========================================================================= Date: Mon, 31 Mar 1997 21:41:59 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: "The Schwimmer Effect" In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970331170531.006a3ebc@pop.slip.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Hi everyone, it's Kevin Killian. If you are in San Francisco on Friday, I hope you will come to my new play, which I wrote with a good friend, the painter Scott Hewicker. In 1949 a small band of would-be actresses and atom scientists (Farrah =46awcett, Elizabeth Taylor, Ursula Andress and Goldie Hawn), together with famed attorney Arlene Schwimmer, the =B3pit bull of Hollywood,=B2 gather at Princeton=B9s Center for Advanced Studies to develop the Schwimmer Effect. It=B9s a device to keep you and your loved ones young forever and it=B9s marketed as fragrances, Black Diamonds and White Pearls. By 1997 the Schwimmer Effect has taken hold of all of Hollywood and indeed the world, except for one tiny corner of mountain fastness in Tibet, where Jack (Dr. Death) Kevorkian, the Dalai Lama (a reformed Ursula Andress) and her ward, Vicki Steubing, join forces to combat an unnatural system of life, death and eternal hype. They watch in horror as the cast of the top NBC sitcom =B3Friends=B2 are killed one by one as soon as they turn thirty. Half melodrama, half sci-fi spectacular, and half witch hunt, =B3The Schwimmer Effect=B2 boasts a cast of topflight actors and the thrills and chills of the =B3Star Wars=B2 adventures! With: Norma Cole, Margaret Crane, Mark Ewert, Kota Ezawa, Phoebe Gloeckner, Craig Goodman, Clifford Hengst, Kevin Killian, Karla Milosevich, Richard Prouty, Rex Ray, Michelle Rollman and Wayne Smith and Alicia Wing. Presented by Small Press Traffic New College Theater 777 Valencia Street 7:30 p.m. $5-$10 sliding scale Limited seating. Please call for reservations: 415/437-3454. Okay, see you everyone! ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 04:23:47 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rob Hardin Subject: BIB/Doug Rice/Man Writes Woman (or possibly not) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dave Br wrote: >Thanks for the tip, some list one, i looked under "whatsnew" and found the >chapter from one of the novelists in question as well as an interview with >Doug Rice. I liked the writing in the novel. Enjoyed the orgasm. Of course, >its one more man writing abt woman's sexuality. Do any of the women on the >list find it accurate? As much as I intend not to haunt this list, I must inform you of this on Doug Rice's behalf: Rice's _Blood of Mugwump_ is far less gender-specific than you might think. The lines between male and female are blurred precisely because the author is ambivalent as to h/e/i/r/s own gender within the gender narrative. And if my statement itself sounds ambivalent, then I must tactfully refer you to Chi Chi Valenti's inspired site, Jackie 60 (click-and-drag): http://www.echonyc.com/~interjackie/. Thus, the question of a "man writing abt woman's sexuality" is rather more complex than it might appear--which ties in splicely with author/mugwump Doug Rice's Faulknerian identity questions. All the best, Rob Hardin http://www.users.interport.net/~scrypt/ http://www.horrornet.com/hardin.htm ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 07:57:02 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Douglas Barbour Subject: Re: Pierre Joris & Kent Johnson Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Pierre Thanks for the clarification. Btw, we would want to call Celan a 'citizen', wouldnt we? A suffering one, to boot. And the concept of being one, & having one's citizenship stripped from one are hovering over a lot of the poems, I think? How does one 'write' one's 'citizenship' into one's poems? Not just one way, I'm pretty sure... On the other hand, if 'Maximus' wasnt a 'citizen,' who was? As a Canadian I can sympathize with Kent Johnson's worries, but I dont have a representative to write to. I cheer from the sidelines on this one. On the other hand, it is possible, isnt it?, that the writers herein are continuing to talk about those seductive gaps here & writing letters or e-notes to their congresspeople offline? Why not? I send my letters to MPs separately from any list... ============================================================================= Douglas Barbour the precision of openness Department of English is not a vagueness University of Alberta it is an accumulation Edmonton Alberta T6G 2E5 cumulous (403) 492 2181 FAX:(403) 492 8142 bpNichol H: 436 3320 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 10:40:05 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "by way of BETH LEE SIMON " Subject: last call for abs: forum on deixis MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Last call to submit an abstract or proposal to participate in the forum on deixis. CALL FOR ABSTRACTS/PROPOSALS STUDIES IN DEIXIS: WORKING THE MARGINS OF PRAGMATICS AND SEMANTICS for the Midwest Modern Language Association Meeting, Chicago, November 6-8, 1997, Ramada Congress Hotel Abstracts are being accepted for "Studies in Deixis: Working the Margins of Pragmatics and Semantics." The multidimensionality of deixis, a linguistic phenomenon at the heart of communication, remains one of the most intriguing aspects of human language. It is impossible to imagine communication that functions without deixis. Deictic elements such as pronouns, demonstrative adjectives, and spatial or temporal adverbs, express a user-centered perspective on time, place and person relationships in the social context of an utterance; simultaneously, they denote formal grammatical functions within an utterance. The aim of the forum is to bring together scholars working on different aspects of deixis--from formal linguistics to stylistics--to discuss the activity that occurs at the intersection of language and reality/structure and function. Publication of the proceedings is planned. Abstracts/proposals should be a maximum of 150 words in length and must be received by Friday, April 4, 1997. Send abstracts (e-mail or fax preferred) to: Beth Lee Simon Dept. of English and Linguistics Indiana University Purdue University Fort Wayne, IN 46805 simon@cvax.ipfw.indiana.edu fax: 219-481-6985 and/or Anna Fellegy, Department of English, 207 Lind Hall, #185, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis MN 55455 felle001@maroon.tc.umn.edu ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 08:43:35 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: doug rice & the other fella Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Rob Hardin et al: but what i wrote was that i had read the i'view with doug rice & the chapter by the other man, a dutch-sounding name i cant now recall. it was to the latter (with its lengthy evocation of orgasm) that i was referring. Sorry for the confusion., db ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 09:31:00 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Franklin Bruno Subject: white caesura Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Steven Marks said: >white caesurae -- This gets my vote. Indicates both the visual and the >breath gap in a term that seems to suggest a mythological creature. What if the poem's printed on pink paper? fjb ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 12:44:19 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Stephen Vincent Subject: Re: BP's Question / gaps caesurae lacunae Curious - as an odd echo to this whole discussion- to now remember Gap's early ad & song campaign: "Fall into the Gap" - and find a fashion cornucopia(?) If I remember right, their name was chosen to vibrate with "Generation Gap" - that then (late 60's, early 70's?) popular phrase became capitalist framing (marketing, social healing(?)) device. We (real adults) sell on one side of the Gap and you (the young) buy on the other. That will make peace! How this all might relate to inarticulated silences in the poem I'm left somewhat agape. Cheers, Stephen Vincent ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 12:00:19 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Your drug supply, Commander J Folks: Received this from a good friend and poet known to many of you (who, sorry, wishes to remain nameless here), and thought I'd send along since it provides context to the FC2 matter. Still playing phone-tag with Curt White at FC2, but will post anything I can get. OK., I'll admit and apologize for my rash annoyance--the discussion on white space is interesting and learned, and I've learned from much of it. But let's see what we can do too to give a hand to these folks at FC2, ok? Kent > It is the Republicans' number one priority (the budget is number 2) to wipe > wipe-out the NEA this year. They have requested something like 2000 works and > have specified, no shit, poetry fellowships as the thing they most want to > kill. I visited the NEA when I was in DC, offered my help in whatever way in > might be helpful. They are already crowded into a little office space, > understaffed. As Leonard Cohen says (in well funded artful Canada), there's > not much to save. I think it's gone. I don't have much hope for our > political system either in my cynical forties. But I think that poetry (and > teaching) becomes all the more important as people find they do not have the > vocabulary or syntax to articulate their feelings in ways that aren't > prefabbed by tv sitcoms. I mean this quite literally. I think people lose > contact with the originality of their own suffering. I think many of us feel > feelings that are prescribed to us by advertisements, movies, capitalist > culture. Of course such a population, incapable of expression or complex > comprehension, turns to pornography and violence. In DC the Post covers the > most heartless, coldblooded and remorseless murders by 14 year olds of 10 and > 12 year olds that you could possibly believe. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 13:14:20 -0500 Reply-To: BobGrumman@nut-n-but.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bob Grumman Subject: The color of Caesurae MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Franklin Bruno wrote about white caesurae: "What if the poem's printed on pink paper?" Otherwhere, Luigi-Bob Drake wrote me about a poem of bpNichol's that has a "white caesura" in it but was printed on lilac paper. Great, I say to both: colored caesurae! Not just white but pink and violet caesurae, and yeller and scarlet! I still think, though, that all such colored caesurae, in essence, are white, whatever concealing color they are overpainted with. But I suspect that further reflection is called for. --Bob G ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 12:32:12 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: FC2 info Just talked to Curt White at FC2. They have loads of stuff pertaining tothe issue in hard copy--anyone wanting a packet can write to Unit for Contemporary Literature, Illinois State Uiverstiy, 109 Fairchild Hall, Normal, IL 61790-4241 (309-438-3582). Curt also told me that there is all sorts of info on Mark America's home page, including statement by FC2, interviews, statements of support from other writer's and artists, etc.-- http\\www.altx.com Kent ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 11:03:44 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Laura Moriarty Subject: Langston Hughes at the Poetry Center Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Hi Kevin - I looked in our Langston Hughes file when I read your post, but was surprised not to find any mention of trouble when he read for the Center in 1958. (There are documents in other files about troubled readings. There was apparently some official worry about a reading of ("cult leader") Allen Ginsberg that is documented in his file.) Hughes was invited to read by Ruth Witt-Diamant, as you mention, who also arranged several other West Coast readings for him. It is interesting that S.I. Hiyakawa is mentioned as arranging an event for Hughes in relation to jazz. The tape of his reading says that Hughes read at the SF Art Museum, which was a usual venue for the Center at that time. Our file consists of xeroxes. I have no way of knowing if it is complete. You are welcome to look through it. Best- Laura moriarty@sfsu.edu >Dear Simon Schuchat, it's Kevin Killian, thanks for your remarks about my >talk printed in the Church Newsletter. >I just want to say that Kevin >Killian's piece "Faggot Vomit: Jack Spicer >>vs. 'the Maidens'" in the most recent issue of the Poetry Project >>newsletter is great. >> >>When will the Spicer bio be available? > >I'm supposed to finish it by June 15th then send it in to Wesleyan. Lew >Ellingham and I are racing against time as usual. The death in 1996 of the >Canadian modernist Dorothy Livesay underlines this vividly (Livesay was >very helpful to me and Lew at the very end of her extraordinary life.) >Now, as so often in the past, I need the help of poetics list members. I'm >writing now about the San Francisco events of November and December 1958 >when Spicer, along with other San Francisco and Berkeley intellectuals and >bohemians, joined the fight against the administration of San Francisco >State to protest its refusal to let Langston Hughes read at the SF State >Poetry Center, where he had been invited by its founder (Ruth >Witt-Diamant), because of his "Communist" past. I'm sure I can't be the >only one to have covered this episode, which has so many resonances (Cold >War politics, black/white relations in avant-garde poetry, homosexuality >and the left, San Francisco as nexus for radical/conservative politics, >etc., etc.) but I've looked in all the likely places and can't find much >coverage of it at all. Even the Hughes biographies I've looked at don't >mention his visit to San Francisco. [To cut to the chase, Hughes was not >allowed to read on campus by Dumke, president of State, but eventually >wound up reading on a houseboat--oh the irony!--provided by sympathetic >admirers and anti-anti-Communists] Can anyone suggest any material on this >outside of contemporary newspaper coverage? If so thanks very much. > >I'm always thanking you all and you always come through. > >Kevin K. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 14:49:46 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steven Marks Subject: Politics at the Gap In-Reply-To: <1452DF176B7@student.highland.cc.il.us> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Stephen Vincent wrote: Curious - as an odd echo to this whole discussion- to now remember Gap's early ad & song campaign: "Fall into the Gap" - and find a fashion cornucopia(?) If I remember right, their name was chosen to vibrate with "Generation Gap" - that then (late 60's, early 70's?) popular phrase became capitalist framing (marketing, social healing(?)) device. We (real adults) sell on one side of the Gap and you (the young) buy on the other. That will make peace! Then from the nameless poet in Kent Johnson's post > I think people lose > contact with the originality of their own suffering. I think many of us feel > feelings that are prescribed to us by advertisements, movies, capitalist > culture. Aesthetics is politics. Maybe white caesurae can blank out white tornados. cheers, Steven __________________________________________________ Steven Marks http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html __________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 13:41:10 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: heart's lacunae MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit KENT JOHNSON wrote (in part): > OK., I'll admit and apologize for my rash annoyance--the discussion on > white space is interesting and > learned, and I've learned from much of it. But let's see what we can > do too to give a hand to these folks at FC2, ok? Agreed! And since we're investigating the unnamed--what about an indelicate sensation that haunts the species at century's end? I mean that involuntary shudder overtaking a person, possibly this person, who has just posted some piece of lunch-chuffling idiocy to a list of, say, 400 people? What do we call that? Poster's remorse? Post-postal tristesse? Entertaining other nominations, Rachel L. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 18:01:40 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: shoemakers@COFC.EDU Subject: Re: name gap (fwd) In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII re: "poetix of car model names": it's true, isn't it, that Marianne Moore was asked by one of the big companies (ford?) to make up model names? Steve Shoemaker ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 22:01:01 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: shoemakers@COFC.EDU Subject: Re: heart's lacunae In-Reply-To: <334180F6.6032@concentric.net> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Hey Rachel, back when we were playing the neologism game i coined "flawdacity"--for the fool's courage to post anyway, even when it's probably going to seem dumb later (tho in my example it was 2am, not lunchtime). How about "post-departum repression" for the desire to take it back right after you've plunked the "send" command? Oops, i think i'm getting ready to have it right now... On Tue, 1 Apr 1997, Rachel Loden wrote: > KENT JOHNSON wrote (in part): > > > OK., I'll admit and apologize for my rash annoyance--the discussion on > > white space is interesting and > > learned, and I've learned from much of it. But let's see what we can > > do too to give a hand to these folks at FC2, ok? > > Agreed! And since we're investigating the unnamed--what about an > indelicate sensation that haunts the species at century's end? I mean > that involuntary shudder overtaking a person, possibly this person, who > has just posted some piece of lunch-chuffling idiocy to a list of, say, > 400 people? What do we call that? > > Poster's remorse? Post-postal tristesse? > > Entertaining other nominations, > > Rachel L. > Steve Shoemaker ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 00:44:07 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM Subject: Re: Mouth Almighty Opens Wide, Says "Awe" Comments: cc: bil@orca.sitesonthe.ne <> Hey, Bil, Gee, I wish I could make it to the Fest. You are truly stirring things up. Be sure to catch USOP -- it's on KET starting this Sat, April 4, at 11:30 PM (I think I've got that right -- would appreciate yr checking and letting me know...) Now. As to Ms Coultas, whose poem about the Ostrich Movie I read at a recent reading of mine, so yes, I do agree with you, she'smost talented, this makes for a grabbing conundrum. Mainly, my working for the record label Mouth Almighty doesn't allow much for my recording people, a skill that ain't mine anyhoo. I'm like a translator between the arts. What I need is poets who have an idea of how their work might translate to the audio medium, not as documentation, but where that (re)presentation finds an appropriate analogue for the text. If this is voice only, so be it. Bbbbbbbut,,,,, does the addition of Other Sounds, music, breaths, frog sirens, create the possibility of dancing to it or doing your homework to it. I am speaking of all manner of utilitarian purposes for poetry. To get it via ear when the poet isn't here. Besides the entire Mouth Almighty Catalogue ("The United States of Poetry," "fLIPPIN THE sCRIPT:Rap Meets Poetry," Michele Serros's "Stories from Chicano Falsa," Wammo's "Fat-Headed Stranger," "Grand Slam! Best of the National Poetry Slam," Ginsberg's "Ballad of the Skeletons," and the newly released, exquisite!, Sekou Sundiata's "Blue Oneness of Dreams") I would draw your attention to the extraordinary "The Past Didn't Go Anywhere" by Utah Philips and Ani DiFranco on the Righteous Babe label and the required but mixed-bag "A Century of Recorded Poetry" on Rhino, which is worth it for the Rukeyser and Stein alone, and there's oodles more.... as examples. So, I guess what I'm saying, is that IN the label, I serve the vision (heh heh -- I mean the aural vision. I guess; I mean.) of the poet herself. That said (heh heh), I'll call Brenda and have a cup of virtual coffee. You got her email? And by the by, I wonder if anyone has any of the aforementioned CD's, and if there's any critiques about. How often do you listen do poetry CDs? How many times do you listen to a single one? Thanks, List! and Bil Bob Holman http://www.mouthalmighty.