm new to the list. Still lurking, checking out the discussion.
If you have a web browser (preferably Netscape 1.2 or later),
please feel free to check out the following poetry website:
http://ic.net/~knimmo/pngon01.htm
We are also accepting submissions for future issues.
Thanks...
Kurt Nimmo
knimmo@ic.net
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 23:11:03 -0400
Reply-To: Robert Drake <au462@cleveland.Freenet.Edu>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Robert Drake <au462@CLEVELAND.FREENET.EDU>
Subject: Re: Book Announcement (forward)
Cydney thought this might not have gotten through... apologies if
it's a repeat... lbd
<begin forwarded message>
New from Avec Books
_Channel-Surfing the Apocalypse_
(a day in the life of the fin-de-millennium mind)
by Susan Smith Nash
/Fiction/ Women's Studies/Cultural Studies
_Channel-Surfing the Apocalypse_ is a collection of outrageously funny,
poignant and insightful no-holds-barred fictions from a writer who
characterizes them as,"stories about and from women driven mad by
dysfunctional relationships." And yet, the stories are more than
installations in the current soap-opera of gender wars. They peel
the armor off of the souls of men and women facing the millennium
and attendant apocalyptic madness. Like all fiction written
during times of universal insanity, these stories are not mad diaries.
These "furious fictions" are intensely sane and personal, and they leave
the reader with a sense of restored perspective and good humor. They appeal
to readers who are interested in gender issues, women's studies,
experimental fiction and cultural criticism. Selections from the book
have been awarded a Gertrude Stein Award for Innovative Writing. A
critically-commended video based on a chapter from the book, which
features the author and her voice , is also available.
"Susan Smith Nash's book Channel-Surfing the Apocalypse is very
interesting. It is certainly a new approach to an area of writing. . .
can I call it fiction(?). You cannot read this book without paying
attention. . .it demands attention...demands a double-take. Susan
Smith Nash deserves such attention. She has created an up-to-the-minute
post-AIDS statement."
--William S. Burroughs
"Insistently parochial, the voice in this book is Oklahoma unalloyed. The
apocalypse arrived early here, on television, and thi fertile, lyrical,
creepy, ovidian book is its detonating antiphon. Remarkable."
--Diane Middlebrook
"Susan Smith Nash is a reporter commissioned by the muses, a kind of
higher intensity poet-version of Christiane Amanpour, reporting live from all
the intimate and mysterious combat zone that fill our world with
terror." --Robert Kelly
"The works of Susan smith Nash are fireworks, with much more than flash.
They are bold, funny, and brilliant, illuminating corners of the literary
landscape that have been dark for a long time."
--Beth Joselow
Pub. Date: May 2, 1996. ISBN: 1-880713-06-3. Price $11.95. 192 pages.
Perfect Bound. Distributed to the trade by Baker & Taylor; Bookpeople and
Small Press Distribution. For Direct orders: Avec Books, P.O. Box 1059,
Penngrove, CA 94951 (please add $1.50 shipping). For additional information,
contact Cyney Chadwick: chadwick@crl.com.
Note to booksellers: a discount is available with prepayment.
-------------------------------
<end forwarded message>
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 01:00:40 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: beckett
Dear George Bowering---
tell me more about BECKETT, please! (cs)
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 16:51:11 JST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: John Geraets <frank@DPC.AICHI-GAKUIN.AC.JP>
Subject: Re: Tasmania
It's a little quieter now. The thing that's
struck me (not a victim thing) more than the
tragedy in Tasmania, was how attentions is
made to function nowadays.
The interesting question is what attracts our
talking to each other.
John Geraets
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 01:31:40 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: writing through
Last week while at the Beckett conference I couldnt do number two. I sat
there and sat there, saying "I can't go. I'll go." Only when I got home did
I go out to compost the garden , squatted there for a while, and moved
around, managing to spell out three longish words. Is that called writing
through the body?
"Toujours est-il que je redoute le signal de l'horrible petite trompette."
-- Cocteau
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 01:31:47 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: Creeley::Boulez??
> Creeley uses sound like Pierre Boulez.
Try Ch. Parker.
"Toujours est-il que je redoute le signal de l'horrible petite trompette."
-- Cocteau
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 09:40:35 GMT0BST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Peter Larkin <LYAAZ@LIBRIS.LIB.WARWICK.AC.UK>
Organization: UNIVERSITY OF WARWICK LIBRARY
Subject: (Fwd) Cambridge Conference of Contemporar
Forwarded message:
From: Self <LIBRIS/LYAAZ>
To: Poetics@ubvm>cc.buffalo.edu
Subject: Cambridge Conference of Contemporary Poetry
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 09:38:42
Though I missed his reading, I can confirm cris's impression that
Adrian Harding is someone to look out for. I picked up some of his
work at the event, and (assuming it's the same person) I have been
reading a fascinating essay by him on "Melancholy and Technology", a
welcome break from too much cyberspace euphoria. As for cris's
comments on confidence and performance, there does too often seem to
be a general space of sag from which poets offer themselves. The
performable aspect of any poem ought to make more of a difference to
that predicament than it does. There may be more UK sag than US.
Peter
Peter Larkin Philosophy & Literature Librarian
University of Warwick Library,Coventry CV4 7AL UK
Tel:01203 524475 Fax: 01203 524211
Email: Lyaaz@Libris.Lib.Warwick.ac.uk
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 07:28:08 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: query re: the queering of Sapphics
In-Reply-To: <199605070409.AAA09036@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
But did you ever try to look up that passage from "Sappho" that leads off
_Dictee_; Nothing in this book should be taken at "face" value --
especially the faces in it --
??
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 10:31:27 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: Booglit Benefit Reading
Featured Readers:
Todd Colby
David Baratier
Bill Luoma
Also Chris Stroffolino and Chris Butters are slated.
Booglit will be publishing a number of limited edition chapbooks for
the reading, including _Compartments (a short run)_ by David Baratier
@ Luna Park
Friday May 31st @ 7:30 pm
249 Fifth Ave.
Brooklyn, NY
(Between Carroll Street and Garfield Place)
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 10:04:51 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Douglas Messerli <djmess@SUNMOON.COM>
Subject: special sales from Sun & Moon Press
Sun & Moon Press announces some very special sales for
participants in the Poetry List:
RIBOT 1, 2 and 3 (regularly $9.95 an issue, for $4.00
an issue)
Ribot, edited by Paul Vangelisti, has become one of the
most significant new poetry magazines.
Issue 1 contains new work by Dennis Phillips, Nathaniel
Tarn, Todd Baron, Martha Ronk, Norma Cole, Enzo Cucchi,
Amelia Rosselli, Amiri Baraka, Adriano Spatola, Gottlieb
Kasper, Douglas Messerli, and Luigi Ballerini
$4.00
Issue 2 contains work by Sam Eisenstein, Mac Wellman, Amiri Baraka,
Frank Chin, Ray DiPalma, Nick Piombino, Dennis Phillips,
Robert Crosson, Adonis, Guy Bennett, Todd Baron, Michael
Clinton, Jerry Rothenbergh, Diane Ward, Martha Ronk, Leland
Hickman, Douglas Messerli, and George Herms
$4.00
Issue 3 has new writing by Ameila Rosselli, Bruce Andrews, Ray
DiPalma, Charles Bernstein, Felisberto Hernandez, Leslie
Scalapino, Norma Cole, Dennis Phillips, Rodrigo Toscano,
Will Alexander, Gottlieb Kasper, Nick Piombino, Cristina Peri
Rossi, Sheila Murphy, Spencer Selby, Marshall Reese,
Martha Ronk, Fernando Sorrentino, and many others.
$4.00
Sun & Moon is also offering, for a special, limited time,
FROM THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CENTURY: A NEW AMERICAN POETRY
1960-1990
very slightly damaged copies (corners slightly bent) for only
$5.00; the regular price is $29.95.
All orders are the quoted price plus $1.00 shipping and handling.
Please order from our website: http://www.sunmoon.com
or through our E-mail page: djmess@sunmoon.com
We will bill you.
Thanks, Douglas Messerli
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 14:22:51 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Comments: Converted from PROFS to RFC822 format by PUMP V2.2X
From: Alan Golding <ACGOLD01@ULKYVM.LOUISVILLE.EDU>
Subject: Jordan
Associate Professor of English, U. of Louisville
Phone: (502)-852-5918; e-mail: acgold01@ulkyvm.louisville.edu
Shaunanne--D'you mean her collection of political essays, *Technical
Difficulties*? (Virago, 1993 in my edition). Maybe not. Then there's the essay
that prefaces *Passion* (Beacon, 1980), called "For the Sake of a People's
Poetry: Walt Whitman and the Rest of Us."
Alan
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 17:27:17 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Bernstein <poetics@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: Reading 5/17 NYC
Ann Lauterbach
Charles
Bernstein
Bruce Andrews
will be reading at the
ICHOR GALLERY
127 West 26th Street
(Manhattan)
Friday May 17 at 8:30pm
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 18:17:31 GMT
Reply-To: Samuel_R._Truitt@tunanet.com
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Comments: RFC822 error: <W> Incorrect or incomplete address field found and
ignored.
From: "Samuel R. Truitt" <Samuel_R._Truitt@TUNANET.COM>
Organization: tunanet
Subject: Re: creeley quote
A poem is never more than the gap between its form and its content.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 14:24:14 GMT+1300
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: Creeley::Boulez??
Try
Miles
Davis
and soon
it will
be Mr
Creeley's
70th
birth-
day.
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 22:58:41 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Bob Holman <Nuyopoman@AOL.COM>
Subject: USOP
Aldon, thanks for USOP commentary few days back. More expansive is what you
seek, and I m certainly with you there, whether in the Olsonian or simply in
more varied poetics. Mandate for USOP was a geographic, cultural AND
aesthetic landscape exploration, not only for the series but each half-hour
segment, and in that order. The themes of the shows also dictated,
considerably, the pool of poems. Much of the more expansive poetry is not
about anything. The final show ( The Word) allowed for some, with Carla H,
Eigner, and Creeley. Tried hard for a Susan Howe piece... among others.
Maureen Owen was to be in a sixth show, cut for funds (she s in the Abrams
book.)
Carter, far from being elder statesman of poetry, is in the series, to me, an
Everypoet. Hey, if Jimmy can do it etc. I do like his poem, one of several in
his _Always a Reckoning_ with an ironic fillip that pushes off his
sentimentality.
As for Barbara Kruger ( always nice to give Barbara Kruger even more credits
than she already has ), her propaganda verbiage was art analogue for director
Mark Pellington -- his videoizaton of her pieces, did it make them more/less
poems ?, is a question. As for implication that this should have been more
alternative -- poetry itself is so alternative, marginalized, that we
needed all the name recognition we could find to get whatever attention we
did get. As I ve mentioned, PBS itself refused to broadcast nationally,
shying away from content, and only half the stations nationwide have aired
the series so far. Kruger (and Jenny Holzer, from show 5 again), in a poetry
show, are they now poets? where does TV end and art/design/poem begin? Or is
video simply a means of transmission of the poem? It gave a luster, too, and
they gave spirited collaborative energy, not to be discounted. Our original
idea of having various directors, allowing the curent vidPo makers to
participate was nixed by ITVS, our funder: they felt strongly that it would
take a single director to pull the porject together.
The McCann/Harris reference ( Try to make it Real/Compared to what ) is most
applicable -- it was the theme song for the WNYC-TV series poetry Spots I
produced for six seasons.
I m with you for more expansive future editions. Write/call your PBS stations
and ask for them to show/repeat USOP. Or just bug em for more po. Current
plans at washington Square Films are to produce single poem videos with
director/poet collaborating, then form shows later. The floor is open for
backchannel nominations.
FYI:
Josh Blum, the other producer of USOP, and I will be on the Hot Seat at Steve
Cannon s Tribes Gallery, 285 E. 3rd (C-D) in NYC on Sun, May 19, 5-7. A
benefit for Steve s gathering of the Tribes mag, we ll show various segments
and get assassinated by the audience. As Ashbery says, Purists will object.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 00:16:29 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: USOP
Bob H.---I did see the first three USOP shows. I tended to like the second
and third ones better than the first. Perhaps this is because I became
used to the format by the second show, but also that there was more of
the urban poetry of protest in the second and third segments and seemed
to be less of the country stuff (Okay, I must acknowledge my subjective
biases here). I kept thinking "wow, what is going on in the minds of the
country folk when they hear these city folk" because the "value systems"
are so different, but then I shouldn't be a city snob (especially considering
I haven't lived in a city now for 4 years). Anyway, no point repeating
the critiques of lack of variety others have made. I did watch it with
two ex-students of mine and they dug it (though not as much as POETRY IN MOTION ) I wish there would have been more of LORD BUCKLEY. My students really
liked Matt Cook. Leonard Cohen was a surprise, as was Thylias Moss (i
would have expected less of a slammy type voice from her). John Wright's
Bob_Newhart deadpan delivery was interesting. The money channel graphics
were interesting. "tumbling like love through a rich man's fingers"
"i'm stubborn as the garbage bags time cannot decay"....
PINA's poem which said the opposite in english of what it said in
spanish too. Jim Northrop's thing about the shrink commiting suicide...
even Dennis Cooper---"SO BORED THEY BEG TO BE BEATEN" and the poem
about the IT'S SO HOT TODAY, and the two poems about wanting to wake
up at what tom waits would call "the crack of noon"....I didn't much
care for the poet who wrote about stealing her sister's fattening food
though..... Looking forward to parts 4 and 5. Chris S.
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 21:27:20 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: the sound of Creeley
>George, when you wrote:
>>In the court-
>>yard at midnight, at
>>
>>midnight. The moon is
>>locked in itself, to
>>
>>a man a
>>familiar thing.
>>
>>, without singing it, singing it.
>
>I did a double take, having just this morning sent off a review of some Bill
>Manhire books that quoted this poem as an example of Creeley's influence. Near
>the beginning of the review I wrote this re Manhire's "singing":
>
>----------------
>
>The iconography of song has always been important in Manhire's poetry, and it
>is surprising that this has been little mentioned until recently. The titles of
>both <i>Sheet Music</i> and <i>My Sunshine</i>, and the guitar on the cover of
>the latter, make this connection explicit, and songs appear throughout <i>My
>Sunshine</i>, particularly in its third section.
>
--etc
>Tom Beard.
That is amazing but not surprising, eh? Only time I met Bill Manhire was
when my friend Tony Bellette took me to meet him for lunch somewhere
upstairs in Wellington. Bill wasnt singing. He wasnt talking, either. It
was explained to me that he often sits silently. I like his poetry fairly
well, though, and was glad to meet him. At the time I was trying to get
over hearing an hour of Sam Hunt performing his verses.
"Toujours est-il que je redoute le signal de l'horrible petite trompette."
-- Cocteau
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 21:26:01 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Thomas Bell <tbjn@WELL.COM>
Subject: threw the body
two other perspectives on how and what we go through in writing and
reading the body through poetry (or petry through the body)?
tom
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Tue, 7 May 1996 17:51:01 EDT
From: Leo Goldberger <gberger@xp.psych.nyu.edu>
To: Multiple recipients of list PSYART <PSYART@NERVM.NERDC.UFL.EDU>
Another reply to John Knapp. May I point out that the word "constructivist"
is, I think, being used in two ways? John is using it to summarize the
position often heard in litry circles these days, that we are "constructed"
by our culture. Leo Goldberger is pointing to its psychological usage,
which he explains. --Best, Norm
----------------------------Original message----------------------------
But are there, indeed, folks out there who assert or believe that the
constructivist perspective is sufficient onto itself?
There is, after all, the realm of "facticity" (including the biological
as well as the geographical) which, at least, must
serve as a starting point for any interpretive "construction".
At issue is meaning making: what we as cultural creatures "make" out of
a given set of facts, within a given set of contexts-- be the facts
"temperament", "height", or an earthquaque.
This discussion reminds me a bit of the old debate in academic psychology
between the traditional "pure perception" theorists vs. the "new look"
writers on perception. The latter researchers had discovered that needs
and motives can influence even the most elementary aspects of perception,
including size judgment, thus casting some doubt on the "veridical"
"autochtonous" factors of the pure perceptionist. For example a hungry
subject was more inclined to overestimate the size of a dime than a sated
subject. Of courses the kicker in all of this was that the variation
around the actual (factual) size as measured by a standardized ruler was
quite limnited. There was a range of invariance, in other words, within
which subjective, interpretive factors held sway (not large enough to
really create problems with the notion of "reality contact".
On Mon, 6 May 1996, knapp
john v wrote:
> John Knapp with a useful admonition--we psac types should be considering
> genetic studies among other psychologies relative to our shenanigans.
> --Best, Norm
> ----------------------------Original message----------------------------
>
> For some of you who may be interested in psychologies other than
> Psychoanalytic, you may wish to read another book that discusses
> identities and the concepts of self indirectly by looking at genetics and
> temperament from the point of view of experimental psychology. The book
> is Jerome Kagan's *Galen's Prophecy* (New York: Basicbooks, 1994), a
> summary of his investigations over the last decade or so. Much of what he
> discusses makes clear to any open-minded reader that constructivist
> coecepts of the self, like so many other fads in humanistic study, is
> merely one way and only one way of looking at such complicated creatures
> as ourselves. Like it or not, some of us are born with temperamental
> qualities that are not "constructed" but innate. Their expression may be
> varied somewhat by the environment (society), but only to a point.
> Commonsensically, those of us who inherit the genes to help make us 5' 9"
> as adults are probably NOT going to become NBA stars who average, say, 6'
> 6''no matter how much we want to blame the problem on "social construction."
>
> I strongly recommend looking at the work of Kagan and his associates. It
> could be useful for psycho-analytic oriented literary critics to begin
> looking more closely at human genetics and work in experimental psychology
> as readily and as easily as they do "constructivism."
>
> Cheers,
>
> JVK
>
>
> *******************************
> John V. Knapp *
> 330 Reavis Hall, Dept. of *
> English; *
> Northern Illinois University, *
> Dekalb 60115 *
> (815) 753-6632 *
> tb0jvk1@corn.cso.niu.edu *
> *******************************
>
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 00:55:54 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Walter K. Lew" <WKL888@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: query re: the queering of Sapphics
Aldon Nielsen asked re: Sappho quotation at beginning of Theresa Hak Kyung
Cha's DICTEE:
>But did you ever try to look up that passage from "Sappho" >that leads off
>_Dictee_; Nothing in this book should be taken at "face" value
ALDON, read what I said in the very next sentence of my message!! that "On
the other hand ... the Sappho quotation is faked". Back in 1991, I spent
days trying to track down a Sappho fragment that might even begin to resemble
the "quotation" and couldn't find anything. Maybe someone out there with good
classical training will have better luck...please inform us when you do. The
lines in the DICTEE epigraph are:
"May I write words more naked than flesh,
stronger than bone, more resilient than
sinew, sensitive than nerve."
NOTE: Prof. Shelley Sunn Wong in her essay on DICTEE thanks a Cornell U.
sophomore for informing her that the Sappho epigraph is apocryphal. That
student had been in the Asian American literature course I taught as a
visiting lecturer at Cornell the year before, didn't know Sappho from Harpo,
and got the information from one of my lectures. Maybe it was just a
statement made to Shelley with no intention of brown-nosing appropriation,
but MAYBE it is related to the fact that when I returned to campus the next
year for a visit she didn't return my greeting when I saw her by coincidence
as she passed me on a stairway. "Oh," I added earnestly and in haste (there
was quite a crowd of students going by), "I began to write a letter back [to
the friendly letter she'd sent me during summer vacation], but I never got
around to finishing and sending it off!" "Yeah, SURE!" she crackled and just
went down to the next floor. Jeez, I really had meant to finish it...
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 01:51:55 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Smith <CharSSmith@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: special sales from Sun & Moon Press
I'll take a 'damaged' copy of _Other Side_ for $5.00, along with issues 2 & 3
or Ribot for $4.00 each. Thanx!
Ship & bill to:
Charles Smith
2135 Irvin Way
Sacramento, CA 95822
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 07:59:04 +0000
Reply-To: William.Northcutt@uni-bayreuth.de
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Comments: Authenticated sender is <bts403@btr0x1.hrz.uni-bayreuth.de>
From: William Northcutt <William.Northcutt@UNI-BAYREUTH.DE>
Subject: George Bowering's Garden Graffffffittttii
George B. rules!!!
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 00:34:24 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: mikl-em <mike@KID-LINEAR.TAYLOR.ORG>
Subject: a sighter lide of a terious sopic
there is a poetic in the prosaic but it is not here...
>From daemon Mon May 6 05:36:33 1996
X-Delivery-Notice: SMTP MAIL FROM does not correspond to sender.
X-Sender: erben@satie
MIME-Version: 1.0
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Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.93.960506082419.12473A-100000@satie>
Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 08:26:02 -0400
Reply-To: A discussion of Jacques Derrida and Deconstruction
<DERRIDA@CFRVM.CFR.USF.EDU>
Sender: A discussion of Jacques Derrida and Deconstruction
<DERRIDA@CFRVM.CFR.USF.EDU>
From: "David Erben (Art)" <erben@SATIE.ARTS.USF.EDU>
Subject: Contest winners (fwd)
To: Multiple recipients of list DERRIDA <DERRIDA@CFRVM.CFR.USF.EDU>
From: Denis Dutton <FINA012@cantva.canterbury.ac.nz>
To: philosop@majordomo.srv.ualberta.ca
Subject: Contest winners
The PHIL-LIT/_Philosophy and Literature_ Bad Writing Contest:
Results for round two.
The entries for the second run of the Bad Writing Contest have now
been tabulated, and we are pleased to announce winners. But first a
few tedious words. There is no question that we have better--if that's
how to put it--entries than the last time we ran the contest. Some of
the entries are stunning, and we think almost all of them deserve a
prize of some sort.
This is not to say that much of the writing we would consider "bad" is
necessarily incompetent. Graduate students and young scholars
please note: many of the writers represented have worked years to
attain their styles and they have been rewarded with publication in
books and journal articles. In fact, if they weren't published, we
wouldn't have them for our contest. That these passages constitute
bad writing is merely our opinion; it is arguable that for anyone
wanting to pursue an academic career should assiduously imitate
such styles as are represented here. These are you role models.
First prize goes to David Spurrett of the University of Natal in South
Africa. He found this marvelous sentence--yes, it's but one
sentence--from Roy Bhaskar's _Plato etc: The Problems of Philosophy
and Their Resolution_ (Verso, 1994): "Indeed dialectical critical
realism may be seen under the aspect of Foucauldian strategic
reversal--of the unholy trinity of Parmenidean/Platonic/Aristotelean
provenance; of the Cartesian-Lockean-Humean-Kantian paradigm,
of foundationalisms (in practice, fideistic foundationalisms) and
irrationalisms (in practice, capricious exercises of the will-to-power
or some other ideologically and/or psycho-somatically buried source)
new and old alike; of the primordial failing of western philosophy,
ontological monovalence, and its close ally, the epistemic fallacy with
its ontic dual; of the analytic problematic laid down by Plato, which
Hegel served only to replicate in his actualist monovalent analytic
reinstatement in transfigurative reconciling dialectical connection,
while in his hubristic claims for absolute idealism he inaugurated the
Comtean, Kierkegaardian and Nietzschean eclipses of reason,
replicating the fundaments of positivism through its transmutation
route to the superidealism of a Baudrillard." It's a splendid bit of
prose and I'm certain many of us will now attempt to read it aloud
without taking a breath. The jacket blurb, incidentally, informs us
that this is the author's "most accessible book to date."
Second Prize is won by Jennifer Harris of the University of Toronto.
She found a grand sentence in an essay by Stephen T. Tyman called
"Ricoeur and the Problem of Evil," in _The Philosophy of Paul
Ricoeur_, edited, it says, by Lewis Edwin Hahn (Open Court, 1995):
"With the last gasp of Romanticism, the quelling of its florid uprising
against the vapid formalism of one strain of the Enlightenment, the
dimming of its yearning for the imagined grandeur of the archaic,
and the dashing of its too sanguine hopes for a revitalized, fulfilled
humanity, the horror of its more lasting, more Gothic legacy has
settled in, distributed and diffused enough, to be sure, that
lugubriousness is recognizable only as languor, or as a certain
sardonic laconicism disguising itself in a new sanctification of the
destructive instincts, a new genius for displacing cultural reifications
in the interminable shell game of the analysis of the human psyche,
where nothing remains sacred." Speaking of shell games, see if you
can figure out the subject of that sentence.
Third prize was such a problem that we decided to award more than
one. Exactly what the prizes will be is uncertain (the first three prizes
were to be books), but something nice will be found. (Perhaps: third
prize, an old copy of _Glyph_; fourth prize two old copies of
_Glyph_.)
Jack Kolb of UCLA found this sentence in Paul Fry's _A Defense of
Poetry_ (Stanford University Press, 1995). Together with the
previous winners, it proves that 1995 was to bad prose what 1685 was
to good music. Fry writes, "It is the moment of non-construction,
disclosing the absentation of actuality from the concept in part
through its invitation to emphasize, in reading, the
helplessness--rather than the will to power--of its fall into
conceptuality." Incidentally, Kolb is reviewing Fry's book for
_Philosophy and Literature_, and believe it or not he generally
respects it.
Arthur J. Weitzman of Northeastern University has noted for us two
helpful sentences from _The Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory
and Criticism_, edited by Michael Groden and Martin Kreiswirth
(JHUP, 1994). It is from Donald E. Pease's entry on Harold Bloom:
"Previous exercises in influence study depended upon a topographical
model of reallocatable poetic images, distributed more or less equally
within 'canonical' poems, each part of which expressively totalized
the entelechy of the entire tradition. But Bloom now understood this
cognitive map of interchangeable organic wholes to be criticism's
repression of poetry's will to overcome time's anteriority." What can
we add to that?
William Dolphin of San Francisco State University located for us this
elegant sentence in John Guillory's _Cultural Capital: The Problem of
Literary Canon Formation_ (University of Chicago Press, 1993): "A
politics presuming the ontological indifference of all minority social
identities as defining oppressed or dominated groups, a politics in
which differences are sublimated in the constitution of a minority
identity (the identity politics which is increasingly being questioned
within feminism itself) can recover the differences between social
identities only on the basis of common and therefore commensurable
experiences of marginalization, which experiences in turn yield a
political practice that consists largely of _affirming_ the identities
specific to those experiences."
And speaking of marginalization, where, you may ask, are women in
this? Aren't we being exclusionary? Indeed, it's frankly unfair that
men should have all the fun, but the gallant Canadian David Savory
found this lucid sentence in the essay "Tonya's Bad Boot," in _Women
on Ice_, edited by Cynthia Baughman: "This melodrama parsed the
transgressive hybridity of un-narrativized representative bodies back
into recognizable heterovisual codes."
Thanks to these and all the other entrants. If you didn't this time, the
next round of the Bad Writing Contest, prizes to be announced, is
now open with a deadline of September 30, 1996. So you've plenty of
time to find examples from the turgid new world of academic prose.
Details of the new contest will appear on PHIL-LIT. Winners of this
contest, watch for your prizes in the mail.
Thanks to all.
Denis Dutton
Editor
_Philosophy and Literature_
d.dutton@fina.canterbury.ac.nz
David G. Myers
Moderator
PHIL-LIT
dgmyers@tamvm1.tamu.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 08:03:27 EDT
Reply-To: Samuel_R._Truitt@tunanet.com
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Comments: RFC822 error: <W> Incorrect or incomplete address field found and
ignored.
Comments: Resent-From: Henry Gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.brown.edu>
Comments: Originally-From: "Samuel R. Truitt" <Samuel_R._Truitt@tunanet.com>
From: Henry Gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Organization: tunanet
Subject: Re: creeley quote
I wonder if anything has been done relating philosopher CS Peirce &
poetry. There's the semiotics, but I don't think Peirce himself wrote
much about aesthetics per se. I think his trichotomy theory - "First,
Second & Thirdness" - was meant in part to be an advance and revision
on the "form/matter" distinctions of scholasticism, of which these
mantras in US poetics about form/content are like an echo. It would
be interesting to see an application of the trichotomy (feeling,
actuality and law is a rough reduction) to poetry. Also, maybe a
dose of Peirce's medieval/scientific realism (very roughly, "universals
and general ideas are REAL and affect life from the FUTURE although
they don't have ACTUALITY yet they can be experimentally TESTED and
be PREDICTIVE") might throw a wrench in the pervasive (what he
might call) "nominalism" of the age (i.e. reality is a phantom of
human naming-systems predicated on the non-identity of the self
and technologies of power & desire). A consequence of Peirce's
scientific approach is that what-we-don't-know and what-we-don't-
name is nevertheless REAL - there is a real un-named out-there
which corresponds, in a way, to silence. Silence frames things
and makes it possible to talk about actualities (i.e. for example
poems as entities, gestalts, something to be considered in-itself).
Sounds kinda new critical doesn't it? Better put on my boxer
shorts & get ready for body language... - Henry Gould
----------------------------Original message----------------------------
A poem is never more than the gap between its form and its content.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 10:33:21 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Re: Jordan
I think the book in question is in print from Routledge Press, with a title
something like _June Jordan's Poetry for the People_. My understanding is
she's more the subject of the book than the author or editor.--Jorahem
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 11:32:50 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tod Thilleman <tunguska@TRIBECA.IOS.COM>
Subject: Re: scanning sag
Peter; re performance and the state of sag poets seem to bring to it, if I
understand you correctly, it is something, to me, akin to, say, actually
reading Prometheus Unbound by Shelley and not just scanning it.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 12:51:08 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: sappho and cha at cornell
hi walter, couldn't help but be amused by your anecdote abt seeing a
sophomore thanked for your idea in a colleague's paper. as a prof i've often
observed, and had the experience myself as a student back when, that students
don't realize that what they're learning is someone's intellectual property
that's being shared. they think they're learning facts that are common
knowledge once they've learned them. i've had students who've complained of
not learning anything in my class quote my lectures word for word in their
own papers, unattributed of course, because they don't remember/realize that
these were my ideas and sentences --to them, these insights are part of their
intellectual environment and free for the taking and reproducing. it's
curious. sometimes, also, i want students to credit each other in their
papers, when they use th einsights from someone else's class presentation,
for example, only to be faced with their objection that this "was not (that
other student's) idea; this is something that emerged in class discussion"
and hence common property. in general, that's just the way it is, i guess.
in college i used to think that the relationship between language and desire
was my pet thing; i was piqued to find out kristeva had written a whole book
about it! of course, i was imbibing the critical concerns of my era, my
teachers, etc, who were reading kristeva! interesting, isnt it, the concept
of intellectual property and proper credit. interesting and a bit
embarrassing, to be forced to be so proprietary about thoughts, which we also
know are shared and communally constructed/generated.
bests, maria d
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 11:56:52 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Herb Levy <herb@ESKIMO.COM>
Subject: Mandatory anouncement
As required by the welcome message of this here e-mail discussion list &
general custom, I must let you know that the book and CD-ROM version of
Microsoft's Internet Directory 96 is now out.
I worked on about 5% of it ( a little less than 200 reviews out of about
4,000). Some of these are obvious (most of the music section), some are
not (consumer information & agriculture/gardening). All the reviews (not
just mine) reflect problems of writing too quickly & corporate copy
editing, so don't go looking for too much intentional poetry here. Still,
in the cursory glance I've given it (I haven't received my copy yet, 'cause
the Mac CD-ROM version isn't ready yet) it seems as if it's at least as
good as most of the other print directories I've seen. I mean, the URLs
seem to have been proofread & some of them are interesting.
There'll be a web site with updates & new listings. When stuff gets up
there (& the search engine works) I'll post the URL.
For the updates I'm doing a wider range of topics, most arts, though NOT
literature, so if you have web sites they'd like to suggest I'd love to see
them. I can't guarantee (despite the obvious idiosyncracies of the music
section, a special case that I won't go into here) that they'll get into
the next book, but I'd love any suggestions you have on visual and/or
performing arts websites, e-mail lists, newsgroups, etc. Back channel is
probably best for these suggestions.
Unlike most such messages to the list, I offer no cheap deals on the book.
I'm not sure I'd even recommend it to most of you. It is part of the
Microsoft Bookshelf 96-97 package, though, so if you or your
office/institution buy that, you'll have it anyway. Hoo-hah.
Bests
Herb Levy
herb@eskimo.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 12:15:58 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Herb Levy <herb@ESKIMO.COM>
Subject: Mandatory addendum
Oh, yeah. As I said, I didn't write the literary sections of the Microsoft
Internet guide.
So don't blame me for the reviews of EPC or POETICS-LIST in the Microsoft
book, which includes and then tells how to sign up to receive Rif/t as if
this'll get you onto POETICS. (Hasn't this happened before a few times?)
I'll send a message to the editor (& the reviewer) that the list is closed
& shouldn't be reviewed anyway & that what is in the book is incorrect.
Though, judging from what just came over the net from Mr Sherwood re:
E-POETRY-L, maybe I shouldn't bother.
Besides, anyone digging around the POETICS-L archive at EPC (besides seeing
all of our deathless prose, stupid jokes, & rare poetry) could find out how
to subscribe easily enough.
- H
Herb Levy
herb@eskimo.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 16:06:25 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "k.a. hehir" <angelo@MUSTANG.UWO.CA>
Subject: this is just to say
In-Reply-To: <v01520d02adb66ef7e673@[166.84.199.56]>
thank you to all who gave me directions Re:blocking pomes. since the sun
refuses to shine here i haven't minded mining the library at school
rather than goofing off like any good student does for the summer.
Walter Lew pointed out Fred Wah after i threw fish and words into
the same kettle. WOW. he is my new favorite orange. i'm embarrassed that i
had never read him before. not only am i stuck between the culture of my
parent's and our new country but i also grew up in saskatchewan.
the most challenging and fun anthology of concrete poetry i have come
across so far is 'the cosmic chef' edited by bpNichol (Oberon
Press,1970).nice to know that some of those cats are active on this
list.
before i go and fix the hole where the air gets out of the back tire of my
a-to-b cycle, i'd like to leave you with what got me to thinkin' bout page
as canvas and stuff.
TRUDGE THEM ALWAYS IS
A
REPULSIVE
A MEAN
DELICATE VISION
OF BLACK
SWEET DEATH
PINK
GARDEN
cheers,
kevin
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 16:02:25 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Daniel Bouchard <Daniel_Bouchard@HMCO.COM>
Subject: solicitation
I'm looking for work for a magazine I'm starting up. It's called MASS AVE.
The first issue will be editorially grounded in "the city." Take that any way
you choose.
Send poems, reviews, poems, critiques, poems, short essays, poems,
correspondence, poems, artwork, poems, rejected doctoral theses, poems,
impressionistic prose of your particular city, neighborhood, street and or zip
code, poems, manifestoes, poems, big checks made out to me, and poems.
Send all these things and a spirit of camaraderie to:
MASS AVE
Daniel Bouchard
210 Winthrop Road
#6
Brookline, MA 02146
Give this memo to anyone who may be interested. Enclose SASE if you want your
work back. Contributors will be paid in copies. E-mail submissions acceptable
but not preferred.
daniel_bouchard@hmco.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 17:35:20 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Loss Glazier <lolpoet@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: Mackey Interview
There's a splendid interview of Nathaniel Mackey made available to us online
through the generosity of Chris Funkhouser. It's really terrific and is
available at the Electronic Poetry Center at Funkhouser's or Mackey's author
home page. This moment, it is also the EPC "Feature" selection. Click on the
"Feature" image on the NEW EPC entrance way and you'll go right to the
interview. Also at the EPC entrance, "Hotlist" contains some recent new
additions, including the great Witz 3.2 with Mark Wallace's essay "The Lyric
as Experimental Possibility". Get it while it's good at the EPC:
http://writing.upenn.edu/epc
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 18:30:17 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Matthew Gary Kirschenbaum <mgk3k@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: NEW: electronic thesis/diss site
Not poetics, not strictly, but I hope this will be of interest
to some here. Apologies if not. Thanks, --Matt
> This is to announce a new web site I have developed for on-line
> references and resources related to electronic masters theses
> and doctoral dissertations (ETDs) in the humanities, including a
> directory of such work currently in progress:
>
> http://osi.lib.virginia.edu/ediss/ediss.html
>
> If you are a graduate student now at work on an ETD, please
> stop by and fill out a short form describing your project
> (available off of the "currently in progress" page). The
> information you provide will be added to the site's on-line ETD
> directory, which I hope will serve as a resource for other
> graduate students who are in the process of seeking approval
> for such work.
>
> I'd also like to hear from anyone who might have other
> suggestions as to the content or potential uses of this site. I
> envision it as a sort of clearing-house for ETD materials,
> including pointers to on-line initiatives and guidelines,
> publications, services, archived mailing-list discussions, and
> other relevant humanities computing materials. Some of the
> pages are stretched a bit thin, as ETDs have not attracted as
> much attention as other forms of scholarly electronic
> publishing; if you know of any ETD resources that I have not
> included, please tell me about them; also, please check back from
> time to time as the site expands.
>
> Potential audiences include not only graduate students but also
> faculty who want to make informed decisions about supervising
> an ETD, as well as librarians, administrators, and publishers.
> I have tentative plans to innaugerate a mailing list devoted to
> this topic as well.
>
> Please forward this announcement as seems appropriate, and
> please excuse cross-postings.
>
> Special thanks to the University of Virginia Library's On-Line
> Scholarship Initiative and Special Collections Deptartment for
> providing server space. Comments should be sent to me at the
> address below.
>
> =================================================================
> Matthew G. Kirschenbaum University of Virginia
> mgk3k@virginia.edu Department of English
> http://faraday.clas.virginia.edu/~mgk3k Electronic Text Center
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 06:46:35 +0800
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Schuchat <schuchat@ARC.ARC.ORG.TW>
Subject: Re: sappho and cha at cornell
In-Reply-To: <960508125106_486832730@emout19.mail.aol.com>
maria, I was interested in your observation that students tend to
consider what they are taught as common property, generally accepted
facts, rather than an individual professor's intellectual property. when
I was a student I very definitely thought that what my professors were
telling me was their own opinion, not necessarily fact and certainly not
what another professor of the same subject would tell me. In fact, I
remember the moment (in a graduate seminar, so it took quite a while for
me to reach this point) when I realized that what they guy was saying was
probably not just his opinion, but the way it really was, or rather the
way that anyone who knew anything about the subject agreed that it was.
whether this attitude was personal (those who know me personally can say)
or more characteristic of the early 70s, I know I was very resistant to
the idea that my teachers, simply by virtue of being teachers, had any
privileged access to truth. if I was impressed by them, as individuals,
I tended to take what they said more seriously. this attitude probably
limited somewhat the benefit I could have derived from my extensive
education, and is no doubt one reason I eventually did leave academics.
however, since I did later later come to think of it as an adolescent
attitude, I am surprised to hear that it is not close to universal among
college students.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 20:19:36 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Loss Glazier <lolpoet@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: New EPC Home Page
I wanted also to elaborate on the *New* EPC home page. As presently
constituted, it contains five images, three large and two small. The three
large images, if clicked, lead to "Hotlist" (recently added and recommended
slots in the EPC), "Feature" (a direct connection to a truly hot new EPC
resource), the EPC banner (leads to our full home page), a tiny box which
reads "Net" (leads to a recommended outside link - at present to the
remarkable Net space of the Swedish performance poetry group, Skin to Skin
"...Skin to Skin work with the new underground expressions which are growing
stronger throughout Europe - a mixture of tribal rites, science fiction,
performance and 'no borders' multimedia...raw, simple and uncensored...
...this is good: tight, concentrated, merciless shock at a hard pulsing
tempo... _Arbetet_"), and a Linebreak logo, for some truly incredible poetry
performances/interviews housed at the EPC. "Feature" and "Net" will be
changed often, offering you some quality stuff.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 17:34:24 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: beckett
> Dear George Bowering---
> tell me more about BECKETT, please! (cs)
The festival was hosted by the University of Victoria Theatre Dept., which
is one of the best theatre departments in the country, so the papers that
were delivered were all about the plays, often about the production of
them. There was one paper on _Malloy_, but I missed it because i was at
another session of three papers on Billie Whitelaw, and I love Billie
Whitelaw. I cant remember any of the papers I was thrilled by. Apparently
the Fred Neumann address given the night before the festival got really
going was really good. In fact, there was an earthquake (5.3 on the
Richter, epicentre in Sedro Wooley, Wash.) in the middle of it. Contorski's
keynote address (one hr.) was friendly and engaging and scholarly, and he
had a Sam Beckett haircut and trousers too short, a weird homage. There
were a lot of Beckett scholars there from Florida, others from the
souteast, as well as places like Kansas and Montreal and South Dakota.
But the productions (good lord, so many of them) were a lot more
interesting. There were a few clunkers, but mostly pretty good stuff, and
sometimes 2 productions of the same play. I was disappointed that no one
did _Ohio Impromptu_. There was a company that offered it, but they didnt
make the final cut as far as the selection people went. So.
Every morning there was a room in which the radio plays were broadcast, and
a room in which the videos were shown. After waiting all these years I
finally saw "Film" and it is still wonderful. It provided one of the
instances in which you notice emblems passing from item to item. For
instance, Buster Keaton's handkerchief under his trademark porkpie hat
shoes up again on Willie in _Happy Days_ as handkerchief under straw
boater. The first plays on stage (there were two theatres, the regular
stage and the proscenium stage) were done by the Goetheanum-Buhne Players
of Switzerland, the people from the Rudolf Steiner institute. They did _Not
I_ in German, which is interesting, as Mouth sounds more forceful, less
frantic in that language. Their "Footfalls" looked beautiful, the woman in
real Beckett rags with her one arm out in front of her, palm up. Their
"Catastrophe" was excellent, buit it is not a hard play to do, except for
the victim's posture. They did "Play" and did it well, though as you can
imagine, the speed kept you from picking up the fast talk with a slight
German accent. The person doing the light was actually almost a character.
You could see her operating.
That night the troupe from SUNY New Paltz did "Quad I and II", really fast,
with beautiful shiny cloaks and cowls, in red and white and blue and gold,
except at the end, when they were all white. Fast and with good music. I
loved it, having sat back in the last row. Then in the proscenium theatre
the Pantechnicon Theatre from Pomona did "Footfalls". This was pretty bad,
with a too-young woman doing it, her steps noty always 9 paces, etc. And
she was wearing her wedding ring! Then their guy did "Piece of Monologue"
pretty well. Then their older woman did "Not I"--her speech was perfectly
clear and theatrically adept, but she chose to do it slowly, which might be
pleasant but isnt Beckett.
Next afternoon. Fred Neumann did his adaptation of "Worstward Ho." He is in
a grave with a skeleton and all; now Beckett gave him this, and no one else
has the nerve to do it. It was terrific. for me the highlight of the
festival, though I was knocked out by the new Palts "Quad." Then pone had
to make a choice between "Catastrophe" done by the University of british
Columbia players plus "Krapp's Last Tape" done by University of
Victoria---or Happy Days done by Colorado State Univ. I went to the latter
because I hadnt seen it for so long. It was pretty good, cant remember the
actors' names. Then an hour later I saw "Krapp's Last Tape" played by a
woman who represented Dickinson College and the Jean Cocteau Rep. from NY.
She is the daughter of the guy who did it an hour earlier. She played it as
a man, whole script, etc., but the voice on tape was a woman's. Interesting
genderbending. Sam wouldnt have approved. Semiotically puzzling, but let us
say, effective. I wasnt pissed off purist Beckettian. I dug it. And now my
body and brain were calling out for endless beckett. So two hours for
dinner, and then we saw university of Victoria do "Act Without Words II"
pretty well, and then the Pantechnicon people again. Now thwir guy does a
stage adaptation of "Company," an 80-minute monolgue (some on tape), and it
was a bravura perfgormance, very touching. Then the woman did "Rockabye",
and that was pretty good too. This company works with a modular adjustable
set that they bring on a truck on tour, all hinges and stuff. It works.
Next day, Sunday. The famous Neptune Theatre from Halifax, and their young
comedy troupe called Jest in Time, do a set on the reg. stage. They are, I
think, all gay, three women and one man. They do "Play" creditably, nice
and fast. Makeup isnt as interesting as the Swiss one. They do "Come and
Go." They do "Rough for Theatre I" cross-dressed, and funny. They do
"Quad", a short pre-German one, in brown and with thinner music and with
three short people and one tall; it just didnt look or sound anywhere as
good as the SUNY one. They do a well-timed "What Where" and I at last
understand the mathematics and geometrics, having only "read" it. They they
do "Nacht und Traume," which I have never seen, and it is a hurt, so
beautiful; so close to Beckettian sentimentality, so well lit, a real
theatre moment. Words fail me.
I head for the bathroom. I cant go on. I went on.
To the other theatre, where the festival was ended with a production of
"Breath", also done by the Jean Cocteau Rep. People fell out. Folks
applauded a stage with no one on it.
On the way home to Vancouver I contemplated jumping off the ferry. But I
fell asleep, right beside the kids' play room.
You should have been there. You wdnt haVE HAD TO GET by with my
subjective words.
Federman shd have been there.
..........................
"Toujours est-il que je redoute le signal de l'horrible petite trompette."
-- Cocteau
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 01:10:33 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Walter K. Lew" <WKL888@AOL.COM>
Subject: Billy Whitelaw!
Dear George Bowering,
What a summary! I am crazy about Billy Whitelaw, too. Saw her most
recently in a TV broadcast of _Charlie Bubbles_ (Liza Minelli's cinematic
debut--Who played the writer? Do you know?) I am not that familiar w
Whitelaw's career, however, can you point me to more information? Is there a
British book about her? What did the papers about her work discuss? What is
she doing now? Is there a Whitelaw fanzine? I'm sure you're beginning to
regret mentioning you went to the conference--just telegraph your
observations. Much appreciated,
Walter K. Lew
8 Old Colony Rd.
Old Saybrook, CT 06475
(860) 388-4601 (ph/fax)
WKL888@AOL.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 23:31:47 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: Billy Whitelaw!
>Dear George Bowering,
> What a summary! I am crazy about Billy Whitelaw, too. Saw her most
>recently in a TV broadcast of _Charlie Bubbles_ (Liza Minelli's cinematic
>debut--Who played the writer? Do you know?) I am not that familiar w
>Whitelaw's career, however, can you point me to more information? Is there a
>British book about her? What did the papers about her work discuss? What is
>she doing now? Is there a Whitelaw fanzine? I'm sure you're beginning to
>regret mentioning you went to the conference--just telegraph your
>observations. Much appreciated,
>
>
>Walter K. Lew
>8 Old Colony Rd.
>Old Saybrook, CT 06475
>(860) 388-4601 (ph/fax)
>WKL888@AOL.com
Well, the papers on Whitelaw were pretty well noncritical, ranging from
gossipy to comparative.
But you are in luck. In 1995 her autobiography was published. It is called
_Billie Whitelaw" Who He?_
She shows up in movies from time to time, usually things that are deemed
not international enough to be seen over here. But there is a kind of
filmography in the autobiography.
I'll give you the addresses of the three people who did papers:
Dr. Stephen Dilks, University of North Dakota (I think). He is an Englishman.
Dr. Malcolm Page, English Dept., Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C.,
V5A 1S6, Canada. (He writes a lot about modern English drama, but not very
critically)
Dr. Eric Prince. He is a director but I dont know his Univ. affiliation. He
was listed as from Scarborough, England.
..........................
"Toujours est-il que je redoute le signal de l'horrible petite trompette."
-- Cocteau
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 8 May 1996 23:44:02 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
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From: David Carl <dgcarl@UCDAVIS.EDU>
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 6 May 1996 to 7 May 1996
I know (from lurking) that people on the list are generally (understandably)
hesitant to play the "define a movement" game, but I heard someone recently
define language poetry as "that school of poetics which most consciously and
critically engages language as ideology." While this struck me as somewhat
reductive, I had a hard time formulating a response to highlight the
short-comings of the definition, and thought I might throw it out here for
people to bat around.
dgcarl@ucdavis.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 05:46:53 -0400
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From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 6 May 1996 to 7 May 1996
Dear david carll--
well, one response to that reductive definition (is there any other
kind of definition?) might be that it essentializes language.....
but then this opens up the whole "use value" question I think
Larry Price, Tenney Nathanson and Pat Philips bounced back and forth
around november '95 on this list.......cs
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 05:50:59 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
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From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: beckett
Dear george Bowering, thanks for "nothing"---cs
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 09:12:45 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
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From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: sappho and cha at cornell
schuchat:
times have changed. or maybe this is a minnesota thing again. the thing
that makes me terrifically uncomfortable about teaching is precisely being
regarded as an "authority." being a 70s person myself, i like the idea of
sitting around talking w/ students. but most of my students now (mostly
u-grads, i admit) seem to want to be told things. if they come away with a
lot of notes, they think the teacher "knows his/her stuff." a former
student, now a friend, who teaches at a private college in mn, and who also
believes in discussion-oriented classes, says she's gotten anonymous hate
mail from students saying stuff like, "we pay you to teach, so teach." also
at my institution there is a terrible gender problem as well; a female
professor will be resented for being an authority; a male deferred to --his
authority is seen as normative i.e. invisible. but it is extremely stressful
for me to be in a "leadership" role in any official capacity, in front of
people for whom i am to some extent responsible. i feel much more
comfortable among peers, or as a student myself. bests, maria d
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 07:32:30 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
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From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: bobbobbobbob
In-Reply-To: <199605080409.AAA11836@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
If you believe that more "expansive" poetry is not about anything (and
later you can tell me why you believe that), then why do you agree with
me that future editions should be more expansive? Are you adopting a
poetics of anti-aboutness??
Did ya by any chance see that John Barth essay of some years ago titled
"About Aboutness"?
Just how does something made out of language go about not be about
anything???? (which, as in painting, I would expect is considerably a
different matter from being non-representational) ["go about not be]??
my keboard writes poems to me --
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 07:49:17 -0700
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From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: Sappho and Man at Yale
In-Reply-To: <199605090407.AAA11016@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
Walter -- The second line was what I wondered about -- that is, I was
wondering if anybody else had tried to find the Sappho, because I'm not
sure how we know it's "faked" -- Any classics people out there who can
tell us fer sure??? I've been taking your former student's word, which I
now learn is your word, for this, and see no reason not to continue, but
it sure wd. be reassuring if there were absolute evidence that Cha wrote
it herself, or that it is not an "adaptation" of some sort -- As the
poet said, "I have not the Greek," so all I've done is thumb thru
translations -- not the best way to achieve certainty on such a count --
but I always was no account --
Down in New Orleans we always await the second line --
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 08:13:46 -0700
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From: "Sheila E. Murphy" <semurphy@AZLINK.COM>
Subject: Re: sappho and cha at cornell
A few thoughts in response to Maria's comments about students' expectations:
Many students and professionals pursuing professional growth seems wrapped
and rapt by the information-as-commodity syndrome. This pattern seems to
provide its own natural tiers of progression, and to offer a sense that one
is "getting somewhere" and, in addition, "gaining something."
Regardless of the truth of this pantomime, I look upon it both gently and
wryly, I guess. Sometimes it's frustrating to see rat-in-maze behaviors
when this behavior seems in conflict with engagement.
The way that I've bridged these two is by creating VERY structured exercises
that provide for the drawing out of analytical and/or integrative thought.
While group process used to be mysterious to me, it's now second nature.
And I love it. But STRUCTURE has been the point of rescue on all of this.
Sometimes I have difficulty believing the fervor with which I see people
taking notes when I offer some linear list. It's like a feeding frenzy.
But my sympathies remain in place, as I know how they participants have been
programmed.
Sheila
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 10:26:53 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Alexander <chax@MTN.ORG>
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 6 May 1996 to 7 May 1996
>I know (from lurking) that people on the list are generally (understandably)
>hesitant to play the "define a movement" game, but I heard someone recently
>define language poetry as "that school of poetics which most consciously and
>critically engages language as ideology." While this struck me as somewhat
>reductive, I had a hard time formulating a response to highlight the
>short-comings of the definition, and thought I might throw it out here for
>people to bat around.
We've had declarations that poetics is not primarily concerned with poetry,
and now we have a practice in poetry defined as a school of poetics. This is
what troubles me about this definition, even though I am not one to divorce
poetry from poetics, nor am I one to inextricably link the two. But in
specifically describing a poetry practice as a school which critically
engages language as ideology, this definition seems to make secondary
elements which I find most attractive about language poetry, which is the
foregrounding of poetry as language at play. Any definition of language
poetry which can succeed in including the playful use (& I would argue that
play is absolutely useful; I would also argue that it is ideological, but
not that ideology is the primary intent) of language in Gertrude Stein,
bpNichol, and Charles Bernstein, would gain my confidence. While one can
choose to look at all three of these in terms of critically & consciously
engaging language as ideology, I don't think this is by any means the only
lens one needs to illuminate primary aspects of the work. And I choose these
three writers only because of their diversity and their rather obvious joy
in creating language works.
charles alexander
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 06:55:00 -1000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
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From: Gabrielle Welford <welford@HAWAII.EDU>
Subject: THE MASSACRE HAS STARTED....IN BACHAJON,CHIAPAS. (fwd)
Further news from Chiapas. Yuk. Gab.
---------- Forwarded message ----------
We enclose an alert we just received from ASSOCIATED MINISTRIES
OF TACOMA,WASHINGTON. Their note requests that we distribute
this information as soon as possible due to the extreme danger of
escalation.
Associated Ministries informs us that the lines on Peacenet are
down at this time, we do not know if this is due to scheduled
maintenance or some other reason.
We add our deep concern and encourage you to distribute this as
widely as possible and send those faxes immediately.
Thank you,
The Editors of AMANECER PRESS
-----
May 5,1996
CHURCHES UNITED a project of
ASSOCIATED MINISTRIES OF TACOMA-PIERCE
1224 South I Street
Tacoma, Washington 98405 USA
Tel:(206)383-3056 FAx:(206)383-2672
e-mail: assmin@igc.apc.org
THE MASSACRE HAS STARTED....IN BACHAJON,CHIAPAS.
With these words, a few moments ago, we received information
that an armed confrontation is taking place at this time in
Bachajon, Chiapas, between the paramilitary group locally known
as "The Chinchulines" and formally known as "Youth Group" with
ties to the PRI, and indigenous from the Ejido San Jeronimo.
This paramilitary group assaulted about 300 indigenous men
and women last night, as they made their way home after a
communal assembly in San Jeronimo where the paramilitary group
lost communal elections.
This paramilitary group took over the municipality of Chilon
(a few miles from Bachajon) about 14 days ago and has kept the
civilians and human rights workers under constant verbal abuse
and threats of violence.
Neither the State nor Federal authorities have intervened in
stopping the violent actions of this paramilitary group.
At the present time, we have the confirmation of at least
one person dead and many injured. Heavily armed men have been
seen traveling by pick up truck from Chilon to Bachajon.
There is an unconfirmed report that the Church in Bachajon
belonging to the Jesuit Mission has been set on fire, we are
presently trying to confirm this but are unable to reach anyone
to do so.
This is but one more sign of the decomposition of the system
and the growing activity of the paramilitary groups in Chiapas.
If this local conflict does not have a quick political solution
it can place the Peace Dialogue in jeopardy.
This would mean a new threat of a violent confrontation at a
larger scale.
On the other hand, the Mexican Press reports today that a
vehicle belonging to MIlitary Intelligence and the Public
Security, has been following Bishop Ruiz all week very closely
and remains outside his residence.
We ask ourselves what are really the intentions of the
Mexican government?
We encourage you to send faxes to President Zedillo asking
him to intervene BRINGING ABOUT A POLITICAL SOLUTION THAT FAVORS
THE CONTINUITY OF THE PEACE TALKS.
>From USA: 011-52-5-271-1764 from Mexico:(915)271-1764
We suggest copies to: CONAI from USA:011-52-967-83136 and
CEDIAC 011-52-967-102-07 and in the US you may send them to
us at:(206)383-2672
Thank you,
THE COORDINATION OF CHURCHES UNITED OF ASSOCIATED MINISTRIES
** End of text from cdp:reg.mexico **
[The above article was distributed by the ANTIFA INFO-BULLETIN, as
Supplement 39, May 7, 1996]
* * * * *
Bay Area Coalition for Our Reproductive Rights (BACORR)
750 La Playa # 730
San Francisco, California 94121
Voice: (415) 437-4032
E-Mail: <tburghardt@igc.apc.org>
On PeaceNet visit BACORR's <women.clinicdefense> conference. For
subscription information e-mail Wendi Jones, <wjones@igc.apc.org>
BACORR text files can also be found on the following sites:
Arm The Spirit
WWW:gopher://locust.cic.net:70/11/politics/Arm.The.Spirit/BACORR
FTP: ftp.etext.org --> /pub/politics/Arm.The.Spirit/BACORR
FTP: ftp.etext.org -->
/pub/politics/Arm.The.Spirit/Antifa/Antifa.Info-Bulletin
Institute For Alternative Journalism (AlterNet)
http://www.alternet.org/an/demworks/html
gopher://gopher.igc.apc.org:70/00/orgs/alternet
*****************************************************************
BACORR: DEFENDING CLINICS, EXPOSING TERRORISM --
BECAUSE NO ONE'S GONNA DO IT FOR US!
*****************************************************************
++++ stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal ++++
++++ if you agree copy these 3 sentences in your own sig ++++
++++ see: http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/spg-l/sigaction.htm ++++
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 13:27:55 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 6 May 1996 to 7 May 1996
In-Reply-To: Message of Thu, 9 May 1996 10:26:53 -0500 from <chax@MTN.ORG>
On Thu, 9 May 1996 10:26:53 -0500 Charles Alexander said:
>specifically describing a poetry practice as a school which critically
>engages language as ideology, this definition seems to make secondary
>elements which I find most attractive about language poetry, which is the
>foregrounding of poetry as language at play. Any definition of language
>poetry which can succeed in including the playful use (& I would argue that
>play is absolutely useful; I would also argue that it is ideological, but
>not that ideology is the primary intent) of language in Gertrude Stein,
>bpNichol, and Charles Bernstein, would gain my confidence.
This would correspond (since no one else is taking me up on this thread)
with CS Peirce's category of "firstness", to which he attached aesthetics
(the "admirable in itself") in general - feeling, quality, randomness,
the unrelated pure exploding variety of nature. - H. Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 14:01:21 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Edward Foster <EFOSTER@VAXC.STEVENS-TECH.EDU>
Subject: LANSING TALISMAN!!!
The Gerrit Lansing issue of _Talisman_ just arrived: I. Gerrit Lansing
section: Lansing's "In Erasmus Darwin's Generous Light" -- Essays/New
Work by Featherston, Foster, Killian, Podgurski, Schelb, Stein, Stroffolino,
II. New Work by Albon, Alexiou (trans. Kostos), Cherkovski, Cigale,
Cornford, Davidson, Ellis, English, Featherston, Geranis (trans. Kostos),
Glazier, Henning, High, Hunt, Hunter, Kalamaras, Kalleberg, Keckler,
Kelley, Lazar, Lease, Lovell, Lubeski, Mac Low, Marshall, Mossin,
Needell, Perlman, Ramsdell, Retsov, Rubenstein, Samuels, Schwartz, Selby,
Shurin, Sobin, Stoloff, Tarn, Valente, Waldner, Wright, Yau, III.
Commentary by Boughn on Blaser and Emerson, Owens on Nash, Borkhuis on
Palmer, IV. Columns by Mobilio, Schwartxz, Shurin, and V. exchange between
Perloff and Walsh, and nine-page list of recently received (i.e., great
new books, magazines to read). A MAJOR MOMENT!!! And only $6 or subscribe
at $11/year. THESE PRICES GO UP SOON! (They have to as our costs continue
to spiral!) Please subscribe soon and often. We eschew all academic and
other support; they offer, and we do not respond politely. Talisman is
a journal for/by poets, but we desperately need your support if we are
to continue as such!!!! Talisman, P.O. Box 3157, Jersey City, NJ 07303-3157
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 15:58:48 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Edward Foster <EFOSTER@VAXC.STEVENS-TECH.EDU>
Subject: WONDERFUL NEW BOOK
Just published, arrived this minute from the printer, wonderful selection
of Geoffrey O'Brien Poems from Talisman: _Floating City: Selected Poems
1978-1996_, ISBN 1-883689-38-4, $10.50, from Talisman House, Publishers.
Available soon at the bookstores we appreciate and patronize, or quicker
with Visa/MasterCard, call 1-800-243-0138, or with $3 for pstage/handling,
write: Login Publishers Consortium/InBook, 1436 West Randolph Street,
Chicago, IL 60607. O'Brien's at the top, amazing poet, terrific book.
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 15:56:50 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: Re: LANSING TALISMAN!!!
Ed Foster:
Sean Killian or Kevin Killian?
Thanks.
David Baratier
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 17:00:09 CDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Peter Zukowski <U37753@UICVM.BITNET>
Subject: Peter Neagoe
Does anyone know of a Rumanian/American writer by the name
of Peter Neagoe? I read a short story by him, published
in _transition_ magazine and believe he published several books
of short stories, poetry, prose, and translations.
I would like to find out if there are any books in print by
him, about him, or about the Surrealist activities in which
(I believe) he was involved.
Anyone know any answers? Just respond to the list or e-mail
me.
Thank you.
Peter Zukowski
zukowski@uic.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 16:51:21 +1200
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Dan Horne <DHORNE@NZ.ORACLE.COM>
On 9th May, Sheila Murphy wrote:
"Many students and professionals pursuing professional growth seems wrapped
and rapt by the information-as-commodity syndrome."
Those of us in the info tech industry have always known and championed the
fact that information is a commodity. It used to be knowledge, but nowadays
who can know everything?
Regards
Dan Horne
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Technical Analyst
Oracle New Zealand Ltd. +64 9 309 1946
Level 16, 7 City Rd. dhorne@nz.oracle.com
Auckland, New Zealand
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed here are my own, and are not
necessarily those of Oracle Corporation.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 01:25:47 +0000
Reply-To: jzitt@humansystems.com
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Comments: Authenticated sender is <jzitt@bga.com>
From: Joseph Zitt <jzitt@HUMANSYSTEMS.COM>
Organization: HumanSystems
Subject: Re: special sales from Sun & Moon Press
Comments: To: Douglas Messerli <djmess@SUNMOON.COM>
On 7 May 96 at 10:04, Douglas Messerli wrote:
> Sun & Moon Press announces some very special sales for
> participants in the Poetry List:
> Sun & Moon is also offering, for a special, limited time,
> FROM THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CENTURY: A NEW AMERICAN POETRY
> 1960-1990
>
> very slightly damaged copies (corners slightly bent) for only
> $5.00; the regular price is $29.95.
>
> All orders are the quoted price plus $1.00 shipping and handling.
Yes! I'll go for one of these! I'm at
Joseph Zitt
Texas Instruments
8505 Forest Lane
M/S 8678 (Cube #-4144)
Dallas, TX 75243
Thanks!
---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1----------
|||/ Joseph Zitt ==== jzitt@humansystems.com ===== Human Systems \|||
||/ Organizer, SILENCE: The John Cage Mailing List \||
|/<A HREF="http://www.realtime.net/~jzitt/">Joe Zitt's Home Page</A>\|
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 09:15:12 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Bob Holman <Nuyopoman@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 8 May 1996 to 9 May 1996
In a message dated 96-05-10 00:26:21 EDT, you write:
>If you believe that more "expansive" poetry is not about anything (and
>later you can tell me why you believe that), then why do you agree with
>me that future editions should be more expansive? Are you adopting a
>poetics of anti-aboutness??
The poem is about, Aldon, but the poetry is not, is what I think I mean. And
that is the Olson expansive. As to expanding to further, as in exploding
parameters, that's wjhere I agree. And yup, everything is everything. (Again?
I think)
>Just how does something made out of language go about not be about
>anything???? (which, as in painting, I would expect is considerably a
>different matter from being non-representational) ["go about not be]??
>my keboard writes poems to me --
1. By being "about everything" 2. By "being about" language 3. My mind speaks
to me
4. I'm going to sit write down and right myself a letter (pick ONE:
abcdefghijklmnopqstuvwxyz)
Bob Holman
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 08:37:49 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: relang.
In-Reply-To: <199605100409.AAA03672@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
Years ago (I AM getting old) Ron S. offered as an acceptable definition
of a language poet: "anyone who has ever been accused of being a language
poet"
now THAT'S expansive --
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 12:58:46 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 8 May 1996 to 9 May 1996
This discussion between Aldon N. And B. Holman
about being not about
to be about or not to be about
-------
I don't think Bob was saying that
poems that aren't ABOUT something don't have any meaning....
but what he meant by ABOUT was a very particular kind of "aboutness"
______
It can't be "about" things like "consciousness" or "words"
as much as rootedness, in place or ethnic identity, and there
must be some kind of thematic consistency, PIN DOWNable....
easily.......
______
though pop songs are sometimes more of a challenge
than wild "out there" "free improv....."
------
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 13:00:50 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Edward Foster <EFOSTER@VAXC.STEVENS-TECH.EDU>
Subject: Re: LANSING TALISMAN!!!
it's _kevin_ killian in this case, david: he rewrites a hawthorne story
making "kevin" and "gerrit lansing" central figures. quite wonderful in
fact: a "thrice-told" tale. -ed
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 13:02:31 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gwyn McVay <gmcvay1@OSF1.GMU.EDU>
Subject: Re: relang.
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SOL.3.91.960510083633.4191B-100000@athens>
When did the term "L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E" poet vs. "language" poet drop out of
use? with the demise of the original L=, or just because people got tired
of typing equals signs, or what? Institutional laziness on the part of
academicians who couldn't be bothered to distinguish between the
different varieties of querzblatz poetics?
Yrs for Scrabble,
Gwyn
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 13:06:17 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Loss Glazier <lolpoet@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: 72 Hours
Just spent about 72 hours (not continuously!) in the darkest forests of
HTML. I continue to be amazed at what an extraordinarily intricate world
this is *at a technical* or writing level. (That is, like grammar, how
commands and operations mean different things at different times; how some
operations are misleading and so to be clear you must use a circumlocution -
or less-than-direct path between the trees.) This is a writing space where
the most minute movements are possible. Painfully incremental adjustments of
latitude and longitude; increments of relative positioning of both "inline"
and "floating" images; adjustments to physicality of the presentation
*itself* (do you want to specify the PROJECTED dimensions of the graphic?
what is its relation to the real dimensions of the graphic? do you wish to
adjust its number of colors, its resolution, its pixelation?) Is there a
difference in anyone's eye between the thousands of web pages that are
springing up (CNN, Ford, ATT True Savings - the announcement of this last
site really got me. As if those phone calls offering you deals on your long
distance service weren't already enough!) and a web-writing that is
different not from the obvious point of view of content but of *writing*? In
a piece of writing we also read the grammar (or misread it). Do we tend to
_read_ less when we're online? Perhaps it also took a while for people to
begin "reading" TV?
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 10:35:15 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Watts <cwatts@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 8 May 1996 to 9 May 1996
In-Reply-To: <199605100409.AAA03672@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu> from "Automatic
digest processor" at May 10, 96 00:05:20 am
Re: Billie Whitelaw: as many of you may know, she's in the Zeffirelli
version of Jane Eyre -- she plays -- Grace Poole! I only know that from
the credits at the end of the picture; couldn't recognize her while she
was on screen.
Charles Watts
cwatts@sfu.ca
"The present order is the disorder of the future" -- Saint Just, via Ian
Hamilton Finlay
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 17:26:05 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: 72 Hours
what's HTML?
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 17:46:04 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jonathan A Levin <jal17@COLUMBIA.EDU>
Subject: About about
In-Reply-To: <01I4JHXLN9TU8WWP5T@cnsvax.albany.edu>
About about: I quote William James, from "The Principles of Psychology,"
commenting on the substantive bias of language: "All dumb or anonymous
psychic states have, owing to this error [of supposing that where there is
no name no entity can exist], been cooly suppressed; or, if recognized at
all, have been named after the substantive perception they led to, as
thoughts 'about' this object or 'about' that, the monotonous word *about*
engulfing all their delicate idiosyncrasies in its monotonous sound. Thus
the greater and greater accentuation and isolation of the substantive
parts have continually gone on."
In other words, language begins to get interesting when you go around
about, as Frost might have put it. (Oh, that sounds like a challenge!)
Best,
Jonathan Levin
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 18:16:01 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tim wood <twood@CONNECT.NET>
Subject: Re: special sales from Sun & Moon Press
>On 7 May 96 at 10:04, Douglas Messerli wrote:
>
>> Sun & Moon Press announces some very special sales for
>> participants in the Poetry List:
>> Sun & Moon is also offering, for a special, limited time,
>> FROM THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CENTURY: A NEW AMERICAN POETRY
>> 1960-1990
>>
>> very slightly damaged copies (corners slightly bent) for only
>> $5.00; the regular price is $29.95.
>>
>> All orders are the quoted price plus $1.00 shipping and handling.
Put me down also:
Tim Wood
PO Box 835984 Richardson, TX 75083
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 16:57:19 -0800
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: klobucar <klobucar@UNIXG.UBC.CA>
Subject: Re: Orono Conference
I'm critical of personal requests and commentary on this list, but
I can think of no better medium, so here goes....
Some weeks ago, I noticed specific enquiries about potential bunk
mates for the Orono Conference next month. I too am hoping to save some
USD by finding a rooming partner for the duration, or at least part of
June's event. Thus a general request: anybody requiring a male roomie in
Orono please respond via my e-mail address
klobucar@unixg.ubc.ca
Hope to hear from somebody,
Thanks,
Andrew
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 21:00:24 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Eryque Gleason <eryque@ACMENET.NET>
Subject: Re: 72 Hours
once upon a time, maria d. wrote:
>what's HTML?
html stands for HyperText Markup Language or something very much like that.
it's one of the types of computer code that is used to make web pages.
You can do all sorts of nifty things with it if you know what you're doing,
or even if you don't. it's a pretty rudimentary system. if you've got a
terminal around with netscape or mosaic, you can look at
http://www.cnw.com/~drclue/Formula_One.cgi/HTML/HTML.html
which is dr. clue's infobahn html guide and has much more info than i do.
if you don't have a graphical web browser like netscape around you may have
a text only browser like lynx available, but with lynx you can't see all
the cheesy graphics dr. clue put on his page. maybe someone else knows the
url of a text-based info site?
hope this helps!
eryque
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 18:30:07 +0100
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Kevin Killian <dbkk@SIRIUS.COM>
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 8 May 1996 to 9 May 1996
>Re: Billie Whitelaw: as many of you may know, she's in the Zeffirelli
>version of Jane Eyre -- she plays -- Grace Poole! I only know that from
>the credits at the end of the picture; couldn't recognize her while she
>was on screen.
>
>Charles Watts
>cwatts@sfu.ca
This is Kevin Killian. I will never forget Billie Whitelaw in "Night
Watch," the US-financed thriller made in London around 1975? or so? where
she is the other woman Lawrence Harvey loves and so they both try to drive
Elizabeth Taylor crazy, and Taylor wears the most insane nightdress you've
ever seen . . . Billie Whitelaw must have seen that dress and then buried
herself up to the neck in sand in shock.
As for "Jane Eyre," any film that has Whitelaw, Plowright, Maria Schneider
(!!!!), Elle Macpherson (????), and GERALDINE CHAPLIN all in it will be
playing for years at our local camp theaters here in San Francisco, perhaps
in a triple bill with "Showgirls" and "Valley of the Dolls."
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 21:01:37 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Alexander <chax@MTN.ORG>
Subject: Re: 72 Hours
>what's HTML?
HyperText Mark-up Language
It's the coding required for the world wide web. A strange way to tell
things browsers like NetScape how to display language and images. And it's
the biggest such code going, although there are other possibilities, like
JAVA, which works in a rather different manner. But if one wants to do work
on the web, HTML is a part of the poetics.
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 22:51:17 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "k.a. hehir" <angelo@MUSTANG.UWO.CA>
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 8 May 1996 to 9 May 1996
In-Reply-To: <199605101735.RAA11432@beaufort.sfu.ca>
On Fri, 10 May 1996, Charles Watts wrote:
> Re: Billie Whitelaw: as many of you may know, she's in the Zeffirelli
> version of Jane Eyre -- she plays -- Grace Poole! I only know that from
> the credits at the end of the picture; couldn't recognize her while she
> was on screen.
>
> Charles Watts
> cwatts@sfu.ca
>
> "The present order is the disorder of the future" -- Saint Just, via Ian
> Hamilton Finlay
>
thank you for the spotting.
our english dept. softball team called the Jane Errors just lost by 8ight
runs to the library. you've told us that Billie Whitelaw plays Grace
Poole, but can she play second base?!
kevin
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 23:14:59 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "k.a. hehir" <angelo@MUSTANG.UWO.CA>
Subject: Re: special sales from Sun & Moon Press
In-Reply-To: <199605102316.SAA24610@connect.net>
On Fri, 10 May 1996, Tim wood wrote:
> >On 7 May 96 at 10:04, Douglas Messerli wrote:
> >
> >> Sun & Moon Press announces some very special sales for
> >> participants in the Poetry List:
> >> Sun & Moon is also offering, for a special, limited time,
> >> FROM THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CENTURY: A NEW AMERICAN POETRY
> >> 1960-1990
> >>
> >> very slightly damaged copies (corners slightly bent) for only
> >> $5.00; the regular price is $29.95.
> >>
> >> All orders are the quoted price plus $1.00 shipping and manhandling
i hope the euphoria of commerce does't taint the list, but i'll take 1 too.
kevin angelo hehir
578 lambto st.
london, on
N5Y 4G2
please inform me backchannel as to best get the USD to you.
thanks,
kevin
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 11 May 1996 01:11:18 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: Schneider?
>As for "Jane Eyre," any film that has Whitelaw, Plowright, Maria Schneider
>(!!!!), Elle Macpherson (????), and GERALDINE CHAPLIN all in it will be
>playing for years at our local camp theaters here in San Francisco, perhaps
>in a triple bill with "Showgirls" and "Valley of the Dolls."
Kevin, you're kidding! Maria Schneider is in another movie already? Oh,
lord! I have been hearing so much about "Jane Eyre." Thank goodness.
Because Whiyelaw has been in so many low budget unseen movies in recent
years.
Hey, how would that movie play on Turk Street if it had Nastasia Kinsky in it?
..........................
What does Lucky Strike mean again?
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 11 May 1996 01:11:21 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Whitelaw
>
>thank you for the spotting.
>our english dept. softball team called the Jane Errors just lost by 8ight
>runs to the library. you've told us that Billie Whitelaw plays Grace
>Poole, but can she play second base?!
>
>kevin
I saw her in the Bradford High School brass band. She was playing second bass.
..........................
What does Lucky Strike mean again?
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 11 May 1996 10:44:16 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Wendy Battin <wjbat@CONNCOLL.EDU>
Subject: Re: Electronic Ink
In-Reply-To: <199605110409.AAA07736@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
For all those who replied to my request way back for small press &
bookstore URLs: the beginnings of the database are available at
http://camel.conncoll.edu/ccother/wjbat/Electronic_Ink
There are links to EPC, of course, to presses, bookstores, & a few
e-text sites. I'm most interested in making this a distribution
tool for print; if/when your press or bookstore has a website with
catalog, send me the URL & I'll add it.
Wendy
----------------------------------------------------------------
Wendy Battin http://camel.conncoll.edu/ccother/wjbat/
wjbat@conncoll.edu
wbattin@mit.edu
----------------------------------------------------------------
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 11 May 1996 11:45:18 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Loss Glazier <lolpoet@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: EPC Featured Connect
The "Net" (featured connect) at the EPC right now is
$lavery Cyberzine
>The April 15, 1996 issue contains work by Alice Notley, John Godfrey
>Jackson Mac Low, Ed Sanders, Barbara Barg, Douglas Oliver,
>Simon Pettet, Yvonne Jacquette, Allen Ginsberg,
>Ted Berrigan and many others. Also includes collage/collab
>photography, fine art, etc.
>
>Site designed and maintained by Harris Schiff
The EPC is at http://writing.upenn.edu/epc
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 11 May 1996 09:07:03 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: = = = = =
In-Reply-To: <199605110409.AAA07736@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
Gwyn: typing laziness on my part when it comes to e-mail
BUT, I can report at least one experience of being blasted heavily by an
anonymous reader for a journal who thought it outrageous that I should
use such a term as "L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E," which, despite its appearance in
books, articles etc., my anonymous ref. assured me NOBODY used anymore --
go figger!
--------------
about about: the responses to my last on this topic leave me if anything
further beclouded -- sounds as ig the objection isn't actually that some
poems "aren't about anything," but rather a strong reaction against what
they are in fact about?
remember that great sixties cliche, "we're about the business of . . ."?