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 08:28:45 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bob Grotjohn Subject: Re: name gap (fwd) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit shoemakers@COFC.EDU wrote: > > re: "poetix of car model names": it's true, isn't it, that Marianne > Moore was asked by one of the big companies (ford?) to make up model > names? > > Steve Shoemaker A car--Ford decided on Edsel (not Moore's choice). Ford didn't use her suggestions, none of which I can remember right now, though one was something like turtletop flyer (might have worked as well as Edsel). -- Bob Grotjohn ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 08:39:59 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Ah Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Bob -- I do my homework to recordings of Ted Berrigan and Bernadette Mayer. I've listened to the cd packaged with the Exact Change Yearbook No. 1 many times. The Kerouac boxed set is tremendous, and not bad either is the _Howls Raps Roars_ set, especially the Allen Ginsberg and the Lenny Bruce. Call me a purist, though, I like the unaccompanied Kerouac readings (what a self that guy put forward!) a lot better than the cute Zoot Sims or the noodly Steve Allen stuff. Which is not to say you can't put forward a great self with some music in the background, but it's tough ... Getting going, Jordan ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 08:42:53 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jonathan A Levin Subject: Re: name gap (fwd) In-Reply-To: <3342893D.29CD@cit.mbc.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I have to share Don DeLillo's bit on car names, from White Noise, for those who haven't read it. The scene is the school gym, during an "airborn toxic event" (so it goes), the protagonist (chair of Hitler studies at the College on the Hill) is watching his daughter sleep, and she utters "Toyota Celica": "A long moment passed before I realized this was the name of an automobile. The truth only amazed me more. The utterance was beautiful and mysterious, gold-shot with looming wonder. It was like the name of an ancient power in the sky, tablet-carved in cuneiform. It made me feel that something hovered. But how could this be? A simple brand name, an ordinary car. How could these near-nonsense words, mumured in a child's restless sleep, make me sense a meaning, a presence? She was only repeating some TV voice. Toyota Corolla, Toyota Celica, Toyota Cressida. Supranational names, computer-generated, more or less universally pronounceable. Part of every child's brain noise, the substatic regions too deep to probe. Whatever its source, the utterance struck me with the impact of a moment of splendid transcendence. I depend on my children for that." JL ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 09:13:11 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Gwyn McVay Subject: Re: name gap (fwd) In-Reply-To: <3342893D.29CD@cit.mbc.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Moore's choice was Utopian Turtletop. g. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 08:44:52 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: heart's lacunae Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Rachel, aren't you reinventing the wheel? I thought it was called Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. but I love "lunch-chuffling idiocy," especially at this moment when I'm due at a meeting in 20 minutes. thanks! Sylvester And since we're investigating the unnamed--what about an >indelicate sensation that haunts the species at century's end? I mean >that involuntary shudder overtaking a person, possibly this person, who >has just posted some piece of lunch-chuffling idiocy to a list of, say, >400 people? What do we call that? > >Poster's remorse? Post-postal tristesse? > >Entertaining other nominations, > >Rachel L. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 15:55:07 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: John Kinsella Subject: Salt In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII For those interested, Salt poetry journal should be available through your local book stores. If not, ask them to order through: Penguin Books: Australia and NZ Specialized Book Services: USA and Canada Liverpool University Press: Britain and Europe. Back issues and Folio(Salt) books are also available through AWOL. The publisher is Fremantle Arts Centre Press in conjunction with Folio (Salt). Yours John Kinsella (Editor) ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 11:08:44 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bob Grotjohn Subject: Re: name gap (fwd) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Gwyn McVay wrote: > > Moore's choice was Utopian Turtletop. > > g. That would have been better than Edsel. It would have been a better name not just for the car but for the guy the car was named after (with aplogies to anyone on the list named Edsel). He could have moved to an old Wisconsin dairy-town and nobody would have noticed. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 08:24:09 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: doug rice & others (came back as failed mail due to a "missing routing file" search me! Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Date: Tue, 01 Apr 1997 19:34 -0600 (CST) >From: postmaster@iix.com >Subject: Mail failure >To: David Bromige >MIME-version: 1.0 >Posting-date: Tue, 01 Apr 1997 19:34 -0600 (CST) > >FROM: AMS/CLLBMCS/POSTMASTER >TO: David Bromige DATE: 04-01-97 > TIME: 19:34 >SUBJECT: Mail failure >------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >[021] Message was not delivered due to missing routing file. > > >------------------------------------------------------------------------------ >FROM: David Bromige (SMTP:dcmb@METRO.NET) > >TO: SMTP:POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > >SUBJECT: doug rice & the other fella > >------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >Rob Hardin et al: but what i wrote was that i had read the i'view with doug >rice & the chapter by the other man, a dutch-sounding name i cant now >recall. it was to the latter (with its lengthy evocation of orgasm) that i >was referring. Sorry for the confusion., db > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 17:56:04 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: John Kinsella Subject: P.S. Salt In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Salt 9 includes work by John Ashbery, Caroline Bergvall, Andrew Duncan, Dorothy Hewett, Michael Hulse, Tony Lopez, Rod Mengham, Ian Patterson, Peter Porter, JH Prynne (trans in French by Bernard Dubourg), Tracy Ryan, Susan M Schultz, Iain Sinclair, John Tranter, and others. Yours John Kinsella (Ed.) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 22:55:53 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steve Carll Subject: catching up on S.F. readings Comments: To: poetics@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu, AERIALEDGE@aol.com, Lppl@aol.com, jms@acmenet.net, maz881@aol.com, Marisa.Januzzi@m.cc.utah.edu, drothschild@penguin.com, Daniel_Bouchard@hmco.com, jarnot@pipeline.com, jdavis@panix.com, lease@HUSC.HARVARD.EDU, wmfuller@ix.netcom.com, fittermn@is.nyu.edu, daviesk@is4.nyu.edu, lgoodman@ACSU.Buffalo.EDU, mwinter@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu, I.Lightman@uea.ac.uk, eryque@acmenet.net, levyaa@is.nyu.edu, harris4@soho.ios.com, chris1929w@aol.com, SAB5@psu.edu, lcabri@dept.english.upenn.edu, kunos@lanminds.com, aburns@fnbank.com, acornford@igc.org, leslie@researchmag.com, hale@etak.com, olmsted@crl.com, andrew_joron@sfbayguardian.com, 102573.414@compuserve.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Our story begins at New College on March 14th, when Ed Foster and Giovanni Singleton read to a near-capacity crowd. Dodie Bellamy first introduced Ed, who read from such works as "Four Last Songs For Schubert" and "Wheel of Fortune", dropping such gems as: anger is my treason irony was your defence as if it was not solitude the angel rises from the page we don't need coffee, we don't need you your hand becomes a part of my depleted sky ticky-tock, ticky-tock, T.S. Eliot swallowed a clock it drew me up and I was tethered to the sun I am my hierophant be prominent; I miss you the first thing seen is true the obligation each man owes himself is buried in the rhythms of his speech this jacket is the wind I'm moving in Then Giovanni, a recent graduate of the Poetics program at New College, read from _Blue Cactus_ and _The Green Book, A Drama in Scenes_, among other pieces. Some of her pithier lines included: names forgive their meaning this action believes syllables come inward from behind a decision drums do not go quietly the world created with symbols is at times noncommittal there is a time to be silent and a time to be silent secrets offer a circle recognition of a mistake does not free one from desire to make it again interaction can differentiate from competition I'm a compulsive but sensitive jaywalker multitasking has something to do with Mercury Spotted in the crowd were Kevin Killian, Stephanie Baker, Adam Cornford, Spencer Selby, A.L. Nielsen, Thoreau Lovell, Andrew Joron, Leslie Davis, Norma Cole, Margie Sloan, Hung Tu, Joe Donahue, Simon Pettet, Jack and Adelle Foley, Renee Gladman, Tiffany Higgins, Lito Sandoval, Robert Gluck, Mary Burger, John High, Steve Dickison, Kush, Aaron Shurin, and Pam Lu. On Monday March 18th there was a Poetics Faculty Reading at New College. Brilliantly hosted by Michael Price, the reading started off with David Meltzer reading from _No Eyes_ and, from _Beat Thing_, a hilarious catalogue of "Beat food": when you get to Paradise, is it merely nice? it's all umber, you dig? when you disappear, fear disappears with you it's simply zipped and done with mirrors and windows so, what about Beat food? wasabi bullet from blasting eyes feel surge of immortality turn beatnik skins inside out L.A.'s poor poet horsemeat buffets suck on paper just to chew as if eating real food. Lyn Hejinian went next, reading from _A Border Comedy_, from which I excerpt: brutality delivers nothing but hurry every work of art is an uncommitted crime I'm afraid of encountering a specter but I know it's only hope since we never went to bed, our need for murder is superfluous "stupid people dismiss as untrue anything that happens seldom" the driver is dressed in warm cardboard Then Gloria Frym read a prose poem from a new manuscript called _Tagging_: it is not as though his personal spirits cannot soar; no... never have we encountered a poet/butcher; this is perhaps sad. Adam Cornford followed with some sonnets which included the following lines: lint drifts ectoplasmic God binary with Godzilla the window hangs open like a second thought the universe, drunk with space, expands faster than it can cohere warm and difficult as friction, without them I take no step are you where now is? To end off the evening, Tom Clark gave an emotion-filled reading of recent work which included: not copper-stripped and subject to the worm all the ballast of familiar life old moon yearning in the new moon's arms what they mourn is as shifting and undefined as can be The audience was the audience. The very next night played host to another benefit for Prosodia, the New College literary journal, featuring recent San Francisco resident Duncan McNaughton, who helped invent the Poetics Program at New College back in the 70's, and the lovely and talented Marina Lazzara, another recent graduate. Marina went first, reading from old work and new, dazzling with her twisty-linguisty thoughtforms: planets that carry their fading to us a slight touch of pond in the rearview mirror someone takes a rake to clear the cornea of its pond the garden on my back is a shoe they wear their hair like a wig although it is their own postpone the saucer and forgive us of our planets even over the intense cinema, you are king Then Duncan regaled us with work from _The Pilot_, _Valparaiso_, a poem called "Paul Celan Cheers Up", and a "Horse goes into a bar" prose-poem that kept us in stitches. Some lines I snatched were: the perjury of genius age and death will have their volition but neither is a fountainhead isn't there something else about her, that she mustn't end? sanity--for that one must travel northerly, and withdrawn, imagination dwells I have a horse your friend can ride on, now that he can't ride on the breeze the mask doesn't hide the world, it uncovers it, like Dario says we put on the mask, and then we go home all of what one's love becomes capable of is called knowledge evidently a soul is infinitely apportionable Present and accounted for this night were the likes of Simon Pettet, Eddie Berrigan, Steve Dickison, Tina Rotenberg, Steven Jones, Benjamin Hollander, Stephanie Baker, Maggie Schold, Charlie Palau and Sarah Menefee. Finally on Sunday the 23rd at Canessa Park, Renee Gladman, Mary Burger, Hung Tu, Carl Rakosi, June, Eric Selland, Naoko, Larry Fixel, Benjamin Hollander, Andrew Joron, Michael Price, Adam and Raphael Cornford, Cami Jones, Kevin Killian, Kenlee, Spencer Selby, Jordon Zorker, Colleen Lookingbill, Chris Daniels, Pat Reed, Margie Sloan and Giovanni Singleton gathered to see yet another recent New College grad, Leslie Davis, and New Yorker Geoffrey O'Brien read. Leslie read from some newer short poems and her manuscript _Lucky Pup_. Behold some fragments: building a shrine to the lost role of mother there is something intelligent here in this rain time imitates a solid line the ones we chose for ushers became pallbearers love makes itself felt in the desire for shared sleep I depend on you you rain on me once the skin is broken there is no other way Geoffrey read from _The Floating City_ and _Sonic Ode_, revealing the war in his work between narrative and music: he prays to the absence of a voice at rest he reshapes his ocean thrust of the sash upward clears thought the grass came screaming out of the ground noise body kept viable by fuzz and slam as if disappearance were a species of music coralline architecture of lullaby they puncture the mountain for flute notes tram gone groggy Geoffrey finished by reading a hilarious poem based on a dream, complete with an original dream song with not a half-bad melody. Then we went to Enrico's and talked about film noir. April's gonna be a busy month for poetry here, with readings coming up by Darin DeStefano, Elizabeth Robinson, and Chris Daniels on the 5th, Deena Metzger on the 9th, Rob Hale, Doug Powell and George Albon on the 12th, John High on the 13th, Avery Burns and Ron Silliman on the 14th, Eileen Myles on the 15th, Steve McCaffery and Liz Willis on the 19th, Bob Grenier and Fanny Howe on the 20th, Kristin Prevallet on the 25th (talk on Helen Adams) and 27th (poetry reading), Barrett Watten on the 26th, Michael Boughn and Brian Lucas on the 27th, and then Ron Johnson on May Day. And that's not counting Kevin Killian's play "The Schwimmer Effect" on April 4th. Whew! ********************************** sjcarll@slip.net Steve Carll http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/mags/antenym http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/ezines/antenym In seed- sense the sea stars you out, innermost, forever. --Paul Celan ********************************** ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 12:20:59 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: [Fwd: radical poetics] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: message/rfc822 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Received: from naga.mailbase.ac.uk (naga.mailbase.ac.uk [128.240.226.3]) by sarah.albany.edu (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id MAA19641 for ; Wed, 2 Apr 1997 12:03:25 -0500 (EST) Received: by naga.mailbase.ac.uk id (8.7.x for naga.mailbase.ac.uk); Wed, 2 Apr 1997 17:26:43 +0100 (BST) Received: from hermes.dur.ac.uk by naga.mailbase.ac.uk id (8.7.x for naga.mailbase.ac.uk) with SMTP; Wed, 2 Apr 1997 17:26:40 +0100 (BST) Received: from venus.dur.ac.uk by hermes.dur.ac.uk id (8.6.12/ for dur.ac.uk) with SMTP; Wed, 2 Apr 1997 17:26:41 +0100 Received: from vega by venus.dur.ac.uk id ; Wed, 2 Apr 1997 17:26:40 +0100 (BST) Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 17:26:40 +0100 (BST) From: R I Caddel To: british n irish poets Subject: radical poetics Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII X-List: british-poets@mailbase.ac.uk X-Unsub: To leave, send text 'leave british-poets' to mailbase@mailbase.ac.uk Reply-To: R I Caddel Sender: british-poets-request@mailbase.ac.uk Precedence: list Announcing a twice yearly international of creative action: Radical Poetics : Inventory of Possibilities Conducted in the spirit of Eric Mottram Issue One Spring 1997 4.00 pounds Featuring Charles Bernstein, Fielding Dawson, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Allen Ginsberg, Pierre Joris, Martha King, Harryette Mullen, Jeff Nuttall, Jerome Rothenberg, T. Wignesan, Eric Mottram, John Stevens & John Whiting. Orders to 23 Broadcroft Avenue Stanmore Middx HA7 1NT UK Payment (Sterling only) payable to M.Hrebeniak ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 12:23:01 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Burma Needs Your Land! (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII As a Mass. native and longtime resident/social activist in the Boston area, I subscribe to a list that posts left activist announcements for the Eastern Mass. area. I think folks on the list might be interested in the project described below. A genuinely interesting idea about linking our native poetic heritage and political activism! Mark P. Atlanta ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 17:35:31 -0500 From: Nick Jehlen To: act-ma@igc.org Subject: Burma Needs Your Land! Dear Activists, As part of the effort to build the boycott against companies supporting the Burmese dictators, we're planning a "Burma-Slave" publicity campaign based on the old Burma-Shave roadside signs. Detailed information on the Burma-Shave signs (and the new "Burma-Slave" signs) is provided below. The idea behind this campaign is to set up signs by the sides of roads bearing short poems which illustrate the connection between Texaco and UNOCAL and the repression and brutality in Burma. Ideally, these signs will be permanent, but in some cases we will have people hold signs in places where long-term signs can't be placed. If you own land by the side of a highway or road, or know someone who does, please contact Nick Jehlen at the address below. If you are interested in participating in or organizing a Burma Slave protest in your area, please email the address below with information about where you'd like to set up the signs and how many people you could bring to a protest. Nick Jehlen email: statusquo@cybercom.net voicemail: 617-765-7181 (please email when possible to keep phone bills down) Burma Shave: History In 1927 a small company began using a new form of advertising in order to promote its newest product: brushless shaving cream. They set up a series of signs by the side of a road, each one with a line of a advertising slogan on it. Over the next forty years, these signs were put up all over the country, with hundreds of different slogans - most of them short rhyming poems, all of them ending with a sign which read "Burma Shave". (The Burma Shave name comes from the fact that many of the ingredients came from Burma.) These signs became a favorite pastime for travelers, and were used for the next forty years in one of the most successful advertising campaigns ever. Examples of Burma Shave signs: don't stick your elbow out so far it might go home in another car. Burma-Shave sleep in a chair nothing to lose but a nap at the wheel is a permanent snooze Burma-Shave Burma-Slave While boycotts are built one person at a time, to become successful, they must penetrate the public consciousness. A company's brand-name is a valuable commodity, and by spreading the word about companies policies (through a boycott campaign) this commodity is devalued. The idea behind the original Burma Shave signs was inspire people to watch for the poems, to read them, to remember them, and to get them to talk to their friends and family about them. The idea behind the Burma Slave signs is the same. While we don't expect to put up as many signs, we will spread the word through media exposure. Many media outlets that would never touch a boycott story may be more willing to run a story about the rebirth of the old Burma Shave signs. Examples of Burma Slave signs: Burmese children build the roads to bring you gas to help you go. Slave labor is the hidden cost when you pull into Texaco. Burma-Slave Our money goes to enslave the masses. Set burma free boycott UNOCAL gases. Burma-Slave Permanent and Temporary Signs The ideal place for a set of Burma Slave signs is by the side of a small highway, on land owned by a supporter. Depending on the speed of the cars on the road, a set of signs would need between 50 and 250 yards of road-side space. In the mean time, we'd like to set up a set of signs by the side of a road (Memorial Drive or Soldiers Field Road in Boston) with a person holding each sign up for an hour or two. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 16:03:41 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: Re: white caesura ~~~~~~~~~~ start quote ~~~~~~~~~~ Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 09:31:00 -0800 From: Franklin Bruno Steven Marks said: >white caesurae -- This gets my vote. Indicates both the visual and the >breath gap in a term that seems to suggest a mythological creature. What if the poem's printed on pink paper? fjb ~~~~~~~~~~ end quote ~~~~~~~~~~ okay, how about: negative opacity? akashic bandwidth? blank blippism? a room w/ a view? elbow-room sans elbow? "a brief nirvana break" (?) d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 16:40:06 +0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bil Brown Subject: Re: Mouth Almighty Opens Wide, Says "Awe" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Bob & List, PO-etry CDs are listened to often, but I think I (and the rest us) are waiting for a ONE shot performance on CD that hits. Tired of the antho-album. One artist, and without the sense of being backed up but maybe the sense (like RASA) of being part of the work as a whole. Early attempt at this (talking Ms. Estep & Mr. such-&-such) are good efforts but are easily forgetable. If we are as Ed Sanders put-it once, "the daemons urging toward the mainstream" then take advice from the indi labels that have made it before. Look at Sup-Pop (for example); making something limited and exclusive - like a poem 7" a month for a year or two) anything to make it collectable to people who wouldn't listen to the digital noise usually. Maybe, even take example from Nicole Blackman's recent release and find the existing audience of another artist and utilize that to further an ENTIRE genre of popular culture (perf-po-ing is NOW part of pop culture 'cause of the likes of all of us that are doing-it PUBLICly.. spearheaded by you of course :) ) ... I don't know, it's odd talking about this on THIS list of all places. No one wants to hear this here. A different front, a brooding seriousness about the words, syntax, and sympathy for the phonemes here... But, since it started here, it should continue. I would LOVE to hear responses from the fringe! Bil Brown ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 09:30:19 +1200 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: DS Subject: Re: Ah Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I'll put in a vote for the Kerouac also. I play Hydrogen Jukebox for homework though. I also have a WCW reads himself that i would play more were it on cd rather than tape - but do play. & i listen to homer read by actors - in the car (when not music or the goon show) Dan At 08:39 AM 4/2/97 -0500, you wrote: >Bob -- > >I do my homework to recordings of Ted Berrigan and Bernadette Mayer. I've >listened to the cd packaged with the Exact Change Yearbook No. 1 many >times. The Kerouac boxed set is tremendous, and not bad either is the >_Howls Raps Roars_ set, especially the Allen Ginsberg and the Lenny Bruce. > >Call me a purist, though, I like the unaccompanied Kerouac readings (what a >self that guy put forward!) a lot better than the cute Zoot Sims or the >noodly Steve Allen stuff. Which is not to say you can't put forward a >great self with some music in the background, but it's tough ... > >Getting going, >Jordan > > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 16:53:02 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: William Burmeister Prod Subject: Re: Ah In-Reply-To: DS "Re: Ah" (Apr 3, 9:30am) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii >Call me a purist, though, I like the unaccompanied Kerouac readings (what a >self that guy put forward!) a lot better than the cute Zoot Sims or the >noodly Steve Allen stuff. Which is not to say you can't put forward a >great self with some music in the background, but it's tough ... > I'll put in a vote for the Kerouac also. I play Hydrogen Jukebox for > homework though. I also have a WCW reads himself that i would play more were > it on cd rather than tape - but do play. & i listen to homer read by actors > - in the car (when not music or the goon show) John Cage is great too on the Roratorio CD reading his mesostic version of _Finnegan's Wake_ with an Irish accent. Bill B. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 17:25:44 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: Subject: heart's lacunae On All Fools' Day [as the Britts would have it, but where I was reared, 'twas April Fools' Day], thus quoth Rachel Loden: ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ start of quote ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ ... And since we're investigating the unnamed--what about an indelicate sensation that haunts the species at century's end? I mean that involuntary shudder overtaking a person, possibly this person, who has just posted some piece of lunch-chuffling idiocy to a list of, say, 400 people? What do we call that? Poster's remorse? Post-postal tristesse? Entertaining other nominations, Rachel L. ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ end of quote ~~~ ~~~ ~~~ interesting jump from macro- to micro-shudder (from the humankind at-the-fin to poster-at-the-mouse) -- here's nominations: with oopsful affect an oopssome regret post-post pathetics (PPPs) -- as in: "No sooner had Jonny Hackerstein hit the Reply key, than he was awash, indeed unwontedly o'ertaken by a sudden (and I dare say all to lucid) sense of oopssome regret. 'Get ahold of yourself, Jonny" -- his auto-admonishment feedback loop kicked in quick (hey, Boulder U. training, always at the ready). 'Enogh w/ the post-post pathetics, key-boy. We've got' -- he glanced up from his VitaSoy swizz as the revolvo-door injected into NutraVille the silverfoil semblance of none other than the much-ballyhooed Mona Lisa Applewood -- 'a little, like they say, job to do.'" d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 14:02:13 +1200 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: DS Subject: Re: Ah Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Is this still aROUND? >John Cage is great too on the Roratorio CD reading his mesostic version of >_Finnegan's Wake_ with an Irish accent. > >Bill B. > > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 2 Apr 1997 21:12:04 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dave Zauhar Subject: Creeley and Wieners at the Warhol Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Robert Creeley and John Wieners will be in Pittsburgh PA on Saturday, April 12th for a reading at the Andy Warhol Museum, which is located in an old building at 117 Sandusky street (north side). The reading starts at 7:30 and is held in conjunction with the opening of a special exhibition of Francesco Clemente's portraits (including Creeley's and Wiener's). Admission to the museum (and the reading) is $6, $5 for senior citizens and $4 for students. And if you happen to find yourself in Pittsburgh this summer (like, say you've committed a crime against the state and are exiled there), the Clemente exhibit is up through August 31. Yours from Appalachia Dave Zauhar ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 00:15:17 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Chris Stroffolino Subject: Re: POETICS In This is a general vague and somewhat shot in the dark attempt to help someone locate an apartment in NYC (Manhattan ideally, but mostly brooklyn). The person is well-behaved, potty trained, and all that, and makes an excellant pet, provided you don't tie it to the doorknob. Anyway, I should be more serious about this considering the desperation my friend is currently in---and if ANYBODY knows of something, with or with out roomate, available ASAP (though May 1st is fine, etc.) in Brooklyn or lower east side kinda range of NYC (rent circa no more than $800 per month, though if realtor's fee is waived I mean dodged (transcended or collapsed), the person would surely be interested in negotiating. could you please backchannel if any, even somewhat remote, leads may materialize. Thanks you, suspiciously, timidly, yours, chris stroffolino ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 09:54:58 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: William Burmeister Prod Subject: Re: Ah In-Reply-To: DS "Re: Ah" (Apr 3, 2:02pm) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii > Is this still aROUND? Yes. The CD is available with a German label (I think it is Ars Acoustica or something like that). I am at work now, but will extract more information from the label tonite. Bill B. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 08:25:00 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: n/formation 1.1 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT just a quick announcement before I cut out (sign off) this afternoon to leave for the denver conference ~~~~~~~~~~~~announcement follows~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ the first issue of n/formation is now available (on-line), featuring work by Peter Ganick, our own Alan Jen Sondheim, Martin Corless-Smith, Linda V. Russo, & myself, plus a review-article by the lovely Steven Marks. it can be viewed at http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce or http://128.110.40.180/~calexand/nonce (same site) comments are appreciated, backchannel of course. --enjoy chris .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 07:42:29 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Re: Ah Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" The US company Mode has a 2-CD set of Cage "Reading Through Finnegans Wake", the hour-long horspiel "Roaratorio" of sounds collaged over this vocal track, & an interview with Cage about the works. The German label Wergo has released a CD of just Roaratorio). FWIW, I don't think Cage is putting on an Irish accent, it's just the way his intoning voice sounds regardless of the source material for the text. I'd also recommend cris cheek's Skin Upon Skin & Nate Mackey's Strick in the spoken CD category. Bests, Herb >Is this still aROUND? > > > >>John Cage is great too on the Roratorio CD reading his mesostic version of >>_Finnegan's Wake_ with an Irish accent. >> >>Bill B. >> >> Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 08:07:28 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: catching up on S.F. readings In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970401225553.0069b160@pop.slip.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 10:55 PM -0800 4/1/97, Steve Carll wrote: >April's gonna be a busy month for poetry here, with readings coming up by >Darin DeStefano, Elizabeth Robinson, and Chris Daniels on the 5th, Deena >Metzger on the 9th, Rob Hale, Doug Powell and George Albon on the 12th, >John High on the 13th, Avery Burns and Ron Silliman on the 14th, Eileen >Myles on the 15th, Steve McCaffery and Liz Willis on the 19th, Bob Grenier >and Fanny Howe on the 20th, Kristin Prevallet on the 25th (talk on Helen >Adams) and 27th (poetry reading), Barrett Watten on the 26th, Michael >Boughn and Brian Lucas on the 27th, and then Ron Johnson on May Day. And >that's not counting Kevin Killian's play "The Schwimmer Effect" on April >4th. Whew! Good work, Steve, summarizing all these dates. May I, Kevin Killian, add a few more events happening this week in Bay Area? Tonight, April 3, Harry Mathews at the Alliance Francaise; Monday, Jeanette Winterson at Diesel; Tuesday, David Sedaris at Rizzoli and I believe it's April 10th, Robin Blaser will be stealing in and out of UC Santa Cruz. Looked at this way it does sound kind of tiring. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 08:19:44 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: elephant(itis) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I thought this could stand another round. Dodie >Mime-Version: 1.0 >Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 09:06:43 -0500 >Reply-To: Queer Studies List >Sender: Queer Studies List >From: "David H. Serlin" >Subject: Re: Heaven's Gate >To: QSTUDY-L@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU >Status: U > >Hey all, I thought I would share with you something I picked up from >another list-serv, this one aimed at making fun of cultural studies, by >real live scientists. ALthough you might find one or some of these topics >funny, be aware that the general tenor of the list was to laugh laugh >laugh about how silly cultstud types are, and science studies types even >more so. While many in science/queer/gender studies regard people like >Donna Haraway or Sandra Harding as visionary, sci-tech people bash them >with increasing regularity. A word to the wise. > > >Date: Tue, 1 Apr 1997 06:52:01 -0500 >From: "Harry M. Marks, H-SCI-MED-TECH" >Subject: CFP: Cultural Studies Conference (x H-LABOR) > >SETHW@MAINE.MAINE.EDU writes: > > A CONFERENCE PROPOSAL > > A CONFERENCE PROPOSAL > > THE ELEPHANT AND CULTURAL STUDIES > >*The Elephant as "Physical" Other* > Does the Elephant Exist? Zoological Hegemony vs. Cultural Fabrication. > Pachyderm "Evolution": Eurochronocities and Eurocentric Linearity in > the late (post)modern zoological script. > Tracking the elephant through texts: Western Visuality and > Olfactory Perception > >*The Elephant: Interrogating Multi-Cultural Rhetoricities:* > The elephant: Cyborg, Ethnicity, or "Species"? > (E) (L) (E) (P) (H) (A) (N) (T)? What's That": Exploitation and > the Rhetorical Stategies of Denial in Thai Forestry Camps. > Viceroy-on-Elephant or Elephant-on-Viceroy? Accidents and the > Uncertainties of Domination in some Durbars of the Late > British Raj. > > British Raj. > >*The Elephant As Eurocentric Object:* > The elephant and the Lion: the Metaphoricity of Binarity in Early > Medieval Texts. > "Hunting the Beloved Other": The elephant as Paradigmatic > Problematic of Conservationist Conversations in Theodore > Roosevelt's African memoirs. > Garage Sales and elephants: A Dialogue of Contested Spaces. > >*The Elephant As (Post)Modernist Construction* > Post-Modern, (Post)Modern, or Postcontemporary Elephant? Epistemic > Privileging and Discursive Spaces in MLA Debates. > Wild Elephant, Tamed elephant, Zoo-Confined Elephant, Extinct Elephant: > Alternative Modernities for a Culturally-Constructed Ani(Male). > Elephant Ears: Symbolic Excess in (Post)Nouvelle Pastry Culture. > Situating the Paradigmatic other: The Elephant in Weight-Loss Discourse. > >------------------------------ > PINE 3.95 MESSAGE TEXT Folder: saved-messages Message 2 of 10 31% > > >------------------------------ > > David Serlin, American Studies * NYU * 285 Mercer St., 8th floor * > New York, NY 10003-6607 * 212-998-8538 (office) * 212-995-4371 (fax) * > *e-mail: dhs3627@is2.nyu.edu * > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 12:00:07 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Bernstein Subject: Erica Hunt & Marty Erlich at Brandeis Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Thursday, April 10 7:00pm "Can You Hear a Motion": a jazz and poetry collaboration with Marty Ehrlich, Erica Hunt and Stan Strickland Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University This is the first such collaboration by Marty and Erica. I'd love to be be able to go! ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 10:45:00 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" Subject: Re: elephant(itis) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII just thought people should know that the Elephantine parody call for papers long predates the Sokal affair, and was not simply a science-technology attack on cultstuds -- I was first handed a copy of this thing four years ago by a colleague in the philosophy department -- I think, like the term "politically correct," it may have had its origins in self-parody and then been seized upon for use by people with little or no sense of humor -- intersting to see it reappear as it works its way through our culture -- one might even make a study of the culture of circulation as it moves from xerox room bulletin board to electronic bulletin board -- one might even give a conference paper on it! ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 11:09:35 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: MAXINE CHERNOFF Subject: Re: catching up on S.F. readings In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Dear List Members: May I add a few more SF area readings? Elizabeth Willis and Paul Hoover at UC Santa Cruz Bookstore, April 8, Paul Hoover at the Poetry Center, Unitarian Church, April 10, 7:30pm, Aaron Shurin and Ruth Schwartz at the Poetry Center, SFSU, April 17th, 4:30 pm, as well. Best, Maxine Chernoff On Thu, 3 Apr 1997 dbkk@SIRIUS.COM wrote: > At 10:55 PM -0800 4/1/97, Steve Carll wrote: > > >April's gonna be a busy month for poetry here, with readings coming up by > >Darin DeStefano, Elizabeth Robinson, and Chris Daniels on the 5th, Deena > >Metzger on the 9th, Rob Hale, Doug Powell and George Albon on the 12th, > >John High on the 13th, Avery Burns and Ron Silliman on the 14th, Eileen > >Myles on the 15th, Steve McCaffery and Liz Willis on the 19th, Bob Grenier > >and Fanny Howe on the 20th, Kristin Prevallet on the 25th (talk on Helen > >Adams) and 27th (poetry reading), Barrett Watten on the 26th, Michael > >Boughn and Brian Lucas on the 27th, and then Ron Johnson on May Day. And > >that's not counting Kevin Killian's play "The Schwimmer Effect" on April > >4th. Whew! > > Good work, Steve, summarizing all these dates. May I, Kevin Killian, add a > few more events happening this week in Bay Area? Tonight, April 3, Harry > Mathews at the Alliance Francaise; Monday, Jeanette Winterson at Diesel; > Tuesday, David Sedaris at Rizzoli and I believe it's April 10th, Robin > Blaser will be stealing in and out of UC Santa Cruz. > > Looked at this way it does sound kind of tiring. > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 14:15:44 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joel Kuszai Subject: Notice: Change of Address MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII sorry to take up space on the information super-highway, but there may be some people out there I may not reach in time. NOTICE! Meow Press has moved. The new address is: p.o. Box 527 Buffalo, NY 14226 effective immediately. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 13:07:49 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jean Day Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 1 Apr 1997 to 2 Apr 1997 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dear Steve (Carll) and all, Barrett Watten's not reading by himself on April 26th! He's reading with me: Jean Day / Barrett Watten New Langton Arts 1246 Folsom St. San Francisco 8:00 pm (I think) We'll both be reading from new books--his is FRAME from Sun & Moon, mine THE LITERAL WORLD from Xenos. Hastily, Jean ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 00:26:49 +0200 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Erik Skjeveland Subject: Bukowski's splash In-Reply-To: <"noralf.uib.771:03.04.97.07.26.38"@uib.no> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I keep reading the poem "splash" from "Betting on the Muse". To me this poem seems to be a description of Buk's special kind of narrative style. The style he kept sharpening til the end. On the other hand this poem also has a feel to it that is reminiscent of Buk's early more surrealistic poems. This caused me to wonder about when this poem first appeared. I know many of the poems in BOTM are from the early 60's, but I haven't been able to pinpoint were/when "splash" was first published. Do any of you out there know? Anyone else like this poem? All this wondering gives me something to do while waiting for "Bone Palace Ballet" Erik.Skjeveland@lili.uib.no University of Bergen, Norway ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 16:33:40 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Alexander Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 1 Apr 1997 to 2 Apr 1997 In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >We'll both be reading from new books--his is FRAME from Sun & Moon, mine >THE LITERAL WORLD from Xenos. Jean Tell me more about Xenos. What other books? etc. charles charles alexander / chax press / chax@theriver.com ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 22:18:22 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Zimmerman Subject: Re: elephant(itis) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Aldon L. Nielsen wrote: > > just thought people should know that the Elephantine parody call for > papers long predates the Sokal affair, and was not simply a > science-technology attack on cultstuds -- I was first handed a copy of > this thing four years ago by a colleague in the philosophy department -- I > think, like the term "politically correct," it may have had its origins in > self-parody and then been seized upon for use by people with little or no > sense of humor -- intersting to see it reappear as it works its way > through our culture -- one might even make a study of the culture of > circulation as it moves from xerox room bulletin board to electronic > bulletin board -- one might even give a conference paper on it! Title for conference paper: "Elephants All The Way Down." ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 22:28:20 -0600 Reply-To: jzitt@tab.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joseph Zitt Organization: Human Systems Subject: Re: Ah MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii DS wrote: > > I'll put in a vote for the Kerouac also. I play Hydrogen Jukebox for > homework though. I also have a WCW reads himself that i would play more were > it on cd rather than tape - but do play. & i listen to homer read by actors > - in the car (when not music or the goon show) Well, I'm glad to no longer have homework... but I like to listen to bits of Cage's Empty Words while I'm working (whether it's the Italian Riot mix or the Coney Island Sun Ra collaboration depends on my mood) as well as Jackson Mac Low and the Four Horsemen. -- ---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------- |||/ Joseph Zitt ===== jzitt@humansystems.com ===== Human Systems \||| ||/ Austin, Texas! =========== SILENCE: The John Cage Mailing List \|| |/ http://www.realtime.net/~jzitt == <*> <*> == Empty Words == ecto \| ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Apr 1997 22:31:10 -0600 Reply-To: jzitt@tab.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joseph Zitt Organization: Human Systems Subject: Re: Ah MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii DS wrote: > > Is this still aROUND? > > >John Cage is great too on the Roratorio CD reading his mesostic version of > >_Finnegan's Wake_ with an Irish accent. Yes, it's available on CD from Mode and from Wergo (though I strongly recommend the Mode double-CD which has the complete spoken track on its own (the Wergo, I believe, contains one section) as well as a long recorded interview and two very thick booklets, one of which contains the complete mesostic. -- ---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------- |||/ Joseph Zitt ===== jzitt@humansystems.com ===== Human Systems \||| ||/ Austin, Texas! =========== SILENCE: The John Cage Mailing List \|| |/ http://www.realtime.net/~jzitt == <*> <*> == Empty Words == ecto \| ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 00:26:51 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: mgk3k@FARADAY.CLAS.VIRGINIA.EDU Subject: new e-list for MLA members Comments: To: h-amstdy@msu.edu, spoon-announcements@jefferson.village.virginia.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" PLEASE REPOST WIDELY: LIST ANNOUNCEMENT REPOST TO HUMANITIES, LITERATURE, WRITING, RHETORIC, AND LANGUAGE LISTS REPOST TO DEPARTMENT LISTS REPOST TO PROFESSIONAL-ISSUES/ACADEMIC-LABOR LISTS Delegate-L, a discussion list for MLA members interested in public and institutional policy affecting the study and teaching of the humanities. For the first time ever, members of the Modern Language Association will be able to discuss freely, on a year-round basis, the issues and actions that they would like the MLA Delegate Assembly to consider. Topics can include all matters of academic working conditions and professional life, including public policy, legislation, publication, and the workplace dignity of colleagues at all ranks of the profession, including adjunct and student labor.* To join, send the message: subscribe delegate-l yourfirstname yourlastname to listproc@listproc.bgsu.edu If you have any trouble subscribing, please post the list manager, Alan Rea . Sponsored and managed by the Graduate Student Caucus, Delegate-L is an unmoderated discussion list open to all MLA members interested in governance. While only MLA members and governance figures are invited to participate in this list, Delegate-L is not sponsored or managed by the Modern Language Association or its Delegate Assembly. * Specificially, the MLA Constitution provides that one of the responsibilities of the assembly shall be to "formulate and submit to the membership for ratification resolutions on matters of public and institutional policy affecting the study and teaching of the humanities and the status of the language and literature professions represented by the association. Such matters may include proposed or enacted legislation, regulations, or other governmental and institutional policies, conditions of employment and publication, or additional matters that affect the association, its members in their professional capacities, or the dignity of members' work"(MLA Const.9.C.10). Any conversation meeting this description or addressing any of the other governance responsibilities of the MLA Delegate Assembly is appropriate to delegate-l. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 00:33:15 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: Re: elephant(itis) Quoth Aldon L. Nielsen : << . . . one might even make a study of the culture of circulation as it moves from xerox room bulletin board to electronic bulletin board -- one might even give a conference paper on it! >> & quoth Daniel Zimmerman: <> a nice reminder of the turtles tale that (it seems) I heard Ram Dass tell (in talk at UCLA circa '70 -- tempus is fugiting still) . . . but anent the Elephant -- coincidentally, on the Indology listproc in the past day or two, Elephants have surface. Not related to the call-for-papers satire; rather, quest-for-Pali-text references (re: the "blind men & the elephant" allegorical tale -- attributed to the Buddha) -- said cites being duly provided, & further refs. to Rumi's version (in the Mathnawi) being likewise noted. So if anyone gets "serious" abt. an elephant paper (or conference or whatnot), let me know & I'll zap you w/ the footnote fodder. pachydermially yours, d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 00:21:19 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Hugh Steinberg <hsteinberg@INFOREL.COM> Subject: Re: elephant(itis) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Reminds me of chain letters/urban legends. One of the things I've just received (from two separate sources) is this scary message warning people on the internet not to open any messages entitled "penpal," which alledgedly conceals a virus that wipes your hard drive, then mails out copies to everyone on your mailing list. It's a hoax, but just scary enough to make anyone nervous (sort of like the one about the gangsta initiation ritual of driving around in a car with the headlights out and shooting anyone who flashes their highbeams at them). Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 00:38:06 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA> Subject: Re: elephant(itis) In-Reply-To: <s3444d74.001@SKGF.COM> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Just a note. The disease that features oversized feet etc, is called not elephantitis but properly elephantiasis. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 03:49:43 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> Subject: The Mess or Wound MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII - JENNIFER BANGS AT HER NAMESAKE SERVER: The Mess or Wound {k:22} Banging Jennifer Banging Alan: I tried to get into you ksh: Banging: not found over and over again, Alan/ {k:16} finger jennifer@jennifer.com >> z Jennifer never answers the {k:17} host jennifer.com >> z email. I stalk Alan/Jenn- {k:18} lynx http://www.jennifer.com/ >> z ifer who just won't listen {k:19} telnet jennifer.com 13 >> z to anything I have to say. Connection closed by foreign host. {k:20} telnet jennifer.com 21 >> z USER sondheim My name's her own. PASS jennifer My name's my own. PASV I'm not passive. QUIT I'll never quit. Connection closed by foreign host. She's not foreign. {k:33} telnet jennifer.com 25 >> z I send him mail. HELO panix3.panix.com I'm very polite. VERB MAIL FROM: jennifer@jennifer.com I am his mail. RCPT TO: sondheim@sondheim.com DATA Alan, I love you madly! I tell the truth. Jennifer! I sign my name. QUIT Connection closed by foreign host. [jennifer.com] The sad results: jennifer.com has address 198.6.197.1 jennifer.com mail is handled by mail.nicom.com ^[[?1h^[= (B^[)0^[[m ^[[H^[[J^[[23B^[[0;7m Getting http://www.jennifer.com/Look up www.jennifer.com.^[[0m ^H^H^H^H^[[0;7m Unable to locate remote host www.jennifer.com.Alert!: Unable to connect to remote host.^[[0m ^H^H^H^H^H^[[K^[[?1l^[> lynx: Can't access startfile http://www.jennifer.com/ Trying 198.6.197.1... Connected to jennifer.com. Escape character is '^]'. Thu Apr 3 19:59:05 1997 Trying 198.6.197.1... Connected to jennifer.com. Escape character is '^]'. 220 dcez.nicom.com FTP server (Version wu-2.4(1) Fri Dec 29 06:15:49 GMT 1995) ready. 331 Password required for sondheim. 530 Login incorrect. 503 Login with USER first. 221 Goodbye. Trying 198.6.197.1... Connected to jennifer.com. Escape character is '^]'. 220 dcez.nicom.com ESMTP Sendmail 8.8.3/8.7.3; Thu, 3 Apr 1997 20:10:57 -0500 (EST) 250 dcez.nicom.com Hello panix3.panix.com [198.7.0.4], pleased to meet you 250 Verbose mode 250 jennifer@jennifer.com... Sender ok 250 sondheim@sondheim.com... Recipient ok 354 Enter mail, end with "." on a line by itself 050 sondheim@sondheim.com... Connecting to sondheim.com. via smtp... 050 220 hijinks.com ESMTP Sendmail 8.8.5/8.7.3; Thu, 3 Apr 1997 16:49:28 -0800 (PST) [...] Closing connection to sondheim.com. closing connection 221 dcez.nicom.com closing connection _________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 02:09:57 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: MAXINE CHERNOFF <maxpaul@SFSU.EDU> Subject: Re: catching up on S.F. readings In-Reply-To: <l03020901af698554f019@[205.134.247.64]> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Dear List Members: Tried sending this out earlier but it somehow vanished. (Kevin, did it go just to you?) Anyway, more readings in April: April 8 at UC Santa Cruz Bookstore: Elizabeth Willis and Paul Hoover. April 10 at SF State Poetry Center, Unitarian Church on Franklin, 7:30 pm: Paul Hoover. April 17 at SF State Poetry Center (on campus), 4:30 pm: Aaron Shurin. Also, Susan Schultz will be reading May 1 at a cafe in SF. More details later-- (Susan: what's the exact name?) Maxine Chernoff ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 08:28:06 EST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: hg <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU> Subject: more soapbox BLASTS Since I can't go to the rutgers conference on "poetry & the public sphere", I'm filling up webspace with an (im)pertinent blast again, maybe some well- meaning conference attender can make use of this in some way. The Poetry Mission was started with thoughts around this question, and on Apr 23rd we're hosting a public forum ourselves to assess poetry's public role. We're inviting writers and others to bring poems & statements to contribute. This is a draft of my own personal blast. It's probably too long & prosaic for what we're planning. So use it or abuse it, rutgerzians. ROLE OF POETRY Poetry like humanity is capable of standing erect on its own two feet, and this has been one of the motivating ideas of the Poetry Mission. We started this project believing that poetry can & should make itself heard in a free and open civic space, mediated as little as possible by large and peripheral institutions. However, as I tried ot prepare for today's event, I came to the conclusion that for me, at least, this social role exists in tandem with a more narrowly intellectual role. I say poetry plays a role which is _at least_ as major as that of any of the human or pure sciences, in revealing whatever universal realities are accessible to human beings. This particular claim has been rejected again and again--first, by those who deny poetry's propositional efficacy; second, by those who accept the unbridgeable chasm between the arts and sciences; and third, by those who, in the name of postmodernism or various economic determinisms, deny meaning to either rationality or tradition. In order for poetry to stand on a par with the other arts and sciences, it must first of all acknowledge its own didactic potential-- as giving form to a criticism of life, in the school of bitter and ecstatic experience. Secondly, it must come to terms with science _on its own terms_-- recognizing a shared creative process in the formation of scientific concepts, while rejecting a dehumanized (and profane) scientific positivism. These demands on poetry will strike many of you, I'm sure, as absurdly academic. And if there weren't something more than this, your scepticism would be justified. But in my view poetry stakes its claim to stand among the arts and sciences--even, perhaps, at their matrix--_not_ because of its status as "Queen of the Arts", or as the quintessential expression of aesthetic values. Poetry, by the most basic means--by means of the individual human voice--fulfills, sanctions, and profoundly _transcends_ aesthetics. The theory of poetry--as Dante, Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, Wallace Stevens, and Paul Celan, among others, conceive it--rests on a theory of reality. This theory stands distinct from science, on the one hand, and nihilism, on the other. You might call it an Orphic theory of reality. I find it difficult to encapsulate in a phrase, but it might go as follows: _the Universe is a vast meaningful riddle of animate signs. Our destiny is to spell them out._ Or, as Shakespeare's Master Shallow [I think] put it more concisely: _All's figures._ I thought I would end my statement there, but I find I've left out the really important, paradoxical thing. By giving form to the free, _unofficial_, undogmatic human voice, poetry is empowered to _declare its ignorance_-- to put experience before abstraction, the heart before the mind. In so doing, poetry draws its most subtle, most scandalous, most dangerous, most _perfect_ image of the truth. - Henry Gould for the Wm. L. Bergeron Memorial Reading[Event] 1997, Cranston, RI 4.23.97 [this might be a pretty good manifesto for the Providence School] ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 09:59:49 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: William Burmeister Prod <burmeist@PLHP002.COMM.MOT.COM> Subject: Re: Ah In-Reply-To: Joseph Zitt <jzitt@HUMANSYSTEMS.COM> "Re: Ah" (Apr 3, 10:31pm) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii >John Cage is great too on the Roratorio CD reading his mesostic version of >_Finnegan's Wake_ with an Irish accent. >Yes, it's available on CD from Mode and from Wergo (though I strongly >recommend the Mode double-CD which has the complete spoken track on its >own (the Wergo, I believe, contains one section) as well as a long >recorded interview and two very thick booklets, one of which contains >the complete mesostic. Does the Mode double-CD version have the complete spoken 120 page version of the writing through the wake? In the Wergo version, there is a 14 minute solo for the 40 page reduction, the same one that he reads in the hour-long horspiel (Writing through the wake for the second time). Bill B. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 11:50:48 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Charles Bernstein <bernstei@BWAY.NET> Subject: Allen Ginsberg Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Allen Ginsberg has been diagnosed with liver cancer and is not given much more time to live. There are articles about his illness in today's New York Post and Philadelphia Inquirer. I would imagine everyone reading this will have the same intense reaction I am having. It seems like Allen Ginsberg has been with me all my life. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 10:57:05 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Jean Day <jday@UCLINK.BERKELEY.EDU> Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 2 Apr 1997 to 3 Apr 1997 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Charles, Xenos is Lyn Hejinian and Travis Ortiz's new series--THE LITERAL WORLD is imminent, as is another new one from Barrett Watten, part or all of BAD HISTORY, I think. These are the first two; many others are in the works--maybe I can get Lyn to post the prospectus or get hold of it and post it myself. Cheers, Jean >>mine >>THE LITERAL WORLD from Xenos. > >Jean > >Tell me more about Xenos. What other books? etc. > >charles > > >charles alexander / chax press / chax@theriver.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 15:06:34 PST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Bill Luoma/Notes1/Vanstar <Bill_Luoma@VANSTAR.COM> Subject: Time Change Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: Text/Plain This Sunday, 4/6/97, at 2:00 A.M., most of the country will be moving their clocks ahead one hour in observance of daylight savings time. Since Indianapolis does not change their clocks, for the next six months they will be in the Central Time Zone. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 15:04:19 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19970404165048.006c1c44@bway.