Like Paul Blackburn, I remain as ever yours, in, on, or about the
premises -- particularly the unspecified and presupposed premises
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 11 May 1996 09:16:24 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: Orono and there abouts
In-Reply-To: <199605110409.AAA07736@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
My essay for the 50s conference at Orono was briefly orphaned by the
disappearance of the papers to either side of it, but Burt and Company
have now happily relocated me on panel 3B, at 3:30 on the first day of
the conference. If you're interested in innovative poetics and
African-American writing, note that the panel now addresses Stephen
Jonas, Melvin Tolson and Russell Atkins. (Though this means I will have
to miss other interesting panels, but maybe the Mina Loy panelists, for
example, will let me read copies?)
----
Now, about these prepositions --
The James quote is about perfect, in my book! In another book, a photo
voulme in tribute to W.E.B. DuBois published by Johnson Publications, I
see that the blurb writers have DuBois attending a course with Henry,
rather than William, James! Now that would have been something to write
home about --
love to all from hereabouts,
aldon
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 11 May 1996 12:47:14 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: = = = = =
Aldon, are you trying to "coin" a new movement here?
Based on eqaulity (we are all equals in signs).
"I am he as you are...."
or is that the flipside
===============being the music (the median strip)
to the "meaning" (metonymy) that is language?
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 11 May 1996 13:16:55 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: chapbook (new)
I just received via email today a chapbook published by
reference:press
it includes work by three writers:
jennifer moxley
angela littwin
and keith waldrop----
definitely worth checking out.
send queries to
Beth Anderson, 154 Doyle ve. Providence, RI. 02906....
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 11 May 1996 16:19:30 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Bill Luoma <Maz881@AOL.COM>
Subject: Larry Levis
Comments: To: CAP-L@vm1.spcs.umn.edu
Comments: cc: halem@tcplink.nrel.gov
The poet Larry Levis has died. A heart attack. He was 49 and teaching in
Virginia. Born and raised near Fresno, CA. Student and long time friend of
Phil Levine. The books I have of his are The Afterlife, Wrecking Crew and
Winter Stars. I have another one of his books, On Out by Lew Welch. It is
inscribed:
For Larry --
get out of town
Lew
7/10/68
I remember kicking field goals with him and his son through the goal posts of
almond trees at his mother's selma ranch. The mountain bluebirds down from
the sierra winter lighting on the short grafted trees. Playing pool at a
mexican bar in perfectly normal crossroads. A lowrider pulling up next to him
and saying: You and me man, we just can't get low enough. On his harley in
suit and his lovely bride in white on the back. His gentle and sexy deep
voice. He could never get a group of lions at the zoo to roar but would
instead have them swooning. I'm going over to my mom's to get some
lampshades for Louise.
What follows is Rhododendrons by Larry Levis.
Rhododendrons
WINTER has moved off
somewhere, writing its journals
in ice.
But I am still afraid to move,
afraid to speak,
as if I lived in a house
wallpapered with the cries of birds
I cannot identify.
Beneath the trees
a young couple sits talking
about the afterlife,
where no one, I think, is
whittling toys for the stillborn,
I laugh,
but don't know.
Maybe the whole world is absent minded
or floating. Maybe the new lovers undress
without wondering how
the snow grows over the Andes,
or how a horse cannot remember those
frozen in the sleigh behind it,
but keeps running until the lines tangle,
while the dead sit coolly beneath their pet stars.
As I write this,
some blown rhododendrons are nodding
in the first breezes. I want
to resemble them, and remember nothing,
the way a photograph of an excavation
cannot remember the sun.
The wind rises or stops
and it means nothing.
I want to be circular;
a pond or a column of smoke
revolving, slowly, its aches.
I want to turn back and go up
to myself at age 20,
and press five dollars into his hand
so he can sleep.
While he stands trembling on a street in Fresno,
suddenly one among many in a crowd
that strolls down Fulton Street,
among the stores that are closing,
and is never heard of again.
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 11 May 1996 14:20:58 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Herb Levy <herb@ESKIMO.COM>
Subject: Re: pick ONE
Bob Holman wrote:
>4. I'm going to sit write down and right myself a letter (pick ONE:
>abcdefghijklmnopqstuvwxyz)
Obviously some sort of trick deck, though I don't get the point of the trick.
Or perhaps an homage to WCW.
Herb Levy
herb@eskimo.com
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 11 May 1996 17:54:14 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: Larry Levis
thanks maz for the eulogy and poem. never heard of levis before, but now i
have and am glad. esp to hear of someone else whose mother's called selma.
went to a funeral myself this a.m., and heard a 10 yr old girl read a poem to
her dad whose 34 yr old dad's car crashed a coupla mornings ago, and he went
up in the fiery wreckage..."I sit here in grief, listening with
disbelief...daddy daddy why'd you leave? daddy daddy come back please." it
was...poetic. i didn't know the guy he was a friend of friends and i went
cuz they wanted to show up in my car instead of their own work truck.
bests, maria d
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 11 May 1996 13:47:08 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Ron Silliman <rsillima@IX.NETCOM.COM>
Subject: Ism-isms
Aldon (who doesn't look that old) notes:
>
>Years ago (I AM getting old) Ron S. offered as an acceptable
definition of a language poet: "anyone who has ever been accused of
being a language poet"
>
>now THAT'S expansive --
>
My old roomie, Tinker Greene, used to suggest (irritably) that a
language poet was anyone who denied being one.
By the bye, Aldon, that was a GREAT presentation on Steve Jonas at New
College the other day. Genuinely terrific!
>From: Gwyn McVay <gmcvay1@OSF1.GMU.EDU>
>Subject: Re: relang.
>
>When did the term "L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E" poet vs. "language" poet drop out
of use? with the demise of the original L=, or just because people got
tired of typing equals signs, or what? Institutional laziness on the
part of academicians who couldn't be bothered to distinguish between
the different varieties of querzblatz poetics?
>
>Yrs for Scrabble,
>Gwyn
So far as I know, nobody associated with the poetry itself ever used
the equal signs in a self-identifying fashion. Some others (critics,
reviewers and revilers) did so in order to associate the social
phenomenon with one of its later manifestations. I've always read the
equal signs as a special code on the part of an author as their way of
signalling "I don't get it"
Ron Silliman
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 11 May 1996 15:21:09 +0100
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Kevin Killian <dbkk@SIRIUS.COM>
Subject: Stephen Jonas
This is Dodie Bellamy. Ron Silliman wrote:
>By the bye, Aldon, that was a GREAT presentation on Steve Jonas at New
>College the other day. Genuinely terrific!
>
Thanks for the pr for Small Press Traffic, Ron. I thought the whole panel
was wonderfully provoking, the issues of racism and its relationship to
outsiderness and the yearning to be inside.
Your reading for us (here in San Francisco) at Four Walls was great too. I
guess absence does make the heart grow fonder.
x,
Dodie
p.s. For those of you who were not at the Stephen Jonas panel/event with
Aldon Nielsen, Will Alexander and Joe Torra . . . Small Press Traffic has a
great bargain for you. Jeff Conant & Woof Press took the occasion to
produce a limited edition broadside/lithograph-each one unique, hand
colored-of a "new" S. Jonas poem, made available to us by the executors of
the Jonas estate, Raffael de Gruttola and Gerrit Lansing. Only $15.00 +
nominal shipping. Back channel me (at dbkk@sirius.com) for more
information. Thanks everyone.
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 11 May 1996 20:01:04 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gary Hawkins <ghawkins@HALCYON.COM>
Subject: Re: Larry Levis
from Laura Hope-Gill c/o GHawkins@halcyon.com
In kind response to Bill Luoma's picture of Levis amid the almond tree
goalposts and outside the lion's cage, I want to offer more pictures of
him, from just January-- such a surprising short time until this.
I had the great however brief pleasure of knowing Larry Levis as
student/acquaintance at Warren Wilson College MFA Prog. last winter, my
first and his many-eth, and I am sad. remembering him clearly there in the
snowed-in campus, smoking a Marlboro, drinking beer, the music from the
"Sweatheart Ball" coming out into the night, looking over the snow-buried
gardens and mountains saying "you expect Jack Nicholson to come around in
the SnowCat any second don't you?"
Larry Levis wore v-necked sweaters w/o turtleneck or undershirt under a
thin overcoat in 0 degree wind, broke mid-lecture into full-text "Life
Stories", danced madly in large steps and wide spins, quoted Talking Heads
in the same sentence as Ezra Pound and made it work.
He was calm, understated, dry, realistic, (when can we say "brilliant.")
When Tony Hoagland asked, after the reading and outside smoking, "How's
your class on "Thought and Feeling" coming along?" Levis responded, leaning
on the iced rail, exhaling thickly "I ditched the thought portion and my
life's been easier since."
I called a friend who was corresponding with him this semester and was as
of yesterday without "teacher," and we agreed: there's just a certain breed
of human we can't stand to lose.
A former student and friend of the poet sent us this excerpt from
"Adolescence" in Winter Stars:
> -He had been drinking steadily all week,
> And was dealing cards
> When the muscle of his own heart
> Kicked him back into his chair so hard its wood snapped.
> He must have thought there was something
> Suddenly very young inside his body,
> If he had time to think . . .
I hear the heart attack was so massive he probably didn't know, and I hope.
There are others out there who are much sadder than I am I'm sure, with
deeper memories which pain more deeply, and I wish you well with your
memories of "the Levis of the Levis of the Levis. ("Self Portrait with
Radio"), who did not "think that anything could choose me/ To be a Larry
Levis before there even was/ a Larry Levis. ("Family Romance")"
"When he died it was like a whole library had burned down." -Laurie Anderson
I am glad I saved the cap off the bottle of champagne shared between Levis
and a few students including myself at the final dinner, not knowing why I
was tucking it safely into my pocket as I believed myself "over" the
tchotchke phase (perhaps it's the swooning of lions, Bill), on which I read
today the word pressed into the metal: BRUT and think no, not at all.
With warmest regards,
Laura Hope-Gill
laurahopegill@halcyon.com
>The poet Larry Levis has died. A heart attack. He was 49 and teaching in
>Virginia. Born and raised near Fresno, CA. Student and long time friend of
>Phil Levine. The books I have of his are The Afterlife, Wrecking Crew and
>Winter Stars. I have another one of his books, On Out by Lew Welch. It is
>inscribed:
>
>
>For Larry --
>get out of town
> Lew
> 7/10/68
>
>
>I remember kicking field goals with him and his son through the goal posts of
>almond trees at his mother's selma ranch. The mountain bluebirds down from
>the sierra winter lighting on the short grafted trees. Playing pool at a
>mexican bar in perfectly normal crossroads. A lowrider pulling up next to him
>and saying: You and me man, we just can't get low enough. On his harley in
>suit and his lovely bride in white on the back. His gentle and sexy deep
>voice. He could never get a group of lions at the zoo to roar but would
>instead have them swooning. I'm going over to my mom's to get some
>lampshades for Louise.
>
>What follows is Rhododendrons by Larry Levis.
>
>Rhododendrons
>
>WINTER has moved off
>somewhere, writing its journals
>in ice.
>
>But I am still afraid to move,
>afraid to speak,
>as if I lived in a house
>wallpapered with the cries of birds
>I cannot identify.
>
>Beneath the trees
>a young couple sits talking
>about the afterlife,
>where no one, I think, is
>whittling toys for the stillborn,
>I laugh,
>
>but don't know.
>Maybe the whole world is absent minded
>or floating. Maybe the new lovers undress
>without wondering how
>the snow grows over the Andes,
>or how a horse cannot remember those
>frozen in the sleigh behind it,
>but keeps running until the lines tangle,
>while the dead sit coolly beneath their pet stars.
>
>As I write this,
>some blown rhododendrons are nodding
>in the first breezes. I want
>to resemble them, and remember nothing,
>the way a photograph of an excavation
>cannot remember the sun.
>
>The wind rises or stops
>and it means nothing.
>
>I want to be circular;
>a pond or a column of smoke
>revolving, slowly, its aches.
>
>I want to turn back and go up
>to myself at age 20,
>and press five dollars into his hand
>so he can sleep.
>While he stands trembling on a street in Fresno,
>suddenly one among many in a crowd
>that strolls down Fulton Street,
>among the stores that are closing,
>and is never heard of again.
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 12 May 1996 05:25:21 -0500
Reply-To: landers@vivanet.com
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: landers <landers@VIVANET.COM>
Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company
Subject: Re: Ism-isms
Ron writes, re:
>>From: Gwyn McVay <gmcvay1@OSF1.GMU.EDU>
>>Subject: Re: relang.
>>
>>When did the term "L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E" poet vs. "language" poet drop out
>>of use?
>
>So far as I know, nobody associated with the poetry itself ever used
>the equal signs in a self-identifying fashion. Some others (critics,
>reviewers and revilers) did so in order to associate the social
>phenomenon with one of its later manifestations. I've always read the
>equal signs as a special code on the part of an author as their way of
>signalling "I don't get it"
>
>Ron Silliman
Ron,
I have used the equals to indicate the 'zine. What do these poets have
in common beyond the 'zine, anyway? Sure, there seems to be a common
reading list... one that was written about extensively in the 'zine! And
there are common publishers. I don't think of language poetry as a
school of poets so much as a group of readers who share their points of
view in similar forums. And, if it is a school, there are a lot of fish
swimming the other way! The 'zine was the hippest thing when it was
going. I might say you all had a common essay style, but that's about as
far as I would go.
I used to sneak reading time in L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E when I was supposed to
be shipping books. You were all very helpful to me because you let me
know that someone out there liked the same stuff. The universities sure
weren't foisting LZ or Gertrude.
Peter Landers
landers@vivanet.com
Hey readers! Check out my website... I'm getting ready for the great
unveiling of Happy Genius, and I practiced on my own poetry.
http://www.vivanet.com/~landers
pdl
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 12 May 1996 10:00:34 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: = that is to the thing itself
In-Reply-To: <199605120407.AAA12487@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
as critic / reviler I never used "L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E School" or movement,
but was found on occasion using "L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E" to refer to writers who
in fact appeared in the pages of said mag., and to continue to
distinguish that from the journal _Language_, already on the scene before
Bernstein and Andrews got their stapler going --
But, Chris, I wasn't trying so much to coin a new movement as to make use
of that which has now been left behind, and is therefore there for the
taking? If we are to write of "language writers," I think, particularly
since I work, when I work, at the same institution as Alan Soldofsky, one
of the ur-revilers who first loosed the unequal version of the misnomer
upon the world, that I should inherit those now unused symbols of
identity; I'm such an egalitarian -- though I may not be equal to the
task --
As Dodie & Kevin mentioned -- Those Jonas broadsides are BEAUTIFUL --
Jeff Conant's work is a prize -- each sheet is different from the others
-- GET ONE OF THESE! -- better than yr average broadside == dare I say,
without equal?
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 12 May 1996 10:30:01 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Douglas Messerli <djmess@SUNMOON.COM>
Subject: New Sun & Moon electronic magazine
Dear Friends,
Thanks for the orders for RIBOT and FROM THE OTHER
SIDE OF THE CENTURY. We still have copies of all of
these, and can fill further orders at the same prices
($4.00 for the RIBOTS) and ($5.00 for the anthology) if
you missed out on this good sale. We'll plan sales of
other slightly damaged S&M titles from time to time.
I'm writng at this moment, however, to announce a new
magazine of the internet: WHERE LITERATURE LIVES. The
first issue, #1, is now up at the Sun & Moon web-site
(http://www.sunmoon.com). This will be a monthly mag-
azine with selections from forthcoming Sun & Moon titles,
reviews of Sun & Moon books, occasional reviews of other
books, plays, and films (incorporating what we tried to
do in EL-E-PHANT) and other literary information.
The first issue, designed by the remarkable Kenny
Goldsmith, contains fiction by Spanish writer Norberto
Luis Romero, a selection from the new novel NOD, by Fanny
Howe, and a section from Stacey Levine's upcoming novel,
DRA--. The issue contains poetry by contemporary Norwegian
poet Paal-Helge Haugen, the Finnish poet Claes Anderson, the
great living Turkish poet Ece Ayhan, the Austrian modernist
Friederike Mayrocker, a work from readiness / enough / depends /
on by Larry Eigner, and poems by younger American poets Lee Ann
Brown, Juliana Spahr and Cole Swensen. The first issue also has
a powerful essay "Further Under" from Aaron Shurin's forthcoming
UNBOUND: A BOOK OF AIDS.
We invite you to all take a look at this new offering, and down-
load any stories or poems you want. Do remember, however, that
all material is copyrighted.
We're hard at work on the June issue.
Finally, two new Sun & Moon books have just been published, and
we expect a third next week. They are:
THE CATASTROPHE, a wonderful new novel by Robert Steiner
ISBN: 1-55713-233-X, Sun & Moon Classics #134, $13.95
WHERE HEAT LOOMS, a collection of poetry by the renowned French
Modernist Andre du Bouchet
ISBN: 1-55713-238-0, Sun & Moon Classics #87, $12.95
and
LOTION BULLWHIP GIRAFFE, a first collection of poetry by Tan Lin
ISBN: 1-55713-258-5, New American Poetry Series: 26, $10.95
Sun & Moon offers a 15% discount on these titles for the Poetics
List.
Order through our web-site.
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 12 May 1996 15:34:36 -0500
Reply-To: landers@vivanet.com
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: landers <landers@VIVANET.COM>
Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company
Subject: laughing at myself about Tagart
I'm laughing hard at myself! I just read Taggart's piece in Apex of the
M and I don't think he would take too kindly to my comparison of him to
Glass. I was thinking of "Peace on Earth" when I said that. oops! It
just goes to show how such comparisons are misleading. And yes, I found
the interview where Creeley and Ginsburg are talking about music.
Creeley said that he was writing while listening to jazz.
Peter Landers
landers@vivanet.com
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 12 May 1996 14:44:40 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Alexander <chax@MTN.ORG>
Subject: info: May 12 update book information website
I thought this might be useful to at least a few on the Poetics List. I
haven't checked it out enough to know if such special collections as
SUNY/Buffalo's Poetry Room, or UC-San Diego's Archive for New Poetry, or SF
State's American Poetry Archive, are included. One would hope so, as well as
other treasures perhaps. Some of the sites which concern book arts and
alternative book forms may be of interest to those interested in
textual/visual concerns.
>Return-Path: owner-book_arts-l@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
>Date: Sun, 12 May 1996 10:09:31 EDT
>Reply-To: "The Book Arts: binding, typography, collecting"
> <BOOK_ARTS-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU>
>Sender: "The Book Arts: binding, typography, collecting"
> <BOOK_ARTS-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU>
>From: Ton Cremers <101502.3511@COMPUSERVE.COM>
>Subject: info: May 12 update book information website
>To: Multiple recipients of list BOOK_ARTS-L
> <BOOK_ARTS-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU>
>X-UIDL: f769d2aa6439f37bac7acf166533b5d7
>
>Http://www.globalxs.nl/home/c/cremers
>
>
>In our May 12 update you can find new links to:
>
>-Special Collections of the University of Virginia Library with underlying
links
>to Special Collections on the Internet, the Electronic Text Center (top 5% of
>the web, Magellan 4 stars site), National and International Special Collections
>-Scott B.Denlingers site (Catalog Librarian for the German Library Project at
>the German Society of Pennsylvania)
>-The American Library Ass. (oldest and largest library ass. Of the world)
>-information was added to: Online Catalogs with Webbed Interfaces
>-visit our page http://www.globalxs.nl/home/c/cremers/bo00025 Extraordinary and
>the on-line exhibition The Pop-Up world of Ann Montanaro, with links to other
>Pop-Up sites and textfile History of Pop-Up and Movable Books
>-Pop-Up books from the Collections at the Lilly Library
>-Broders Rare and Used Books
>-in the Manuscript section a modern manuscript has been added: Maske: Thaery
>Jack Vance, a website by Mike Berro
>-Legacy Art & Bookworks, Columbia MO, Bookconservation and repair, Handbinding,
>Decorated Papers, Workshops
>-(The Friends of) The Museum of Printing. A museum not yet to be visited
but the
>plans seem to be okay
>-Typography Links and Contact,regularly updated page with over one hundred
>typography links
>-Kelly Stones IDIOLECT in the artists books section
>-Nat.Museum of Am.History and Printing Presses in the Graphic Arts Collection
>-new page has been created with Photography Galleries on the WWW
>-The Penny Magazine, nineteenth century weekly magazine for the workingclass.
>Many issues on-line
>-Miniature Book Society
>-in the manuscript section: The Tyndale New Testament, The Sforza Hours, Magna
>Carta, Lindisfarne Gospels
>-Type designers and their faces: Alphabetical list of type designers
through the
>ages, with samples of their work and biographical information
>-Cathedral Libraries Catalogue, books printed before 1701 in the libraries of
>the Anglican Cathedrals of England and Wales
>-Five hundred Years of Bembo, with related links.
>-Joseph Wu Origami Page (nice site)
>-Xerxes Books Home Page
>-Archives and Manuscript Finding Aids at Harvard/Radcliffe
>-Manuscripts with Music: seminar in the History of the Book to 1500.
>-Sarabande Paper Quote. High resolution scans of handmade papers.
>-Information has been added to Center for Book Arts summer programs: large
>textfile with information about all couses at the Center for Book Arts.
>
>Please send information about additional relevant sites.
>
>5/12/96
>....................
>regards,
>
>
>Ton Cremers and Marian Beereboom
>******BOOKS************
>Rechter Rottekade 171
>3032 XD Rotterdam
>Holland
>e-mail: 101502.3511@compuserve.com
>e-mail: cremers@globalxs.nl
>http://www.globalxs.nl/home/c/cremers
>http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/cremers_books
>INFOCENTER ON BOOKS/BOEKEN INFORMATIE CENTRUM
>***************************************************************
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 12 May 1996 16:29:23 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: Ism-isms
aldon, cd u back channel me or snail me w/ yr jonas paper of which rilliman
raves?
128 racing beach ave
falmouth ma 02540
bests, maria d
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 12 May 1996 18:38:42 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark Wallace <mdw@GWIS2.CIRC.GWU.EDU>
Subject: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
Annie Finch has asked me to forward the following message to the poetics
list. She is not on the list herself, but I will send any responses on
the list to her, and of course anyone who wants to contact her could do
so at the address below.
Mark Wallace
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Fri, 10 May 1996 15:39:42 -0500
From: Annie Finch <finchar@muohio.edu>
To: mdw@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu
Cc: kvarnes@udel.edu
Subject: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition
Dear Mark Wallace,
My email access is restored and I can finally think about the
compelling issues raised by our recent discussions about innovative form.
It seems to me that the distinction between "innovative" and
'noninnovative" forms, implicitly raised by your comment that I had
overlooked certain forms in my AWP piece, may be an unnecessary
distinction. Perhaps, as Michael Boughn has suggested, the distinction
between formal and nonformal poems is, in the final analysis, also an
unnecessary distinction, and poems are all formal but lie along a continuum
between regular and irregular form. In the AWP piece, as in the Formal
Feeling Comes anthology, I tried to define the characteristics that bring a
poem closer to the regularly formal end of the continuum, namely a
structure formed by conspicuous repetition of any language element.
The question is, is there anything in that definition to rule out
innovative poetry. After considering the texts you mentioned in your
fascinating bibliography, I still don't think there is any opposition
between my definition of form and innovative language use. There may be
temperamental disinclination among many "innovative" poets to use regularly
repeating forms, which may be why I had such a hell of a time finding
regularly formal innovative poets for the anthology. But they do exist, as
you so rightly point out; Henry Gould, Jackson MacLow, Juliana Spahr,
etc., are certainly writing regularly formal poems.
The two points I would make are these: First, I have yet to see
(though I would LOVE to see) a regular form that is truly, in and of
itself, an Innovative Form--in other words, a form, according to the
structured by conspicuous repetition definition, that is truly NEW in a
significant way. Jackson MacLow, of whom I am now a staunch fan, and who I
am extremely grateful to you for making me read again, does wonderfully
innovative things IN form, but the forms themselves are familiar forms; he
uses a kind of pantoum in "HappyNew Year 1964," "syllabics in "Odes for
Iris," concrete or shaped poems, a sonnet once in a while, and most of the
time, even in incarnations as fresh as "Molly Go" and certainly in poems
like the Light poems, a form as old as the hills, very flexible and often
overlooked as a form, but a familiar regular form nonetheless: the chant.
Is it possible that regular forms are like the letters of the
alphabet--you can do things with them that are new, but they themselves are
basically simple tools, hard to improve on, Dr. Seuss's On Beyond Zebra
notwithstanding? If this is true, getting that fact out into the open
would certainly simplify the field of poetics at the formal end of the
continuum. I am, of course, keeping here to the definition of formal
poetry as structured by the conspicous repetition of any language element,
a definition that is practical and of necessity somewhat reductionistic.
The fact that irregular form, organic form, and larger formal/thematic
structures also operate in much contemporary poetry at the "irregular" end
of spectrum shouldn't interfere with the usefulness of a firm definition of
what is formal at the "regular" end.
The other point concerns what Michael Boughn calls 'deformations,"
poems that change/deform received forms. After much thought on this
matter, it seems to me that, while all deformations of a traditional form
can certainly be usefully thought of as akin to each other, some
deformations remain at the formal end of the continuum while others do not.
To take the sonnet as an example, the deformations I included in A Formal
Feeling Comes are still regularly formal--some rhymed nonmetrical sonnets,
some unrhymed metrical sonnets, some metrically variable but still metrical
sonnets, some 16 or 18 line sonnets or 12 line sonnets that kept the rhyme
and meter. All these deformations are still formal, because they are
structured by the conspicuous repetition of language elements. Bernadette
Mayer's deformations of the sonnet, while it is interesting to consider
them in the context of the more formal deformations--which is why I
mentioned them in the introduction to A Formal Feeling Comes-- are on the
other hand not regularly formal, in my opinion, since the only elements of
the sonnet they keep are the name and the length and they are otherwise
irregular in structure (length, by itself, seems a quality of extension or
size, not of structure or shape, or else any nineteen-line poem would be a
villanelle).
At this point, my preference in editing the upcoming book would be
to include "innovative" poems, poems with nonreferential or nonsequential
language, among the more mainstream poems, as much as the editors of the
individual sections (the section for each form will be edited by a
different poet) would like/will permit. Unless any innovative regular
forms turn up that really WON'T fit under the existing rubrics of chant,
concrete poem, syllabic poem, etc., it seems an inappropriate
ghettoization to isolate innovative poems in a separate section based on
their language when their forms would include them in already existing
sections.
Any poets who do have innovative regularly formal poems, by
themselves or others, that they'd like to have considered (keeping in mind
that this anthology will consist largely of pre-20th century poems, so
space is very limited for contemporary work) should contact me or Kathrine
Varnes, my coeditor (kvarnes@udel.edu), and we will forward the work to the
appropriate section-editor; also anyone who has a strong proclivity for a
certain form and might want to edit a section on it, please contact us and
we'll see if the form is still available.
Many thanks, Mark, for forwarding this message to the poetics list.
ANNIE FINCH
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH
MIAMI UNIVERSITY
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 12 May 1996 18:53:03 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Walter K. Lew" <WKL888@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: Billy Whitelaw 2B
Billy Whitelaw may not play 2B, but it is a perfect ballplayer's name,
considering the number of Billy's, White's (Bill White 1B, Frank White 2B,
Roy White OF, etc.), and Law's (Vernon, most of all) that have played major
league ball. For fantasy lineups, please see Charles North's series of ten
lineups in _Transfer_, 1/2 (Sp '88). Just to give two examples:
Clover cf
Chicory 3B
Daisy ss
Sunflower lf
Thistle 1b
Dandelion rf
Queen Anne's Lace 2b
Milkweed c
Honeysuckle p
AND:
Pun ss
Paradox lf
Metaphor cf
Simile rf
Hyperbole 1b
Metonymy 3b
Irony c
Understatement 2b
Zeugma p
And what abt that City Lights book about 20 years ago, _Major League Poets_?
I still remember the profile of Franz "Bugsy" Kafka 2b, known for his
problems w the management, and the opening logo of the baseball diamond
pasted-in between the two legs of a Blakean compass. Who wrote that book? I
lost my copy long ago.
My baseball memory begins with the Baltimore Orioles of 1964, Brooks
Robinson's MVP year, and the arrival of Frank Robinson in 1966, how he played
w an intensity, pride, AND self-abnegation that I had never seen before
(willingness to hit a ground ball to the right side to move a runner up
despite leading the league in home runs, slamming the only homer completely
out of Memorial Stadium off El Tiante after being decked twice by pitches
aimed at his head, etc.). Many years later, when Frank Robby was part of the
visiting Orioles' office staff, I waited outside in the rain at Yankee
Stadium after a game hoping to get his autograph. When he opened the door to
see how hard it was raining, I pleaded: "Frank! I've been a fan of yours for
20 years--you gotta sign my glove!" He looked down at me and said with a
smile, "No I don't," and shut the door. Elrod Hendricks, bullpen coach at
the time, and also a player on the 60's Orioles, was a lot kinder. I guess
I'm just telling this pointless story to see if there are any other Orioles
fans lurking on the elist...
WKL888@AOL.com
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 12 May 1996 20:12:19 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Eryque Gleason <eryque@ACMENET.NET>
Subject: Re: teach, teach
maria d. done writ:
>says she's gotten anonymous hate
>mail from students saying stuff like, "we pay you to teach, so teach."
a couple weeks ago i witnessed a convo on campus about this very topic.
one of the grad students said that when she gets that sort of response from
students she makes *them* get up and teach the class.
dan h. done wrote:
>Those of us in the info tech industry have always known and championed the
>fact that information is a commodity.
yeah, but. information isn't *always* a commodity, is it? sometimes the
stuff's just got no "market value" and is nothing but some used up brain
cells. seems like a lot of my classmates have the idea that we show up to
our very first college class and some old bearded man in a tweed jacket
(leather arm patches optional) hands them a big plastic bag which we are
supposed to spend the next four (or five or six) years filling. then the
idea is (supposedly) that we take our bags o' facts to our first job and
wow em. (!)
i dunno, maybe if someone had created a really good sorting system for
their bag it might be impressive. mine's worn a hole through the bottom
already and i can never find anything but poetry anthologies and pop-tart
wrappers except the one time i found my marbles.
anyway, i'd hope that more people start to figure out that a bag o' tricks
(so to speak) might be handier in "the real world".
>It used to be knowledge, but nowadays who can know everything?
what the heck does that mean?
nuttin' up my sleeve,
eryque
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 12 May 1996 21:43:10 -0700
Reply-To: Thomas Bell <tbjn@well.com>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Thomas Bell <tbjn@WELL.COM>
Subject: serious poetry?
In-Reply-To: <960511175405_292091586@emout08.mail.aol.com>
I hope these two were misquoted or poorly edited. The hundreds
of thousands who read it wouldn't wouldn't read it at all if
they didn't care about it, would they? It wouldn't matter where
it was written. Would lovers of "serious" poetry only seek it
in the cloisters?
tom
> "A group of Nobel Prize winning poets has declared that cyberspace
> is no place for serious verse, according to Reuters. Asked if the
> use of the Internet was one way to reverse the low popular appeal
> of poetry, the group said no. Poets Derek Walcott, Octovio paz,
> and Czeslaw Milosz were undaunted about the current dearth of
> readers. Walcott stated that "I'd rather have just one person
> who reads and feels my work deeply than hundreds of thousands who
> read it but don't really care about it." Milosz allowed that
> computers were useful incomposition, but was skeptical that lovers
> of serious poetry would look for it on the Internet.
>
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 02:51:01 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Eryque Gleason <eryque@ACMENET.NET>
Subject: Re: serious poetry?
>>...Milosz allowed that computers were useful incomposition, but was skeptical
>>that lovers of serious poetry would look for it on the Internet.
uhm, "GIMME AN F!!!!! GIMME A U!!!!!! ....."
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 09:17:31 +0000
Reply-To: William.Northcutt@uni-bayreuth.de
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Comments: Authenticated sender is <bts403@btr0x1.hrz.uni-bayreuth.de>
From: William Northcutt <William.Northcutt@UNI-BAYREUTH.DE>
Organization: btr0x1.hrz.uni-bayreuth.de
Subject: to Doug Messerli
Sorry folks, couldn't reach Doug's address for some reason.
Doug, could you please send me 3 copies of From the Other Side...@$5
each?
William Northcutt
Anglistik I, GWII
Universitaet Bayreuth
95440 Bayreuth
Germany
Thanks, William
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 05:07:53 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
Dear Mark Wallace---
Thanks for forwading Annie Finch's remarks on poetry.
I am going to have to print the message out before I can respond more
fully, and hopefully then, some of the distinctions she makes between
formally innovative poems, etc, will become clearer.
But, valuing a stance of "naivete" as I do, I'm curious as to some of
the applications of these distinctions. In considering form as a criteria
for anthologies (ostensibly in disregard of other aesthetic/tonal/
emotional/ concerns), do these other (ostensibly non-formal) considerations
slip in through the backdoor as it were?
For instance, there seemed to be an implicit (latent--though I may be
simply reading this into Ms. Finch's remarks) PREFERENCE for the "regular"
forms of MacLow over the "irregularities" of Mayer. Does this mean that
Ms. Finch would be more apt to include Maclow in her forthcoming
anthology than Mayer (let's get down to the realpolitik of it!)?
I am also wondering if my recent series CUSPS (Aerial/Edge, 1995--
I think Rod still has copies) would be considered as "innovative
regular formal" or "innovative irregular formal" (or neither)....
Chris
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 08:03:24 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Henry Gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
In-Reply-To: Message of Sun, 12 May 1996 18:38:42 -0400 from
<mdw@GWIS2.CIRC.GWU.EDU>
On Sun, 12 May 1996 18:38:42 -0400 Annie Finch said:
> The two points I would make are these: First, I have yet to see
>(though I would LOVE to see) a regular form that is truly, in and of
>itself, an Innovative Form--in other words, a form, according to the
>structured by conspicuous repetition definition, that is truly NEW in a
>significant way.
>Is it possible that regular forms are like letters of the
>alphabet--you can do things with them that are new, but they themselves are
>basically simple tools, hard to improve on, Dr. Seuss's On Beyond Zebra
>notwithstanding? If this is true, getting that fact out into the open
>would certainly simplify the field of poetics at the formal end of the
>continuum.
This is an interesting question. My first reaction would be that every
form had to be a new form at some point in history, so the advent of
really new forms would have to be a probability. On the other hand,
perhaps forms like the sonnet or the villanelle should be considered
"finishings" rather than something really new. If one tries to view
the whole span of poetry history, the sense is that distinct forms
emerged out of an archaic ritual matrix in which specific song-
forms filled particular communal roles, so that more recent, "literary"
forms might be "finished" conversions on an older "alphabet", rather
than really new.
What then is this "finish" - and is there a potential for "really new"
forms in contemporary writing on a par with the sonnet (i.e. not
really REALLY new, but new conversions of an older alphabet)? Perhaps
the common element in finish is a kind of complexity - an added layer
of self-consciousness or reflexivity or awareness which renovates
a slumbering form - or a slumbering social reality which instigates
a form. Here again, though I hate to sound axe-grinding repetitive,
poets might find some useful tools in the study of formal logic.
CS Peirce's logic/semiotic is all about how new knowledge is worked
out by way of an acute awareness of the linguistic workings of thought
itself - his "logic of relatives" (warning: I'm a novice here & am probably
misrepresenting this) seems to be about discovering new meaning
in the structural overlay of term/hypothesis/proposition/argument -
i.e. hypothesis is built in to the structure of EVERY verbal statement.
So that in this day & age "really new" forms might grow out of
a logical systematic built into poems - that poets might discover
these forms by grounding verbal "hypotheses"(i.e. the "content")
in the concrete "evidence" or "argument" of the form. (Here "form"
and "content" would be reversible - and Peirce's category of
"thirdness" or meaning/law would play the role of structure or
completion - the "formal feeling"). This is probably already
being done by several poets. And these new new formalists are
probably breaking hearts just like the old ones. - Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 09:31:03 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: Billy Whitelaw 2B
wall, we've talked about that Big League Poets a while back. it's by Mikhail
Horowitz, and someone just sent me a copy in response to my enthusiasm. --md
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 09:31:10 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
this is maria --hi annie! (we were grad school colleagues, she was my
"apprentice" teacher in freshman english, that wonderful
institutionalizing-discursive institution of stanford). i don't have much to
say on the subject of form, except to ask why it is such an
emotional/intellectual issue in poetics circles. this is not a rhetorical
question --what's at stake in the "form" issue?
love, maria
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 10:06:28 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: all sonnets by Hal Sirowitz
First of all,
Bernadette Mayer does not preserve the codified length of a sonnet
(14 lines) consistently throughout her book
_The Sonnets_. Some go 16.
Second of all,
To call all repetition of a given word chant is to collapse
In a heap the distinctions between jazz and plainsong,
Light poems and sleeping with women.
Third of all,
I'm hearing all these echoes of the
Alfred Corn discussion is anyone else. A sonnet
Is not sitting down and writing some metronomically correct thing.
And neither am I.
There's usually a turn in a sonnet but all I hear is one side of the argument.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 10:18:04 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Re: pick ONE
>>4. I'm going to sit write down and right myself a letter (pick ONE:
>>abcdefghijklmnopqstuvwxyz)
>
>Obviously some sort of trick deck, though I don't get the point of the trick.
>
>Or perhaps an homage to WCW.
Close. This is clearly an homage to Tony Door, expositor of the early
history of the Commutative Function of the Alphabet poets (CFAP, no equal
signs). --J (for metric's sake)
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 10:57:23 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: formal/continuum addendum
Another thought on Annie Finch's post : seems like the "search for new forms"
would want to take chaos theory into account. Here's CS Peirce in 1884,
a century before chaos theory arrived:
"You have all heard of the dissipation of energy. It is found that in all
transformations of energy a part is converted into heat and heat is always
tending to equalize its temperature. The consequence is that the energy of
the universe is tending by virtue of its necessary laws toward a death of the
universe in which there shall be no force but heat and the temperature
everywhere the same.
We may say that we know enough of the forces at work in the universe
to know that there is none which can counteract this tendency away from
every definite end but death.
But although no force can counteract this tendency, chance may and will
have the opposite influence. Force is in the long run dissipative; chance
is in the long run concentrative. The dissipation of energy by the
regular law of nature is by those very laws accompanied by circumstances
more and more favorable to its reconcentration by chance. There must
therefore be a point at which the two tendencies are balanced and that
is no doubt the actual condition of the whole universe at the present
time."
Rigid formal structures in poetry might be considered analogues of entropy
as Peirce describes it above; I have certainly found in my own writing
that forms increase the opportunities for chance combinations. Perhaps
the "finished", literary forms such as the sonnet are, again, chance
recombinations expressing social entropy of some kind. The difficulty
is finding a real home in forms, rather than a sense of school project
or alienated rhetorical hat-trick. Maybe form is like the rundown tenement
occupied by squatter architect-gardeners, where entropy becomes
possibility. Or, in Mandelstam's words, "classicism is revolution",
and "tall grass is growing in the streets of St. Petersburg". - Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 10:29:50 EST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Keith Tuma <KWTUMA@MIAMIU.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Re: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 13 May 1996 09:31:10 -0400 from
<MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Re the form fuss: from this morning's reading some instances to ponder:
Reference
this is the poem from which i quote
'this is the poem from which i quote'
Sunday Draught
studying zymology, and in particular zymurgy
watching the zymogenesis of the zymogens
counting the zygospores and zygotes after zygosis
zymosis! quick, the zymometer!
Two from a page of Tom Raworth's _Tottering State_
Form is a kind of quotation? What's at stake is what's being quoted and how?
What's not "at stake" is the "temperamental disinclination among many
'innovative' poets to use regularly repeating forms" but rather what "counts"
as "linguistic elements"--e.g., the sentence (the period), the phrase, the
phoneme, a "regular" propensity for the ampersand, his relentless ability to
work the word "blue" into every line, your sudden happenstance decision to
print every poem in the last half of the book in the shape of a hippogriff?
Form of the utterance, form of the text? Form of the noise, form of the
doodle? Form of the question "What form is that?" Form of the frame framing
fractious fomenting re form?
best to all from here where the flowers babel,
Keith
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 08:58:33 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: Jonas Jones
In-Reply-To: <199605130407.AAA26348@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
Maria -- You already have it, to all intents and purposes -- I gave a
talk based on the longish chapter I mailed you a couple years back,
supplemented with reading from some unpublished letters & poems --
That Jonas chap. will appear in another book from U of Georgia Press --
however, since said book won't appear for more than a year yet -- I am
ready to accept invites to blabber from said chapter here & there! and
will, of course, share copies of this uncorrected ms. with folk writing
on Jonas --
Meanwhile -- Please note that new issue of _House Organ_ has poem by
Russell Atkins, who is not heard from that often these days --
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 12:19:30 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "c.g. guertin" <cguertin@JULIAN.UWO.CA>
Subject: Re: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <POETICS%96051311375447@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
On Mon, 13 May 1996, Keith Tuma wrote:
> Form is a kind of quotation? What's at stake is what's being quoted and how?
> What's not "at stake" is the "temperamental disinclination among many
> 'innovative' poets to use regularly repeating forms" but rather what "counts"
> as "linguistic elements"--e.g., the sentence (the period), the phrase, the
> phoneme, a "regular" propensity for the ampersand, his relentless ability to
> work the word "blue" into every line, your sudden happenstance decision to
> print every poem in the last half of the book in the shape of a hippogriff?
> Form of the utterance, form of the text? Form of the noise, form of the
> doodle? Form of the question "What form is that?" Form of the frame framing
> fractious fomenting re form?
>
By this definition, would Daphne Marlatt's use of space/silence as a part
of the alphabet of her poetic form be a regular repeating form...or is it
no form at all?
Carolyn Guertin
cguertin@julian.uwo.ca
"One's life is particularly one's own when one has invented it"
-- Djuna Barnes, Nightwood
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 09:55:52 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Herb Levy <herb@ESKIMO.COM>
Subject: Re: pick ONE
Comments: cc: jdavis@PANIX.COM
Jordan -
Perhaps I was too oblique. If you use CFAP on the alphabet cited below,
you'll end up with a lipogram. One has already been picked from this not
so fresh deck.
- H
>>>4. I'm going to sit write down and right myself a letter (pick ONE:
>>>abcdefghijklmnopqstuvwxyz)
>>
>>Obviously some sort of trick deck, though I don't get the point of the trick.
>>
>>Or perhaps an homage to WCW.
>
>
>Close. This is clearly an homage to Tony Door, expositor of the early
>history of the Commutative Function of the Alphabet poets (CFAP, no equal
>signs). --J (for metric's sake)
Herb Levy
herb@eskimo.com
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 12:17:08 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: formal continuum
Dear Annie Finch,
It seems apparent from having viewed this discussion about the AWP
piece for the last few months that your idea of the "regular formal"
includes a specific metric rhythm and that this rhythm is observed
only in terms of the line it occurs within. These limitations directly
result in your observation of not having seen "a truly innovative
form" with your search. Had I the same constraints would have surmised
the same conclusion.
When the formalized criteria is widened in dimensions to include a
work that is written in series, the first thing one notices from the
"irregular" form (as you termed it) is what elements work toward
regularizing the rest of the piece. Within a masterwork, one finds that
the defining elements of regularities rest within the axiom and create
a core for a piece of work to be understood. When repetition occurs in
large series of pieces, it is no longer the structure of the language
element which one concerns themselves with but rather what center does
this series revolve around and refine through its innaccuracies and
reververations to the evolving form.
I would like to take the epistolary form as an example. Rather than
fitting your definition of a strict metrical form, these types of
pieces rely upon the tone of the lyric as a methodology to establish
what contitutes the form. The material often focuses on what cannot be
said to another in person because of the inaccuracies within the
referent of the body, and some closing of the past through the event of
the letter. That Heloise could not reach her emotions for Abelard until
the bodies were no longer a signifier-chain which diffused or confused
meaning. That syntactical logic for Cicero only had a direct
correlation to the page and could not be constructed otherwise. That
Paul could not tell the Corinthians what to do in person. When reading
any of these in series one relies upon the understanding of tone and
timber, coveyed by the syllables and syntax more than the metrical
structure of the piece. While mono-syllabics may induce a palipitation
for revolution in a letter from Neruda or a staccato of laughter from
Pope, it is discerning the tone of the speaker which is the form. These
ideas themselves have went through further transliterations as one
could experience through the recent work of Alice Notley's Descent of
Alette where the tone of the voice itself is nearly impossible to
discern, thereby adding to the epic and epistilary form through a new
conveyance of voice.
I think your decision to avoid the "informal poetries" severely
limits your capacity for exhumation of past forms and for present
discoveries and do hope that some of the words on this list will be
conducive for challenging your opion as expressed in the AWP article.
Be Well
David Baratier
dave.baratier@mosby.com
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 13:06:27 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Re: pick ONE
Comments: To: Herb Levy <herb@eskimo.com>
Yah--R for Rothschild. (Duglas Rothschild, aka Tony Door)
but then I always was bad at reading comprehension..
--Jd
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 12:59:14 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Henry Gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 13 May 1996 10:29:50 EST from
<KWTUMA@miamiu.acs.muohio.edu>
On Mon, 13 May 1996 10:29:50 EST Keith Tuma said:
>
>studying zymology, and in particular zymurgy
>watching the zymogenesis of the zymogens
>counting the zygospores and zygotes after zygosis
>
>zymosis! quick, the zymometer!
By gum, this is not science. This is zymnastics. Ergo: poetics.
Fourfold zymnergy, Dr. Livingstone, I presume. pi + paw(2) = pi/face.
Elementary. - Dr. Gesund Heit, Ph=d
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 13:36:35 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Object 6/ DC Reading
Sunday, May 19th @ 3 PM
Jennifer Moxley
& Lisa Jarnot
@ DCAC 2438 18th St NW ph 202 462 7833
(near 18th & Columbia) (it's 3 bucks)
I am even more reccomendatious than usual w/ regard to this reading. Ya'll
come. Also:
Just published:
_Object 6_ featuring Jennifer Moxley. Includes 17 pages of her work. If you
don't get it, you don't get it. Also
8 pages from Jarnot's "Sea Lyrics", Toscano, Sher, Stefans, Farrell,
Lawrence, Kovac, Keckler, Hale, cover art & portfolio by Richard Baker.
Make checks payable to Robert Fitterman. $7 per copy, $12 two issue
subscription. _Object_, 7-13 Washington Square North #47B, NYC, NY 10003.
The credits:
DCAC series curated by Heather Fuller & Joe Ross
Object 6 edited by Robert Fitterman
Thank you.
The end.
etc.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 16:05:50 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Ken Norris <Ken_Norris@VOYAGER.UMERES.MAINE.EDU>
Organization: University of Maine
Subject: Somewhere Across the Border
The second issue of Somewhere Across the Border, a Canadian Interactive
Poetry magazine, is now available for viewing at
www.letelier.com/sab/sab.html
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 16:21:29 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Emily Lloyd <emilyl@EROLS.COM>
Subject: Re: Cope's Stein/Rod? Gwyn?
Comments: To: Jennifer Ashton <ashto_j@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu>
Sorry it's taken me so long to thank you for these leads--I've been horribly
lax about e-mail for awhile, tackling finals, attending a conference,
writing a book proposal <arrgh>...thanks very much. I tracked down the
Stimpson & it *is* interesting...anyway, pleased to meet you backchannel.
Are you a prof or student at Johns Hopkins? I'm starting an MFA at George
Mason in the fall, pretty close... em
At 08:25 PM 5/2/96 -0400, Jennifer Ashton wrote:
>I tried to post an answer to your query about transgender criticism on
>Stein once before and for some reason my post never appeared. I hope
>this works. There are a couple of earlier accounts that you might
>consult, if nothing else just to see how much more thinking still needs
>to be done on this subject. A couple of not-so-recent essays by
>Catherine Stimpson are "Getrice/Altrude: Stein, Toklas, and the Paradox
>of the Happy Marriage" and another for which I am missing the title, but
>I know the phrase "Lesbian Lie" or "Lies" is in there somewhere. Also,
>you might look at "A Signature of Lesbian Autobiography" by Leigh
>Gilmore, also not-so-recent.
>
>Jennifer Ashton
>Johns Hopkins University
>ashto_j@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu
>
>
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Emily Lloyd emilyl@erols.com
"Fist my mind in your hand"--Rukeyser
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 16:26:22 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Emily Lloyd <emilyl@EROLS.COM>
Subject: sorry folks...
about that mail meant for Jennifer Ashton & sent to everyone. I didn't see
the "CC:." If I could demurely blush, I'd demurely blush. em
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Emily Lloyd emilyl@erols.com
"Fist my mind in your hand"--Rukeyser
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 16:52:20 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tod Thilleman <tunguska@TRIBECA.IOS.COM>
Subject: Re: Poetry New York Issue #8
PNY #8 out now, featuring: textimages by Owen Smith, poetry by, Karen
Alkalay-Gut, Alicia Askenase, Jane Augustine, Kenneth Bernard, Charles
Bernstein, Charles Borkhuis, Joseph Brodsky, Dionisio Canas, Robert
Carnavale, David Caskey, Alex Cigale, Billy Collins, Joseph Conte, Bernie
Earley, George Economou, Ted Enslin, Stephen Ellis, Daniel Gabriel, Karl
Gartung, Peter Haaren, Ronald Johnson, Richard Kostelanetz, Jerry Mazza,
Robert McDowell, Hermine Meinhard, Mickey Moon, Inna Ososkov, Rochelle
Owens, Pam Rehm, Elio Schneeman, Hugh Seidman, Daniela Serowinski, Lee
Slonimsky, Miriam Solan, Adam Sorkin, Peter Spiro, Michael Stephens,
Madeline Tiger, Robert Timm, Eugene Van Itterbeek, Mark Wallace, Jacqueline
Waters, Bruce Weigl, Walter Whitehead, Alyce Wilson.
E-mail for issue ($7 upon receipt) tunguska@tribeca.ios.com
May 18th, this Saturday, we will be having a reading featuring some of the
contributors, at the new Knitting Factory, 74 Leonard Street, Manhattan. 2
to 5 o'clock. Feel free to drop by and chat (downstairs bar) we'll have back
issues on sale trying to raise funds like they say for the cause!
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 14:16:15 +0100
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Kevin Killian <dbkk@SIRIUS.COM>
Subject: SPT's annual soiree
Hi, this is Dodie Bellamy. The board of Small Press Traffic asked me to
post the following:
U.S. Poet Laureate to be honored by San Francisco's Small Press Traffic
Robert Hass, Poet Laureate of the United States, will be among the guests
honored at Small Press Traffic's annual Soir=E9e benefit on June 2, 1996. Th=
e
fundraising event celebrates SPT's recent move of its Literary Arts Center
to New College of California at 777 Valencia in San Francisco.
A number of the Bay Area's important literary figures will be in
attendance, including Francisco X. Alarc=F3n (Lenguas Sueltas Poemas),
Barbara Guest (Fair Realism), Thom Gunn (The Man with Night Sweats), Ginu
Kamani (Junglee Girl) and Janice Mirikitani (Shedding Silence). In
addition, there will be an auction of signed manuscript pages by the above
mentioned writers as well as signed works of William S. Burroughs, Ted
Berrigan, Dorothy Allison, Richard North Patterson and others. Food and
beverages will be provided, plus music by Megan Bierman on the tenor
saxophone.
The Sunday event will be held from 4:00 to 7:00 p.m. at the San Francisco
home of Edith Jenkins. Parking will be available. A tax-deductible donation
of $40-$60 is requested. Call (415) 437-3454 for more information and
reservations.
Small Press Traffic was founded in 1974 by a group of writers and
individuals who saw the need for an outlet for new and experimental writers
and small press publications. From being primarily a bookstore, Small Press
Traffic has evolved into a presenting organization sponsoring writing
workshops and readings throughout the year, with special attention to
emerging writers. Small Press Traffic's new home at New College will also
allow the organization to establish a writing/publishing resource library
open to the public.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 13 May 1996 15:10:51 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Peter Quartermain <quarterm@UNIXG.UBC.CA>
Subject: Sun&Moon sale
Sorry, everyone. This is for Douglas Messerli but i can't get through
backchannel.
yes please send me the three issues of Ribot at $4 each, plus p&p.
>At 10:04 AM 5/7/96 -0700, you wrote:
>>Sun & Moon Press announces some very special sales for
>>participants in the Poetry List:
>>
>>RIBOT 1, 2 and 3 (regularly $9.95 an issue, for $4.00
>>an issue)
>>
>>Ribot, edited by Paul Vangelisti, has become one of the
>>most significant new poetry magazines.
>>
>>Issue 1 contains new work by Dennis Phillips, Nathaniel
>>Tarn, Todd Baron, Martha Ronk, Norma Cole, Enzo Cucchi,
>>Amelia Rosselli, Amiri Baraka, Adriano Spatola, Gottlieb
>>Kasper, Douglas Messerli, and Luigi Ballerini
>>
>>$4.00
>>
>>
>>Issue 2 contains work by Sam Eisenstein, Mac Wellman, Amiri Baraka,
>>Frank Chin, Ray DiPalma, Nick Piombino, Dennis Phillips,
>>Robert Crosson, Adonis, Guy Bennett, Todd Baron, Michael
>>Clinton, Jerry Rothenbergh, Diane Ward, Martha Ronk, Leland
>>Hickman, Douglas Messerli, and George Herms
>>
>>$4.00
>>
>>Issue 3 has new writing by Ameila Rosselli, Bruce Andrews, Ray
>>DiPalma, Charles Bernstein, Felisberto Hernandez, Leslie
>>Scalapino, Norma Cole, Dennis Phillips, Rodrigo Toscano,
>>Will Alexander, Gottlieb Kasper, Nick Piombino, Cristina Peri
>>Rossi, Sheila Murphy, Spencer Selby, Marshall Reese,
>>Martha Ronk, Fernando Sorrentino, and many others.
>>
>>$4.00
>>
>>
>>Sun & Moon is also offering, for a special, limited time,
>>FROM THE OTHER SIDE OF THE CENTURY: A NEW AMERICAN POETRY
>>1960-1990
>>
>>very slightly damaged copies (corners slightly bent) for only
>>$5.00; the regular price is $29.95.
>>
>>All orders are the quoted price plus $1.00 shipping and handling.
>>
>>Please order from our website: http://www.sunmoon.com
>>
>>or through our E-mail page: djmess@sunmoon.com
>>
>>We will bill you.
>>Thanks, Douglas Messerli
>>
>>
>
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
Peter Quartermain
128 East 23rd Avenue
Vancouver
B.C.
Canada V5V 1X2
Voice and fax: 604 876 8061
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 13:02:58 GMT+1200
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Wystan Curnow <w.curnow@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: English Dept. - Univ. of Auckland
Subject: Re: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
Comments: To: KWTUMA@miamiu.acs.muohio.edu
Keith,
Thank you, and about time.
If the question of where our poetics might go from here--which is
surely a preoccupation of Mark's, but also a question vital to life of
my interest in the list--is put in the terms of where once it was the
only answer usefully elicited is an insistence on where, at least, it
for the moment is.
Wystan
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 00:27:54 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: James Perez <jmp2p@UVA.PCMAIL.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: antlers
picked up the "Breccia" collection by Pierre Joris last week and was
wondering if anyone out there knows where I could get the full-text version
of the first poem in the collection "Antlers." Information about the
publisher, etc. would be much appreciated.
thanks
James Perez
jmp2p@virginia.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 07:07:10 -0400
Reply-To: knimmo@ic.net
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Kurt Nimmo <knimmo@MAIL.IC.NET>
Subject: poetry on the net
> "A group of Nobel Prize winning poets has declared that cyberspace
> is no place for serious verse, according to Reuters. Asked if the
> use of the Internet was one way to reverse the low popular appeal
> of poetry, the group said no. Poets Derek Walcott, Octovio paz,
> and Czeslaw Milosz were undaunted about the current dearth of
> readers. Walcott stated that "I'd rather have just one person
> who reads and feels my work deeply than hundreds of thousands who
> read it but don't really care about it." Milosz allowed that
> computers were useful incomposition, but was skeptical that lovers
> of serious poetry would look for it on the Internet.
>
It would seem, unfortunately, that Milosz et al do not understand
the medium. People who would have never cracked a book of poetry are
now reading it on the internet. A traditionally printed magazine of
poetry may be able to reach only a few hundred people -- but a
webzine of the same can reach thousands. Granted, much of the poetry
out there on the internet is BAD... but this wasn't the question. As
for "serious" poetry -- who makes the determination?
If I recall correctly, Czeslaw Milosz is featured on a web site...
As for the "low popular appeal of poetry"... "To a poor reader,"
Laurence Perrine wrote in _Literature: Structure, Sound, and Sense_,
"poetry will often seem dull and boring, a fancy way of writing
something that could be said more simply. So might a colorblind man
deny that there is such a thing as color." I'd have to say it is not
a matter of "popular appeal," but rather the state of literacy in
this nation. If the average person shuns reading a newspaper, can
you expect him/her to read poetry?
Kurt Nimmo
==========
http://ic.net/~knimmo/png.htm
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 10:13:14 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Kellogg <kellogg@ACPUB.DUKE.EDU>
Subject: Re: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
In-Reply-To: <Pine.3.89.9605121851.A15709-0100000@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu>
> Is it possible that regular forms are like the letters of the
> alphabet--you can do things with them that are new, but they themselves are
> basically simple tools, hard to improve on, Dr. Seuss's On Beyond Zebra
> notwithstanding? If this is true, getting that fact out into the open
> would certainly simplify the field of poetics at the formal end of the
> continuum.
Just to contribute to this discussion a bit: I think the analogy to the
alphabet *complicates* rather than simplfies formal discussions. I have
two questions:
1) would a poem count for you as regular form if it used "conspicuous
repetition" at the alphabetic level? (Say a poem is lineated around the
principle of "three f's per line." Is the letter an "element of
language" like the phoneme?
2) are new letters really that unlikely? A friend of mine is carving
lithograph blocks into an alphabet for printing his poems. He's adding a
few new letters for good measure (pardon the pun).
Cheers,
David
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
David Kellogg Duke University
kellogg@acpub.duke.edu University Writing Program
(919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708
FAX (919) 684-6277
There is some excitement in one corner,
but most of the ghosts are merely shaking their heads.
-- Thomas Kinsella
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 10:54:22 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: continuum (ht_lit & poetics coincide in xanadu)
The copyrighted alphabet
although apparently a foolish issue
becomes serious
when transclusion
or the enforcement of copyright on the internet
is discussed.
Transclusion is a form of 'sideways publishing'
in which documents are maintained permanently
in a sort of electronic alexandria
or 'xanadu' as its inventor Ted Nelson calls it.
Once published
a bit of text
may be read by anyone
for a copyright fee
measured in nanodollars.
Everyone may read all documents
and there is no trace, no record
of the payment
and so no record of who has read what.
A document
such as 'The Waste Land'
that incorporates other texts
may do so
by linking to those other texts.
The copyright on samples
is maintained
in this system, the trademark of which is
'eternal-flaming-x'.
The fear
(if I understand this system
and there is a strong chance I do not)
was that someone
would (as domain speculators had,
buying up licenses to obviously profitable
names like bigmac or usa)
copyright the alphabet,
collecting microscopic royalties
on every text published
in perpetuity.
Bob Holman's alphabet presumes
a world in which the 'r'
has been claimed. The plural of being?
or the brand of Bob's ranch.
We all have letters we forego.
This letter goes out three days too soon.
--Jdn
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 11:14:35 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Deadline and Announcement Dates
Complete application packages must be postmarked no later than May 17, 1996.
All poetry fellowship applicants must send the required materials in one
package to:
Information Management Division, Rm 815
Fellowships for Creative Writers: Poetry
National Endowment for the Arts
Nancy Hanks Center
1100 Pennsylvania Ave NW
Washington DC 20506-0001 (Overnight mail zip code: 20004)
Fellowships for Creative Writers are $20,000.
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 13:40:21 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Golumbia <dgolumbi@SAS.UPENN.EDU>
Subject: Re: Deadline and Announcement Dates
In-Reply-To: <v01520d0aadbe614bdc43@[166.84.199.56]> from "Jordan Davis" at
May 14, 96 11:14:35 am
Hey Jordan, what are the required materials? I assume they include
application forms & the like that it's too late to get before the deadline...
Jordan Davis wrote:
>
> Complete application packages must be postmarked no later than May 17, 1996.
> All poetry fellowship applicants must send the required materials in one
> package to:
>
> Information Management Division, Rm 815
> Fellowships for Creative Writers: Poetry
> National Endowment for the Arts
> Nancy Hanks Center
> 1100 Pennsylvania Ave NW
> Washington DC 20506-0001 (Overnight mail zip code: 20004)
>
> Fellowships for Creative Writers are $20,000.
>
--
dgolumbi@sas.upenn.edu
David Golumbia
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 11:05:09 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
In-Reply-To: <199605140409.AAA21073@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
The post Mark forwarded seemed simultaneously procrustean & too general
-- given the defintions offered, the only work that wd. be recognized as
a new form wd. seem to be a work that invented something new to repeat --
if I read this forward aright -- which wd. render all those delightful
new forms dreamed up by our frioends the OULIPIANS old hat -- as they're
always counting syllables, or letters, or stresses, or something else
that somebody else had already counted????
or, to go really mainstream, that wd. make Hollander's thirteeners just
the same old same old, just like MacLow after all!
Is there room for "footprintinsm" among these old forms?
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 14:30:28 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Henry Gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 14 May 1996 11:05:09 -0700 from
<anielsen@email.SJSU.EDU>
On Tue, 14 May 1996 11:05:09 -0700 Aldon L. Nielsen said:
>The post Mark forwarded seemed simultaneously procrustean & too general
>-- given the defintions offered, the only work that wd. be recognized as
>a new form wd. seem to be a work that invented something new to repeat --
>if I read this forward aright -- which wd. render all those delightful
>new forms dreamed up by our frioends the OULIPIANS old hat -- as they're
>always counting syllables, or letters, or stresses, or something else
>that somebody else had already counted????
But why are some forms "traditional"? Is it worth making a distinction
(I'm not saying a value judgement) between forms that are old - have been
around - and 20th century forms in the "tradition of invention"? Does
it have something to do with "occasion" - that forms like the sonnet
began as chance developments out of various entropies of cultural
demand - or occasions? The occasion of 20th century forms is often
simply the occasion of their making - or the occasion of freedom from
occasions (demands). Is there a difference between the multitude of
whimsical wheeled contraptions and the major occasions for travel
(car, bike, stroller)? In looking for new forms (if this is not a
dead goose chase) as opposed to forms of "the new" should we open
our eyes to what "occasion" might mean today in a social/cultural
sense (it might be very different from past meanings). - Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 14:52:14 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
Of course, it might be worth remembering that the title is lifted
from the first line of a Dickinson poem...
AFTER GREAT PAIN, a formal FINCH comes....
Is the Dickinson poem itself a "traditional" form?
After all, it is one of those Dickinson poems that does not really
fit the "amazing grace"/"heartbreak hotel"/"yellow ribbon of texas"/
"gates of eden" pattern--
and so I am also interested in the co-optation of Dickinson as a formalist
(which i distrust at least as much as the co-optation of Dickinson by the
Grenier types---you know "the message is the handwriting"....)
cs
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 15:17:59 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 14 May 1996 14:52:14 -0500 from
<LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
On Tue, 14 May 1996 14:52:14 -0500 Chris Stroffolino said:
> Of course, it might be worth remembering that the title is lifted
> from the first line of a Dickinson poem...
> AFTER GREAT PAIN, a formal FINCH comes....
> Is the Dickinson poem itself a "traditional" form?
Then we have to also remember that after great hors d'oeuvres an informal
Stroffolino comes... but some poets are themselves the occasion for poetry,
and form follows incarnation as swallow follows finch. - Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 15:35:42 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Golumbia <dgolumbi@SAS.UPENN.EDU>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
In-Reply-To: <01I4P77MYKCY8Y6U78@cnsvax.albany.edu> from "Chris Stroffolino"
at May 14, 96 02:52:14 pm
According to my aviary sources, Dickinson's "finch" in fact turned out to
be a relatively exotic sparrow (or do I have that backwards?) -- &
somewhere I read that all of her poems can be recited in the meter & tune
of "Train in Vain" (or maybe "El Paso" but only with Weir! singing).
--
dgolumbi@sas.upenn.edu
David Golumbia
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 15:48:06 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gwyn McVay <gmcvay1@OSF1.GMU.EDU>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
In-Reply-To: <POETICS%96051415252772@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
isn't it more like "after great form a painful feeling comes?"
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 07:57:47 GMT+1300
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: formal continuum
Good reply David Baratier. I like: "inaccuracies and reververations"
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 08:21:33 GMT+1300
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From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
I am surprised at the interest in "counting" as form. Form is plainly
what anyone is or is not in, when they write--- on a good day, so to speak ---
when things go right --- as with any other sport. Counting is no
more a measure of success in writing than checking out the golden
mean and other similar proportional divisions in a painting is a
meausre of anything except the goofiness of the measurer.
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
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Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 17:03:16 -0400
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From: David Kellogg <kellogg@ACPUB.DUKE.EDU>
Subject: Poetic Briefs
This is for Jeff Hansen I think.
I just got PB#20, thanks Elizabeth Burns & Jeff.
Jeff, How much are subscriptions again? There was no information on it in
the issue; also, I wonder if I could get a copy of PB#18, on Clark
Coolidge, as well as descriptions of other back issues if available.
Thanks.
Cheers,
David
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
David Kellogg Duke University
kellogg@acpub.duke.edu University Writing Program
(919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708
FAX (919) 684-6277
There is some excitement in one corner,
but most of the ghosts are merely shaking their heads.
-- Thomas Kinsella
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Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 16:57:04 EDT
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From: Daniel Bouchard <Daniel_Bouchard@HMCO.COM>
Subject: LIFT chapbooks (announcement)
Four chapbooks from LIFT in Somerville, MA have been recently published:
The Journals of The Man Who Kept Bees, by Michael Franco
At Last Round Up, by T.J. Anderson
Immediate Orgy and Audit, by Ange Mlinko
Timeserver, by Nick Lawrence
The books are individually designed, saddle-stiched, and printed on quality
paper and cover stock. Cover images by Ben E. Watkins, Katha Seidman and Molly
Torra. The set sells for $24.00 plus $3.00 for postage.
Make checks payable to Joseph Torra
and send your order to
lift
10 REAR Oxford Street
Somerville, MA 02143
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Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 19:07:21 -0400
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From: Emily Lloyd <emilyl@EROLS.COM>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
At 02:52 PM 5/14/96 -0500, Chris Stroffolino wrote:
>After all, it is one of those Dickinson poems
that does not really
>fit the "amazing grace"/"heartbreak hotel"
/"yellow ribbon of texas"/ <------ribbon is a rose is
a
...a si esor a si esor
No, Gwyn; it's After Great Pain, a Semi-formal Dress...
I don't think anyone's tackled Maria's raised issue: what's at stake with
the form question? As one who's (voluntarily) written both quertzblatz
stuff & heroic couplets in the past year, I'm not sure I can answer...I
haven't <gag> "found my [one] voice" as They so deeply encourage--I'm not
even out looking--but sowing my wild forms (or nonforms, as Annie has it), &
yeah, interested in more talk of stakes, emily
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Emily Lloyd emilyl@erols.com
"Fist my mind in your hand"--Rukeyser
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Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 19:32:00 -0500
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From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
yeah, gwyn, it is a vicious circle (Orc cycle?) too often...
now mr. golumbia has got train in vain going buzzing in my ears
(i heard a fly ... buzz when i died ...)
the form is the FUNERAL in "I felt a funeral in my brain"
(and yes. Ms. Finch I could write a formal essay backing this up
but I think I'll wait for pain....in vain?) cs
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Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 19:36:48 EST
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From: Keith Tuma <KWTUMA@MIAMIU.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Re: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 15 May 1996 08:21:33 GMT+1300 from
<t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Hey Tony,
Re:form (again). Who's talking about counting? I said I was curious about
what counts (i. e. what so-called "linguistic elements" "matter") when one
talks about "form" (from outside the process, as a critic, someone chomping on
Plato's dream-bit, etc.) Quotes around "counting" just pun-fun.
But I'm curious--given your definition of form as something you're in or not
(and you're always in fine form, Tony)--when would you know or say or guess
someone or something is "in form"? Let's say--since we're almost talking about
it--something a number of people have agreed to call a poem?
As for what's at stake (not your question) more questions from me: Is there
really anyone out there who would not like to see a proliferation of forms?
Why would one want to limit or legislate forms? And someone once wrote that
"Inflexible standardization is the arteriosclerosis of language." Who would
argue with that in this for(u)m? But that's not what Annie Finch is arguing
anyway (is it Annie?). I take it that she's saying something closer to what
Nathaniel Tarn once wrote (in "The Issue of 'New Forms'"): "There are a
limited number of topics around which our critical arguments revolve over and
over again--as if they were stuck in some monstrous groove. One of them is
the question of new forms--as if we were never to realize that, in essence,
these forms were extraordinarily limited. . ." [He then goes on to talk of
"content.' No doubt many would take issue with Tarn's essay.] Anyway, that's
what I took to be "at stake" in Annie Finch's remarks (I may be wrong.) To
respond more directly to Maria D, I'd guess that what's most often "at stake"
in these debates about "form" is "the politics of poetic form"--which is of
course a very big topic I ain't agonna get into here.
Or, thinking of George B and Sam B, one might just ask how does one go on? Or
perhaps it's just how or why I go on right now when the Bulls and Knicks have
already tipped off?
Dribble dribble,
keith
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Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 21:02:29 -0400
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From: Gwyn McVay <gmcvay1@OSF1.GMU.EDU>
Subject: Alice Notley's _The Descent of Alette_
In-Reply-To: <POETICS%96051420241846@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
"Everyone must" "rush out" "immediately & get" "for themselves"
"a copy of Alice Notley's" "_The Descent of Alette_" "not only because"
["it pertains"
"to these discussions" "we have been having" "of form & not-form"
["but because
"it's the real thing" "no apologies" "to Coca-Cola" "and you need it"
Gwyn
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Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 01:04:26 GMT
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From: Tom Beard <beard@MET.CO.NZ>
Subject: quertzblatz
Pardon my ignorance, but...
I've seen the word "quertzblatz" (?sp) used on this list a few times, and can
guess from context that it means something similar to "experimental", but I
can't find a definition anywhere. Can anyone help with meaning, etymology &c?
Thanks,
Tom Beard.
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Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 21:17:30 -0400
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From: Sam Pereira <LITSAM@AOL.COM>
Subject: The Death Of Larry Levis
Let me add my distress at this news. Larry was a dear friend...we shared
Fresno and Iowa City along with lots of good people. Now, we lose another
one. I have added a WAV file of Larry reading from a 1984 Fresno appearance
to my WEB page. I hope his friends and the lovers of his work will find it
calming. Larry would be amused by all the attention, I think, but he was one
of the good guys.
The address is: http://home.aol.com/LITSAM
The sound file is at the very end of the page. Let me know what you
think.
Sam
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Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 14:17:06 GMT+1300
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From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
in form? in the work worth publishing (from the writer's point of
view): off form, when the work won't go right. I'm not interested in
conventional structures -- that's the term -- so much as genres of
discourse, occasions and audiences. "Form" is in my mind more a word
for pre-given structures, hence the tendency for formalists to want
to count things in them, to make sure that they are all there and in
the right order. Isn't the problem of pre-given forms to do with the
way that any precipitation of sense is apt to overflow or negate such
things of necessity. I'm hooked on the "never more than" of the
Creeley sentence...never mjore than an exdtension of content, in the
sense of wanting to say something that takes form as it goes. Form,
then, is a process of forming, a verb rather than a noun -- hence my
sense of form as being in or on form as one writes. But this is
familiar to many on this list I'm sure as Olsonian or Creelesque.
Isn't the fifties poetics of Olson set up much in opposition to a
fomalism a correctness of conventional verse patterns or
structures? Tell me if I'm way off track..
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
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Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 22:50:10 -0500
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From: Eryque Gleason <eryque@ACMENET.NET>
Subject: Re: quertzblatz
t.b. (which does not stand for teburculosis and now that i write this i'm
sorry i even brought it up but it was fun while it lasted) asked:
>I've seen the word "quertzblatz" (?sp) used on this list a few times, and can
>guess from context that it means something similar to "experimental", but I
>can't find a definition anywhere. Can anyone help with meaning, etymology &c?
mayhaps gwyn would like to explain quertzblatz some more, i think she
coined it, or at least introduced it to the list, and i think jordan uses
it more than anyone else, so one might hope he know's what he's saying :-).
one of the things i like about the word is that it doesn't feel like it's
really defined yet. i take it's meaning to be something just a little left
of 'experimental', less stale. and like i've said before, it's got a q in
it, can't beat a good word with a q in it. extra points in scrabble.
>Pardon my ignorance, but...
no buts about it, bless everyone's ignorance.
back to the *old* keyboard. (paperwork to be typed)
eryque
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Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 23:56:27 -0400
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From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Re: querzblatz
In-Reply-To: <199605150305.XAA03518@shell.acmenet.net>
My dictionary, Eryque, supplies only one t for querzblatz. It cites Gwyn
McVay. As I've said before, though, I don't really know the meanings of
these words that I seem to need to keep saying. All I can tell from the
contexts in which I've used this word is that it seems to be connected to
the procedures of vast avant-gardes without having noisome parameanings.
Correction: this seems to be somebody else's dictionary.
On a different topic: can somebody tell me what the point of all this
poetry writing is? I remember hearing something about 'the love of the
good' and I wonder if anybody else heard this thing more clearly, and could
run an ideology check on it for me.
Thanks!
Jordan
PS Chris S uses querzblatz more often than I do.
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Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 00:14:06 -0400
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From: Diane Marie Ward <dward@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: Re: poetry on the net
In-Reply-To: <3198695E.2043@mail.ic.net>
On Tue, 14 May 1996, Kurt Nimmo wrote:
> It would seem, unfortunately, that Milosz et al do not understand
> the medium. People who would have never cracked a book of poetry are
> now reading it on the internet. A traditionally printed magazine of
Amen! This posting coincides with a very interesting meeting which I
attended recently where I witnessed those who believed in the viability
of the Internet as a research tool, a method of preserving and disseminating
information trying to coerce/convince/assuage the hesitations of others to
make a concerted step to move forward and embrace the Internet in a
Library/Research atmosphere (and I will add some of the fears
were justifiable and raised good questions which will need good solutions)
I had myself shunned computers a la Kurt Vonnegut - and saw DHLawrence's
wisdom when he wrote in Studies in Classic American Literature "the machine
is the greater neuter...in the end it emasculates us all" -- But there is
undeniably an impact being made through the progressive spirit of those
who embrace the Internet as a tool to explore/instruct/ and enhance the
acquisition of knowledge and I whole-heartedly embrace these positive
aspects: the Internet has so many advantages for poets -
1)one is not subject to a publisher- one is free to explore/experiment
2) even if the poetry is not refined/honed, the poet will be exposed to
more poetry through his/her interest in the subject by doing a simple Net
search - thus almost self-teaching, or at least refining taste by being
introduced to new styles and perhaps a different approach.
3) Poetry may be in popular decline now - but the younger generation which is
being raised in this paradgim will appreciate creativity & the freedom
of the Net and perhaps poetry will see a resurgence and
4) small press publishers indie book sellers will benefit in the long run
because people will develop a taste for certain authors and may seek out to own
a copy.
5)New marriages of poetry and art and sound will occur, and the public
will be exposed to them rather than waiting for PBS to produce a series ;
6.) the hypertextual poem has been born opeing up new routes of reading,
different levels of meaning - for example Ken Sherwood and Alexis Kirke
and others are experimenting with hypertextual poems (take a look at the author
section of the EPC) --
7)In addition to that Loss Glazier has crafted a
unique Poetry resource for poets/researchers etc -- the exposure poets
receive (free to both poet and audience -- plus the audience is global)
is remarkable and cannot be duplicated in print.
Nobel Prize winners may question its viability, but we should not allow
that to shadow any of the progress being made -- There will always be a
struggle between those whose arms are folded and those who run to embrace.
(Personally I still prefer to read a book - but the value found on a
computer screen connected to the world is all too seductive.)
> If I recall correctly, Czeslaw Milosz is featured on a web site...
It is at http://sunsite.unc.edu/dykki/poetry/milosz/ -- it is a very
impressive site complete with audio text of him reading in English & Polish.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Diane M. Ward
dward@acsu.buffalo.edu
State University of New York at Buffalo
THE AESTHETE'S LIST : http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~dward/
"I dreamt I dwelt in marble halls, and woke to found it true,
I wasn't meant for an age like this,
Was Smith, Was Jones, Were you?" -- George Orwell.
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Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 00:31:31 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Eryque Gleason <eryque@ACMENET.NET>
Subject: Re: querzblatz
>and I wonder if anybody else heard this thing more clearly, and could
>run an ideology check on it for me.
sorry, not me. i'm shoulder deep in final papers (wilt chamberlain's
sholders mind you) and M$ word doesn't have that function built in.
though i'm sure if we asked bill gates he'd say that we just hadn't found
all the features yet.
eryque
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Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 01:00:21 -0400
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From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
Comments: cc: finchar@muohio.edu
Re "what's at stake" in the formal question. I tend to think Hejinian's "The
Rejection of Closure" a place to start. Rasula's _Wax Museum_ pretty good for
recent history, though I think Berrigan, Mayer, etc. deserve more than
footnote. Cage's _Silence_ also something to be known. I tend to think that
the terms open & closed, tho often used cavalierly w/ regard to form, do, in
the end, have descriptive meaning. Personally, I prefer the open.
Gwyn mentioned Notley-- heard her read at St. Mark's last week, from _Alette_
and other stuff. Very engaging.
Must say I was disappointed in her essay in _Disembodied Poetics_ -- equating
"literary theory" with "hipness."
& this-- ". . . poetry has become more & more intellectual & specialized, has
become words." This is essentially an attack upon & dismissal of most of what
I consider the most interesting work done since the early seventies from a
poet I consider extremely complex and interesting. Her argument is
essentially for a return to the allegorical as a source. Which I don't
dismiss--
it can work, obvious. Read Blake. Joris & Rothenberg's choice of Blake to
open their anthology is relevant here I think. It's a matter of the pressure
of attention brought to the process of composition-- Blake's powerfully
allegorical but madly satisfyingly OPEN as well, I believe. A pretty hip lit
theorist in his way.
Two arguments for open form:
"Truth is a contrivance based on opinion which is always learned." --Kathy
Acker
&
"Both belief and denial throw existence into question."
--Carla Harryman
Thing is, it's open, form, whether you think it is or not. So, work that
knows that, starts with that, I think, has a leg up. O'Hara, talking relative
to the Beat interest in jazz as source for the work sd he preferred
painting-- "painting is static and therefore tragic." But I think an
interesting counter to that comes from Picasso (tho Duchamp sd similar)--
that "A painting goes on changing according to whoever is looking at it."
That's the open, or part of it, I'm intending here. Duchamp said: "A work of
art is always completed by the observer."
--Rod Smith
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Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 01:09:10 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: Alice Notley's _The Descent of Alette_
Re _Descent of Alette_, which is now available from Penguin for $14.95.
_Descent of Alette_ is also available in a book called _The Scarlet Cabinet_
which includes two other Notley books in their entirety as well as three
books by Douglas Oliver. _The Scarlet Cabinet_ is also $14.95. This is
similar to the Barnes & Noble versus independent argument. Call SPD at 510
549 3336 to order. Might I suggest picking up _Alice Ordered Me to Be Made_
or _At Night the States_ or the Talisman _Selected_ while you're at it.
Rod
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Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 23:23:25 -0700
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Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Thomas Bell <tbjn@WELL.COM>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
In-Reply-To: <960515010020_300991141@emout12.mail.aol.com>
this may come from sheer blissful ignorance but im having trouble
distinguishing form from technique in this discussion, especially
in light of tony greens comments. one can have fine technique and
not be "in form". can one follow a form (?closed) with no technique?
are form and technique identical, similar, or mutually exclusive?
tom bell
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 14 May 1996 23:40:20 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Thomas Bell <tbjn@WELL.COM>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
In-Reply-To: <960515010020_300991141@emout12.mail.aol.com>
On Wed, 15 May 1996, Rod Smith wrote:
> Gwyn mentioned Notley-- heard her read at St. Mark's last week, from _Alette_
> and other stuff. Very engaging.
> Must say I was disappointed in her essay in _Disembodied Poetics_ -- equating
> "literary theory" with "hipness."
> & this-- ". . . poetry has become more & more intellectual & specialized, has
> become words." This is essentially an attack upon & dismissal of most of what
> I consider the most interesting work done since the early seventies from a
Clive Matson makes essentially the same point in _exquiste corse_ #57
"The sterile reading of Duncan's poetry by many of his peers displays the
limits of literary culture. People may be so deadened that they cannot
feel."
Is closed form a barrier against feeling? Is open form a way of
avoiding feeling? While this may seem oblique to the topic at hand,
Ithink it's quite relevant and significant, as Rod goes on to note
(from my reading of his post):
> of attention brought to the process of composition-- Blake's powerfully
> allegorical but madly satisfyingly OPEN as well, I believe. A pretty hip lit
> theorist in his way.
>
> Two arguments for open form:
>
> "Truth is a contrivance based on opinion which is always learned." --Kathy
> Acker
> &
> "Both belief and denial throw existence into question."
> --Carla Harryman
>
> --Rod Smith
>
tom bell
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 07:05:39 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: John Whiting <100707.731@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
John Cage is inevitably mentioned. He once said to me that after
he had heard any piece of his more than once, it began to sound
melodic! Eric Mottram's response when I told him this was that
the human brain is inherently incapable of producing something
which is formless. Which is why Cage didn't like improvisation;
he said it was too predictable.
John Whiting
Diatribal Press
London
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 08:39:27 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Henry Gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 15 May 1996 08:21:33 GMT+1300 from
<t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Re: Tony Green's post on counting - you'd be surprised how much mathematics
there is in tennis (and Mondrian) (and Stravinsky) (and...) - Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 09:17:15 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Henry Gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 15 May 1996 07:05:39 EDT from
<100707.731@COMPUSERVE.COM>
On Wed, 15 May 1996 07:05:39 EDT John Whiting said:
>John Cage is inevitably mentioned. He once said to me that after
>he had heard any piece of his more than once, it began to sound
>melodic! Eric Mottram's response when I told him this was that
>the human brain is inherently incapable of producing something
>which is formless. Which is why Cage didn't like improvisation;
>he said it was too predictable.
This is what I was getting at when I mentioned form as increasing
possibilities for chance developments. Hey I got an idea - closed
wear red shirts, open wear blue. then we'll know what's at stake
and who's the good guys. Did anybody read what I wrote about
form-occasions, or a trichotomy beyond the form/content binary
politico-emotiono-football game, or form as entropy (rather than
"funeral")? Do we have to trumpet the same old camps? Anybody home?
- Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 09:43:02 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: FUNKHOUSER CHRISTOPH <cf2785@CSC.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: ECchair.html
[IMAGE]
_________________________________________________________________
Timothy Leary, who has terminal cancer, is going to kill himself
"live" on the Internet. How do we feel about it here at Exquisite
Corpse? First, we are going to declare him the first Exquisite Corpse
of the Millenium. Secondly, we commend him for inventing the new art
of Public Self-Snuff, a performance art long anticipated. Thirdly, we
look forward to the Internet Public Self-Snuff of thousands of lesser
luminaries, to be followed surely by mass suicides. The Avantgarde, as
we know, always ends up at Wal-Mart sooner or later. Fourthly, we
congratulate ourselves on having been the first to propose the idea of
the Net as an Afterlife. Now, we will not only have cemeteries in
cyber-space but actual "live" suicides. We also proposed that the Net
Afterlife is nature's way of thinning the affluent (who don't die fast
enough) with the help of their own toys. (The poor will always die
like they have, from poverty, diseases and anonymity). Fifthly, we
salute Tim for taking the spotlight off Kevorkian who now becomes just
an old-fashioned audience/assistant: Tim turns all of us into
Kevorkians, who can voyeurize and abet. Sixthly, we remeber reading
Leary's Psychedelic Prayers in a heightened state and finding them
pretty humorous.We will certainly miss his Irish charm and verve.
Surely he will make a splendid saint in the Great Bardo. Go, Tim.
Check out what's inside Corpse #56.
________________________________________________________________________
HOME | SUBSCRIBE
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 09:49:29 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gwyn McVay <gmcvay1@OSF1.GMU.EDU>
Subject: Re: quertzblatz
In-Reply-To: <96051501042597@met.co.nz>
Tom Beard,
"Querzblatz" (although "quertz-" is an acceptable variant spelling) has
absolutely no meaning nor etymology whatsoever. I made it up. It is
supposed to accomodate the poetries and poetics that words like
"experimental," "avant-garde," "language," "innovative" (although that
last may come closest) don't cover; I was tired of not having a word. It
has Q and Z in it because those are the letters not on the telephone
dial, and they sound cool.
Gwyn McVay
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 09:58:40 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Making fun of their names again
Rod--
Interesting take on Notley's arg--
which I took to be 'sympathy for Tom Clark'--
tho to suggest--
that one read the already-on-the-threshold-of-readability 'Alette'--
in the unwieldy-past-the-bounds-of-post-medieval-time _Scarlet Cabinet_--
is to advise people NOT to read it, near as I can tell--
And I'm mighty non-plussed by the turn towards open/closed discussions--
Wasn't id Davit Shapiro who said--
'poetry is not open or closed, poetry is a well'--
as in 'well,'--
and Henry--
there's counting in Mondrian but it's fibonacci counting--
or gauss counting--
or duke ellington counting--
which is a different count--three and two--
from ah-one-two-three--
Taggart's Bryars essay bugged me because I AGREED with it--
and didn't like being coopted to a GREATER spiritualism--
what is at stake in SPIRITUALISM--
that you have to propose--
in public notes--
a GREATER spiritualism--
and what is that recourse to authority, while I'm at it--
that quoting recent writers as scripture--
Jd
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 09:27:19 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: a formal flinch
I brought up "Descent of Alette" in conjunction with the form of the
epistle as a way to open the subject inherent within the tenor of
voice as a new form fostered by repetition. Not only does Alette's
form bring forth a sense of breath simialr to the WCW foot, but also
challenges and agrees with Wah's insistence of the oversized sentence
fitting the capacity of new form through Notley's use of
capitilization without punctuation. It seems that Annie's definition
of form does not allow for discovery through anti-polarity of
exposition, even when repetition is present. What I mean is if you
have a poem without an "I" it's one of the features that demarcates
its composition. That one can define through a process of exposure, of
what is not held within the definition.
Rod: If I remember correctly only a few sections of "Descent" are in
the _Scarlet Cabinet_ not all.
David Baratier
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 10:41:00 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Bill Luoma <Maz881@AOL.COM>
Subject: Ideology Check
Comments: cc: drothschild@penguin.com, 73132.2550@compuserve.com,
halem@tcplink.nrel.gov
Jordan you wrote:
>>can somebody tell me what the point of all this
>>poetry writing is? I remember hearing something about 'the love of the
>>good' and I wonder if anybody else heard this thing more clearly, and could
>>run an ideology check on it for me.
I think creely had the take:
"the good" that darkness surrounds us
and what can we do against it.
Write poems for your friends to help keep them alive
while you try to watch out where you're going
reading the poems your friends write for you.
Dharmok and Jilad at Tenagra.
Ginsberg and Kerouac at the Sunflower.
Kevin & Dug & Lisa in Nogo.
I think that's the good, the bad and the lovely of it.
Bill
ps you're friends die anyway.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 11:19:22 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: a formal flinch
DB wrote,
>> Rod: If I remember correctly only a few sections of "Descent" are in
>> the _Scarlet Cabinet_ not all.
I know the _Descent of Alette_ in _The Scarlet Cabinet_
begins & ends the same way the Pngn edition does. I'll check pg count when I
get a chance, my impression is it's the same.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 11:24:00 -0400
Reply-To: John_Lavagnino@Brown.edu
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: John Lavagnino <John_Lavagnino@BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: continuum (ht_lit & poetics coincide in xanadu)
In-Reply-To: <v01520d04adbe597f078b@[166.84.199.56]> (message from Jordan
Davis on Tue, 14 May 1996 10:54:22 -0500)
Jordan Davis writes...
| The copyrighted alphabet
| although apparently a foolish issue
| becomes serious
| when transclusion
| or the enforcement of copyright on the internet
| is discussed.
| Transclusion is a form of 'sideways publishing'
| in which documents are maintained permanently
| in a sort of electronic alexandria
| or 'xanadu' as its inventor Ted Nelson calls it.
| Once published
| a bit of text
| may be read by anyone
| for a copyright fee
| measured in nanodollars. ...
| The fear
| (if I understand this system
| and there is a strong chance I do not)
| was that someone
| would (as domain speculators had,
| buying up licenses to obviously profitable
| names like bigmac or usa)
| copyright the alphabet,
| collecting microscopic royalties
| on every text published
| in perpetuity. ...
There's an aspect of Nelson's scheme (as he describes it in his
wonderful book, Literary Machines) that is of great importance but
doesn't get pushed enough these days, and which works against this
phenomenon. Copyright owners today get control over who can use
intellectual property, and the right to demand money for any use at
rates that they set themselves in any way they please. In the Xanadu
system, when you publish something, you have no control over its use,
and although you get paid for any use you can't set the rates. Such a
system would fix the major problem for anyone trying to publish
something electronically today that draws on existing materials: the
problem of getting permissions from a raft of copyright owners, and
possibly having to pay absurdly high rates. The technical problems
with electronic publishing are trivial by comparison. In the Xanadu
system you wouldn't ask for permission, and you'd know right away what
you'd be charged; someone like Bill Gates might buy up rights to all
the querzblatz poetry in the Xanadu system, but it wouldn't affect its
availability or the cost of reading it.
The copyrighted alphabet is still a real issue that users of any
Xanadu system would have to work out: Nelson gives an example of a new
text within the system that would consist of an old one with the
modification of a single word, so the idea that you could routinely
claim rights to quite small bits of text does seem essential to the
system. I also don't see anything in Literary Machines about the term
of ownership---it does appear to be perpetual, which is a problem.
(The book doesn't ever suggest that you could sell or transfer the
rights to your texts in any way, and the system it describes is based
on private contracts rather than copyright, but some way of
transferring rights is probably inevitable.) Not that things appear
to be heading in a xanalogical direction, in any case...
John Lavagnino
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 11:20:40 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: John Whiting <100707.731@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: Re: quertzblatz
Gwyn McVay says:
". . . quertzblatz . . . has absolutely no meaning . . ."
What? I was just writing an essay explaining that it was an
expletive first used by a German philologist learning to touch-
type. You have no right to say it is meaningless; it no longer
belongs to you. As soon as a sound is uttered or an arrangement
of letters is placed upon a page and others assign it a sense,
it goes straight into God's Dictionary. Is "chortle" nonsense
just because Lewis Caroll so intended? If you want to invent a
meaningless word, best keep it to yourself.
John Whiting
Diatribal Press
London
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 11:35:09 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gwyn McVay <gmcvay1@OSF1.GMU.EDU>
Subject: Re: quertzblatz
In-Reply-To: <960515152040_100707.731_EHU118-1@CompuServe.COM>
John Whiting,
I'm terribly sorry. You are quite right. Please forgive my mimsy brain;
the air conditioners are out today, and it's brillig in here.
Gwyn
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 12:01:20 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
Re Cage & improvisation-- actually he sd he changed his mind about
improvisation after hearing Messian improvise on the organ.
--Rod
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 12:11:23 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Emily Lloyd <emilyl@EROLS.COM>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
At 09:17 AM 5/15/96 EDT, Henry Gould wrote:
Hey I got an idea - closed
>wear red shirts, open wear blue. then we'll know what's at stake
>and who's the good guys.
ah, I think this is what I mean when I ask what's at stake--yes, of course
I'm aware of the politics of open form & all that...& I assume HG is
tongue-in-cheek here but he doesn't seem that far off...when I ask "what's
at stake" what I mean is what HG gets at: why is the form issue such a
threat that we end up debating closed v. open (& I'd go further--open lyric
narrative v. open querzblatz) so much? And when Annie Finch says "what
you're doing is not what I'd consider the creation of new forms"...what does
the response to her show? In rejecting old capital F forms on political
grounds, what I'm wondering is, why the apparent drive to gain acceptance in
the same quarters those capital Fs haunt? To say, ok, my work is as valid &
vigorously crafted as so-&-so's villanelle, so recognize that, Annie, let me
in...but if we reject those old forms (& the criteria for judging &
inhabiting them) why do we want to find a similar criteria for ourselves or
Annie to judge open work...are those Forms forever yardsticks...what's at
stake, I guess, if Annie isn't convinced? & why do we care about convincing
her? & why is 37 lines in each of 37 stanzas or something similar, why is
that the extension of content? Why is that not as "oppressive" a floor plan
as abbaabbaetcetc? Specifications like that, so wondrously hailed &
oft-commented, are not what makes _My Life_ brilliant or interesting to
me...& is form still "open" when those #s come into play? & is the drive to
be "open" & "poised against" Form,etc. compatible with sequences--even when
random? How open is open? how pure is politics? then how righteous? emily
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Emily Lloyd emilyl@erols.com
"Fist my mind in your hand"--Rukeyser
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 09:20:17 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Christopher Reiner <creiner@CRL.COM>
Subject: Re: Alice Notley's _The Descent of Alette_
In-Reply-To: <960515010909_300996921@emout17.mail.aol.com>
Just a note about _The Descent of Alette_: There's a review of _The
Scarlet Cabinet_ (and much about _Alette_) in the first issue of WITZ
(1.1), available for download at the EPC. The review is by Ed Foster
(hi, Ed). You will have to bring up the complete issue (it's not
hypertext), but anyone interested in the book might want to take a look
at what Ed has to say. (Hint: if you want to get through all the other
articles and go directly to the review, search on the word Alette.)
--Chris Reiner
creiner@crl.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 12:38:54 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: poetry on the net
what's this about poetry being in popular decline now?--md
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 10:51:51 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: mikl-em <mike@KID-LINEAR.TAYLOR.ORG>
Subject: Re: quertzblatz
> "Querzblatz" (although "quertz-" is an acceptable variant spelling) has
> absolutely no meaning nor etymology whatsoever.........It
> has Q and Z in it because those are the letters not on the telephone
> dial, and they sound cool.
>
> Gwyn McVay
Gwyn, watch out! the new pay phones I have seen have Q and Z printed on
the 1. See how the resistance becomes the establishment! whoever it was
with those new alphabets better hurry--poetry's getting harder than chinese
algebra. [or is it just happy to see me?]
: )
bezt, mkl.
m 2 thee eye 2 thee see 2 thee osh 2 thee eh 2 thee eeee! 2 thee elle.
mike
@taylor.org
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 12:34:10 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Alexander <chax@MTN.ORG>
Subject: chax books
I'm going to muddy up the poetics waters with commerce once more, but I
haven't noticed too many complaints from other presses doing so, so here
goes. Please DO NOT send any orders to this poetics list, rather send them
directly to me via email at chax@mtn.org, or via postal service to Chax
Press, P.O. Box 19178, Minneapolis, MN 55419-0178. And you can call at
612-721-6063.
These three offers, or combinations of them, are good only for orders placed
by June 10, 1996.=20
I.
Chax printed a small pamphlet just in time for the recent Robert Duncan
conference in Buffalo, and after selling those at the conference and to
press standing orders, we have just a few left, for $10 each plus $3
shipping & handling.
The pamphlet contains excerpts from three of Duncan's copy book entries. It
also contains a sentence from the copy books leading in:
"Mine are songs for people who cannot sing to sing."
and another sentence leading out of the book:
"The language revising its own architectures is the cloud palace and drift
of your desire."
The other excerpts are somewhat longer, and one is a poem. The entire
pamphlet is 12 pages, these pages being a combination of Gutenberg, Biblio,
and Moriki papers, hand sewn into handmade paper wrappers. All type in the
pamphlet is handset and printed letterpress in 2 colors.
2.
Chax has a limited number of copies of the first book produced by the press
in Tucson, Arizona, in 1984, which still carries a Black Mesa Press imprint,
Black Mesa being the press begun by Charles Alexander in 1981 in Madison,
Wisconsin. I think we had an NEA grant which included this book, so had to
use the Black Mesa imprint, even though everything else became Chax Press
upon the move to Tucson in 1984.
This book is hand printed on Rives lightweight paper in two colors, and
consists of twenty of Mac Low's French Sonnets. The type is Garamond from
the Golgonooza Letter Foundry, and the design is very classical. The three
signatures of the book are sewn and bound in cloth over boards. The binding
was designed by Katherine Kuehn, who currently operates the Salient Seedling
Press in Albuquerque, and was executed by Katherine and by Mary Laird, who
currently operates the Quelquefois Press in Berkeley. This book has been
selling for $65, but is currently offered to Poetics List members for $20.
3. Finally, Poetics List members may choose from the following list any 3
books for $5 each, a savings of up to $10 per book. a $3 shipping/handling
charge will be added for orders of 3 books; however, no shipping charge will
be added for orders totaling $20 or more, including any combination of
orders from the following list, of the Mac Low book, and of the Duncan=
pamphlet.
Kathleen Fraser, when new time folds up, 1993=20
Norman Fischer, Precisely the Point Being Made, 1993 (co-published with O=
Books)
Rosmarie Waldrop, Fan Poem For Deshika, 1993, (hand printed pamphlet)
Beverly Dahlen, A Reading 8 =97 10, 1992
Ron Silliman, Demo to Ink, 1992
Eli Goldblatt, Sessions 1 =97 62, 1991
Sheila Murphy, Teth, 1991
Karen Mac Cormack, Quirks & Quillets, 1991
Charles Alexander, Hopeful Buildings, 1990
Larry Evers and Felipe S. Molina, Wo=92i Bwikam/Coyote Songs, 1990
bp Nichol, art facts: a book of contexts, 1990
Once again, please send orders directly to me at chax@mtn.org, or to the
address listed in the first part of this message.
and thank you,
Charles Alexander
Chax Press
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 13:55:28 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Daniel Bouchard <Daniel_Bouchard@HMCO.COM>
Subject: Re: poetry on the net
>>>what's this about poetry being in popular decline now?--md
Funny, I heard something about popular poetry being in decline now.
daniel_bouchard@hmco.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 14:18:24 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: I muse you make so slight a question
Comments: cc: finchar@muohio.edu
What's at stake? What's a stake? What's open? What's closed? If you don't
know, why do you ask? Why fly? Do the words reflect events, environs? Isn't
place a question of syntax? Do your profs think they're speak from a platform
of objectivity or are they fooling themselves? Do you think TV is the
catholic church of the new dark ages? Isn't this simply behavior? Don't you
grow weary, irritable? Have you read _Sunset Debris_? What for? You don't
like it? What sort of things can be done in Finnish that can't be done in
English? Does the worth of the value concede to the expectations of the
narrow castle walls called syllabic muffins? Will you publish my next book?
Does CHRIS STROFFOLINO remind YOU of NIETZSCHE? But isn't a difference in
tone really a difference in meaning? Does that one look like a cop or a
crook? If there are no conclusions why do we wish for them? So there's no
special way of knowing when a poem is over? Can it be _sort of_, or does it
have to be yes or no? Think'st thou that I'll endanger my soul _gratis_? Is
this an easy attainment? What is so important? Nietzsche? And for that reason
did the robe really cease to signify anything relative to the truth of zen?
And who's the good guys? Do you have a conscious, underlying reason that you
write? Is it only to make up a world?
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 15:03:44 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: quertzblatz
my objection to the term "quert(z)blatz" is precisely that it sounds too
germanic for my taste, being more of a romance-lingo-orientated chick myself,
and a german philologist is about the last type of guy i'd want to be
emulating. sorry gwyn, i love the idea of a neologism to describe what,
after all, wants to neologize the language, but the Q-word isn't one that'll
creep into my vocab anytime soon. i like "experimental" cuz of all the nice
vowels in it.
md
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 15:13:01 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: John Whiting <100707.731@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
Comments: To: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
John Cage changed his mind every day - that's why it never
smelled bad. The great thing about his dicta was that they
weren't rules, they were celebrations or warnings.
John
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 15:46:45 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: quertzblatz
Well, Jordan, actually I say QUERTZBLATZ,
YOU say querzblatz....
(is the t big enough for the two of us?) c
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 15:59:49 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: poetry on the net
no, I thought it was that "decline" is popular in poetry now....
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 16:00:35 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: quertzblatz
how about el quertblatzo, maria
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 13:09:35 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: poetry on the net
>what's this about poetry being in popular decline now?--md
Wait. Isnt that a kind of oxymoron? Or does it mean that the decline of
poetry is popular with people? But then that would mean that people cared
about what happens with poetry....
..........................
Is a counterfeit robot different from an ordinary robot?
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 17:03:46 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joe Amato <amato@CHARLIE.ACC.IIT.EDU>
Subject: walcott/paz/milosz news clip...
i would greatly appreciate it if whoever posted that news clip with our
nobel laureates' rejection of cspace would post me same again
backchannel... and/or the source, if possible... i accidentally tossed it,
and it'll help me greatly with something i'm busy brewing...
please post to
amato@charlie.acc.iit.edu
many thanx!...
joe
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 18:09:51 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Emily Lloyd <emilyl@EROLS.COM>
Subject: Re: quertzblatz
At 04:00 PM 5/15/96 -0500, Chris Stroffolino wrote:
> how about el quertblatzo, maria
>
but certainly not nietzschblatz...to me "querzblatz" sounds, happily enough,
like Dr. Seuss, but then it occurs to me that he must've been German...
"and [experimental poetry]'s name a boneless string of vowels..." ? em
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Emily Lloyd emilyl@erols.com
"Fist my mind in your hand"--Rukeyser
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 18:57:07 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: *Querzblatz*: Specimens and usage
Rrrr-whaaar, you dear and pungent l'construction workers:
Since neologisms tend to congeal--to become stained by the
context in which they are used--I thought I'd blend in my very
own (all ideas copyright 1996 by Robert Hardin, professional
prosodist: DO NOT PARAPHRASE) examples before the cement hardens
and the color scheme goes to the printer.
Microwave your mixed metaphors for faster flavor,
Rob Hardin
(who requires no insurance or medical coverage, since a certain pelagic
sonnet by a Pultzer Prize-winning Belgian will allow him to "live forever")
*Querzblatz*: Specimens and usage
IIII. An exact copy of Kandinsky's *Staccato Abstract* was tattooed all
over the suspect's pulsating, querzblatz hands.
XV. I can't read the letterhead on account of those roosters and their
querzblatz neo-Italian madrigals.
VV. It is no longer querzblatz to read the ingredients aloud while pouring
the [table of] contents on yourself.
MCCCXXXCIV. Ron Silliman's new manual, *Teach Yourself Querzblatz
in Fourteen Days*, is a must for students and professional prosodists alike.
LXDQD. Aphid hail, aphid hail, querzblatz *homopterae* in the local mail!
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 19:25:44 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: poetry on the net
At 12:38 PM 5/15/96, Maria Damon typed:
> what's this about poetry being in popular decline now?--md
Yes, and the little toy ships are much further away than they used to
be, according to Yeats, and people are now smaller and more misshapen,
and trees bear less fruit, as of 443 b.c., according to Thucydides.
Yes, I've heard rumors that poetry is no longer read,
just as I've heard that poetry is permanent--that,
long after the Earth is a cold black planet orbiting a
dead star, Keats will still be "immortal."
On the other hand, I have neighbors who read Barret Watten.
signature here,
the lowly self-effacing novice
(don't look here)
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 20:12:40 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: coincidence xanadu (taking a pitch)
Comments: cc: drothschild@penguin.com, 73132.2550@compuserve.com,
halem@tcplink.nrel.gov
Not that things appear to be heading in a xanalogical direction, in any case=
...
What's at stake? Think'st thou that I'll endanger my soul _gratis_?
=8A=E9.=EF=EE=E7~=F1
Bill--
I agree.
. (3 and 2, men on second and third)
--Jordan
))NEw
publsihgne grot aserr tmmm from the beginnnnnn =E9=E9=E9=E9 qzblqtzlctlblaqt=
zl
boom
I take SPACE
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 17:58:24 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: quertzblatz
>I've seen the word "quertzblatz" (?sp) used on this list a few times, and can
>guess from context that it means something similar to "experimental", but I
>can't find a definition anywhere. Can anyone help with meaning, etymology &c?
>
>
>Thanks,
> Tom Beard.
It was first used, I believe, by Joseph Conrad, the Polis novelist. You'll
see it during the explosion scene at the end of _Heart of Darkness_.
..........................
Is a counterfeit robot different from an ordinary robot?
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 14:05:36 GMT+1200
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Wystan Curnow <w.curnow@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: English Dept. - Univ. of Auckland
Subject: Re: poetry on the net
Comments: To: Daniel_Bouchard@HMCO.COM
decline popular poetry now
w.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 18:19:16 -1000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gabrielle Welford <welford@HAWAII.EDU>
Subject: words better than my own (fwd)
Have you heard about the young guy in LA who was found assassinated?
He'd been working on behalf of Mumia Abu Jamal. Gab.
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 18:29:33 -1000
From: x341540 <fwo@directnet.com>
To: iww-list@iww.org
Subject: words better than my own
I send this poem to explain a situation full of pain, confusion, and anger.
who killed mcduffie
(a definitive question)
his brain was bashed
cranium crashed
skull fractures/broken
all the way around
but they said those who beat him
didnt kill him
so who killed mcduffie?
maybe it was the ame ones
who didnt kill
clifford glover/randy heath/jay parker
claude reese/randy evans/luis baez
arturo reyes/bonita carter/ eula love elizabeth magnum/arthur miller &
countless others
when they musta tripped or
their fingers slipped
maybe it was the same ones
who didnt kill
jose torres/zayd shakur/fred & carl
hampton/jonathan & george/joe dell
twyman myers/spurgeon winters &
a few thousand others
perhaps it was those who didnt kill
lumumba/che/amilcar/biko/fanon
mondlane/marighella/cordero &
quite a few thousand more
do you suppose it may have been those
who didnt kill
the indians & mexicans
who didnt steal the land &
claim that they discovered it
who didnt steal afrikan peoples
halfway across the planet
who didnt loot our customs/cultures
religions/languages/labor/& land
who didnt bomb the japanese/
vietnamese/& boriqua too
do you think it might have been those
who didnt kill at attica/watts/dc/
detroit/newark/el barrios
at jackson state, at southern u
at the algiers motel
who didnt shoot mark essex for
16 hours after he was dead
ask them and thy'll tell you
what they didnt do
but they cant tell you
who killed mcduffie
maybe it was one of those
seizures unexplainable where he
beat himself to death
it wouldnt be unusual
our history is full of cases where we
attack nightsticks & flashlights with our heads
choke billyclubs with our throats till we die
jump in front of bullets with our backs
throw ourselves into rivers with
our hands and feet bound
and hang ourselves on trees/in prison cells
by magic
so it shouldnt be a mystery that
nobody killed mcduffie
he just died the way many of us do
of a disease nobody makes a claim to
the police say they didnt do it
the mayor says he didnt do it
the judges say they didnt do it
the gov't says it didnt do it
nixon says he didnt do it
the fbi/cia/military establishment
says they didnt do it
xerox/exxon/itt say they didnt do it
the klan & nazis say they didnt do it
(say they were busy in greensboro & wrightsville)
i know i didnt do it
that dont leave nobody but you
& if you say you didnt do it
we're back to where we started
looking for nodody
who killed mcduffie
you remember nobody dont you
like with de facto segrgation
where they said the schools were segregated
but nobody did it on purpose
loke when they said there's been
job discrimination for years
but nobody did it intentially
but nobody we're looking for
the one with the motive to kill mcduffie
& you see, we must find this nobody
who slew mcduffie
because the next person nobody will beat,
stomp,hang or shoot to death
wont be mcduffie
it'll be you or someone close to you
so for your own safety
you should know the pedigree of
who killed mcduffie
you should know the reason of
who killed mcduffie
and you should remember all those forgotten
who died of the disease nobody makes a claim to
so we wont be asking who killed you
by Hakim Al-Jamil
from Hauling Up the Morning.
amor y solidaridad,
miguel
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 16:37:42 +1200
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Daniel Salmon <dpsalmon@IHUG.CO.NZ>
Subject: Re: quertzblatz
querzblatz = anglicization of german qwertz-platz
which translates as typewriter/keyboard place -
probably relates well to laureatte discussion also
dan.
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 01:19:55 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Eryque Gleason <eryque@ACMENET.NET>
Subject: Re: poetry on the net
> poetry now
>
starring marlon brando and martin sheen.
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 01:23:46 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: John Whiting <100707.731@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: Re: poetry on the net
Comments: To: Wystan Curnow <w.curnow@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
"Decline popular poetry now"
Popular poetry now.
Popular poetry then.
Popular poetry now and then.
John
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 23:50:12 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Herb Levy <herb@ESKIMO.COM>
Subject: Re: poetry in the nabes
>
>On the other hand, I have neighbors who read Barret Watten.
That's not so uncommon, the people next door to me have neighbors who read
Watten too.
Herb Levy
herb@eskimo.com
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 03:59:46 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "k.a. hehir" <angelo@MUSTANG.UWO.CA>
Subject: qwertyuiop
In-Reply-To: <199605160437.QAA15949@ihug.co.nz>
as for the form thing. wasn't there a sestina being chucked around here
not to long ago? isn't that a form? if i want to write a poem and dress it
up as a sonnet; do i go shakespeare or spenser? am i borrowing
culture, elevating it to an "accepted" medium? i'm not sure.
would the function of me/you/us churning out 100 cantos in terza rima be
a shrine or a mockery to/of dante?
kevin
"the true Querztblatzists are against Quertzblatz"
-the ghost of Tristan Tzara(who bends my
paperclips and steals my smokes)
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 17:42:33 +0930
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carol or Jeremy Close <cclose@ACADEMY.NET.AU>
Subject: Poetry On The Net
Hello
People who would have never cracked a book of poetry are
>> now reading it on the internet. A traditionally printed magazine of
>
>Amen!
:)
There is poetry on many of my non poetry my mailing lists. And my husbands. They include wargaming, housewife, health, womens, sex, and a joke list.
People often quote poetry in their sigs. In the body of their mail they send topical poems they find or write, quote poetry urls, make references to poets or particular poems. Poetry is as about as unpopular as chocolate. People may say they don't dig poetry but that doesnt stop them it using it, writing it, quoting it and pointing to it.
I wonder is e-mail seeing a change in written correspondence which has darned gone and produced a new loquat age for poetry?
There is poetry right through the nonsense/humour page set as well.
I have just founded a poetry webring thanks to Sage Weil. If anyone is interested in becoming part of this interesting navigational setting let me know. The webrings themselves are already poetry:)
Amazing numbers of homepages sidle of to a poetry page at some point!
Carol
<major redelurk>
Lachlan (born 20/12/95) has this to say about web poetry-
,kmjmk,k m sAr t k pA ak xxq- FC FVVDFCCCV ,,,,,L; ZNNB JJJJJJJJFF F IUMNM M B
<My personal ego salvo- Internet in a Poem- has moved . IAP gets a lot of positive feedback from non-poetry ppls :) >
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Carol or Jeremy Close, Adelaide, Australia cclose@academy.net.au
Jeremy is member 0 in the Inner Circle of net-Wraiths
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 07:58:15 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: hen <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 15 May 1996 12:11:23 -0400 from <emilyl@EROLS.COM>
On Wed, 15 May 1996 12:11:23 -0400 Emily Lloyd said:
>in...but if we reject those old forms (& the criteria for judging &
>inhabiting them) why do we want to find a similar criteria for ourselves or
>Annie to judge open work...are those Forms forever yardsticks...what's at
>stake, I guess, if Annie isn't convinced? & why do we care about convincing
>her? & why is 37 lines in each of 37 stanzas or something similar, why is
>that the extension of content? Why is that not as "oppressive" a floor plan
>as abbaabbaetcetc? Specifications like that, so wondrously hailed &
>oft-commented, are not what makes _My Life_ brilliant or interesting to
>me...& is form still "open" when those #s come into play? & is the drive to
>be "open" & "poised against" Form,etc. compatible with sequences--even when
>random? How open is open? how pure is politics? then how righteous? emily
A lot of good questions here... off the top of my head, two reasons why
I have been interested sometimes in "formalities" - first, they CAN provide
resistance while writing, that brings out new things. Second, it's a
way of communicating & challenging & absorbing what's been done before.
It's not really an ideological issue for me, it's a matter of writing.
Others have made an ideological issue out of it. To them I would say:
yes, Olson & WCW & Pound & Whitman & others did a world-changing tremendous
thing in poetry (but not exactly a new thing in world poetry). & yes they
are as much if not more background in my particular writing than most
more traditionally formalist poets. But ultimately I would say:
Celan's free verse is as closed as an axe falling. Mandelstam's tight
quatrains are as open as a hobo's daydream. Open is closed; closed
is open. Deal with it. - Henry Gould
>
>
>
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>Emily Lloyd emilyl@erols.com
>"Fist my mind in your hand"--Rukeyser
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 08:23:18 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: Making fun of their names again
In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 15 May 1996 09:58:40 -0500 from <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
On Wed, 15 May 1996 09:58:40 -0500 Jordan Davis said:
>and Henry--
>there's counting in Mondrian but it's fibonacci counting--
>or gauss counting--
>or duke ellington counting--
>which is a different count--three and two--
>from ah-one-two-three--
yeah well, a march is different from a july. but it's all counting,
a seasonal thing. "Teach me to number my days." Might as well
dance while you have a chant. - HG
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 08:30:35 EDT
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Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: John Whiting <100707.731@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: Re: words better than my own (fwd)
Comments: To: Gabrielle Welford <welford@HAWAII.EDU>
The "young guy in LA who was found assassinated" was Michael
Taylor. He had been a KPFA volunteer and was attempting to start
a micro radio station. He had indeed been working on behalf of
Mumia Abu Jamal, but even informed radical journalists in the area
believe that the killing was done by three men who knew him well
and was for "financial gain" rather than from political motives -
one of them was later caught driving his car. Conspiracy theorists
will have to go very far out into left field on this one.
John Whiting
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 10:02:38 -0400
Reply-To: knimmo@ic.net
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Kurt Nimmo <knimmo@MAIL.IC.NET>
Subject: Re: poetry on the net
Diane Marie Ward wrote on Wed, 15 May 1996:
> aspects: the Internet has so many advantages for poets -
> 1)one is not subject to a publisher- one is free to explore/experiment
This may be one of the reasons Milosz et al fear the Web -- the
medium is very democratic, even anarchistic, & anybody can publish
anything -- yes, even garbage -- which has a tendency to blend
everything together... I suspect Milosz et al like a tightly
controlled situation -- i.e., a small number of literary (paper
media) publishers with access to bookstores -- because in such a
situation they are prominently featured.
> 2) even if the poetry is not refined/honed, the poet will be exposed to
> more poetry through his/her interest in the subject by doing a simple Net
> search - thus almost self-teaching, or at least refining taste by being
> introduced to new styles and perhaps a different approach.
In order to do this with traditional media, you would have to spend
hundreds, even thousands of dollars on expensive books -- plus wait
weeks, months for the books to be shipped. Finding an obscure
author in the nooks & crannies alone would take an immense amount
of work. All of this -- with a robust search engine -- takes only a
few minutes on the Web...
> 3) Poetry may be in popular decline now - but the younger generation which is
> being raised in this paradgim will appreciate creativity & the freedom
> of the Net and perhaps poetry will see a resurgence and
> 4) small press publishers indie book sellers will benefit in the long run
> because people will develop a taste for certain authors and may seek out to own
> a copy.
More than a few publishers have samplers & catalogues on the web.
These include SUN & MOON PRESS (http://www.sunmoon.com/), BLACK
SPARROW (http://www.blacksparrow.com/bsg5.html), and AVEC SAMPLER
(http://www.crl.com/~creiner/syntax/sampler.html). Others are
coming online all the time...
> 5)New marriages of poetry and art and sound will occur, and the public
> will be exposed to them rather than waiting for PBS to produce a series ;
I take it you are referring here to the PBS series THE UNITED
STATES OF POETRY. A good series -- even if it spends too much time
on the old standards: Allen Ginsberg, Amiri Baraka, Lawrence
Ferlinghetti, Jack Kerouac, Derek Walcott, Rita Dove, Joseph
Brodsky, Czeslaw Milosz -- even Lou Reed and former prez Jimmy
Carter. Nothing against any of these poets -- just that there are
hundreds of others who need the exposure (does Jimmy Carter *need*
exposure?)...
> Nobel Prize winners may question its viability, but we should not allow
> that to shadow any of the progress being made -- There will always be a
> struggle between those whose arms are folded and those who run to embrace.
> (Personally I still prefer to read a book - but the value found on a
> computer screen connected to the world is all too seductive.)
Yes, I prefer a book also... tho if you find a poem on the Web, you
can always send it to yr printer & take it with you on the bus or
to the park...
> > If I recall correctly, Czeslaw Milosz is featured on a web site...
> It is at http://sunsite.unc.edu/dykki/poetry/milosz/ -- it is a very
> impressive site complete with audio text of him reading in English & Polish.
So why is he skeptical of the technology if he is featured on a
web site?
Kurt Nimmo
http://ic.net/~knimmo/png.htm
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 11:49:12 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Michael Boughn <mboughn@CHASS.UTORONTO.CA>
Subject: Re: a foraml Finch comes
Since no one seems interested in speaking up on behalf of Annie Finch,
allow me--
I have just gone through her book, _The Ghost of a Meter_, and her
main point, as well as many of her readings, are worth checking out.
She's not another Timothy Steele, as some people on the list seem to have
assumed. She wants to establish an understanding of metrics as a
code--it's a Sausurrian reading of how regular metrical forms signify,
or can be made to signify, by certain writers in certain conditions.
So her sense of "form" seems to have to do with how traditional forms
are made to signify as codes. It's a theoretically naive sense of
what constitutes form from the perspective of modern mathematics and
physics and their application to poetics, as a number of people have
pointed out, but it's not, I think, based on the kind of political
position that's been attributed to her.
Her reading of Dickinson is actually rather similar to Susan Howe's
reading, except that whereas Howe stresses the painterly aspects of
Dickinson's prosodic ruptures as signifying her resistance to
patriarchy, Finch stresses Dickinson's uses and oppositions of
metrical forms. She examines the ways Dickinson modulates between,
say, a tetrameter line and a pentameter line in the same poem, and
argues that such shifts mean something--usually having to do with
resistance to a patriarchal poetic tradition. In so far as she's
dealing with metrics as a meaningful rather than a decorative aspect
of the poem, her fundamental position is not that different from many
people on this list, although I'm sure there are major differences
over how that process is understood to take place.
For the record, she misquoted me in her post to Mark--I did not
say that forms exist on a continuum from regular to irregular. I was
speaking of metrics, and arguing that metrical patterns exist on such
a continuum, my main point being that the notion of non-metrical
poetry promoted most recently by Steele and Co. is nonsense, that all
poetry is metrical, i.e. measured, although we can speak meaningfully
of regular metrics and irregular metrics (what Williams called the
variable foot).
Mike
mboughn@epas.utoronto.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 12:21:35 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: quertzblatz
i think it's the blatz so soon after the quertz. i'd go for "quertablazzo"
--italianize it. gives the "er" a less "ur" sound too.
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 12:21:42 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: Poetry On The Net
right on, carol and jeremy close. people love to moan and groan about the
decline of poetry but as far as i'm concerned, that kind of precious,
self-aggrandizing nostalgia has nothing to do w/ reality.
bests, maria d
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 09:54:32 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: mikl-em <mike@KID-LINEAR.TAYLOR.ORG>
Subject: Milton Project
this may be of interest to some, so I thought I would pass it along...and I
did, in fact. mkl.
X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL24]
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Message-ID: <199605151910.PAA182278@faraday.clas.Virginia.EDU>
Date: Wed, 15 May 1996 15:10:20 -0400
Reply-To: "A. E. B. Coldiron" <aec2b@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Sender: mike@supacat.c2.org
From: "A. E. B. Coldiron" <aec2b@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: X-Post: Milton Transcription Project
To: Multiple recipients of list PROSODY <PROSODY@MSU.EDU>
Dear PROSODY Readers,
As John Milton wrote in _Areopagitica_, "a good Booke is the
pretious life-blood of a master spirit, imbalm'd and treasur'd
up on purpose to a life beyond life."
THE MILTON TRANSCRIPTION PROJECT is dedicated to assuring that
all of Milton's poetry and prose will be available for public
access on the Internet. Although most of Milton's poetry will
soon become available at the Oxford Text Archive and at the
University of Richmond server, most of the English and Latin
prose--along with a great deal of fascinating Miltoniana--
remains to be transcribed. We invite you to join us in
providing accurate scholarly transcriptions of these texts.
THE MILTON TRANSCRIPTION PROJECT (MTP), currently supported by
Milton-L, _Milton Quarterly_, the Computer Writing and Research
Laboratory at the University of Texas at Austin, _EMLS_, and the
University of Richmond's web-server, is the joint creation of
volunteers from 24 colleges and universities in three countries.
Volunteers may transcribe as much or as little as they wish;
each transcription will be proofread, formatted, checked, and
refereed. We shall acknowledge any significant contribution,
and all accepted transcriptions will be credited by name.
In order to volunteer, to view test sites, or to receive other
information, please contact either Professor Hugh Wilson (MTP,
Editor; dithw@ttacs.ttu.edu) or Professor A.E.B. Coldiron,
(MTP, Internet Liaison; aec2b@virginia.edu).
The only requirements are diligence, concern for accuracy, and
the ability to type with one or more fingers. Volunteer: earn
the intangible reward of "those whose publisht labours advance
the good of mankind" (_Areopagitica_, 1644).
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 15:01:19 EDT
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From: Ward Tietz <100723.3166@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: Re: Formal Continuum
Tom Bell raises a good question about the distinction between form and
technique. My sense is that it's something we don't talk about enough. Here's
what John Dewey said in "Art as Experience,"
"Technique is neither identical with form nor yet wholly independent of it. It
is, properly, the skill with which the elements constituting form are managed.
Otherwise it is show-off or a virtuosity separated from expression.
Significant advances in technique occur, therefore, in connection with efforts
to solve problems that are not technical but that grow out of the need for new
modes of experience...."
As for the formal continuum debate, I don't find the idea of a continuum useful
except to the extent that it allows me to say that I think its premise is
completely wrong, which I guess makes it an idea that's wrong in all the right
ways.
To define poetic form from within the confines of poetry exclusively, by means
of a continuum, it seems to me, does not define form very well at all. It's an
approach that defines by force, by fixing the institutional endpoints of praxis
as functional and universal, and then organizes the refusal to recognize
anything beyond them as normal and self-regulating, as a simple matter of
category and history. A validation of what is found in between these agreed
"points" might resemble diversity, but it's a diversity that's preordained, not
one that is simultaneous with formal possibility.
The use of the term "form" without any discussion of material or other technical
factors, seems to me to be too "formal." It leaves too many aspects of
production and reception unspecified and leaves form only fit for describing
ideology. As politics is elevated above all other concerns poetry can only
respond in kind, that is become internally politicized itself. Once diverted by
politics it becomes incapable of responding to form in a more general way, or to
expressive opportunities outside of its historical or technical domain.
Arguing about who or what marks the endpoint of praxis, for me, marks little
difference. It's still the discipline or category instituting itself.
I think "scene," by the way, tries to do the same thing as continuum, only on a
smaller scale.
Ward Tietz
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Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 15:25:08 -0400
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From: Bob Holman <Nuyopoman@AOL.COM>
Subject: Pick ONE
Jordan, I too flubbed "Reading Comprehension." Always read, "Reading
Compsosition." Helas.
BobH
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 15:39:17 EDT
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From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: formal continuum
Ward Teitz's remarks are helpful in generalizing the issues of form
rather than re-hashing politicized debates. It raises a question
though: just how DO you focus on the place where technique & form
interact? At one extreme you have a blindered form/content open/
closed debate, on the other a kind of wide-open quest for poetry
as a multi-art phenomenon under the influence of all kinds of
lenses, ideological, material, art-historical, etc. Themes.
I know this is kind of a useless rhetorical question. At the back
of my mind (to the left) is the idea that poetry is paradoxical
in that a great deal is going on in an extremely concentrated
reality under a rather simple unprepossessing surface. Perhaps
the ultimate "form" poetry takes is the riddle. And the claims &
debates that rage & ramble are carried on by people (us) who
often never enter that hidden reality, or get to the poem.
Does the concept rule the form - or is the concept multi-form,
depending on what lense we bring to the "artefact"?
(Is the concept Peirce's "thirdness"...) Or is this all
mene mene tekel under the sign of dissolving Babel before
the emergence of a para-language...zzzzz... - Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 16:42:24 -0500
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From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: readings in NYC the next few days
At POETRY CITY tonight, 5/16
Gary Lenhart
&
Carol Conroy
6:30 p.m. 5 Union Sq W, 7th fl free
At SEGUE tonight, 5/16
Bill Luoma
&
Deirdre Kovac
7:30 p.m. 303 E 8th st free
At ICHOR tomorrow, 5/17
Bruce Andrews,
Charles Bernstein
&
Ann Lauterbach
8:30 p.m. 127 W 26th St $?
At the EAR Saturday, 5/18
Jeff Derksen
&
Eileen Myles
2:30 p.m. 326 Spring St $3
At POETRY CITY Thursday 5/23
Robert Hale
&
Shannon Ketch
6:30 p.m. 5 Union Sq W free
attendance is mandatory
there will be a quiz
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 17:01:09 -0500
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From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Remaking their names again
Sed Hen: yeah well, a march is different from a july. but it's all counting,
a seasonal thing. "Teach me to number my days." Might as well
dance while you have a chant. - HG
The intensity though is it high enough?
("Nervous don't pay"--Clint Eastwood)
What was substituted in poetry circa Basho
was not thousands of wet leaves on the road.
For what. For an irrecoverable grace?
It was surprised. Surprised was substituted
(I don't understand basketball at all
but people are very kind and will explain it.
around the time of the frog (the year of the cat?)
and counting, which was when I played bass
most of what I did, especially in Lohengrin,
is that really what you do when you have something to say
when you have to say something to the count
anything is possible but there is a shot clock)
--the count
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Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 21:31:10 GMT
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From: Tom Beard <beard@MET.CO.NZ>
Subject: Re: a foraml Finch comes
Mike Boughn wrote:
>So her sense of "form" seems to have to do with how traditional forms
>are made to signify as codes.
Form is never _less_ than an extension of content.
Tom Beard (whose preferred initials are TRB, not TB (funnily enough))
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Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 17:48:03 -0400
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From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: a foraml Finch comes
mike boughn, i for one have nothing against annie finch nor do i assume an
antagonistic politics on her behalf. since questions of form per se do not
interest me, but questions of the meanings that get attached to form DO i
nterest me, i'm glad to have a precis of her work in a way that makes it
sound intriguing and meaningful beyond a nostalgic apologetics; i wd expect
as much from her--thanks--md
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Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 17:51:41 -0400
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From: Gwyn McVay <gmcvay1@OSF1.GMU.EDU>
Subject: Re: a foraml Finch comes
In-Reply-To: <96051621311046@met.co.nz>
I like what the esteemed Chas. Bernstein said:
Form is never more than an expression of _malcontent._
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 18:22:52 -0400
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From: Mary Hilton <mhilton@TIA.ORG>
Subject: Political Diction - Announcement
Submissions are now being accepted for "Political Diction 96," a
magazine devoted to the electoral process, and most specifically to the
election year 1996. A multi-partisan magazine distributed each
election year, it is hoped that "PD" will allow writers and artists to
express their views about the democratic process and our government.
Interesting and innovative essays, poetry, short stories and (easily
reproduced) visual art are welcome. Submission deadline is August 15,
and the mag will be distributed in Sept/Oct. Please send to:
Political Diction 96
c/o M. Hilton
1706 U Street, NW, #102
Washington, DC 20009
"Democracy, which shuts the past against the poet, opens the future
before him. . ." Alexis de Tocqueville
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Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 18:44:24 -0500
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From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: a foraml Finch comes
Mike Boughn, I agree with Maria. I was not trying to demonize finch
as to assert my lack of interest in systematic studies of form (which
I know, you're interested in too). Maybe this will change on my part--
but the questions of the MEANING that get attached to forms interests
me too. What does Maria mean by this meaning, meaning as value?
Since I read both "traditional" and "non-traditional" (i'm not defining
that now) verse (in terms of "form"), I guess I'm curious what form
attracts me and why. But I guess I feel that "meaning" tends to get
pushed aside, in such discussions. As if the meaning of the form matters
more than the meaning on a more content level. If I see the MEANING
of say a Berrigan poem as similar to the meaning of a Shakespeare sonnet
(and i don't mean a SINGULAR meaning, but a kind of meaning-complex),
am I being a bad boy who has not eaten enough of my post-modern peas
and recognized how IMPORTANT the formal differences are in the fashion-
show of life? cs
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Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 19:04:28 -0500
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From: Eryque Gleason <eryque@ACMENET.NET>
Subject: Re: readings in NYC the next few days
>At POETRY CITY Thursday 5/23
>Robert Hale
>&
>Shannon Ketch
>6:30 p.m. 5 Union Sq W free
>
>attendance is mandatory
>there will be a quiz
jordan, i apologize for my absence. my dog ate it.
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 14:11:32 GMT+1300
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From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: poetry on the net
declining poetry? what dead language is this? poetry, poetryst,
poetryiton?
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
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Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 19:23:26 -0700
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From: Gary Hawkins <ghawkins@HALCYON.COM>
Subject: Re: readings in NYC the next few days
Would like to add
Segue May 18
Chris Mann
(Australian linguistic composer, phenomenal.)
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 14:30:05 GMT+1300
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From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
But yes, Henry Gould, I was listerning to you & Ch.Pierce, don't
worry abt it.3rdness is good fun.
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 14:31:28 GMT+1300
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From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
I'm not surprised abt "maths" in "artworks", just chary of seeing
that as its value.
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
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Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 23:24:36 -0400
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From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Fwd: Re: Fwd: Re: formal continuum/conspicuous repetition (fwd)
---------------------
Forwarded message:
From: FINCHAR@miavx1.acs.muohio.edu
To: AERIALEDGE@aol.com
Date: 96-05-16 15:22:48 EDT
Dear Rod,
Thanks. Could you please forward this one to the list?
Re: Replies to the post on the formal continuum:
A dozen replies are waiting on the server in my office an hour from home and
I
can't acess fthem until next week. But I have seen a couple fo the
latest--and
the subject haeadings--so I have some idea, i think, fo what the resposne has
been. And I just wanted to throw into the mix the thought that my idea of
formalism--my love for sensual repetition in poetry, and my interest in
celebratingcc
elerating it in books like the anthology in question--has nothign to do with
political conservatism (I saw timothy Steele's name mentioned in this
context).
First, ther eis no connection between formal proclivities nad political
ones,
or else fascist Pound and antisemite Eliot would have written sonnets while
radical Millay would have written the Cantos. Check out Adrienne Rich's essay
Format and Form in her new book of essays for more on this common
misperception. Also, my own interst in form is based if anything on a sense
of
he democratic potential of oral poetries, and appreciation for the
universal/communal roots of the art in tribal poetics. I am not personally a
conservative in the least. ANd of course, I am personally tired of having it
assumed that because I love formal poetry I am some kind of reactionary in my
personal life. My main point though is that I wish we could begin to discuss
some kind of common overall map of how poetics works, without panic based on
political factions/fractions.
My own poetry started out in freee verse, and when noticed the coded
meanings
in my occasional unintentional metrical riffs, I wanted to mistress meter and
find out how to control it better. That led to learning to wrtie in form,
enjoyhing it,a nd to the idea of the metrical codes explained in THE GHOST OF
METER. Ghost of Meter in turn led me to realize that as a fefminist I wanted
to write in other meters, and I am now writing in metetrs that have not been
seriously explored before, to wit in dactyls. These are regular meters, with
a
regular rhythm. But they are plenty challenging to me as I learn how to vary
them and make them live. THey defamiliarize language and rid me of the need
to
put an ego-subject in the middle of the poem. i enjoy them.
But his is not for politically reactionary nrreasons; if i waqnt to go back,
it
is about 10,00 years back, not back to the ighteenth century as some
formalists
do seem to want to do.
Well, I will resond mor eafter I read athe texts being held hostage at my
office.
--Annie
I ome--et smakbbpmy
fegn g .to T HsetMy fowrks. anry But still, asal tribacs a lir Adn and ant
quto
has
nothing
to do
with is
at tThough The
last I etDear
Pis list?
wrard this
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Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 23:39:55 -0400
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From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: Formal Continuum
At 3:01 PM 5/16/96, Ward Tietz typed:
> The use of the term "form" without any discussion of material or
> other technical factors, seems to me to be too "formal." It leaves
> too many aspects of production and reception unspecified and leaves
> form only fit for describing ideology.
Discussions of form are *usually* too unspecified. Why is that?
In classical (and quertzblatz) music composition, discussions of
form are almost always on the level of formal construction.
The absence of terms, I think, is what makes formal discussions
in music so like a classical argument in which the terms are unknown.
I'd like to see more of that in discussions of the poetry of our peers--
especially in discussions of so-called experimental poetry.
The ideological aspect of form seems to me to be form's least
interesting aspect. Certainly, attempts to right ideological flaws
by means of formal innovation have created important approaches
to form and technique--for example, Cage's chance operations, which
were often created in an attempt to avoid intrusions of "the ego."
But in arbitrary cases, there is also the danger of losing the
initial impulse that leads to the occurrence of the poem. In the service
of some self-conscious attempt to posit opposing or utopian takes on
politics, many poets seem obsessed with writing prosodic PC models--
colloquial models to make the poem more "real," appropriations of street
art to somehow avoid the artificiality of language (an impossibility).
People often argue against formal Eurocentrism--as if Afrocentric forms
were a priori better (or worse). I would argue that the *properties* of
a poem--its idiomatic (not ideological) event, is resonance--are what
make the poem work. Sometimes, the wish to avoid the obvious is the
only doctrine, the only belief system, that a writer needs.
All the best,
Rob Hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 23:42:28 -0400
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From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
Comments: cc: finchar@muohio.edu
>Open is closed; closed
is open. Deal with it. - Henry Gould
1. Do your profs think they're speaking from a platform
of objectivity or are they fooling themselves?
2. But isn't a difference in
tone really a difference in meaning?
3. Don't you
grow weary, irritable?
4. Can it be _sort of_, or does it
have to be yes or no?
5. So, um, case closed?
ok, time's up, put down your pencils.
please.
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 00:03:38 -0400
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From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: readings in NYC the next few days
G.H. wrote--
>Would like to add
>Segue May 18
Chris Mann
>(Australian linguistic composer, phenomenal.)
time?
I highly tout this individual. Go, if you can, he's an amazement. Just read
at Bridge Street, terrific performer/poet/composer.
Rod
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 00:25:33 -0400
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From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: fromal Fnich cmoes a/ a fomral Ficnh coems/
At 11:49 AM 5/16/96, Michael Boughn typed:
> She wants to establish an understanding of metrics as a
> code--it's a Sausurrian reading of how regular metrical forms signify,
> or can be made to signify, by certain writers in certain conditions.
> So her sense of "form" seems to have to do with how traditional forms
> are made to signify as codes. It's a theoretically naive sense of
> what constitutes form from the perspective of modern mathematics and
> physics and their application to poetics, as a number of people have
> pointed out...
Among other things, metrics are certainly a kind of code. The mere fact
that a work might involve metrical patterns that might play against the
content (line breaks, metrics that foreground the weaknesses and disloca-
tions of syntax) suggests that there is a kind of pun, a duality, involved
in metrical considerations. The most obvious examples might well be
medieval--metaphysical shape poetry; medieval music by Machaut, which
was sometimes written "in the shape of" the architecture of the
cathedral in which it was to be performed; *musica ficta*--musical notes
in a code that usurped the notes as written; *augenmusic*
(music for the eye, ie, notation that drew pictures on the page);
the parody mass, which sometimes encoded popular songs in an almost
unrecognizable cantus firmus. I might argue that all sonically-based
technique can be considered as a kind of code.
The tricky part comes when one attempts to affix meanings to the
*terms* of the code. I might argue that meter is a kind of non-functional,
non-representational cryptography. The sound of language might have
*originated* through a misguided attempt to represent, but ontomatopoeia
retains an endearing artificiality. When sound-patterns repeat, the
meaning often grows progressively more opaque. Laugherino, laugherino...
In Julius Caesar, Shakespeare employs a rhetorical device that
seems relevant: He uses the phrase "honorable men" repeatedly until
the term begines to mean its opposite, and an angry crowd goes away in
search of the "honorable" men they later kill. Could this be an example
of how rhythm can be used to provide a counterpoint to poetic meaning?
> Finch stresses Dickinson's uses and oppositions of
> metrical forms. She examines the ways Dickinson modulates between,
> say, a tetrameter line and a pentameter line in the same poem, and
> argues that such shifts mean something--usually having to do with
> resistance to a patriarchal poetic tradition.
The resistance of ED's modulation/vacillation between meters *does*
mean something. But I fail to see how any patriarchy is involved.
Mallarme and Hopkins were resisting conventional metrics as well.
There is no secret, pervasive conspiracy of straight white males
formed to keep poetry metrical, just as jews are not responsible
for the economic state of the world.
BTW: I do not accept the idea that the Canon is such a "conspiracy"
of straight white males.
> I was speaking of metrics, and arguing that metrical patterns exist on such
> a continuum, my main point being that the notion of non-metrical
> poetry promoted most recently by Steele and Co. is nonsense, that all
> poetry is metrical, i.e. measured, although we can speak meaningfully
> of regular metrics and irregular metrics.
So poetry would seem to be to me--though I am speaking from the perspective
of a musician as well as a writer. No matter what style or period, poetry--
indeed, all writing, including prose--seems to scan as rhythmically as sheet
music: everything still breaks down to two's and three's. Is this some sort
of literal-minded failing on my part as a reader? Possibly--but I'm inclined
to think otherwise. To me, it seems a failing on the reader's part *not*
to hear music when s/he reads--unless there has been a conscious rejection
of sound in poetry on reader and writer's part. (The idea is interesting,
though, and has already lead to some fascinating work.)
All the best,
Rob Hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 16 May 1996 21:39:07 -0700
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From: Thomas Bell <tbjn@WELL.COM>
Subject: range review Nobel form or lil Hans
Comments: To: AERIALEDGE@aol.com, "Sheila E. Murphy" <semurphy@AZLINK.COM>,
Jorge Guitart <guitart@acsu.buffalo.edu>,
welford@hawaii.edu, MDamon9999@aol.com, jdavis@panix.com,
lsr3h@faraday.clas.virginia.edu, lsr3h@virginia.edu,
cris@slang.demon.co.uk, clements@fas.harvard.edu
In-Reply-To: <Pine.3.89.9605162157.A4323-0100000@well>
> > > > > > Lil Hans put his finger in the dike
> > > > > > > A group of Nobel Prize winning poets has declared that cyberspace
> > > > > > > is no place for serious verse, according to Reuters. Asked if
> > the
> > > > > > > use of the Internet was one way to reverse the low popular
> > appeal
> > > > > > > of poetry, the group said no. Poets Derek Walcott, Octovio
> > paz,
> > > > > > > and Czeslaw Milosz were undaunted about the current dearth of
> > > > > > > readers. Walcott stated that "I'd rather have just one person
> > > > > > > who reads and feels my work deeply than hundreds of thousands
> > who
> > > > > > > read it but don't really care about it." Milosz allowed that
> > > > > > > computers were useful incomposition, but was skeptical
> > that lovers
> > > > > > > of serious poetry would look for it on the Internet.
> > > > > > > yeah well, "seriouous" somea this Csezlaw
> > > > > > > cereal poetry on the cornflakes box made me what I am today
> > > > > > "I read you, chaise-lounge, but i don't really care about you..."
> > > > > > What I care about is demonstrating outside my window this morning
> > > > > > twenty thousand lilac blossoms excercizing their rites
> > > > > > exotica of the navel tickle the holy grails
> > > > > for smart bombs. Don't believe a word of it
> > > > sparse gleanings from the ivoried groves of academ
> > > and don't forget those of us who have a visceral reaction to
> > triumph of the human spirit stuff such as milosz and walcott churn
> > out--our viscerae get bored.
> > One develops an understanding of different levels of
> > suffering.
> > stuttering machine gun ducklings
> >
>
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 00:53:38 -0400
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From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
At 11:42 PM 5/16/96, Rod Smith typed:
> 1. Do your profs think they're speaking from a platform
> of objectivity or are they fooling themselves?
If my "profs" (whoever these nebulous strangers
might be) either "think" they're speaking from a platform
of objectivity or are "fooling themselves," then it
follows that my profs must either:
1. merely imagine they are speaking from a platform of objectivity
(in which case, they would seem to be incorrect according to the
terms of your question), or
2. are certain they speak from a platform of objectivity
(in which case, they would seem to be correct according
to the terms of your question).
An interesting idea, but a strange one...
> 2. But isn't a difference in
> tone really a difference in meaning?
You would have to ask the writer. Otherwise, how could you
presume to know what s/he means merely by listening to the tone?
(Ad hominem and stir, my personable gourmet?)
> 3. Don't you
> grow weary, irritable?
Don't you walk three blocks north of your house on Suffolk Street
to kick stray cats on your way to the Estroff Pharmacy on Second Avenue?
Don't you ask to fill a prescription for your remissive phlebitis and
sigh sensually when you receive your treasured prescription?
If not, why not?
> 4. Can it be _sort of_, or does it
> have to be yes or no?
*Always?*
> 5. So, um, case closed?
Not if my mind is still open. Would you please check the trunk?
> ok, time's up, put down your pencils.
But I'm enjoying my phallocentric pencil's attempt to
visually usurp my androgynistic imagination with notions
of POWER, MORE POWER, adjective-verb, adjective-verb,
adjective verb! Meaning is arbitrary, don't you think?
Arf, arf! Whinny! Bra-a-a-ck!
> please.
Well, when you put it *that* way...
All the best,
Hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 01:16:37 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
At 12:01 PM 5/15/96, Rod Smith typed:
> Re Cage & improvisation-- actually he sd he changed his mind about
> improvisation after hearing Messian improvise on the organ.
>
> --Rod
Fascinating information, Rod. Thanks for offering it.
Where did you hear this?
All the best,
Hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 01:26:55 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: John Whiting <100707.731@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: Re: Formal Continuum
Re John Cage and chance operation:
In 1982 in London there was a major 70th birthday festival given
for Cage. It included two whole afternoons in which his music was
performed without formal breaks, consecutively and simultaneously.
Many of the same musicians took part. The structures of both were
determined by chance operations governed by the I Ching. The first
event was planned by one of the organizers, the second by Cage
himself.
The first afternoon was dreary beyond description. 4'33" seemed
like 4hrs33'. The second afternoon went by in a flash. Everyone was
constantly laughing and applauding. Never had four hours gone so
quickly.
Why?
Cut to Gertrude Stein's death bed.
Alice: What is the answer?
Gertrude: What is the question?
John Whiting
Diatribal Press
London
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 02:03:01 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: range review Nobel form or lil Hans
Lil Hans put his finger in the dike
> > > > > > > A group of Nobel Prize winning poets has declared that
cyberspace
> > > > > > > is no place for serious verse, according to Reuters. Asked
if
> > the
> > > > > > > use of the Internet was one way to reverse the low popular
> > appeal
> > > > > > > of poetry, the group said no. Poets Derek Walcott, Octovio
> > paz,
> > > > > > > and Czeslaw Milosz were undaunted about the current dearth
of
> > > > > > > readers. Walcott stated that "I'd rather have just one
person
> > > > > > > who reads and feels my work deeply than hundreds of
thousands
> > who
> > > > > > > read it but don't really care about it." Milosz allowed
that
> > > > > > > computers were useful incomposition, but was skeptical
> > that lovers
> > > > > > > of serious poetry would look for it on the Internet.
> > > > > > > yeah well, "seriouous" somea this Csezlaw
> > > > > > > cereal poetry on the cornflakes box made me what I am today
> > > > > > "I read you, chaise-lounge, but i don't really care about you..."
> > > > > > What I care about is demonstrating outside my window this morning
> > > > > > twenty thousand lilac blossoms excercizing their rites
> > > > > > exotica of the navel tickle the holy grails
> > > > > for smart bombs. Don't believe a word of it
> > > > sparse gleanings from the ivoried groves of academ
> > > and don't forget those of us who have a visceral reaction to
> > triumph of the human spirit stuff such as milosz and walcott churn
> > out--our viscerae get bored.
> > One develops an understanding of different levels of
> > suffering.
> > stuttering machine gun ducklings
Jimmy America Animal Razzamatazz, shit
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 08:04:46 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
In-Reply-To: Message of Thu, 16 May 1996 23:42:28 -0400 from
<AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
On Thu, 16 May 1996 23:42:28 -0400 Rod Smith said:
>>Open is closed; closed
>is open. Deal with it. - Henry Gould
>
>
>1. Do your profs think they're speaking from a platform
>of objectivity or are they fooling themselves?
what profs?
>
>2. But isn't a difference in
>tone really a difference in meaning?
>
problem is a lot of meanings presented in monotone.
>3. Don't you
>grow weary, irritable?
>
no, I make others so. See answer to #2
>4. Can it be _sort of_, or does it
>have to be yes or no?
>
the rest comes from evil. [see 3 doors down: Circle of the Equivocators]
>5. So, um, case closed?
>
Bill's in the mail. - Guru Dobba Bowl
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 08:49:37 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Peter and Karen Landers <landers@VIVANET.COM>
Subject: Re: sometimes a formal Finch comes
tom bell wrote:
>this may come from sheer blissful ignorance but im having trouble
>distinguishing form from technique in this discussion, especially
>in light of tony greens comments. one can have fine technique and
>not be "in form". can one follow a form (?closed) with no technique?
>are form and technique identical, similar, or mutually exclusive?
just a quick semantic point:
- "formal" means *starting* with a predetermined form, in my book
- not all shapes are forms, that would extend the definition of the word
beyond all use
- many modernists sought "new forms" rather than an end to form (Spring
and All)
- "open form" is a form because it can be seen as a reflection of one of
the current models of the universe
- there is often more structure in an "open form" piece that in any formal
poem I have ever seen
Peter Landers
landers@vivanet.com
http://www.vivanet.com/~landers
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 08:50:27 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Michael Boughn <mboughn@CHASS.UTORONTO.CA>
Subject: Re: a formal Finch comes
In-Reply-To: <v01540b02adc1a6d6de89@[204.74.3.74]> from "Carnography" at May
17, 96 00:25:33 am
> Among other things, metrics are certainly a kind of code. The mere fact
> that a work might involve metrical patterns that might play against the
> content (line breaks, metrics that foreground the weaknesses and disloca-
> tions of syntax) suggests that there is a kind of pun, a duality, involved
> in metrical considerations.
Actually I meant "code" in a more strictly structuralist sense. This
is what she says: ". . . the metrical-code theory concentrates on the
information value of specific occurences of metrical patterns within a
poem. The word _code_ implies that meter in a metrically organic poem
can function like a language, carrying different information at
different points within a poem. . . . metrical associations create
their own layer of literary meaning as they develop throughout a poem."
Metrical "meaning", according to this theory, is generated through
difference within a structure--an obvious reference to Saussure. As I
said, it's an interesting way of looking at what certain poets have
done in certain circumstances, a different way of reading the
meaningfulness of meter.
As for E. Dickinson and patriarchy, read Finch's argument. I never
meant to become an apologist for her. I just wanted to correct what in
my sleep-deprived state (damn those 2 a.m. feedings!) seemed to me a
somewhat knee-jerk response by _some_ people to her brand of
formalism. If my tone seemed shrill, I apologize.
But here's one for you. What's the difference between "rules" and
"conventions"? I just read an essay by Peter Burger in his collection
called _The Decline of Modernism" (I don't have it here--it's 3 floors
down--and can't remember the name of the essay and have Amelia
sleeping finally in one arm as I type this and am not going to go down
to the kitchen for it and risk waking her up--just to reintroduce the
"body" here) in which he argues that one of the
differnces, or points of modulation in the development of modernism
(the transition from the 18th to the 19th century, from the
Enlightenment to Romanticism) was the shift in poetic composition from
rules to conventions and the different way that positioned the writer
socially and as an "artist".
Mike
mboughn@chass.utoronto.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 08:30:24 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: forming at the mouth
M. Boughn's & A. Finch's recent posts maybe answered my question of
yesterday re: W. Teitz's message: how to focus more precisely on where
form & technique conjoin. The focus on metrics & measure might lead
into the internal structure, where all the effects take place.
It's not that ideology & background are not important - it's that
they excuse a superficial reading or a non-reading. Meter is famously
hard to read & hard to agree on - thus the dearth of comments on it
here & elsewhere, I suppose - but to listen to it (along with all the
other halting stuttering slowdown effects of poetry) might lead to the
water in the rock. Maybe combined with some kind of "semiotic approach"
(what is the order of meanings - the yes & no - that builds the
architectonic?) I know this is not anything new. But then classicism
is revolution (I mean the prehistoric classics) - Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 09:33:55 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: readings in NYC the next few days
some say:
attendance is mandatory
>there will be a quiz
but i say:
will there be a querz.
md
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 10:00:05 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Maria Damon <MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: range review Nobel form or lil Hans
Lil Hans put his finger in the dike
> > > > > > > A group of Nobel Prize winning poets has declared that
cyberspace
> > > > > > > is no place for serious verse, according to Reuters. Asked
if
> > the
> > > > > > > use of the Internet was one way to reverse the low popular
> > appeal
> > > > > > > of poetry, the group said no. Poets Derek Walcott, Octovio
> > paz,
> > > > > > > and Czeslaw Milosz were undaunted about the current dearth
of
> > > > > > > readers. Walcott stated that "I'd rather have just one
person
> > > > > > > who reads and feels my work deeply than hundreds of
thousands
> > who
> > > > > > > read it but don't really care about it." Milosz allowed
that
> > > > > > > computers were useful incomposition, but was skeptical
> > that lovers
> > > > > > > of serious poetry would look for it on the Internet.
> > > > > > > yeah well, "seriouous" somea this Csezlaw
> > > > > > > cereal poetry on the cornflakes box made me what I am today
> > > > > > "I read you, chaise-lounge, but i don't really care about you..."
> > > > > > What I care about is demonstrating outside my window this morning
> > > > > > twenty thousand lilac blossoms excercizing their rites
> > > > > > exotica of the navel tickle the holy grails
> > > > > for smart bombs. Don't believe a word of it
> > > > sparse gleanings from the ivoried groves of academ
> > > and don't forget those of us who have a visceral reaction to
> > triumph of the human spirit stuff such as milosz and walcott churn
> > out--our viscerae get bored.
> > One develops an understanding of different levels of
> > suffering.
> > stuttering machine gun ducklings
Jimmy America Animal Razzamatazz, shit
on a shingle, and adam and eve on a raft, venus on the
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 10:14:39 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark W Scroggins <mscroggi@ACC.FAU.EDU>
Subject: ANNOUNCEMENT: NEW JOURNAL
In-Reply-To: <960517093354_492968659@emout13.mail.aol.com>
ANNOUNCING:
The premier issue of FLASHPOINT: A Multidisciplinary Journal in the Arts
and Politics.
Issue 1 features:
-New poetry by CHARLES BERNSTEIN, CLAYTON ESHLEMAN, JOE BRENNAN, DAVID
HICKMAN, CARLO PARCELLI, FREDERICK POLLACK
-Art by SUE COE and A. ZEMEL
-RON SUKENICK interview and story
-JOE BRENNAN on the LANGUAGE POETS
-JUDITH BRODY on SUE COE
-ART COVER on Adaptive Ecology
-DAVID KAUFMANN on THEODOR ADORNO
-MARK SCROGGINS on IAN HAMILTON FINLAY
-Reviews of Eshleman, Perelman, Nicholls, Comens
FlashPoint combines a commitment to modernist/postmodernist
poetics with a rigorously political social commentary. 8 1/2 x 11",
100pp. The first issue is available for $7.50; make checks payable to
FlashPoint, PO Box 6243, Washington DC 20015-0243. Inquiries may also be
directed to Jim Angelo at <jima@vais.net>.