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII The Daily News said 4 months to a year. If it wasn't for Howl, I would have broken down in Pennsyvania; it was my first epiphany. I found it at a local bookshop when it first came out; I was around 13 at the time and already depressive. Alan On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Charles Bernstein wrote: > Allen Ginsberg has been diagnosed with liver cancer and is not given much > more time to live. There are articles about his illness in today's New York > Post and Philadelphia Inquirer. > > I would imagine everyone reading this will have the same intense reaction I > am having. It seems like Allen Ginsberg has been with me all my life. > ____________________________________________________________________ URL: http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html MIRROR: http://www.anu.edu.au/english/internet_txt/ ++++++++++++++++ IMAGES: http://www.cs.unca.edu/~davidson/pix/ TELEPHONE 718-857-3671 CUSEEME: 166.84.250.149 +++++ Editor, BEING ON LINE, Lusitania, 1997 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 12:26:20 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Joe Safdie <jsafdie@SEACCD.SCCD.CTC.EDU> Subject: Re: Time Change In-Reply-To: <9704041958.AA02412@solnotes.vanstar.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Bill Luoma/Notes1/Vanstar wrote: > This Sunday, 4/6/97, at 2:00 A.M., most of the country will be moving their > clocks ahead one hour in observance of daylight savings time. Since > Indianapolis does not change their clocks, for the next six months they will be > in the Central Time Zone. > Congratulations to the citizens of Indianapolis for resisting the artificial, mechanical construction of "daylight savings" -- it's all done for business interests -- (though this is the "good" pole, when we're all supposed to be happy for the "extra" daylight) -- (and are) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 12:39:42 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: Time Change In-Reply-To: <Pine.HPP.3.94.970404122107.20967G-100000@seaccd.sccd.ctc.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 12:26 PM -0800 4/4/97, Joe Safdie wrote: >Congratulations to the citizens of Indianapolis for resisting the >artificial, mechanical construction of "daylight savings" -- it's >all done for business interests -- (though this is the "good" pole, >when we're all supposed to be happy for the "extra" daylight) -- Actually I think it's done for people who have cats. I'm really looking forward to daylight savings time so Blanche and Stanley will quit trying to wake me up at 6:30 in the morning to feed them. Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 15:37:27 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Steven Marks <swmar@CONNCOLL.EDU> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.95.970404150256.10737A-100000@panix3.panix.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I was about 13, too, when I first heard of Allen Ginsberg from my 7th-grade English teacher who clandestinely read us the beginning of Howl. All I remember was that it wasn't the sing-songy verse we were usually fed. I also remember wondering why our English teacher was being so secretive. This was in 1965 or 1966. Now I know why and now I also know that things haven't changed nearly enough. sadly, Steven __________________________________________________ Steven Marks http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html __________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 16:28:55 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM> Subject: Remindah Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Ourrr reading tonight featuring starrr viol d'Ingrrrres types Kenneth Goldsmith and Carrrrrl Watson is at 7 pm and will featurrrrre morrrre rrrr sounds than you may have known you could hearrrr at Poetry City in the offices of Teachers & Writers 5 Union Szquare Weszt Szeventh Flooah New Yorrrrk New Yorrrrrrrk ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 16:30:37 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Don Cheney <doncheney@GEOCITIES.COM> Subject: Allen Ginsberg Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" i've never met allen ginsberg but i was within arms reach of him one late afternoon many years ago. stephen rodefer was having allen talk about jack kerouac for one of his ucsd literature classes and invited me to drop in. i remember walking to the lecture hall and allen was walking in front of me amidst a small crowd of people trying to get through the door. and i remember he was wearing this dopey dark blue polyester sport coat and i remember that nobody seemed to notice him really and i had the urge to tap him on the shoulder and say "what's up with this ginsberg goofball anyway?" but i didn't and obviously i've regretted it over all these years. and i've regretted it because i've come to understand what a large and open sense of humor he has. =================================== Don Cheney San Diego, CA, USA http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5791 doncheney@geocities.com =================================== ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 16:02:53 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" shall we write a group poem/renga/range of affection for allen ginsberg? At 3:04 PM 4/4/97, Alan Jen Sondheim wrote: >The Daily News said 4 months to a year. > >If it wasn't for Howl, I would have broken down in Pennsyvania; it was my >first epiphany. I found it at a local bookshop when it first came out; I >was around 13 at the time and already depressive. > >Alan > >On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Charles Bernstein wrote: > >> Allen Ginsberg has been diagnosed with liver cancer and is not given much >> more time to live. There are articles about his illness in today's New York >> Post and Philadelphia Inquirer. >> >> I would imagine everyone reading this will have the same intense reaction I >> am having. It seems like Allen Ginsberg has been with me all my life. >> > >____________________________________________________________________ >URL: http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html >MIRROR: http://www.anu.edu.au/english/internet_txt/ ++++++++++++++++ >IMAGES: http://www.cs.unca.edu/~davidson/pix/ TELEPHONE 718-857-3671 >CUSEEME: 166.84.250.149 +++++ Editor, BEING ON LINE, Lusitania, 1997 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 14:58:41 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Christopher Reiner <creiner@CRL.COM> Subject: Witz In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19970404165048.006c1c44@bway.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Announcing: WITZ: A Journal of Contemporary Poetics Spring 1997 Volume Five, Number 1 Stephen Ratcliffe on Larry Eigner William Marsh on Hypertexts Susan M. Schultz and Dan Featherston on Bob Perelman Kasey Cummings and Carl Peters on Rae Armantrout Susan Smith Nash on Susan Gevirtz Tod Thilleman on Kenneth Bernard (38 pages, 5" x 8-1/2") $4/copy or $10/individual subscription (3 issues) to WITZ P.O. Box 40012 Studio City, California 91614 **Please make checks payable to Christopher Reiner** And check out the Witz Archive at the EPC: http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/ezines/witz/ for plain vanilla ascii versions of issues 1.1 to 4.1 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 16:50:32 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Stephen Cope <scope@SDCC3.UCSD.EDU> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" This is sad, tho expected, news. I've had dreams in the past of receiving such information, which I suppose says much about the depth to which he's entered my own consciousness. I've always found Allen, in my limited experience, to be among the most generous, open, encouraging, and dedicated members of the poetry community. A leader in so many ways... God bless him... ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 15:22:19 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Charles Alexander <chax@THERIVER.COM> Subject: Re: Time Change In-Reply-To: <Pine.HPP.3.94.970404122107.20967G-100000@seaccd.sccd.ctc.e du> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" The state of Arizona doesn't change either. So part of the year we're on mountain time, part on Pacific time. I suppose that means we're getting ready to be on Pacific time again. I can't say that it's either an advantage or a disadvantage. In the summer here I'd really rather have the cooler nights come sooner, not later. charles At 12:26 PM 4/4/97 -0800, you wrote: >On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Bill Luoma/Notes1/Vanstar wrote: > >> This Sunday, 4/6/97, at 2:00 A.M., most of the country will be moving their >> clocks ahead one hour in observance of daylight savings time. Since >> Indianapolis does not change their clocks, for the next six months they will be >> in the Central Time Zone. >> >Congratulations to the citizens of Indianapolis for resisting the >artificial, mechanical construction of "daylight savings" -- it's >all done for business interests -- (though this is the "good" pole, >when we're all supposed to be happy for the "extra" daylight) -- > >(and are) > > charles alexander / chax press / chax@theriver.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 19:19:03 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" <Timmons@ASU.EDU> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg Comments: To: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> In-Reply-To: <v01540b0faf6a49e9bad5@[128.101.215.176]> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Maria Damon (Maria Damon) wrote: > shall we write a group poem/renga/range of affection for allen ginsberg? yes. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 20:34:54 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Allen Ginsberg's death Here is the great equalizer, it would seem. Language is slippery, pronouns are fuzzy, poetry is not poetry. But death? Death is death, and there it is, no experimental messing with it. I suspect Ginsberg would not want any sentimental sniffling. He's been talking about death for a long time. I remember at the Orono conference in--was it--'93? I approached Ginsberg after his reading there and introduced myself as the person who had edited the Buddhist anthology of contemporary American poets in which he prominently figured. I was sure he owuld be impressed, probably would embrace me warmly, since clearly this was the most important anthology to appear in post-war America, intro by Gary Snyder, numerous avant-garde poets along with big mainstreams, unknowns, etc. He had a red bandanna tied to four corners around his head, sipped deeply on a soda and said in a decidedly laconic way: Oh, so yu're the guy who did that... And then he turned and started talking to someone else. I felt hurt and felt resentlful for a good time after that-- especially after riding back to the motel in the same van with him and he was yakkety yakketing with Marjorie Perloff and Jerome McGann and it was as if I was not there. Invisible. Look Allen, I have adored you, wanted to be like you, wondered what it would be like to walk down the street with you, read you out loud with my friends inthe bar, and all you can do after I edit a Buddhist anthology of poetry is treat me like shit. Did I think to myself: I wish you would die, motherfucker. (but no, no, I don't mean that,that's a wrong thing to feel, that's jsut my drunkenness, I'm not that kind of dperson...) And of course he will. And of course all of us will. The intensity comes out of the factness of death, doesn't it, like a beatnik on acid with beads, staring us in the face with all of his teeth? Now I realize death was probably teaching me a lesson, saying so what if you did so and so, you sorry idiot? No merit. So don't be sad. I'll bet Allen wouldn't want it that way. But then again, I could be worng. And only death will prove us all, in the end, immaculately right. Right? kent > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 11:50:48 -0500 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > From: Charles Bernstein <bernstei@BWAY.NET> > Subject: Allen Ginsberg > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > Allen Ginsberg has been diagnosed with liver cancer and is not given much > more time to live. There are articles about his illness in today's New York > Post and Philadelphia Inquirer. > > I would imagine everyone reading this will have the same intense reaction I > am having. It seems like Allen Ginsberg has been with me all my life. > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:04:50 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Daniel Zimmerman <daniel7@TRIBECA.IOS.COM> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg's death MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > Here is the great equalizer, it would seem. Language is slippery, > pronouns are fuzzy, poetry is not poetry. But death? Death is death, > and there it is, no experimental messing with it. > > I suspect Ginsberg would not want any sentimental sniffling. He's > been talking about death for a long time. I remember at the Orono > conference in--was it--'93? I approached Ginsberg after > his reading there and introduced myself as the person who had edited > the Buddhist anthology of contemporary American poets in which he > prominently figured. I was sure he > owuld be impressed, probably would embrace me warmly, since clearly > this was the most important anthology to appear in post-war America, > intro by Gary Snyder, numerous avant-garde poets along with big > mainstreams, unknowns, etc. He had a red bandanna tied to four corners > around his head, sipped deeply on a soda and said in a decidedly > laconic way: Oh, so yu're the guy who did that... And then he turned > and started talking to someone else. > > I felt hurt and felt resentlful for a good time after that-- > especially after riding back to the motel in the same van > with him and he was yakkety yakketing with Marjorie Perloff and > Jerome McGann and it was as if I was not there. Invisible. Look Allen, > I have adored you, wanted to be like you, wondered what it would be > like to walk down the street with you, read you out loud with my > friends inthe bar, and all you can do after I edit a Buddhist > anthology of poetry is treat me like shit. > > Did I think to myself: I wish you would die, motherfucker. (but no, > no, I don't mean that,that's a wrong thing to feel, that's jsut my > drunkenness, I'm not that kind of dperson...) > > And of course he will. And of course all of us will. The intensity > comes out of the factness of death, doesn't it, like a beatnik on acid > with beads, staring us in the face with all of his teeth? Now I > realize death was probably teaching me a lesson, saying so what if > you did so and so, you sorry idiot? No merit. > > So don't be sad. I'll bet Allen wouldn't want it that way. But then > again, I could be worng. And only death will prove us all, in the end, > immaculately right. Right? > > kent > > > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 11:50:48 -0500 > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > From: Charles Bernstein <bernstei@BWAY.NET> > > Subject: Allen Ginsberg > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > Allen Ginsberg has been diagnosed with liver cancer and is not given much > > more time to live. There are articles about his illness in today's New York > > Post and Philadelphia Inquirer. > > > > I would imagine everyone reading this will have the same intense reaction I > > am having. It seems like Allen Ginsberg has been with me all my life. > > Singing "Father Death" & Blake's Songs, Allen's left more life than death can take away. Don't feel bad, Kent. He brushed me off once, after I read a few poems at the WCW festival in Paterson, as "very intelligent." No blame. Om Kavaye Namah. [Honor to the Great Poet.] Dan ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 21:22:45 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg's death On April 4 Dan Zimmerman said: > Singing "Father Death" & Blake's Songs, Allen's left more life than death > can take away. Don't feel bad, Kent. He brushed me off once, after I read > a few poems at the WCW festival in Paterson, as "very intelligent." No > blame. Om Kavaye Namah. [Honor to the Great Poet.] > > Dan > Dan: I'm not trying to be smart, but when you say that Allen left more life than death can take away, it sounds like you might really be scared. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 21:36:36 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg Comments: To: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" <Timmons@ASU.EDU> In-Reply-To: <Pine.SOL.3.91.970404191841.13016B-100000@email1.asu.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 7:19 PM -0700 4/4/97, Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: >On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Maria Damon (Maria Damon) wrote: > >> shall we write a group poem/renga/range of affection for allen ginsberg? > >yes. okay, somebody else start please, and can we not talk about him as if he's already dead please. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:38:11 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Wendy Battin <wjbat@CONNCOLL.EDU> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <9704042012.AA02084@oak.cc.conncoll.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Alan Jen Sondheim wrote: > The Daily News said 4 months to a year. > > If it wasn't for Howl, I would have broken down in Pennsyvania; it was my > first epiphany. I found it at a local bookshop when it first came out; I > was around 13 at the time and already depressive. Ditto, except Delaware. Wendy ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:36:20 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Daniel Zimmerman <daniel7@TRIBECA.IOS.COM> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg's death MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > On April 4 Dan Zimmerman said: > > > Singing "Father Death" & Blake's Songs, Allen's left more life than death > > can take away. Don't feel bad, Kent. He brushed me off once, after I read > > a few poems at the WCW festival in Paterson, as "very intelligent." No > > blame. Om Kavaye Namah. [Honor to the Great Poet.] > > > > Dan > > > > Dan: > > I'm not trying to be smart, but when you say that Allen left more life > than death can take away, it sounds like you might really be scared. > > Kent Not scared, but struck by the sublime: that 18th century sense of the awe-ful or, as Blake says, who died singing of angels, the "terrific": "portions of eternity, too great for the eye of man." Scared of what? Dan ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 21:40:55 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 21:36:36 -0600 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > At 7:19 PM -0700 4/4/97, Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: > >On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Maria Damon (Maria Damon) wrote: > > > >> shall we write a group poem/renga/range of affection for allen ginsberg? > > > >yes. > > okay, somebody else start please, and can we not talk about him as if he's > already dead please. As if that would be a terrible thing? Oh, awful death. Let us not, for it is not to be spoken of. Now since death is so pornographic, what will be the first line of this renga? ketn> ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:51:04 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Wendy Battin <wjbat@CONNCOLL.EDU> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <9704050342.AA05998@oak.cc.conncoll.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, KENT JOHNSON wrote: > for it is not to be spoken of. Now since death is so pornographic, > what will be the first line of this renga? Now, since death is so pornographic, where can they sell it? ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:53:26 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Daniel Zimmerman <daniel7@TRIBECA.IOS.COM> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 21:36:36 -0600 > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> > > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > At 7:19 PM -0700 4/4/97, Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: > > >On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Maria Damon (Maria Damon) wrote: > > > > > >> shall we write a group poem/renga/range of affection for allen ginsberg? > > > > > >yes. > > > > okay, somebody else start please, and can we not talk about him as if he's > > already dead please. > > As if that would be a terrible thing? Oh, awful death. Let us not, > for it is not to be spoken of. Now since death is so pornographic, > what will be the first line of this renga? > > ketn> pull my daisy, poet ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:06:14 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:53:26 -0800 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > From: Daniel Zimmerman <daniel7@TRIBECA.IOS.COM> > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > > > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 21:36:36 -0600 > > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > > From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> > > > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > > > At 7:19 PM -0700 4/4/97, Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: > > > >On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Maria Damon (Maria Damon) wrote: > > > > > > > >> shall we write a group poem/renga/range of affection for allen ginsberg? > > > > > > > >yes. > > > > > > okay, somebody else start please, and can we not talk about him as if he's > > > already dead please. > > > > As if that would be a terrible thing? Oh, awful death. Let us not, > > for it is not to be spoken of. Now since death is so pornographic, > > what will be the first line of this renga? > > > > ketn> > > pull my daisy, poet Happening to notice the willow leaves in the garden, a braille page of words ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 23:10:59 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Daniel Zimmerman <daniel7@TRIBECA.IOS.COM> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:53:26 -0800 > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > From: Daniel Zimmerman <daniel7@TRIBECA.IOS.COM> > > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > > > > > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 21:36:36 -0600 > > > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > > > From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> > > > > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > > > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > > > > > At 7:19 PM -0700 4/4/97, Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: > > > > >On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Maria Damon (Maria Damon) wrote: > > > > > > > > > >> shall we write a group poem/renga/range of affection for allen ginsberg? > > > > > > > > > >yes. > > > > > > > > okay, somebody else start please, and can we not talk about him as if he's > > > > already dead please. > > > > > > As if that would be a terrible thing? Oh, awful death. Let us not, > > > for it is not to be spoken of. Now since death is so pornographic, > > > what will be the first line of this renga? > > > > > > ketn> > > > > pull my daisy, poet > > Happening to notice the willow leaves in the garden, a braille page > of words the wind a simultaneous translation ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:14:55 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 23:10:59 -0800 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > From: Daniel Zimmerman <daniel7@TRIBECA.IOS.COM> > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > > > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:53:26 -0800 > > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > > From: Daniel Zimmerman <daniel7@TRIBECA.IOS.COM> > > > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > > > KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > > > > > > > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 21:36:36 -0600 > > > > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > > > > From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> > > > > > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > > > > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > > > > > > > At 7:19 PM -0700 4/4/97, Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: > > > > > >On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Maria Damon (Maria Damon) wrote: > > > > > > > > > > > >> shall we write a group poem/renga/range of affection for allen ginsberg? > > > > > > > > > > > >yes. > > > > > > > > > > okay, somebody else start please, and can we not talk about him as if he's > > > > > already dead please. > > > > > > > > As if that would be a terrible thing? Oh, awful death. Let us not, > > > > for it is not to be spoken of. Now since death is so pornographic, > > > > what will be the first line of this renga? > > > > > > > > ketn> > > > > > > pull my daisy, poet > > > > Happening to notice the willow leaves in the garden, a braille page > > of words > > the wind a simultaneous translation the sorority girls sing of fucking in a plaintive way> ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 23:18:47 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <1976E213ECC@student.highland.cc.il.us> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII pull my daisy, poet Happening to notice the willow leaves in the garden, a braille page of words the wind a simultaneous translation the sorority girls sing of fucking in a plaintive way nothing has happened, no one has died ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 23:24:12 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Daniel Zimmerman <daniel7@TRIBECA.IOS.COM> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 23:10:59 -0800 > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > From: Daniel Zimmerman <daniel7@TRIBECA.IOS.COM> > > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > > > > > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:53:26 -0800 > > > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > > > From: Daniel Zimmerman <daniel7@TRIBECA.IOS.COM> > > > > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > > > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > > > > > KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > > > > > > > > > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 21:36:36 -0600 > > > > > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > > > > > From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> > > > > > > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > > > > > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > > > > > > > > > At 7:19 PM -0700 4/4/97, Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: > > > > > > >On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Maria Damon (Maria Damon) wrote: > > > > > > > > > > > > > >> shall we write a group poem/renga/range of affection for allen ginsberg? > > > > > > > > > > > > > >yes. > > > > > > > > > > > > okay, somebody else start please, and can we not talk about him as if he's > > > > > > already dead please. > > > > > > > > > > As if that would be a terrible thing? Oh, awful death. Let us not, > > > > > for it is not to be spoken of. Now since death is so pornographic, > > > > > what will be the first line of this renga? > > > > > > > > > > ketn> > > > > > > > > pull my daisy, poet > > > > > > Happening to notice the willow leaves in the garden, a braille page > > > of words > > > > the wind a simultaneous translation > > the sorority girls sing of fucking in a plaintive way> brushed silk blouses darkening in the midday heat, dank hyacinths ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:27:04 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 23:18:47 -0500 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > pull my daisy, poet > Happening to notice the willow leaves in the garden, a braille page > of words > the wind a simultaneous translation > the sorority girls sing of fucking in a plaintive way > nothing has happened, no one has died beside a bowl smelling of old cat's milk, Jeniffer weeps> ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 23:29:23 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <3345FE1C.38E1@tribeca.ios.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Is it necessary to quote with, to include post headers, to ignore other contributions? Alan, bowing out On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Daniel Zimmerman wrote: > KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > > > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 23:10:59 -0800 > > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > > From: Daniel Zimmerman <daniel7@TRIBECA.IOS.COM> > > > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > > > KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > > > > > > > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:53:26 -0800 > > > > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > > > > From: Daniel Zimmerman <daniel7@TRIBECA.IOS.COM> > > > > > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > > > > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > > > > > > > KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > > > > > > > > > > > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 21:36:36 -0600 > > > > > > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > > > > > > From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> > > > > > > > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > > > > > > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > > > > > > > > > > > At 7:19 PM -0700 4/4/97, Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: > > > > > > > >On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Maria Damon (Maria Damon) wrote: > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > >> shall we write a group poem/renga/range of affection for allen ginsberg? > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > >yes. > > > > > > > > > > > > > > okay, somebody else start please, and can we not talk about him as if he's > > > > > > > already dead please. > > > > > > > > > > > > As if that would be a terrible thing? Oh, awful death. Let us not, > > > > > > for it is not to be spoken of. Now since death is so pornographic, > > > > > > what will be the first line of this renga? > > > > > > > > > > > > ketn> > > > > > > > > > > pull my daisy, poet > > > > > > > > Happening to notice the willow leaves in the garden, a braille page > > > > of words > > > > > > the wind a simultaneous translation > > > > the sorority girls sing of fucking in a plaintive way> > > brushed silk blouses darkening in the midday heat, dank hyacinths > ____________________________________________________________________ URL: http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html MIRROR: http://www.anu.edu.au/english/internet_txt/ ++++++++++++++++ IMAGES: http://www.cs.unca.edu/~davidson/pix/ TELEPHONE 718-857-3671 CUSEEME: 166.84.250.149 +++++ Editor, BEING ON LINE, Lusitania, 1997 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 23:32:03 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> Subject: Form silliness MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII About form - If you send a reply by _forwarding_ instead of _replying,_ you can send back to poetics without the carets; if you also cut out the headers... The renga that occurred I think about a year ago? got out of hand; we've all got a hand in; I remember caret-clipping, caretine poisoning, and Allen already has a bad liver... Alan, sorry, grumpy ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 20:31:47 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Mark Weiss <junction@EARTHLINK.NET> Subject: Re: Time Change Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" But the Navajo reservation is on daylight savings time, probably as a way of emphasizing their sovereignty to the rest of Arizona. At 03:22 PM 4/4/97 -0700, you wrote: >The state of Arizona doesn't change either. So part of the year we're on >mountain time, part on Pacific time. I suppose that means we're getting >ready to be on Pacific time again. I can't say that it's either an >advantage or a disadvantage. In the summer here I'd really rather have the >cooler nights come sooner, not later. > >charles > >At 12:26 PM 4/4/97 -0800, you wrote: >>On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Bill Luoma/Notes1/Vanstar wrote: >> >>> This Sunday, 4/6/97, at 2:00 A.M., most of the country will be moving their >>> clocks ahead one hour in observance of daylight savings time. Since >>> Indianapolis does not change their clocks, for the next six months they >will be >>> in the Central Time Zone. >>> >>Congratulations to the citizens of Indianapolis for resisting the >>artificial, mechanical construction of "daylight savings" -- it's >>all done for business interests -- (though this is the "good" pole, >>when we're all supposed to be happy for the "extra" daylight) -- >> >>(and are) >> >> >charles alexander / chax press / chax@theriver.com > > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:50:44 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: renga can one take back something in cyber-renga? for example, in the line "beside an old bowl smelling of cat's milk, Jenniffer weeps," the 'smelling' is unnecessary. Or is it too late? kent ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 23:55:16 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> Subject: Re: renga In-Reply-To: <198076933A7@student.highland.cc.il.us> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Perhaps the beginnings at this point should be rewritten, restarted; everything is fluid here, fissured, uninscribed - Alan On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, KENT JOHNSON wrote: > can one take back something in cyber-renga? for example, > in the line "beside an old bowl smelling of cat's milk, > Jenniffer weeps," the 'smelling' is unnecessary. > > Or is it too late? > kent > ____________________________________________________________________ URL: http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html MIRROR: http://www.anu.edu.au/english/internet_txt/ ++++++++++++++++ IMAGES: http://www.cs.unca.edu/~davidson/pix/ TELEPHONE 718-857-3671 CUSEEME: 166.84.250.149 +++++ Editor, BEING ON LINE, Lusitania, 1997 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 23:21:54 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: renga > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 23:55:16 -0500 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> > Subject: Re: renga > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU yes, Alan is Allen, allen is fissured, everyone is restarted, Jennifer rewritten. Alan is dying, everything is fluid, death is uninscribed, renga is rewritten. death is verboten, perhaps the beginning, point should be fucking,none should be fissured. all should be dying, ginsberg is watching, where should we start, where should we come to, whale meat is rotting, children are cavorting. I mean (guy who can't, trying to rap) on a beach where children play baseball and whales are rotting. > Perhaps the beginnings at this point should be rewritten, restarted; > everything is fluid here, fissured, uninscribed - > > Alan > > On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > can one take back something in cyber-renga? for example, > > in the line "beside an old bowl smelling of cat's milk, > > Jenniffer weeps," the 'smelling' is unnecessary. > > > > Or is it too late? > > kent > > > > ____________________________________________________________________ > URL: http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html > MIRROR: http://www.anu.edu.au/english/internet_txt/ ++++++++++++++++ > IMAGES: http://www.cs.unca.edu/~davidson/pix/ TELEPHONE 718-857-3671 > CUSEEME: 166.84.250.149 +++++ Editor, BEING ON LINE, Lusitania, 1997 > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 00:28:44 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Daniel Zimmerman <daniel7@TRIBECA.IOS.COM> Subject: Re: renga MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > Date sent: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 23:55:16 -0500 > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> > > Subject: Re: renga > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > yes, Alan is Allen, allen is fissured, everyone is restarted, > Jennifer rewritten. Alan is dying, everything is fluid, death is > uninscribed, renga is rewritten. death is verboten, perhaps the > beginning, point should be fucking,none should be fissured. all > should be dying, ginsberg is watching, where should we start, where > should we come to, whale meat is rotting, children are cavorting. I > mean (guy who can't, trying to rap) on a beach where children play > baseball and whales are rotting. > > > Perhaps the beginnings at this point should be rewritten, > restarted; > everything is fluid here, fissured, uninscribed - > > > > Alan > > > > On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > > > can one take back something in cyber-renga? for example, > > > in the line "beside an old bowl smelling of cat's milk, > > > Jenniffer weeps," the 'smelling' is unnecessary. > > > > > > Or is it too late? > > > kent > > > > > > > ____________________________________________________________________ > > URL: http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html > > MIRROR: http://www.anu.edu.au/english/internet_txt/ ++++++++++++++++ > > IMAGES: http://www.cs.unca.edu/~davidson/pix/ TELEPHONE 718-857-3671 > > CUSEEME: 166.84.250.149 +++++ Editor, BEING ON LINE, Lusitania, 1997 > >here's Howling at you, kid. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:05:34 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@EMAIL.SJSU.EDU> Subject: Re: elephant's memory In-Reply-To: <33460D3C.16F2@tribeca.ios.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I've been away from the list for a while -- but will say this -- I was once standing on my own several yards away from where Ginsberg was talking quietly with a group of admirers after a reading here in San Jose -- He saw me there alone, broke away from the group -- came over and asked how it was with me, did I write, what did I write, how did the community fare since his few San Jose days "In Back of the Real" -- There are few in my experience so generous with themselves as he has been -- any of us, I'm sure, might on occasion be distracted, brusque -- whatever -- Few have been such a tireless champion of the writing of others, even others he didn't know -- We had a wonderful short talk that night about poetry, about poets we knew, about local labor history -- the stars seemed more acute as we turned back toward the town ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:26:16 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA> Subject: Re: Time Change In-Reply-To: <9704041958.AA02412@solnotes.vanstar.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >This Sunday, 4/6/97, at 2:00 A.M., most of the country will be moving their >clocks ahead one hour in observance of daylight savings time. Since >Indianapolis does not change their clocks, for the next six months they >will be >in the Central Time Zone. Except the Pacers, who will be in the eastern conference. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 03:33:57 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Rob Hardin <scrypt@INTERPORT.NET> Subject: Visit Lou Stathis at the Columbia Presbyterian Hospital Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To all who know critic and editor Lou Stathis: It is certainly sad that Ginsberg is dying--especially now, after he had just sold his papers for an amazing amount of money and would have lived out the rest of his days in long-deserved comfort. However, Ginsberg's place in history is secure and his visitors will be legion: I doubt he would benefit emotionally from receiving visits from blurred acquaintances like me. Given the relative consolations of G's notoreity, I must regretfully leave him to his myriad of friends, and mention a writer whom I'm hoping will not die unremembered and unattended. His name is Lou Stathis, and as an editor and benevolent presence, he has been a constant boon to innumerable struggling writers in NYC. In addition, he was a discerning critic and lip-smart writer who taught a generation of readers about alternative culture. Recently, he inherited (congenitally) a writer's worst fate: a brain-tumor which left him without the ability to read, write, or formulate intelligible sentences. Still-- beyond his language impasse, one can still sense Lou's intelligence and sensitivity--even in his gropings for words he can no longer reach. He is not expected to outlive Ginsberg, and I am asking anyone who has ever known Lou or enjoyed his writing to please visit him at the Columbia Presbyterian Hospital on 167th Street in New York City. Let him know that his work is important and that his life does matter. Today, when Darius James and I visited him, he was extremely weak and sad. Even so, he managed to say, "I'm still in here. It's still me. It's still me." All best always, Rob Hardin requiescate in pace aut emergate quandprimum http://www.users.interport.net/~scrypt/ http://www.horrornet.com/hardin.htm ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 04:17:18 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Bromige <dcmb@METRO.NET> Subject: poem Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ALLEN GINSBERG like David Bromige Kent Johnson Maria Damon & Wayne Gretzsky not dead yet ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 08:44:06 EST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: simon@CVAX.IPFW.INDIANA.EDU Subject: Re: Time Change I like the assertion that Indianapolis will up and move to the central time zone. How mobile, and when you think that even for indiana, the polis outs the right, and as for crhistians, as my grandmother would say, don't ask, how breezy of it. The rest of the state (exc a cple of counties where they don't play with snakes in church) has to stay where it is, here, and go on with the same old god's own time, which is, and we have it on the best authority, right now, eastern time. Of course, when the rest of the eastern time goes on daylight, the true eastern reads suspiciously like central. But that's the east for you. Central. Don't trust it. One of those deictics with a u-haul index. beth ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 07:22:53 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Rachel Loden <rloden@CONCENTRIC.NET> Subject: Re: poem MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Now I believe you are lovely, my soul, soul of Allen, Allen-- and you so beloved, so sweetened, so recalled to your true loveliness, your original nude breathing Allen will you ever deny another again? from "Sather Gate Illumination" David Bromige wrote: > > ALLEN GINSBERG > > like David Bromige > Kent Johnson > Maria Damon > & Wayne Gretzsky > > not dead yet ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 07:40:53 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Herb Levy <herb@ESKIMO.COM> Subject: Re: Ah Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Does the Mode double-CD version have the complete spoken 120 page version of >the writing through the wake? In the Wergo version, there is a 14 minute solo >for the 40 page reduction, the same one that he reads in the hour-long horspiel >(Writing through the wake for the second time). The Mode set includes the whole text in both audio & print form, though the printed text is in extremely tiny type, even by CD booklet standards - it looks like a photo-reduction of the first publication, including the scattered punctuation marks. Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 12:00:29 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> Subject: Allen Ginsberg + MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII WCBS just announced Allen Ginsberg has died. Alan ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 11:14:33 -0600 Reply-To: jzitt@tab.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Joseph Zitt <jzitt@HUMANSYSTEMS.COM> Organization: Human Systems Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Wendy Battin wrote: > > On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > for it is not to be spoken of. Now since death is so pornographic, > > what will be the first line of this renga? > > Now, since death is so pornographic, where can they sell it? OK, a first line: Now, since death is so pornographic, BTW, if a renga evolves, I *will* keep on top of this one and try to make it into a hypertext as it goes along. -- ---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------- |||/ Joseph Zitt ===== jzitt@humansystems.com ===== Human Systems \||| ||/ Austin, Texas! =========== SILENCE: The John Cage Mailing List \|| |/ http://www.realtime.net/~jzitt == <*> <*> == Empty Words == ecto \| ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 11:34:35 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: michael corbin <evadog@BITSTREAM.NET> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg + MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Alan Jen Sondheim wrote: > > WCBS just announced Allen Ginsberg has died. > R.I.P. "Ah, dear father, graybeard, lonely old courage-teacher, what America did you have when Charon quit poling his ferry and you got out on a smoking bank and stood watching the boat disappear on the black waters of Lethe?" (A Supermarket in California) mc ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 11:35:15 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Miekal And <dtv@MWT.NET> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg + MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit hath die sly bath died live as death live as who those lips kiss miekal ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 12:19:34 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <3345FB03.10B@tribeca.ios.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >KENT JOHNSON wrote: As if that would be a terrible thing? Oh, awful death. Let us not, >> > > for it is not to be spoken of. Now since death is so pornographic, >> > > what will be the first line of this renga? >> > > >> > > ketn> spare me your sarcasm, you don't know anything about my experiences with death or anything else for that matter. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 13:53:07 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM Subject: Allen Ginsberg's Death Kent, it is never too late to stop and not smell the cat's milk. Please, Loss, cut "smelling of" and let cat's milk simply be cat's milk (my opinion, good edit). First thought, Second thought... I was 15, New Richmond, Ohio, 1964, cursing under breath, weeding the weekly chore, HOWL Pocket Poets Series in back pocket, touchstone of sanity, poetry. Bob Holman ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 13:53:08 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM Subject: Re: Ginsberg's Death The harmonious roar. Words hollowed out for Life to fill ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 13:04:23 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg I didn't mean to offend. But I apologize, because the message was silly and unnecessary. I'm sitting here now, just having read Alan Sondheim's post. I feel really weird. Is anyone else out there crying too? Kent > Date sent: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 12:19:34 -0600 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> > Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > >KENT JOHNSON wrote: > As if that would be a terrible thing? Oh, awful death. Let us not, > >> > > for it is not to be spoken of. Now since death is so pornographic, > >> > > what will be the first line of this renga? > >> > > > >> > > ketn> > > spare me your sarcasm, you don't know anything about my experiences with > death or anything else for that matter. > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 14:39:37 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <1A6419F47C4@student.highland.cc.il.us> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Sat, 5 Apr 1997, KENT JOHNSON wrote: > I feel really weird. Is anyone else out there crying > too? > > Kent Yes - many of us - Alan ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 15:10:48 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> Subject: html-body MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII (The two pieces below were to have been sent out with the html page sent yesterday; I hesitate to send them today, but they're commentary that explains the other post. I apologize as well for the obscurity of this stuff; it's concerned directly with the poetics of cyberspace, an area that's still little explored. I promise to cut back here.) __________________________________________________________________________ HTML-BODY: Explanation <!--Alan writes his desires; Jennifer receives the page--><BR> <!--Agreeable Alan dreams his way across Jennifer--><BR> <!--Writing, punctuated by warnings, corrupts his body--><BR> <!--"You are ALL TEXT," Jennifer says--><BR> <!--"There's nothing to me," Agreeable Alan--><BR> Another experiment in wryting the html body, exp.htm uses _alert_ buttons among the viewer, "Jennifer," and "Alan"; links and targets simply shudder the page slightly, as if a tremor went through the body. Certain links leave text altogether, sink to the lower and blank margins of the page, a non-inscriptive ground, divided by a series of horizontal lines / plateaus from the body of the text. And the body itself turns on the phrase "you spread me on your screen," like jelly, like jam, like roadkill or sexual arousal - a phrase which appears through the majority of alerts. The mouse moves across the field, stumbling over the poor simulacrum of skin, the body with organs (BWO), javascript, html, tcp/ip. One _enters_ the text, alerts protrude, freeze the body until cancelled. And as for the rest? The surface? Speaking less than the interior, but hardly less intel- ligent or inscribed; the surface in fact is an intelligent surface, blank of image, refusing to give way _beneath._ Because of the nature of email lists, these accounts have used at most two text files; other html-body-works here, it can only be noted, use up to 35 files, border on obscenity, and can't be introduced here. It is not that I desire blind-html, imageless, text-hysteric; it's that there is an addi- tional dialog, with email, that reconstructs the possible. ------(lynx treats the file as broken form, filled example, below)------ it hurts you spreading jelly_____ open my breast______ splay my skins______ cut me a river______ fuck me forever_____ sing to me my song__ suck my nipple jam__ hold me, darling____ Murmur you aren't more, Alan. turn me into holy hole comfort me smoothly_ use my writing___ wet my deep throat__ dry my labia milk___ kill me in lactate__ hurt me, leave me___ wound me, suture me_ amputate my mind____ burn me into coiling roll enter me quickly____ heal my birthing____ love me with pain___ call me jennifer____ be me alan__________ hug me, finger me___ kiss me, crush me___churn me into soiling hole open my womb________ play with my cunt___ lie with my cock____ be with me be be me_ eat me or eat me____ cry me a river______ write with placenta_ run with me alan____ my twisted mind brings you whisper fuck to me__ shit for me darling_ talk to me jennifer_ get to me quicken___ yearn for me alan___ pine for me jennifer piss for me alan____ come to me murmur___against my toiling folds ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ (Text entry field) Enter text. Use UP or DOWN arrows or tab to move off. ___________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 13:48:58 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Mark Weiss <junction@EARTHLINK.NET> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Strange how the sudden announcement of the death hits so hard, even though its imminence was known before. One had thought to have a few months to prepare for it, as if preparation for anyone's death were ever possible. But to say goodbye. Anything by way of poetry more specific to this death on the part of those who were not his intimates is likely to ring with the hollowness of funeral elegies. Among Jews the ritual of sitting shive--a week of visiting with the family, who stay at home, cared for by others, and receive vistors--is accompanied by the ritual, tho unprescribed, telling of anecdotes about the dead, most often of a comic or endearing nature. The memory of other deaths invariably present. But even that degree of commentary has to wait the 24 hours until after the burial--time for a few deep breaths. The shock of intimate loss is incoherent, the building of verbal monuments by others at that point unseemly. Elegies are made of stone, and headstones aren't placed at Jewish graves until a year after the death, which is supposed to mark the end of mourning, although in my experience it doesn't so much end as mature. I guess what I'm saying is that a little silence right now might go a long way. The media will clobber us with enough noise about this. Liver cancer is a horrible way to die. I hope he got some help. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 16:20:01 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <1A6419F47C4@student.highland.cc.il.us> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 1:04 PM +0600 4/5/97, KENT JOHNSON wrote: >I didn't mean to offend. But I apologize, because the message was >silly and unnecessary. I'm sitting here now, just having read Alan >Sondheim's post. I feel really weird. Is anyone else out there crying >too? > >Kent > not yet. just having a quiet time. it's raining outside, like it's crying in my heart; what *is* this lethargy that penetrates my heart? must be grief. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 16:28:00 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" <pritchpa@SILVERPLUME.IIX.COM> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg Comments: To: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN I'm with you Kent & Alan. Listening right now to P. Glass's "Wichita Vortex Sutra" which sounds all of a sudden like ave atque vale. And I'm truly surprised by how hard and how deeply Allen's death is affecting me. I've driven around town today in a weird daze, everything feeling and looking uncanny, as if a great silent shockwave had passed through the world and nobody's noticed, nobody's noticed at all. And everything is the same and goes on being the same, just as it ought. It ought to be the same. Only it isn't and it can't be. But it's the same all the same and only this very weird feeling of a tiny vacuum at the center of things. I never knew Allen; only brushed by him twice in passing as it were. The first time was 1989 at City Lights, the day before the quake and the Series and I was handing out copies of a miserable poetry rag I'd put together and which is best forgotten but we bumped into each other at the crowded front counter and naturally being alert for favorable omens I was delighted. The second time was last year in Anselm Hollo's backyard where I found myself sitting, rather like Aldon, apart from the main group, on a lawn chair, and Allen and his nephew I guess it was Al came up and joined my wife and I and Lindsay Hill. We were all eating veggie burgers and watermelon and I thought how frail Allen looks and then he and Lindsay talked a bit about somebody's mother, maybe it was Steven Marks'? maybe not - the name has faded. He was wearing bright red suspenders which I put into a poem a few days later. And that was all very funny really since I'd panned his last book in a brief review I'd done for the Daily Camera and was mortally afraid to introduce myself in case someone had told him about it and that review was how Anselm Hollo and I met, by vigourous exchange of letter, and eventually led me to joining the list so I owe it this chance of expression and amends I guess in retrospect to my hubristic attempt to take Allen Ginsberg down a notch what a silly thing to do and I will miss him who else has done more for poetry and there should be a state funeral if there was such a thing as a state with honor that could see itself that way but then what need for Allen Ginsberg except the example of his beauty and anyway such ceremonies are deceptive flatteries that cannot take the place or can they of real grieving as this list will do very nicely even better for that I say. I intend to get drunk tonight and watch Jerry Aronson's "The Life & Times of Allen Ginsberg." GINSBERG AT 70 Dharma Lion thin now, skin a little sallow. Huddles over veggie burger on the half bun, pink crescent of watermelon shining on plate (adjunct to Gemini). Big red X of suspenders marks the spot on his back as if to say, here it is folks, look no farther: the matchless candor of the human heart. On Sat, 5 Apr 1997, KENT JOHNSON wrote: > I feel really weird. Is anyone else out there crying > too? > > Kent Yes - many of us - Alan ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 16:32:11 -0600 Reply-To: jzitt@tab.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Joseph Zitt <jzitt@HUMANSYSTEMS.COM> Organization: Human Systems Subject: Re: renga MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > can one take back something in cyber-renga? for example, > in the line "beside an old bowl smelling of cat's milk, > Jenniffer weeps," the 'smelling' is unnecessary. > > Or is it too late? > kent I'll note it as such in the hypertext. -- ---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------- |||/ Joseph Zitt ===== jzitt@humansystems.com ===== Human Systems \||| ||/ Austin, Texas! =========== SILENCE: The John Cage Mailing List \|| |/ http://www.realtime.net/~jzitt == <*> <*> == Empty Words == ecto \| ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 17:55:05 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Charles Bernstein <bernstei@BWAY.NET> Subject: Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Piping down the valleys wild Piping songs of pleasant glee On a cloud I saw a child.. And he laughing said to me. Pipe a song about a Lamb: So I piped with merry chear, Piper pipe that song again So I piped he wept to hear. Drop thy pipe thy happy pipe Sing thy songs of happy chear So I sung the same again While he wept with joy to hear. Piper sit thee down and write In a book that all my read -- So he vanish'd from my sight, And I plucked a hollow reed And I made a rural pen, And I stain'd the water clear, And I wrote my happy songs, Every child may joy to hear ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 18:02:25 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Kenneth Goldsmith <kennyg@BWAY.NET> Subject: Ginsberg's Body Lies In State Comments: To: poetics@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" According to Usenet, Ginsberg's body is lying in state at: Shambhala Center 118 W.22nd St. NYC Usenet advises to call first: (212)675-6544 +===============================================================+ Kenneth Goldsmith work: http://www.ubuweb.com 611 Bway, #702, NYC 10012 v.212.260-4081 --------> editor UbuWeb ViSuAL COncReTE & SoUNd PoEtRy http://www.ubuweb.com/vp <----------------- ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 17:23:20 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Memorial services Does anyone have information on memorial and funeral services for Allen? Gary Snyder is scheduled to be here to read this coming Friday, and obviously the sudden news may change all that. I have left a message for Gary, but he can be hard to get. Any information would be greatly appreciated. And Charles Bernstein: thank you. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 18:29:20 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Israel <DISRAEL@SKGF.COM> Subject: cyberRenga for Ginsberg *Back to the Renga* The renga so far (as best I can put it together -- from going through yesterday's & today's posts). [Please see notes below, for (a) attributions and (b) some explanations.] RENGA 1| pull my daisy, poet 2| Happening to notice the willow leaves in the garden, a braille page of words 3| the wind a simultaneous translation 4| the sorority girls sing of fucking in a plaintive way 5| nothing has happened, no one has died 6| brushed silk blouses darkening in the midday heat, dank hyacinths 7| beside a bowl of old cat's milk, Jeniffer weeps 8| the stars seemed more acute as we turned back toward the town 9| I'm sitting here now, just having read Alan Sondheim's post 10| I feel really weird. Is anyone else out there crying too? 11| not yet. just having a quiet time. 12| it's raining outside, like it's crying in my heart 13| what *is* this lethargy that penetrates my heart? must be grief. 