(Or you can drop me a line--Mark Scroggins)
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 10:20:12 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: range review Nobel form or lil Hans
In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 17 May 1996 10:00:05 -0400 from
<MDamon9999@AOL.COM>
On Fri, 17 May 1996 10:00:05 -0400 Maria Damon said:
Lil Hans put his finger in the dike
A group of Nobel Prize winning poets has declared that
cyberspace
no place for serious verse, according to Reuters. Asked
if
the
use of the Internet was one way to reverse the low popular
appeal
of poetry, the group said no. Poets Derek Walcott, Octovio
paz,
and Czeslaw Milosz were undaunted about the current dearth
of
readers. Walcott stated that "I'd rather have just one
person
who reads and feels my work deeply than hundreds of
thousands
who
read it but don't really care about it." Milosz allowed
that
mputers were useful incomposition, but was skeptical
that lovers
serious poetry would look for it on the Internet.
yeah well, "seriouous" somea this Csezlaw
cereal poetry on the cornflakes box made me what I am today
"I read you, chaise-lounge, but i don't really care about you..."
What I care about is demonstrating outside my window this morning
enty thousand lilac blossoms excercizing their rites
exotica of the navel tickle the holy grails
for smart bombs. Don't believe a word of it
sparse gleanings from the ivoried groves of academ
and don't forget those of us who have a visceral reaction to
triumph of the human spirit stuff such as milosz and walcott churn
out--our viscerae get bored.
One develops an understanding of different levels of
suffering.
stuttering machine gun ducklings
Jimmy America Animal Razzamatazz, shit
on a shingle, and adam and eve on a raft, venus on the
pair a dicey flytraps for the eyes have it eventually
between the tis and the this it hurts
said Milt the popularist Blind King Atwells Avenue Poet Porthole
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 10:38:45 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Re: range review Nobel form or lil Hans
Lil Hans put his finger in the dike
> > > > > > > A group of Nobel Prize winning poets has declared that
cyberspace
> > > > > > > is no place for serious verse, according to Reuters. Asked
if
> > the
> > > > > > > use of the Internet was one way to reverse the low popular
> > appeal
> > > > > > > of poetry, the group said no. Poets Derek Walcott, Octovio
> > paz,
> > > > > > > and Czeslaw Milosz were undaunted about the current dearth
of
> > > > > > > readers. Walcott stated that "I'd rather have just one
person
> > > > > > > who reads and feels my work deeply than hundreds of
thousands
> > who
> > > > > > > read it but don't really care about it." Milosz allowed
that
> > > > > > > computers were useful incomposition, but was skeptical
> > that lovers
> > > > > > > of serious poetry would look for it on the Internet.
> > > > > > > yeah well, "seriouous" somea this Csezlaw
> > > > > > > cereal poetry on the cornflakes box made me what I am today
> > > > > > "I read you, chaise-lounge, but i don't really care about you..."
> > > > > > What I care about is demonstrating outside my window this morning
> > > > > > twenty thousand lilac blossoms excercizing their rites
> > > > > > exotica of the navel tickle the holy grails
> > > > > for smart bombs. Don't believe a word of it
> > > > sparse gleanings from the ivoried groves of academ
> > > and don't forget those of us who have a visceral reaction to
> > triumph of the human spirit stuff such as milosz and walcott churn
> > out--our viscerae get bored.
> > One develops an understanding of different levels of
> > suffering.
> > stuttering machine gun ducklings
Jimmy America Animal Razzamatazz, shit
on a shingle, and adam and eve on a raft, venus on the
range life, if I could settle down, if I could settle down
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 10:46:25 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: readings NYC next days
Maria,
If there are quiz blossoms
then who will gather them.
If there is blinding meaning
will we still have to look.
What is the issue is a little power,
A very little power,
To resist almost successfully
Our disappearance. Imagine
Andy Warhol without power,
imagine Frank O'Hara without power,
imagine the language school.
Your contradictory Berlitz,
Jordan
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 11:36:46 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Poetics List <poetics@UBVMS.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: New Welcome Message
>
> Rev. 5-16-95
>____________________________________________________________________
>
>
> 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. Who's Subscribed
> 4. Digest Option
> 5. When you'll be away
> 6. The Electronic Poetry Center (EPC)
> 7. Poetics Archives at EPC
> 8. Publishers & Editors Read This!
>
>
>
>[This document was prepared by Charles Bernstein (bernstei@acsu.buffalo.
>edu) and Loss Pequen~o Glazier (lolpoet@acsu.buffalo.edu).]
>____________________________________________________________________
>
>1. About the Poetics List
>
>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 is
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>
>The "list owner" of Poetics is Charles Bernstein: contact me for further
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>
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>& turn it on again with: set poetics mail
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>____________________________________________________________________
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>6. 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
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>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
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>well as the archive of LINEbreak, the radio interview series.
>
>The EPC is directed by Loss Pequen~o Glazier.
>____________________________________________________________________
>
>7. Poetics Archives via EPC
>
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>as easy as possible to our users and ENCOURAGE you to participate! Send a
>list of your press/publications to
>lolpoet@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 your
>word 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 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, 17 May 1996 08:39:42 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: young guy killed in LA
In-Reply-To: <199605170404.AAA11340@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
Gab -- the story is still up in air, mysterious, etc -- young guy in
question is former street person who'd gotten involved in broadcast
journalism thru the Pacifica station here & its programs -- yes, he'd
been coveing AMJ story, along with many others -- small story in LA
Times, and some coverage in LA Sentinel (Local black paper) but true
motive for murder of this young man still not known -- I'd suggest a
phone call to KPFK or to Pacifica near you as possible place to begin if
you're looking for info about this tragic murder --
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 08:59:10 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Herb Levy <herb@ESKIMO.COM>
Subject: Re: range review Nobel form or lil Hans
Or renga viewer, or whatever.
Uhhm, I know that summer's coming up, the season for mailbox filling
"renga", but, erm, wasn't there a decision by consensus of the list to
circulate these collectively created poems privately during the composition
period & post some of the completed pieces to the entire list.
Rather than, say, take over everyone's mailboxes with screen after screen
of growing columns of left hand carets.
At issue here is not the quality of the work, but the quantity of the process.
Those who are new to the list since last fall may find this attitude
unnecessarily harsh. If so, I suggest that you search the Poetics-List
archives <http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/poetics/archive/> for the word
"renga" to get a fuller sense of the previous instance of this kind of
thing & the discussion about it.
Herb Levy
herb@eskimo.com
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 12:01:38 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "k.a. hehir" <angelo@MUSTANG.UWO.CA>
Subject: Re: range review Nobel form or lil Hans
In-Reply-To: <960517100004_115556083@emout19.mail.aol.com>
On Fri, 17 May 1996, Maria Damon wrote:
> Lil Hans put his finger in the dike
> > > > > > > > A group of Nobel Prize winning poets has declared that
> cyberspace
> > > > > > > > is no place for serious verse, according to Reuters. Asked
> if
> > > the
> > > > > > > > use of the Internet was one way to reverse the low popular
> > > appeal
> > > > > > > > of poetry, the group said no. Poets Derek Walcott, Octovio
> > > paz,
> > > > > > > > and Czeslaw Milosz were undaunted about the current dearth
> of
> > > > > > > > readers. Walcott stated that "I'd rather have just one
> person
> > > > > > > > who reads and feels my work deeply than hundreds of
> thousands
> > > who
> > > > > > > > read it but don't really care about it." Milosz allowed
> that
> > > > > > > > computers were useful incomposition, but was skeptical
> > > that lovers
> > > > > > > > of serious poetry would look for it on the Internet.
> > > > > > > > yeah well, "seriouous" somea this Csezlaw
> > > > > > > > cereal poetry on the cornflakes box made me what I am today
> > > > > > > "I read you, chaise-lounge, but i don't really care about you..."
> > > > > > > What I care about is demonstrating outside my window this morning
> > > > > > > twenty thousand lilac blossoms excercizing their rites
> > > > > > > exotica of the navel tickle the holy grails
> > > > > > for smart bombs. Don't believe a word of it
> > > > > sparse gleanings from the ivoried groves of academ
> > > > and don't forget those of us who have a visceral reaction to
> > > triumph of the human spirit stuff such as milosz and walcott churn
> > > out--our viscerae get bored.
> > > One develops an understanding of different levels of
> > > suffering.
> > > stuttering machine gun ducklings
> Jimmy America Animal Razzamatazz, shit
> on a shingle, and adam and eve on a raft, venus on the
>
phone
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 12:46:34 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Comments: Converted from PROFS to RFC822 format by PUMP V2.2X
From: Alan Golding <ACGOLD01@ULKYVM.LOUISVILLE.EDU>
Subject: Typo of the Day
Associate Professor of English, U. of Louisville
Phone: (502)-852-5918; e-mail: acgold01@ulkyvm.louisville.edu
I'm intrigued by this Polis novelist you mentioned, George. Would that be
Conrad Olson?
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 13:08:33 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: a foraml Finch comes
la di da di da di la
did did la la did la di deeee
la du du dud du la lud lud lud duh lull
le le leee lee leee leee de de de de de
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 13:47:48 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: a foraml Finch comes
In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 17 May 1996 13:08:33 -0500 from
<LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
On Fri, 17 May 1996 13:08:33 -0500 Chris Stroffolino said:
> la di da di da di la
> did did la la did la di deeee
> la du du dud du la lud lud lud duh lull
> le le leee lee leee leee de de de de de
checked my bird book - that's no finch, it's a stufted sandsifter.
- hullygully red
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 14:06:55 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Alan Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM>
Subject: read it but don't
In-Reply-To: <Pine.3.88.9605171258.A17654-0100000@mustang-a.uwo.ca>
"seriouous" somea this Csezlaw > > > > > > > What I care about is
Don't believe a word of it > > > > > > > "I read you, chaise-lounge, but i
computers were useful incomposition, but was skeptical > > > > and don't
cornflakes box made me what I am today > > > > > > > > yeah well,
demonstrating outside my window this morning > > > > > > > exotica of the
don't really care about you..." > > > > > > > > and Czeslaw Milosz were
excercizing their rites > > > One develops an understanding of different
forget those of us who have a visceral reaction to > > > > > sparse
gleanings from the ivoried groves of academ > > > > > > for smart bombs.
in the dike > > > stuttering machine gun ducklings > > > > > > > >
levels of > > > appeal > > > out--our viscerae get bored. > > > paz, > > >
my work deeply than hundreds of > > > > > > > > A group of Nobel Prize
navel tickle the holy grails > > > > > > > twenty thousand lilac blossoms
on a shingle, and adam and eve on a raft, venus on the > person > that >
phone > > Jimmy America Animal Razzamatazz, shit > Lil Hans put his finger
really care about it." Milosz allowed > > > > > > > > readers. Walcott
said no. Poets Derek Walcott, Octovio > > > > > > > > of serious poetry
stated that "I'd rather have just one > > > > > > > > use of the Internet
stuff such as milosz and walcott churn > > > who > cyberspace > if > of >
suffering. > > > that lovers > > > the > > > triumph of the human spirit
thousands
undaunted about the current dearth > > > > > > > > is no place for serious
verse, according to Reuters. Asked > > > > > > > > of poetry, the group
was one way to reverse the low popular > > > > > > > > who reads and feels
winning poets has declared that > > > > > > > > cereal poetry on the
would look for it on the Internet. > > > > > > > > read it but don't
http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html
images: http://www.cs.unca.edu/~davidson/pix/
Ich war Hamlet. Ich stand an der Kuste und redete mit der Brandung
BLABLA, im Rucken die Ruinen von Europe. Heiner Muller
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 14:20:28 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: sometimes an informal Cage comes
> Re Cage & improvisation-- actually he sd he changed his mind about
> improvisation after hearing Messian improvise on the organ.
>
> --Rod
>Fascinating information, Rod. Thanks for offering it.
Where did you hear this?
>All the best,
>Hardin
From Cage. It was late 80s I believe. Messiaen improvised on a cathedral
organ in France. I don't think John changed his mind abt jazz improvisation,
but w/ the number pieces he admits (or at least he saw it this way) or gives
permission for improvisation in a way he hadn't
previously. He may talk abt this in an interview somewhere as well. I'll see
if I can find a cite for you, if you have Retallack's _MUSICAGE_ it might be
in there.
Rod
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 15:15:03 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Pierre Joris <joris@CSC.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Help
In-Reply-To: <960517142027_537320820@emout15.mail.aol.com>
Would anyone have the snailmail address of the University of Sidney
Press? Please backchannel -- mercy buttercups, Pierre
=======================================================================
Pierre Joris | "Form fascinates when one no longer has the force
Dept. of English | to understand force from within itself. That
SUNY Albany | is, to create." -- Jacques Derrida
Albany NY 12222 |
tel&fax:(518) 426 0433 | "Poetry is the promise of a language."
email: | -- Friedrich Holderlin
joris@cnsunix.albany.edu|
=======================================================================
On Fri, 17 May 1996, Rod Smith wrote:
> > Re Cage & improvisation-- actually he sd he changed his mind about
> > improvisation after hearing Messian improvise on the organ.
> >
> > --Rod
>
> >Fascinating information, Rod. Thanks for offering it.
> Where did you hear this?
>
> >All the best,
>
> >Hardin
>
> >From Cage. It was late 80s I believe. Messiaen improvised on a cathedral
> organ in France. I don't think John changed his mind abt jazz improvisation,
> but w/ the number pieces he admits (or at least he saw it this way) or gives
> permission for improvisation in a way he hadn't
> previously. He may talk abt this in an interview somewhere as well. I'll see
> if I can find a cite for you, if you have Retallack's _MUSICAGE_ it might be
> in there.
>
> Rod
>
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 16:33:47 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Comments: Converted from PROFS to RFC822 format by PUMP V2.2X
From: Alan Golding <ACGOLD01@ULKYVM.LOUISVILLE.EDU>
Subject: Bob Bertholf
Associate Professor of English, U. of Louisville
Phone: (502)-852-5918; e-mail: acgold01@ulkyvm.louisville.edu
Does anyone have a number or e-mail address for Bob Bertholf at Fubbalo? I
couldn't locate him through the EPC. Thanks.
Alan
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 17:14:04 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: John Whiting <100707.731@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: Re: sometimes an informal Cage comes
Comments: To: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Cage certainly allowed for improvisation within the established
parameters of the Four Songs he wrote for Electric Phoenix (SATB
quartet plus electronics). He attended our first rehearsal at my
studio in London and gave his approval to our rather free-wheeling
approach; his only caveat was that the singers shouldn't listen to
each other. His droll recognition of the groups' character was
contained in his final note of instruction: "A virtuosic performance
is invited." He got it!
John Whiting
October Sound (my other hat)
London
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 13:03:37 -1000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gabrielle Welford <welford@HAWAII.EDU>
Subject: Re: range review Nobel form or lil Hans
In-Reply-To: <Pine.3.89.9605162133.A4323-0100000-0100000@well>
> > > > > > > Lil Hans put his finger in the dike
> > > > > > > > A group of Nobel Prize winning poets has declared that cyberspace
> > > > > > > > is no place for serious verse, according to Reuters. Asked if
> > > the
> > > > > > > > use of the Internet was one way to reverse the low popular
> > > appeal
> > > > > > > > of poetry, the group said no. Poets Derek Walcott, Octovio
> > > paz,
> > > > > > > > and Czeslaw Milosz were undaunted about the current dearth of
> > > > > > > > readers. Walcott stated that "I'd rather have just one person
> > > > > > > > who reads and feels my work deeply than hundreds of thousands
> > > who
> > > > > > > > read it but don't really care about it." Milosz allowed that
> > > > > > > > computers were useful incomposition, but was skeptical
> > > that lovers
> > > > > > > > of serious poetry would look for it on the Internet.
> > > > > > > > yeah well, "seriouous" somea this Csezlaw
> > > > > > > > cereal poetry on the cornflakes box made me what I am today
> > > > > > > "I read you, chaise-lounge, but i don't really care about you..."
> > > > > > > What I care about is demonstrating outside my window this morning
> > > > > > > twenty thousand lilac blossoms excercizing their rites
> > > > > > > exotica of the navel tickle the holy grails
> > > > > > for smart bombs. Don't believe a word of it
> > > > > sparse gleanings from the ivoried groves of academ
> > > > and don't forget those of us who have a visceral reaction to
> > > triumph of the human spirit stuff such as milosz and walcott churn
> > > out--our viscerae get bored.
> > > One develops an understanding of different levels of
> > > suffering.
> > > stuttering machine gun ducklings
> > > soliloquy
> >
>
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 13:34:02 -1000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gabrielle Welford <welford@HAWAII.EDU>
Subject: House Budget Figures '97 (fwd)
Thought ye'all might be interested in this. Gab.
---------- Forwarded message ----------
#########
U.S. House of Representatives
Committee on the Budget
Majority Caucus
Washington, DC 20515
Departments and Programs Recommended for Elimination
and Privatization in the
Fiscal Year 1997 House Budget Resolution
May 8, 1996
########### CLIP ################
* Terminate funding for the National Endowment for the Art after
fiscal year 1997
* Terminate funding for the National Endowment for the
Humanities after fiscal year 1998.
* Terminate funding for the National Capital Arts and Cultural
Affairs.
* Eliminate national and community service programs (Americorps)
* Terminate the following
- Migrant Education
- College Assistance Migrant Program
- Innovative Education Program Strategies State Grants
- Instruction in Civics
- Dropout Prevention Demonstrations
- Ellender Fellowships
- Telecommunications Demo for Math
- National Difusion Network
- 21st Century Community Learning Centers
- National Writing Project
* Combine over 25 education programs into a single block grant
to governors.
* Privatize Corporation for Public Broadcasting over six years.
* Eliminate Goals 2000, thereby restoring State and local
authority over education standards.
* Eliminate Federal funding for bilingual education, thereby
freeing local school districts to promote English proviciency.
* Discontinue unneeded [sic] annual capital subsidies for
Perkins Loans, as proposed in the President's 1995 Budget.
Retain Perkins Loan $6 billion revolving fund.
* Eliminate funding for the State Incentive Grant program.
* Eliminate the following programs:
- Student Financial Aid Database and Info Line
- Native Hawaiian & Alaska Native Culture & Arts
development
- Eisenhower Leadership Program
- Innovative Projects for Community Service
- Cooperative Education
- Law School Clinical
- Urban Community Service
- National Early Intervention Scholarships
- Douglas Teacher Scholarships
- Olympic Scholarships
- Teacher Corps
- Harris Fellowships
- Javits Fellowshipos
- Legal Training for the Disadvantaged
- Faculty Development Fellowship Program
* Eliminate new awards from the Robert C. Byrd Scholarship
program.
######### CLIP ############
* Eliminate subsidies to health professions education
institutions that do not go directly to students.
############ END CLIP #################
*========================================================================*
| >>>> The National Association of Graduate - Professional Students <<<< |
| 825 Green Bay Road, Suite 270 PHONE: 847-256-1562 |
| Wilmette, IL 60091 FAX: 847-256-8954 |
| NAGPS@NETCOM.COM |
*------------------------------------------------------------------------*
| NAGPS 11th National Conference - Santa Monica, California |
| October 24 - 27, 1996 |
| SAVE THE DATE!!! |
+-------------------------------------+----------------------------------+
| To get access to our Jobs Page, | The NAGPS National Office Area |
| send e-mail to NAGPS@NETCOM.COM ! | Code changed to 847!! |
*-------------------------------------+----------------------------------*
| #### WWW Site > http://nagps.varesearch.com/NAGPS/nagps-hp.html #### |
*------------------------------------------------------------------------*
| >>>>>>>> Stop The Raid On Student Aid! * Call 1-800-574-4AID! <<<<<<<< |
*========================================================================*
_____________________________________________________________________________
This message | *** *** *** Stop the Raid on Student Aid! *** *** ***
sent using the | Call 1-800-574-4AID
NAGPS E-mail | Send your letter to SAVE-STUDENT-AID@NETCOM.COM and NAGPS
Server | will print it and hand-deliver it to your Congress people
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 20:10:25 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: musica ficta
Thought you might find this of interest.
My response to Jordan's thoughtful note on musica ficta, in which
he mentioned that his Grove Dictionary defined musica ficta as
the use of 'wrong notes' or unacceptable intervals--noncanonical
intervals forbidden by the Church:
As someone who was actually taught musicology by nuns (simper), I must
explain that both the _Grove Dictionary of Music_ (not as reliable as
Apel's _The Harvard Dictionary of Music_ and Grout's _A Concise History
of Western Music_, both of which are entirely by scholars with intensive
musical backgrounds) and my own description of Musica Ficta are correct.
Certainly, forbidden intervals--"wrong-notes" as a technique applies more
to Prokofiev than to medieval music--were encoded in musica ficta. But
these were not necessarily incorrect, nor was this the only kind of
musical information encoded in musica ficta. For example, certain
cadences that were commonly understood to contain accidentals (such
as the Landini Cadence, named after a composer who used it frequently)
would not be notated as such, since musicians were presumed to know
the proper voicing to sing or to play. This kind of Cabalistic encoding
of presumed knowledge also reminds me of the figured bass in baroque music,
and which all composition and theory students are required to learn.
In this light, _Gradus ad Parnassum_ can be seen as a kind of magical
treatise. Finally, the omissions and reinterpretaions in jazz notation,
such as the substitution of swing time for normal eighth notes, and the
reification of diminished and half-diminished symbols in jazz chord
notation--to say nothing of the voicings and soloing techniques one is
presumed to know before even opening a fake book--contain a hidden
system of knowledge and notation. In music, one frequently does a double-
take when looking at a composition, looking for what is hidden in the
purely abstract sense. So too, I think, do formal considerations in
poetry--especially my favorite poetry--hinge on such dualities of
referents and abstract codes:--and I mean *coding* literally--not in
the linguistic sense of a set of conventions for converting one signal-
ling system into another. To avoid confusion, maybe it is time for
another neologism--*musicacrypta*, perhaps.
> --all that best,
Errata: Rereading my post, I see that I grouped the metaphysicals in
with medieval work. Obviously, the metaphysical poets, who occasionally
wrote pattern-poetry, such as George Herbert (1593-1633), are from
the seventeenth century rather than the medieval period. I was thinking
of the fourteenth century "Musical Heart"--a musical composition written
in the shape of a heart--and forgot my chronological head. Play it,
Thelonius...
Bested,
Rob Hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 22:54:48 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Loss Glazier <lolpoet@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: Re: Bob Bertholf
Alan, his e-mail is bertholf@acsu.buffalo.edu but I'm not sure how good a
way this is to contact him. It might be better to relay a message through
basinski@acsu.buffalo.edu
Regards,
Loss
PS. We list Basinski's address as the Poetry Room address in the EPC.
---
At 04:33 PM 5/17/96 EDT, you wrote:
>Associate Professor of English, U. of Louisville
>Phone: (502)-852-5918; e-mail: acgold01@ulkyvm.louisville.edu
>
>Does anyone have a number or e-mail address for Bob Bertholf at Fubbalo? I
>couldn't locate him through the EPC. Thanks.
>
>Alan
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 20:57:17 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gary Hawkins <ghawkins@HALCYON.COM>
Subject: Re: readings in NYC the next few days
Don't know-- Chris just said he'd be there. Segue should know. For those
of you near Seattle, he's performing Speakeasy 9 pm May 21.
Thanks, Rod, for endorsement. They say John Cage read two books in his
last year: the _Holy Bible_ and Chris Mann.
Laura via G.Hawkins
>G.H. wrote--
>
>>Would like to add
>
>>Segue May 18
>Chris Mann
>>(Australian linguistic composer, phenomenal.)
>
>time?
>I highly tout this individual. Go, if you can, he's an amazement. Just read
>at Bridge Street, terrific performer/poet/composer.
>
>Rod
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 21:28:40 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: poetry in the nabes
>>
>>On the other hand, I have neighbors who read Barret Watten.
>
>That's not so uncommon, the people next door to me have neighbors who read
>Watten too.
>
>
people next to me read Rona Watten.
..........................
Is a counterfeit robot different from an ordinary robot?
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 17 May 1996 21:47:45 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: Typo of the Day
>I'm intrigued by this Polis novelist you mentioned, George. Would that be
>Conrad Olson?
No, no, Alan, Polis is what it says on the side of a cop car in Germany. I
knew a cop who was writing a novel in one, on duty. Called the _Art of
Dorkness_, all about people being hounded for committing the German crime
of Qwertz-Blasm.
..........................
Is a counterfeit robot different from an ordinary robot?
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 18 May 1996 03:37:05 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: John Whiting <100707.731@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: Re: musica ficta
Comments: To: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Rob Hardin's concise and thoroughly reliable summary of musica
ficta (corresponding to my own memories of Edward Lowinsky's
lectures at UC Berkeley), clicks on a hypertext connection with
John Eliot Gardiner's recent publicizing of research which reveals
that a number of Beethoven's most familiar symphonic themes were
taken from French revolutionary composers. While the press
sniggered about plaigarism, Gardiner's own excellent program on
the South Bank Show (London Weekend TV) made it clear that this
was a "Masonic handshake" to the cognoscienti in which his
sympathies were communicated under the very noses of the censors.
Such considerations are central to all discussions of form. Forms
can be mysteries which are intended to be revealed to some but
concealed from others, often as a defense against oppressive regimes.
They presuppose an interlocking sequence of learned traditions which
extend further back in time than mere nostalgia for the day before
yesterday. At the simplest level, they impel us to stand up (or sit
down!) for the National Anthem; at their most complex they beckon us
to life-long journeys through the Cantos or the Maximus Poems.
In America, such cultural continuity has been undermined by two
factors (among others): relative freedom of speech such that, except
among compulsive conspirators, it is unnecessary to speak in code; and
the advertising-impelled convention that no communication should
require even a moment's reflection in order to understand it.
John Whiting
London
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 18 May 1996 08:58:07 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Re: musica ficta
the advertising-impelled convention that no communication should
require even a moment's reflection in order to understand it.
--You mean, like e-mail?
Jordan
PS George! You're back.
Won't you come join the range (formerly renga?) gang again?
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 18 May 1996 12:49:34 -0500
Reply-To: landers@vivanet.com
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: landers <landers@VIVANET.COM>
Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company
Subject: Re: fromal Fnich cmoes a/ a fomral Ficnh coems/
Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET> echoed:
> BTW: I do not accept the idea that the Canon is such a "conspiracy"
> of straight white males.
what? not enough evidence in the anthologies for you?
Peter Landers
landers@vivanet.com
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 18 May 1996 13:43:12 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: FUNKHOUSER CHRISTOPH <cf2785@CSC.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: words.html
Wordherds
Words are like buffalo.
They will not be hurried, but instead
Lumber along at their own pace,
Tepid beasts at best.
They loom darkly and smell of mud and blackwater and stay
Hidden behind rheumy eyes.
They wallow in filth, blocking progress, and
None can guess their intent.
They will go where they will.
They crop from the gardens of all the world, and make them
Fertile with their leavings.
They level the earth.
They surge and cannot be dammed from
Where their need is sweetest.
Shrouding horizons in vagueness,
They grow plump and vast and portentous.
They are perfect keepers of secrets.
You cannot force them home; they must
Roam the parched fields where they belong to nobody.
Come sundown, they will amble back through the mist
To nuzzle you urgently in your dung-caked hut
And shape your dreams.
Back to the Poetry Page
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 18 May 1996 14:01:07 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Smith <CharSSmith@AOL.COM>
Subject: rules & conventions
Mike,
Could you talk more about Burger's sense of "rules & conventios"? Does he
mean rules re something one either obey or break & conventions are what one
"plays" with? Or what?
<<What's the difference between "rules" and
"conventions"? I just read an essay by Peter Burger in his collection
called _The Decline of Modernism" ... in which he argues that one of the
differnces, or points of modulation in the development of modernism
(the transition from the 18th to the 19th century, from the
Enlightenment to Romanticism) was the shift in poetic composition from
rules to conventions and the different way that positioned the writer
socially and as an "artist".>>
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 19 May 1996 00:30:23 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: fromal Fnich cmoes a/ a fomral Ficnh coems/
"Did the finch devour the bluejay
Right in the cleft of the dead bird of paradise?"
from Bernadette Mayer's SONNETS--
there's also a poem called
THE FALSE FINCH'S WEDDING GOWN....
in the same collection....
--------
p.s. so is any body going to give me the lowdown on Chris Mann's
virtuoso improvisations (in either NYC or DC?)
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 19 May 1996 01:54:20 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: JOEL LEWIS <104047.2175@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: stop sub
help! I've been trying to stop e-mail while I'm away, but Mr.Listserv is not
buying. Could some one shut off the works while I'm away?
Joel Lewis
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 19 May 1996 08:06:58 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Ken Edwards <100344.2546@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: querzblatz
This is to announce formally that I am happy to be identified as a querzblatz
poet, but I strongly deny being a Q=U=E=R=Z=B=L=A=T=Z poet.
I hope this makes things clear.
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 19 May 1996 05:47:25 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Ron Silliman <rsillima@IX.NETCOM.COM>
Subject: Will Alexander's work
I've been reading Will Alexander's Asia & Haiti with great pleasure,
and have a couple of questions.
The first has to do with a primary device of his, which for want of a
better phrase I want to call "controlled overwriting." His work (and
not just this book, but everything I've ever seen by him) is with dense
contradictory phrases on the order of
"in this primeval penumbra
in this heightened verdigris scarlet
in this incisive analogical omniscience"
In this almost logorheaic excess (a pleonast's plenitude), particularly
given the long and open nature of the texts, I at moments sense a kind
of deja vu echo of Frank Stanford's old "the battlefield where the moon
says i love you" (Lost Roads/Mill Mountain, 1977), an American
surrealist classic that is ultimately a very raw text by a very young
writer. But Alexander is neither raw nor young and it's apparent he
revises (at least one of the footnotes for page 12, for example, seems
to refer to an earlier stage of the text).
If most of us tried this kind of cumulative effect even in a first
creative writing course (and maybe especially there), we'd get shot
down pretty fast. So I want to know what it is about Alexander's use of
it that makes it so effective, even riveting.
My second question is for someone like Walter Lew, say, who might find
the adoption of the collective "we" and dense use of stereotypes. I
know that I cringe at the undifferentiated use of a term like Marxists,
as in
"these drab & scaly Marxists"
or, later
"here was Marx
here was the State"
which profoundly fails to grasp the anti-statist impulse that runs
throughout Marx's own work (tho not that of Lenin and his followers,
say)
So how does this level of generalization play out racially, esp. when
the author is an African American who is obviously brilliant and knows
what he's doing?
Just asking....
Ron Silliman
rsillima@ix.netcom.com
PS,...and let me echo others' comments on what a pleasure it is to see
George Bowering back on the list.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 08:26:20 GMT+1300
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: musica ficta
apropos swing time eighth notes in jazz -- there is a similar usage
in French styles of keyboard music -- 17th century for equivalents of
eighth notes. This is "articulation"? Some J.S. Bach can sound nice
(to my jazz corrupted ear) that way too and that is without drums and bass and
Swingles -- also some English 16th century keyboard music. When
did "European" written music get to be played "strictly" as written?
about 1760? or is it later?
I agree that questions like this are
important to the notions of strict measured form (in any arts). I
can't believe in some of the very rapid mechanical sounding playing
of Mozart fortepiano/(clavichord?) sonatas (especially the early
ones) in much 20th century performance. They seem to me to need
articulatory freedoms of various kinds. Dinah Washington shd have
sung them.
performance either.
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 08:49:30 GMT+1300
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: Typo of the Day
George, just count da feet.
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 09:00:57 GMT+1300
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: a formal Finch comes
Dear Michael Boughn, read Amelia a renga or two, see if that induces
sleep. Best
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 19 May 1996 17:07:58 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Fred E. Maus" <fem2x@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: Re: musica ficta
In-Reply-To: <2EF21F0227A@ccnov2.auckland.ac.nz> from "Tony Green" at May 20,
96 08:26:20 am
> apropos swing time eighth notes in jazz -- there is a similar usage
> in French styles of keyboard music -- 17th century for equivalents of
> eighth notes. This is "articulation"?
notes inegales
> Some J.S. Bach can sound nice
> (to my jazz corrupted ear) that way too and that is without drums and bass and
> Swingles -- also some English 16th century keyboard music. When
> did "European" written music get to be played "strictly" as written?
> about 1760? or is it later?
never, the notation always underdetermines the performances,
always, and the (somewhat) mechanical-sounding rhythms one
might find in Toscanini or Hogwood are as much a product of
interpretation as the highly articulated performances of Fischer
or Leonhardt. (and they are not so mechanical either,
especially Toscanini's. on the inadequacy of the "literalist"
interpretation of Toscanini's performances, and the role of
literalism in p-r puffery, see Horowitz _Understanding
Toscanini_)
the best recent writings on performance practice, to my taste,
are those of Richard Taruskin, gathered in a recent collection
from California. among other things RT argues, convincingly I
think, that the rigid "text-oriented" style of performance is a
manifestation of early-20th-c modernist taste.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 11:51:45 GMT+1300
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: musica ficta
Thanks Fred E Maus for intrsting comments. I must check out Taruskin.
Certainly mechanical sound is interpretation, but it seems to me the
easy way out (tho tough on fingers etc no doubt).
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 19 May 1996 21:03:26 CDT
Reply-To: tmandel@cais.cais.com
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tom Mandel <tmandel@CAIS.CAIS.COM>
Subject: musica ficta
Re: Beethoven's melodies. I believe the issue of ownership of melody
was not raised until about a decade or so after Beethoven's death. No
one thought -- at least this is my understanding -- that a melody was
owned by anybody, constitued what we now call "intellectual property."
Tom Mandel
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 19 May 1996 21:29:52 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: musica ficta
Fred E. Maus typed:
> never, the notation always underdetermines the performances,
I wouldn't have put it quite that way, but I do agree.
In classical music performance, interpretation is far less
strict than people imagine. Learning a piece of music and
then hearing it played by someone else is rather like burning
some beloved poem into the memory, only to discover that the
the very rhythms and sonic properties you'd presumed were
intrinsic to everyone's interpretation--most of all the
author's--might prove the overlay of your very own ear.
> the best recent writings on performance practice, to my taste,
> are those of Richard Taruskin, gathered in a recent collection
> from California. among other things RT argues, convincingly I
> think, that the rigid "text-oriented" style of performance is a
> manifestation of early-20th-c modernist taste.
I'm not convinced *yet*, but I'd like to be persuaded.
Do you have the title and publisher of the book? If so,
tell us. Perhaps we can discuss it.
However: being "text-oriented" is hardly a side-effect of
modernism. If so, what was Thomas Campion? (And yes, I do see that
you've qualified "text-oriented" with quotes and the adjective
"rigid.")
And for the record: In important ways, musica ficta was as
score-specific as Beethoven. Dynamic and phrase markings didn't
exist yet, but rhythms and notes were written as they are today.
All the best,
Rob Hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 19 May 1996 21:50:11 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: Will Alexander's work
I am very glad that Ron has brought up Will Alexander for consideration
here. Though I haven't read ASIA AND HAITI in over a year (I remember
finding ASIA more engaging than HAITI; and I also tend to prefer other
shorter work of Will's better--such as "Being As Neutrality And Drift"
but I digress),and I'm having a hard time finding my notes on it....
Actually, a question for RON--What PAGE is the line about the PENUMBRA
from---because context may matter in terms of the question you ask about
whether he contradicts himself, and on what level, etc. For, my memory
of ASIA (which I think that passage is from) was that despite the "us"
vs. "them" frame device, these contradictions are really complications
that deal as much with the "internal" enemy. But, again, I want to see
the context of the lines you quoted.
Perhaps this goes towards answering the MARXIST question.
I think that regardless of Alexander's general views of Marxism, the
historical specificity of the poem allows him to get away with such
generalizations because it is being spoken by, and/or through (the
p.o.v. goes back and forth between Alexander and the monks), these
beings persecuted by MAOISTS who did invoke MARX.
For instance, if I were to write a poem attacking CHRISTIAN HYPOCRISY
that wouldn't necessarily be attacking christ (say Sinead O'Connor
pope picture incident).
For me the problem is not so much Alexander's reduction of Marx as it
is the Maoist's misapplication of same Marx....
Chris
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 19 May 1996 21:58:45 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Fwd: address change for Maria Damon
dear poetrixers,
i'm unsubbing for now, but if anyone wants to contact me directly i'm at
mdamon9999@aol.com until june 11, thereafter at damon001@maroon.tc.umn.edu
love, maria d
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 19 May 1996 22:02:02 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rae Armantrout <RaeA100900@AOL.COM>
Subject: ALA Conference
Are any of you Listees planning on coming to San Diego for the ALA
conference in a couple of weeks? Could someone backchannel me with info abt
interesting panels?
Rae Armantrout
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 19 May 1996 21:29:06 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: the rhetoric of surrealism?
In-Reply-To: <199605200406.AAA04283@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
Ron? Are those by any chance rhetorical questions? because, don't they
pose answers and ask for someone to explain why those answers might be
wrong? You, of course, don't expect an answer from me, do you? because,
what could I possibly say about such intentionally contradictory lines
that raise again the ole bug bear of intention the which bugbear I'm too
bugged to get into here agin?
BUT -- (I don't have answers bevause I haven;t thought even about the
questions yet, this being one problem, for me, of such e-mail, that I
write a response before I've thought carefully about what's been said!) --
There IS, I think, a very interesting recption question here, as
Alexander was indeed dinged, blasted, rejected, etc. for years, during
which time _Hambone_ was one of the very few places he could get
published -- & now seemingly suddenly folks are calling himn up for
manuscripts & rushing to his defense in the _American Book Review_ --
claiming his work for their own very contradictory purposes (are
Weinberger and Noto reading the same Will Alexander -- and how about the
way they read him at the _Apex of the M_, which certainly ain't the way
he's read over at _Sulfur_, undsoweiter,,, and none of these folk seem to
have read that earlier book from Jazz press,, but I DO think it's a
reception question 'cause as you so rightly point out, the writing itself
has not changed that much, just the reading of it $($*$
so, what ARE the right answers to those questions anyway --
love,
we who say "we" and mean every word of it --
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 19 May 1996 22:03:29 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: rhetoric of surrealism II
In-Reply-To: <199603110702.CAA10237@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
tho to be just one shade more srious about Ron's questions --
I think any useful answers to the latter will have to account for the
fact that hte line about "Marxists" is spolen by a "collective voice of
rebellious monks" from a "focal point of anti-Chinese feeling" -- That
is, we can still talk about what Alexander is up to in these lines, but
we have to begin by looking at the rhetorical context OF the lines, their
status as lines spoken by fictive characters --
"the" "line" "serious" "spoken" [insert correct words above as required]
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 09:00:28 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Bob Holman <Nuyopoman@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 18 May 1996 to 19 May 1996
Sun (5/19/96), NYTimes "Arts and Leisure" (not Book Review) USOP CD review
updates Wordsworth's definition of poetry. To me, Stephen Holden finally
breaks with the media's love affair with performed poetry as a sociological
phenonmenon and begins to treat it as art.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 09:12:18 EST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Burt Kimmelman -@NJIT" <kimmelman@ADMIN.NJIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: Bob Bertholf
loss,
is that michael basinski by any chance?
burt
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 09:13:58 EST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Burt Kimmelman -@NJIT" <kimmelman@ADMIN.NJIT.EDU>
Subject: fake book
Comments: cc: simmons@admin.njit.edu
speaking of musica ficta, does anyone know anything etymologically or
otherwise about the term "fake book" used among jazz musicians but elsewhere
too?
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 09:21:09 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gwyn McVay <gmcvay1@OSF1.GMU.EDU>
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 18 May 1996 to 19 May 1996
In-Reply-To: <960520090027_538865971@emout07.mail.aol.com>
Yes, Bob, saw that review--was amazed at his cogent words on many of the
pieces, esp. Sparrow's wonderful vivid piece and old god-daddy Ginsberg,
and his ability to make subtle distinctions between artists like Leonard
Cohen and Lou Reed. Of course you could debate until eternity what it
*means* to be "more a poet than a musician" or vice versa--how he
characterized Cohen and Reed, respectively--but it's nice to see that
level of skilled attention being paid to perf-po in the Times.
Gwyn McVay
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 09:29:53 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Poetry / Stephen Holden
Has Stephen Holden published any poems lately? Last thing I saw (pretty if
conventional, mainly about stars) was in an anthology from 20 years ago or
so. --Jd
PS What's the title of the first Alexander book?
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 09:32:38 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Fred E. Maus" <fem2x@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: Re: musica ficta
In-Reply-To: <v01540b02adc57740bc00@[204.74.3.74]> from "Carnography" at May
19, 96 09:29:52 pm
> > the best recent writings on performance practice, to my taste,
> > are those of Richard Taruskin, gathered in a recent collection
> > from California. among other things RT argues, convincingly I
> > think, that the rigid "text-oriented" style of performance is a
> > manifestation of early-20th-c modernist taste.
>
> I'm not convinced *yet*, but I'd like to be persuaded.
> Do you have the title and publisher of the book? If so,
> tell us. Perhaps we can discuss it.
_Text and Act_ from Oxford U P (not California, which has
published other things of his but not this one), 1995. I hope I
can commend this as a brilliant book without endorsing
Taruskin's bombastic rhetoric.
> And for the record: In important ways, musica ficta was as
> score-specific as Beethoven. Dynamic and phrase markings didn't
> exist yet, but rhythms and notes were written as they are today.
Hmm? I thought the point about ficta was that some of the notes
are *not* written the same way: to us it looks like one pitch,
but the intended sound is a half step away from what we might
think.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 10:46:13 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jena Osman <josman@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: chain/3 now available
Forwarded message:
From josman@conciliator.acsu.buffalo.edu Mon May 20 10:44:26 1996
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 10:44:05 -0400 (EDT)
From: Jena Osman <josman@acsu.Buffalo.EDU>
To: Jena Osman <josman@acsu.Buffalo.EDU>
Subject: chain contribs (fwd)
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**ANNOUNCING**
**NOW AVAILABLE**
CHAIN/3, volume 1
Special Topic: Hybrid Genres/Mixed Media
(volume 2 will be published in September)
If you would like to order a copy, please send a check for $10 (for
volume 1) or $18 (for volumes 1 & 2) made out to UB Foundation to:
Chain
107 14th St.
Buffalo, NY 14213
_____________________________________________________________________
CONTENTS OF CHAIN/3, VOLUME ONE
Publication date: May. 1996
Mac Adams: Four Sculptures
Will Alexander: Transgression of Genre as Vitality
Dennis Barone: Pia at Play
Martine Bellen: Lola Montez
Charles Bernstein: Introjective Verse
Sherry Brennan: Belle Mort
Patti Capaldi: Consumption
Norma Cole & Michael Palmer: A Library Book
Elizabeth Cross: Schoenberg Dance 12
Maria Damon: Perfume River: the Oxymoron Wannabe & Me
Tim Davis: The Nearsighted Poet Reads to St. Jerome
Marta Dieke, Spencer Selby, Gary Sullivan: from How We Learn
Rachel Blau DuPlessis: Draft 29: Intellectual Autobiography
Geraldine Erman: Vivarium No. 2
William L. Fox: from Zero Comma One: A Visual Essay
Janie Geiser: Evidence of Floods
Susan Gevirtz: Figment of Appointment
David Golumbia: Theory
Jenny Gough
Carla Harryman: Males (terrorists)
Lyn Hejinian & Travis Ortiz: The Staking Effect
Fanny Howe: from Nod (a novel)
Lisa Jarnot: Five Collages
Tom Johnson
Alystyre Julian: Shifting Attentions, Shifting Attentions
Karen Kelley: Gesture/Geisha/Genre
Bruce McIntosh
E.A. Miller: Trouble (please do not disturb)
Afe Murray: Phenomenal Rooms
Sianne Ngai: Five Collage Poems
Hoa Nguyen: From A Series of Letters
Nick Piombino: New Languages for Old
Mark Robbins: Scoring the Park
Christy Sheffield Sanford: Bivens Arm Nature Poem
Gail Sher: Innocent Diversions
Brian Kim Stefans
Cassandra Terman and Katie Yates
Nico Vassilakis: Orange: A Manual
Mac Wellman: The Peach-Bottom Nuclear Reactor Full Of Sleepers
C.D. Wright: The Lost Roads Project: A Walk-in Book of Arkansas
Paul Zelevansky: Four Heads on a One Way Street
CONTENTS OF CHAIN/3, VOLUME TWO
Publication date: September, 1996
Polly Apfelbaum
Lutz Bacher: Jim & Sylvia
Perry Bard: A Modest Proposal
Jim Brashear: from The Western Materials
Lee Ann Brown & Susan Meyer Fenton
Brad Buckley
Mary Burger: Coughing Fit
Stacy Doris: Re: The Birth of So And So, or, How I Noticed the
Beginnings of Nature
Johanna Drucker & Brad Freeman: Hybrid Anxieties
Thalia Field : On the First Day
Heather Fuller: Placards
Loss Pequeo Glazier: Intermedial Investigations
Barbara Henning & Miranda Maher: How to Read and Write in the Dark
Kathy High: (A Few) Statistics On the (Possible) Meaning of An Encounter
With (Some) (Middle-Class) Academic Women
Adeena Karasick: Genrecide: A Poetics for the Unproductive
Cynthia Kimball: Thinking In Words Does Not Become You
Heidi Kumao: Cinema Machines
Eve Andre Laramee: Apparatus for the Distillation of Vague Intuitions
Pamela Lu: from Noir
Steve McCaffery: Dilemma of the Meno
Marlene McCarty: More Crash and Burn
Jerome McGann: The Alice Fallacy, Or, Only God Can Make A Tree: A
Dialogue of Pleasure and Instruction
Kevin Magee: from April Theses
Gerard Malanga: Prototypes of Experience
Denise Newman
M. Nourbese Philip: Discourse on the Logic of Language
Kristin Prevallet: Allegory for the Real, Covered Up
Joan Retallack & Rod Smith & Melanie Nielson: Empty Envelopes: Is This
Any Way to Correspond?
Lisa Robertson: Index A: Lyric Or Prohibitive
James Sherry: Critical Menus Clef
Ken Sherwood: Scrims
Sally Silvers: Wall of Ownbrain: Movement/Film/Text/Science
Carolyn Steinhoff-Smith: from . . . And If, Taking From a Cage an Eye
Fiona Templeton: Real Dead and Fake Living: Notes for the Issue on
Hybrid Form
Ward Tietz: Two Collages
Anne Waldman: from Iovis
Mark Wallace: Processes of Attention
Janet Zweig: Mind Over Matter
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 07:58:56 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Herb Levy <herb@ESKIMO.COM>
Subject: Re: fake book
A fake book is a compilation of lead sheets for popular or standard songs
that band members at casuals (gigs like weddings at which the band members
may not have ever played together before, let alone rehearsed a particular
repertoire) or at bars where you never know what song someone will request.
It's "fake" because it provides enough information to fake your way
through the tune without rehearsal or prior knowledge of the tune.
There's been a subsequent publication, called the real book, that is used
in the same way, but instead of being photocopied (technically illegally)
is an actual offset published book for which the composer royalties have
been paid.
Many players still use fake books, though, cause the real book, because it
has paid royalties, has only a limited selection & isn't as comprehensive,
or idiosyncratic, as the usual fake book.
>speaking of musica ficta, does anyone know anything etymologically or
>otherwise about the term "fake book" used among jazz musicians but elsewhere
>too?
Herb Levy
herb@eskimo.com
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 13:41:28 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: fake book
At 9:13 AM 5/20/96, Burt Kimmelman -@NJIT is rumored to have typed:
> speaking of musica ficta, does anyone know anything etymologically or
> otherwise about the term "fake book" used among jazz musicians but elsewhere
> too?
From my earliest memories of playing with the conveniently-named
Thara Memory to my last jazz performance with members of the Cecil
Taylor Ensemble (or whatever they were called), I noticed that
musicians' references to fake books were always made in the context
of "faking it"--ie, of playing the head, improvising over the changes,
playing the head again and then going to the tag. Obviously, certain
tunes in fake books are through-composed (no repeating sections, no
improv in the stricter sense). But fake books are usually comprised
of melodies and chord symbols rather than complete arrangements--hence
the term.
The most famous fake book is the one that issues from The Berkeley
School of Music, which is called The Real Book. In it, one finds
more elaborate arrangements than is usually the case. But if there
weren't room in the Real Book for "faking it"--a witty, self-
deprecating term for the ability to extemporize if ever I heard one--
then we probably wouldn't think of it as jazz.
Can you think of anything approximating a fake book in poetry?
If so, tell us. This is pertinent to the subject of poetic notation.
All the best,
Rob Hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 14:01:42 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: musica ficta
Fred E. Maus typed:
> _Text and Act_ from Oxford U P (not California, which has
> published other things of his but not this one), 1995.
Thanks for the information!
Me:
> > And for the record: In important ways, musica ficta was as
> > score-specific as Beethoven. Dynamic and phrase markings didn't
> > exist yet, but rhythms and notes were written as they are today.
Fred:
> Hmm? I thought the point about ficta was that some of the notes
> are *not* written the same way: to us it looks like one pitch,
> but the intended sound is a half step away from what we might
> think.
Yes, you are correct in stating that in musica ficta, certain
notes are not played as written. But the written notes still suggest
exact raised and lowered pitches, hence the music is still score-
specific. If medieval musicians had been allowed allowed to *improvise
on the idea* of raising and lowering notes, we might find less score-
specific processes in effect.
However, there *is* real improvisation in the baroque period,
both in practice (we read about the public riffing of Bach and
others) and in notated form (realizations of the figured bass).
Still: there was a kind of conceptual improvisation in late
medieval music that fascinates me: the mensuration canons
of Ockeghem, for example, and his mass that was written to be
performed in any key.
What might the parallel be in writing? A play that could either
be performed as a tragedy or a farce? A multicultural discovering-my-
identity poem that could be read from the point of a person from
any race, gender, religious or sexual orientation? A descriptive poem
in which all nouns and verbs can be transposed?
All the best,
Rob hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 14:14:11 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Fred E. Maus" <fem2x@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake book (fwd)
from Michael Morse at York University:
> To my knowledge, "Fake Book" comes from "to fake," i.e., to play by ear
> and intuition a piece you've never played (or sometimes even heard)
> before. Thus a fake _book_ lets you play previously unfamiliar material.
> That the use of the book means you are no longer (literally) "faking
> it" is an intriguing paradox. However, many of the books were so rife
> with mistakes, especially in terms of harmonic progression, that the
> performer was still left to their own devices, and obliged to repair the
> goofs on the fly. In that sense, a "fake book" was one which could not be
> read or used uncritically.
> An illustration: when the Bostonian "Real Book"--complete with an
> arrogant introduction, distancing itself from "fake" books came out in
> the seventies, it disseminated a whole new series of mistakes and
> misunderstandings. These quickly led experienced players to ask obvious
> neophytes if the tune they'd suggested was learned from the Real Book. If
> the answer was "yes," a hurried conference ensued, correcting the book's
> gaffes. If, as sometimes happened, the neophyte insisted on the authority
> of the written text, the usual upshot was refusal to play the piece,
> typically effected by hurriedly counting off another number. I remember
> playing Bronislaw Kaper's "Invitation" with a youthful quintet once, who
> knew the song solely from the Real Book. To save space, the compilers
> notated an A - B - A' piece as A - B, d.c., coda. Is "coda" only the last
> time, then? A fascinating ambiguity--one which led, within the space of a
> few choruses, to the band ending up in FIVE different places..
> MWM
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 14:18:55 -0500
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From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Re: fake book
Rob--
there is rumored to be a phrase book for speakers of english entitled
'10,000 useful english phrases' many of which phrases turn up in recent
poetry--
also a _standard book of american faces_, a typeface book done by an insane
or maybe modernism-damaged New Jersey compositor genius circa 1934 has
yielded up some happy compositions or rather some happy composing
experiences for me--
emil littr=E9's french dictionary was a sort of fake book for ponge--
Kim Lyons has written (or maybe just talked about?) on using any dictionary
any reference work as fake book--
Tim Davis seems to be using everything around him as a fake book--
Jordan
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 14:38:04 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
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From: Alan Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Rudyard Kipling's If
If, by Rudyard Kipling
If I could I always would go to the tree where my parents stood There in
the night with candle light I'd cry Babylon for my daughter's plight Down
where my son has almost gone, I'd find the one with the golden palm Back
where the flame has blackened my name I'd play the game of silver fame
With weeping and wails in rains and hails I'd set my ship with copper
sails And travel the Net where I would would get my family and yet the
storm would set Upon the stores with fire and hail the whores of Babylon
scream their wars And I'd go no farther for sister or brother or bother a
mother or kill the father Beneath the world where famished for food in
angry mood the couple lewd Did pace this space to make a face my own with
grace that died apace O die decease in peace the lease of land is found
with crease Where Tigris flows Euphrates goes the couple lewd on raft
sights crows And other birds or troubled herds that make these words
fulfill with woes What I could say if I could splay my legs to play in
eagle's way Where fire sires liars, pyres expire, wires tire, cryers mire
And if I could I would be mood wood.
_________________________________________________________________________
http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html
images: http://www.cs.unca.edu/~davidson/pix/
Ich war Hamlet. Ich stand an der Kuste und redete mit der Brandung
BLABLA, im Rucken die Ruinen von Europe. Heiner Muller
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 11:31:28 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Herb Levy <herb@ESKIMO.COM>
Subject: Re: fake book
Rob Hardin wrote:
>Can you think of anything approximating a fake book in poetry?
>If so, tell us. This is pertinent to the subject of poetic notation.
Cause (even in performance poetry situations) people rarely ask an artist
to do a poem that isn't their own, the issue is pretty different.
In the few cases when someone does interpret the work of another, there's
less leeway than is usually the case for a musician. I mean, if someone
asked for, say, Frank O'Hara's "In Memory of My Feelings" they probably
wouldn't be satisfied with something that had the broad formal outline
correct, but which had some different words. Even when the words are all
correct, there's often a sense that a performance that strays from that of
the original poet's is not "right."
The only example that I can think of in poetry like a fake book are the
various dictionaries of poetic forms that describe how many lines of how
many syllables stressed in what ways etc. make up a pantoum or an
alexandrine or a whatever.
But these aren't guides for recreating a specific work, rather for creating
something in a more general form.
Herb Levy
herb@eskimo.com
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 15:35:51 -0400
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From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: fake book (fwd)
Fred E. Maus typed:
> from Michael Morse at York University:
> > That the use of the book means you are no longer (literally) "faking
> > it" is an intriguing paradox.
An intriguing paradox indeed, and not only to us. Notated chance
operations hinge on the paradox mentioned here.
> > However, many of the books were so rife
> > with mistakes, especially in terms of harmonic progression, that the
> > performer was still left to their own devices, and obliged to repair the
> > goofs on the fly.
I don't think I've ever peformed in public without finding
at least one problem in the score. Aren't textual inaccuracies
part of *being* a performer--indeterminacy in everyday life?
> > In that sense, a "fake book" was one which could not be
> > read or used uncritically.
Meaning that the book *itself* was fake! Touche--nice insight.
> > An illustration: when the Bostonian "Real Book"--complete with an
> > arrogant introduction, distancing itself from "fake" books came out in
> > the seventies, it disseminated a whole new series of mistakes and
> > misunderstandings. These quickly led experienced players to ask obvious
> > neophytes if the tune they'd suggested was learned from the Real Book. If
> > the answer was "yes," a hurried conference ensued, correcting the book's
> > gaffes.
Amusingly, I do remember conversations in which Berkeley graduates
(not neophytes) attributed biblical authority to the Real Book.
To impose pedantry on aural tradition *in the middle of a gig*
has always struck me as a rather impractical activity.
Such second-hand arrogance is one of the reasons I stopped playing
jazz in public. Since I grew up playing and composing classical music,
I reasoned, let those who truly grew up with the jazz tradition get
props for doing it. Hence, people should go to Matthew Shipp to hear
jazz piano and not to me. As unpopular as this sounds, I improvise
from harmonic/contrapuntal traditions that are primarily European
and non-Afrocentric (though of course the lines are blurred) in
origin. To do otherwise strikes me as dishonest. I'm not
interested in becoming the Vanilla Ice (rather than the
3rd Bass) of swing.
But back to _The Real Book_:
Interestingly, I don't recall the level of error found by Mr. Morse.
Pieces by Towner, Methaney, Steve Swallow (and so on) were often
transcribed by the composers themselves. But perhaps many of the
mistakes of which he speaks had been ironed out by the early eighties,
when I came in contact with the book. I never bought it, though,
because I was preoccupied with studies at New England C to think
about BSM.
Incidentally: Anyone who's read my interview in the cyberpunk
issue of Keyboard (May '89) will probably deduce that--merely
in terms of knowledge and experience--I'm not a "neophyte."
Still, the use of such labels is yet another aspect of the
academicized jazz community that disturbs me. I rather
enjoy the presence of neophytes in any artistic community.
For me, the problem is not the neophyte. It is the instant
expert.
In the words of Montaigne, "What do I know?"
------------------------
I've typed and deleted this question a few times in my last five
posts, but now I think it's time to leave it stet.: Is all this
music-specific talk germaine to the Poetics discussion group?
I worry about dragging other poets off-topic. I'd feel better
about this if we could bring our ideas on music notation back
to the topic of *poetic* notation.
But I do find it helpful to interpret poetry as written music
and instrumental music in prosodic terms. Here is another paradox:
Although it is useful to frame studies of the arts in interdisciplinary
contexts, the benefits of such studies can prove idiomatic to either art.
------------------------
All the best,
Rob Hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 15:53:44 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Edward Foster <EFOSTER@VAXC.STEVENS-TECH.EDU>
Subject: RUSSIAN/AMERICAN SCHEDULE
The draft schedule for the Russian/American poetry festival this coming
week-end is on its way to all who have told us they plan to attend. if
your paper/reading/panel is not scheduled for a time convenient for you,
please let us know as soon as possible. the final schedule goes to press
thursday morning.
it does look like one amazing occasion. if there is anyone who is planning
to come and still does not have room arrangements, i'd suggest you try the
dormitory office here, speak with cathy mcHugh; i believe she still has
some rooms available.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 13:00:37 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 18 May 1996 to 19 May 1996
> Ginsberg,
>and his ability to make subtle distinctions between artists like Leonard
>Cohen and Lou Reed. Of course you could debate until eternity what it
>*means* to be "more a poet than a musician" or vice versa--how he
>characterized Cohen and Reed, respectively.
Well, I think that it means that Leonard cant really sing or play his
instrument, and Lou's words are pretty banal.
..........................
"Even the Parisien exists."
-Michaux
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 13:03:47 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: Typo of the Day
>George, just count da feet.
>
>Tony Green,
>e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
Well, on that thing that I just ate, there were seven. It was either a
mutated insect or a mutilated spider.
..........................
"Even the Parisien exists."
-Michaux
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 16:14:40 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: "fake" book/"real" improvisation
At 11:31 AM 5/20/96, Herb Levy typed:
> Cause (even in performance poetry situations) people rarely ask an artist
> to do a poem that isn't their own, the issue is pretty different.
I was speaking not only of a collection of poems to be read aloud
(any anthology could be a fake book in this context), but also
a collection of poems on which to *improvise*. I think it would
be fun to do such a collection, don't you? Professor Larry McCaffery
of SDSU is already working on a few "cover album" (ie, pastiche)
anthologies inspired by Hal Wilner. I would enjoy asking poets
from all traditions and disciplines to write texts with im/explicit
openings for improvisation.
> Even when the words are all
> correct, there's often a sense that a performance that strays
> from that of the original poet's is not "right."
Not necessarily. Not always. Some people are far better at composing
than performing. Shouldn't these people be read aloud by others?
Aside from being an excellent poet, Bruce Andrews is also an
exceptionally good and versatile performer. It might be revelatory
and amusing to hear him recite other people's work, don't you think?
> The only example that I can think of in poetry like a fake book are the
> various dictionaries of poetic forms that describe how many lines of how
> many syllables stressed in what ways etc. make up a pantoum or an
> alexandrine or a whatever.
An interesting idea. Recently, a group of writers called Unbearables,
to which I sometimes belong, wrote improvs on The Chicago Manual of Style:
What fun.
All the best,
Rob Hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 16:41:07 EDT
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Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: John Whiting <100707.731@COMPUSERVE.COM>
Subject: Re: fake book (fwd)
Comments: To: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
As someone trained in lit but working in music I've been
fascinated by the direction which this thread has taken. Are we
again entering an age in which the poetry/music distinction is
as impossible as with the English madrigalists whom Pound so
revered? After working for years with Bob Cobbing and Clive
Fencott in an improvised sound poetry/electronics ensemble
called Oral Complex, I now find myself improvisingly similarly
with John Kenney, a great trombonist with whom the interactivity
is totally analogous.
John Whiting
October Sound
London
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 17:06:37 EST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Burt Kimmelman -@NJIT" <kimmelman@ADMIN.NJIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake book
A quasi analog to musical fake books is perhaps the old english manuscripts
that showed the full elaboration of a stanza pattern including the refrain
and any other repeating features, and then showed the other unique lines
of successive stanzas--all done to save parchment that was precious.
So how would this be fake? I don't know. Of course, thinking of
parchment, one can't help but recall the whole delicious issue of
the palimpsest--but now, we are perhaps straying beyond prosody and into
purely textual/linguistic and/or philosophical matters.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 20:47:53 -0500
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Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake book
Dear Herb Levy--
That you mentioned O'Hara's "In Memory..." as an example for the
"interpretation" question (music/poetry analogy) pricked up my ears.
I'm genuinely curious about how you perceive the parameters of
"interpretation" for surely they are wider than (was it?) Rob Hardin's
more strict analogy (where say one poet with a distinctive reading style
--say Andrews--"interprets" O'Hara, but of course then the locus of
comparison would be not O'Hara's writing but O'hara's performance of the
same poem--Are their tapes of him reading it?). It seems to me that
you're more onto the idea of reading as a collaborative act, of
writing-while-reading as an interpretation, and I think of Pound's
"diluters" but also Bloom's idea that the only "strong" criticism or
interpretation of a poem must itself be another poet (and of course
trying to claim that his form of criticism may BE a poem). Thus, there
is no end to interpretation. And thus, there is no "original" poem
per se (or the dreaded "lost original" as Shapiro interprets it--or
Sappho). And the two senses of interpretation interact in complex
ways. From one perspective, poems (ALL POEMS) can not help but be
interpretations, yet in being interpretations of interpretations (i.e.
conventions), self consciously, as O'Hara's poem-suite is, they attempt
to cancel out the hyperontological, mere similacrum, to bring one to
the illusion of "the thing itself." (Now, I'm thinking of Benjamin's
"task of the translator" here--translator as poet-interpreter).
Anyway, is there a way to tie any of this into Rod Smith's recent
"IN MEMORY OF MY THEORIES" (or as a friend called it "In MEMORY OF MY
O BOOK)?
For instance, the marker is there (just as in Ray Ragosta's William
James title), and could send a scholarly interpreter/explicator towards
looking for similarities between the two books, as if there was some
REASON, beside a spur-of the moment flash, or a flash that occured
repeatedly more than once, that Smith called his book such. Though part
of me (or one of my selves, as O'Hara would have it) wants to say,
"No, Chris, it is absolutely a wild goose chase to see Smith's book
as an interpretation of O'Hara" (or to take Perelman's O'hara meets
Barthes in heaven as anything but a high joke to get the goat of
academic drudges---for as Shapiro writes, "a title is not a can opener"),
another one of my selves feels that even stale conventions such as a
comparison/contrast mode can be a starting point for new possibilities.
(though not "new" vs. "old" in possibility....)
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 22:18:27 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Re: theory book
Chris--
Re 'theories'--
What if Rod's borrowing of O'Hara's title is meant to compare O'Hara's
times with these times?
Think of how the word 'feelings' sounded to you before you knew the O'Hara poem.
I wasn't alive when the poem was written, so I don't know how the
pre-Feliciano environment heard it, but I suspect 'feelings' was a word of
dangerous purple.
Now. Rod's book (Rod--you want to jump in here?) is titled after a poem,
yes? The poem in which Al Gore is conflated with both Paul Simons? And a
cheerleader coaxes us to spell out "VLUH!"? I think Rod's goofing on the
word 'theories' to make it possible to take that word seriously again.
Cough. Really. Or hear it, anyway, as the abused center of our times (inner
city of meaning?). It's risky for the reasons you cite and joke about. That
kind of risk is interesting, tho, right?
--Jd not Kd nor Td nor (e)
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 01:13:11 -0700
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Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tenney Nathanson <tenney@AZSTARNET.COM>
Subject: but this is Lovely to Think About
>Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 11:31:28 -0700
>From: Herb Levy <herb@ESKIMO.COM>
>Subject: Re: fake book
>
>In the few cases when someone does interpret the work of another, there's
>less leeway than is usually the case for a musician. I mean, if someone
>asked for, say, Frank O'Hara's "In Memory of My Feelings" they probably
>wouldn't be satisfied with something that had the broad formal outline
>correct, but which had some different words. Even when the words are all
>correct, there's often a sense that a performance that strays from that of
>the original poet's is not "right."
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 05:45:52 -0400
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Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: fake book
At 8:47 PM 5/20/96, Chris Stroffolinoe typed:
> Dear Herb Levy--
> That you mentioned O'Hara's "In Memory..." as an example for the
> "interpretation" question (music/poetry analogy) pricked up my ears.
> I'm genuinely curious about how you perceive the parameters of
> "interpretation" for surely they are wider than (was it?) Rob Hardin's
> more strict analogy (where say one poet with a distinctive reading style
> --say Andrews--"interprets" O'Hara
That was only one of my points, and certainly not one of my own analogies.
I was arguing in favor of (as opposed to Herb's argument against) others
besides the poet interpreting the poet's work. The subject was more his
than mine. If you presumed that guest recitations were the point of my
reply, then I hope you'll reexamine what I wrote.
I choose to be open to the idea of interpretation in the context
of the work of other poets. If you dislike anyone's interpretation,
or *version* (which can mean any number of compositional/performance
techniques) of a particular work, you can always go back to the
original poem and poet. And it is unfair to compare all interpretative
work suggested by me--aleatoric, satirical, even ultra-rationalist--
with pedestrian interpretation; with a CD of Kevin Costner
reading e. e. cummings.
> I think of Pound's
> "diluters" but also Bloom's idea that the only "strong" criticism or
> interpretation of a poem must itself be another poet (and of course
> trying to claim that his form of criticism may BE a poem).
I like Harold Bloom's idea of poetic misreading. But why should I take
his word for it and denounce the reader's interpretation as mere
undigested influence? I can't presume to know the level of every
reader's interpretation.
(Besides, who said we weren't talking primarily about other poets?)
And why shouldn't a poet or reader approach influence and interpretation
from any angle that works for him/her on a practical level?
> Thus, there
> is no end to interpretation. And thus, there is no "original" poem
> per se (or the dreaded "lost original" as Shapiro interprets it--or
> Sappho). And the two senses of interpretation interact in complex
> ways. From one perspective, poems (ALL POEMS) can not help but be
> interpretations, yet in being interpretations of interpretations (i.e.
> conventions), self consciously, as O'Hara's poem-suite is, they attempt
> to cancel out the hyperontological, mere similacrum, to bring one to
> the illusion of "the thing itself."
This is a useful idea, certainly. But it would seem to me to be one long
footnoted paraphrase of Foucault's essay, "what is an author?" (1969),
which is a useful work, but--again--doesn't contain the only useful
ideas for a practicing poet. At this point, decon is still important,
but it is also familiar news (or seems so to me).
All best always,
Rob Hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 08:29:16 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Michael Boughn <mboughn@CHASS.UTORONTO.CA>
Subject: Re: rules & conventions
In-Reply-To: <960518140107_297041462@emout12.mail.aol.com> from "Charles
Smith" at May 18, 96 02:01:07 pm
Charles:
The essay is called "Literary Institution and Modernization" and it's
conncerned to track changes in the the relation of literature to its
producers and consumers (and to the social generally) during the
transition to modernism. Burger proposes that the production of
literature is governed by rules during (and preceding) neo-classicism
when the institution of literature is part of a stable social order
within which artists peacefully exist.
Within the Enlightenment, the _doctrine classique_ is replaced by the
aesthetics of autonomy. "The bourgeois subject, claiming personal
autonomy, and being itself a result of modernization, opposes society
as an alien object. The critique which has been concerned with
traditional residues, such as dogmatic systems of belief, can now turn
against modernization itself." Simultaneously, rules give way to
conventions as the mode of organizing literary production. Rules are
either on or off, whereas conventions evolve and change and become deformed.
So I'm wondering how to characterize our situation now? Are we still,
as poets, in a conventional mode? Is this giving way to something new,
like, say, procedures? Can we even know that?
Maybe this is boring to people on the list, but it seemed relevant to
the discussion that Annie Finch gave rise to.
Gotta run,
Mike
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 07:51:32 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: a range life, if I could settle down, I would...
I have been trying to find the new addresses of the following
publications (or if they are even still publishing)
cyanosis
North American Ideophonics
Syn/aes/the/tic
Turbulence
I also recall a note a while back that either _lyric&_ or _Lower Limit
Speech_ had moved. Any information greatly appreciated.
Be Well.
David Baratier
dave.baratier@mosby.com
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 08:38:46 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Poetics List <poetics@UBVMS.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake book (fwd)
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: fake book (fwd)
To: Multiple recipients of list POETICS <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Fred E. Maus typed:
> from Michael Morse at York University:
> > That the use of the book means you are no longer (literally) "faking
> > it" is an intriguing paradox.
An intriguing paradox indeed, and not only to us. Notated chance
operations hinge on the paradox mentioned here.
> > However, many of the books were so rife
> > with mistakes, especially in terms of harmonic progression, that the
> > performer was still left to their own devices, and obliged to repair the
> > goofs on the fly.
I don't think I've ever peformed in public without finding
at least one problem in the score. Aren't textual inaccuracies
part of *being* a performer--indeterminacy in everyday life?
> > In that sense, a "fake book" was one which could not be
> > read or used uncritically.
Meaning that the book *itself* was fake! Touche--nice insight.
> > An illustration: when the Bostonian "Real Book"--complete with an
> > arrogant introduction, distancing itself from "fake" books came out in
> > the seventies, it disseminated a whole new series of mistakes and
> > misunderstandings. These quickly led experienced players to ask obvious
> > neophytes if the tune they'd suggested was learned from the Real Book. If
> > the answer was "yes," a hurried conference ensued, correcting the book's
> > gaffes.
Amusingly, I do remember conversations in which Berkeley graduates
(not neophytes) attributed biblical authority to the Real Book.
To impose pedantry on aural tradition *in the middle of a gig*
has always struck me as a rather impractical activity.
Such second-hand arrogance is one of the reasons I stopped playing
jazz in public. Since I grew up playing and composing classical music,
I reasoned, let those who truly grew up with the jazz tradition get
props for doing it. Hence, people should go to Matthew Shipp to hear
jazz piano and not to me. As unpopular as this sounds, I improvise
from harmonic/contrapuntal traditions that are primarily European
and non-Afrocentric (though of course the lines are blurred) in
origin. To do otherwise strikes me as dishonest. I'm not
interested in becoming the Vanilla Ice (rather than the
3rd Bass) of swing.
But back to _The Real Book_:
Interestingly, I don't recall the level of error found by Mr. Morse.
Pieces by Towner, Methaney, Steve Swallow (and so on) were often
transcribed by the composers themselves. But perhaps many of the
mistakes of which he speaks had been ironed out by the early eighties,
when I came in contact with the book. I never bought it, though,
because I was preoccupied with studies at New England C to think
about BSM.
Incidentally: Anyone who's read my interview in the cyberpunk
issue of Keyboard (May '89) will probably deduce that--merely
in terms of knowledge and experience--I'm not a "neophyte."
Still, the use of such labels is yet another aspect of the
academicized jazz community that disturbs me. I rather
enjoy the presence of neophytes in any artistic community.
For me, the problem is not the neophyte. It is the instant
expert.
In the words of Montaigne, "What do I know?"
------------------------
I've typed and deleted this question a few times in my last five
posts, but now I think it's time to leave it stet.: Is all this
music-specific talk germaine to the Poetics discussion group?
I worry about dragging other poets off-topic. I'd feel better
about this if we could bring our ideas on music notation back
to the topic of *poetic* notation.
But I do find it helpful to interpret poetry as written music
and instrumental music in prosodic terms. Here is another paradox:
Although it is useful to frame studies of the arts in interdisciplinary
contexts, the benefits of such studies can prove idiomatic to either art.
------------------------
All the best,
Rob Hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 08:53:07 EST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Burt Kimmelman -@NJIT" <kimmelman@ADMIN.NJIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: a range life, if I could settle down, I would...
Synaesthetic is published by Alex Cigale. His home address is
98 Vanderbilt Ave
Brooklyn, NY 11205
there is a po box for the mag, but i've misplaced it, but anyway alex
is doing the mag virtually single handed.
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 09:24:47 -0400
Reply-To: Robert Drake <au462@cleveland.Freenet.Edu>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Robert Drake <au462@CLEVELAND.FREENET.EDU>
Subject: Re: a range life, if I could settle down, I would...
david--
synaesthetic, c/o alex cigale
178-10 wexford terrace #3d
jamaica ny 11432
north american ideophonics
c/o mark nowak
908 franklin terrace, 3rd floor
minn. mn 55406
turbulence
david nemeth
po box 40
hockessin de 19707
... i _think_ turbulence folded after their first issue, which was
dated oct. 93...
all of these have been reviewed in past issues of TapRoot Reviews;
if this kind of material is ov continued interest, you might
consider subscribing: $10/4 issues to Burning Press, PO Box 585,
Lakewood OH 44107. we're constantly late, but we're constant...
luigi
ed.
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 09:44:43 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: A Booglit benefit reading
Featured Readers:
Todd Colby
David Baratier
Bill Luoma
Dan Wilcox
Also Chris Stroffolino and Chris Butters are slated.
Booglit will be publishing a number of limited edition chapbooks for
the reading, including _Compartments (a short run)_ by David Baratier
@ Luna Park
Friday May 31st @ 7:30 pm
249 Fifth Ave.
Brooklyn, NY
(Between Carroll Street and Garfield Place)
For folks who are unfamiliar with Booglit, the present editorial staff
is:
Michael Basinski: Buffalo, NY
David Baratier: Philadelphia, PA
Dan Wilcox: Albany, NY
Rod Smith: Washington, DC
Lee Ann Brown: Boulder, CO
Dan Bouchard: Boston, MA
Booglit is a community focused publication where the editors for the
various cities contribute material on area writers and events in each
issue. One city is chosen to be the featured city of each issue. A
third of the publication space is dedicated to the featured city.
Authors of other chapbooks availiable from Booglit include:
Lee Anne Brown, Laynie Browne, Amiri Baraka,
Bill Shields & Eliot Richmond, Barry Gifford,
Marc Ducharme, Ed Saunders, and many others.
For a full catalog send an SASE to
Booglit / PO Box 221 / Oceanside, NY 11572-0221
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 07:35:45 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake books
In-Reply-To: <199605210407.AAA02763@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
in my role as restater of the obvious, let me remind all of the subtitle
of Maxine Hong Kingston's novel, _Tripmaster Monkey: His Fake Book_
a pleasant diversion, easy to hum, great changes
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 10:53:17 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: Re: formal continuum
"Metrical "meaning", according to this theory, is generated through
difference within a structure--an obvious reference to Saussure. As
I said, it's an interesting way of looking at what certain poets
have done in certain circumstances, a different way of reading the
meaningfulness of meter."
I fail to see how this is supposed to substitute as a new
articulation, theory or hypothesis. Or is the benefit of the word
Saussure supposed to singlehandedly transpose an un/new-found
conveyance upon the sensibilities of the reader? Pick a poem, any poem
from, oh say-- Blake's Song of Innocence and Experience and see what
the meter does in relation to the "meaningfullness of meter." This is
one of them pre-existing ideas (CREATED BY A POET AND CONSEQUENTLY
STOLEN I MIGHT ADD) sacked from the cul-de-sac of poetical intention,
dressed up in a label of newfangled foppery and subsequently selling
itself as "a brand new bag" ala James Brown without a momentary
reflection for retention.
Be well.
David Baratier
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 11:48:48 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steven Howard Shoemaker <ss6r@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: fake science
Given all the discussion of faking it one the list lately, i cldn't resist
forwarding this.
steve
"I fake it so real I am beyond fake"--Courtney Love
>
> Dear All,
>
> The following article from the _Baltimore Sun_ speaks in so
> many different ways that I had better just let it speak for
> itself.
>
> "A bold scientist fights the tyranny of reality"
> by Linda Seeback (May 15, 1996)
>
>
> "Pleasanton, Calif - Physicist Alan Sokal of New York
> University meticulously observed all the rules of the academic
> game when he constructed his article on postmodern physics and
> submitted it to a prestigious journal of cultural studies
> called _Social Text_.
>
> The people he cites as authorities are the superluminaries of
> the field, the quotations he uses to illustrate his argument
> are strictly accurate and the text is bristling with footnotes.
>
> All the rules but one, that is: Dr. Sokal's article is a
> parody. Under the grandiloquent title "Transgressing the
> Boundaries: Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum
> Gravity," it appeared in the Spring/Summer 1996 special issue
> of the magazine, one entirely devoted to "the science wars," as
> the editors term the tension between peple who actually do
> science and the critics who merely theorize about it.
>
> Many scientists believe that the emperors of cultural studies
> have no clothes. Dr. Sokal captured the whole royal court
> parading in naked ignorance and persuaded the palace
> chroniclers to publish the portrait as a centerfold.
>
> Once the article was safely in print, he revealed his modest
> experiment. "Would a leading journal of cultural studies," he
> wrote in the May/June issue of _Lingua Franca_, "publish an
> article liberally salted with nonsense of (a) it sounded good
> and (b) it flattered the editors' ideological preconceptions?"
> Unfortunately, yes.
>
> Dr. Sokal's deliberate nonsense is anything but subtle.
> Translated into plain English from the high-flown language he
> borrowed for the occasion, his first paragraph says that
> scientists "cling to the dogma" that the external world exists
> and its properties are independent of what human beings think.
> But nobody believes that old stuff any more, right? Now we all
> know that physical reality is "at bottom a social and
> linguistic construct."...
>
> There are so many red flags planted throughout the paper that
> even non-scientists "should have spotted at least one and
> started laughing" Dr. Sokal said last week. "Either this is a
> parody or the author is off his rocker."
>
> The physicist was prompted into parody by a 1994 book, "Higher
> Superstition: The Academic Left and Its Quarrels with Science,"
> by Paul Gross and Norman Levitt, which ruffled a lot of
> postmodernist feathers.
>
> "I'm an academic leftist and I have no quarrel with science,"
> Dr. Sokal said, "so the first thing I did was go to the library
> and check their references, to see whether (Messrs, Gross and
> Levitt) were being fair," and they were. In fact, he found
> even more examples of scientific illiteracy, some of them even
> worse.
>
> "It would be so boring to refute them," Dr. Sokal said, "I
> picked the silliest quotes from the most prominent people and I
> made up an argument for how they were linked together.".....
>
> "A liberatory science cannot be complete without a profound
> revision of the canon of mathematics," he concludes. "We can
> see hints of (such emancipatory mathematics) in the
> multidimensional and nonlinear logic of fuzzy systems theory,
> but this approach is still heavily marked by its origins in the
> crisis of late-capitalist production relations." He drags in
> catastrophe theory and chaos theory too.
>
> There is a political point to Dr. Sokal's demonstration, but
> it's not the right-wing one he's sure will be attributed to
> him. He's proud to call himself a leftist, and his resume
> includes a stint teaching mathematics at the National
> University of Nicaragua under the Sandinistas.
>
> "If you take up crazy philosophies you undermine your ability
> to tackle questions of public policy, like ecology," he said.
> "It really matters whether the world is warming up."...
>
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 10:58:50 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: Reading Tonight 5/21
Tuesday in Philadelphia
_Boulevard_ presents a reading by James Tate. Border's center city
1727 Walnut Street. @ 7:30
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 11:51:20 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steven Howard Shoemaker <ss6r@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: fake science: reply
And here is Andrew Ross's reply to the Sokaldebacle.
steve
> * + * + * + * + * + * + * + * + * + * + * + * + * + * + * + * + * + *
>
> Ross:
>
> >What were some of the initial responses of the journal's editors when we
> >first learned about Alan Sokal's prank upon Social Text? One suspected
> >that Sokal's "parody" was nothing of the sort, and that his admission
> >represented a change of heart, or a collapse of his intellectual resolve.
> >Another, while willing to accept the story, was less sure that Sokal knew
> >very much about what or whom he thought he was kidding. A third was
> >pleasantly astonished to learn that the journal is taken seriously enough
> >to be considered a threat to anyone, let alone to natural scientists. At
> >least two others were furious at the dubious means by which he chose to
> >make his point. All were concerned that his actions might simply spark
> >off a new round of caricature and thereby perpetuate the climate in which
> >science studies has been subject recently to so much derision from
> >conservatives in science. However varied the responses, we all believe
> >that Sokal took too much for granted in his account of his prank. Indeed,
> >his claim--that our publication of his article proves that something is
> >rotten in the state of cultural studies--may have turned out to be as
> >wacky as the article itself.
> >
> >First, let me recount the history of the editorial process regarding
> >Sokal's article, in order to provide readers with a framework that Lingua
> >Franca did not seek when they decided to publish his piece. From the
> >first, we considered Sokal's unsolicited article to be a little hokey.
> >It is not every day that we receive a dense philosophical tract from a
> >professional physicist. Not knowing the author or his work, we engaged
> >in some speculation about his intentions, and concluded that this article
> >was the earnest attempt of a professional scientist to seek some kind of
> >affirmation from postmodern philosophy for developments in his field. His
> >adventures in PostmodernLand were not really our cup of tea. Like other
> >journals of our vintage that try to keep abreast of cultural studies, it
> >has been many years since Social Text published contributions to the
> >debate about postmodern theory, and Sokal's article would have been
> >regarded as sophomoric and/or outdated (and therefore unnacceptable to the
> >editors) if it had come from a humanist or social scientist. As the work
> >of a natural scientist it was unusual, and, we thought, plausibly
> >symptomatic of how someone like Sokal might approach the field of
> >postmodern epistemology i.e. awkwardly, assertively, and somewhat
> >aimlessly, with a veritable armada of footnotes to ease his sense of
> >vulnerability. In other words, we read it more as an act of good faith of
> >the sort that might be worth encouraging than as an exercise of the
> >intellect whose scholarly worth had to be judged. On those grounds, the
> >editors considered that it might be of interest to readers as a "document"
> >of that time-honored tradition in which modern physicists have discovered
> >harmonic resonances with their own reasoning in the field of philosophy
> >and metaphysics. Consequently, the article met one of the several
> >criteria for publication which Social Text recognizes. As a non-refereed
> >journal of political opinion and cultural analysis (entirely
> >self-published by an editorial collective until its recent adoption by
> >Duke University Press), Social Text has always seen its lineage in the
> >"little review" tradition of the independent left as much as in the
> >academic domain, and so we often balance diverse editorial criteria when
> >discussing the worth of submissions, whether they be works of fiction,
> >interviews with sex workers, or interventions in postcolonial thought.
> >In other words, this is an editorial milieu with principles and aims quite
> >remote from that of a professional scientific journal.
> >
> >Having established an interest in Sokal's article, we did ask him
> >informally to revise the piece. We made a general request to him a) to
> >excise a good deal of the philosophical speculation and b) to excise most
> >of his footnotes. Sokal seemed resistant to any general revisions of this
> >sort, and indeed insisted on retaining almost all of his footnotes and
> >bibliographic apparatus on the grounds that his peers, in science,
> >expected extensive documentation of this sort. Judging from his
> >response, it was clear that his article would appear as is, or not at all.
> >At this point, Sokal was admitted to the category of "difficult,
> >uncooperative author," well known to journal editors. His article entered
> >a state of limbo, well known at Social Text at least, as "too much trouble
> >to publish, not yet on the reject pile, and capable of being redeemed if
> >published in the company of related articles."
> >
> >Some months after this impasse was reached, the editors did indeed decide
> >to assemble a special issue on the topic of science studies. We wanted to
> >gauge how science studies practitioners were responding to the scurrilous
> >attacks of Paul Gross and Norman Levitt, and other conservatives in
> >science. Contributions were solicited from across the field of knowledge;
> >from humanists, social scientists and natural scientists (the final lineup
> >included many of the more significant names in science studies (Sandra
> >Harding, Steve Fuller, Emily Martin, Hilary Rose, Langdon Winner, Dorothy
> >Nelkin, Richard Levins, George Levine, Sharon Traweek, Sarah Franklin,
> >Ruth Hubbard, Joel Kovel, Stanley Aronowitz, and Les Levidow). Most
> >responded directly to the evolving controversy that some were calling the
> >"Science Wars," while others wrote their own accounts of work in their
> >respective fields. Here, we thought, was an appropriate and heterogenous
> >context in which Sokal's article might appear, providing a feasible
> >solution to our editorial dilemma. He expressed some concern when asked
> >if we could publish his piece in this special issue (we assumed he wished
> >to distance himself from the polemical company assembled for the issue),
> >but he reiterated his eagerness to see it in print. Our final decision to
> >include him presumed that readers would see his article in the particular
> >context of the Science Wars issue, as a contribution from someone unknown
> >to the field whose views, however peculiar, might still be thought
> >relevant to the debate. Since his article was not written for that
> >special issue, and bears little resemblance, in tone or substance, to the
> >other commissioned articles, it was not slated to be included in the
> >expanded book version of the issue (with additional articles by Katherine
> >Hayles, Michael Lynch, Roger Hart, and Richard Lewontin) which will be
> >published by Duke University Press in September.
> >
> >In sum, Sokal's assumption that his "parody" struck a disreputable chord
> >with the woozy editors of Social Text is ill-conceived. Indeed, its
> >status as parody does not alter substantially our initial perception of,
> >and our interest in, the piece itself as a curio, or symptomatic document.
> >Of course, the whole affair may say something about our own conception of
> >how physicists read philosophy, but that seems less important to us than
> >that his prank does not simply lead to a heightening of the hysteria which
> >the Science Wars have induced.
> >
> >Most of all, what his confession altered was our perception of his own
> >good faith as a self-proclaimed leftist. In the view of our editors,
> >Alan Sokal was now revealed to be either a) a leftist whose self-loathing
> >has been activated by conservative caricatures of the cultural left, or b)
> >a leftist whose genuine sense of commitment led him to a questionable
> >manner of expressing his political point. In either respect, his
> >actions smacked of a temper often attributed to "unreconstructed male
> >leftists." More to the point, the boy stunt pulled by Sokal seemed
> >typical of the professional culture of science education.
> >
> >Having talked to the (real) Sokal subsequently, we believe that most of
> >the issues he intended to air are, at this point, rather well-known to
> >readers of Social Text and to Lingua Franca. Indeed, they have been
> >going the rounds in the academy since the first postmodern, social
> >constructionist, or anti- foundational critiques of positivism appeared
> >over thirty-five years ago. That many natural scientists have only
> >recently felt the need to respond to these critiques says something about
> >the restricted trade routes through which knowledge is still circulated in
> >the academy, policed, as it is, at every departmental checkpoint by
> >disciplinary passport controls. Nor are these critiques unfamiliar to
> >folks who have long been involved in debates about the direction of the
> >left, where positivism has had a long and healthy life. At this point in
> >time, we have a vestigial stake in these critiques and debates, but much
> >less of an interest than Sokal supposes. When Sokal discovers that the
> >cultural left he believes he has outsmarted really doesn't give much of a
> >hoot about what Lacan said about topology in his 1966 seminar, then we can
> >talk turkey.
> >
> >Our main concern is that readers who may be new to the debates engendered
> >by science studies are not persuaded by the Sokal stunt that this is
> >simply an academic turf war between scientists and humanists/social
> >scientists, with one side trying to outsmart the other. More important to
> >us is the gulf of power between experts and lay voices, and the currently
> >shifting relationship between science and the corporate state. Nor are
> >these concerns extrinsic to the practice of science. Prior to deciding
> >whether science intrinsically tells the truth, we must ask, again and
> >again, whether it is possible, or prudent, to isolate facts from values.
> >
> >Why does science matter so much? Because its power, as a civil religion,
> >as a social and political authority, affects our daily lives and the
> >parlous condition of the natural world more than does any other domain of
> >knowledge. Does it follow that non-scientists should have some say in the
> >decision-making processes that define and shape the work of the
> >professional scientific community? Some scientists (including Sokal
> >presumably) would say yes, and in some countries, non-expert citizens do
> >indeed participate in these processes. All hell breaks loose, however,
> >when the following question is asked. Should non-experts have anything to
> >say about scientific methodology and epistemology? After centuries of
> >scientific racism, scientific sexism, and scientific domination of nature
> >one might have thought this was a pertinent question to ask.
> >
> >Andrew Ross, Co-Editor, Social Text
>
> BYDLR@virginia.edu
>
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 12:05:36 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steven Howard Shoemaker <ss6r@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake book
In-Reply-To: <009A29F7.2B5A39E4.132@admin.njit.edu> from "Burt Kimmelman
-@NJIT" at May 20, 96 05:06:37 pm
Burt Kimmelman writes:
Well, speaking of parchment, I guess those de/composed fragments of Sappho
have served as fake books for improvisations by Pound and others...
steve
>
> A quasi analog to musical fake books is perhaps the old english manuscripts
> that showed the full elaboration of a stanza pattern including the refrain
> and any other repeating features, and then showed the other unique lines
> of successive stanzas--all done to save parchment that was precious.
> So how would this be fake? I don't know. Of course, thinking of
> parchment, one can't help but recall the whole delicious issue of
> the palimpsest--but now, we are perhaps straying beyond prosody and into
> purely textual/linguistic and/or philosophical matters.
>
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 09:16:35 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Christopher Reiner <creiner@CRL.COM>
Subject: Avec Books offer
I am forwarding this for Cydney Chadwick:
---------------------------------------------
AVEC SALE
A special sale for subscribers to the Poetics List...for $14 you
will receive:
AVEC #4, containing a translation section of contemporary poetry
and prose from France (most of the work is still unpublished in
book form and unavailable elsewhere). Also includes work by Michael
Palmer, Lyn Hejinian, Clark Coolidge, Laura Moriarty, Leslie
Scalapino, an image and text piece by Johanna Drucker, art by
Susan Bee, and cover art by New York School painter Norman
Bluhm.
AVEC #8. with this issue the journal began featuring longer
sections of work per contributor, some of whom are: Elizabeth
Willis, Sianne Ngai, Chris Stroffolino, Agnes Rouzier, Friederika
Mayrocker, Keith Waldrop, Rosmarie Waldrop...also, an award-winning
photo-text collboration by Norma Cole and Ben E. Watkins.
A CAST OF TENS by David Bromige. The 29th book by the 1988 winner
of the Western States Book Award.
"Bromige is a master at probing the irreducibility of symbolic
logic, and his playful yet outrageous equivalencies explode the
neat, cut-and-dried tautologies of Wittgenstein:
The old man is 112 pages long
and so is the sea
They are deeply symbolic (psychotic).
Bromige's structures are sinuous and mathematic,
and they evoke the tonal colors of Schoenberg, Satie, or Cage,
successfully evading what Bromige has characterized as iambic
pentameter's 'echoic invasions.'"--Taproot Reviews
"Bromige combines the erudite with the dryly humorous."--The
Independent
Sale from May 21-July 14th (Bastille Day). Please make checks
payable to AVEC: P.O. Box 1059, Penngrove, Ca 94951.
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 13:05:33 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Alan Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Re: fake science: reply
In-Reply-To: <199605211551.LAA180400@faraday.clas.Virginia.EDU>
The reply is incredible if I read it correctly. Social Text would allow a
sopomoric article that might be a parody to be printed because it was
written by a scientist. We have a new brand of essentialism here.
Meanwhile the journal is compromised doubly, not only by the article, but
by the dissembling reply by Ross.
Alan
http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html
images: http://www.cs.unca.edu/~davidson/pix/
Ich war Hamlet. Ich stand an der Kuste und redete mit der Brandung
BLABLA, im Rucken die Ruinen von Europe. Heiner Muller
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 13:15:46 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Henry Gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: formal continuum
In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 21 May 1996 10:53:17 CST from
<dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
David Baratier,
On the face of it, your quote from previous post seems a fairly straight-
forward replay of Jakobson-type Russian formalist lit crit. I fail
to see the motive for your spleen. Was the theory claiming to be new-fangled?
Did Blake or some other poet put a patent on metrical effects & how to
read them? Sounds like Finch et al. are simply emphasizing an awareness
of what metrical rhythms might be doing (as opposed, maybe sometimes,
to the "rhythm" of rhetorical effects). Of course poets who try to
take this turf from the critics are in danger of quick petrification
and de-humidification. That's why we have critics. - Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 13:44:21 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Re: formal continuum/computer writing demo
Dear Dave,
Is it the word 'saussure' to which you object? The other part of the quote
looks pretty intelligent from here, unless of course you don't think poems
set up separate structures, or you don't think meaning operates in
differences. Mainly it's monotony I object to, as opposed to repetition,
which is the basis of music, no? Monotony then would mean repetition
without surprise.
Come to Teachers College tomorrow morning for a poetry reading and computer
writing demonstration by 6th graders from the Ralph Bunche School. The
reading is at 10 a.m. at Room 157 in Thorndike Hall, 525 W 120th St, New
York.
Btw, Rob, is it the Foucaldian paraphrase that turns you off? Wasn't
Foucault paraphrasing Nietzsche's first 'untimely meditation'? To ask along
with Rod Smith, doesn't Chris remind you of Nietzsche, but with more
energy? Energy kicks.
Hotcha,
Jordan
PS Dave, should we go to the booglit show or should we go to Philadelphia.
(You can tell me where to go : )
PPS Lot of guys writing lately to the list, huh?
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 13:28:37 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Henry Gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake science: reply
In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 21 May 1996 13:05:33 -0400 from
<sondheim@PANIX.COM>
There's a long op-ed piece in today's NY Times defending Social Text(by Stanley
Fish). Seems to me both sides are talking past each other to side issues;
what the imbroglio reveals are unarticulated philosophical assumptions
on both sides. Ross et al. claim that "of course there's a real world
out there but it's all relative to social constructions of its meaning";
Sokal et al. claim that "the real world reflects a truth that we must
constantly adjust our lenses to grasp". That's the nub of the difference,
and it gets to the deep issues that Peirce explores in his lifelong
contrasting of realism (or ideal-realism) and nominalism. He would
I believe come down on the side of Sokal; truth is not relative to
our names for it (nominalism) - our naming is relative to the truth,
and requires empirical testing (realism). This is an utter
simplification (Hank's demonio reductium!!) but it's the core issue.
All the biz about Sokal or Ross's good faith or credentials are
the side issues. It's a real dispute about the limits of both
science and its sociology. - Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 13:48:57 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Golumbia <dgolumbi@SAS.UPENN.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake science: reply
In-Reply-To: <199605211551.LAA180400@faraday.clas.Virginia.EDU> from "Steven
Howard Shoemaker" at May 21, 96 11:51:20 am
Can we be filled on where Ross's reply appears? Has it been, or will it
be, published somewhere? Or was it meant to be distributed electronically?
And did anyone note with interest (as did I) Ross's statement that SOCIAL
TEXT is an "unrefereed" journal?? I realize it may not have a formal
referee process, and that most of its contributions are solicited -- but
this claim has never, so far as I know, appeared inside the journal
itself, let alone near its prominently-featured list of the prominent
members of its "Editorial Collective"?? I wonder how many persons have
sent contributions to ST believing otherwise? What exactly does ST do
with unsoliicted manuscripts, in that case? I'm baffled.
Although I'm ambivalent about Stanley Fish, there's a provocative reply
to all of this by him on the OpEd page of today's NY Times.
Which does not mention what for me is the oddest irony: the fact that
Sokol's prank is described in the NY Times headline breaking the story
as a "deconstruction" of cultural studies -- thus for the first time
using the term to mean perhaps the exact opposite of Derrida's uses of
it...
--
dgolumbi@sas.upenn.edu
David Golumbia
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 15:56:16 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Smith <CharSSmith@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: fake science: reply
hmm.... contra... more to it
(i find it fascinating)
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 16:00:21 EST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Burt Kimmelman -@NJIT" <kimmelman@ADMIN.NJIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake book
Hey I have been misquoted (disinformationized!). Steve has me saying stuff
about Sappho and Pound and is otherwise misleading his readers. I said something
about Old English autographs on parchment and the like.
Burt Kimmelman
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 08:09:17 GMT+1300
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: rules & conventions
Apropos Burgeresque historical generalisations: I'd be inclined to check
the relations between writers (or other
"artists") with their social setup of neoclassicism or pre-neoclassicism.
Say, what was the position of Dr Johnson or Piranesi
to patronage?! fr'instances. Artists were having problems with
patrons way back in the 16th century. The Romantic artists had a
tradition to conserve ready for use maybe.
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 15:13:49 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joe Amato <amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake science: reply
like alan, i have doubts about ross's caricature of the editorial decision
at _social text_ to accept sokol's piece... i think mebbe ross oughtta just
cop to it, and admit that sokol's prank got past the editorial board...
like david, i find it somewhat disturbing too that ross should now publicly
make the claim for "unrefereed" status, and i'm not a big stanley fish fan,
either---at least, not of late (though i'm gonna try to find that op-ed
piece)... and like henry, i feel that both sides are in fact talking past
the other...
nevertheless, i find mself on the ross side of things in terms of
challenging sokol's "leftist" motives, and in terms of what sort of work i
find valuable, even as, again, i do think that sokol managed to put one
over on _social text_, all naysaying to the contrary...
the society for literature and science (sls), of which i've been a member
for some eight years, has in the past couple of years addressed (in its
annual conference, and its general discussion) the more conservative
attacks on cultural studies work (in fact there is a somewhat dormant
e-list, litsci-l (now out of ucla), of which i was once listowner, which
one would think would be noisy as hell in light of these recent events)...
i for one have found certain claims coming out of cultural studies,
relative to science in general, problematic... b/c i don't believe that all
empirical inquiry, for example, is intrinsically "positivistic"... and yet
i do believe, with ross, that the sites are contested, as well they should
be, that they should in fact be even more contested... that is, to put
ross's way of putting it in the affirmative, non-experts *should* have
something to say about scientific methodology and epistemology---provided,
that is, they go about their own business as expert-ly as possible... i
mean, i'm not wedded to the idea that a cultural studies type interrogating
a scientific-technological reality becomes, in such methodological terms, a
non-expert... but i'll let the latter terminological slippage slide for the
moment...
b/c for me the real matter of the moment here has to do with david's
question about whether ross's reply was meant for electronic
distribution... why is it that this controversy, at least as it's coming
down the pike, is taking place over there, in print?... at least among the
contenders, i mean---ross, fish, sokol, etc?... why the hell don't we have
an electronic forum where sokol, ross, fish and anybody else who's
interested can converge to chew over these... discrepancies?... litsci-l
could be used for same, for example... or even this forum, poetics, which
to its credit is motivated enough to introduce and discuss this issue
almost out-of-context (---thanx steve!)... but i mean, why aren't alla
these well-known folks busy discussing and dialoguing online?---or if they
are (my apologies), where is this happening?...
it seems to me that venues like the ny times are not open to everyone
(anymore than are the pages of _social text_) and that in the interest of
things democratic it would help immensely if such conversations weren't
restricted to print, which seems to me to act as a silent mechanism for
silencing those w/o name-status from actively contributing, hence for
constructing a certain sort of "public" space... and i regard this not as a
consequence of conspiracies, but of institutional orthodoxies... which is
to say that, though too many folks still don't have access to emedia, there
are many more who *can* voice their opines in these spaces than are likely
to see their names in the ny times... and i mean, like, the folks who're
doing all the talking surely have email accounts...
a lot of the hogwash that's likely to emerge from this controversy could
probably be addressed and dispensed with in just a few email exchanges...
which, of course, is hardly to argue for progress, but which is to make a
claim for process, due and otherwise...
joe
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 13:36:36 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Herb Levy <herb@ESKIMO.COM>
Subject: Re: fake book
Despite Rob Hardin's reading of what I wrote (taking note of the state of
things is not the same as approving of them), I'm very much in favor of
people performing poetry by others.
It is usually extremely interesting to hear a piece of music performed by
the composer (whether you're talking about Stravinsky conducting his own
works, or Pauline Oliveros performing hers), but radically different
performances by other performers can illuminate musical works in a way that
has rarely been considered in the world of literature (cf John Coltrane's
many versions of My Favorite Things, Glenn Gould's Mozart sonatas, etc.).
In literature, the author's own version is often taken as the ONLY way to
sound a work out loud. Texts aren't usually treated as scores for
performance by others, or they are treated more strictly than is often the
case with musical scores. As long as this is true, any kind of tradition
of performative interpretation will be rare in poetry.
If authors wish to give up their authority (as unacknowledged, & often
unacknowledgeable, authors of traditional works in oral cultures have at
least in a de facto way), then maybe there can be a kind of poetry fake
book, in the sense of a way to get a quick overview of how to perform a
work that you literally may never have known of before.
Until the cultural context of literature changes that radically, I think we
can only be concerned about which books are not fake poetry books.
Which I think we'd all agree is a very different issue, though I doubt we'd
all agree on which books were which.
Oh, and as an aside to Chris Stroffolino - I only chose the O'Hara poem
because when I turned to look at the bookshelf next to me the first thing I
saw was the MOMA memorial book of the same title with various artists
illuminating various O'Hara poems.
I wasn't thinking (& am not now) in terms of Harold Bloom or any use of the
term interpretation in the sense of criticism, but rather (as described by
several folks in the context of the fake book thread) performance as
interpretation. As perhaps a lounge poet (sic) might say "here's one of my
own personal favorites, I hope it's one of yours: my interpretation of
"Maximus to Himself." Is the band ready? Ah, one, ah two, one two three
four. I've had to learn ... "
Bests,
Herb Levy
herb@eskimo.com
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 16:32:34 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Fred E. Maus" <fem2x@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake science: reply
In-Reply-To: <199605212013.PAA23874@charlie.cns.iit.edu> from "Joe Amato" at
May 21, 96 03:13:49 pm
Gee, I really liked Andrew Ross's account of the editorial
decision. It sounded completely plausible to me. Maybe that's
because my own editing experiences have to do with music
publications, and in those settings things are constantly being
published because of something about the identity of the
author. "Yes it's not very good, but it's interesting that a
*composer* is trying to write about it" or "that this
particular composer said that" etc. The statement that they
finally printed it because they thought it was interesting
documentation of a scientist trying to think through some
theoretical things sounds like unvarnished truth to me.
If they say they are "unrefereed" doesn't that just mean the
editorial collective makes all the decisions without turning to
other readers for evaulations? Why the fuss?
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 13:46:07 +0100
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Kevin Killian <dbkk@SIRIUS.COM>
Subject: Re: fake science: reply
This is Dodie Bellamy.
What a coincidence! I read Sokal's article in _Lingua Franca_ just last
night, while eating a burrito in one of San Francisco's many
budget-friendly tacquerias, and I found it a camp riot in its haughty
scientism, found myself merrily copying down line after line to collage
into my own work.
Content isn't everything, you know.
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 16:47:17 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Alan Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Re: fake science: reply
In-Reply-To: <199605212013.PAA23874@charlie.cns.iit.edu>
I read Joe's reply and agree with much of it. I've also been writing a
bit about this on the Derrida list and just want to say, briefly, what I
said there - that I don't believe cultural studies/decon folks know very
much about science, and I understand why scientists (including a number
I've known) get angry at them. If you haven't studied mathematica, and,
say a course on fundamental particle physics, including the mathematics,
experimental apparati and methodologies, all you're doing is attempting
to colonize a field you know nothing about, period. In any other cultural
area this would be called imperialism, particularly as we look more and
more towards 'native' voices for ethnography. But science seems a free-
for-all, as if there is a totality called "science" embracing everything
from particle physics to geology, geography, etc. Not only is this in-
correct, but it's also highly prejudicial.
Too many cultural theorists are too busy theorizing to actually sit down
and, say, take that course, or work through the books themselves.
Alan
http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html
images: http://www.cs.unca.edu/~davidson/pix/
Ich war Hamlet. Ich stand an der Kuste und redete mit der Brandung
BLABLA, im Rucken die Ruinen von Europe. Heiner Muller
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 17:14:47 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Ursula K Heise <ukh2@COLUMBIA.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake science: reply
In-Reply-To: <v01520d00adc76ad631ff@[205.134.228.15]>
I, too, would be interested to know where Ross' reply was printed. I
understand that he will publish a reply to Sokal in the next issue of
_Lingua Franca_.
As for the account of how ST decided to publish the article: yes,
perhaps, as somebody suggested, "unrefereed" just means the editorial
collective decided. I still find that disturbing in the case of an issue
on science if there are no scientists on the editorial board (I'm not sure
whether they are). If one publishes an article from a field that one
doesn't have expertise in, I do think there is an obligation to run it by
somebody from the field to see if it makes sense in its own discipline.
Fish's op-ed piece misses the mark in this respect, I believe: sure, trust
is part of the scholarly/scientific enterprise, but so is fact-checking
and editing.
I also found Ross' patronizing attitude toward scientists very disturbing.
So he accepts a piece that he himself thinks is inferior because those
poor physicists don't know how to do better and should be encouraged in
their modest efforts to understand literary and cultural theory? I can't
help but find that attitude condescending.
Ursula K. Heise
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 16:29:54 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joe Amato <amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake science: reply
fred, i suspect that some of us are feeling/responding to the
visibility/reputation of _social text_... that is, to it's being published,
whatever its "little review" lineage, by duke up, which itself is a
power-broker in the academic world (which is not to suggest that duke up is
evil or some such)... hence ross's description of the editorial decision
smacks of a certain condescension toward those without proper credentials
(read "appropriate institutional identity card")---in this case, a
scientist... but in any case, it could be anybody---that is, anybody w/o
visibility (note the list he gives of better-known scholars, by way of---is
it justification of even-handedness?)... and if one lacks this ostensibly
arbitrary but identifible identity status, and is likewise not a scientist
(these latter will evidently be allowed to go public on occasion b/c of
their 'expert' status---in science, that is), then what does this say about
one's chance of publication in such a "nonreferreed" journal?... that is,
what *is* being published by _social text_---or solicited---finally?...
identities?...
which is perhaps to state the case contra ross much too harshly... but it
is nonetheless to state the case...
still, i'm ultimately on ross's side on this, if i've gotta choose sides, i
mean... i don't think he's been disingenuous, i think rather he's merely
saturated with his subject position, and is seeping here & there...
joe
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 18:21:53 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Stephen L Burt <stephen.burt@YALE.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake science: reply (long)
In-Reply-To: <960521155615_306350275@emout19.mail.aol.com>
My 50p on the fake science issue:
If Fish's description in today's NYT of what science studies people, a.k.a.
sociologists of science, do is accurate, than Sokal got it wrong,
perceived a threat to science where there was none, and created a
damaging controversy that will only give the "wrong people" ammunition.
But in defense, not of Sokal's actions but of his reactions to the books he
read: it's easy to imagine Sokal reading some badly-written or
poorly-thought-out science studies pieces, and coming to the false
conclusion that science studies people thought phlogiston was just as
real as oxygen. And it would be bad for (e.g.) the global climate if
everyone started to believe in phlogiston. Again, if Fish is right,
science studies can't possibly pose such a risk; but Sokal probably
hadn't been reading Fish.
To generalize:
The badly-written pieces in any subfield, especially a subfield
that challenges the basic assumptions of the wider culture, do serious
damage to that field's attempt to get itself taken seriously outside the
subdisciplines in which it's already established. Bad American
deconstructionists encouraged people to laugh, unfairly, at something called
"deconstruction," and every dull or badly-informed piece of academic
writing about popular culture encourages people who don't "do" contemporary
popular culture to believe that it's not worth studying, or even to feel
threatened by the "growing" study of it. Careful editing is always a
good; in a controversial subfield it ought to be a tactical necessity.
An example in a quite
different subfield (and one that's unlikely to offend anyone reading this
list) is Reynolds and Press' _The Sex Revolts_, a poorly-written, sloppy
book applying queer theory to underground rock, and one that's probably
done some damage to whatever receptive audience there might have been for
a good one down the road.
Re Andrew Ross' defense: it makes sense to me that _Social Text_
would want to publish in an issue devoted to Science Wars the
"take" on these issues of somebody trained in physics, especially if they
didn't have any other essays reflecting a physics background, and if Sokal
essay was more interesting than whatever else _Social Text_
happened to have in the "science" file of their bottom drawer.
What struck me as slightly wacky in Ross' piece was the hint of an assumption
that the cultural authority of scientists, because it had often been used to
promote sexism and other bad things, therefore _ought_ to be undermined.
It's easy to imagine practicing scientists-- especially in some fields
with immediate political implications, say climatology-- considering it a
matter of some moral urgency that their profession GAIN cultural authority.
If Miami's going to be underwater unless we listen more to climatologists
(and I'm not saying it is) then climatologists have a good and ethical
reason to want to protect certain aspects of their privileged positions.
Finally:
Those who, like me, don't know much about science studies but find it
interesting anywaymight want to look at last week's (not this week's)
TLS, which had a full-page review of a science studies book out of
Edinburgh. There's some blather about the information age in the front,
but you can ignore it.
--------------------------------------------------------
Obligatory poetics-related remark: has anyone else read or enjoyed John
Keene's _Annotations_, which I got through last month? It seemed to want
to be an African-American rewrite of _My Life_, with the same intricate
structure of repetitions & returning lyrical single-sentence moments.
steve pangolin
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 18:57:35 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Loss Glazier <lolpoet@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: Re: Bob Bertholf
Yes, indeed.
At 09:12 AM 5/20/96 EST, you wrote:
>loss,
>
>is that michael basinski by any chance?
>
>burt
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 19:15:15 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Golumbia <dgolumbi@SAS.UPENN.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake science: reply
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.93L.960521170559.16491B-100000
@labdien.cc.columbia.edu> from "Ursula K Heise" at May 21,
96 05:14:47 pm
1. Two persons have now suggested that "unrefereed" means "without external
reviewers." They may very well be right; I've never heard the term
"unrefereed" before. What I've heard is the term "refereed," as in "you
should fill your cv with publications of essays in refereed journals."
"Refereed" in this case meaning "peer reviewed." Implying that
"unrefereed" means "not peer reviewed." In any meaningful sense of the
term "refereed," review of unsolicited manuscripts by ST's Editorial
Collective would seem to qualify as "refereed."
I don't know why I should care so much about this, except that I guess
that Ross's use of the "u" term struck me as a kind of after-the-fact
denial of responsibility. It sounds like he's saying that ST isn't a
standard academic journal -- which I very much hope it is, for it until
now has done little to explain how it differs from one.
2. The science question, I just can't go on about this, but I disagree
witha great deal of what's been said. Science is *always* a cultural
practice, always embedded, standards of objectivity themselves embedded.
Ross and Fish give up too much ground in their defense. The crucial place
to read about this is less sociology of science, in my opinion, and more
feminist critiques of science. The notion that culturla theorists don't
"know science" is itself deeply problematic: what is "science"? What is
it that an astronomer knows about science that is shared with a molecular
biologist? One thesis of cultural theory re: science, as I've said,
considers it as cultural practice, integrated into every aspect of our
culture (he says, typing on his computer): what puts a "scientist" into a
privileged position regarding cultural practices and their theoritization
and keeps a cultural theorist away from said privilege? It would be one
thing if Ross was trying to tell somebody how to extract DNA from human
tissue; but to suggest that the biologist is in a beetter position to
"theorize" that pracitce begs the question.
Furthermore, practicing scientists themselves differ just as much as
non-scientists in their views -- consider, for example, S.J. Gould, E. F.
Keller, & R. Lewontin, all of whom are or were hard-core scientists, all
of whom (Keller & Lewontin more than Gould) accept the "cultural
practice" view of science.
And experience (and th pages of Scientific American) show that a lot of
philosopphers are really bad theorists, thinkers, writesr, about much but
their own specific efforts or experiments.
3. The relation of all this to poetics is...
--
dgolumbi@sas.upenn.edu
David Golumbia
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 16:59:55 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Christopher J. Beach" <cjbeach@BENFRANKLIN.HNET.UCI.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake science: reply (long)
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SOL.3.91.960521174844.29414I-100000@minerva>
Who is John Keene? Sounds interesting.
C Beach
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 10:01:16 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark Roberts <M.Roberts@ISU.USYD.EDU.AU>
Subject: AWOL: Inaugural Olympic Sports Poet (forwarded)
>
>The following message has been posted on behalf of Network Tennis
>Australia. Please address all enquiries to them at the contacts listed
>below. The AWOL email address should only be used to submit entries which
>will then be forwarded to NTA.
>
>
>
>
>*******************************
>
>Network tennis Australia (NTA) has launched a new poetry competition, to
>be awarded annually. In the year of the Olympic Summer Games it shall be
>known as the 'Olympic Sports Poet' award. In other years it shall be
>known as the '(Nation) Sports Poet award.
>
>This unique award has been created to celebrate & symbolise the powerful
>& exhilarating synergy that exists between sport and poetry and entries
>for the Inaugural Olympic Sports Poet 1996 are now being invited..
>
>
>
>
>Conditions of the Award
>
>
>Prize allocation is:
>
>Open section 1st prize $400, 2nd prize $200, 3rd prize $100.
>
>Olympic Sports Poet junior section 1st prize $100, 2nd prize $50, 3rd prize
>$25.
>
>
>
>
>Competition opens 1 May 1996 and closes 30 June 1996. Late entries will not
>be accepted.
>
>
>Entries can be submitted in paper copy to:
>
>Mail Network Tennis Australia,
>Sports Poet Competition,
>210 Annandale Street,
>Annandale NSW Australia 2038.
>
>Fax 61 2 5172466.
>
>Entries can also be emailed to: awol@ozemail.com.au or you may submit your
>entry through the Sports Poet web page
>http://www.ozemail.com.au/~awol/sportspoet.html
>
>
>The theme of the poems entered must be sport
>
>Entries must be written in English.
>
>The junior section is for poets 13 years or younger at 30 June 1996. Junior
>entries must be clearly marked and the the poet's date of birth must be
>included.
>
>Poems must not be under consideration by any publisher. Entrants requiring
>manuscripts returned or to be notified of the winners should enclose a SSAE
>. Overseas entrants should enclose an international reply coupon (entrants
>who submit poems by email will receive a post listing the winners).
>
>Competition judges are Les Wicks and Ron Pretty. The judges decision shall
>be final and no correspondence shall be entered into. NTA shall make
>changes to the judges panel in the event of a Judge being unavailable.
>
>The winners shall be announced in July/August 1996 and published in the
>Poets Union Inc magazine Five Bells soon after.
>
>
>NTA shall not be responsible for any loss or damage to entries and reserves
>the right to reproduce the winner's poem and other selected poems.
>
>
>
>
>For further information about these conditions please contact Network
>Tennis Australia on ph 61 2 556 2100, fax 61 2 517 2466.
>
>
>AWOL
>Australian Writing On Line
>awol@ozemail.com.au
>http://www.ozemail.com.au/~awol
>PO Box 333 Concord NSW 2137 Australia
>Phone 61 2 7475667
>Fax 61 2 7472802
>
__________________________________
Mark Roberts
Student Systems Project Officer
Information Systems
University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia
M.Roberts@isu.usyd.edu.au
PH:(02)351 5066
FAX:(02)351 5081
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 00:54:21 GMT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tom Beard <beard@MET.CO.NZ>
Subject: what a scientist knows about science
David Golumbia wrote:
>What is
>it that an astronomer knows about science that is shared with a molecular
>biologist?
They both know what it's like to 'do' science - to have to test one's
hypotheses against observation. This is something that cultural theorists (and
other theorists, eg theoretical physicists) do not have to do. Being a
practising scientist is a quick way to lose the illusion that science is about
discovering universal truths - it is about formulating useful, falsifiable
hypotheses that are tentatively accepted until something better comes along.
They should also both know some physics - new theories of electromagnetism,
for example, would affect both spectroscopy and the formation of protein
molecules. This is where science gains usefulness over pure empiricism - all
its fields are connected, and developments in one area may produce new ideas in
another discipline. Reductionism may have a bad name in some circles, but it's
an extremely useful tool.
It's sad to see so much anti-science feeling still among people in the arts and
humanities. I'd hoped that Snow's 'two cultures' had gone further towards
talking to one another. Part of it, I think, comes from a simplistic view of
'Western Thought', and of science's place within it. It's true that much of
today's research is tied up with military-industrial power structures, and that
some have misused science to promote racism and patriarchy. On the other hand,
many see the mind/body duality as part of western thought, but science, and
philosophes such as Diderot, have done more to undermine this duality than any
amount of deconstruction.
Perhaps it's a question of territory, and the tendency to see everything in
terms of one's discipline. A cultural theorist tends to see everything in terms
of culture, in the same way that a physicist might reduce everything to
physics, or an economist reduce everything to money. I'd like to think that
writing poetry is a useful way to understand what our senses tell us, and so is
science.
Tom Beard.
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 22:11:14 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: - Kim Tedrow <RoseRead@AOL.COM>
Subject: what a poet knows about science
Tom writes:
>>>>I'd like to think that writing poetry is a useful way to understand what
our senses tell us, and so is science.<<<<<
I'm enjoying this thread. I remember that as an undergraduate, I found
myself writing more/being more "creative" when I was taking what are thought
of as "left brain" courses: Intro to Logic, Astonomy, Biology, Technical
writing, etc. I never exactly tried to express why that was, except that I
found the *ways* of thinking and perceiving through a different "discipline"
stimulating -- the new vocabulary, a new system of thinking, a whole new set
of metaphor and description.
I married a soil scientist who also happens to write pretty decent poems. We
had many discussions about how the scientific method is indeed creative, and
how frustrating he found the bias in liberal arts against science. Of
course, the complementary bias in the sciences exists as well, which he found
much more frustrating.
Just my $.02. Thanks Tom.
-Kim
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 00:51:22 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: FUNKHOUSER CHRISTOPH <cf2785@CSC.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Will Alexander's work
about Will Alexander's work--
Ron,
Eric Dolphy used to talk about trying to hit three or four notes at the
same time, & there are other *out* musicians who have said
(theorized & practiced) the same, so I'd begin by connecting it with
something like that. Will has an incredible record (LP) collection.
Perpetual fire in language with meaning (everything in there has
meaning/means something: I remember Will saying how he got the
biggest dictionary he could, read it all, spending a lot of time writing
down every interesting word he found in it -- filling many
notebooks, which he uses for content) -- he's a self-proclaimed jock & a
surrealist artist (painter as well as writer): going at it on all levels --
sometimes I think of his writing as something like a museum of
Bosch paintings -- each piece having everything it has in it in it &
everything else too -- symbolism, meaning, spirit, contraries,
whatever you see or experience in it. othertimes it is something else.
surrealism with meaning?? i don't know about that, but the
combination of books he celebrates as sensual in "The Myrmidons of
Oblivion" are by Cesaire, Turgenyev, and Rene Leys, if that says
anything. Anyway It seems as though all the various things in the
_in this_ places are there in Asia, so dark and psychedelic.
"logorheaic excess (a pleonast's plenitude)..." is one thing, & one way
to read it. It could also be something like someone who's totally
smashed on language & the oppression of people, especially non-
white cultures, for a few centuries. Will's work seems like all those
things (a wild and relentless unpublicized history). Of course this
would be shot down in a workshop! How many students (or teachers)
want to (have the time to?) to deal with a poem such as Asia. The
"voices" in the poem are the spirits of murdered Tibetan monks who
have come back to perform "astral warfare" on the Chinese. It's
much more gruesome than "Helter Skelter", & a challenging read.
The "we" is artifice, for sure, but I'm willing to allow Will to imagine
the voices of slaughtered monks (who probably didn't think the
marxists were scaly, but who knows what they were thinking as
they were feeling the bullets approaching their skin?) Also, "here
was Marx, here was the state" to me implies that the two are
seperate, not together, in the "voices" mind, for what it's worth
The footnote on page twelve is refering to a quote from one of the
books Will makes multiple references in the poem, listed on p. 138.
the quotes in the poem & notes are from these books, not an earlier
draft of the poem.
dig it, chris f
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 01:03:03 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: Will Alexander's work
I don't know if I should be saying this...
And I hope it's not fuel for any severe detractors of Alexander's
For I say it with absolute respect...
But one interesting thing re Will Alexander's "earlier draft"
is that when I was sent the poem ASIA in MS, I marvelled over
his vocabulary and also words I considered to be NEOLOGISMS....
I wrote Will about my love of his word "exhile" (which I took as
a neologism on exile and exhale) and also
"furnance" ("furnace, finance?)---
and went through explications of such....
Will said, "oh no, they were just typos, spelling errors."
c
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 01:29:23 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Eryque Gleason <eryque@ACMENET.NET>
Subject: Re: Will Alexander's neologistic typos
i read chrisS's post and realized i didn't really know what neologism
meant. definition #2 in mirriam webster's tenth edition: "a meaningless
word coined by a psychotic".
"veeeerrrry interesting, but stupid." thought it might be of some
relevance/interest here.
eryque
> I don't know if I should be saying this...
> And I hope it's not fuel for any severe detractors of Alexander's
> For I say it with absolute respect...
> But one interesting thing re Will Alexander's "earlier draft"
> is that when I was sent the poem ASIA in MS, I marvelled over
> his vocabulary and also words I considered to be NEOLOGISMS....
> I wrote Will about my love of his word "exhile" (which I took as
> a neologism on exile and exhale) and also
> "furnance" ("furnace, finance?)---
> and went through explications of such....
> Will said, "oh no, they were just typos, spelling errors."
> c
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 21 May 1996 22:38:02 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Marjorie Perloff <perloff@LELAND.STANFORD.EDU>
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 20 May 1996 to 21 May 1996
In-Reply-To: <199605220407.AAA28583@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
Like Ursula Heise, I find Andrew Ross's condescending tone to scientists
extremely irritating. As someone married to a scientist (an M.D.) who
writes countless articles, I think it should make clear that the purpose
of, say, articles in CIRCULATION is to describe new and better ways of
treating heart disease, in my husband's case of prolonging the lives of
those with congenital heart disease--people who used to die at age 16 or
so and with scientific advances, now live to middle age and beyond. The
purpose of articles about such disease is to inform other members of the
profession as to specific treatments, advances, problems, etc. It's not
to be clever or to find essentialist truth, etc etc.
So when Stanley Fish says on today's Op Ed page that--gotcha!--because the
poor deluded scientist didn't even realize that the issue was the social
construction of science not scientific truth, he is entirely missing the
point which was that a non-sociologist of science could produce a spoof
which was ACCEPTED FOR PUBLICATION in what is supposedly a classy journal
which turns down many articles and essays. On what basis was it
accepted?? All of Ross's excuses and Fish's disclaimers won't convince me
until they manage to get an article into CIRCULATION or any comparable
journal.
The real issue here is : what is the purpose of professional publication?
Is it to chat with other like minded humanists about what we think science
is? Or is to advance knowledge in some way?
No wonder the public thinks we're a bunch of decadent creeps!
Marjorie Perloff
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 05:01:53 GMT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tom Beard <beard@MET.CO.NZ>
Subject: what poetry knows about scientists
Kim writes:
>I'm enjoying this thread. I remember that as an undergraduate, I found
>myself writing more/being more "creative" when I was taking what are thought
>of as "left brain" courses: Intro to Logic, Astonomy, Biology, Technical
>writing, etc.
I had the same feeling. Mathematics, in particular, I found a highly creative
activity, requiring intuitive leaps as well as rigorous logic. Some of group
theory and what mathematicians call 'foundations' (the intersection of logic,
set theory and number theory) is especially beautiful.
People often talk about the connections between mathematics & music, but the
only connection that I found useful at the time was in understanding acoustics
and digital sampling. I'll mathematical composition to Xenakis.
>how frustrating he found the bias in liberal arts against science. Of
>course, the complementary bias in the sciences exists as well,
Yes, and I was as guilty as any. I've no problems now about being a scientist
who writes poetry, but my scientific background leads me to bristle at some
extremes of post-structuralist theory - for example, the refusal of many
cultural theorists to even _consider_ the possibility of biological influences
upon human behaviour.
I've rarely tried to involve science in my poetry, and tend to cringe at most
attempts to write poems about chaos theory. My career in meteorology has
affected my writing - but on the other hand, show me a poet who has never
mentioned rain, wind, sunshine or clouds! I find that, contrary to some claims,
the more I know about a phenomenon such as thunderstorms, the _more_ they fill
me with wonder and awe.
On rare occasions I've written from a persona that uses scientific metaphors:
_The Physicist Drinks to Forget_
no use in
crying
over it, Hera's milk
spilt
across our nights
that hub
that turns around us
the way
she turns
around me, turns
me around
--
what's the use of
laws, the attractions
of gravity, electricity?
all it takes
is three bodies (sun,
earth, that damned cold
moon)
and we're lost
and I'm caught
lying
like a star fallen
till the dew
falls, twinkles
in my lashes,
clear as gin
_The mathematician defines her space_
With time, everything tends
to zero.
=> leave her.
You prove existence, but not
uniqueness. I am necessary
but not sufficient.
=> leave.
This triangle would appall
Euclid -- nothing adds up.
She warps our space.
=> let's begin
with new axioms, construct
a metric, a way to measure
space, the distances
between us.
It amuses me now to recall how many of my colleagues really talked like this,
using mathematical jargon to describe their personal lives.
There's been some transfer the other way too. Some aspects of theory, in
particular hypertext theory, have informed my current work: writing/designing
computer-aided learning packages for meteorologists. I've gone away from the
standard heirarchical presentation of knowledge (headings, subheadings, sub-
subheadings &c) in favour of a dense web of hyperlinked nodes. This, I think,
is much closer to the way that the atmosphere actually works.
Cheers &c,
Tom Beard.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 04:02:39 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Ron Silliman <rsillima@IX.NETCOM.COM>
Subject: Fake editing
Fake books, fake science...it's all intriguing.
But I was especially amused at the raised eyebrows over the idea of
Social Text (a mag which I've always presumed to imply the term social
as in "social mixer" or, better, "social climber"), that form of
postmodernism that knows how to dress, should be "unrefereed."
So I thought I would throw my perception that the "referee" process is
one of the great hoaxes of academic life. It generally neuters the
journal that uses it (why there has never been a really good college
literary magazine) and, in critical areas, often tends to permit a lot
of ax grinding go on behind the curtains. I've seen good articles
rejected because a referee did not want X or Y (including some Xs and
Ys on this list) to make a credible argument from an established
position that might later compromise his or her forthcoming article(s),
or to pay off a grudge on some tenure or step increase decision.
It's no accident that all of the decent magazines over the past 80
years have been the work of single, strong-willed individuals, even
ones with whom one might not agree. Editorial committees by their
nature seek compromise -- at the Socialist Review, where we had two
collectives (one of which, in Boston, tended to "referee" articles and
one of which, in the Bay Area, did not), we lost several great articles
because they were simply too provocative -- including a great Samuel R.
Delaney response to Donna Harraway that is still unpublished. That we
managed to print "Manifesto for Cyborgs" (by an editorial majority of
5-4 in which the deciding vote declared that SR ought to publish
"anything I can't understand") or Avital Ronell's manifesto for nuclear
criticism always amazed me. Leslie Scalapino's response to my own intro
to a collection of poetry (which gave rise to the much fuller dialog
that later appeared in Poetics Journal) certainly could not make it
through the process -- I was the lone vote in favor of publishing it.
So let me add one additional category to this discourse:
refereeing = fake editing
Ron Silliman
rsillima@ix.netcom.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 08:12:11 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Henry Gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake science
Hope you'll all forgive me for harping on my hobbyhorse again, but I'm
reading Peirce (that shd be clear by now) & can't get over how relevant
it is to the Sokal flap. He sets up a philosophical position that not
only grounds the realist/nominalist distinction (as I related to the
dispute in earlier post) - he also debunks the arrogance of science
(in scientism & positivism) which dominated the "philosophy of science"
at the end of the 19th century. He was able to do this because he
was one of those rare birds, a real philosopher coming out of a background
in experimental science. His explorations in logic led to an architecture
of meaning which describes nature's operations as "like a language";
which suggests a cosmic sentience or universal Mind not on theological
claims (transcendentalism) but on observation of the workings of logic
itself - a creative tripartite structure in which the "chance" subject
is linked to a general "predicate" which has meaning in the context
of the whole as "coming from the future" (a consensus of truth).
Wish I could be more precise - I know how foggy this all sounds - but
what I'm driving at is that Peirce revaluates some of these
issues - the social construction of science, the relation of reality
to our descriptions of it, and the relations between creative thinking
in general both to chance and what can be termed "the true". And he does this
in ways that can't be pigeon-holed as conservative, idealistic, positivistic,
etc. He took care not to be pigeonholed by those who claimed him
as their guide - Wm James & the pragmatists. It almost goes without
saying that he was ostracized, attacked & ignored by the academic
establishment of the time & died in poverty. There is the possibility
of a philosophy of science which recognizes the "fallibilism" (Peirce's
term) of socially and politically-textured knowledge without
falling into either camp of "nominalist" relativism or its obverse
twin, positivist empiricism. - Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 10:11:39 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Ediots
yes, ediots.
It's a term who's time has come.
Rod
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 07:22:54 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Sheila E. Murphy" <semurphy@AZLINK.COM>
Subject: Re: Fake editing
Ron Silliman wrote:
>So I thought I would throw my perception that the "referee" process is
>one of the great hoaxes of academic life. It generally neuters the
>journal that uses it (why there has never been a really good college
>literary magazine) and, in critical areas, often tends to permit a lot
>of ax grinding go on behind the curtains.
>It's no accident that all of the decent magazines over the past 80
>years have been the work of single, strong-willed individuals, even
>ones with whom one might not agree. Editorial committees by their
>nature seek compromise --
I second the motion. The erasure of personality has been one of the
ungreatest inventions of our time. Have had this same perception about
committee (job) interviews, by the way (of less direct interest to this
list). Have always felt I could hire more effectively with the benefit of
clear, direct thinking on the part of one individual, rather than trying not
to offend or threaten certain components of the sprawling decisionmaking
vehicle..
Committees and referee groups are inherently intuition bashers when it comes
to decisionmaking of this sort. Groups are better for idea development and
other things.
Sheila Murphy
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 10:30:15 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Golumbia <dgolumbi@SAS.UPENN.EDU>
Subject: Re: Ediots
In-Reply-To: <960522101138_496291252@emout12.mail.aol.com> from "Rod Smith" at
May 22, 96 10:11:39 am
I think Ron's account in fact highlights my own unease with Ross's claim.
SOCIAL TEXT's editorial process makes it not very different from most
other journals. Ross strikes me as dissembling when he uses the term
"unrefereed" to imply that ST is somehow less at fault for what happened.
The truth is that he and the Editorial Collective screwed up big time --
screwed up in a way that reflects badly on a cause that I for one think
is important -- and Ross should have apologized for it. By throwing all
the blame (instead of the, say, 50% he deserves) on Sokol, Ross makes
himself and the "cause" look even worse.
Did I mention that the rest of the essays in the "Science Wars" issue in
fact raise all the points we've been discussing here, often with a great
deal of sophistication? Funny how, even in my own mind, the 15 or 16
articles in the issue that aren't by Sokol have just vanished from
discussion.
And the truth is? I think Ross et al are too cock-sure to believe they
could be fooled -- and thus were fooled. And surely this does show that
some more caution and care and attention are needed, at least in halls
like those of SOCIAL (-climbing, thanks Ron) TEXT.
--
dgolumbi@sas.upenn.edu
David Golumbia
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 10:24:55 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Daniel Bouchard <Daniel_Bouchard@HMCO.COM>
Subject: Re: Ediots
>yes, ediots.
>It's a term who's time has come.
>Rod
__________
I've been enjoying the term "critiots" for a while now.
daniel_bouchard@hmco.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 08:38:56 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Marjorie Perloff <perloff@LELAND.STANFORD.EDU>
Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 20 May 1996 to 21 May 1996
In-Reply-To: <199605220407.AAA28583@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
Some further thoughts on Ross's apologia for the Social Text fiasco:
The crux of what I consider plain bad faith is Ross's sentence, "Sokal's
article would have been considered sophomoric and outdated . . . had it
come from a humanist or social scientist." But coming from a "scientist"
it was deemed acceptable so that Social Text readers could see how
"scientists" regard things.
How essentialist can you get? The very people who castigate those who say
"Women think X but men think Y," or "Heterosexuals do X but gays do Y" are
now assuming that there's an entity called "scientist" that "represents" a
fixed point of view. Instead of judging the essay according to its
argument, its originality, its interest, and so on, the editorical
"collective" (read, board) thought they'd publish the article so
that their readers might be exposed to that specimen known as scientist.
It's a pretty frightening mode of thought...
Secondly, as to refereed journals. If indeed it is true that all ST
essays are commissioned, what sort of "social text" is this? Where is the
openness to other points of view? For whom is the journal produced? The
silly designation "editorial collective" can't mask the authoritarianism
and, yes, political correctness involved in such hokey operations.
Marjorie Perloff
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 11:44:57 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Deirdre Kovac <Eurydice@AOL.COM>
Subject: Big Allis NYC Reading
Just a last-minute reminder to those in New York to simultaneously support
_Big Allis_ (and the Segue reading series) and hear a stellar string of
poetry and more at the benefit/launch for the hot-off-the-press issue #7.
Tomorrow.
Thursday 23 May
Segue
303 East 8th Street
between B & C
7:30 P.M.
(will-yes-begin on time)
$3 suggested contribution
Big Allis #7 and back issues on hand
The current slate of anticipated readers/presenters:
Hannah Weiner, Fiona Templeton, Anne Tardos, Juliana Spahr, Jena Osman (in
absentia), Rod Smith, James Sherry, Gail Sher, Peter Seaton, Joan Retallack,
Sianne Ngai, Melanie Neilson (reader and gracious host), Jackson Mac Low,
Lori Lubeski, Deirdre Kovac, Michael Gottlieb, Elizabeth Fodaski, Jeff
Derksen, Dorothy Trujillo Lusk (in absentia), Tina Darragh, Abigail Child,
Rachel Careau, and Bruce Andrews.
While I'm here, would also like to plug next week's Segue reading, another
not-to-be-missed event:
Heather Ramsdell & Garrett Kalleberg
Thursday 30 May
Segue
303 East 8th Street
7:30 P.M.
Free
This has been my first ever post, so do hope it has come through clear and in
time.
Until Thursday,
Deirdre Kovac
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 11:02:02 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: fakehaus
DG asks what does this have to do with poetry? how bout the creation
of a new word, or better yet:
"I'd like to think that writing poetry is a useful way to understand
what our senses tell us, and so is science."
a faint reminder that before the current
conceptualization of science was formed, that poets (yes POETS) were
the folks who made the big scientifical discoveries, by expanding the
perceptions of their audience through the author's unique linkage with
the mysteries of nature.
David Baratier
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 12:26:05 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steven Howard Shoemaker <ss6r@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake book
In-Reply-To: <199605211605.MAA125120@faraday.clas.Virginia.EDU> from "Steven
Howard Shoemaker" at May 21, 96 12:05:36 pm
Sorry Burt! The "Burt Kimmelman writes" below was supposed to come *after*
my bit and *before* Burt's stuff beginning "A quasi analog..."
Guess i faked it without even trying!
steve
>
> Burt Kimmelman writes:
>
> Well, speaking of parchment, I guess those de/composed fragments of Sappho
> have served as fake books for improvisations by Pound and others...
>
> steve
>
>
> >
> > A quasi analog to musical fake books is perhaps the old english manuscripts
> > that showed the full elaboration of a stanza pattern including the refrain
> > and any other repeating features, and then showed the other unique lines
> > of successive stanzas--all done to save parchment that was precious.
> > So how would this be fake? I don't know. Of course, thinking of
> > parchment, one can't help but recall the whole delicious issue of
> > the palimpsest--but now, we are perhaps straying beyond prosody and into
> > purely textual/linguistic and/or philosophical matters.
> >
>
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 11:50:10 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: Re: formal continuum
Henry Gould, Jordan Davis
The word "Saussure" instigated the note. While I no longer have the
original post, from memory I can assertain that the word appeared as a
substitution and that I was focused on why "metrical meaning" was such
an "obvious reference to Saussure" as compared to Blake,
Wollstencraft, Pope, and anon previous practitioners. It wasn't the
emphasis of metrical rhythm awareness that I found disturbing, but
rather the methodology of attributing a particular philosopher with a
discovery that an author metrically establishes for any acute reader
to find.
Be Well
David Baratier
HG: I sent some journals to the Poetry Mission, let me know if you
recieved them.
JD: I'll be reading for 45 minutes to an hour in Philly, fifteen in
Bklyn. Your call. Backchannel me, theres more.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 12:30:50 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steven Howard Shoemaker <ss6r@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake science: reply
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.93L.960521170559.16491B-100000
@labdien.cc.columbia.edu> from "Ursula K Heise" at May 21,
96 05:14:47 pm
Sorry, folks, i don't know where the Ross reply originally appeared. By
the time it got to me the origin was lost in the vagaries of e-mail
forwarding.
steve
Ursula Heise writes:
"I, too, would be interested to know where Ross' reply was printed. I
understand that he will publish a reply to Sokal in the next issue of
_Lingua Franca_."
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 12:52:26 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steven Howard Shoemaker <ss6r@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake science
In-Reply-To: <POETICS%96052209004949@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU> from "Henry Gould"
at May 22, 96 08:12:11 am
Alright Henry, i'll bite. Can you go into a bit more detail about Peirce's
take on "the realist/nominalist distinction"?
steve
>
> Hope you'll all forgive me for harping on my hobbyhorse again, but I'm
> reading Peirce (that shd be clear by now) & can't get over how relevant
> it is to the Sokal flap. He sets up a philosophical position that not
> only grounds the realist/nominalist distinction (as I related to the
> dispute in earlier post) - he also debunks the arrogance of science
> (in scientism & positivism) which dominated the "philosophy of science"
> at the end of the 19th century. He was able to do this because he
> was one of those rare birds, a real philosopher coming out of a background
> in experimental science. His explorations in logic led to an architecture
> of meaning which describes nature's operations as "like a language";
> which suggests a cosmic sentience or universal Mind not on theological
> claims (transcendentalism) but on observation of the workings of logic
> itself - a creative tripartite structure in which the "chance" subject
> is linked to a general "predicate" which has meaning in the context
> of the whole as "coming from the future" (a consensus of truth).
>
> Wish I could be more precise - I know how foggy this all sounds - but
> what I'm driving at is that Peirce revaluates some of these
> issues - the social construction of science, the relation of reality
> to our descriptions of it, and the relations between creative thinking
> in general both to chance and what can be termed "the true". And he does this
> in ways that can't be pigeon-holed as conservative, idealistic, positivistic,
> etc. He took care not to be pigeonholed by those who claimed him
> as their guide - Wm James & the pragmatists. It almost goes without
> saying that he was ostracized, attacked & ignored by the academic
> establishment of the time & died in poverty. There is the possibility
> of a philosophy of science which recognizes the "fallibilism" (Peirce's
> term) of socially and politically-textured knowledge without
> falling into either camp of "nominalist" relativism or its obverse
> twin, positivist empiricism. - Henry Gould
>
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 12:54:40 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Golumbia <dgolumbi@SAS.UPENN.EDU>
Subject: Re: steakhouse
In-Reply-To: <9604228327.AA832787682@smtp-gw.mosby.com> from "David Baratier"
at May 22, 96 11:02:02 am
And DB wrote:
>
> a faint reminder that before the current
> conceptualization of science was formed, that poets (yes POETS) were
> the folks who made the big scientifical discoveries, by expanding the
> perceptions of their audience through the author's unique linkage with
> the mysteries of nature.
Yes! Heraclitus was 1) poet or 2) scientist? I'm entranced by not being
able to answer...
--
dgolumbi@sas.upenn.edu
David Golumbia
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 12:05:44 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joe Amato <amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU>
Subject: fake science...
i'm really enjoying this thread... again, i wanna reiterate that, as i see
it, ross shoulda simply admitted that he and the rest of his editorial
board were bamboozled by sokol... i like to attribute good intention where
i'm able, so i prefer to read ross's lapse---his convoluted justification
(this my opine even after reading marjorie's, david's and ron's glosses on
"unreferreed" etc.)---as owing to ross's commitment to cultural studies-ish
agenda...
at the same time (as a former practicing engineer, just to authorize my own
experience a tad), i feel the need to aver that there is damned good work
being done from a cultural studies angle that addresses scientific and
technological practice (both contemporary as well as historically
remote)... sure, there are debates over same (witness, for example, helen
longino's response to donna haraway's notion of "core narratives" from
within a phil. of sci. perspective)... and, with alan and tom and ursula k.
and ___, i share the view, which again has been debated for years now
within sls, that the cultural/literary side of things should know its
science ... much as i expect scientists to know their cultural studies...
but this again is where the problem lies: science as an arbiter of truth
has a much more programmatic influence in our society (not to mention
funding) than the humanities... this may not be what scientists or
engineers intend (and for the moment, again, i'll refrain from
distinguishing between scientists on the one hand and technological
professionals on the other)... but it's painfully evident on my tech.
campus who gets to say what, and how, and how much government
monies---taxpayer dollars---support this power differential... which
suggests that there are some institutional realities that need to be
understood aright if one is to go about understanding how science and
technology operate in practice...
it's not that american culture, for example, is 'un' or 'non-literary' as a
direct result of scientific hegemony, or that scientists are operating,
say, in a literary void, are uninfluenced by aesthetics etc... what's at
stake here are the various ways that our institutions act to discourage
scientific practitioners, as well as much of the public, from understanding
just how intimately science and technology are bound up with social and
cultural developments... and perhaps there would be some benefit to
understanding, as well, the degree to which the humanities (broadly
speaking) has often resisted the legislated primacy of more functional
(even vocational) studies by sticking its collective heads in the sand...
so those who choose to explore the interconnections among (?) these domains
are bound to find themselves in mixed company, so to speak... it's fraught
terrain, punctuated by territorial struggles and anxieties... and practical
jokes (like sokol's) aside, there's a certain need, as i see it, to try to
speak in ways that promote dialogue, not division...
joe
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 13:14:29 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: formal continuum
In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 22 May 1996 11:50:10 CST from
<dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
On Wed, 22 May 1996 11:50:10 CST David Baratier said:
>
> HG: I sent some journals to the Poetry Mission, let me know if you
> recieved them.
Thank you in advance, David - that's wonderful. I'll be getting back to
you when it arrives. And thanks to Jonathan Brannen, Luigi-Bob Drake,
Walter Lew, and Tim Wood for your fine donations. I hope I haven't
left anyone out. The Mission project is coming together - we added
greatly to the library from a discount bksale at the mother of all
small press poetry libraries, the Harris Collection at Brown - we
are also negotiating with a new gallery in town for steady performance
space. - Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 13:38:10 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Michael Boughn <mboughn@CHASS.UTORONTO.CA>
Subject: Re: formal continuum
In-Reply-To: <9604228327.AA832789668@smtp-gw.mosby.com> from "David Baratier"
at May 22, 96 11:50:10 am
>
> Henry Gould, Jordan Davis
>
> The word "Saussure" instigated the note. While I no longer have the
> original post, from memory I can assertain that the word appeared as a
> substitution and that I was focused on why "metrical meaning" was such
> an "obvious reference to Saussure" as compared to Blake,
> Wollstencraft, Pope, and anon previous practitioners. It wasn't the
> emphasis of metrical rhythm awareness that I found disturbing, but
> rather the methodology of attributing a particular philosopher with a
> discovery that an author metrically establishes for any acute reader
> to find.
>
> Be Well
>
> David Baratier
>
Just to clarify, the reference to Saussure was in regards to Annie Finch's
basic structuralist thesis in _The Ghost of Meter_. It wasn't a
"substitution", it was an attempt to indicate her debt to a line of
thought that originates in Saussure's structuralist linguistics,
especially her notion that metrical meaning arises (again, in some
cases) out of differences within a structure, rather than as an
identity of some particular rhythm and some particular transcendent meaning.
Peace, love, and good vibes,
Mike
mboughn@chass.utoronto.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 13:09:10 EST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Burt Kimmelman -@NJIT" <kimmelman@ADMIN.NJIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake book
So, Steve, you weren't purposely trying "to fake-book" it in your misquote
(misprision?)?
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 13:22:30 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake science
In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 22 May 1996 12:52:26 -0400 from
<ss6r@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Steven,
I'm sure there's somebody better qualified on this list, but I'll
do what I can re: Peirce & "nominalism/realism". Peirce went deeper
into the study of logic & came up with more new insights on it
than anyone in his time. He had a huge ambition to build an
"architectonic" philosophy on the level of Aristotle or Kant.
His studies in logic led him to the disputes of high scholasticism
over the status of "universals". Are "universals" (general
concepts, like "humanity") real - do they have a real existence
beyond our verbal conceptualizations? Or is the universe made
up of pure particularities? Realists claimed that our general
concepts corresponded to some real general order to reality
outside the mind; nominalists called general concepts artificial
"names" by which we order reality. These debates were taken
to depths of great subtlety and nuance; as one commentator on
Peirce put it, Duns Scotus (realist) and Occam (nominalist)
were divided by the width of a hair.
Peirce felt these issues pervaded world-views into our own
time; as I tried to summarize in earlier post, to a nominalist
truth is relative to human language about it; to a realist our
language is relative to the truth and must always be adjusted
by experiment & experience. Peirces own "pragmaticist" way
began as kind of a middle road between the two: his scientific
training gave him a deep respect for "brute fact" and chance
which counterbalanced any truth-claims that weren't backed up
both by the logic of experiment and by human consensus; while
his belief in a reality which corresponded to our abstract
conceptions kept him out of both the British empiricist stream
of skepticism (Hume et al.) and the scientific positivism
which took its place. One of the fascinating things about
Peirce is this combination of scientific humility & discipline
with philosophical originality: his pragmatic-ideal-realism
grew more subtle as he explored the logic of nature as a
semiotic system. His final formulations of a definition of
"truth" are careful in the extreme & map out the distinctions
of which the debates about the social constructions (or
constrictions) of knowledge, the limits of science, and the
limits of Mind and causation are all taken into account.
Peirce was recognized as a prescient thinker who foresaw
developments in quantum theory & relativity; some commentators
have noted close affinities between his work & that of
physicist David Bohm 100 yrs later. In Peirce, the
postmodern "social embeddedness" of science is further
de-centered by an extremely stringent conception of what
real knowledge consists of : it is predicated on meanings
("thirdness") operating on present understanding FROM THE
FUTURE. There was no question for him, however, of which
side he lands on in the realist/nominalist debate : the order
(which includes chaos) of which we are a part exists outside
of our present formulations of its meaning. For someone
who believed in real general truths, pragmaticism was a
way of escaping the pitfalls of both an unscientific idealism
(Emerson) and a pseudo-scientific positivism. And it was
all built on what he perceived as the creative logic of
hypothesis.
The best intro to his bizarre career is by Joseph Brent -
"Charles Sanders Peirce: a life" (Indiana UP, 1993)
- Henry Gould
p.s. someone was talking on this thread about scientists-as-poets:
Brent mentions that Peirce revered Poe; he discovers a lot of
affinities between Peirce himself and Baudelaire, of all people.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 11:33:30 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: death in L.A.
In-Reply-To: <199605220407.AAA28583@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
FYI -- for those who were inquiring about the death of Michael Taylor --
According to an article in yesterday's _LA Times_, both police and
Taylor's friends believe that the people who killed Taylor were
attempting to steal an expensive piece of radio equipment he had acquired
while preparing to start up a microbroadcasting station. Police suspect
there may have been more people involved in the murder than the three
suspects who have been arrested.
________________
FYI2 -- same _LA Times_ finally ran an article on the death, in Japan, of
Johnny "Guitar" Watson -- took 'em long enough -- maybe they were shamed
into by the obit. in New York -- Watson was a central figure in LA music
for decades. In contrast, the same paper had a next day article on the
death of an actor from the cast of _General Hospital_ --
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 14:53:45 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: summa more peirce
One more blip on why I think Sokal et al & Ross talking past each other
& why philosopher on level of Bohm or Peirce is useful. Philosophy
began with poetry & became a way of talking about cosmos in _everyday
terms_ - common knowledge. This is important to remember. Science
falls prey to positivism: i.e., "we don't need philosophy - we've got
power". Leads to science jargon & techno-elite. If people think
Social Text is jargon, try reading any advanced math book. If Sokal
bases his judgement on the experimental method alone, he is certainly
open to the postmodern critique & rightly so. Yet, on the other hand,
I can hear Peirce looking at the whole gamut of postmodernism, post-
structuralism, etc. etc. and saying: these are the nominalists of our
day. To them, since the real is purely relative, a blank, we will
"theorize" to our heart's content, without the messy trouble of
evidence, proofs, logic, argument, etc... we'll go on sophistry alone.
Note that this strain loves to wrap itself in the mantle of "poetry" -
and with friends like this the scar's the delimit.
What's missing here is a philosophy which can make sense of knowing
and un-knowing, conscious & unconscious, slips and trips, mine &
Thou(ght). Poets make nature second nature. - Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 14:32:54 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jonathan Brannen <jbrannen@INFOLINK.MORRIS.MN.US>
Subject: Re: chax books
This is a product endorsement. The Mac Low, Duncan and Waldrop books are
all beautiful examples of fine printing, as well as good reads, and these
are bargain basement prices. The trade editions are all excellent. I don't
wish to single out any one out of these books at the expense of the others
but, if you're not already familiar with the work of Karen MacCormack (whose
work deserves to be more widely known than I suspect it is), _Quirks &
Quillets_ is a worthy introduction.
Best,
Jonathan
=20
>3. Finally, Poetics List members may choose from the following list any 3
>books for $5 each, a savings of up to $10 per book. a $3 shipping/handling
>charge will be added for orders of 3 books; however, no shipping charge=
will
>be added for orders totaling $20 or more, including any combination of
>orders from the following list, of the Mac Low book, and of the Duncan
pamphlet.
>
>Kathleen Fraser, when new time folds up, 1993=20
>Norman Fischer, Precisely the Point Being Made, 1993 (co-published with O
Books)
>Rosmarie Waldrop, Fan Poem For Deshika, 1993, (hand printed pamphlet)
>Beverly Dahlen, A Reading 8 =97 10, 1992
>Ron Silliman, Demo to Ink, 1992
>Eli Goldblatt, Sessions 1 =97 62, 1991
>Sheila Murphy, Teth, 1991
>Karen Mac Cormack, Quirks & Quillets, 1991
>Charles Alexander, Hopeful Buildings, 1990
>Larry Evers and Felipe S. Molina, Wo=92i Bwikam/Coyote Songs, 1990
>bp Nichol, art facts: a book of contexts, 1990
>
>
>
>Once again, please send orders directly to me at chax@mtn.org, or to the
>address listed in the first part of this message.
>
>and thank you,
>
>Charles Alexander
>Chax Press
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 15:50:44 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steven Howard Shoemaker <ss6r@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake book
In-Reply-To: <009A2B68.54522542.48@admin.njit.edu> from "Burt Kimmelman
-@NJIT" at May 22, 96 01:09:10 pm
Well, i dint *think* i was, but now that you mention it i've been getting
more and more fascinated by how much of what we want to call "thinking"
(w/ rationalist connotations) is actually unconscious (and this sort of
loosely ties in to Henry's latest stuff on Peirce, or at least one small
bit of it). So who knows--maybe i somehow *meant* to fake it all along?
And, of course, i can't leave this question without the obligatory nod
toward our medium here, and how it blurs both author-ization and
intentionality. One tries, sort of, to construct stable entities out of
all these floating names and addresses (the personalized "sig" as an
attempt to stabilize the flux, carve out a little real estate w/ your
name out front?), but it's so hard to remember "who" said what...
steve
"Burt""sez":
>
> So, Steve, you weren't purposely trying "to fake-book" it in your misquote
> (misprision?)?
>
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 15:57:01 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "c.g. guertin" <cguertin@JULIAN.UWO.CA>
Subject: Re: chax books
In-Reply-To: <9605221932.AA29035@infolink.infolink.morris.mn.us>
On Wed, 22 May 1996, Jonathan Brannen wrote:
> if you're not already familiar with the work of Karen MacCormack (whose
> work deserves to be more widely known than I suspect it is), _Quirks &
> Quillets_ is a worthy introduction.
I second that motion. Has she published anything since _Quirks & Quillets_?
Carolyn Guertin
cguertin@julian.uwo.ca
"One's life is particularly one's own when one has invented it."
-- Djuna Barnes, Nightwood
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 10:02:34 -1000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gabrielle Welford <welford@HAWAII.EDU>
Subject: Kani Xulam faces deportation & death (fwd)
More joy in the world. Gab.
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 01:47:50 -1000
From: Berkeley Calif <gnat@iww.org>
To: anarchy-list@cwi.nl, fnb-l@netcom.com, iww-news@igc.apc.org,
oahugmb@iww.org, sfgmb-l@iww.org, slcgmb@iww.org, staff@iww.org
Subject: Kani Xulam faces deportation & death
AKIN internet administrator and burn.ucsd.edu client Kani Xulam faces
deportation and certain execution in Turkey as a result of his effective
human rights advocacy and his radical use of electronic media.
burn administrators and other IWW internet workers are extremely concerned
about this situation, but our ability to formulate a response strategy is
limited by our lack of more current information.
Please mail staff@iww.org if you know anything we don't.
_________________________________________________________________
American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN)
PRESS RELEASE #8
APRIL 16, 1996 - FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
TURKISH GOVERNMENT CONVINCES U.S. TO ARREST KURDISH ACTIVIST IN D.C.
In a bold move, trying to discredit the peaceful efforts of the
American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN), the government of Turkey
persuaded the U.S. State Department to seek the arrest of Kani Xulam,
that group's respected spokesman in Washington, D.C.
Xulam has been advising members of Congress and the Administration of
the atrocities perpetrated by Turkish armed forces in their
destruction ofover 3,000 Kurdish villages, the murder of tens of
thousands of civilians, and the forced relocation of millions. Turkey
relies on U.S. military aidto enforce its denial of fundamental human
rights to some 20 million Kurds.
Xulam comes from Turkish occupied Kurdistan, where he - as all other
Kurds - was forbidden to use his native Kurdish language. Now, on the
pretext of "passport fraud", the State Department initiated legal
proceedings which resulted in Xulam's arrest last week and his
appearance on Monday in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C.
In an affidavit to the court, the State Department claimed that it had
been informed by the government of Turkey that Xulam "may be a member"
of a terrorist organization. Based on that allegation by a foreign
power that seeks to silence Xulam, the federal magistrate detained
him. Apparently, the government is afraid Xulam may flee the country
and they want him held so that he can be deported.
Some twenty local human rights activists appeared to speak for Xulam's
character and long time commitment to seek peaceful solutions to the
present conflict between the Turkish armed forces and the Kurdish
people. Among them were Kathryn Cameron Porter, President of Human
Rights Alliance and wife of Rep. John Porter (R, IL.), Maryam Elahi of
Amnesty International, and Sister Patricia Krommer of the Human Rights
Foundation.
Although the AKIN offices in Washington, D.C. were searched and its
papers rummaged, it is still operating and will continue to campaign
for the rights of Kurds everywhere.
Ralph D. Fertig, Secretary of the Board of Directors of AKIN and a
former federal administrative judge for the E.E.O.C. in Los Angeles,
commented: "It is clear that these proceedings against Xulam are
testimony to his effectiveness in alerting American public officials
to the use of U.S. tax dollars to support and equip the Turkish
government in its violation of basic human rights of the Kurds. Xulam
is a dedicated pacifist, and his efforts have been used in the best
American tradition of peacefully petitioning the U.S. government.
Neither he nor his cause shall be silenced."
Respectfully,J. Azboy
Director
_________________________________________________________________
American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN)
2623 Connecticut Avenue NW #1
Washington, DC 20008-1522
The American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN) provides a public
service to foster Kurdish-American understanding and friendship.
Tel: (202) 483-6444
Fax: (202) 483-6476
E-mail: akin@kurdish.org
Web: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~akin
_________________________________________________________________
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 16:20:33 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steven Howard Shoemaker <ss6r@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: Re: fake science
In-Reply-To: <POETICS%96052214140865@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU> from "henry gould"
at May 22, 96 01:22:30 pm
You've got me pretty damn interested in Peirce here. He's actually someone
i've meant to check out for a long time (in the mental cardfile somewhere
near Muriel Rukeyser's bio of the similarly crucial-but-neglected
physicist Willard Gibbs). Anyway, there's no question these are still
live issues. To shift the terms a bit, i sometimes feel *everything* is
about the dialectic of "the ideal" and "concrete." On the latter side,
here's something from the neuroscientist (and lucid explicator) Francisco
Varela. He starts off by talking about the old-dominant top-down idealist
approach to knowledge, then goes on to say:
There are strong indications that among the loose federation of sciences
dealing with knowledge and cognition--the cognitive sciences--there is a
slowly growing conviction that the picture is upside down, that a radical
paradigmatic or epistemic shift is is rapidly developing. At the very
center of htis emerging view is the belief that the proper units of
knowledge are primarily *concrete*, embodied, incorporated, lived. This
unique, concrete knowledge, its historicity and context, is not "noise"
that occludes the brighter pattern to be captured in its true essence,
an abstraction, nor is it a step toward something else: it is how we arrive
and where we stay."
And another sample:
"There is considerable support for the view that brains are not logical
machines, but highly cooperative, nonhomogeneous and distributed networks.
The entire system resembles a *patchwork* of subnetworks assembled by
a complicated history of tinkering, rather than an optimized system
resulting from some clean unified design."
(from "The Reenchantment of the Concrete," in *Zone 6*)
Henry writes:
>
> Steven,
> I'm sure there's somebody better qualified on this list, but I'll
> do what I can re: Peirce & "nominalism/realism". Peirce went deeper
> into the study of logic & came up with more new insights on it
> than anyone in his time. He had a huge ambition to build an
> "architectonic" philosophy on the level of Aristotle or Kant.
> His studies in logic led him to the disputes of high scholasticism
> over the status of "universals". Are "universals" (general
> concepts, like "humanity") real - do they have a real existence
> beyond our verbal conceptualizations? Or is the universe made
> up of pure particularities? Realists claimed that our general
> concepts corresponded to some real general order to reality
> outside the mind; nominalists called general concepts artificial
> "names" by which we order reality. These debates were taken
> to depths of great subtlety and nuance; as one commentator on
> Peirce put it, Duns Scotus (realist) and Occam (nominalist)
> were divided by the width of a hair.
> Peirce felt these issues pervaded world-views into our own
> time; as I tried to summarize in earlier post, to a nominalist
> truth is relative to human language about it; to a realist our
> language is relative to the truth and must always be adjusted
> by experiment & experience. Peirces own "pragmaticist" way
> began as kind of a middle road between the two: his scientific
> training gave him a deep respect for "brute fact" and chance
> which counterbalanced any truth-claims that weren't backed up
> both by the logic of experiment and by human consensus; while
> his belief in a reality which corresponded to our abstract
> conceptions kept him out of both the British empiricist stream
> of skepticism (Hume et al.) and the scientific positivism
> which took its place. One of the fascinating things about
> Peirce is this combination of scientific humility & discipline
> with philosophical originality: his pragmatic-ideal-realism
> grew more subtle as he explored the logic of nature as a
> semiotic system. His final formulations of a definition of
> "truth" are careful in the extreme & map out the distinctions
> of which the debates about the social constructions (or
> constrictions) of knowledge, the limits of science, and the
> limits of Mind and causation are all taken into account.
> Peirce was recognized as a prescient thinker who foresaw
> developments in quantum theory & relativity; some commentators
> have noted close affinities between his work & that of
> physicist David Bohm 100 yrs later. In Peirce, the
> postmodern "social embeddedness" of science is further
> de-centered by an extremely stringent conception of what
> real knowledge consists of : it is predicated on meanings
> ("thirdness") operating on present understanding FROM THE
> FUTURE. There was no question for him, however, of which
> side he lands on in the realist/nominalist debate : the order
> (which includes chaos) of which we are a part exists outside
> of our present formulations of its meaning. For someone
> who believed in real general truths, pragmaticism was a
> way of escaping the pitfalls of both an unscientific idealism
> (Emerson) and a pseudo-scientific positivism. And it was
> all built on what he perceived as the creative logic of
> hypothesis.
>
> The best intro to his bizarre career is by Joseph Brent -
> "Charles Sanders Peirce: a life" (Indiana UP, 1993)
> - Henry Gould
>
> p.s. someone was talking on this thread about scientists-as-poets:
> Brent mentions that Peirce revered Poe; he discovers a lot of
> affinities between Peirce himself and Baudelaire, of all people.
>
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 16:13:51 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Daniel Bouchard <Daniel_Bouchard@HMCO.COM>
Subject: Re: Kani Xulam faces deportation & death (fwd)
Thanks for this post Gab.
daniel_bouchard@hmco.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 12:24:00 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Don Cheney <Don_Cheney@UCSDLIBRARY.UCSD.EDU>
Subject: Re: chax books
---------------------------- Forwarded with Changes ---------------------------
From: cguertin@JULIAN.UWO.CA at @UCSD
Date: 5/22/96 3:57PM
*To: POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU at @UCSD
Subject: Re: chax books
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Carolyn
i was just reading Joko Beck's book "EVERYDAY ZEN" and your Barnes quote (One's
life is particularly one's own when one has invented it.") reminded me of a
quote from Joko's book (actually, she's quoting an anonymous zen teacher. It's
the zen angle on what one's life is):
"Your life is none of your business."
Don
dcheney@ucsd.edu
---------------------------------------------------------------------
>On Wed, 22 May 1996, Jonathan Brannen wrote:
>
>> if you're not already familiar with the work of Karen MacCormack (whose >
>work deserves to be more widely known than I suspect it is), _Quirks & >
>Quillets_ is a worthy introduction.
>
>I second that motion. Has she published anything since _Quirks & Quillets_?
>
>Carolyn Guertin
>cguertin@julian.uwo.ca
>
>"One's life is particularly one's own when one has invented it."
> -- Djuna Barnes, Nightwood
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 16:48:42 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Alexander <chax@MTN.ORG>
Subject: Re: chax books
>On Wed, 22 May 1996, Jonathan Brannen wrote:
>
>> if you're not already familiar with the work of Karen MacCormack (whose
>> work deserves to be more widely known than I suspect it is), _Quirks &
>> Quillets_ is a worthy introduction.
>
>I second that motion. Has she published anything since _Quirks & Quillets_?
>
>Carolyn Guertin
>cguertin@julian.uwo.ca
Yes, _Marine Snow_ came out in 1995, from ECW Press, and it's quite
marvelous. ECW, I believe, is trying to gain distribution by SPD, but may
not have such distribution yet. The address of ECW is 2120 Queen Street
East, Toronto, Ontario M4E 1E2, Canada. The price is not printed on the
book, so I can't tell you what it costs, Canadian or American.
Chax will be bringing out Karen Mac Cormack's _The Tongue Moves Talk_ in
the fall of 1996. I'm sure I'll make some kind of announcement on the
Poetics List, although keep in touch, please. We should be moved before that
book comes out, so it's possible I won't have email or Poetics List
connection for a while in late summer/early fall.
charles alexander
chax press
p.o. box 19178
minneapolis, mn 55417
usa
612-721-6063
chax@mtn.org
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 21:17:26 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Pierre Joris <joris@CSC.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: chax books
In-Reply-To: <Pine.3.88.9605221549.C2538-0100000@panther.uwo.ca>
Re Karen Mac Cormack: yes, she has published a new book since "Quirks &
Quillets," namely "Marine Snow," from ECW Press (1995). Also not to be
forgotten are the books preceding Q&Q: "Quill Driver" (Nightwood Editions
1989) & "Straw Cupid" (Nightwood 1987). All of it, I think, lovely,
lovely books - she keeps amazing & delighting me. -- Pierre
=======================================================================
Pierre Joris | "Form fascinates when one no longer has the force
Dept. of English | to understand force from within itself. That
SUNY Albany | is, to create." -- Jacques Derrida
Albany NY 12222 |
tel&fax:(518) 426 0433 | "Poetry is the promise of a language."
email: | -- Friedrich Holderlin
joris@cnsunix.albany.edu|
=======================================================================
On Wed, 22 May 1996, c.g. guertin wrote:
> On Wed, 22 May 1996, Jonathan Brannen wrote:
>
> > if you're not already familiar with the work of Karen MacCormack (whose
> > work deserves to be more widely known than I suspect it is), _Quirks &
> > Quillets_ is a worthy introduction.
>
> I second that motion. Has she published anything since _Quirks & Quillets_?
>
> Carolyn Guertin
> cguertin@julian.uwo.ca
>
> "One's life is particularly one's own when one has invented it."
> -- Djuna Barnes, Nightwood
>
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 22:08:13 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: Orioles
>I'm just telling this pointless story to see if there are any other Orioles
>fans lurking on the elist...
>
>WKL888@AOL.com
One hates the Orioles. I even hope that Alomar goes into a terrible slump;
loved one game last week when I saw him make three bad plays.
..........................
"the sunne
a good good mama
a very loud star"
--Anselm Hollo
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 22 May 1996 22:59:15 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Marjorie Perloff <perloff@LELAND.STANFORD.EDU>
Subject: Re Refereed Journals
In-Reply-To: <199605230407.AAA00160@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
I agree that anonymous submissions (as in PMLA) are obnoxious but Ron, I
wonder if you really mean what you're saying. I serve on a lot of
editorial boards and, for instance, on CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE I think the
process is extremely fair. All "refereed" means is that particular
members of the board are sent an article to evaluate and their reports
then go to the editors in chief. But I take it that Social Text doesn't
even bother with that-- they just commission articles. Which means no one
outside the little clique gets in. Do you really think that's optimal?
I think the best and liveliest journals are more open than that.
Marjorie Perloff
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 02:14:25 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: Ediots
Just quick to note that I think Andrew Ross is WAY ok. He's the real thing--
& while I wouldn't go quite as far w/ the social constructivist stance as he
does (few do)--
I think he has a great deal to say that should be listened to (paricualarly
in _Chicago Gangster Theory of Life_ & as ed. of _Universal Abandon_).
The Sokal brooha is a media non-issue as most media issues are, the facile
foolishness & complete lack of contextual acumen evinced by the "reporters"
is deeply offensive-- whatever mistakes an academic might make at least most
don't make the mistake of believing the New York Times (only slightly
overstated rhetoric). It's also troubling the degree to which the media
control the terms of conversation even here on our little corner of the
debate-net.
I'm w/ Mr. Gould for a change on the Bohm/Peirce framing of the question. We
cld take it back to Hegel as well, & then fast fwd to have him shake hands w/
Duchamp.
_Big Allis_ publication party tonight (Thursday) at 7:30 Segue Space (303 E
8th, twixt B & C)-- yous New York area folks all com'n I hope.
Rod
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 02:28:01 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: Orioles
>I'm just telling this pointless story to see if there are any other Orioles
>fans lurking on the elist...
>
>WKL888@AOL.com
They're my team. However I will be offering TRADE CAL RIPKEN T-shirts to the
list very soon.
R
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 08:05:17 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Michael Boughn <mboughn@CHASS.UTORONTO.CA>
Subject: Re: chax books
In-Reply-To: <199605222148.QAA16145@freedom.mtn.org> from "Charles Alexander"
at May 22, 96 04:48:42 pm
> Yes, _Marine Snow_ came out in 1995, from ECW Press, and it's quite
> marvelous. ECW, I believe, is trying to gain distribution by SPD, but may
> not have such distribution yet. The address of ECW is 2120 Queen Street
> East, Toronto, Ontario M4E 1E2, Canada. The price is not printed on the
> book, so I can't tell you what it costs, Canadian or American.
Its ISBN is 1-55022-258-9 and the price is $12.00 Canadian (which,
these days, must be about $3.00 US).
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 09:20:04 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Bob Perelman <perelman@DEPT.ENGLISH.UPENN.EDU>
Subject: a)science b) self-promo
a)
Can someone forward me Ross's response (or the whole of yesterday's
listserv if that's easier)? I want to forward it to Howie Winant,
sociologist at Temple, old *Socialist Review* friend of Ron's.
There are, Howie tells me, already jokes circulating around this issue.
I.e.: when the editors realized they'd been had, they opened the twelfth
story window, jumped out, and fell up.
The whole issue is fascinating & goes back a long way: Pythagoras,
Lucretius, etc. But more 'recently', Wordsworth in one of the original
avantgarde manifestos, "Preface to the Lyrical Ballads," makes a big deal
about poetry as the more capacious and mobile form for scientific truths.
A grandiose defensive hope that poetry will subsume science.
I agree with Marjorie about Ross's condescension & essentializing, which
seems pretty clearly to come from defensiveness. Why not just say, "You
got us?" and go on to the bigger issue, the huge chasms between the spheres
of discourse? If the rhetorical sour notes in Ross's piece are overlooked,
he does say some interesting things that point toward that problem, at
least as I remember the piece. But the sour notes are sour, and the
projection of sophomoric theorizing onto Sokal clearly bounces back onto
*Social Text*: wasn't S's article saying that gravity was a construct?
Like I say, if anyone on the list could forward it to me, I'd appreciate it
(perelman@english.upenn.edu)
b)
And speaking of attempts to unite spheres of discourse: I just got an
advance copy of *The Marginalization of Poetry: Language Writing and
Literary History*; they tell me it will be out in about a week. Cloth or
paper (nice cover). Contains:
1) "The Marginalization of Poetry"--(revised) genre-cross-dressing poem
2) "Language Writing and Literary History"--group formation; collaboration;
individual readings
3) "Here and Now on Paper: The Avant-Garde Particulars of Robert
Grenier"--*This* 1; I HATE SPEECH; the oxymoron of avantgarde narrative;
*Pieces*/*Sentences*; *Transpiring etc*
4) "Parataxis and Narrative: The New Sentence in Theory and Practice"--new
sentence, Jameson's take, narrative issues, collage, Berrigan; Silliman /
Hejinian; new sentence 'novels'
5) "Write the Power: Orthography and Community"--Bernstein; genre-wars;
error & textuality; Brathwaite's nation-language
6) "Building a More Powerful Vocabulary: Bruce Andrews and the World
(Trade Center)"--Andrews & and the attempt to shatter (literary) capital;
identity poetics; Angelou's "Pulse of Morning"/"Pumice of Morons"
(Coolidge & Fagin's OULIPO parody)
7) "This Page is My Page, This Page is Your Page: Gender and
Mapping"--American male-gaze landscape poem, Frost, Stafford, &
derivatives (Sharp-Implement School, in Rae Armantrout's phrase); the
political maps of Ginsberg ("Wichita Vortex Sutra") & Ashbery ("Daffy Duck
in Hollywood"); Watten's *Progress* as anti-map; women's non-nominalist
maps: Dahlen *A Reading*, Susan Howe "Thorow", Armantrout *Necromance*,
Harryman, *In the Mode Of*
8) "An Alphabet of Literary History"--signifying poems of & on literary
history
9) "A False Account of Talking with Frank O'Hara and Roland Barthes in
Philadelphia"--daily life, mortality, television, desire, poetic language,
transcendental dirty jokes; poet & critic discuss these in dream
narrative/short story format.
--
Well, this is too long already. But: Princeton wants a list of profs to
contact about possible course-adoption. If anyone has any suggestions I'd
appreciate it if you'd backchannel them. Thanks.
Bob Perelman
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 09:06:20 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joe Amato <amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: Re Refereed Journals
i'm intrigued about this particular question of refereed vs. unrefereed...
seems to me that, though no review is entirely 'blind,' a publishing
enterprise can effect a significant over-the-transom result if it at least
attempts some anonymity... i mean, i can't see as how partiality is
necessarily wrong, but i also can't see as how impartiality (to whatever
extent this is possible) can't be of some use either... depends on the
editor(s), no?...
now as to how one goes about making such matters public, or what it
means---ethically, say---to violate stated editorial policies---well, these
seem to me to be somewhat different, if related, issues...
joe
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 10:34:53 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Kellogg <kellogg@ACPUB.DUKE.EDU>
Subject: Re: Re Refereed Journals
Comments: cc: Marjorie Perloff <perloff@Leland.stanford.edu>
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.93.960522225143.28565A-100000@elaine27.Stanford.EDU>
I have been following this thread with terrific interest. As a poet and
critic who is currently teaching science writing and has served as the
managing editor for a major scientific journal (the Journal of
Neuroscience), I must agree with Marjorie: There's no substitute for a
good peer referee process.
What can the humanities learn from the peer review proces in science? In
my experience, the following:
For almost all scientific journals at least two written peer reviews are
ALWAYS given. These reviews are generally timely (written within a
month), extensive, and helpful. The typical form of such reviews is
tripartite:
1) A summary of the submitted piece, showing that the reviewer
knows what she's talking about;
2) A section of major critiques and suggestions; and
3) A list of minor critiques (reference errors, typos, etc.)
In the journal I worked for, readers were also asked to rate work on its
quality and importance. (These numbered ratings were not given to the
authors).
This kind of peer reviewing is quite standard in scientific journals: if
the review process isn't followed properly, nobody is well served and the
history is lost.
My experience with humanities journals is much more mixed. Some essays
have been very thoroughly reviewed, which I appreciate. Some reviews have
been cursory at best. I have had one essay accepted by a "peer-reviewed"
journal over email, with no suggestions for revision at all. I wrote back
to the editor saying, didn't somebody have some constructive suggestion?
He said no, they just thought it should be published as is. I would like
to think this reflected the quality of my argument, but I honestly believe
it was more indicative of a shoddy review process.
I must also point out that while the best science journals typically tell
authors the disposition of a manuscript WITHIN A MONTH (at J. Neurosci.
there were the following possibilities: reject, reject w/ encouragement
to resubmit, revise and re-review, revise without re-review, and accept (a
virtual impossibility on the first go-round)), even the best humanities
journals (excluding house-journals like PMLA -- a different topic) may
wait THREE OR FOUR MONTHS before the author hears a peep.
Sorry, I'm griping. But I do think that Sokal -- though he's acted
despicably and doesn't understand the cultural study of science -- puts
his finger on a real problem in the humanities review process.
One thing the humanities could do is follow science's lead and make peer
reviewing one of those things you count for tenure.
Cheers,
David
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
David Kellogg Duke University
kellogg@acpub.duke.edu University Writing Program
(919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708
FAX (919) 684-6277
There is some excitement in one corner,
but most of the ghosts are merely shaking their heads.
-- Thomas Kinsella
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 07:35:20 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: Rukeyser's Gibbs
In-Reply-To: <199605230407.AAA00160@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
Has noone read this book?
Fascinating stuff -- Gibbs got involved in the _Amistad_ case, visiting
the Africans in jail before the trial and working to help with
interpretation -- In later times he received letters from the
by-then-freed Africans --
Now there was a man with a conscience, willing to put his learning at the
service of the oppressed --
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 11:16:28 -0400
Reply-To: John_Lavagnino@Brown.edu
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: John Lavagnino <John_Lavagnino@BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: Re Refereed Journals
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SOL.3.91.960523101550.14674A-100000
@godzilla4.acpub.duke.edu> (message from David Kellogg on Thu, 23
May 1996 10:34:53 -0400)
I wonder how well the peer-review process as it works in science
applies to humanities scholarship. We don't have quite the same level
of shared assumptions about what any particular field is, what
important work is, and how it ought to be expressed. Any well-known
scholarly journal in our field has ideas about what they want to
publish that go well beyond straightforward questions of field,
quality, and importance; or perhaps it's better to say that quality
and importance are defined in very different ways by different
journals.
When I think of peer-review horror stories I've heard that related to
the humanities, they generally have to do with work being dismissed,
directly and without supporting argument, as not being serious
humanities scholarship. And, in the case of any particular journal,
it's certainly easy to think of many approaches, subjects, or writers
that just wouldn't be acceptable. (The other main focus of these
horror stories is long delays, and generally the slothful rudeness
that is so common in the academic humanities, as David Kellogg rightly
points out.) Horror stories that have come to me about peer review in
the sciences have turned on deliberate obstruction with commercial
motivation, and involve cases that ended in lawsuits. (Scientific
fields may be more objective, but there are also large amounts of
money at stake in some of them.)
We also read humanities journals, we don't just refer to them. We
don't have any journals like the Physical Review, which runs to a yard
or so of shelf space for one year; nobody reads it, you just glance at
the subset of articles covering your own little field. Andrew Ross's
account of deliberations at Social Text points out one thing that's
true about many humanities journals: you don't just take the top
twenty best articles each year, you select articles in part because
they fit together.
In the Social Text case, you can certainly question the stated
justification for the editors' publication of an article they thought
was weak---I also find it condescending; but you can't plausibly claim
that these people don't know cultural studies and couldn't judge that
aspect of the article. (Everyone talks in the popular press about how
the article was obvious nonsense, but most people outside the world of
literary studies would have the same reaction to any article that has
ever appeared in Social Text.) What opens them to ridicule is
publishing something that claims some kind of scientific support or
connection for these postmodern themes, when the science in the
article was (we're told) bogus. An outside reviewer from the world of
physics could have given them some idea of whether the physics made
any sense or not, and generally if you're going to publish
interdicsiplinary work you really ought to seek advice on fields you
don't know anything about.
John Lavagnino
Women Writers Project, Brown University
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 08:25:13 +0100
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Kevin Killian <dbkk@SIRIUS.COM>
Subject: Re: death in L.A.
This is Kevin Killian speaking.
Aldon N wrote I think rather dismissively about the death of John Beradino--
>FYI2 -- same _LA Times_ finally ran an article on the death, in Japan, of
>Johnny "Guitar" Watson -- took 'em long enough -- maybe they were shamed
>into by the obit. in New York -- Watson was a central figure in LA music
>for decades. In contrast, the same paper had a next day article on the
>death of an actor from the cast of _General Hospital_ --
IMHO, Beradino was a great star and a figure of major cultural importance.
Everyone knew he was in failing health and I'm sure the LA Times had a
correspondent with very close connections to Cedar-Sinai where the stars
die. He had to leave "General Hospital" in 1993 after thirty years,
because he was sick. Soap opera fans and baseball fans all over the world
are sad that he has died. Give him the dignity of his name now that he is
dead. But Aldon, I understand why the disparity between the reportage of
the two entertainers outrages you. Yet soap opera stars receive less
respect even than the great guitar players of our day. Why is that? I
think because their work is perceived as somehow effeminate, decadent, off
the beat. Ephemeral. Unrelated to life.
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 08:32:19 +0100
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Kevin Killian <dbkk@SIRIUS.COM>
Subject: Come In Spinner!
This is Kevin Killian. This post is especially to our Australian and Kiwi
correspondents, but please, I need help from all. Have any of you read
"Come In Spinner!" by Dymphna Cusack & Florence James? I am thinking of
writing about this book and would appreciate knowing if anyone knows of
previous critical studies. I don't want to say what everyone else has
already said without knowing it (God, what a sentence, but I hope you know
what I mean). Thanks to all. XXX Kevin K.
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 12:25:28 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Golumbia <dgolumbi@SAS.UPENN.EDU>
Subject: Re: Re Refereed Journals
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SOL.3.91.960523101550.14674A-100000
@godzilla4.acpub.duke.edu> from "David Kellogg" at May 23,
96 10:34:53 am
David Kellogg wrote:
> virtual impossibility on the first go-round)), even the best humanities
> journals (excluding house-journals like PMLA -- a different topic) may
> wait THREE OR FOUR MONTHS before the author hears a peep.
I count three or four months as a good response. I can't even count the
number of times I've waited six, 8, 12, 18 months, & then had the most
bizarre reactions from the journals -- all the way from "we're accepting
it and by the way we need the proofs by tomorrow why won't you call us
back right away," this more than 2 years after initial submission -- to
one-line rejection sentences. One of the least professional parts of
"professional" life I've encountered. My favorite thing is the number of
times journals lose essays mailed to them -- I count on no better than a
75% chance of a journal actually receiving a piece (& have had them
"lost" or "never received" at least six times, including SOCIAL TEXT
itself!) -- never had a credit card payment lost in the mail yet though!
And then we could talk about edited volumes (too bad Maria's offline).
--
dgolumbi@sas.upenn.edu
David Golumbia
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 12:51:30 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Golumbia <dgolumbi@SAS.UPENN.EDU>
Subject: Re: Re Refereed Journals
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SOL.3.91.960523101550.14674A-100000
@godzilla4.acpub.duke.edu> from "David Kellogg" at May 23,
96 10:34:53 am
Come to think of it, David K's suggestion that peer reviewing count
toward tenure (but aren't there "peers" who aren't tenure-track
professors??) is interesting. But also disturbing. As Steve Fuller hinted
in his letter to the Times today, there is a relatively astounding lack
of professional standards throughout the humanities. I mean, it'd be nice
to *reward* profs for being reviewers; but it'd be even nicer if they
*already* reviewed in a timely and thoughtful way, considering that it's
a relatively clear part of their professional duties (that is, if they've
accepted the role as reviewer on a journal in the first place).
Whoops! I'm gripin' too.
--
dgolumbi@sas.upenn.edu
David Golumbia
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 14:58:38 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: Re: refereed
DK & DG
In terms of submissions
my experience has been
similar
just goes to show
there is only one thing
you can be sure of
a literary journal
accepting
in each submission
whether 6 by 9
or business sized
large or small
checks
David Baratier
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 11:07:00 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Don Cheney <Don_Cheney@UCSDLIBRARY.UCSD.EDU>
Subject: Here, Kevin!
sorry kevin
i didn't mean to write "Here, here, Kevin" as if you were a pet or
something.
i meant HEAR, HEAR!
don
dcheney@ucsd.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 11:00:00 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Don Cheney <Don_Cheney@UCSDLIBRARY.UCSD.EDU>
Subject: Re: death in L.A.
---------------------------- Forwarded with Changes ---------------------------
From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM at @UCSD
Date: 5/23/96 8:25AM
*To: POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU at @UCSD
Subject: Re: death in L.A.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Here, here, Kevin!
I have an old black and white photo of my mom with John Beradino walking a
picket line together (i think in front of ABC-TV, Los Angeles). I always
thought he was cool just because of walking the lines in support of what must
have been an electrical workers strike (as my dad was vp of the IBEW in
Hollywood at that time (late 1960's)).
thanks Kevin, i didn't know that that was who Aldon was referring to.
Don Cheney
---------------------------------------------------------
This is Kevin Killian speaking.
Aldon N wrote I think rather dismissively about the death of John Beradino--
>FYI2 -- same _LA Times_ finally ran an article on the death, in Japan, of
>Johnny "Guitar" Watson -- took 'em long enough -- maybe they were shamed
>into by the obit. in New York -- Watson was a central figure in LA music
>for decades. In contrast, the same paper had a next day article on the
>death of an actor from the cast of _General Hospital_ --
IMHO, Beradino was a great star and a figure of major cultural importance.
Everyone knew he was in failing health and I'm sure the LA Times had a
correspondent with very close connections to Cedar-Sinai where the stars
die. He had to leave "General Hospital" in 1993 after thirty years,
because he was sick. Soap opera fans and baseball fans all over the world
are sad that he has died. Give him the dignity of his name now that he is
dead. But Aldon, I understand why the disparity between the reportage of
the two entertainers outrages you. Yet soap opera stars receive less
respect even than the great guitar players of our day. Why is that? I
think because their work is perceived as somehow effeminate, decadent, off
the beat. Ephemeral. Unrelated to life.
>-- Saved internet headers (useful for debugging)
>Received: from UCSD.EDU by mail.ucsd.edu; id IAA15393 sendmail 8.6.12/UCSD-2.2
>Received: from listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu (listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu [128.205.7.
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>Reply-T
>Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UB
>From: Kevin Killian <dbkk@SIRIUS.COM>
>Subject: Re: death in L.A.
>To: Multiple recipients of list POETICS
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 10:02:35 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark Roberts <M.Roberts@ISU.USYD.EDU.AU>
Subject: AWOL: Leith Morton & Philip Hammial in Japan (fwd)
>Mime-Version: 1.0
>Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 11:31:25 +1000
>To: awol@ozemail.com.au
>From: awol@ozemail.com.au (awol)
>Subject: AWOL: Leith Morton & Philip Hammial in Japan
>
>The following information has been posted by AWOl on behalf of the
>organisers of the two readings in Japan. Please address any enquiries to
>leithd@nichibun.ac.jp. Our thanks to OzLit for the information about these
>readings.If you haven't visited the OzLit site their URL is
>http://www.vicnet.net.au/~ozlit/
>
>
>
>*****************************************
>
>
>May 24 & May 30
>
>Poetry readings in English and Japanese by the Sydney poet , Philip Hammial
>and the Newcastle poet, Leith Morton, will be held in Japan on 24 and 30
>May. The first reading will be at the International Research Centre for
>Japanese Studies (Nichibunken), where Leith Morton is a visiting professor,
>in Kyoto; while the second reading will be at the Australian Embassy in
>Tokyo. In addition to the readings, talks will be given at several
>universites in Japan on contemporary Australian poetry by the two poets. A
>number of meetings have also been arranged with contemporary Japanese poets
>to discuss Australian and Japanese poetry. The readings have been organized
>with the financial assistance of the Literature Fund of the Australia
>Council for the Arts, Nichibunken and the Australian Embassy in Tokyo.
>Contact Leith Morton at the email addressleithd@nichibun.ac.jp for more
>information.
>
>
>
>
>AWOL
>Australian Writing On Line
>awol@ozemail.com.au
>http://www.ozemail.com.au/~awol
>PO Box 333 Concord NSW 2137 Australia
>Phone 61 2 7475667
>Fax 61 2 7472802
>
__________________________________
Mark Roberts
Student Systems Project Officer
Information Systems
University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia
M.Roberts@isu.usyd.edu.au
PH:(02)351 5066
FAX:(02)351 5081
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 10:10:30 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark Roberts <M.Roberts@ISU.USYD.EDU.AU>
Subject: Re: Come In Spinner!
>This is Kevin Killian. This post is especially to our Australian and Kiwi
>correspondents, but please, I need help from all. Have any of you read
>"Come In Spinner!" by Dymphna Cusack & Florence James? I am thinking of
>writing about this book and would appreciate knowing if anyone knows of
>previous critical studies. I don't want to say what everyone else has
>already said without knowing it (God, what a sentence, but I hope you know
>what I mean). Thanks to all. XXX Kevin K.
Kevin
I haven't actually read the book (but I have seen the mini series!!) if you
like I could post you enquiry to the Auslit discussion group and forward
any responses.
__________________________________
Mark Roberts
Student Systems Project Officer
Information Systems
University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia
M.Roberts@isu.usyd.edu.au
PH:(02)351 5066
FAX:(02)351 5081
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 18:37:44 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Ayre <david_ayre@MINDLINK.BC.CA>
Subject: KSW Events for June, 96
***********************************
* The Kootenay School of Writing *
* Vancouver B.C., Canada *
* EVENTS FOR JUNE 1996 *
* *
* email: ksw@wimsey.com *
* www: http://www.wimsey.com/~ksw *
* 112 West Hastings *
* Vancouver B.C. V6B 2G8 *
* (604) 688 6001 *
***********************************
The Kootenay School of Writing is extremely pleased to host a reading of new
work from Vancouver writers:
jam. ismail & Lisa Robertson
June 1st : Saturday : 8:00 pm : Admission $4/$5
jam. ismail is the author of sexions (1984) and co-author with artist
Jamelie Hassan of the
collaborative bookwork JAMELIE*JAMILA PROJECT (Presentation House
Gallery, 1992), She
has been featured in the journals Contemporary Verse, Capilano Review
and Canadian Literature,
the anthology Many-Mouthed Birds: Contemporary Writing by Chinese
Canadians (Douglas &
McIntyre, 1991) and Ankur magazine. She currently divides her time
between Hong Kong and Vancouver.
Poet and art critic Lisa Robertson is the author of XEclogue (Tsunami
Editions, 1993), Earth
Monies (Lounge, 1995) and The Apothecary (Tsunami Editions). She has
been published in West
Coast Line, Raddle Moon, Capilano Review and most recently in the
feminist journal Tessera and
in the British anthology Out of Everywhere: an anthology of
linguistically innovative writing from
women from the U.K. and North America (Reality Street Editions).
_____________________________________________
The Kootenay School of Writing is a
non-profit artist run center operated collectively
by working writers. For 11 years KSW has offered
the varied literary communities of B.C. readings,
workshops, and talks that challenge and motivate
critical enquiry into the ways and means
of language.
Visit Our Web site ! ------> http://www.wimsey.com/~ksw
Join our Email mailing list ! --> http://www.wimsey.com/~ksw/maillist.htm
The Kootenay School of Writing
ksw@wimsey.com
(604) 688 6001
112 WEST HASTINGS
v6b 2g8
Canada
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 18:41:19 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Ayre <david_ayre@MINDLINK.BC.CA>
Subject: KSW Events for June, not May
Sorry for any confusion... the subject header of
my last message should have read
Events for JUNE, and not May....
Lisa Robertson and jam. ismail are reading on June 1st,
Saturday, 8:00 pm at KSW.....
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Date: Thu, 23 May 1996 21:34:29 -0700
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From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: Re Refereed Journals
I'm sorry, but this is one of those times upon which I have to disagree
with Marjorie. Maybe it is because I am more interested in writing than in
scholarly criticism, but my experience with literary / critical journals
over too many decades to be cheerful about, is that the more interesting
writing has come from journals that are cranky, perhaps, run by devotees
rather than committees, have an exe to grind, and last a lot shorter time
that PMLA. I dont think that Pound's essays, or Williams's, or Stein's,
would ever have passed a group of referees. Yet essays full of
brain-numbing jargon do so every quarter. When referees read refereed
articles (and yes, I have been a referee), they tend to favour something no
more interesting than their own articles.
..........................
"the sunne
a good good mama
a very loud star"
--Anselm Hollo
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 03:18:45 -0700
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From: Ron Silliman <rsillima@IX.NETCOM.COM>
Subject: Ref them journals
Marjorie,
I haven't been as articulate as I would like to have been. I don't
think that the issue with journals is or should be one of fairness, but
rather one overall of providing the greatest value to the reader -- and
that I would argue can only come from a journal that presents a
distinct point of view. It almost doesn't matter whether it comes from
a clique (as in Social Text, SAQ, or the journal Bill Luoma likes to
call Reputations) or a single person (Clayton Eshelman, say, or even
Bly in The Fifties and Sixties, or Corman in Origin, or Bernstein &
Andrews in L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E or or or...). And, having worked on
Socialist Review, it's not that I'm setting myself off as any better
than anyone whose worked in a collective editorial process, regardless
of the method. But publications like Contemporary Literature are
ultimately lowest-common-denominator ventures. It's built into their
structure.
I never will buy a magazine because it has just one article that I'm
interested in -- and almost by definition, publications like CL never
will have two, so I end up never reading them. Give me Mirage
#4/Period(ical) any day of the week. I always know that Kevin and Dodie
will give me several things worth reading--and often from people whose
names I don't know or recognize (yet). In the long term, that's where
the value is -- and it's the likes of Kevin and Dodie who should be
getting the insitutional subsidies to make their work easier.
But, as a few folks have noted, there is more than a mere discursive
difference between cultural publications and ones in the "hard"
sciences. I wouldn't want Andrew Ross operating on my heart!!
All best,
Ron
P.S., hey, I like the Orioles, though I think it's time that Cal Jr.
think about switching to third or even (a la Ernie Banks) to first. And
(to complete the threading of current topics) Johnny Berardino, as he
was called when he played in the majors, used to be with the Orioles'
predecessor St. Louis Browns. He was their starter from '39 to '42 and
then again after he returned from the war in '46. His best year was
probably 1940, when he hit 16 home runs and drove in 85 RBI. He was a
shortstop in some years, second baseman in others and, after '46, was
pretty much a utility player. Batted and threw right handed. Lifetime
BA. of .249. I saw one obit that referred to him as "leading the
Cleveland Indians to their one World Series victory but he only played
66 games in 1948, batting just .190. Typical "good hands" infielder,
sort of what you look for in a surgeon, no?
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Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 09:40:30 -0500
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From: Navdeep Dhillon <nsd0@GTE.COM>
Organization: GTE Laboratories, Inc.
Subject: Poetics Mailing List FAQ
Does anyone know if there is a FAQ for this list, or another similar
list. If so, any information on where it's locate is appreciated.
Thanks in advance,
Navdeep Dhillon
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 10:20:45 -0500
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From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: KSW Events for June, 96
david ayre----so, do you know whwere lisa robertson's new book LOUNGE
can be gotten from? thanks, chris
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Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 11:20:47 -0400
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From: Mark Wallace <mdw@GWIS2.CIRC.GWU.EDU>
Subject: refereed, non-refereed?
Of course, there's no such thing as a non-refereed journal, there are
simply different types and degrees of refereeing. At the very least,
SOMEONE had to agree to accept a given piece, even if they didn't read it.
But I don't think the issue is whether one imaginative editor can accept
more risky work than a committee, or that a committee allows for more
thorough reading of a text. Instead, I think the issue has to do with the
POLITICS of contemporary humanities publishing. I think Ron Silliman is
right about the value of imaginative editors, given our current
environment, at least to the extent that many of
the most insightful essays on contemporary poetics will not appear inside
a normative academic publishing environment. Why? Charles Bernstein's
recent essay "Tone Lock" has the answers to that question, and I hope
that he'll forward that essay to the list, or tell people where it's
otherwise available.
The essential point of Charles' essay, which he can make more
eloquently than I can, is that contemporary "refereed" journals allow,
with very few exceptions, for only one kind of critical TONE--that of the
dispassionate, objective, scientific "observer"--and this is usually true
no matter how much the critic in question would critique any of the above
terms. That is, it's not simply that contemporary referreed journals
publish "experts," but that there is a language that expertise must speak
in order to be considered expertise. As long as that is true, the
most interesting articles will be published by journals who can exist
outside the "refereed" environment, that is, outside an environment that is
not value-free and chooses the most interesting articles, but rather is an
environment that determines in advance that one tone, and one tone only,
is proper for the expert.
Of course, there are exceptions which make the issue more
complicated. Boundary 2 used to publish a variety of interestingly
"alternative" format essays until its original editor, the vastly
underrated William Spanos, passed it along to the slick and professional
emptiness of Paul Bove. Before that, all sorts of things used to happen
in Boundary 2. And another area of exceptions is that people like Charles
Bernstein, who have acquired enough "cultural capital" that they HAVE to
be listened to by people who would prefer to ignore them, often do get to
publish alternative format essays in "refereed" (read: TONE LOCKED)
journals. But from my own firsthand experience, Charles' work is often
not taken seriously as criticism precisely because people look at the
alternative format of his work and so "oh, he's just a poet"--i.e. he
succeeds in writing against the grain at the cost of being considered an
"expert" at all in many normative academic environments.
For my own money, the most interesting poetics essays in recent
years have all been published in journals that exist outside the refereed
environment--Chain, Talisman, Witz, Poetic Briefs, Lower Limit Speech,
Aerial, Taproot, many
others. Essays in those journals are often looser and sloppier, I'll
admit, than those essays in the standard refereed journals. But in
challenging the normative criteria of tone-locked academic journals, they
do provide an environment in which criticism can remain engaged on the
level of TONE, as well as being not totally chained to the variety of
limitations that such tone-lock creates for critical thinking. Of course,
there's no doubt that excellent articles on poetics do appear in academic
journals, but they nonetheless always seem pretty coercively standardized.
At Poetic Briefs, and with Leave Books, having a group editorial
staff never harmed our ability to publish even the most extreme critical
texts--we weren't beholden for our money to the current standardized
practices of academic criticism.
The Leave Books publication A POETICS OF CRITICISM, still
available I believe from SPD, features a variety of critical essays (of
varying degrees of success, I'll grant) that do not have the standard
form of critical essays and nonetheless are being put forward as
criticism. There is almost not a single essay in that collection that
could have been published in a refereed journal, which is proof, I
think, that more needs to be done to challenge the control that tone lock
has over what supposedly constitutes successful critical thinking.
So what's at stake here is not whether one person is better than
a committee, but rather the politics of critical practice--that is, the
problem of who controls the resources and puts forth the standards for
what counts as "acceptable" critical practice.
Mark Wallace
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Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 10:42:47 EST
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From: Keith Tuma <KWTUMA@MIAMIU.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Re: Ref them journals
In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 24 May 1996 03:18:45 -0700 from
<rsillima@IX.NETCOM.COM>
I think it's true that journals like Contemporary Literature don't have a
distinct point of view--agreeing with Ron Silliman here--but I don't think it's
at all true that a lowest common denominator is "built into" their structure.
If we consider refereed journals not one at a time but within something like
the profession of literary or cultural studies as a whole, it's rather
hierarchy or structured conformity that is the end result. Such and so--say
our own Alan Golding--will typically be sent articles on contemporary American
poetry by the editors of CL, and they will largely defer to his review. Now
Alan's own articles--for CL but especially for another journal with a little
more so-called prestige (say Critical Inquiry)--will be refereed by somebody
else who's been around a little longer, who's a little higher in the academic
pecking order. Say our own Marjorie Perloff for instance. (Not that Critical
Inquiry cares much for contemporary poetry anymore, or that Marjorie actually
reads for them.) By the time you get to Harvard UP there's relatively few
people being asked to referee manuscripts. These are the people who've been
around longest, have the biggest reputations etc. At the top of the heap
there's--oh I don't know, say Harold Bloom or Helen Vendler--sitting behind
the screen like the Wizard of Oz. Now this pyramid figure I'm sketching is
overly simplistic--there are actually many pyramids and more freedom of
circulation and movement within them than such a caricature suggests. And
what some might call conformity here (the results of the profession's referee-
structure) others would call standards. Distinct or idiosyncratic points of
view do tend to have their edge removed by such a power-structure but not
because a lowest common denominator rules but rather a particular set of
(more or less questionable) standards, methodologies, and interests. Such
power structures seek to perpetuate themselves, though they also require
contestation and change. It used to be one of the functions of
non-professional journals like Sulfur to whack away at these orthodoxies
but given the hyper-specialization of the humanities and arts today I'm not
sure that that's happening very much, or rather that anyone not already
predisposed to read Sulfur (or other similarly-edited journals) is paying
much attention. On the other hand we do have people like Marjorie--who must be
asked to review a thousand manuscripts a year--moving between zones in a useful
way. Sorry--all this could be clearer. I'm sympathetic to Ron's point, but
I can't accept this "lowest common denominator" formulation. And in
comparing L=A=N=G=U=A=G-E and Contemporary Literature we're also comparing
apples and kiwi. Both of 'em necessary in a healthy diet.
banalities for a friday afternoon,
Keith Tuma
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Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 08:42:31 -0700
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From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: eniacs
In-Reply-To: <199605240407.AAA27294@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
I normally would agree with Rid that Andrew does good work, etc. -- BUT,
if what he says in the first two paragraphs of his response is an
accurate reflection of the real discussion among the editorial board of
his journal, then the journal should damn well go out of business -- How
can anyone justify publishing an article that they believe is inadequate
(meanwhile, I prseume, rejecting any number of quite interesting and
well-constructed unsolicited essays [try "presume"] from non-physicists)
is beyond me --
On the other hand, I cannot understand why blind editorial review should
be considered obnoxious -- If it were not for blind review (the VERY FEW
places where the blindness is real, and not an editorial fig leaf) those
of us who do not happen to have gone to graduate school with the editors
would be out in the cold forever --
Take a gander, by the way, at the list of people who got tenure track
jobs in English departments that appears in the back of the same issue of
_Lingua Franca_ -- The message this list seems to convey to prospective
grad. students is that you'd better go to one of the big power schools
like UCLA or Yale if you want to get a job when you graduate --
Rod, sorry about that "Rid" -- and to everybody, sorry about the grammar
above -- can't use cursor keys to back up and make corrections -- whoever
designed the interface between DOS and MAC applications for e-mail must
have been malicious or stupid --
employed and blindly yours,
a.l.nielsen
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Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 08:50:23 -0700
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From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: death and the times in LA
In-Reply-To: <199605240407.AAA27294@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
no dismissal intended, sorry if some felt -- All I was getting at was
that if one works in television, the LA TIMES will take notice -- whereas
should one devote decades to working in the black music community of LA,
as opposed, say, to getting paid for def jam, they;ll take their bloody
time getting around to you --
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Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 12:09:28 -0500
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From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: blindness and inside
Please forgive me riding my hobby-horse
So then an end
is to include the
poem in the poem
Is that possible or even desirable
Are we meant to figure out the criteria for possibility
Or are we arguing out of necessity
Is this side of things about definite v indefinite
as opposed to the popular idea that it is about object v subject
What is it you are saying about this politic
--Jd
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Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 13:15:00 -0400
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From: Bill Luoma <Maz881@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: Soaps
Kevin,
You are right to point out that baseball players are huge soap fans.
Thank you for your support.
Bill
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 07:59:00 -1000
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From: Robert J Wilson <rwilson@HAWAII.EDU>
Subject: free fall of Social Text/"slick professional b2"
In-Reply-To: <199605241018.DAA27532@dfw-ix2.ix.netcom.com>
A Few Banalities and Animadversions from Hawaii
Some of you may have read the essay by Bruce Robbins in a recent *Social
Text* (45, Winter 1995) called "Some Versions of U.S, Internationalism" in
which Bruce Robbins (Andrew Ross's co-editor at the ST "Editorial
Collective") tried to map out the cultural-politica differences of
globalization/localization tactics ("adversarial internationalism") of
four differently situated U.S. cultural studies journals-- Diaspora,
boundary 2, Social Text, and Public Culture in that order-- and re-ground
these tactics in the US geopolity/state/civil society domains of
discourse-production.
Such a push to draw a 'cognitive map'for the emerging collective vision of
each journal was helpful and cautionary, especially for one such as myself
who has attempted since 1989 as 'advisory editor' to push b2 into
"Asia/Pacific" reaches and to pressure the local resistance/local poetics in
any globalization visions of capitalist restructuration.
While I found Bruce's overall vision of 'transnational capital' rather
appallingly user-friendly and overforgiving, and his reading of the
quasi-Marxist globalism of b2 off the mark re what he took to be its
Euroamerican rationalism cum 'romanticization of the local' as site of
contemporary resistance (thus getting the global/local dialectics of b2
wrong on both counts), I was startled at how he explained and justified
(trumping b2 as it were) the cultural politics and commodity-culture
rooted populism of Social Text (in its contemporary moment), with one ear
tuned to the streets and the other to the capitalist poetics of the
corporate board room as he said.
Robbins explained the political edge of the "culturalism" of Social Text
in the following terms (p.102): "as one instance of what has been called
culturalism, it tries to colonize and assimilatate authoritative
discourses that claim not to be culture by identifying them as cultural
constructs and revealing the social interests hidden behind them, as the
titular notion of the social-as-text suggests." As an embrace of 'popular
culture,' furthermore, ST turns against entrenched hierarchies,
escpecially of expertise-guarding elites. I have no problem with the
latter tactic, but I am startled by the 'colonizing' reach of this ST
'culturalism' into and across all domains of knowledge and into the very
subatomic reaches of understanding and the real as such. Do we want such
an over-extended "culturalism"? What kinds of practics and values and
discourses will such a vision generate: an "antifoundationalism" towards
what (neopragmatic/liberal US ends)?
Shaking the foundations of professional expertise at and around ST, Sokol
is now accused of having written a sophomoric 'fraud' and having violated
the very professional ethics and professional decorums that sustain such
expertise knowledge communities (Stanley Fish,predictably, in his Oped
take-out so-called Sokol piece); but what the NYU professor of physics has
actually written is not so much 'fraud' as a parodic miming of the pomo
cult codes (some of his footnotes are pretty hilarious) and a sending up
of an over-extended 'culturalism' colonizing domains of
reality/history/material production and reproduction where it may just
fall apart or become wishy-washy and inadequate.
That ST editors ex post facto can now claim (via AR on WWW) that they knew
all along it was a 'sophomoric' piece of cultural studies by a naive
scientist; that ST is never 'refereed' (what is the in-house critical
collective but a set of primary discrimination makers of the in/out,
enacting [sure, informally] the rules for what passes as any "Social Text"
text); and that the Sokol essay was going to be dropped from the expanded
book edition at Duke UP (this would be an unusual post facto decision to
make, as Duke UP usally runs all the essays and whatever else the editors
choose to add from its journals "special issues," within space limits of
course), sounds like more critical two-step shuffle to me: why not admit
to having been deceived and worked from the insights and struggles of that
moment? Sure, it's a postmodern black hole now: That a pro-Sandinista
physicist can be embraced as an ally by Rush Limbaugh on right-wing talk
radio and be stimulated by the "Higher Superstion" faction of
anti-pc-construction science to write such a piece just plays into the
spectacle of media reductions-- some at b2 have suggested this will only
drive up the subscription lists of ST and generate more cultural capital
and "science war" discourse for the players (if they don't fall or leap
from NYU windows and fall upward, "deconstructing postmodern gravity,
slyly") and the press.
Despite this Ross/Sokol fiasco, ST remains an inventive and important
cultural studies journal; it has provided timely critiques of
'postcolonial discourse' machine and affiliated itself with domains of
popular culture and transnational critique we need to know of in NYC to
Seoul. Ross, eg, has done astonishing work on the cooptation of local
Pacific culture in Hawaii by the Polynesian Cultural Center (Mormon
"culturalism") and the political ambiguities of Hawaiian sovereignty
struggle in "Chicago Gangster Theory of Life: Nature's Debt to Society."
But Sokol has, I think, caught Ross and the ST "Star Wars" discourse
apparatus in an over-extension of their 'culturalism,' miming the codes in
devious simulacrous ways that reflect and refract where the journal is
philosophically at. As somebody has said, under such pressure, the
"subject position" is oozing into "position(s)."
boundary 2 is no set of holy rollers, to be sure, and the "critical
collective," post-Spanos, practices its own methods of inclusion/exclusion
and discursive maneuverings on US academic turf: I will say that, since
the editorship of Paul Bove, each submission is screened initially by him,
sent out to another reader on the critical collective, and, if the
interest is there given two or three reader's hard-hitting reports to
suggest ways to revise and strengthen. Hard stories on
rejections/omissions/sins of commission may abound still. But "special
issue" prjects (such as forthcoming one to be edited by Charles Bernstein,
like one in the past and another by Arif Dirlik on "Postmodernity in
China") enact ways to cut across in-house boundaries and knowledge domains
of areas/disciplines/ professional expertise.
The b2 editorial collective is not perfect, to be sure, but it remains
"Gramscian" at core in the ongoing and multi-sited attempt to forge a
counter-hegemony to the injustices and imperfections of capitalism in its
colonizing transnational/local reach.
The St fiasco should give us pause on how such journals procede and what,
in truth and trope, they finally stand for inside/against US "collective"
struggle.
Rob Wilson
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Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 12:07:47 -0700
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From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: refs
In-Reply-To: <199605240407.AAA27294@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
Many departments DO, in fact, "count" work as a journal ref., but rather
modestly, under the heading of professional service -- I'm not sure I'd
want to see it go much farther than that -- do we really want tenure
committeess passing judgement on the quality of the work we do passing
judgement?
Bigger problem to me is how these groups of refs. are constituted in the
first place -- Too often winds up, yet again, being a list of the
editors' friends rather than any kind of systematic attempt to convene
scholars who are doing important work in whatever field -- This is
particularly a problem if the work you do opens up new areas (new only to
critics, I hasten to add) -- for example -- when I write about avant
garde black poets -- my work is typically sent to some freind of an
editor who is "in" African-American literature, but who hasn't read three
poems in the last year -- OR to some "specialist" in poetry, who hasn't
read any poetry by black writers (perhaps excepting Brathwaite &
Brooks?!?) post WWII --
It's NOT that there are too few scholars working with this poetry; it IS
that too few editors can trouble themselves to find out who they are --
AND, as radically democratic as I tend to be, I've found the words
"editorial collective" to mean, generally, abandon any hope of democratic
openness ye who submit here --
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 17:47:36 -0400
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From: Steven Howard Shoemaker <ss6r@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: fake radio
If you get to the end of this you'll see that it's written by one
Joel Woller at Carnegie Mellon. steve
> > All--
> >
> > For whatever it is worth, I am attaching a copy of my two cents on
> > Sokalmania. I've been travelling, hence my tardiness.
> >
> > One further brief comment. The issue for us is not realism or any of
> > the other topics which Bhaskar in particular addresses so well. Still
> > less is all of this about Andrew Ross. The question is how how the
> > left, and in particular the academic left, is represented to various
> > publics. That's why I agree entirely with having a second panel on the
> > Sokal adventure, one focused on the left and the media.
> >
> > ----------------
> > 22 May 1996
> >
> > All Things Considered
> > National Public Radio
> > <atc@npr.org>
> >
> > Dear ATC:
> >
> > Bravo! Encore! Thank you so much for your brilliant critique of the
> > narrow-minded anti-intellectualism of Gross and Levitt~s The Higher
> > Superstition (All Things Considered, May 15). No fan of Derrida and
> > company, I was nevertheless thrilled by your ruthless depiction of those
> > who would, in the name of reason, refuse to engage their writings in a
> > reasonable manner.
> >
> > Your ~Sokal~ is without doubt the most engaging parody of the
> > reactionary academic type since Saul Bellow~s crotchety classics
> > professor ~Bloom~ appeared on the scene about a decade ago. It is
> > clearly this character, ~Sokal,~ who provides the cutting edge of your
> > Swiftian satirical spoof. His arrogance (~I deal with the real world
> > every day~~as we non-physicists don~t); his pompous demeanor (witness
> > the tone of voice with which he read passages from non-fictional
> > scholars such as Derrida); his self-righteousness (as he declares
> > himself a leftist and feminist, for instance); his naivete (in believing
> > that cooperating in the production of a fluffly ~man bites dog~ type of
> > story somehow advances the causes of science and the left); his
> > ignorance (as if Social Text claimed to be edited in the manner of a
> > science journal, or even to be a juried journal); his disarming
> > simple-mindedness (a well-written 19th century parody of Darwin would
> > not necessarily have been false, after all~even by ~Sokal~s~ own
> > presumed standards of argument)....the details of your characterization
> > are absolutely stunning.
> >
> > Furthermore, your characterization of ~Sokal~ is remarkably consistent.
> > For instance, his substitution of a flimsy rhetorical question (~What
> > the hell does [Derrida] mean?~) for a carefully-argued position reflects
> > the irrationality of his overall position, since, as he refuses to
> > really argue with his chosen antagonists, ~Sokal~ demonstrates that it
> > is actually he who disrespects reason even as he claims to speak in its
> > name. Thus, you expose the underlying contradiction of the position
> > which rejects critiques of science in sweeping terms: for in
> > defensively mocking those who study or would study the venerable
> > institution of science, ~Sokal~ mystifies science and destroys the
> > critical spirit that true science requires. ~Sokal~s~ commitment is not
> > to the practice of science, which is indeed exemplified especially well
> > in the best critical studies of science, but rather to the unquestioned
> > authority of an idol of science (which, like any deity, is not to be
> > looked at too carefully).
> >
> > The actor portraying ~Sokal~ certainly brought to life the figure who
> > has filled the pages of Social Text, Lingua Franca, and The New York
> > Times. However, the performance of the actor playing the snickering
> > journalist was just as good, and perhaps even more subtle. For this
> > fictional journalist never even claimed to have attempted to contact the
> > editors of Social Text. In failing to adhere to basic standards of
> > journalistic objectivity as he ~reports~ (in the midst of his own Rush
> > Limbaugh-style laughter) on the lack of objectivity allegedly possessed
> > by social and cultural critics of science, the "journalist" character
> > ironically undermines his own position. Well done!
> >
> > I do have one concern, however. Since in this case you dropped the
> > ~satire from~ tag that you attach to the work of the likes of Harry
> > Shearer, I suspect that some listeners may have been taken in by your
> > hoax. Unable to appreciate the joke, on the basis of the May 15 show
> > and others like it they may conclude that your programming now more
> > than ever resembles that of the commercially-sponsored corporate media;
> > in particular, they might reason that a piece such as yours serves, in
> > the end, to trivialize the entire debate about science, the institution
> > of the university, and indeed the very notion of truth. Why then aid
> > your underwriters in keeping you on the air? they may ask. Good humor
> > may not be for all of us, all the time.
> >
> > Very sincerely yours,
> >
> > Joel Woller
> > Carnegie Mellon University
> > Department of English
> > Program in Literary and Cultural Theory
> >
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 19:44:36 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Lisa Samuels <lsr3h@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU>
Subject: Sokal responds (fwd)
more on the matter --
ls
According to Michael Uebel:
> From root Fri May 24 18:26:31 1996
> Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 18:25:41 -0400
> From: Michael Uebel <mdu6f@faraday.clas.virginia.edu>
> Message-Id: <199605242225.SAA82462@faraday.clas.Virginia.EDU>
> X-Mailer: Mail User's Shell (7.2.5 10/14/92)
> To: eng-grads@virginia.edu
> Subject: Sokal responds
>
>
> >From Alan Sokal:
>
> Here's the latest news from the NY Times: After giving
> Stanley Fish 38 column inches (not including graphics) to
> misrepresent my views, and giving Bruce Robbins and
> Andrew Ross an additional 4 column inches to restate their
> own views and mildly misrepresent mine, the NYT letters
> editor (Kris Wells, 212-556-1873) has refused to print my
> 12-column-inch reply. She said I could have only 7.3 column
> inches. Since such drastic compression would make a
> travesty of my letter, I refused.
>
> Here, for your interest, is the letter the NYT refused to
> print.
> Feel free to distribute it.
>
> Best, Alan Sokal
>
>
> To the editor:
>
> It's not every day that a mere theoretical physicist such as
> myself has the honor of being subjected to a half-page
> personal attack by the august Stanley Fish ("Professor
> Sokal's Bad Joke", May 21). Fortunately, his allegations
> can be refuted in far fewer words.
>
> Fish implies that I am opposed to all sociology of science,
> and that I fail to understand the elementary distinction
> between sociology of science and science. Give me a break!
> I have no objection whatsoever to sociology of science,
> which at its best can clarify the important political and
> economic issues surrounding science and technology.
> My only objection is to _bad_ sociology of science ---
> numerous examples of which are praised (!) in my parody
> article in the spring/summer 1996 issue of _Social Text_.
>
> Fish's discourse on the "social construction" of science and
> baseball is amusing, but the situation can be stated much
> more simply. The laws of nature are not social constructions;
> the universe existed long before we did. Our theories about
> the laws of nature are social constructions. The goal of
> science is for the latter to approximate as closely as
> possible the former. Fish seems to agree.
>
> Unfortunately, not everyone in the trendy field of
> "cultural studies of science" agrees.
> In a lecture at the New York Academy of Sciences
> (February 7, 1996), _Social Text_ co-editor Andrew Ross
> said: "I won't deny that there is a law of gravity.
> I would nevertheless argue that there are no laws in
> nature, there are only laws in society. Laws are things
> that men and women make, and that they can change."
> [verbatim quote in my notes]
>
> What could Ross possibly mean? That the law of gravity
> is a social law that men and women can change?
> Anyone who believes _that_ is invited to try changing
> the laws of gravity from the windows of my apartment:
> I live on the twenty-first floor.
>
> Now, perhaps all Ross means is that our
> _understanding_ of the laws of physics changes over
> time; but if that's what he meant, why didn't he say so,
> and what's the big deal?
>
> Granted, not even the _Social Text_ editors would deny
> the existence of an external world, or claim that
> "physical `reality' \ldots\ is at bottom a social and
> linguistic construct." The fact remains that they
> published an article saying exactly this
> in its first two paragraphs. And despite my repeated
> requests during the editorial process for substantive
> comments, suggestions and criticisms, none were ever
> received, just an acceptance letter.
>
> Concerning my ethics, this issue is treated in detail in
> my article in the May/June issue of _Lingua Franca_, so
> I won't repeat it here. Suffice it to say that there is a
> long and honorable tradition, going back at least to
> Jonathan Swift, of truth-telling through satire.
> Doesn't Fish have a sense of humor?
>
> My goals, however, are utterly serious.
> I'm a leftist and a feminist and proud of it;
> I'm angered by a shoddy "scholarship" that claims to be
> left-wing but in fact, through its sophistry and
> obscurantism, undermines the prospects for progressive
> social critique. Like innumerable others from diverse
> backgrounds and disciplines, I call for the left to reclaim
> its Enlightenment roots.
>
> But let me now shut up:
> far better to give voice to the humanists and social
> scientists who have been flooding my e-mail for the
> past two weeks, expressing relief that the nakedness
> of their local emperors has finally been exposed.
> Let's hear their stories about the debate that is now
> opening up.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Alan Sokal
>
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 21:40:30 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: Soaps
>Kevin,
>
>You are right to point out that baseball players are huge soap fans.
>
>Thank you for your support.
>
>Bill
And taking my mother as typical (and what else could she be?), I have to
point out that she has been watching (I think it is) "The Edge of Night"
(either that or "As the World Turns" AND the Montreal Expos on TV for 25
years.
..........................
"Stupidity is not my strong point."
--Valery
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 24 May 1996 22:40:25 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Marjorie Perloff <perloff@LELAND.STANFORD.EDU>
Subject: Re: interesting/boring journals
Comments: To: Automatic digest processor <LISTSERV@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
In-Reply-To: <199605250406.AAA14768@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
I do agree with Ron, of course, that literary journals are much better,
livelier, etc. if they have a point of view. But journals like Sulfur,
Language, Poetics Journal, Talisman, etc etc. aren't sponsored by
university presses, don't pretend to be run by an "editorial collective"
and all that. When a journal is a kind of house organ at a particular
university (e.g., Critical Inquiry, New Literary History, Diacritics),
with a board made up of people both within and without said university,
then there's some responsibility to reach out and include unknowns who
might just submit a brilliant article.
What I objected to was Ross's saying that all the articles in sT are
invited, commissioned. That seems to me not Kosher. And when he went on
to say that, hey, Alan Sokal was someone "we didn't even know," as if,
well, then he must be some suspicious type, I do cringe.
Incidentally, at U-Wash, where I just spent a delightful two days at a
Comp Lit colloquium, a grad student finally gave me the Sokal article and
I think it's even more amazing than I would have believed. Fabulously
done and utterly devastating. He is constantly praising Ross and
Aronowitz and subtly working in their statements into his physics rap. It
is truly in line with Swift etc.--a brilliant piece of work. Read it!
Marjorie Perloff
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 25 May 1996 05:43:05 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Alexander <chax@MTN.ORG>
Subject: presses in Ireland?
Dear Poetics List-ers:
A question came up on a book arts list, wondering about small presses &
private presses & related activity in Ireland. If anyone here knows of such
activity and where to find it, please post information to me (chax@mtn.org)
so I can forward it to that list and help some travelers. This would include
small literary & non-literary presses, particularly (but not limited to) any
doing letterpress printing, binding, etc.
thank you.
charles alexander
chax@mtn.org
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 25 May 1996 09:57:50 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: george hartley <gehartle@MAGNUS.ACS.OHIO-STATE.EDU>
Subject: orono in June?
Would someone please send me registration & rooming info for June's poetry
conference at Orono? I just heard about it last week. Anyone sharing rooms?
Thanks, George Hartley
gehartle@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
(614) 792-2642
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 25 May 1996 09:06:26 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: reading Sokal in SoCal
In-Reply-To: <199605250406.AAA14768@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
thanks for reproducing the Sokal letter -- this makes one thing stand out
clearly --
Ross says that the ST editors tried to get some changes made in the
article, and that the author refused to make such changes --
Sokal says that he asked for editorial advice, but that all he received
was an acceptance letter --
One need not adhere to a correspondence theory of truth to recognize that
at least one of these letters is wildly misleading --
this much is serious indeed and ought to be aired in public
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 25 May 1996 12:31:35 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joel Kuszai <v369t4kj@UBVMS.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: David Wilk
Does anyone out there in poeticsLand have any current info on David Wilk:
where to reach, if available, & is there a David Wilk and/or Truck
archive--
thanks-
=========================================================================
Date: Sat, 25 May 1996 13:52:20 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Alexander <chax@MTN.ORG>
Subject: Re: David Wilk
>Does anyone out there in poeticsLand have any current info on David Wilk:
>where to reach, if available, & is there a David Wilk and/or Truck
>archive--
>
>thanks-
Joel
David Wilk, after Truck and after his stint as head of Literature at the
NEA, in about 1982 or 83 founded Inland Books in East Haven, Connecticut. I
heard that Inland within the last year has been through one or another stage
of bankruptcy proceedings and has been to some degree reconstituted as
Inbooks (perhaps spelled InBooks?). As Inland, and continuing as InBooks,
they distribute some small press literary books. I didn't have good luck
with them for Chax books, and discontinued sending them books several years
ago. When I began making books, however, David Wilk was immensely helpful to
me, and I wish him very well. I have two addresses, but remember, both of
them are some years old, and you might want to find some directory which is
more current. But here they are:
P.O. Box 120261
East Haven, CT 06512
(203) 467-4257
and/or
140 Commerce Street
East Haven, CT 06512
As far as any Truck archive goes, I'd certainly suggest asking David Wilk.
As a journal, I'm not certain when Truck published its last issue. As a
distributor (Truck Distribution), when David Wilk went to the NEA in the
late 1970's he sold Truck Distribution (reportedly for a cup of coffee, but
perhaps that's apocryphal) to Jim Sitter, who re-named it as Bookslinger.
When the ten or so best-selling, largest producing presses pulled out of the
non-profit Bookslinger in the late 1980's (my chronology is by memory here)
to go with the for-profit Consortium Book Sales & Distribution, which was
begun by someone leaving Bookslinger & attracting those presses away,
Bookslinger hung on with difficulty only due to the hard-working and
much-caring hands of Rod and Hanje Richards, but finally went under in 1993.
With the increasing professionalization of distribution for a dozen or so of
the biggest small presses in the country, and the nearly simultaneous demise
of Bookslinger and Segue Distribution, most small press distribution was
left to SPD. And while I like SPD, in general small press distribution was
in much better shape 10 or 15 years ago than it is now, except for the very
largest of the small presses. There are many reasons for this, including the
demise of indepent booksellers, the rise of chain book superstores, the
difficulties of funding for distribution, general trends in the economy, and
more.
But this is more than you asked for. Good luck tracking down David Wilk.
charles
=========================================================================
Date: Sun, 26 May 1996 08:53:04 -1000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Robert J Wilson <rwilson@HAWAII.EDU>
Subject: :re: spanos/post-spanos b2
Dear Mark Wallace, I am taking the liberty to write to you out of the
(internet) blue after I saw your comment on the Buffalo "poetics" list re
the way *boundary 2* journal, in past ten years post-Spanos, has moved
away from experimentation of form/tone/genre/language game in the
editorial shift from Spanos to Bove as main editor. You do have a
clear-hitting case, and perhaps with C Bernstein editing a special issue
of b2 in the near future with an array of interviews and poetic/poem
materials, there can be a chance of reclaiming some of this language area.
But more more should be done on many fronts re the ongoing reinvention of
scholarly/theory/poetics form of discourse in USA outlets. The journal is
much too Northeastern/Atlanticist in its problematics as well
When I coedited a special issue of b2 on"Asia/Pacific as Space of Cultural
Production," I used some pidgin and indigneous language poems and some
Pacific cultural works in nonstandard genres (fiction/"Our Sea of Islands"
theory by Hauofa) not only because it reflected key cultural work out in
postmodern Pacific but because (invoking the Spanos precedent), we could
reclaim and reimagine some of those language territories and moves. The
"slick and professional emptiness of Paul Bove" that you indict may be a
function of how the collective is constituted now and what it sees as
professional and cultural work. The collective has its own tensions and
devisions re what constitutes "an international journal of postmodern
culture" and literary-critical work.
There seems to be almost little to no interest in poetry there anymore,
but there is a really interesting packet of materials in next b2 on the Ho
Chi Mih "Prison Diary" poems, showing how cannily critical of Vietnames
transnationalization he was, and using translation forms (by Steve
Bradbury) that expose the ideology of form ("American free verse") of
prior translations (done, for the most part, not from the Chinese but the
French).
A lot of the stuff is impossibly repetitive, stale, miming the careerist
codes, so I do appreciate your scathing critique re the "tone locked"
academic form of the essay even b2 has become reified into. Need to push
on that in ways that Bernstein's "A Poetics" inventively,
heteroglossically, and courageously opens up even in a deadwood press like
Harvard UP american poetics. Take care, Rob Wilson
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 27 May 1996 10:52:39 GMT+1200
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: refereed, non-refereed?
Good one, Mark Wallace!
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 27 May 1996 09:47:13 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark Roberts <M.Roberts@ISU.USYD.EDU.AU>
Subject: Readings/Lit scene in Auckland
Dear Poetics people (especially those in New Zealand)
I received the following post to the AWOL address the other day and I was
wondering if anyone can help with some information. You can backchannel me
at M.Roberts@isu.usyd.edu.au or awol@ozemail.com.au with info and I will
pass it on. Many thanks
>From: rschofie@ALPHA2.CURTIN.EDU.AU (Dennis Schofield)
>Subject: request for info re New Zealand
>X-Sender: rschofie@cc.curtin.edu.au
>To: awol@ozemail.com.au
>MIME-version: 1.0
>
>Dear Mr Roberts,
>I've just been given AWOL's email address as a group that may be able to
>provide me with some information regarding Auckland's lit scene. I'm trying
>to put myself in contact with any groups over there that have regular
>readings, and wondered if you might know of any, or know of somebody else
>who might. I'm planning to be in Aukland for a week early in July, and
>although it isn't something that comes naturally to me, I thought that while
>I'm over there I should put in a bit of self-promotion. My novel,
>Slackwire, was published by Fremantle Arts Centre Press last year, and being
>the smallish press that they are, they don't have much of a promotional
>budget (they tell me). So I was hoping to get brave and give the book a bit
>of an airing myself while in Auckland. I haven't yet, though, been able to
>find anyone who can put me in contact with Auckland's local lit groups. I'm
>hopeful, then, that you may be able to help me.
>Thanks for your time, and hoping to hear from you,
>Dennis Schofield.
>
>email: rschofie@cc.curtin.edu.au
__________________________________
Mark Roberts
Student Systems Project Officer
Information Systems
University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia
M.Roberts@isu.usyd.edu.au
PH:(02)351 5066
FAX:(02)351 5081
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 27 May 1996 09:19:18 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Poetics List <poetics@UBVMS.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: Welcome Message
Rev. 5-16-95
____________________________________________________________________
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. Who's Subscribed
4. Digest Option
5. When you'll be away
6. The Electronic Poetry Center (EPC)
7. Poetics Archives at EPC
8. Publishers & Editors Read This!
[This document was prepared by Charles Bernstein (bernstei@acsu.buffalo.
edu) and Loss Pequen~o Glazier (lolpoet@acsu.buffalo.edu).]
____________________________________________________________________
1. About the Poetics List
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 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.
Word-of-mouth (and its electronic equivalents) seems to be working fine.
The "list owner" of Poetics is Charles Bernstein: contact me for further
information. As of May, Joel Kuszai is working with me to administer the
list. For subscription information contact us at POETICS@UBVMS.CC.BUFFALO.EDU
____________________________________________________________________
2. Subscriptions
The list has open subscriptions. You can subscribe (sub) or
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the one-line message should say:
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The most frequent problem with subscriptions is bounced messages. If your
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If the problem is low disk quota, you may wish to request an increase from
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____________________________________________________________________
3. Who's Subscribed
To see who is subscribed to Poetics, send an e-mail message to
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You will be sent within a reasonable amount of time (by return e-mail) a
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____________________________________________________________________
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set poetics digest
NOTE:!! Send this message to "listserv" not to Poetics or as a reply
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____________________________________________________________________
5. When you'll be away
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:
You can temporarily turn off your mail by sending a message:
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 7 below.)
____________________________________________________________________
6. 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 Pequen~o Glazier.
____________________________________________________________________
7. 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
____________________________________________________________________
8. 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
lolpoet@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 your
word 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 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: Mon, 27 May 1996 12:25:29 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: David Wilk
I'm almost positive that David Wilk's not to be found at the addresses
Charles A. posted. The Inland bankruptcy was completed a few months ago. The
new outfit (it actually existed before the ruptcy), InBook, operates through
Login publishers-- Wilk may or may not still be connected w/ that. I'll see
what I can find out.
Rod
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 27 May 1996 09:28:41 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: Sokal in SoCal II
In-Reply-To: <199605270412.AAA29582@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
Today's _L.A. Times_ wieghs in on the _Social Text_ scandal, managing to
codescend to all parties at once -- Identifying Stanley Fish as "the
publisher" of the journal (apparently because the _N.Y. Times_ identified
him as the exec. dir. of Duke U P). Having insulted everybody, they agree
with Fish: "The field of cultural studies may be sluggish in making
progress, it may need to bone up on Strunk & White's "Elements of Style"
and it may have wasted too much energy on such pursuits as studying the
genesis of Tupperware. But given the cultural misunderstandings that
continue to surround us at home and abroad, surely we can see the
importance of its mission as defined by Fish:"
There you have it -- cultural studies as diversity management!
And one can't help but wonder what Strunk and White would have to say
about that image of "the field of cultural studies" boning up on their
manual -- just how does a field bone up?
To round things out, this editorial is followed by another that
concludes: "No one is suggesting that universities make their best
reseachers teach intorductory chemistry or physics." Of course, if that
did happen, perhaps a few more professors in our field would realize that
Pi is not a variable.
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 27 May 1996 09:31:23 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@ISC.SJSU.EDU>
Subject: Re: Bob Kaufman in SoCal
In-Reply-To: <199605270412.AAA29582@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
The last session of the American Literature Association conference in San
Diego will include a panel on Bob Kaufman -- If you're in San Diego and
interested, come on by the Bahia --
Rae -- did you ever get the schedule? If not, call me at (310) 473-4018
& I'll give you info. over the phone --
Kaufman session is Sunday morning, by the way --
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 27 May 1996 13:12:03 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Alan Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Poem of Weeping Ghosts in Sonnet Form
The Poem of Weeping Ghosts
I wept because I had no shoes until I dreamed a man who had a tree.
A rolling tree groped its way past stubbed branches yearning in the night.
A stitch in branches sutured the soul to its repeated self.
Give them their tired wounds yearning for repetition saving nine.
I can be led to runes; I can scoop them up.
Runes heal all wounds of selves repeated branches scraping sky.
Skies repeat skies as definitions of neurosis you can't tell to stop.
The world's neurotic with you; the world's psychotic alone.
Beneath the sun, the silent world is all there is.
Within the silent world a tree falls silently weeping.
Time makes the hearts of trees fall groping.
The weeds are always groping on the other side of the fence.
There, silently weeping, I sit shoeless on the wrong side of the tracks.
There, by Albion, silently being born.
__________________________________________________________________________
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 27 May 1996 15:30:21 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: eniacs
this is Rid speaking:
My main point, & this is where the defense of Ross comes in-- The "point" of
Ross's last book can be summed up thusly-- that corporate culture operates
out of the assumption that there isn't enough to go around. It seems more
than reasonable to question this assumption. As long as "the game wins" most
of us won't. This is what you won't find much, or any discussion of at NYT &
co. So given the relative power of Social Text vs the times it's important, I
think, to ask why _this_ issue for the Times & not another.
The discussion on this list so far wld not be that different had the Sokal
story been on the cover of AWP.
------------------------------------------
May 24th A.L. wrote:
I normally would agree with Rid that Andrew does good work, etc. -- BUT,
if what he says in the first two paragraphs of his response is an
accurate reflection of the real discussion among the editorial board of
his journal, then the journal should damn well go out of business -- How
can anyone justify publishing an article that they believe is inadequate
(meanwhile, I prseume, rejecting any number of quite interesting and
well-constructed unsolicited essays [try "presume"] from non-physicists)
is beyond me --
On the other hand, I cannot understand why blind editorial review should
be considered obnoxious -- If it were not for blind review (the VERY FEW
places where the blindness is real, and not an editorial fig leaf) those
of us who do not happen to have gone to graduate school with the editors
would be out in the cold forever --
Take a gander, by the way, at the list of people who got tenure track
jobs in English departments that appears in the back of the same issue of
_Lingua Franca_ -- The message this list seems to convey to prospective
grad. students is that you'd better go to one of the big power schools
like UCLA or Yale if you want to get a job when you graduate --
Rod, sorry about that "Rid" -- and to everybody, sorry about the grammar
above -- can't use cursor keys to back up and make corrections -- whoever
designed the interface between DOS and MAC applications for e-mail must
have been malicious or stupid --
employed and blindly yours,
a.l.nielsen
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 27 May 1996 17:09:19 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Alexander <chax@MTN.ORG>
Subject: publications & rights
dear poetics listers:
I received the text of the following message on another list, but thought it
might be at least a tangent to the poetics list discussion of
refereed/unrefereed journals. Plus i'd be curious -- are academic literary
journals and/or anthologies and/or collections these days generally demanding
agreements like this message describes?
charles alexander
chax press
chax@mtn.org
_________________________________________________________
>Yesterday (Saturday) I received page proofs for an article which had been
>requested by the editors of an international journal about the middle ages.
>
>Included was a "Letter of Agreement" from the university press which will
>publish this journal. Short and too the point, it states:
>
> "The undersigned author hereby grants and assigns to ______
>University Press the copyright and all publication and subsidiary rights in
>his/her contribution to _______, edited by ______ and ______ ."
>
>Absent from the page proofs was the copyright symbol which accompanied the
>manuscript.
>
>This concerned me. I e-mailed the senior editor that all I was willing to
>grant was first North American serial rights (meaning that while they may
>copyright the whole issue, as an issue, I will retain copyright [property
>right] in my contribution).
>
>The editor is concerned that this may not be negotiable. On Tuesday the
>press in question should be open for business (!) again and we will see.
>
>If the terms are not negotiable, neither am I. It's a life.
>
>Jack
>
> Jack C. Thompson
> Thompson Conservation Laboratory
> The Caber Press * Istor Productions
> Portland, OR 97217
> 503/735-3942 (voice/fax)
> jct@Reed.edu * tcl@teleport.com
> http://www.teleport.com/~tcl/index.html
>
> "Is a half-wit herbalist only parseley sage?"
> Don Guyot, 1996
>
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 27 May 1996 20:16:55 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Michael Heller <hellerm@IS2.NYU.EDU>
Subject: Re: San Diego Reading
In-Reply-To: <199605270412.AAA29582@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu>
MICHAEL HELLER READING AT PORTER TROUPE GALLERY
301 SPRUCE STREET
SAN DIEGO
SATURDAY, JUNE 1ST AT 2 PM
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 27 May 1996 11:59:29 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Michael Coffey <MCOFFEY@PW.CAHNERS.COM>
Subject: David Wilk -Reply
Comments: To: v369t4kj@UBVMS.CC.BUFFALO.EDU
joel kuszai wrote:
Does anyone out there in poeticsLand have any current info on David
Wilk: where to reach, if available, & is there a David Wilk and/or Truck
archive--
thanks-
david's inland books (a wholesaler of alternative press books), alas,
has gone bankrupt, but a small distribution outfil that sprang out of it,
inbook, has survived, in that it was purchased by login, a distributor
based in chicago, and david, has gone along with it (although i'm not
sure if he relocated to chicago or not); login can be reached at Login
Brothers Book Co., 1436 Randolph St, Chicago, Ill. 60607; phone
800-621-4249; and they will put you in contact with david.
if this doesn't turn him up, give me a call and i'll check some publishing
industry directories for updated numbers etc.
michael coffey
212-463-7660
or mcoffey@pw.cahners.com
=========================================================================
Date: Mon, 27 May 1996 12:19:56 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Michael Coffey <MCOFFEY@PW.CAHNERS.COM>
Subject: presses in Ireland? -Reply
Comments: To: chax@MTN.ORG
dear charles alexander:
an introduction to what's happening in ireland can be found in the march
issue of American Bookseller, the publication of the american
booksellers association; i'm sure they would fax you the article if you
called them at 800-637-0037
or ask for Dan Cullen, the managing editor there, who fancies himself an
Irishman.
i do a lot of reading in irish poetry; it's a fabulour pasttime for many
reasons, but one of which is that the place of poetry in ireland is
almost a metaphor for expression in a cultural/historical context: it is a
neat metaphor, by which i mean ireland can be grasped, the tradition is
small, workable; and continues with a certain focus (there are only 3
million people in ireland); it has an original bardic history (poetry in irish
bing perhaps the oldes vernacular spoken art in europe) and has its
language of the victor, english, making language a particulary bloody site
of cultural conflict. and ireland, being the wessternmost outpust of
eurpoean civilication is still (relatively) unchanged racially and culturally
(though my no means unchanged).
one way i keep in touch with books irish is through a website from
kennys bookshop in galway; they will send you monthly postings of
new books and you can order from them.
Please direct all orders/queries to Aine O'Connor at aine@kennys.ie
Kennys Bookshop & Art Galleries Ltd., High Street, Galway, Ireland
Tel + 353.91.562739 Fax + 353.91.568544 Email maryse@kennys.ie
Check out the March issue of The Kenny Review, our on-line newsletter
at:- http://www.iol.ie/kennys/Review.html
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 08:07:19 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Henry Gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: blindness and inside
In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 24 May 1996 12:09:28 -0500 from <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
On Fri, 24 May 1996 12:09:28 -0500 Jordan Davis said:
>Please forgive me riding my hobby-horse
Va bene. Sta bene.
>
>So then an end
>is to include the
>poem in the poem
E una relazione etica - veramente concreta e DonJuan Castanedica.
>
>Is that possible or even desirable
Si e possibile ma e troppo difficile per me - scuzi.
>
>Are we meant to figure out the criteria for possibility
>Or are we arguing out of necessity
E un questione di le due fondazione della realta: la giustizia e
il miracolo (o lo scandalo - le due sono uno).
>
>Is this side of things about definite v indefinite
>as opposed to the popular idea that it is about object v subject
Scuzi - ma il motor-scooter Americanski - c'e a vuoi? E - perche?
>
>What is it you are saying about this politic
La politica e una questione solo per le prigioniere. No - e per tutto -
ma le prigioniere provisano il... come sei dice... "the answer"
- Enrico Gouldini
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 09:34:28 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Re: Poem of Weeping Ghosts in Sonnet Form
In-Reply-To: "Your message dated Mon, 27 May 1996 13:12:03 -0400"
<Pine.SUN.3.91.960527131023.3789A-100000@panix3.panix.com>
If the weeping ghosts poem is a sonnet, then what does sonnet mean?
Apparently a poem in 14 lines and/or a poem that its author chooses to call a
sonnet.
IS it good and useful for poetics as a field to ahve its terminology become SO
open in meaning that a term like sonnet ceases to carry much information?
By the way, after much thought, and largely in response to the passioante and
fascinating debate we inspired on this list, Kathrine (coeditor) and I have
decided we want to open the forms anthology to any experimental forms,not just
chants and others that repeat the typical language elements, but any, ANY, so Iv so i
reiterate the earlier request for people to edit sections (CONSISTING of a
brief intro describing how the form works and several pages (5-6?) of represe
ntative examples of the form). PLEASE, contact me to propose such sections on
any form you desire to work with. IN response to the previous request, I got three
sestinas(!) and nothing else--but we would really like someone(s) to edit
sections on forms we haven't thought of before, even forms that may not be
formal by the "conspicuous repetition" definition. So please come
forward--I'll send you detailed guidelines when I hear from you.
Annie Finch
ph 513-961-4982
Af maons on ansand fo teh lpes21
wot knesli
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 09:53:22 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steve Carll <sjcarll@SLIP.NET>
Subject: Nonset Form
At 09:34 AM 5/28/96 -0500, Annie Finch (hi Annie, haven't seen you since New
College days!) wrote:
>IS it good and useful for poetics as a field to have its terminology become SO
>open in meaning that a term like sonnet ceases to carry much information?
Yes, it is. If the term sonnet tells you too much about what to expect in
the poem, the poem itself becomes superfluous. Why read another bloody
sonnet if it's just going to do exactly the same as all the other sonnets?
The word sonnet is always going to carry some information, why not play with
that, stretch the boundaries of possibility?
I'm not at all anti-form, but when I work in one, I want the form and myself
to TRANSform each other.
Alan, "Weeping Ghosts" is a beautiful poem. Thank you for posting it.
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
``````````````````````````````````````````````
Steve Carll sjcarll@slip.net
I listen.
I hear nothing. Only
the cow, the cow
of nothingness, mooing
down the bones.
~~Galway Kinnell
``````````````````````````````````````````````
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 13:46:44 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Kellogg <kellogg@ACPUB.DUKE.EDU>
Subject: Re: interesting/boring journals
In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.93.960524223424.26389F-100000@elaine30.Stanford.EDU>
On Fri, 24 May 1996, Marjorie Perloff wrote:
> journals like Sulfur,
> Language, Poetics Journal, Talisman, etc etc. aren't sponsored by
> university presses, don't pretend to be run by an "editorial collective"
> and all that.
Right. The type of journal makes all the difference. The inside cover of
Social Text has all the apparatus of a peer-reviewed journal (submit
essays in triplicate to such-and-such address in this form), and there's
in fact nothing to indicate otherwise. (Nor to indicate that you're
probably wasting your time, since everything's solicited anyway).
Seriously now: all of us can tell the difference between Talisman and
Contemporary Literature, and the fact that Talisman happens to be livelier
doesn't meant that CL should stop being peer-reviewed. With regard to
Social Text, Ross's claim that the journal isn't peer reviewed is an
obvious attempt to escape responsibilty for publishing an article that
nobody on the board (or collective) cared to engage seriously.
Cheers,
David
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
David Kellogg Duke University
kellogg@acpub.duke.edu University Writing Program
(919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708
FAX (919) 684-6277
There is some excitement in one corner,
but most of the ghosts are merely shaking their heads.
-- Thomas Kinsella
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 08:31:15 +1200
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Dan Horne <DHORNE@NZ.ORACLE.COM>
Subject: Sokal
Lately there's been a lot of emails on the Sokal debate. Unfortunately, it
seems I've picked up the threads halfway through, so I'm not even sure what
the story is, although it sounds mighty interesting. Can someone please give
me a brief summary so that I can follow this apparently juicy subject?
Regards
Dan Horne
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Technical Analyst
Oracle New Zealand Ltd. +64 9 309 1946
Level 16, 7 City Rd dhorne@nz.oracle.com
Auckland, New Zealand
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed here are my own, and are not
necessarily those of Oracle Corporation.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 17:09:42 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jonathan Brannen <jbrannen@INFOLINK.MORRIS.MN.US>
Subject: Re: chax books
Caroline,
I just picked up a copy of _Marine Snow_ at Talking Leaves bookstore in
Buffalo for $12.00 (US). You can order by mail from Talking Leaves. I've
misplaced the store's address but maybe somebody in Buffalo can provide it.
Of course, it was probably the store's only copy, so you might be better off
going directly to the press as Charles suggested.
My copy of MacCormack's _Quill Driver_ (Nightwood Editions, probably
available from SPD) has neither a publication date nor a copyright date in
it. I think it came out between _Straw Cupid_ and _Quirks & Quillets_, but
it might be more recent. If you don't already have them, I highly recommend
them also.
I just got back from a camping trip or I would have responded sooner.
Best,
Jonathan Brannen
>>On Wed, 22 May 1996, Jonathan Brannen wrote:
>>
>>> if you're not already familiar with the work of Karen MacCormack (whose
>>> work deserves to be more widely known than I suspect it is), _Quirks &
>>> Quillets_ is a worthy introduction.
>>
>>I second that motion. Has she published anything since _Quirks & Quillets_?
>>
>>Carolyn Guertin
>>cguertin@julian.uwo.ca
>
>Yes, _Marine Snow_ came out in 1995, from ECW Press, and it's quite
>marvelous. ECW, I believe, is trying to gain distribution by SPD, but may
>not have such distribution yet. The address of ECW is 2120 Queen Street
>East, Toronto, Ontario M4E 1E2, Canada. The price is not printed on the
>book, so I can't tell you what it costs, Canadian or American.
>
>Chax will be bringing out Karen Mac Cormack's _The Tongue Moves Talk_ in
>the fall of 1996. I'm sure I'll make some kind of announcement on the
>Poetics List, although keep in touch, please. We should be moved before that
>book comes out, so it's possible I won't have email or Poetics List
>connection for a while in late summer/early fall.
>
>charles alexander
>chax press
>p.o. box 19178
>minneapolis, mn 55417
>usa
>
>612-721-6063
>chax@mtn.org
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 18:06:39 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Re: Poem of Weeping Ghosts in Sonnet Form
Counselor Carll having discussed this part--
>IS it good and useful for poetics as a field to ahve its terminology become SO
>open in meaning that a term like sonnet ceases to carry much information?
--I'd like to look at this part, your honor.
>If the weeping ghosts poem is a sonnet, then what does sonnet mean?
>Apparently a poem in 14 lines and/or a poem that its author chooses to call a
>sonnet.
As someone recently excused from a jury panel--having admitted writing
poetry, and surviving the discussion of poetry pursuant to that
admission--I would ask counsel to supply the hidden parameters in her
definition of 'sonnet' to be acknowledged by the clerk--and registered as
evidence--for it is this counsel's position that the poem in question,
'poem of weeping ghosts in sonnet form', may or may not be a sonnet, but
may never be 'apparently' anything until all parties have produced
evidence.
Juridically,
Jd
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 18:11:21 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: scsi fcta
Henry--
forgive me Laura Riding's Italian--
but--
are you saying--
that the taste of miracle-gro--
is the foundation of realty?--
there is a car--
perched--
beside the motorscooter--
a is next to the--
to the b--
viz David Schubert--
the poetics--
the prison--
is down among the trees--
you want me to come see--
'il duce'--
with thee?--
Jd
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 09:25:50 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark Roberts <M.Roberts@ISU.USYD.EDU.AU>
Subject: AWOL: Next Wave Festival (forwarded)
>Mime-Version: 1.0
>Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 22:13:18 +1000
>To: awol@ozemail.com.au
>From: awol@ozemail.com.au (awol)
>Subject: AWOL: Next Wave Festival
>
>The following information has been posted by AWOL on behalf of the Next
>Wave Festival. For further details please use the contact details for the
>Next Wave Festival at the end of the post.
>
>
>
>***************************
>
>
>NEXT WAVE WRITERS WEEKEND
>
>Saturday 1 June - Sunday 2 June. Next Wave Writers Weekend will be held in
>Storey Hall RMIT 360 Swanston Street, Melbourne, Melbourne Co-operative
>Bookshop, Lounge 243 Swanston Street Melbourne, Budinski's upstairs 380
>Lygon Street Carlton & RMIT Bookshop RMIT corner Swanston & La Trobe
>Streets Melbourne.
>
>Costs: Storey Hall Readings and Forums: session $4 day ticket, $10 weekend
>ticket $15 (Show'n Tell $8, $6 with weekend ticket). Free entry to Spiels
>Reading, Electric Words, launches & demonstrations).
>
>
>Program:
>
>
>1 June
>
>
>11am Flesh it Out - writers perform. Seminar Room, Story Hall. Edward
>Berridge, Anna Kay, Michael Foster, Moira Burke, Claire Murphy.
>
>11.15 Electric Words Antoni Jach's Introduction to CD-Rom literature,
>Lecture Theatre, Storey Hall (free).
>
>12pm I Started a Fan-zine. Zine-sters discuss their careers. Lecture
>theatre Storey Hall. Richard Watts, Tracy Grimson, Vicki Shuttleworth,
>Gerry (Dark Angel). Chaired by Phillippa Byrne.
>
>1pm Physical Mass. Writers Perform. Seminar Room Storey Hall. Edwina
>Preston, Eric Dando, Jim Buck, Bernadette Taylor, Mark Panozzo.
>
>1.30pm CD-Rom Demonstration RMIT Bookshop Free.
>
>2pm Fear & the Other. Homophobia, misogyny, racism & the writer. Forum,
>Lecture Theatre, Storey hall. Raimondo Cortese, Leonie Stevens, Christos
>Tsiolkas, Anna Kay.
>
>3pm In Your Face. Writers Perform. Seminar Room, Storey Hall. Justine
>Ettler, Kathryn Buck, Rob Walmsley, Tom Ball, Richard Watts.
>
>3.30pm CD-Rom Demonstration RMIT Bookshop Free.
>
>4pm The Journalist as Writer: Journalists discuss their writing. Forum,
>Lecture Theatre, Storey hall. Matthew Jones (Outrage, Melbourne Star
>Observer,) Michelle Griffin (freelance), Felicity Lewis (Herald Sun).
>
>8pm Show'n Tell: Speak now or forever hold your piece. Storey hall
>Auditorium. An evening of spoken word performance from Melbourne artists,
>live bands and live crosses to New York performers. Featuring Richard
>Watts, Edwina Preston, Howlings in the Head, Eric Dando & the Bald Men in
>Sleeping Bags, Tom Ball, Jay Kranz, Neil Boyack, Cecilla Mellis (cost $8 or
>$6 for day and weekend ticket holders).
>
>
>2 June
>
>11am Speaking of Spoken Word A global conference of print-medium writers &
>spoken word practitioners debating the spoken word medium, both in
>Melbourne & live from New York. Conference, Lecture Theatre Storey hall.
>Chaired by Kerry Watson. Melbourne speakers: Peter Salmon, PI0,Howlings in
>the Head. New York speaker: Bob Holman (Nuyorican Poets & United States of
>Poetry).
>
>12pm. Fictions Writers perform. Seminar Room Storey hall. Leonie Steveens,
>Lisa Greenaway, Scott Robinson, Karen McKnight, Ken Hew.
>
>12.15pm Electric Words Antoni Jach's Introduction to CD-Rom literature,
>Lecture Theatre, Storey Hall (free).
>
>1pm What we Talk About When we Talk About Dirty Realism: A literary
>movement? a genre? or just a dirty word? Forum Lecture Theatre Storey hall.
>Edward Berridge, Justine Ettler, Neil Boyack.
>
>1.30pm CD-Rom Demonstration RMIT Bookshop Free.
>
>2pm Read My Lips Writers perform. Seminar Room Storey Hall. Barbara Wels,
>Natasha Cho, Alicia Sometimes, Andy Griffiths, Clare Mendes.
>
>3pm Rock'n Roll Aint Literary Pollution: Rock journalists explore their
>words. Forum, Lecture Theatre, Storey Hall. Clinton Walker, Tracey Grimson,
>Paul Stewart, Lauren Zoric. Chaired by James Young.
>
>3.30pm CD-Rom Demonstration RMIT Bookshop Free.
>
>4pm Face the Music: writings about and with music. Seminar Room Storey
>Hall. Chris Gregory, Clinton Walker, Jay Kranz, Cecillia Mellis, Membrane
>
>5pm Overland launch: Next Wave Overland issue of writers and editors under
>30. Storey Hall Auditorium Foyer - free. Featuring guest speaker and
>performances by contributors
>
>5.30pm Spiels Reading Frank Moorhouse and University of Melbourne Students.
>Budinski's free (doors open 5pm) Upstairs 380 Lygon Street Carlton.
>
>
>For further information contact the Next Wave Festival Phone 03 9417 7544,
>fax 03 9417 7481 or email nextwave@peg.apc.org
>
>
>AWOL
>Australian Writing On Line
>awol@ozemail.com.au
>http://www.ozemail.com.au/~awol
>PO Box 333 Concord NSW 2137 Australia
>Phone 61 2 7475667
>Fax 61 2 7472802
>
__________________________________
Mark Roberts
Student Systems Project Officer
Information Systems
University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia
M.Roberts@isu.usyd.edu.au
PH:(02)351 5066
FAX:(02)351 5081
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 09:27:21 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mark Roberts <M.Roberts@ISU.USYD.EDU.AU>
Subject: AWOL: OVERLAND 143 & the Next Wave Festival (forwarded)
>Mime-Version: 1.0
>Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 06:58:55 +1000
>To: awol@ozemail.com.au
>From: awol@ozemail.com.au (awol)
>Subject: AWOL: OVERLAND 143 & the Next Wave Festival
>
>The following message has been posted by AWOL on behalf of OVERLAND
>magazine. OVERLAND 143 will be launched this Saturday as part of the Next
>Wave Festival Writers' Weekend in Melbourne. It is available now from the
>AWOL Virtual Bookshop (email us for details or look at our web site).
>OVERLAND 143 will also be available shortly at the following bookshops:
>Readings (Hawthorn), Greens Bookshop (Flinders Lane), Avenue Bookshop
>(Albert Park), Pentimento Bookstore (Balmain), Norton Street Bookstore
>(Leichhardt), Gleebooks (Glebe), Ariel Booksellers (Paddington), The
>Bookshop (Darlinghurst & Newtown), The Library Shop (State Library of NSW),
>Half a Cow (Glebe), University Co-op Bookshop (ANU), National Library Shop
>(Canberra) and the Friendly Street Reading Bookshop (at their monthly
>reading in Adelaide). If you favourite/local bookshop doesn't stock
>OVERLAND they can order it through AWOL.
>
>
>
>******************************************************
>
>
>
>
>Next Wave festival meets OVERLAND
>
>The winter issue of OVERLAND is the result of a unique collaboration
>between an Australian literary magazine and a festival. The issue forms a
>part of the literary activities of the 1996 Next Wave Festival, and
>consists entirely of work by writers under 30 and selected by a group of
>young editors enrolled in various creative and professional writing courses
>around Melbourne. The enlarged issue has been specially designed for the
>festival with new fonts, a new cover, and special layouts by Stephen Banham
>of The Letterbox.
>
>Work in the issue includes a discussion of relationships by internet, poems
>on ducks and goannas, a story from the borders of the Roman Empire and a
>poem of directions for adventurers and dreamers.
>
>Other features deal with the age of grunge and the phenomenon of the zines
>and their culture. Tony McGowan introduces readers to the world of Sydney
>Westies and surfies. Mic Smith goes hitching from Tailem Bend to
>Gellibrand, and tom ball finds love mixed up with everything except capital
>letters. Eric Dando writes a modern fairy tale of Jack Sprat and the bean
>stalk. Edwina Preston gives us Parsiphae's view of the bull. & Neil Boyack
>finds a mother in a bar.
>
>There is also the traditional OVERLAND mix of fiction,,poetry, features and
>reviews, but all from the perspective of the next wave of writers. These
>are the authors who are already writing our future.
>
>OVERLAND 143 will be launched during the Next Wave Festival Writers Weekend
>in Storey hall RMIT on 2 June at 5pm.
>
>OVERLAND is distributed by AWOL and is available for Aust$8 from AWOL's
>Virtual Bookshop (check out our website http://www.ozemail.com.au/~awol or
>call us for details).
>
>
>AWOL
>Australian Writing On Line
>awol@ozemail.com.au
>http://www.ozemail.com.au/~awol
>PO Box 333 Concord NSW 2137 Australia
>Phone 61 2 7475667
>Fax 61 2 7472802
>
__________________________________
Mark Roberts
Student Systems Project Officer
Information Systems
University of Sydney NSW 2006 Australia
M.Roberts@isu.usyd.edu.au
PH:(02)351 5066
FAX:(02)351 5081
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 18:39:54 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: Poem of Weeping Ghosts in Sonnet Form
Hey, Anne Finch,
Since when do sonnets have to be 14 lines long? I've seen lots of them that
are 11 or 12.
..........................
"Stupidity is not my strong point."
--Valery
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 21:59:59 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Deirdre Kovac <Eurydice@AOL.COM>
Subject: Big Allis Offer
As noted with the recent reading/launch announcement, Big Allis #7 is hot off
the press and in celebration of this the following offers are extended to the
poetics list and its environs and acquaintances:
Big Allis #7 / $5
Work by: Jean Donnelly, Laurie Price, Ann Lauterbach, Charles Bernstein, Joan
Retallack, Deirdre Kovac, Gail Sher, Anne Tardos, Hannah Weiner, Mark
DuCharme, Elizabeth Fodaski, Stephen Ratcliffe, James Sherry, Tom Beckett,
Caroline Bergvall, Michael Gottlieb, Stacy Doris, and Rod Smith. And perfect
bound, with pictures!
Big Allis Back Issues #1 through #6 / $3 each
(Note: Issue #4 may take longer to ship.)
Subscription / $12
Includes two issues (indicate issue to start with) and one back issue of your
choice.
All prices include domestic postage. An invoice will be sent with magazines.
(Please include full name and mailing address with any order.)
IMPORTANT NOTE: Nothing regarding these offers should be sent to the poetics
list.
All orders, queries, etcetera should be sent backchannel, directly to me via
e-mail: Eurydice@aol.com
or, if e-mail is not possible, via post:
Big Allis
c/o Deirdre Kovac
20 Douglass Street #3
Brooklyn NY 11231
Thank you in advance. No quote. Deirdre.
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 23:06:17 -0400
Reply-To: Robert Drake <au462@cleveland.Freenet.Edu>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Robert Drake <au462@CLEVELAND.FREENET.EDU>
Subject: AVEC sale (fwd)
Cydney Chadwick asked me to repost this; apologies if it's a duplicate.
Please respond to Cydney (at chadwick@crl.com), *not* to me or to the
whole list...
lbd
[begin forwarded message]:
AVEC SALE
A special sale for subscribers to the Poetics List and internet
users: for $14 you will receive: AVEC #4, which contains part two of
a translation section of contemporary poetry and prose from France
(most of the work is still unpublished in book form and unavailable
elsewhere). It also includes work by Michael Palmer, Lyn Hejinian,
Clark Coolidge, Laura Moriarty, Leslie Scalapino, an image and text
piece by Johanna Drucker, art by Susan Bee, and cover art by New York
School painter Norman Bluhm.
Also: Avec #8. With this issue the journal began featuring longer
sections of work per contributor, some of whom are: Elizabeth Willis,
Sianne Ngai, Chris Stroffolino, Agnes Rouzier, Friederika Mayrocker,
Kieth & Rosemary Waldrop, and the award-winning photo-text collboration
by Norma Cole and Ben E. Watkins.
And finally: A Cast of Tens by David Bromige. The 29th book by the 1988
winner of the Western States Book Award.
"Bromige is a master at probing the irreducibilities of symbolic
logic, and his playful yet outrageous equivalencies explode the
neat, cut-and-dried tautologies of Wittgenstein: "The old man is
112 pages long / and so is the sea / They are deeply symbolic
(psychotic)." Bromige's structures are sinuous and mathematic,
and they evoke the tonal colors of Schoenberg, Satie, or Cage,
successfully evading what Bromige has characterized as iambic
pentameter's "echoic invasions."--Taproot Reviews
"Bromige combines the erudite with the dryly humorous."--The Independent
Sale from May 18-July 14th (Bastille Day). Please make checks payable to
AVEC: PO Box 1059, Penngrove, Ca 94951.
e-mail:chadwick@crl.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 00:45:39 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: Poem of Weeping Ghosts in Sonnet Form
Annie Finch:
> If the weeping ghosts poem is a sonnet, then what does sonnet mean?
> Apparently a poem in 14 lines and/or a poem that its author chooses to call a
> sonnet.
> IS it good and useful for poetics as a field to ahve its terminology become SO
> open in meaning that a term like sonnet ceases to carry much information?
Annie:
1. Just as a metrical pattern can be played against until the pattern
becomes almost unrecognizable except in terms of perpetual modulation,
so the *idea* of a particular form can supplant its normal technical
demands of the poem--especially after hundreds of years, when said
form might well be presumed to be sufficiently in place.
2. Sometimes the word *haiku* is employed to merely to suggest a succinct
poem, often comprised of a single sentence, which makes use of, or
parodies, (as in senryu, really a variation, if I recall correctly, of
the tanka) stylized concrete observation.
3. Just so, a sonnet can be seen purely in terms of its formal argument,
compression, contour, diction, or play on any of these. Likewise, I
would argue that any poem devoted to the exploration of *any* aspect of
sonnet form may legitimately be called a sonnet in some sense.
4. Still, none of this is particularly useful to know if you are
trying to master Shakepearean, Petrarchan, Miltonian, Keatsean (or
Etceterean) sonnet form. I myself like to write what I call
*parallel sonnets* (I can't be the only one who's done this),
in which the the metric is syllabic/accentual (rather than the other
way around) and the simple rhyme scheme is as follows:
a. abcd abcd efg efg.
b. Here is an example, which I present here to show my technical
interest in the sonnet form, a form for which I feel no particular
reverence:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
_Parallel Sonnet_
Her tazed remains electrify the lake,
your Gamma rays deface our clientele.
I've eyed the sore through diadems of plasma
like silver bottles made of Plutarch's nerves.
A whiff of midden hypnotized the hick:
his face expanded like a parasol.
The mandibles of corpses belch miasmas,
tinting the wind in which a cinder swerves.
Go home, erased equestrian, tapeless worm.
You tongue the twelve-inch someone wants to type.
To err is Hume, the shell-game is the switch--
or else the verb assasssinates its form.
The glove reverts to thumb, the trill to strip
of chins in pails, that itch to drop in pitch.
(orig. published in Cups Magazine, 1989)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hope this helps.
All the best,
Rob Hardin
PS: I've done a ridiculous number of experiments in Greek meter,
acrostics using medieval classical/contrapuntal techniques and
irregular stanzaic patterns, neo-Campionesque quantitative verse,
my own versions of Augenmusik, etc. I'd regard all of these as
hopelessly anal if I didn't weren't addicted to the medieval
period and its cerebral, almost arbitrary approach to
questions of musical form. Thus, I'd love to submit work
to your forthcoming anthology of form(al) poetry.
(Tel: 212/477-1066, afternoons)
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 00:48:10 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: Poem of Weeping Ghosts (oops--corrected)
Annie Finch:
> If the weeping ghosts poem is a sonnet, then what does sonnet mean?
> Apparently a poem in 14 lines and/or a poem that its author chooses to call a
> sonnet.
> IS it good and useful for poetics as a field to ahve its terminology become SO
> open in meaning that a term like sonnet ceases to carry much information?
Annie:
1. Just as a metrical pattern can be played against until the pattern
becomes almost unrecognizable except in terms of perpetual modulation,
so the *idea* of a particular form can supplant its normal technical
demands--especially after hundreds of years, when said form might well
be presumed to be sufficiently in place.
2. Sometimes the word *haiku* is employed merely to suggest a succinct
poem--often comprised of a single sentence--which makes use of, or
parodies, (as in senryu, really a variation, if I recall correctly, of
the tanka) stylized concrete observation.
3. Just so, a sonnet can be seen purely in terms of its formal argument,
compression, contour, diction, or play on any of these. Likewise, I
would argue that any poem devoted to the exploration of *any* aspect of
sonnet form may legitimately be called a sonnet in some sense.
4. Still, none of this is particularly useful to know if you are
trying to master Shakepearean, Petrarchan, Miltonian, Keatsean (or
Etceterean) sonnet form. I myself like to write what I call
*parallel sonnets* (I can't be the only one who's done this),
in which the the metric is syllabic/accentual (rather than the other
way around) and the simple rhyme scheme is as follows:
a. abcd abcd efg efg.
b. Here is an example, which I present here to show my technical
interest in the sonnet form, a form for which I feel no particular
reverence:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
_Parallel Sonnet_
Her tazed remains electrify the lake,
your Gamma rays deface our clientele.
I've eyed the sore through diadems of plasma
like silver bottles made of Plutarch's nerves.
A whiff of midden hypnotized the hick:
his face expanded like a parasol.
The mandibles of corpses belch miasmas,
tinting the wind in which a cinder swerves.
Go home, erased equestrian, tapeless worm.
You tongue the twelve-inch someone wants to type.
To err is Hume, the shell-game is the switch--
or else the verb assasssinates its form.
The glove reverts to thumb, the trill to strip
of chins in pails, that itch to drop in pitch.
(orig. published in Cups Magazine, 1989)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hope this helps.
All the best,
Rob Hardin
PS: I've done a ridiculous number of experiments in Greek meter,
acrostics using medieval classical/contrapuntal techniques and
irregular stanzaic patterns, neo-Campionesque quantitative verse,
my own versions of Augenmusik, etc. I'd regard all of these as
hopelessly anal if I weren't addicted to the medieval period and
its cerebral, almost arbitrary approach to questions of musical
form. Thus, I'd love to submit work to your forthcoming anthology
of form(al) poetry.
(Tel: 212/477-1066, afternoons)
=========================================================================
Date: Tue, 28 May 1996 06:21:35 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Pierre Joris <joris@CSC.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: query
In-Reply-To: <199605272209.RAA07720@freedom.mtn.org>
Does anyone on the list have the snail-mail address of Victor Hernandez
Cruz? Please backchannel, if possible. Mercy buttercups -- Pierre
=======================================================================
Pierre Joris | "Form fascinates when one no longer has the force
Dept. of English | to understand force from within itself. That
SUNY Albany | is, to create." -- Jacques Derrida
Albany NY 12222 |
tel&fax:(518) 426 0433 | "Poetry is the promise of a language."
email: | -- Friedrich Holderlin
joris@cnsunix.albany.edu|
=======================================================================
On Mon, 27 May 1996, Charles Alexander wrote:
> dear poetics listers:
>
> I received the text of the following message on another list, but thought it
> might be at least a tangent to the poetics list discussion of
> refereed/unrefereed journals. Plus i'd be curious -- are academic literary
> journals and/or anthologies and/or collections these days generally demanding
> agreements like this message describes?
>
> charles alexander
> chax press
> chax@mtn.org
>
> _________________________________________________________
>
>
> >Yesterday (Saturday) I received page proofs for an article which had been
> >requested by the editors of an international journal about the middle ages.
> >
> >Included was a "Letter of Agreement" from the university press which will
> >publish this journal. Short and too the point, it states:
> >
> > "The undersigned author hereby grants and assigns to ______
> >University Press the copyright and all publication and subsidiary rights in
> >his/her contribution to _______, edited by ______ and ______ ."
> >
> >Absent from the page proofs was the copyright symbol which accompanied the
> >manuscript.
> >
> >This concerned me. I e-mailed the senior editor that all I was willing to
> >grant was first North American serial rights (meaning that while they may
> >copyright the whole issue, as an issue, I will retain copyright [property
> >right] in my contribution).
> >
> >The editor is concerned that this may not be negotiable. On Tuesday the
> >press in question should be open for business (!) again and we will see.
> >
> >If the terms are not negotiable, neither am I. It's a life.
> >
> >Jack
> >
> > Jack C. Thompson
> > Thompson Conservation Laboratory
> > The Caber Press * Istor Productions
> > Portland, OR 97217
> > 503/735-3942 (voice/fax)
> > jct@Reed.edu * tcl@teleport.com
> > http://www.teleport.com/~tcl/index.html
> >
> > "Is a half-wit herbalist only parseley sage?"
> > Don Guyot, 1996
> >
>
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 01:24:56 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: Derrida's maxim
>"Form fascinates when one no longer has the force
>to understand force from within itself. That
>is, to create." -- Jacques Derrida
This is certainly a critic's understanding of form and
not a poet's. Even Pound was perversely fascinated with
the technicalities of form--let alone those who dogmatically
assert that a poet must be "free" of "external" formal constraints.
Such a preoccupation is to formalism what Satanism is to
Christianity--belief by the back door.
(Will I get the neither/nor lecture again for using parallelism here?)
To understand from within *and* from without--surely
this must be the best of both worlds.
All the best,
Rob Hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 00:46:32 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joe Tabbi <jtabbi@UIC.EDU>
Subject: ebr special issue: visual narratives
Call for Papers
ebr, the electronic book review <http://www.altx.com/ebr/>, is now
soliciting essays, visual projects and reviews for its upcoming issue on the
interaction of narrative and image in print and electronic media. We're
open to essays in combination with online visual projects that deal with any
aspect of narrative (narrative theory, cultural criticism, politics, etc.).
We are especially interested in works that perform the ideas they articulate
and would most like to see submissions that could do so on-line. Specifics
and possible starting points are given below. Please address all
correspondence to both guest-editors, Steve Tomasula (Tomasula.3@nd.edu) and
Anne Burdick (ABINCITE@aol.com). Deadline for finished work: November 1, 1996.
Part I, Ars Fabula (Narrative and Image)
In this section of the issue, we hope to showcase essays in which the visual
component of a narrative is germane to its interpretation. The emphasis
should be on narrative; that is, we are not interested in the artist's book
that is concerned with purely formal or material considerations: the book
itself as art object. However, we are very interested in the artist's book
that integrates materials and formal concerns in a narrative, especially as
these may influence interpretation or structure specific, alternate
"readings." The works under investigation can take a variety of forms, but
some examples might be: works that use the grid of the page/screen and
typography (in the tradition of Raymond Federman's _Double or Nothing_, Ron
Sukenick's _Out_, Derrida's _Glas_ or "The Double Session"); works that
integrate images as part of the narration, such as William Gass's _Willie
Master's Lonesome Wife_, Rem Koolhaas's _S, M, L, XL_, the Mexican
photo-novella, or graphic novels such as Art Spiegelman's _Maus_; works that
use images as glosses upon the text or conversely books that actually tell
their stories through images' indirect commentary, e.g. Simon Schama's _Dead
Certainties_, Carole Maso's _The Art Lover_, Julian Barnes's _History of the
World in 10-1/2 Chapters_; signal works in the history of text/image
collaboration, by Fluxus, for example, or the Futurists (Russian and Italian).
Essays should deal with some aspect of the interaction of word and image,
i.e., not simply the interaction of two kinds of expression, but of two
different modes of narration, two languages that are absorbed into a third:
the metalanguage of the image/text. How is such work different from other
types of narrative? What are its aesthetics? On what terms is it to be
discussed, interpreted, critiqued? What are its ramifications? For
example, if an analysis of point-of-view can reveal modernist epistemology,
what do image-driven text narrations reveal about contemporary culture? Do
our values, narative theory, aesthetics, language, ideology inhere in Howard
Stern's _Miss America?_
Part II, Ars Electronica (Narrative and Electronic Media)
In this section we would like to examine text- and image-driven narration in
the environment made possible by new technologies. The above criteria apply
to submissions for this category. However, here we are particularly
interested in stories that can only be told, and essays whose arguments can
only be made, through electronic media. Thus, if the work under discussion
could have been done in an older medium, it probably isn't right for this
section.
More appropriate are issues of literary narration that might have been
sublimated before, or might have been more applicable to the theater, opera,
or film. Again, what do narrative elements such as character or plot or
organization mean in works of multimedia? What are the poetics of
hypertext? What is its rhetoric? What are we to make of the "found art"
aesthetic that has entered into fiction? Of issues like indeterminacy and
intertextuality? motion, space, time, interactivity? What, if anything, is
narration that incorporates contemporary technology working against? Should
we reread Wayne Booth? J. Hillis Miller? If book technology placed
constraints on narrative, what are the constraints of html or the CD-ROM?
Of the computer monitor? How do these constraints manifest themselves in
electronic narrative, and what difference does it make?
How does all this affect our relationship with the material form.
Essays submitted to ebr should take up some aspect of "reading," but reading
in a narrative that is also able to incorporate sound, images, video,
hotlinks, interactivity. Emphasis should be on aesthetics or narratology or
cultural context: the ramifications of a medium that forces us to rethink
poetics. Of course, essays that contextualize or historicize media-driven
narratives are also welcome.
III reVIEWS
As always, ebr is interested in reviews of art works, graphic novels, hyper
novels, performances, recent conferences, or stories that relate to the
above two themes.
Who We Are
ebr is an electronic book review, an online forum allowing critical writers
to present their work on the Internet. We are committed to reviewing
(literally, seeing again) every aspect of book culture--fiction, poetry,
criticism, and the arts--in the context of emerging media. At the same
time, ebr is a review of electronic books, promoting translations and
transformations from print to screen, and covering literary work that can
only be read in electronic formats. To facilitate print/screen
collaborations, and as a service to writers whose primary domain is print,
ebr plans on sharing reviews with various print journals. Our first two
issues have appeared as focuses of _The American Book Review_, and
particular essays are scheduled to appear in various academic and mainstream
journals (including _Harper's Magazine_). We'd be interested in hearing
from editors who would like to discuss arrangements for sharing reviews in
the future.
Guidelines
For future issues, we are soliciting critical writing not only on, but in
hypertext. We are interested especially in exploring narratives whose logic
is as much visual as verbal, and we prefer thoughtful overviews, polemics,
and review essays to evaluations of single works. Authors are encouraged to
mark up their essaysin html and, if possible, to put them up at their own
web sites for us to download. Otherwise, you should send us hard copy and a
disk (preferably formatted for IBM machines). If you use a Mac, please
format the disk for pc use, and save an additional version as a text file.
Essays should follow the general format of the essays and reviews that have
appeared in ebrs 1 & 2. While we have no proscriptions against specialized
language or scholarly rigor, we request that endnotes be kept to a minimum
(or that they should be worked unobtrusively into the design of the
screen-page). Since we are not a peer review journal, we discourage reviews
that simply verify an author's or the reviewer's credentials. We prefer not
to assign novels to novelists, books of poetry to poets, or academic books
to professor-critics. Interdisciplinary work is encouraged when attention
is paid to the methods, values, and professional protocols of each of the
fields under discussion. References to web sites or online books should be
accompanied by the appropriate URLs.
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 08:03:57 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: scsi fcta
In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 28 May 1996 18:11:21 -0500 from <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
On Tue, 28 May 1996 18:11:21 -0500 Jordan Davis said:
>Henry--
>forgive me Laura Riding's Italian--
>but--
>are you saying--
>that the taste of miracle-gro--
>is the foundation of realty?--
>there is a car--
>perched--
>beside the motorscooter--
>a is next to the--
>to the b--
>viz David Schubert--
>the poetics--
>the prison--
>is down among the trees--
>you want me to come see--
>'il duce'--
>with thee?--
M. Jordan, tu n'est pas loin du Royaume de Dieu.
Mais les dictateurs ne sont plus de fagots pour le feu.
Quand l'Empire des grands fous
Comme Pierre Ott et Gilles Ooze
Seront 'ci --
Ma --
Che fai?
Eh?
-- Jacques Grillon
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 08:41:03 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: russ/american poetry conf report
Still coming down from as the russkies call it the "yekstasy" of the
great Russ-American Poetry Conference in Hoboken. What to say, it
was magnifique, magnotic, hypnetic, and kenotic. Even though they
smoke like blowfish, walk out of readings (zey do zis in Russia too),
drink like like glug glug, they are for real. Dragomoshenko a great
clown, a great performance poet. Elena Shvarts in a class by herself
- americans have yet to dive into this cosmos of a 4-ft tall
Petersburg wonder. Seems appropriate that this get together happens
under friendly auspices of many american "EXERPERMENTIL" AND
"LINGEWOGE" type poets since pure products of america go crazy and
lignuohodge poetry is pure american crazy-talk (another great
gift to me was to hear some of them read out loud, Bruce Andrews,
Jackson Mac Low, Rod Smith, Leslie Scalp-yr-hindo, many another)...
but ironically these russkies are still very representative of their
own traditions - branching out from them toward us - and that
style is so DIFFERENT from us - as Shvarts told me (she likes to
be provocative) Americans spend a long time getting to what they
want to say & putting all the prep-work into the poem, whereas the
russkies put a kind of finality into their compact poems - one
aspect of this is that often it's all memorized (MORE than often) -
rhymed, metered, recited - extreme example the incredible Ivan
Zhdanov - "force of nature" from the Altai region - very offhand,
subdued recital of very densely-packed imagery & concept. Making
no value-judgements here. The high-energy Americans I heard were
a revelation. But, well, we come from where we come from, and
I just happen to be a russian poet.
More later maybe - what a storm of interesting purple - endless
gratitude to Ed Foster & gang (if there was a gang) - Gyenri Gyould
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 09:29:53 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Daniel Bouchard <Daniel_Bouchard@HMCO.COM>
Subject: Re: russ/american poetry conf
I only made it to the Friday night readings but agree with Henry that it was a
worthwhile trip. I don't understand Russian so the Russians who read were
interesting mostly for sound and inflection and the reactions of people in the
room who understood them. (There were some translations: Leslie Scalapino read
in English a portion of Dragomonshenko's poems.)
Nathaniel Tarn, Jackson Mac Low, Leslie Scalapino and Simon Pettit all gave
excellent readings. Can anyone tell me the name of the second Russian reader--
the man who read over a cassette tape of spoken words while drumming into the
microphone? I believe he introduced it as a kind of folk song tradition. I
wanted to understand the language so much!
The behavior of the Russians during the reading was of interest to all I was
with. It seems that whenever a Russian read, all (not all, but most of) the
Russians left the room to chat. And when anyone else read the Russians stayed
in the room and chatted without a hint of self-consciousness. How do you
translate "when in Hoboken, do as the Hobokians" and why didn't they?
Henry wrote: "Dragomoshenko a great clown, a great performance poet."
Sometimes, as in this case, I'm not sure what distinguishes the two. He did,
even if most didn't understand the language he read in, consistently attract
the attention of everyone in the room, even when he was reading. Can anyone
explain why he entered the room and shouted "yes" and then walked to the
blackboard and wrote "no?"
Well, thanks for the account, Henry. It's always useful to get another
perspective of what one saw and heard.
daniel_bouchard@hmco.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 10:19:05 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joe Amato <amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: Sokal in SoCal II
a few more thoughts re the sokal brouhaha, esp. after reading rob wilson's
and others' thoughtful posts:
-- there is a journal---as i recall the title, _the journal of
irreproducible results_---that provides a forum for mock-scientific studies
of mock phenomena, playing specifically off of *scientific* jargon and
methodology, and playing specifically to scientists and the
scientifically-inclined... i mention this by way of indicating that sokal's
parody has precedent within scientific discourse communities... of course
this sidesteps the tricky issue of accepting a submission on the basis of
formal criteria alone (please permit me this form/content dualism for a
moment)... but if what sokal did is, as ross calls it, a "boy stunt," it is
also connected with the general ethos of scientific discourse, if only on
this latter's (lunatic?) fringes... an ethos emerging from a long history
of proving, disproving, and, on occasion, offering up false proofs as a
challenge, or for a few laughs---whatever the residual positivism or, as
some would have it, male-adolescent leanings (haven't many of you seen
proofs that 1 does not = 1?)... in any case, i think we oughtta be asking
ourselves whether, when discourses collide, there isn't bound to be some
friction owing to the assumptions each party makes about the nature of
discourse...
-- i'm certain there are unreconstructed marxists out there (and mebbe even
a few reconstructed ones) already itching to refer to this hoax as ample
evidence that ludic postmodernism (you've heard this term, yes?) is
consuming itself... that _social text_ is not materialist enough, is not
grounded enough in economic realities, hence is susceptible to the general
foolishness of various postmodernisms (btw, i have serious doubts that
sokal is familiar with this latter position)... though i'd prefer to read
the ny times publicity itself less as evidence of nasty corporate
constituencies (which are surely at work) than as the public alignment of
right-conservative discourse with american anti-intellectualism in
general... which latter, for me anyway, will not be sufficiently
explained/analyzed through elaboration of needs-based symbolic practices
(i.e., there are always enough words to go around---which i take to mean
there are always more than enough intentions to go around)... but my point
here is that sokal's stunt is likely to draw even more attention to what
constitutes politics per se in leftist discourse, from within related
communities... which may or may not be a bad thing...
-- BUT, despite what i've just noted, and contra the good intentions
hereabouts re revising our review practices to make them somehow more
scrupulous, the worst thing that can happen now is for publishers to get
fascist about things (sorry!), for critical journals to be more on their
guard, to demand even more "tone lock" (thanx for introducing charles'
term, mark)... in fact the failure of _social text_ to read sokal's parody
*as* parody may point to the general success of academic discourse in
creating formal/conventional codes that pass, in and of themselves, for
critical insight/knowledge... and this is as true of the left as of the
right, though the right's tightassedness about idiosyncracy in general will
tend to eliminate just about anything out of the orthodox (in more orthodox
venues, that is)...
-- the problem in these terms becomes one of finding ways to be even MORE
open, while not being exactly susceptible to bullshit... were the _social
text_ editors more familiar with or open to alternative discourses,
alternative ways of conducting critical/theoretical practice, alternative
readings of critical vs. 'creative' discourse, perhaps they would have
eliminated sokal's parody b/c it was a *parodic* failure, b/c it failed to
open up any new critical (or even scientific) territory as parody (or isn't
this a possibility?)...
-- or perhaps not... perhaps (i haven't read it) sokal's article should be
looked at again for what it *does* tell us about its ostensible topic,
mebbe in spite of itself... surely its publication-in-context speaks,
however, to the discursive habits of _social text_ and of the left, as well
as to scientific ethos, "boy stunts," ETC.... but it may well be that
sokal's piece works in ways that neither sokal nor the _social text_
editorial board really understands... or is willing to... just as neither
party seems willing to entertain a more loosely-defined notion of what
constitutes scholarship (ok---in the humanities)...
-- the general public response on both sides, as i've heard it, amounts to
both sides laying claim to higher social ground predicated on a similar,
narrowly-defined understanding of what constitutes (good) scholarship
(which latter is itself being understood, convolutedly, in terms of
intention)... here's the options, as presented by each position: (1) if
sokal sez it's parody, it's mere parody... and b/c they published his
parody, _social text_ and journals of its ilk regularly publish false and
misleading information ... (2) whether or not sokal sez it's parody, its a
"curio, or symptomatic document" (ross) at best, poor scholarship at
worst... and b/c he submitted a parody under the guise of scholarship,
scientists (like sokal) are hostile to the notion of cultural critique...
-- there must be more than two options, two positions (and both positions
as articulated would seem to argue against what is viewed by opposing
parties as a form of intellectual corruption)... it seems to me we oughtta
be looking at more than two ways of looking at sokal's parody, not so much
in formal terms, but in terms of the sorts of formal (-institutional)
constraints implied by its (almost) ipso facto rejection as "good"
scholarship---by both parties (albeit one (apparently) a bit belatedly,
post-publication)...
-- so it seems to me, in all, that neither party is being sufficiently
literary... and i say this with [ahem] no due respect for realpolitik...
(THIS IS NOT A PARODY, i am a human being...)
joe
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 11:36:58 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Mary Hilton <mhilton@TIA.ORG>
Subject: primitive publications -- Announcement
Announcing primitive publications, a new press dedicated to bringing
historically based text toward a greater accessibility. This press, which
will publish approximately 6 chapbooks a year, will showcase
present-day writing based on historical text or subject, as well as
essays which deal with modern writing in a historical context (allowing
the writing of today to been viewed as historically significant).
Manuscript submissions are encouraged, when accompanied by a
self-addressed, stamped envelope.
Current titles include:
"A True Relation of the State May Last, 1616" by Mary Hilton
"The Haunted Baronet" by Mark Wallace (upcoming June, 1996)
Cost of one chapbook is $4.00, or $20.00 for six. Please send
submissions and orders to the following address:
primitive publications
c/o Mary Hilton
1706 U Street, NW, #102
Washington, DC 20009
or you can drop an e-mail to me at mhilton@tia.org
Thank you!
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 07:19:18 -1000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Robert J Wilson <rwilson@HAWAII.EDU>
Subject: (un)becoming "literary" in ST &
In-Reply-To: <199605291519.KAA27207@charlie.cns.iit.edu>
Dear Joe Amato, Your analysis of the ST/NYT/Sokal/Ross/Fish event pushes
the oppositions and debates to a trenchant level of anti-intentional
lucidity that may prove helpful: I admire your support and application of
"the literary" as something that canny and innovative-- to miss this power
of form and force would be for Bove/Ross to be asleep at the wheel. I
quess you made me feel a bit like an "unreconstructed Marxist" (okay by me
at times) barking at the "ludic postmodernity" of discursive flimflam game
and careerist miming (here the lapsed Catholic Marxism of Wilson and Bove
and Pease et al kicks in, seeing "sins" and "crimes" of
omission/commission, deformations of the American subject-ego by
professional self-serving capital).
To amp up the moral dimension as such, "Sin" can be a matter of living
with and covertly endorsing the deformations and injustices of capital
because the "symbolic engineers" (Ross to Sokal, no outside to this,
humanities to social science in elite forms) keep winning at this two-tier
language game too (b2 is not outside this at all: Duke UP packing more
"fetish quality per pound" in their books/journals as the NY Times put it
last year in their annual size up the MLA horseshit piece).
I am not surethere is anywhere to go with your oppositions though, except
in the same (overdetermined, institutionally constrained) directions?
"Sokal in Socal" gives you some estrangement distance on the event, but
that LA Times editorial was not so helpful in its sermon as your
discriminating "literary" critique. Regards, Rob Wilson
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 15:27:12 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Edward Foster <EFOSTER@VAXC.STEVENS-TECH.EDU>
Subject: Re: russ/american poetry conf
the poet at the russian/american conference who read/sang over the tape of
spoken words was vadim mesyats. his work has not been widely published yet
in english versions, but there will be a volume of his selected works in
translation published by talisman this fall. he has a quite substantial
reputation in russia, and some of his songs have infiltrated that world
so well that they are sung without the singer's necessarily knowing who
wrote them. that's true recognition, when the poem is better known than
the poet. it's the kind of recognition that any genuine poet obviously
must prefer. --ed foster
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 15:23:48 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
In-Reply-To: "Your message dated Tue, 28 May 1996 09:53:22 -0700"
<2.2.16.19960528095548.1ae76ec0@pop.slip.net>
Hi steve!
I'm all for stretching sonnets, but if things are stretched too much they
sometimes start to show holes. My feeling is that that is starting to happen
with the sonnet. And if it starts falling apart, there will be nothing to
stretch anymore.
--Annie
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 15:35:09 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Re: Poem of Weeping Ghosts in Sonnet Form
In-Reply-To: "Your message dated Tue, 28 May 1996 18:06:39 -0500"
<v01520d07add1362c071f@[166.84.199.56]>
Esteemed Jd, right honorable courtiers,
It would be tempting to --it is tempting to --paraphrase Housman and say that i
can no more define a sonnet than a terrier can define a r at, but I know one
when I see it.
But that would be simplistic and begging your honorable question. wq. I guess I
would, honestly, define a sonnet as a poem in 14 lines of ip with a
such-and-such rhyme scheme or any variations of it. Obviously the variations
are theoretically infinite and shade off into other kinds of poems taht are
not sonnets; I had a very hard time editing a "A FORMAL FEELING COMES for this
reason, but I did feel that there was a difference between the poems that were
actually doignn something, some variation, WITHIN the sonnet form, and those
that were USING the sonnet form for its poignant cultural connotations.
I used the "structured by conspicuous repetition" definition as a way of trying
to codify that difference at the time; now I am becoming more interested in the
philospohical/aesthetic/perhaps even ethical dimensions of the distinction.
"Poem of Weeping Ghosts in Sonnet Form" is a marvellous poem that gets a lot of
its marvels from the evocation of the sonnet in the title. Without the title,
as in virtually all of Mayer's SONNETS, the only aspect of the poem evocative
of the sonnet form is the number of lines.
I think the "Poem of Weeping Ghosts" is a poem ABOUT the sonnet, but not a
sonnet.
My definition of the sonnet is a poem that honestly takes on the technical challenges and
lenges and limitations of the form as it has evolved over the
centuries--always in flux, certainly.
The poststructuralist use of the form seems to me to make a real technical leap into
into a sort of metapoetic use fo the form, in fact a sort of colonization of
it from the outside. To me such poems are not sonnets, however deeply and
provocatively they engage with the idea fo the sonnet.
.
, however, s, wher ethe form is a .
eh aht This is asking a lot of the title.
sonnets, you oramarguments
eh soaht . df nsetMaybe the question of
convention versus procedure a wh
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 16:28:58 MDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Louis Cabri <ldmcabri@ACS.UCALGARY.CA>
Subject: Re: chax books
In-Reply-To: <199605201446.KAA12148@conciliator.acsu.buffalo.edu>; from "Jena
Osman" at May 20, 1996 10:46 am
On the subject of Karen Mac Cormack's books, the one book of hers
not so far mentioned, and unfortunately not to my knowledge
available other than secondhand, is her first: Nothing By Mouth,
published, I think, in 1984, and not by Chax.
And not to not plug Steve McCaffery's latest book of poetry,
it's just out from ECW Press in Toronto: The Cheat of
Words. Includes poems some may have seen over the years in excerpted
form in West Coast Line, hole, and other mags, and unpublished
early pieces.
Louis
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 17:14:25 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steve Carll <sjcarll@SLIP.NET>
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
At 03:23 PM 5/29/96 -0500, you wrote:
>Hi steve!
>I'm all for stretching sonnets, but if things are stretched too much they
>sometimes start to show holes. My feeling is that that is starting to happen
>with the sonnet. And if it starts falling apart, there will be nothing to
>stretch anymore.
>
>--Annie
I wouldn't worry about it, Annie: everyone in England thought the sonnet
form was exhausted in 1595, and it's still with us 401 years later!
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
``````````````````````````````````````````````
Steve Carll sjcarll@slip.net
I listen.
I hear nothing. Only
the cow, the cow
of nothingness, mooing
down the bones.
~~Galway Kinnell
``````````````````````````````````````````````
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 19:22:32 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joe Amato <amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: (un)becoming "literary" in ST &
dear rob, how to say this as uncontortedly as possible?... i'm always
feeling as though i can't drop my (theoretical) guard when it comes to
talking theory & (academic and other) institutional realities & such
like... not helped at all by the recognition that even if communication
itself were 100% communicable, this is no guarantee that we'd be any closer
to social justice in any practical sense...
anyway: there's no place to go that's not institutional, no, but that
doesn't exactly or entirely speak to why one writes, or how one writes (as
you know)... i mean, i might be hallucinating at the moment, just imagining
that you're following me hereabouts... or i may very well be forgoing
dinner to post you, though admittedly it's doubtful that i'm going w/o food
for the night due to lack of pocket money (i would venture that most on
poetics are with me here)... nor does the institutional per se speak to the
contribution one may be making to one's fictional or actual community (term
used advisedly) of readers, if one is or believes oneself to be so endowed
...
which i say by way of saying that there's no one way, no one method, no one
aesthetic that works (or that pleases, or that feeds), even if there may
well be causes or platforms or positions or programs that are more
acceptable given corresponding local and global circumstances... and that,
whether utopian or materialist or happy-go-lucky or ?, it may do and do
well to consider alterations in our way of speaking talking exchanging
(letters or pixels), to consider writing against as well as with whatever
grain (incl. the critical), even if doing so does little in in/direct
correlative terms to relieve, for example, human suffering in general... am
i preaching to the choir here?... so then, i preach to the choir...
in the critical context, writing and reading with a more literary sense of
the possibilities attendant to same may contribute to (if not result in) a
better social transaction, even a better professional context, provided one
is willing to write and read thus with the understanding that "better"
means tentative, means local, means circumstantial, is a function of how
meaning is made of whatever by whomever; and, yes, may contribute to (if
not result in) worse too, worse so delimited... emphasis on *may*, due
allowance made for systemic-discursive (incl. capitalist and professional)
evils... and due allowance made for (to trope) the paradox of those
artistic practices that speak against any such progress-ive discourse, that
hazard appearing out of step completely with the whole critical shebang
(mself, i'll bump heads with such writers/artists on occasion, but this is
no necessary indication of the quality or usefulness of their writings)...
which i guess is just another way of saying that risks must be taken... and
that some we needs to continue to seek and construct ways of developing and
maintaining new and various fora that are conducive to taking risks... that
the literary---and here my particular plug for diverse poetics, along with
diverse publics---that the literary, as a contested site of alphabetic
culture that often operates on and at the margins of experience (and all
that this means under, to steal from your post, current sociocultural
deformations of the subject), may represent not simply a set of
institutional/cultural values of one sort or the other, but ways of
confronting these values with an eye (ok---i) toward understanding the
(often painful) necessity of revaluation...
i mean, for those so inclined...
all best, & w/o sounding too nietzschean, i trust,
joe
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 12:49:43 GMT+1200
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Wystan Curnow <w.curnow@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: English Dept. - Univ. of Auckland
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
Comments: To: FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU
Hi Annie,
look i'm as worried as anyone about things falling apart. But
the truth is there's always something to stretch, and an little more
stretch in everything. Soak it in milk overnight.
Wystan
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 19:34:06 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gary Hawkins <ghawkins@HALCYON.COM>
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
On 5-29-96 Annie Finch wrote:
>Hi steve!
>I'm all for stretching sonnets, but if things are stretched too much they
>sometimes start to show holes. My feeling is that that is starting to happen
>with the sonnet. And if it starts falling apart, there will be nothing to
>stretch anymore.
>
>--Annie
If a thing has holes in it, I think we should know about it. What's called
"anomaly" in science is called "rebellion" in poetry-- either way
revolutions do happen.
The English dumped the Italian sonnet once they realized it's easier to
rhyme in Italian. American rhymes even less.
Besides, once a form's been done, why do it again for anything other than
practice, to prove you can do it?
laura c/o ghawkins@halcyon.com
laurahopegill@halcyon.com
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 22:42:09 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Re: Poem of Weeping Ghosts (oops--corrected)
In-Reply-To: "Your message dated Wed, 29 May 1996 00:48:10 -0400"
<v01540b01add14ef2349f@[204.74.3.74]>
Dear Rob,
I am glad to see your lucid and graceful explanation of how the contours,
argument, diction, compression, and other less quantifiable aspects of the
sonnet form can be "legitimately" engaged (the judicial subtext continues) as a
means of extending the sonnet tradition.
The argument is persuasive and of course intriguing, tempting in its
simplicity: there is no difference, ultimately, in all the different things
that "sonnent" means to us; all can be engaged in, with, equally, and the form
will still be living.
But I have trouble fuzzing the perhaps-too-obvioius distinction between the
form as commonly understood and its less tangible attributes. A poem is an
embodied thing, to me, embodied in its actual words, rhythms, stanzas, rhymes,
phrases. It has a spirit too, but to engage with the spirit seems to me a
definitely different thing than to engage with th e body, just as to engage
with the spirit or idea of a dead or absent person is different than engaging
with the actual living body and presence of the person.
I am intaerested in your work on forms and will phone tomorrow probably. Is
there a form you would like to edit a section on, since this is a composite
anthology of different sections on forms?
--Annie F.
typosoupwehreaarouble .
qu n the es the tn fo teh wu
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 23:00:29 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
In-Reply-To: "Your message dated Tue, 28 May 1996 09:53:22 -0700"
<2.2.16.19960528095548.1ae76ec0@pop.slip.net>
Dear Steve,
Your feeling that the sonnet will still be around no matter how we treat it
reminds me of how people used to feel about the ocean, the ozone, ad the
old-growth forests. A form is a living thing in my book and needs sustainable
care.
Annie
.vagfeole
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 21:20:19 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Thomas Bell <tbjn@WELL.COM>
Subject: Re: Music City sonnet
Comments: cc: cris cheek <cris@slang.demon.co.uk>,
clements@fas.harvard.edu, lsr3h@virginia.edu, jdavis@panix.com,
welford@hawaii.edu, guitart@acsu.buffalo.edu, cris@slang.demon.co.uk,
MDamon9999@aol.com, cschei1@grfn.org, AERIALEDGE@aol.com
In-Reply-To: <199605292221.SAA285440@faraday.clas.Virginia.EDU>
>
>
> bantering martians hope for glory
> we committed literary piracy on the high seas
> Al left Billie Joe Cat found the path to
> hunger large as scaredy free-throw
> underground stone guitar blue uniformed blow
> mouth on double-cross diploma clue
> a world without nouns is healthy?
> sequined sequels quells
> primacy recency a magnificat its own
> catorziemme and quattrocento etc
> and minnie pearl and conway twitty
> a dirge enough for Solent murk
> too much robing and screeing
> the voice of an angel and the soul of
> blue few, grow a garage band
> glue bag a branding fag wagered row
> Sue the crew could count, although
>
>
>
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 21:39:46 PDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: William Marsh - 3809183 <wmarsh@NUNIC.NU.EDU>
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
In-Reply-To: <01I5AMUBJBXU8WXNOZ@miavx1.acs.muohio.edu>; from "Annie Finch" at
May 29, 96 11:00 pm
i once had a teacher who defined the sonnet as a "short fat know-it-all"
a genuine pomo sonnet would probably be most concerned with taking that
def to task
-- a fellow know-it-all-ateer
bmarsh
=========================================================================
Date: Wed, 29 May 1996 21:59:49 PDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jerry Rothenberg <jrothenb@CARLA.UCSD.EDU>
Subject: Re: Poem of Weeping Ghosts in Sonnet Form
>, however, s, wher ethe form is a
>eh aht This is asking a lot of the title.
>sonnets, you oramarguments
> eh soaht . df nsetMaybe the question of
>convention versus procedure a wh
dear Annie Finch --
I was startled & delighted to see this coming at the end of one of your
notes & similar but more condensed constructions at the end of others.
Is there a method here too that turns the ordinary into the extraordinary --
something that the machine (in its own way) is trying to tell us? It is,
anyway, a remarkable statement on sonnets, something that wraps it all up.
Jerome Rothenberg
jrothenb@carla.ucsd.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 01:38:38 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Kenneth Goldsmith <kgolds@PANIX.COM>
Subject: Madonna
>>> I AM A TIP-TOP STARLET
>>> In Which Something Is Lost, But Much Is Gained, In The Translation
>>>
>>>
>>> GARRY TRUDEAU
>>>
>>>
>>> When the huge Evita production company blew into Budapest last month
>>> to rent its ancient architecture, Madonna, the film's star, was much
>>> too busy staying in character to meet with the local press. Finally,
>>> on the eve of her departure, good manners prevailed, and the pop diva
>>> submitted to an interview with the Budapest newspaper Blikk. The
>>> questions were posed in Hungarian, then translated into English for
>>> Madonna, whose replies were then translated back into Hungarian for
>>> the paper's exclusive. Shortly thereafter, at the request of USA
>>> Today, Madonna's comments were then retranslated from Hungarian back
>>> into English for the benefit of that paper's readers. To say that
>>> something was lost in the process is to be wildly ungrateful for all
>>> that was gained. "I am a woman and not a test-mouse!" reads a typical
>>> quote. USA Today, presumably pressed for space, published only a few
>>> of these gems, leaving the rest to the imagination, whence has sprung
>>> the following complete transcript:
>>>
>>>
>>> Blikk:
>>>
>>> Madonna, Budapest says hello with arms that are spread-eagled. Did
>>> you have a visit here that was agreeable? Are you in good odor? You
>>> are the biggest fan of our young people who hear your musical
>>> productions and like to move their bodies in response.
>>>
>>>
>>> Madonna:
>>>
>>> Thank you for saying these compliments [holds up hands]. Please
>>> stop with taking sensationalist photographs until I have removed my
>>> garments for all to see [laughs]. This is a joke I have made.
>>>
>>>
>>> Blikk:
>>>
>>> Madonna, let's cut toward the hunt: Are you a bold hussy-woman that
>>> feasts on men who are tops?
>>>
>>>
>>> Madonna:
>>>
>>> Yes, yes, this is certainly something that brings to the surface
>>> my longings. In America it is not considered to be mentally ill when
>>> a woman advances on her prey in a discotheque setting with hardy
>>> cocktails present. And there is a more normal attitude toward
>>> leather play-toys that also makes my day.
>>>
>>>
>>> Blikk:
>>>
>>> Is this how you met Carlos, your love-servant who is reputed? Did
>>> you know he was heaven-sent right off the stick? Or were you dating
>>> many other people in your bed at the same time?
>>>
>>>
>>> Madonna:
>>>
>>> No, he was the only one I was dating in my bed then, so it is a
>>> scientific fact that the baby was made in my womb using him.
>>> But as regards these questions, enough! I am a woman and not a
>>> test-mouse! Carlos is an everyday person who is in the orbit of a star
>>> who is being muscle-trained by him, not a sex machine.
>>>
>>>
>>> Blikk:
>>>
>>> May we talk about your other "baby," your movie, then? Please do
>>> not be denying that the similarities between you and the real Evita
>>> are grounded in basis. Power, money, tasty food, Grammys -- all these
>>> elements are afoot.
>>>
>>>
>>> Madonna:
>>>
>>> What is up in the air with you? Evita never was winning a Grammy!
>>>
>>>
>>> Blikk:
>>>
>>> Perhaps not. But as to your film, in trying to bring your
>>> reputation along a rocky road, can you make people forget the bad
>>> explosions of Who's That Girl? and Shanghai Surprise?
>>>
>>>
>>> Madonna:
>>>
>>> I am a tip-top starlet. That is my job that I am paid to do.
>>>
>>>
>>> Blikk:
>>>
>>> O.K., here's a question from left space: What was your book Slut
>>> about?
>>>
>>>
>>> Madonna:
>>>
>>> It was called Sex, my book.
>>>
>>>
>>> Blikk:
>>>
>>> Not in Hungary. Here it was called Slut. How did it come to
>>> publish? Were you lovemaking with a man-about-town printer? Do you
>>> prefer making suggestive literature to fast-selling CDs?
>>>
>>>
>>> Madonna:
>>>
>>> These are different facets to my career highway. I am preferring
>>> only to become respected all over the map as a 100% artist.
>>>
>>>
>>> Blikk:
>>>
>>> There is much interest in you from this geographic region, so I
>>> must ask this final questions: How many Hungarian men have you dated
>>> in bed? Are they No. 1? How are they comparing to Argentine men, who
>>> are famous for being tip-top as well?
>>>
>>>
>>> Madonna:
>>>
>>> Well, to avoid aggravating global tension, I would say it's a tie
>>> [laughs]. No, no, I am serious now. See here, I am working like a
>>> canine all the way around the clock! I have been too busy even to try
>>> the goulash that makes your country one for the record books.
>>>
>>>
>>> Blikk:
>>>
>>> Thank you for your candid chitchat.
>>>
>>>
>>> Madonna:
>>>
>>> No problem, friend who is a girl.
>
Kenneth Goldsmith
http://wmfu.org/~kennyg
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 06:58:53 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: (un)becoming "literary" in ST &: Is this better?
Joe:
Forwarded (because they were public) your public ruminations
to my esteemed occasional colleague, Colin Raff, and *this* was his reply.
Personally, I'm beginning to know how dyslexics feel (esp. Mr. Derrida).
Will respond to your orig. post as soon as I get Colin's version out
of my ears.
Inclusively,
Rob (possibly the wrong Rob, for all I know) Hardin
PS: If you're in NYC this summer, come see "Tableau"--poss. at Jackie
60--a play that Colin and I wrote to illustrate our curriculum for The
University for Combating Degenerate Aesthetics. We drive our points home
with several aesthetically-rewarding decapitation scenes--all simulated,
of course.
A further aesthetic note: At the end of the play, we write
*I Am Fun* across the bellies of students who prove too weak to
survive. Such are the charms of deadly Darwinian aesthetics.
Bring your batons, friends. But germ warfare is strictly forbidden.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>From: Joe Amato <amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU>
>>Subject: Re: (un)becoming "literary" in ST &
>>To: Multiple recipients of list POETICS <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
"Represent" not simply a set of institutional/cultural values of one sort or
the other, but ways of confronting these values with an eye (ok---i) toward
understanding the (often painful) necessity of revaluation. A contribution
one may be making to one's fictional or actual community (term
used advisedly) of readers, if one is or believes oneself to be so
endowed (academic and other) institutional realities & such like, is
not helped at all by the recognition that even if communication
itself were 100% communicable, this is no guarantee that we'd be any
closer to social justice in any practical sense.
Anyway: there's no place to go that's not institutional, no, but that
doesn't exactly or entirely speak to why one writes, or how one writes
(as you know)... i mean, i might be hallucinating at the moment, just
imagining that you're following me hereabouts... or i might very well be
forgoing dinner to post you, though admittedly it's doubtful that i'm
going w/o food for the night due to lack of pocket. Dear--how to say
this as uncontortedly as possible?--i'm always feeling as though i can't
drop my (theoretical) guard when it comes to talking theory & money (i
would venture that most are with me here)... nor does the institutional
per se speak to the critical context, writing and reading with a more
literary sense of the possibilities attendant to same, per se,
that may contribute to (if not result in) a better social transaction--
...
--which i say by way of saying that there's no one way, no one method, no one
aesthetic, that works (or that pleases, or that feeds), even if there may
well be causes or platforms or positions or programs that are more
acceptable given corresponding local and global circumstances,
whether utopian or materialist of whatever by whomever; and, yes, may
contribute to (if not result in) worse too--worse so delimited--emphasis on
*may*, due allowance made, for systemic-discursive or happy-go-lucky or ?
It may do and do well to consider alterations in our way of speaking
talking exchanging (letters or pixels), to consider writing against as well
as with whatever grain (incl. the critical), even if doing so does little
in in/direct
correlative terms to relieve, for example, human suffering in general...
am i preaching to the choir here?... so then, i preach to the choir...
In the even-better professional context--provided one is willing to write
and read that--the literary, as a contested site of alphabetic culture that
often operates on and at the margins of experience (and all that this means
under, to steal from your post, current sociocultural deformations of the
subject), may thus, with the understanding that "better" means tentative,
means local, means circumstantial, is a function of how meaning is made
(incl. capitalist and professional) evils. Due allowance made, i guess this
is just another way of saying that risks must be taken.
Us needs to continue to seek and construct ways of developing and
maintaining new and various fora that are conducive to taking risks that
the literary---and here's my particular plug for diverse poetics, along
with diverse publics---for (to trope) the paradox of those artistic
practices that speak against any such progressive discourse, that hazard
appearing out of step completely with the whole critical shebang (mself,
i'll bump heads with such writers/artists
on occasion, but this is no necessary indication of the quality or usefulness
of their writings)...
i mean, for those so inclined...
all best, & w/o sounding too joean, i trust,
nietzsche
<toward the end>
<< end of forwarded material >>
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 07:57:44 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
Palindrome: "Ten No's: A Sonnet"---
Shakespeare wrote at least one 12 line one...
Oh no, some YAHOO just won in Israel (gotta run)
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 08:33:04 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: Poem of Weeping Ghosts (oops--corrected)
Annie:
> The argument is persuasive and of course intriguing, tempting in its
> simplicity: there is no difference, ultimately, in all the different things
> that "sonnent" means to us; all can be engaged in, with, equally, and the
> form will still be living.
This is good work, Annie, but this is not what I said. There *are*
distinct differences between standard and non-standard sonnets.
But there are subtler classifications to be noted beyond those two.
Some modern sonnets are really "sonnets" (though pomo has rendered
the quotes unnecessary). Much of what is called experimental in the
stricter sense is as patterned and marmoreal as any neoclassical
Dryden. And much of what was written in the transitional stages
of history remains radically experimental to this day.
> But I have trouble fuzzing the perhaps-too-obvioius distinction between the
> form as commonly understood and its less tangible attributes.
In a Shakespearean sonnet, syntax, diction and compression
are demonstrably "tangible." A seventeenth-century sonnet can be
analyzed in purely rhetorical terms. Such aspects of the sonnet
might not be *as* commonly understood as its rime-scheme and meter.
But that doesn't mean they are too obscure to be understood.
> A poem is an
> embodied thing, to me, embodied in its actual words, rhythms, stanzas, rhymes,
> phrases. It has a spirit too, but to engage with the spirit seems to me a
> definitely different thing than to engage with th e body, just as to engage
> with the spirit or idea of a dead or absent person is different than engaging
> with the actual living body and presence of the person.
Would you say that Kandinsky killed, or failed to maintain, the spirit
of representional painting simply because he chose another visual language?
And what about Picasso, who systematically distorted the representational?
Sonata-allegro form crystalized in the work of Haydn, Mozart and early
Beethoven. But what about Beethoven's late sonatas, which were to sonata-
allegro form what post-war Nagasaki is to the original city? Should
Beethoven's late sonatas have been called something else?
What about the obsessive mosaic sonatas of Robert Schumann?
And what about the Silent Sonata of John Cage?
Should these have been called something else
because the old forms didn't apply?
Isn't the best way to revitalize an old form to write in it
yourself? Why proscribe newer prosodic definitions--why delimit
the do's and better-not's--of *sonnet* for other poets with other
approaches?
A free-verse poet might not want to call a poem by another name
than *sonnet*, just as an abstract painter might choose to refer
to a ring of concentric circles and a splotch of paint as _Still Life
#17_. I might debate whether or not the connection, the allusion,
works in each individual case. But that doesn't mean formally allusive
poems are *interchangeable* with Miltonic sonnets. What it means
is this: in modern poetic practice, *sonnet* does not merely refer
to standard rhyme-schemes and forms. If you don't believe me, I
suggest you consult _The Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and
Poetics_.
(Literal-minded approaches to form? Somewhere, there is a performance
poet who has replaced the sonnet's rhyme-scheme and meter with non-
sequitur facial expressions. Someone else has written sonnet-generating
software. Someone else has built a two-room house in the shape of a
Petrarchan sonnet. After all, the word *stanza* is Italian for *room*.)
I appreciate and respect your arguments in favor of preserving the
conventional sonnet. However, I choose to argue in favor of
preserving the *study of prosody itself* rather than some stage of
development within the life of a particular form. I thought
Rothenberg's joke was pretty astute: The train of type at the end
of your post--of leftover cut-and-paste fragments--provided a newer
kind of prosody and another variant of critical perception. Such
accidents are not interchangeable with the sensibility you're
attempting to sharpen. But they are worth looking at. Many
might prove to be important--as have the sequences of freer
sonneteers like Ted Berrigan.
> I am intaerested in your work on forms and will phone tomorrow probably. Is
> there a form you would like to edit a section on, since this is a composite
> anthology of different sections on forms?
>
> --Annie F.
Thanks for your kind offer. I'll be home to take your call
after six p.m.
All the best,
Rob Hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 09:12:42 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Daniel Bouchard <Daniel_Bouchard@HMCO.COM>
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
Annie Finch wrote:
Your feeling that the sonnet will still be around no matter how we treat it
reminds me of how people used to feel about the ocean, the ozone, ad the
old-growth forests. A form is a living thing in my book and needs sustainable
care.
___________
Annie Finch:
Your analogy that poets who experiment with traditional forms like the sonnet
are simliar to some people's reckless attitude towards the environment is in
poor taste and flat-out wrong. One is NOT like the other no matter how closely
you associate the two. Actually, the statement is more telling about your own
uptight attitude where poetry is concerned; a denial of change, innovation and
real creativity. (You did not address the point that Steve made.)
A poetic form may be a "living thing" but it is not eligible for the endangered
species list. If you are looking to give something "sustainable care" then look
into the global danger surrounding frogs and other amphibians. When these die
out they are gone forever. When YOUR definition of a sonnet dies out, someone
elses' may still be flourishing.
daniel_bouchard@hmco.com
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 10:02:12 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steven Clay <sclay@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: poetry books & magazines
Granary Books in NewYork has just issued a catalog of some 650 out-of-print
literary magazines and poetry books mostly from the 1970's and forward. The
prices are very affordable. Some of the writers and magazines listed (to
give a general idea) include:
Clark Coolidge, Adventures in Poetry (& Larry Fagin), Charles Bernstein,
'L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E', 'The World', Bernadette Mayer, Vito Acconci, '0 to 9,'
Kathy Acker, Jackson Mac Low, 'Roof,' Jerome Rothenberg, 'A Hundred
Posters,' 'United Artists,' Alice Notley, Ted Berrigan, 'This,' John
Giorno, Ron Padgett among many, many, many others.
Serious readers are welcome to have a copy of the catalog. Please send me
an E-mail request with your name and address.
Thank you.
Steve Clay
Granary Books 568 Broadway Suite 403, NYC 10012
212-226-5462
sclay@interport.net
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 09:22:29 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: Au pur delice sans chemin (1)
Henri & Jd
Ses purs ongles tres haut dediant leur onyx,
L'Angoisse, ce minuit, soutient, lampadore,
Maint reve vesperal brule par le Phenix
Que ne recueille pas de cineraire amphore.
Francoise Baratier
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 09:19:47 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joe Amato <amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: (un)becoming "literary" in ST &: Is this better?
rob, yes, i've got colin's hack in *my* ears at the moment... i esp. like
how theory & money end up so close together in his version...
tell him i sd thanx!...
best,
joe
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 10:28:55 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: Tomorrow, Friday, may 31st
A booglit benefit reading
Featured Readers:
Todd Colby
David Baratier
Bill Luoma
Dan WIlcox
Also Chris Stroffolino and Chris Butters are slated.
Booglit will be publishing a number of limited edition chapbooks for
the reading, including _Compartments (a short run)_ by David Baratier
@ Luna Park
Friday May 31st @ 7:30 pm
249 Fifth Ave.
Brooklyn, NY
(Between Carroll Street and Garfield Place)
For folks who are unfamiliar with Booglit, the present editorial staff
is:
Michael Basinski: Buffalo, NY
David Baratier: Philadelphia, PA
Dan Wilcox: Albany, NY
Rod Smith: Washington, DC
Lee Ann Brown: Boulder, CO
Dan Bouchard: Boston, MA
Booglit is a community focused publication where the editors for the
various cities contribute material on area writers and events in each
issue. One city is chosen to be the featured city of each issue. A
third of the publication space is dedicated to the featured city.
Authors of other chapbooks availiable from Booglit include:
Lee Anne Brown, Laynie Browne, Amiri Baraka,
Bill Shields & Eliot Richmond, Barry Gifford,
Marc Ducharme, Ed Saunders, and many others.
For a full catalog send an SASE to
Booglit / PO Box 221 / Oceanside, NY 11572-0221
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 10:47:59 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: nonset environmentally destructive form
A fabric of slow writhing
My dark quiet hand dreams this house a whisper
of the quiet wire circles. In coffee rings
around the hallway I wake into night. The disparagement
of numbers lingers in the line, as if we all were
set down by your receiver in a wood-grain sacrifice.
A stain that morning ago. A violin sound on the telephone
where we were years by and a voice comes up
hoping it would hear us again, for the briefest
instant of re-assurance. Things are well here
always have been though the weather is amazing
with a wind you wouldn't believe. We miss shaking
on the porch to the same elements, the strength
of your torso against. In the same way your memory
could be sending a nightgown without.
from logodaedalus
One of the series of Compartments
David Baratier
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 11:51:03 EST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Burt Kimmelman -@NJIT" <kimmelman@ADMIN.NJIT.EDU>
Subject: The Twentieth Century
From: ADMIN::KIMMELMAN "Burt Kimmelman -@NJIT" 29-MAY-1996 16:41:01.12
To: MX%"poetics@aubvm.cc.buffalo.edu"
CC: KIMMELMAN
Subj: The Twentieth Century
I'm writing to ask for help:
I am slated to teach an interdisciplinary course called "The Twentieth
Century World"; the course is global in scope, and must contain three
areas of intense investigation, three modules. The "modules" i have
in mind are: Japan, 1912-1917; England 1939-1945; and, Sub-Saharan
Africa from about 1985 or so to the present.
I need to start the course with an overview so that each of the modules
makes sense in context. The readings for the modules are to be primary materials.
I'm wondering if anyone knows of a good, globally oriented, short book or
long essay on the 20th Century I could use for the overview.
Other suggestions, particularly though not limited to the following would
also be welcome: a novel written by someone English during WW II or at least
by someone English about WW II; a contemporary novel written by a Sub-
Saharan African. I've got Japan pretty much covered but would love to have
suggestions there too. The primary readings are not to be limited to
"high" literature such as fiction. Government documents or whatever from
the relevant period, for instance, are quite acceptable.
Any suggestions, then?
Gratefully,
Burt Kimmelman
kimmelman@admin.njit.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 12:21:28 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: jms <jms@TIAC.NET>
Subject: request for exercises about place
I have to teach a how-to-teach poetry workshop in a week or so about the
theme of place. It is for the Bard L & T program where the emphasis is on
experimental writing approaches (a lot of the assignments resemble things
on the EPC experiments list).
Does anyone have any ones related to the theme/idea of place in particular
that they have heard of/used?
Rod Smith gave me a good one from Burroughs (?) about having people
go out and write down everything they see in a particular color. The
lesson being the collage like nature of experiental experience. Am I telling
this right?
If anyone has any and they back channel them to me, I can post to list
or interested individuals when I compile list.
Also having to teach a fiction workshop next year. Anyone done this?
I need ideas and exercises and syllabi. Same thing, if you have, send to me
and I will
repost or resend.
Thanks lots.
Juliana Spahr
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 09:25:37 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jill A Mccartney <jmccartn@U.ARIZONA.EDU>
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
just thought Gertrude Stein's "sonnet"--which is embedded in "Patriarchal
Poetry"--would be an apt grace note for this discussion.
A SONNET
To the wife of my bosom
All happiness from everything
And her husband.
May he be good and considerate
Gay and cheerful and restful.
And make her the best wife
In the world
The happiest and the most content
With reason.
To the wife of my bosom
Whose transcendent virtues
Are those to be most admired
Loved and adored and indeed
Her virtues are all inclusive
Her virtues her beauty and her beauties
Her charms her qualities her joyous nature
All of it makes of her husband
A proud and happy man.
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 10:22:21 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Steve Carll <sjcarll@SLIP.NET>
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
>Annie Finch wrote:
>
>Your feeling that the sonnet will still be around no matter how we treat it
>reminds me of how people used to feel about the ocean, the ozone, ad the
>old-growth forests. A form is a living thing in my book and needs sustainable
>care.
>___________
I have to go with Daniel Bouchard on this one. Annie, you get upset when
people equate your literary politics with your social ones, so why resort to
a cheap shot like that?
All form is impermanent. Sorry, but everything changes, and especially
forms made of language, which is perpetually re-created by millions of
people speaking who have different ideas about what's what.
A poem-as-living-thing analogy I could buy, but form doesn't exist by
itself, it's always the "form that a poem takes." If the poem wants to
change its form, that's evolution at work. If a child is born with 12 toes
instead of ten, we don't say it no longer fits the definition of _Homo
sapiens_ (at least, I hope no one would say so.)
To me, form is a means to an end, the end being to create a work that can
engage the psyche at a deep level and make some contribution to its
liberation. A poem whose only end is to fit someone's definition of a form
is just showing off. (If I were feeling really pissy, I could draw an
analogy between people who overvalue form and people who have lots of
plastic surgery, but that would put us back into the inappropriate simile trap.)
*************
Steve Carll
sjcarll@slip.net
"--A sound of waters bending astride the sky
Unceasing with some Word that will not die...!"
--Hart Crane
**************************************
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 13:47:05 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Comments: Converted from PROFS to RFC822 format by PUMP V2.2X
From: Alan Golding <ACGOLD01@ULKYVM.LOUISVILLE.EDU>
Subject: Michael Ondaatje
Associate Professor of English, U. of Louisville
Phone: (502)-852-5918; e-mail: acgold01@ulkyvm.louisville.edu
Does anyone have e-mail / snail mail / phone number information for Michael
Ondaatje? (Any or all of these would help.) Backchannel is fine.
Thanx in advance,
Alan
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 13:47:55 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: request for exercises about place
Juliana--
It's called "walking on colors"-- have students walk a city block or a
country mile paying attention as much as possible to one color of their
choosing, & then write about it. Burroghs talks about this somewhere-- one
thing it can lead to is
a realization that "collage" is the norm, a shared characteristic, a color,
is nevertheless diffuse, inconstant, piecemeal. It's also just an attention
trick-- to get one to look carefully at the situation(s). I saw a map
Bernadette used in a St Mark's workshop which gave a route for students to
walk. I think they were supposed to buy something, & come back & give it
away. . .
Rod
-------------------------------
Juliana Spahr wrote:
I have to teach a how-to-teach poetry workshop in a week or so about the
theme of place. It is for the Bard L & T program where the emphasis is on
experimental writing approaches (a lot of the assignments resemble things
on the EPC experiments list).
Does anyone have any ones related to the theme/idea of place in particular
that they have heard of/used?
Rod Smith gave me a good one from Burroughs (?) about having people
go out and write down everything they see in a particular color. The
lesson being the collage like nature of experiental experience. Am I telling
this right?
If anyone has any and they back channel them to me, I can post to list
or interested individuals when I compile list.
Also having to teach a fiction workshop next year. Anyone done this?
I need ideas and exercises and syllabi. Same thing, if you have, send to me
and I will
repost or resend.
Thanks lots.
Juliana Spahr
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 14:07:21 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: just thought you'd want to see this
From: IN%"cap-l@tc.umn.edu" "Discussion of Contemporary American Poetry" 30-MAY-1996 13:23:50.36
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CC:
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Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 12:20:29 -0500
From: CAP-L <abow0001@gold.tc.umn.edu>
Subject: Creeley's Place (fwd)
Sender: Discussion of Contemporary American Poetry <cap-l@tc.umn.edu>
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---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: 29 May 1996 14:12:52 U
From: GrahamD <GrahamD@mac.ripon.edu>
To: CAP-LIST <cap-l@tc.umn.edu>
Subject: Creeley's Place
Prompted by recent discussion, I've been happily re-reading Creeley and some
of the critical responses to his work. One striking fact is that his work
has been respectfully attended to by a wide variety of other poets proceeding
from very different aesthetic stances--everyone from Robert Bly to Thom Gunn,
Donald Hall to Ron Silliman. To be sure, Creeley's aversion to the heroic
(noted by Silliman, among others), as well as his notably skeptical
intelligence, seem to have helped provoke some penetrating critiques even
from admirers.
I find RC's work highly uneven. Many poems are little biting gems (such as
the renowned "I Know A Man"), while others strike me as mere finger
exercises, opaque or trivial notations. An instance of opacity, which opens
the poem "To And":
To and
back and forth
direction
is a third
or simple fourth
of the intention
like it
goes and goes.
And here's a poem I would call trivial, "A Piece" in its entirety:
One and
one, two,
three.
Furthermore, critics have well noted Creeley's tendency to dispense with many
traditional elements of poetic appeal, such as figuration, imagery,
narrative, concrete diction, and sensuous richness as found in Roethke or
Thomas (RC's sound-craft is subtle and elusive on its own terms). Although
his work is intensely intimate, he forgoes confessional revelation almost
entirely. All these are omissions worth noting with skeptical regard, to my
mind.
But so what? The compensating virtues are certainly abundant, and equally
worth examination. One possible way into such a discussion is this. Lately
I have been pondering RC's affinity with a range of writers beyond the usual
Black Mountain suspects. For if as some have argued his work is central to
our time, don't we need to look at how he stacks up against poets outside the
Pound/Olson/Williams current? Such judgments as I have just leveled above
(that many poems are trivial or opaque, e.g.) do presume an intention
evidently not acknowledged by RC, for whom the poem seems not so much an
artifact as the product of an exploratory process. The poem's aim is
improvisation, not just its means.
Putting it in these terms, then, makes me want to connect Creeley's work to
that of A.R. Ammons, Adrienne Rich, and William Stafford--all of whom,
despite obvious differences, appear to share commitment to an improvisatory
poetics. (I see other affinities with poets as distinct as William Bronk and
W. S. Graham.) Ammons and Stafford, in particular, have seemed to many
readers to commit too many trivial or opaque notations, insufficiently
winnowing wheat from chaff. Formally and thematically, all these poets seem
to make a central concern the limitations of language to capture or express
what we most want it to; and all are very skeptical of heroic rhetoric.
Maybe there is a great divide here, between poets of this stripe and others,
such as Lowell, for whom writing a "great" poem is always the object, even in
his most improvisatory mode. Creeley, Rich, et al. don't seem to think that
great poems *can* be written, and appear unsure that one should try: they
seem to suggest that there are more interesting fish to fry, both emotionally
and intellectually. Or at least that notions of greatness need to be
examined afresh.
Well, these thoughts are all too rough, and I certainly haven't said much
about what I admire in Creeley. But perhaps my notions here may provide some
handhold for others to grab and continue the discussion?
David Graham
Ripon College
grahamd@mac.ripon.edu
+++++++++++++++++++++
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 09:52:10 -1000
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Gabrielle Welford <welford@HAWAII.EDU>
Subject: Re: Music City sonnet
Comments: To: Thomas Bell <tbjn@well.com>
Comments: cc: cris cheek <cris@slang.demon.co.uk>,
clements@fas.harvard.edu, lsr3h@virginia.edu, jdavis@panix.com,
guitart@acsu.buffalo.edu, cris@slang.demon.co.uk, MDamon9999@aol.com,
cschei1@grfn.org, AERIALEDGE@aol.com
In-Reply-To: <Pine.3.89.9605292142.A18291-0100000@well>
> > bantering martians hope for glory
> > we committed literary piracy on the high seas
> > Al left Billie Joe Cat found the path to
> > hunger large as scaredy free-throw
> > underground stone guitar blue uniformed blow
> > mouth on double-cross diploma clue
> > a world without nouns is healthy?
> > sequined sequels quells
> > primacy recency a magnificat its own
> > catorziemme and quattrocento etc
> > and minnie pearl and conway twitty
> > a dirge enough for Solent murk
> > too much robing and screeing
> > the voice of an angel and the soul of
> > blue few, grow a garage band
> > glue bag a branding fag wagered row
> > Sue the crew could count, although
> > soccer Tolemy semper vivens
> >
> >
>
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 16:03:11 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Emily Lloyd <emilyl@EROLS.COM>
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
At 10:22 AM 5/30/96 -0700, Steve Carll wrote:
>>Annie, you get upset when
>people equate your literary politics with your social ones, so why resort to
>a cheap shot like that?
Cheap shot or no, the analogy doesn't work because forests are gone, sonnets
are not. Shakespeare's on the net and no one's bombed all the libraries
yet. No matter how the form is played with, strictly formal sonnets do &
will survive, as mummies do. So the question seems to be not whether formal
sonnets will survive but whether they'll continue to be written. Hacker,
Campo, etc., suggest that they will. I am not especially convinced that it
deeply matters if they are not. We've got a lot in & on the books.
Actually--Annie--I think that one way sonnets *can* survive (as a present or
future, not a past thing) is through our engagement & play with them, as in
the "Ghost" (sorry, don't have the rest of the title with me) poem. Using
the word "sonnet" in the title, and then not writing a formal sonnet, may be
a "mockery" of/rebellion against/bending & breaking of the form--but at the
same time, making reference to a "sonnet" at all in the title attests to the
"importance" or "continual life" of the form, even if that importance is
nothing more than that the idea "sonnet" was present when the piece was
composed--that a formal sonnet, perhaps, haunts the poem (or the poet). The
sonnet, too, as Ghost. "Sonnet" is not yet hackneyed. Here it continues to
in/form the poet, poem & audience. What more could an ole' form ask?
>A poem whose only end is to fit someone's definition of a form
>is just showing off.
Oh Steve! And you with a heroic couplet for your sig.!
>sjcarll@slip.net
>
>"--A sound of waters bending astride the sky
>Unceasing with some Word that will not die...!"
> --Hart Crane
Emily
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Emily Lloyd emilyl@erols.com
"Fist my mind in your hand"--Rukeyser
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 13:19:17 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
> A form is a living thing in my book and needs sustainable
>care.
>
>Annie
If it is in your (or anyone's) book is it really living?
..........................
"In town we have arguments."
--Stan Persky
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 17:28:07 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM>
Subject: sonnet quiddity
Rob Hardin certainly wrote:
A seventeenth-century sonnet can be
analyzed in purely rhetorical terms. Such aspects of the sonnet
might not be *as* commonly understood as its rime-scheme and meter.
But that doesn't mean they are too obscure to be understood.
Lawrence J. Zillman's piece on the sonnet in the Pinkerton directory of
poetry suggests that the 'form' of the petrarcan sonnet causes a 'two-part
division of thought' to be 'invited'. Zillman elsewhere notes that Wyatt
took an immediate liking to the closing couplet, that Petrarch's
'artificiality of treatment' stemming from 'Platonic love themes' were
exported throughout Europe along with the metrical pattern and rhyme
scheme, and that in this century the sonnet has seen the gradual phasing
out of 'metronomic' iambs and exact rhymes even as the form has been
present in poems having 'almost any subject and mood.'
Btw, Charles, is the title 'Tone Lock' a reference to the rapper Tone-Loc?
By all of which I mean to suggest, Rob, that opening the encyclopedia is as
exasperating as one imagines.
What is at stake, Maria, I think, is the claim to centrality--not, as some
might have it, centrality of group formation based on the relative merits
of poets or poems--but of the sensibility (the sense it makes) implied by
what one assumes when writing. What is writing about. Some categories of
sensibility--idea, form, words. 'Or words.' If you control the central
sensibility, then people come to your readings, read your poems, talk about
them, etc.
Which they do (or do not) anyway.
It's not simply, Rod, that poets are deluded into thinking there's a
restricted economy. It's more like: poets are intolerant. Poetry has so
much to do with articulating what one is about--subtler more urgent
etc.--that to have to acknowledge work that contradicts one's own--it's a
kind of cognitive dissonance that hits most of the poets I know where they
fight or fly. Quine suggests a logic that can incorporate contradictions,
and he I think cites Whitman. What kind of a poet was Whitman, anyway? What
was central for Whitman, I mean. Joe Ross's 'fuzzy logic' series I've
gushed about here, too. Bob Holman's cafe gig was described by the new
yorker how? Taste brooks no contradictions, though. Apparent conflicts,
like loving both gourmet food and jello, aren't contradictions--travelling
in tastes you see everything--
or, Jordan, if you make a pact with yourself to ignore your basic need to
be rude to people who are making mistakes--then it may be possible for you,
individually, to read poetry (spring in) and participate in (this world of)
poetry politics (poor mutts) happily. This will to be civil may make you
crazy, but it will spare you much embarrassment when your turn comes to be
exposed for the fool you certainly are.
Jordan
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 16:29:33 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joe Amato <amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU>
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
this is a sonnet a sonnet this is
a sonnet is this a sonnet is this
this is a sonnet a sonnet this is
a sonnet is this a sonnet is this
this sonnet is a sonnet this is a
is a this sonnet is a this sonnet
this sonnet is a sonnet this is a
is a this sonnet is a this sonnet
this a sonnet is a sonnet this is
is a sonnet this is a sonnet this
this a sonnet is a sonnet this is
is a sonnet this is a sonnet this
is this a sonnet is this a sonnet
this is a sonnet this is a sonnet
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 17:30:31 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Alexander <chax@MTN.ORG>
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
>this is a sonnet a sonnet this is
>a sonnet is this a sonnet is this
>this is a sonnet a sonnet this is
>a sonnet is this a sonnet is this
>this sonnet is a sonnet this is a
>is a this sonnet is a this sonnet
>this sonnet is a sonnet this is a
>is a this sonnet is a this sonnet
>this a sonnet is a sonnet this is
>is a sonnet this is a sonnet this
>this a sonnet is a sonnet this is
>is a sonnet this is a sonnet this
>is this a sonnet is this a sonnet
>this is a sonnet this is a sonnet
Nice.
this is a sonnet a
a sonnet is a sonnet is this
this is a so is
a sonnet this a sonnet is this
this sonnet is a a
is sonnet is a this sonnet
this sonnet is a net this is a
is a th net
this net is a sonnet this is
is this
this a sonnet is a sonnet this is
is a son net this
is this a so this a sonnet
et this et
charles
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 19:14:22 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Careerism
The following is my contribution--which I may or may not choose to read,
depending on which possibility will do the most to enhance my Poetic Career
(I'm gonna be rich, my astrologer told me!)--at the Unbearables'
Careerism Festival, which will take place on June 2nd, 5pm, at Chez Rollo
(37 Avenue B).
-------------------------------------
Parasitologia Hungarica
(or Stomp Me That Latin Swing)
(in which an insect biologist renounces academic verse
for The Nyorican Poetry Cafe)
Rob Hardin
Her father studied the etiology
of necrophilous and slime-gathering stingless bees,
filth breeding flies on a Hungarian cattle farm.
Breathing stale must in a shuttered office,
she monitored insect thought to research the effects
of popular anti-depressants on worker ants,
engendering adult mosquito surveillance
for control programs involving larval parasitoid uses.
This is a shameless career move, Father said.
And still she couldn't adjust;
her wig-frizz issued parricidal slivers
in a dense-faceted surface as gray as cerci.
Still stiller trembled the insect genechimes,
still still, spittle-spill-reamed the rills of the sills
Muerte, Los Blancos! Muerte, Los Wasperitos!
They call me the Cuban Khlebnikov! The afrocubicentric boy with a
surgically-inset Spanish-American dictionary and the ability to PRONOUNCE
MACARONIC VERSE SEMI-CORRECTLY WHILE SNORING! HAIL MULTICULTURAL SATAN (or
Lyle Menendez)! Do not doubt me, Bob, for I AM THE REAL DEAL!
Oh, yeah, Edwin, swing your notochords, [jazz reference],
doo-wee-ooh-wee-ooh-wee...
dwee-dwee, vah-voooooommmmmmuhhhh....
And then the latinate-pharmacobiological-arachnid-reference-pace quickened.
Highway tube
Speed-bug mood
Flyin' to thuh beaker
With sum speed-bug food
Got-uh hardcore 'scope
N' uh lab-test boll-
Weevil-fat-assed-Creole
Uh-slippin'-n'-uh-lippin?
MMMMM!-uh-nuh-nuh-nuh-nuh-nuh
Bug times, yeah!
Bad times, no!
Listen to thuh pistons
N'-uh off uh go
Vroooooom-vroooooommmmmmmmmmmmuhhhhhhhhhh....
O Morphine Bug-Daddy, nodding off in the petri dish of Now...
Don't stop displaying or you'll get ridged palms, Mother said,
and you'll always live in a cylinder of z-pools.
As the aggregation pheromone of misanthrope hostesses
burrowed through nilotic mires pixeled with pathogens
in foraging behaviour that provided no solutions
to the reliability-detectability problems of late adolescent
Oecologia Blowflies, alterations
in adult taste responses by chemicals present
during the development of Phorma regina sent this pathology inward.
To study the minds of parasites is a worthwhile activity, Ramon,
since all property is theft, according to local open-field shoppers.
Scatologies are the empires of parents who can't awaken
from their sodium tripolyphosphate attachment career decisions.
(I don't believe in endings)
So what do you think, Mr. Courtney? Do I have a shot?
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 11:22:50 GMT+1200
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Tony Green <t.green@AUCKLAND.AC.NZ>
Organization: The University of Auckland
Subject: Re: Poem of Weeping Ghosts in Sonnet Form
I second Jerry Rothenberg's remarks on the extraordinary lines at the
bottom of Annie Finch's posting. Me, I'm all for students being made
to write sonatas to keep The Sonata from being forsaken as an awkward damn
puzzle to solve, and The Sonatina, and the hybrid The Sonnetina. All
The Best,
Tony Green,
e-mail: t.green@auckland.ac.nz
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 16:33:06 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Laura Moriarty <moriarty@SFSU.EDU>
Subject: benefit for New Langton Arts
One Night Only!
Word X Music
Norman Fischer, Leslie Scalapino, Kit Robinson and Laura Moriarty will be
reading with musicians Donald Robinson, James Routhier and Glenn Spearman
in what the flyer describes as a "full on jam session" this Saturday June 1
at 8 pm.
Tickests are a suggested donation of $10. Reservations are at (415)
626-5416.New Langton Arts is at 1246 Folsom Street between 8th and 9th
streets.
=========================================================================
Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 20:53:05 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Thomas Bell <tbjn@WELL.COM>
Subject: Re: Russian/American sonnet quiddity
In-Reply-To: <v01520d02add3c1f2a6e6@[166.84.199.56]>
After a desultory time as an English major, I date the beginning of
my positive experiences with poetry to the early 60's when I was
able to read Russian. I found the early work of Yevtushenko and
Vosnesensky. This led in many directions, but I think the fascination
was related to a comment made on this list a few days ago about the
Russian poetry festival. I deleted this (and would appreciate a copy
sent) but the general idea was that the difference between American
and Russian poetry was that American poetry was a carefully constructed
experience (whether formal or experimental) while Russian poetry began
with the experience.
This is consistent with my experience even if I or the poster of the
comment might not be using words that adequately describe the
difference. I feel there is a difference and that the difference is
related to the current form discussion. If anyone understands what
I am talking about I would appreciate hearing from them either here
or offlist.
Thanks
Tom Bell
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 03:12:03 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: New Books fer Poetics
It was suggested to me that I periodically select 5 or 10 new books from
Bridge Street Books to offer to the list. Hopefully this will be of use for
browsers as well as shoppers, simply as a bit of "what's new." Ordering info
follows the list of books. This first list is almost entirely poetry. In the
future I will include critical books, fiction, etc. We're expecting Bob
Perelman's _Language Writing & Literary History_ soon.
1. _Bleeding Optimist_, Mary Burger, Xurban, $7.00. Some of you may know the
excellent magazine _Proliferation_ Burger was (is?) an editor for. "Accidents
happen here."
2. _Stone Marmalade_, a play by Kevin Killian & Leslie Scalapino, Singing
Horse, $9.50. "This play is our concerted attempt to demolish society."
--L.S.
3. _Frame Structures: Early Poems 1974-1979_, Susan Howe, New Directions,
$12.95. Reprints 4 early books
with a lengthy recent essay.
4. _Symmetry_, Laura Moriarty, Avec, $9.95.
"The one clear night which encompasses the subject forgets everything."
5. _Channel-Surfing the Apocalypse_, Susan Smith Nash, Avec, $11.95. Prose &
some drawings. Hey, a blurb by Burroghs (not quite as rare as Pynchon, but
close).
Titles include: "Knowledge is Lonely and Filled with Sticky Sap" & "My
Bulimic Jesus."
6. _Natural Facts_, Melanie Neilson, Potes & Poets, $11.00. Cover is a
daguerreotype, 1840s, "Still Life with Pumpkin, Shakespeare, and Sweet
Potato." Lauterbach mentions Ives in her blurb, seems right to me. "Will
Congress / Canary the canon?"
7. _Clean and Well Lit: Sel Poems 1987-1995_, Tom Raworth, Roof, $10.95.
Tom's tops.
8. _The Front Matter, Dead Souls_, Leslie Scalapino, Wesleyan, $10.95. "I'm a
scout on the quiet road into it."
9. _In Memory of My Theories_, Rod Smith, O Books, $9.
"No analysand can indent this largesse." Highly recommended.
10. just ask, we may have it.
We also have a limited number of signed copies of Bernstein & Joris books
from their recent significant & enlightened performance on our premises.
Charles' _Dark City_ ($11.95), _Rough Trades_ ($10.95), _The Sophist_
($11.95), _Islets/Irritations_ ($9.95), & A Poetics ($14.95). Pierre's
_Breccia: Sel Poems: '72-'86_ ($14.95), _Turbulence_ ($8), _The Irritation
Ditch_ ($4.50), & _Winnetou Old_ ($5). Also his translation of Celan's
_Breathturn_ ($12.95).
Poetics folks receive free shipping on orders of more than $20. Free shipping
+ 10% discount on orders of more than $30. There are two ways to order.
1. E-mail your order to aerialedge@aol.com with your address & we will bill
you with the books. or 2. via credit card-- you may call us at 202 965 5200
or e-mail aerialedge@aol.com w/ yr add, order, & card # & we will send a
receipt with the books.
Bridge Street Books, 2814 Pennsylvania Ave NW, Wahsington, DC 20007.
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 07:07:59 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Bernstein <bernstei@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU>
Subject: new M/E/A/N/I/N/G
Susan Bee and Mira Schor, editors of
M/E/A/N/I/N/G
are pleased announce=20
the publication of #19/20,=20
a special, double, final, 10th-anniversary issue.
Now available.
#19/20 will be an instant collector's item.=20
It features 120 pages of original artwork by visual artists=20
who have written for past issues.
It also contains a valuable, complete, detailed index to issues #1-20
arranged by subject as well as by author.
This issue is available for $15 for individuals; $20 for institutions.
M/E/A/N/I/N/G #19/20 features:
An All Visual Forum with=20
Emma Amos, Douglas Anderson,Suzanne Anker, Ida Applebroog, Lillian Ball,
Rudolf Baranik, Susan Bee, Charles Bernstein, Jake Berthot, Jimbo Blachly,
Serena Bocchino, Power Booth, Nancy Bowen, Jackie Brookner, Richard Brown,
Kathe Burkhart, Jack Butler, Sheila Butler, Rosemarie Castoro, Emily Cheng,
Myrel Chernick, Daryl Chin, Maureen Connor, Jordan Crandall, Peggy Cyphers,
Kevin deForest, Stephanie DeManuelle, Jane Dickson, Bailey Doogan, Rackstraw
Downes, Johanna Drucker, Hermine Ford, Jason Fox, Nicholas Frank, Nancy
Fried, Ava Gerber, Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe, Sharon Gold, Leon Golub, John
Goodyear, Mimi Gross, Nancy Grossman, Marcia Hafif, Freya Hansell, Hilary
Helfant, Susanna Heller, Lisa Hoke, David Humphrey, Michi Itami, Julia
Jacquette, Yvonne Jacquette, Tom Knechtel, Alison Knowles, Komar & Melamid,
Joyce Kozloff, L. Brandon Krall, Robert Kuszek, Ellen Lanyon, Lawrence
Lipkin, Fern Logan, Pam Longobardi, Medrie MacPhee, Lenore Malen, Ann McCoy,
Ann Messner, Melissa Meyer, Michael Mikulay, Holly Miller, John Miller,
Curtis Mitchell, Gregory Montreuil, David Moreno, Robert C. Morgan, Portia
Munson, Kathryn Myers, Joseph Nechvatal, Diane Neumaier, Paul Pagk, Enoc
P=E9rez, Nancy Pierson, Howardena Pindell, Barbara Pollack, William Pope. L,
Lucio Pozzi, Rebecca Quaytman, Aviva Rahmani, David Reed, Trudie Reiss,
Jacques Roch, Sal Romano, Erika Rothenberg, Juan Sanchez, Miriam Schapiro,
Carolee Schneemann, Mira Schor, Christian Schumann, Arlene Shechet, Kate
Shepherd, Pamela Shoemaker, Harriet Shorr, Dena Shottenkirk, Amy Sillman,
Joan Snyder, Elke Solomon, Nancy Spero, May Stevens, Robert Storr, Sidney
Tillim, Danny Tisdale, Nicola Tyson, Derek Weiler, Lawrence Weiner, Faith
Wilding, Martha Wilson, Michael Windle, Flo Oy Wong, Pamela Wye, Karen
Yasinsky, Alexander Zane, Barbara Zucker
Order Information
A very limited number of complete sets of M/E/A/N/I/n/G #1-20
are available for $300.
M/E/A/N/I/N/G #1, 6, 8, 11 are only available as part of these complete=
sets.
Other back issues (except for #19/20) are available at $6 each.
M/E/A/N/I/N/G #19/20 is $15; $20 (institutions)
SHIPPING COSTS
If you wish to order a complete set, please add for shipping:
$10, Domestic; $25 Foreign (air); $15 (Canada)
=B7Individual issues: $5 (Foreign); $2.50 (Canada)
=B7Issue #19/20: $10 (Foreign); $5 (Canada)
=B7 Foreign orders please pay by international money order in U.S. dollars=
=20
All checks should be made payable to Mira Schor.
Send all orders to:
Mira Schor
60 Lispenard Street
New York, NY 10013
**
also available at some bookstores and from SPD
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 07:48:37 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 29 May 1996 19:34:06 -0700 from
<ghawkins@HALCYON.COM>
On Wed, 29 May 1996 19:34:06 -0700 Gary Hawkins (or Laura?) said:
>
>If a thing has holes in it, I think we should know about it. What's called
>"anomaly" in science is called "rebellion" in poetry-- either way
>revolutions do happen.
Isn't it true that in certain periods in English lit. history, adding an
extra syllable to the line was making a statement - a flourish, something
scandalous, outrageous, flagrant. But the english language has an extraordinar
y springiness to it, and in America it sprang all out of meter. Here, now,
the anomalous thing is to rein in the springiness with meter.
>The English dumped the Italian sonnet once they realized it's easier to
>rhyme in Italian. American rhymes even less.
Depends on your definition of rhyme. Off-rhyme, conceptual rhyme, inside-
out rhyme - the english vowels are FULL of rhyme.
>
>Besides, once a form's been done, why do it again for anything other than
>practice, to prove you can do it?
This attitude, paradoxically, takes form too seriously. It's poets & poetry
from long time ago that still haunt us today (I mean literally haunt us).
I wrote a poem about Hart Crane the 3rd section of which is a sonnet
because I wanted to draw close to Crane's own memorial sonnets (to Dickinson
& Melville). The sonnet is not a form but just a way to direct the song.
- Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 08:14:21 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: Re: Au pur delice sans chemin (1)
In-Reply-To: Message of Thu, 30 May 1996 09:22:29 CST from
<dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
On Thu, 30 May 1996 09:22:29 CST David Baratier said:
> Ses purs ongles tres haut dediant leur onyx,
> L'Angoisse, ce minuit, soutient, lampadore,
> Maint reve vesperal brule par le Phenix
> Que ne recueille pas de cineraire amphore.
Se Franc Goutier et sa compaigne Helaine
Eussent ceste doulce vie hantee,
D'oignons, civotz, qui causent forte alaine,
N'acontassent une bise tostee.
"If Franc Gontier and his companion Helene
had ever led a life as sweet as this,
they wouldn't give a damn for scallions
or onions which cause bad breath"
Franswayze Villon, trans. Anthony Bonner
-- Henri Goulet
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 21:32:31 +0900
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Nada Gordon <nada@GOL.COM>
Subject: naropa dates/topics
Does anyone know the dates and topics for the Naropa summer writing program?
Or if they have something resembling a website?
You can backchannel me at nada@gol.com.
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 08:35:25 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: russ/am po form
Tom Bell made a comment about differing Russian & American approaches to
poetic form. Was it my post you were referring to? I didn't exactly
say that Americans build an experience in the poem, while Russians
respond to prior experience, though that's close. I was reflecting
both on my own take of the readings I heard at the conference and on
a remark made to me my Russian poet Elena Shvarts, to the effect that
Americans take their time through the poem getting to what they want
to say/discover, while the russians impose a kind of finality on the
poem through tight forms. This was most evident in Ivan Zhdanov's
reading, who reads short intense almost riddle-like lyrics in a kind
of flat, resigned way - the manner playing off the intense emotional
effect. On the other hand, a poet like Shvarts is very expansive
- but within the metrical CHANTING speech of russian poetry and
a kind of folklore-witchcraft approach to classic modes & forms
(clearly I think in the line of both Akhmatova & Tsvetaeva).
The end result of both approaches for me was that the american langpos
like Bruce Andrews get to a kind of dionysian explosive effect
through crazy free rant - whereas for the russians the dionysian
is definitely there but it takes on a kind of tragic finality.
Shvarts also mentioned to me how different russian poetry audiences
are - a lot of emotionality, weeping, etc. - Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 09:39:35 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Carnography <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET>
Subject: Re: Careerism, yes; but formal exactitude as well
Jordan Davis:
> yah but obviously matt cour(t)ney's not the one to ask...
That's certainly to his credit, isn't it--
that he turned his back on the nastier
ramifications of self-promotion? I just saw
Matthew in the street, en route to his night at
Biblio's, and I must say, the man has integrity
written on his forehead.
Not coincidentally, when I looked *closely* at
the writing on Matt's forehead, I noticed a
certain adherence to *Shakepearean sonnet form*:
Integrity, integrity inte-
Grity; integrity integrity,
Integrity: integrity inte-
Grity integrity--integrity
Integrity--integrity (Inte-
Grity!) integrity integrity
Integrity integrity inte-
Grity integrity integrity.
Integrity integrity inte-
Grity integrity integrity?
Integrity integrity,inte-
Grity, integrity *integrity*?
Integrity, integrity inte;
Grity integrity, integrity.
(I wonder...do you think...and I mean
this, as it were, in the specu/la/tive
sense...that we might have belabored this
subject? Or is my sentiment too reminiscent
of Henry David Thoreau?)
Obviously, Matt is alluding to the
early magic realism of Virginia Woolf,
who said, simply, "Style is rhythm."
Or perhaps he is merely repeating the
words "mug" and "shoe" in an utterly
random sequence.
Nothing is more formidable than a degree in composition
(except, perhaps, a degree in zither repair).
Looking forward to your thoughts on the relationship between
Tourette's Syndrome and agogic accents in the couplets
of Snodgrass. Until then, I offer you an extended vacation
from my thoughts on any subject.
All the best,
Rob Hardin
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 07:01:15 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Herb Levy <herb@ESKIMO.COM>
Subject: Re: naropa dates/topics
I thought other people might be interested so I didn't back channel the URL
for Naropa.
<http://www.naropa.edu/>
is the main page. The summer programs are described at
<http://www.naropa.edu/summer96.htm>
>Does anyone know the dates and topics for the Naropa summer writing program?
>
>Or if they have something resembling a website?
>
>You can backchannel me at nada@gol.com.
Herb Levy
herb@eskimo.com
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 10:15:52 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Nonset form
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Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 18:10:43 -0500
To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: finchar@muohio.edu (Annie Finch)
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
Emily Lloyd wrote:
>Cheap shot or no, the analogy doesn't work because forests are gone, sonnets
>are not. . . . So the question seems to be not whether formal
>sonnets will survive but whether they'll continue to be written.
Thst's what I mean by "survive"--continue to be written (and not only be
written--be written by engaged, original poets). "Mummy" forms thataren't
being written haven't survived as living forms, only as artifacts.
As you point out, Hacker, Campo etc. can do it, as can some of the women in
A Formal Feeling Comes, because their self-consciously marginalized
position as gays or women builds an ironic distance into the form.
I am not especially convinced that it
>deeply matters if they are not. We've got a lot in & on the books.
You're not convinced, but it clearly matters to some poets such as
Hacker/Campo, who get a lot of power from the form. Personally, I am not
all that interested in writing sonnets either right now (big surprise to
the list, huh?), but I like having many different kinds of forms around.
>
>Actually--Annie--I think that one way sonnets *can* survive (as a present or
>future, not a past thing) is through our engagement & play with them, as in
>the "Ghost" (sorry, don't have the rest of the title with me) poem.
I agree completely. I have no desire to prescribe, ossify, define, or
limit anyone's play with, the form or any form. But I like being able to
speak acccurately about poetic phenomena, and I find the technical terms
in their original meanings extremely useful. Can't people play with the
form, altering it more or less as they desire, without taking the
terminology along with them? Couldn't someone say, my poem is a take on
the sonnet, rather than, my poem is a sonnet, if in fact it is not a sonnet
as much as another poem is? It's common sense, isn't it--most educated
people would know what you meant if you said that one poem was actually a
sonnet and another was a poem that, while not really technically a sonnet,
alludes to a sonnet through such and such characteristics.
My main interest is to increase the number and accuracy of the
terms available to us as people who want to discuss poetics. I understand
the danger of limiting in some regressive and stifling way the play with a
form by saying that such-and-such is not a sonnet and such-and-such is.
But on the other hand, if the sonnet is so dead and pointless, then why all
the fuss about keeping its name? Why not let the poor ole dead pointless
form keep its own name so that those who choose to mess about in its
remains, for whatever perverse reasons of their own, can at least know
clearly what they are messing about in?
Perhaps one reason this idea is so threatening to some on the list
is that the technical and critical awareness/terminology to discuss other
forms, newer forms, is just being developed; we are just barely able to
discuss the poetics/prosody of free verse with any accuracy, thanks to
work like Hartmann's, Boughn's, and Holder's (and perhaps my own Ghost of
Meter). Maybe as we begin to develop resources to discuss the newer
prosodies, it will become clear that there is plenty of room for many kinds
of forms and we don't have to be fighting so hard over the stupid ole
sonnet.
Thanks, Emily, for your response.
Annie Finch
(writing from my office on a decent email program for once, so this time
there will be no typo soup of unerasable fragments to follow so deliciously
on my leftbrain words. Sorry, Jerry Rothenberg! I'll be back home
tomorrow and able to cook up another yummy batch. Aren't they wonderful? I
like them too. I'll miss them when the university finally gets it together
to give me access to this program at home.)
ANNIE FINCH
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH
MIAMI UNIVERSITY
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 10:17:05 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: nonset form
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Date: Thu, 30 May 1996 18:13:52 -0500
To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: finchar@muohio.edu (Annie Finch)
Subject: Re: Nonset Form
When I wrote,
>> A form is a living thing in my book and needs sustainable
>>care.
>
George Bowering wrote,
>If it is in your (or anyone's) book is it really living?
>
Yes, that was my point: That some things in books seem living to me, such
as forms, when they are seriously engaged with, and words, when they are
not too transparently referential .
ANNIE FINCH
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH
MIAMI UNIVERSITY
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 10:25:10 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Peter Jaeger <pjaeger@BOSSHOG.ARTS.UWO.CA>
Subject: nonset form
sonnets are little rooms:
sonnet 2
much
to
young
at
heart
beat
poets
are
the
unacknowledged
income
will
be
penalized
sonnet 18
one
for
all
and
all
for
one
2
3
o'clock
four
o'clock
rock
talk
sonnet 37
so
never
say
never
enough
time
to
go
man
go
go
dance
class
struggle
Peter Jaeger
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 10:37:44 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Jerry Rothenberg's favorite typo soup
By the way, for those who have been wondering if I am possessed by a
mischevious pomo imp bent on undermining any dignity I might manage to drag
into the aarea of the sonnet's wornout aura, an explanatory postscript follows my
the signature of my response to Emily Lloyd .
--Annie F.
(the ion of the nation, as today's imp has it)
hantion ion of the nationla
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 10:46:11 EDT
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Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Daniel Bouchard <Daniel_Bouchard@HMCO.COM>
Subject: Fwd: russ/american poetry conf
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
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---------------------
Forwarded message:
Camden N J--U S America / June 1 '91
Well here I am launch'd on my 73d year--We had our birth
anniversary spree last evn'g--ab't 40 people, choice friends
mostly--12 or so women--Tennyson sent a short and sweet
letter over his own sign manual--y'r cable was rec'd & read,
lots of bits of speeches, with gems in them--we had a capital
good supper (dinner) chicken soup, salmon, roast lamb &c:
&c: &c: I had been under a horrible spel f'm 5 to 6, but warry
got me dress'd & down (like carrying down a great log)--&
trabel had all ready for me a big goblet of first-rate iced
shampagne--I suppose I swigg'd it off at once--I certainly
welcom'd them all forthwith, & at once felt if I was to go down
I would not fail without a desperate struggle--must have taken
near two bottles champagne the evn'g--so I added ("I felt to")
a few words of honor & reverence for our Emerson, Bryant,
Longfellow dead--and then for Whittier and Tennyson "the
boss of us all" living (specifying all)--not four minutes
altogether--then held out with them FOR THREE
HOURS--talking lots, lots impromptu--Dr. B[ucke] is
here--Horace T is married--fine sunny noon--
Walt Whitman
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 10:01:38 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Charles Alexander <chax@MTN.ORG>
Subject: Re: Nonset form
Annie Finch writes, in the current discussion of sonnet form:
"But I like being able to
speak acccurately about poetic phenomena, and I find the technical terms
in their original meanings extremely useful."
I know this is being awfully picky of me, but isn't this sense of "original"
highly problematic? Who wrote the very first sonnet? Who first used the term
sonnet? Is either of these uses the controlling definition of the form (for
"speaking accurately" or any other purposes) Annie or anyone wants?
charles alexander
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 11:13:12 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Pierre Joris <joris@CSC.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: naropa dates/topics
In-Reply-To: <v02130500add4abac3bde@[192.0.2.1]>
The Naropa homepage for the summer program is however a reduced version
-- oddly enough for the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics's
Summer Writing Program it leaves out a number of the visiting writers who
will be teaching there this year: week one also has Kenneth Irby,Katie
Yates,Mark Amerika & Keith Abbot; week 2, Paul Hoover, Beverly Dahlen &
Don Byrd; week 3, Pierre Joris, Will Alexander & Kathleen Fraser.
=======================================================================
Pierre Joris | "Form fascinates when one no longer has the force
Dept. of English | to understand force from within itself. That
SUNY Albany | is, to create." -- Jacques Derrida
Albany NY 12222 |
tel&fax:(518) 426 0433 | "Poetry is the promise of a language."
email: | -- Friedrich Holderlin
joris@cnsunix.albany.edu|
=======================================================================
On Fri, 31 May 1996, Herb Levy wrote:
> I thought other people might be interested so I didn't back channel the URL
> for Naropa.
>
> <http://www.naropa.edu/>
>
> is the main page. The summer programs are described at
>
> <http://www.naropa.edu/summer96.htm>
>
>
>
> >Does anyone know the dates and topics for the Naropa summer writing program?
> >
> >Or if they have something resembling a website?
> >
> >You can backchannel me at nada@gol.com.
>
>
> Herb Levy
> herb@eskimo.com
>
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 10:29:16 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: forming at the mouth
AD HOC SING-SONG SEA SONNET
I heard a tugboat huffing through the fog
while standing on a pier in gloom and guano.
I heard it straining like a hunting dog
leashed against drowning. Far below
gray breakers, the bored sea-god, a snoring
mythological typhoon, dreamed
he floated too - sirens surrounding
his dais, sun feathering the sea-calm...
I thought - despite these dreary docks
and screaming gulls, that dumb sea-god and I
are one. I dreamed his squid-like, salty locks;
he dreamed his air-filled, regal buoyancy;
and neither, throned in dry sandcastles, knows
where that turbulent, stubborn tugboat goes.
- Henry Gould
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 11:28:42 EST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: "Burt Kimmelman -@NJIT" <kimmelman@ADMIN.NJIT.EDU>
Subject: The Poetics of Authorship
From: TESLA::KIMMELMAN 31-MAY-1996 11:27:11.25
To: ADMIN::KIMMELMAN
CC:
Subj: The Poetics of Authorship
Announcing my new book (please ask your local and university
librarians to buy it--since, at $49.95 plus $3.00 shipping, it's
probably too steep for civilians):
THE POETICS OF AUTHORSHIP IN THE LATER
MIDDLE AGES: THE EMERGENCE OF THE MODERN
LITERARY PERSONA
New York: Peter Lang Publishing, 275 7th Ave., NYC 10001.
To order: Phone 1-800-770-LANG (5264), or 212-647-7706.
FAX 212-647-7707
or contact Mary McLaughlin, Director of Marketing,
at: marym@plang.com
or see Peter Lang's web page: http://www.peterlang.com
ABOUT THE BOOK (taken from its back cover):
Literary individualism first manifests in the twelfth century in
word puzzles and overt self-naming as well as in discussions
about the nature of writing and the role of the poet in the
world. Guillem IX, Marcabru, Dante, Chaucer, and Langland,
were poets and intellectuals. This engaging study traces their
claims of authorship, not to a need for what modernity views
as self-promotion, but rather to their interests in contemporary
philosophical debates. Yet in their creations of both history and
fiction, these poets anticipated modern narrative and its literary
persona.
"Kimmelman's work on the poetics of authorship is
enlightened, cogent, often exciting--a significant contribution to
our understanding of the medieval text as mediator between the
collective and the individual. Kimmelman is nuanced,
insightful, and always aware of the resonances that involve not
only the medieval but the modern: in sum, he has given us an
alert, sensitive guidebook to the post-Classical career of ars
poetica."
- Allen Mandelbaum, Kenan Professor of Humanities, Wake
Forest University
"The task that Kimmelman has set himself, to locate in some of
our medieval predecessors the earliest pulse beats of what we
understand--almost take for granted--as the poetic persona,
demands a rich and deep reading not only of writers like
Guillem IX, Marcabru, Dante, Chaucer, and Langland, but
also of the shifting intellectual currents that enabled each of
them to hold up a mirror to reality that also reflected an image
of his individual self. That he rises so well as critic, scholar,
and teacher to this challenge, results in an extraordinary
opportunity of recognition for his readers; there are moments
when Kimmelman's discussions actuate encounters of singular
connection with these historic points of poetic self-
consciousness and vitality."
- George Economou, The University of Oklahoma
Or else, if you are interested, you can contact me:
Burt Kimmelman
kimmelman@admin.njit.edu
Thanks for listening . . . .
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 11:41:04 -0400
Reply-To: Robert Drake <au462@cleveland.Freenet.Edu>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Robert Drake <au462@CLEVELAND.FREENET.EDU>
Subject: Re: Nonset form
>I agree completely. I have no desire to prescribe, ossify, define, or
>limit anyone's play with, the form or any form. But I like being able to
>speak acccurately about poetic phenomena, and I find the technical terms
>in their original meanings extremely useful...
i, fr one, have not misunderstood this discussion to be about prescribing what
one may or ought do; some of the arguementativeness here seems not to be about
what is *allowed*, as it does about what is *useful*... praps some have felt
that a focus on more traditional forms implies that such forms are worth
considering, to the exclusion of work that is bends or breaks those forms?
>...Can't people play with the
>form, altering it more or less as they desire, without taking the
>terminology along with them?
my underlying assumption is that form is a social construct, rather than
an objectivly quantifiable, absolute? (praps this puts us on different
planets, not talking th same language...) but from that standpoint, it
makes perfect sense for a poet to "take the terminolgy" and use it as a
source of cultural meaning/context for work that, in strict prosidic
analysis, doesnt have the physical features of the traditional form.
i used to do a soundpoem performance called "sonnets", no words allowed
but w/ traditional rhythmic & "rhyme" schemes made using vocal & non-vocal
improvised sound events...
it's interesting to me, that this discussion has pretty consistently
refered to sonnet as typical ov formal poetry... wd offer as contra-
example modern haiku--the old 5/7/5 stanza forms and content restrictions
have, in many contemporary "schools", largely been dispensed with. but
distinctions are still made & hotly debated about what is or is not a
"true" haiku--"formal" distinctions being made on the basis of "content"...
dunno how that connects, if at all,w/ yr emphasis in repetition ov elements--
tho it seems that content is the repeated element? in linked forms, where
each verse is to echo/refer to th previous verse, but not to the verse
before that?
asever
lbd
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 11:55:20 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Pierre Joris <joris@CSC.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: naropa dates/topics
In-Reply-To: <Pine.ULT.3.91.960531110311.16221A-100000@loki.hum.albany.edu>
oops, I forgot week 4, which also has Sean Killian, Bradford Morrow & Lee
Ann Brown among its visiting writers
=======================================================================
Pierre Joris | "Form fascinates when one no longer has the force
Dept. of English | to understand force from within itself. That
SUNY Albany | is, to create." -- Jacques Derrida
Albany NY 12222 |
tel&fax:(518) 426 0433 | "Poetry is the promise of a language."
email: | -- Friedrich Holderlin
joris@cnsunix.albany.edu|
=======================================================================
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 08:19:24 -0700
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Joe Aimone <joaimone@UCDAVIS.EDU>
Subject: "A Sonnet" - take two or three
(with apologies to the other Joe A)
This is "A Sonnet," a sonnet. This is
a "sonnet" - - Is this a Sonnet? Is this
This? Is a sonnet a sonnet? This is.
A sonnet is this: a sonnet. Is this
this? Sonnet is. A sonnet, this, is. (A
Is A!) This sonnet is a this. Sonnet
this: sonnet is _a_ sonnet. This. Is a
is a this? Sonnet is a this-sonnet.
This, a sonnet, is a sonnet this is.
Is a sonnet this is a sonnet? This
this a sonnet? Is a sonnet this? Is
is a sonnet this is? A sonnet this
is, this, a sonnet, is this, a sonnet.
This is a sonnet: this is a sonnet.
--
Joe Aimone
Department of English
University of California, Davis
joaimone@ucdavis.edu
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 12:39:38 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: SONNETS/FORMS
I=D5d like to address at once several of the messages from around Ma=
y 15 that I=20
was finally able to read yesterday at my ofice--and then take a breat=
her (!).
1. Rob Hardin wrote,=20
=09 =D2Some modern sonnets are really =D2sonnets=D3 (though pomo has =
rendered=20
=09the quotes unnecessary). =D2
Absolutely; I couldn=D5t agree more. I would even extend the argumen=
t to say=20
that ALL modern sonnets are =D2sonnets=D3, although the only the mo=
re=20
interesting of them seem to be aware of the fact (examples of more an=
d less=20
self-conscious varieties, and various justifications some contemporar=
y poets=20
have for writing them, are available in the infamous A Formal Feeling=
Comes=20
(AFFC).=20
=D2Much of what is called experimental in the stricter sense is as pa=
tterned and=20
marmoreal as any neoclassical Dryden.=D3 =20
Again, I agree completely. And again, please propose editing a secti=
on on=20
one/some of these experimental forms for the Exaltation of Forms book=
. =20
=D2In a Shakespearean sonnet, syntax, diction, and compression are=
=20
demonstrably =D2tangible.=D3
Yes, but are they demonstrably different from the syntax, diction, an=
d=20
compression in Shakespearean blank verse, or in quatrains? Do they =
have=20
any terminological ramifications, since all we=D5re talking about her=
e really is=20
terminology? Aren=D5t the fourpart (English) and the twopart (Italia=
n)=20
argumentative structures, which Paul Oppenheim has brilliantly argued=
=20
helped to construct the bourgeouis consciousness of an individual sel=
f during=20
the Renaissance, the only such aspects of the sonnet that are really =
unique to=20
the form and thus might have definitional value in discussions of poe=
tics? =20
And even if that is the case, is it really worth it to take such a re=
latively bland=20
and widespread phenomenon as syllogistic structure as the defining=
=20
characteristic of the sonnet--thus forfeiting much of the definitiona=
l impact of=20
the outrageously complex and infuriating core structures and all thei=
r=20
hardwon nonce or established variations, 12-line, 18-line, dactylic, =
or=20
whatever?
2.=09Aldon Nielsen wrote:=20
=D2given the definitions offered, the only work that wd. be recogniz=
ed as a new=20
form wd. seem to be a work that invented something new to repeat.=
=D3 =20
=09Yes, that is what the definition was at the time, and it was clea=
rly too=20
limited. It=D5s gone. Maybe the sections on new kinds of forms in t=
he Exaltation=20
of Forms anthology will provide material for those interested in cons=
tructing=20
further definitions of form.=20
3. David Kellogg wrote,
=D2Would a poem count [as formal] for you [according to the definitio=
n discarded=20
above--AF} if it used =D2conspicuous repetition at the alphabetic lev=
el? Say the=20
poem is lineated around the principle of =D23 f=D5s per line.=D3 ?=
=D3
Yes, such a poem would definitely have been formal by my conspicuous=
=20
repetition definition--assuming that the 3 f=D5s were perceptible to =
the naked=20
reading eye. And I love the idea of your friend=D5s new letters of t=
he alphabet.=20
What do they look like, what are their names? Dr. Seuss=D5s are a bi=
t too=20
disappointingly composites of actual letters for me.
4. Tony Green wrote that Dickinson=D5s =D2formal feeling=D3 poem =
=D2does not really=20
fit the amazing grace/heartbreak hotel/yellow ribbon of texas/gates o=
f eden=20
pattern-and so I am interested in the co-optation of Dickinson as a f=
ormalist=D3
I agree, it does not fit the pattern. In the book The Ghost of Meter=
: Culture=20
and Prosody in American Free Verse, I spend a chapter discussing how =
that=20
poem and several others by Dickinson use a dynamic between the folk s=
tanza=20
pattern and the iambic pentameter pattern as their formal principle.
5. Finally, Steve Carll and Tony Green=D5s posts are based on severa=
l=20
unexamined assumptions about form, which I will list to get them out =
in the=20
open:
a. that one =D2traditional=D3 sonnet is exactly like another; hence =
you can predict=20
what a poem will be like if you know it=D5s in traditional sonnet for=
m (Steve=D5s=20
second post)--why should this be true any more than it=D5s true that =
you can=20
predict what one more chant or open-form poem will be like?=20
b. that the only reason to write a sonnet or any other form is =D2to=
prove that=20
you can do it=D3 Ditto--wouldn=D5t that be true to the same extent fo=
r a projective=20
verse poem or any other kind?
c. that =D2counting=D3 is assumed to be =D2a measure of success in w=
riting.=D3 Clearly,=20
what KIND of form something is in has nothing to do with its success =
as=20
writing--except insofar as the text engages more or less dynamically =
and=20
creatively with its form, whatever the form is. This is about termin=
ology, not=20
about judging the quality of writing.
--Annie F.
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 12:57:34 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Re: Nonset form
In-Reply-To: "Your message dated Fri, 31 May 1996 10:01:38 -0500"
<199605311501.KAA05131@freedom.mtn.org>
Dear Charles,
Youa re absolutely right about "original." Very sloppy use fo the word. Well,
is there another way to say it?
If not does thaqt mean it's not worth saying?
--Annie
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 12:58:05 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: henry <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU>
Subject: somnolosonnets
Tell me if I'm wrong,
yea, tell me if I'm wrong--
yet I detect
beneath the stout defense of form-breaking
and the dizzy spins on that most scandalous word,
"Sonnet"--
a longing, yea,
a longing for a little song,
yea, a little song to call our own?
--Sieur Henri de la Tour de Platitude Altesse
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 13:07:52 -0400
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: FUNKHOUSER CHRISTOPH <cf2785@CSC.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: PROTO-ANTHOLOGY of HYPERMEDIA POETRY now AVAILABLE
announcing
the appearance of
a PROTO-ANTHOLOGY of HYPERMEDIA POETRY
edited by Chris Funkhouser
(v.1) featuring
Andrew Stone
Diana Slattery
Christy Sheffield Sanford
Jim Rosenberg
Ted Nelson
Jerome McGann
Bill Luoma
Eduardo Kac
Michael Joyce
Robert Creeley John Cayley
Lee Ann Brown
Jay David Bolter
m a n y o t h e r s
AVAILABLE NOW
free of charge
http://cnsvax.albany.edu/~poetry/hyperpo.html
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 12:32:20 CST
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: David Baratier <dave.baratier@MOSBY.COM>
Subject: non such sonnata forms continuum
As a part of a marginalized group in the US, namely,
a survivor of the generation which directly experienced
the 80's crack epidemic and as a member who actually
parlays any attention to words at all, I quite often use
the sonnet as a formulaic methodology of appropriating
control for myself, as well as large words. The use of
the sonnet as a historically masculinist propaganist tool
for reifying the social stature and division between
upper crust masters and indentured (poet) servants
is aptly suitable for the modern-day low-caste survivalist
whose sensibilities are continually extricated with
a suburbanite martyrdom founded on television coverage
of areas which are so ugly with possession they could not
possibly possess a sense of community.
David Baratier
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 12:55:47 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: "sonnet" in sonnet form
ENCOUNTER
Lurching across the bus, our faces glide
into its core, and back, and then we see
each others' eyes begin and settle them free.
I am the wing struggling in the buses side;
you are the wing that opens when we turn
together to lock our eyes into one bird.
We fly inside, nothing can be heard,
and the first journey ends. Our faces burn
with solitude together though we move
as if I travelled separate from you. Child
made of the darkness, woman, man, my own
remembering, incarnate, opening love,
we look away and leave, grown far more wild
in emptiness, the closer we have grown.
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 13:56:22 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Chris Stroffolino <LS0796@CNSVAX.ALBANY.EDU>
Subject: Re: Nonset form
Dear Annie Finch--
I have a question in all seriousness that I would be really interested
in your answer to. I am currently looking at alot of sonnets by poets
who later on in their careers went on to be known for, and celebrated
more, for their "experimental" vers libra. For instance, the early
sonnets of Frank O'Hara, Jack Spicer, Laura Riding. Coming from the
perspective I do, I tend to want to vindicate these early experiments
in form (just as I am interested in Mondrian's "flowers" (etc) and
Franz Kline's early railroad landscapes)--as important. Yet, would
you be interested in me posting one or two of these. Because it's one
thing for a critic like Marjorie Perloff to criticize, say, O'Hara's
early sonnets in terms of his later work. But I am curious what
you would say about them. I ask this in all humility. Thanks, Chris
Stroffolino
=========================================================================
Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 14:03:32 EDT
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
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From: Daniel Bouchard <Daniel_Bouchard@HMCO.COM>
Subject: Re: "sonnet" in sonnet form
This bus is obviously traveling to Pound's
Dim Lands of Peace.
Express route, one way.
Annie, if this is a "living thing" isn't it kinder to kill the form?
daniel_bouchard@hmco.com
____________________________
ENCOUNTER
Lurching across the bus, our faces glide
into its core, and back, and then we see
each others' eyes begin and settle them free.
I am the wing struggling in the buses side;
you are the wing that opens when we turn
together to lock our eyes into one bird.
We fly inside, nothing can be heard,
and the first journey ends. Our faces burn
with solitude together though we move
as if I travelled separate from you. Child
made of the darkness, woman, man, my own
remembering, incarnate, opening love,
we look away and leave, grown far more wild
in emptiness, the closer we have grown.
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Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 11:44:23 -0700
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From: Steve Carll <sjcarll@SLIP.NET>
Subject: Re: SONNETS/FORMS
At 12:39 PM 5/31/96 -0500, Annie Finch wrote:
>5. Finally, Steve Carll and Tony Green=D5s posts are based on several=20
>unexamined assumptions about form, which I will list to get them out in=
the=20
>open:
>
>a. that one =D2traditional=D3 sonnet is exactly like another; hence you=
can
predict=20
>what a poem will be like if you know it=D5s in traditional sonnet form=
(Steve=D5s=20
>second post)--why should this be true any more than it=D5s true that you=
can=20
>predict what one more chant or open-form poem will be like?=20
I think I have examined this, Annie, and I also think by and large you CAN
predict what one more chant or open-form poem will be about. If form is
adhered to too strictly it becomes a parody of itself. This is what
insisting too authoritatively on "precise definition" produces, and it's the
danger of what you seem to be advocating.
>b. that the only reason to write a sonnet or any other form is =D2to prove=
that=20
>you can do it=D3 Ditto--wouldn=D5t that be true to the same extent for a
projective=20
>verse poem or any other kind?
Again, most of the time, yes, it would, except, as you say below, when it
"engages more or less dynamically and creatively with its form, whatever the
form is." What do "dynamic" and "creative" mean? They have to do with
energy, force, movement into the new. How can that take place without the
TRANSformation I mentioned a couple of days ago? If energy is trapped
within a closed room, the room blows up.
>c. that =D2counting=D3 is assumed to be =D2a measure of success in=
writing.=D3
Clearly,=20
>what KIND of form something is in has nothing to do with its success as=20
>writing--except insofar as the text engages more or less dynamically and=20
>creatively with its form, whatever the form is. This is about terminology,
not=20
>about judging the quality of writing.
Exactly. And I say, overterminologization does violence to the phenomenon
being engaged with.
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
``````````````````````````````````````````````
Steve Carll sjcarll@slip.net
I listen.
I hear nothing. Only
the cow, the cow
of nothingness, mooing
down the bones.
~~Galway Kinnell
``````````````````````````````````````````````
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Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 14:18:52 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
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From: Charles Alexander <chax@MTN.ORG>
Subject: Re: Nonset form
>Dear Charles,
>Youa re absolutely right about "original." Very sloppy use fo the word. Well,
>is there another way to say it?
>If not does thaqt mean it's not worth saying?
>--Annie
Perhaps what you're looking for is a generally "accepted" definition, rather
than an original one. And the discussion on this list generally argues
against any such definition being too static & unchanging. Most of your
comments seem to me to argue that the tradition of the sonnet gets
considerable respect (and not undue respect) in any forthcoming definition.
It's been interesting to me that this is a live and, seemingly, rather
urgent question to people. Frankly, it hasn't been one to me. I may write a
sonnet once in a blue moon, when what I want to say seems to want to occupy
that form -- i.e. I can't remember in the last twenty or so years ever
trying from a beginning point of composition to write a sonnet, but have
found myself, in the midst of the poem, coming to that form or some
emendation/challenge of that form. But as far as arguing for the validity of
the form, or for any definition of it at all, it's just not an issue for me.
So I view this discussion with some interest & curiosity. If this turns into
a conversation about how poems find their form, be that sonnet or whatever,
I would probably be a more avid reader of the posts in this thread.
Good luck in your anthology. I hope you have lots of takers to edit sections
on forms, including evolving forms, experimental forms, etc.
charles alexander
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Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 15:25:30 -0500
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From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Re: SONNETS/FORMS
In-Reply-To: "Your message dated Fri, 31 May 1996 12:39:38 -0500"
<01I5CTNWX7BQ8WXXF6@miavx1.acs.muohio.edu>
Re the reply to Rob H., Aldon N., Steve, Tony, et al:
the program I sent this on converted open quotes to R, closed quotes to S, and
apostropohes to U. I apologize and would appreciate it if anyone who
captures/quotes text convert them to what they should be to avoid the
distraction.
Doesn't all this, even the typo soup, make you appreciate your own email
program?
-Anniedai oahat they sht they 1w t
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Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 15:37:06 -0500
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From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Re: Nonset form
In-Reply-To: "Your message dated Fri, 31 May 1996 13:56:22 -0500"
<01I5CW5JTBTC91VVW0@cnsvax.albany.edu>
Dear Chris,
Yes. I tend to love anything O'Hara does so I might not be too objective, but
I've left his Collected in my office and I would like the chance to respond to
them in the context of this discussion.
--Annie
j
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Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 13:18:45 -0700
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From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: nonset form
>When I wrote,
>
>>> A form is a living thing in my book and needs sustainable
>>>care.
>>
>George Bowering wrote,
>
>>If it is in your (or anyone's) book is it really living?
>>
>Yes, that was my point: That some things in books seem living to me, such
>as forms, when they are seriously engaged with, and words, when they are
>not too transparently referential .
>
>ANNIE FINCH
>DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH
>MIAMI UNIVERSITY
Ah, there's a difference betweeen our poetics, I guess. In my experience,
or in my practice, the form becomes discernible when the poem is spoken,
except for, say, concrete poetry.
..........................
"In town we have arguments."
--Stan Persky
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
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Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 16:05:07 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Re: Nonset form
In-Reply-To: "Your message dated Fri, 31 May 1996 14:18:52 -0500"
<199605311918.OAA09758@freedom.mtn.org>
Dear Charles,
Thanks for your thoughts for the anthology. I hope there will be
takers, and this si the time to take, so please let me know, anyone who wants
to do a section on a form (still some nonexperimetnal ones left too--anyuone
for the ballad stanza? Charles Bernstein--didn't you say you were interested in
cowboy poetry--or perhaps anapests, since you're the only other person I know
besides myself who seems to appreciate Swinburne?) and any experimental form,
repetitive or nonrepetitive.( Women, by the way, would be especially welcome at this point.
this point--
Could one possibly imagine why?)oaically
I completely share your goal, Charles, of bringing the deiscussion to
the point of how poems choose thier forms, sonnet or whatever they may be, and
I think the best demonstration of the sonnet's deadness, or poetry's freedom
from it, would be if your attitude of what's all the fuss about were to become
common.
I have no idea why it's such a big deal. My hands were slapped during
my apprenticeship if I ever tried to write in form, or to write out of the
"Sentimetnal" tradition Pound quashed, so probably it's no surprise that I'm
interestd in these things now. But why is it so threatening in the arena of
this list?
con ? Actually, I don't
care why--
Though I would like to make th epoint that if as Mike B. suggested to me
backchanneling, this is threattening because of a superficial similarity to neocon attacks , and . I have been surprised by the t k,saeiqkamths for the an.e
con attacks on progressive thinking about literature, that is all the more
reason to absorb carefully the germ of truth in each attitude towards poetics
in order to build a stronger and more wellrounded/balanced/impervious/flexible
body of thought about poetics.
--Annie
oi o
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Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 16:38:06 -0400
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From: Rod Smith <AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM>
Subject: Re: Nonset form
came across this rereading Creeley's _Autobiography_ (pg. 95)--
". . . When young, I'd written Olson with almost pious exclamation: 'Form is
never more than an extension of content.' Now I might say equally, 'Content
is never more than an extension of form.' It depends, as they say in New
England. Back of it all I hear Williams again, saying all those years ago,
'Why don't we tell them that it's _fun_. . .' "
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Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 15:42:13 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@UBVM.CC.BUFFALO.EDU>
From: Annie Finch <FINCHAR@MIAVX1.ACS.MUOHIO.EDU>
Subject: Re: SONNETS/FORMS
In-Reply-To: "Your message dated Fri, 31 May 1996 11:44:23 -0700"
<2.2.16.19960531114639.2437dd86@pop.slip.net>
Dear Steve,
So you cede the point taht one can predict what an open-form poem or chant will
be about, or a projective verse poem, as much as one can predict what a sonnet
will be about.
Then how can you read at all, if you find such that such predictability
precludes reading?
Do you honestly think that every "experimental" poem is in a completely new
form? You seem to be painting yourself into a corner.
-Annie
you at
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Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 17:27:43 -0700
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From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: Nonset form
> Who wrote the very first sonnet? Who first used the term
>sonnet?
>charles alexander
Couple decades ago I was listening to Kenner, cant remember whether it was
in the Japanese restaurant or at the lecture, when he posited that the
sonnet was accidentally created when some Italian poet, writing eight-line
stanzas, quit after doing 6 in his second stanza. Someone else found this
and mistook it for a new form, and did another, etc.
Kenner compared this with the post-renaissance European sculptors who found
Greek or Roman busts that were just torsi, the heads and limbs broken off,
so that they started doing it too, not breaking off liombs, but making
sculptures of torsi, and so we got that form.
..........................
"In town we have arguments."
--Stan Persky
George Bowering.
2499 West 37th Ave.,
Vancouver, B.C.,
Canada V6M 1P4
fax: 1-604-266-9000
e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca
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Date: Fri, 31 May 1996 20:18:06 -0700
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From: Joe Aimone <joaimone@UCDAVIS.EDU>
Subject: take a sonnet, any sonnet (Not)
(Since the other Joe A. is so agreeable, let me disagree with myself.)
Not is a sonnet. This sonnet. This not is a
Sonnet. This is a Not Sonnet. This is a not-
Not-is. A sonnet, this sonnet, this not, is a
Sonnet this is. A not sonnet, this is a not-
Not. "This is a sonnet" - - this "not" "is a sonnet."
Is a sonnet not this? Is a sonnet not this
Not this? (Is a sonnet this not?) "Is a sonnet"
Is a sonnet not this. "Is a sonnet" - - not this,
Not sonnet; this is a sonnet, this not.... Is a
Is a "sonnet?" This not is a sonnet. This not-
Not-sonnet, this is a sonnet. This not is a
Is. (A sonnet this not _is_ a sonnet!) This "not"
Is a "not" sonnet. "This" is a not-sonnet "this."
"Not" is a sonnet, "this" not. Is a sonnet this?
--
Joe Aimone
Department of English
University of California, Davis
joaimone@ucdavis.edu