14| we were all eating veggie burgers and watermelon and I thought how frail Allen looks 15| circa '67, strange chanting on TV -- I was eleven & wide-eyed 16| According to Usenet, Ginsberg's body is lying in state 17| 18| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ writers/sources of the above lines: 1: Daniel Zimmerman 2: Kent Johnson 3:? Daniel Zimmerman 4: Kent Johnson 5: Alan Jen Sondheim 6: Daniel Zimmerman 7: Kent Johnson 8: Aldon L. Nielsen 9: Kent Johnson 10: Kent Johnson 11: Maria Damon 12: Maria Damon 13: Maria Damon 14: Pat Pritchett 15: David R. Israel 16: Kenneth Goldsmith 17: 18: Some cyberRenga comments: Note A: ~~~~~~~~~~ Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:50:44 +0600 From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Subject: renga can one take back something in cyber-renga? for example, in the line "beside an old bowl smelling of cat's milk, Jenniffer weeps," the 'smelling' is unnecessary. Or is it too late? kent ~~~~~~~~~~ d.i.'s comment: sure, if one is the author thereof (as is true here). Note B: ~~~~~~~~~~ Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 23:55:16 -0500 From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> Subject: Re: renga Perhaps the beginnings at this point should be rewritten, restarted; everything is fluid here, fissured, uninscribed - Alan ~~~~~~~~~~ d.i.'s comment: the beginning was the beginning (& seems perhaps a good one). And things developed from that (& seem good, too). How about if we proceed & see where it goes? Note C: ~~~~~~~~~~ Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 22:05:34 -0800 From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@EMAIL.SJSU.EDU> Subject: Re: elephant's memory I've been away from the list for a while -- but will say this -- . . . <snip> [an excellent anecdote from Nielson followed, and concluded with this solitary line]: the stars seemed more acute as we turned back toward the town ~~~~~~~~~~ d.i.'s comment: that last line seems in the spirit of the renga, ergo I'm putting it in as the NEXT renga line (which is line 8, where I've put it -- see above). Alright with you, Aldon? (Okay w/ others?) Note D: ~~~~~~~~~~ Date: 04/05/97 06:20pm From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU>>>> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg At 1:04 PM +0600 4/5/97, KENT JOHNSON wrote: >I didn't mean to offend. But I apologize, because the message was >silly and unnecessary. I'm sitting here now, just having read Alan >Sondheim's post. I feel really weird. Is anyone else out there crying >too? > >Kent > not yet. just having a quiet time. it's raining outside, like it's crying in my heart; what *is* this lethargy that penetrates my heart? must be grief. ~~~~~~~~~~ d.i.'s comment: by way of "found poetry" (or "found cyber-renga lines"), I'd like to propose incorporating lines from these posts nto the renga. Question as to form: [In present instance at least], is it alright to have 2 (or even 3) lines in succession from the *same* poet? I'm rather vague on "renga rules," but suspect this had not been traditionally done. Still, if nobody objects, I'll lift a some lines in succession from the above. [See the results, and then judge.] (Others may edit, as suitable.) Caveat: naturally, respective poets can vito, edit, or whatnot. I'm just tinkering here for this portion of the cyberrenga -- then will forthwith (in fact, hereby) send downstream for others. So we have from Kent J, lines 9-10), and Maria D, lines 11-13. Note E: ~~~~~~~~~~ Date: 04/05/97 06:28pm From: Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume <pritchpa@SILVERPLUME.IIX.COM>Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg I'm with you Kent & Alan. Listening right now to P. Glass's "Wichita Vortex Sutra" which sounds all of a sudden like ave atque vale. And I'm truly surprised by how hard and how deeply Allen's death is affecting me. <snip> I never knew Allen; only brushed by him twice in passing as it were. <snip> . . . The second time was last year in Anselm Hollo's backyard where I found myself sitting, rather like Aldon, apart from the main group, on a lawn chair, and Allen and his nephew I guess it was Al came up and joined my wife and I and Lindsay Hill. We were all eating veggie burgers and watermelon and I thought how frail Allen looks . . . ~~~~~~~~~~ d.i.'s comment: Pat, would you permit me to put that last line into the renga above? (That becomes, here, renga line 14.) Note F: Okay, I'm putting in my own line (line 15) at this piont. / / / / / Folks: will this work, as method? Care to take it up & go further? (The fact that the death-announcement occurred mid-Renga does render this a unique cyberRenga, I'd say.) Do consider Sondheim's suggestion of not including ENTIRE posts, but just clipping out the renga & adding a line to it. The method he suggests -- "forrwarding" rather than "replying" is one way to avoid the carets. (Or: whatever.) - David R. Israel post-script: Note G: (this just in) ~~~~~~~~~~ Date: 04/05/97 07:02pm From: Kenneth Goldsmith <kennyg@BWAY.NET> Subject: Ginsberg's Body Lies in State According to Usenet, Ginsberg's body is lying in state . . . I'll put that in as line 16. best, d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 18:43:13 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Israel <DISRAEL@SKGF.COM> Subject: Re: cyberRenga for Ginsberg Folks, having sent out that back-to-cyberRenga post (& then reread same), realize I was amiss re: the 2 & 3 line entries -- (both for reason of form and bec. the single lines seem to work better). Ergo -- PLEASE NOTE -- here's a revised version. (ok?) best, d.i. ////////////////////////////// RENGA 1| pull my daisy, poet 2| Happening to notice the willow leaves in the garden, a braille page of words 3| the wind a simultaneous translation 4| the sorority girls sing of fucking in a plaintive way 5| nothing has happened, no one has died 6| brushed silk blouses darkening in the midday heat, dank hyacinths 7| beside a bowl of old cat's milk, Jeniffer weeps 8| the stars seemed more acute as we turned back toward the town 9| I feel really weird. Is anyone else out there crying too? 10| it's raining outside, like it's crying in my heart 11| we were all eating veggie burgers and watermelon and I thought how frail Allen looks 12| circa '67, strange chanting on TV -- I was eleven & wide-eyed 13| According to Usenet, Ginsberg's body is lying in state 14| 15| 16| 17| 18| 19| 20| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ authorial notes: 1: Daniel Zimmerman 2: Kent Johnson 3:? Daniel Zimmerman 4: Kent Johnson 5: Alan Jen Sondheim 6: Daniel Zimmerman 7: Kent Johnson 8: Aldon L. Nielsen 9: Kent Johnson 10: Maria Damon 11: Pat Pritchett 12: David R. Israel 13: Kenneth Goldsmith 14: 15: 16: 17: 18: 19: 20: ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 17:48:00 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" <pritchpa@SILVERPLUME.IIX.COM> Subject: Re: cyberRenga for Ginsberg Comments: To: David Israel <DISRAEL@SKGF.COM> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN Looks fine to me except what about Wendy Battin's line: Now since death is so pornographic where can they sell it? which I thought was the first line but wld also do fine as line 17. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 18:59:12 -0500 Reply-To: Peter Jaeger <pjaeger@bosshog.arts.uwo.ca> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Peter Jaeger <pjaeger@BOSSHOG.ARTS.UWO.CA> Subject: Allen Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <s3469dd8.001@SKGF.COM> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I write you a poem long ago already my feet are washed in death Here I am naked without identity with no more body than the fine black tracery of pen marks on soft paper as star talks to star multiple beams of sunlight all the same myriad thought in one fold of the universe where Whitman was and Blake and Shelley saw Milton dwelling in a starry temple brooding in his blindness seeing all - Now at last I can speak to you beloved brothers of an unknown moon from "POEM Rocket" in Kaddish ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 19:07:31 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Israel <DISRAEL@SKGF.COM> Subject: Re: cyberRenga for Ginsberg Comments: cc: pritchpa@silverplume.iix.com Here's, now (w/ your collective permission): proposed (VERSION #3) cyberRenga (so far) Pat Pritchett rightly notes: ~~~start~~~ 04/05/97 07:48pm >>> Looks fine to me except what about Wendy Battin's line: Now since death is so pornographic where can they sell it? which I thought was the first line but wld also do fine as line 17. ~~~end~~~ yes, good catch. (And daresay that line prob. works better than the daisy line for line 1). I'll put it in & readjust accordingly. best, d.i. p.s.: just got Peter Jaeger's quotation of lines from Ginsberg himself. Allowing (majorly) for principle of serendipity, I've added the final line from that excerpt (now line 15, see below). Okay, now I'll turn this back over to you'all. ////////////////// RENGA 1| Now since death is so pornographic where can they sell it? 2| pull my daisy, poet 3| Happening to notice the willow leaves in the garden, a braille page of words 4| the wind a simultaneous translation 5| the sorority girls sing of fucking in a plaintive way 6| nothing has happened, no one has died 7| brushed silk blouses darkening in the midday heat, dank hyacinths 8| beside a bowl of old cat's milk, Jeniffer weeps 9| the stars seemed more acute as we turned back toward the town 10| I feel really weird. Is anyone else out there crying too? 11| it's raining outside, like it's crying in my heart 12| we were all eating veggie burgers and watermelon and I thought how frail Allen looks 13| circa '67, strange chanting on TV -- I was eleven & wide-eyed 14| According to Usenet, Ginsberg's body is lying in state 15| Now at last I can speak to you beloved brothers of an unknown moon 16| 17| 18| 19| 20| 21| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ authorial notes: 1: Wndy Battin 2: Daniel Zimmerman 3: Kent Johnson 4: Daniel Zimmerman 5: Kent Johnson 6: Alan Jen Sondheim 7: Daniel Zimmerman 8: Kent Johnson 9: Aldon L. Nielsen 10: Kent Johnson 11: Maria Damon 12: Pat Pritchett 13: David R. Israel 14: Kenneth Goldsmith 15: Allen Ginsberg, *Kaddish* (via Peter Jaeger's post) 16: 17: 18: 19: 20: 21: (kindly join) ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 19:13:04 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Israel <DISRAEL@SKGF.COM> Subject: Re: cyberRenga for Ginsberg Comments: cc: pritchpa@silverplume.iix.com Erratum (typo): >authorial notes: > > 1: Wndy Battin that should be: 1: Wendy Battin -d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 19:14:38 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Grant Jenkins <Grant.M.Jenkins.14@ND.EDU> Subject: Re: cyberRenga for Ginsberg Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Perhaps a passage from Ginsberg himself would go nicely here: Strange now to think of you, gone without corsets & eyes, while I walk on the sunny pavement of Greenwich Village. downtown Manhattan, clear winter noon, and I've been up all night, talking, talking, reading Kaddish aloud, listening to Ray Charles blues shout blind on the phonograph the rhythm the rhythm--and your memory in my head three years after--And read Adonais' last triumphant stanzas aloud--wept, realizing how we suffer-- And how Death is that remedy all singers dream of, sing, remember prophesy as in the Hebrew Anthem, or the Buddhist book of answers--and my own imagination of a withered leaf--at dawn-- Dreaming back thru life, Your time--and mine accelerating toward Apocalypse, the final moment--the flower burning in the Day--and what comes after. . . --from *Kaddish* ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 18:28:54 -0600 Reply-To: jzitt@tab.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Joseph Zitt <jzitt@HUMANSYSTEMS.COM> Organization: Human Systems Subject: Re: cyberRenga for Ginsberg Comments: To: David Israel <DISRAEL@SKGF.COM> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii David Israel wrote: > > Here's, now (w/ your collective permission): > > proposed (VERSION #3) cyberRenga (so far) I've started saving the messages into a Filemaker database, and tomorrow will (with the help of Tim Wood, also of this list) be creating scripts to turn this into an evloving Web site, at a URL I'll point y'all to. The hypertext is almost required to handle the branching of the texts; besides, it's an interesting challenge:-) ---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------- |||/ Joseph Zitt ===== jzitt@humansystems.com ===== Human Systems \||| ||/ Austin, Texas! =========== SILENCE: The John Cage Mailing List \|| |/ http://www.realtime.net/~jzitt == <*> <*> == Empty Words == ecto \| ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 19:47:27 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Israel <DISRAEL@SKGF.COM> Subject: Re: cyberRenga for Ginsberg Grant Jenkins writes -- <<Perhaps a passage from Ginsberg himself would go nicely here: Strange now to think of you, gone without corsets & eyes, while I walk on the sunny pavement of Greenwich Village. . . . [quote continues . . .] --from *Kaddish* >> Grant, as you'll have noted (before you read these words), in latest update (my so-called "version #3"), a line from Kaddish *was* put in as (new) line #15. Also agree it would be fine to put in more from Ginsberg and Kaddish. Must say, as I'm "learning on the fly" here abt. cyberRenga form, I do feel it's best to always alternate poets w/ lines -- if not in some oldworld orderly way (i.e., poet a, b, c, a, b, c, etc.) at least not havving any aa's or bb's -- ergo, how about, Grant, you select a line of Ginsberg's (from your noted selection) and put it in yourself? -- hopefully by time you do that, someone will have added another line (new line 16 [or, et seq.]), so that we won't have Ginsberg *immediately* following Ginsberg . . . but yes, I'm sure there's room for many lines from him -- & in a cyberRenga, I suppose the addition of such lines depends on the poster/poets -- submit a line of your own or (in some cases) of Ginsberg's (or even others' -- in fact, to get that ball rolling, I'll put in a line from Gary Snyder right now . . .!) -- Note re: the Snyder line (from poem "High Quality Information"): this is from memory. Though it's a fave poem, not sure I recall the line aright (a word or two might be off -- so it can to be corrected later by someone with a book -- it's from North Point Press vol. *Left Out in the Rain*). Also to note: it's great that Joseph Zitt is doing the web-based hypertext on this. As for me, I expect to be getting on an airplane (to Calif.) in abt. 9 hours -- & thus prob. won't be able to check out the website (or the further renga-route) for a certain while. "om shantih" d.i. (now I return the Renga to you'all -- e.g., Grant?, or anyone else) / / / / \ \ \ \ / / / / \ \ \ \ / / / / \ \ \ \ ****************** Version #4 cyberRenga ****************** RENGA 1| Now since death is so pornographic where can they sell it? 2| pull my daisy, poet 3| Happening to notice the willow leaves in the garden, a braille page of words 4| the wind a simultaneous translation 5| the sorority girls sing of fucking in a plaintive way 6| nothing has happened, no one has died 7| brushed silk blouses darkening in the midday heat, dank hyacinths 8| beside a bowl of old cat's milk, Jeniffer weeps 9| the stars seemed more acute as we turned back toward the town 10| I feel really weird. Is anyone else out there crying too? 11| it's raining outside, like it's crying in my heart 12| we were all eating veggie burgers and watermelon and I thought how frail Allen looks 13| circa '67, strange chanting on TV -- I was eleven & wide-eyed 14| According to Usenet, Ginsberg's body is lying in state 15| Now at last I can speak to you beloved brothers of an unknown moon 16| following cracks tracing threads guessing where the road goes 17| 18| 19| 20| 21| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ authorial notes: 1: Wndy Battin 2: Daniel Zimmerman 3: Kent Johnson 4: Daniel Zimmerman 5: Kent Johnson 6: Alan Jen Sondheim 7: Daniel Zimmerman 8: Kent Johnson 9: Aldon L. Nielsen 10: Kent Johnson 11: Maria Damon 12: Pat Pritchett 13: David R. Israel 14: Kenneth Goldsmith 15: Allen Ginsberg, *Kaddish* (via Peter Jaeger's post) 16: Gary Snyder (from "High Quality Information" -- via David R. Israel's post ) 17: 18: 19: 20: 21: (kindly join) ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 16:56:39 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@EMAIL.SJSU.EDU> Subject: Re: the rhythm, the rhythm In-Reply-To: <v02130500af6ca7c8267b@[129.74.251.125]> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Don't know which Ray Charles song it was that Ginsberg was listening to -- but Charles's big hit of that day went to the rhythm and melody of: "There's a man going 'round taking names" As Charles transmuted the sacred into the erotic ("I got a woman, way across town, she's good to me") -- Ginsberg must have heard a kindred spirit pg. 144 of the journals (early 50s/60s): The Eye of Everything: to be a photo of Allen Ginsberg ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 19:59:36 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Israel <DISRAEL@SKGF.COM> Subject: Re: cyberRenga for Ginsberg Comments: cc: jzitt@tab.com Joseph-- << I've started saving the messages into a Filemaker database, and tomorrow will (with the help of Tim Wood, also of this list) be creating scripts to turn this into an evloving Web site, at a URL I'll point y'all to. The hypertext is almost required to handle the branching of the texts; besides, it's an interesting challenge:-) >> Thanks for the note. Do hope it proceeds & goes well. (I'll be heading out of town in less than 10 hours, so I might not be back with this for a some while . . . ) I guess it's mainly the fact that the renga starting happening on eve (& then in the midst) of the descent of the "news," that might lend it particular note. I can also understand the poss. reticence of some to chime in at this point. (Perhaps it'll revive, as might be felt appropriate, in course of next few days . . .) best, d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 20:24:00 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Susan Wheeler <wheeler@IS.NYU.EDU> Subject: Re: Memorial services Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Buddhist services Monday, and Jewish Tuesday. Will forward more details as they come in. Susan Wheeler >Does anyone have information on memorial and funeral services for >Allen? Gary Snyder is scheduled to be here to read this coming >Friday, and obviously the sudden news may change all that. I have >left a message for Gary, but he can be hard to get. Any information >would be greatly appreciated. > >And Charles Bernstein: thank you. > >Kent > > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 20:39:38 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Israel <DISRAEL@SKGF.COM> Subject: apology Someone pointed out to me, backchannel, the inappropriateness of my superficial dabbling with the cyberRenga, given the gravity of the circumstances & the need for due silence (a paraphrase). This corrective holds much sense. To any whom my several posts (or line-appropriations) today may have seemed unseemly or offensive, kindly accept my adject apology. yours, d.i. p.s. Susan Wheeler just now writes: >Buddhist services Monday, and Jewish Tuesday in appropriationist mode, that's seem a candidate; but "enough" (quoth Francis Brabazon) "has been far too much" ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 20:11:20 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: apology > From: Self <STUDENT/KJOHNSON> > To: David Israel <DISRAEL@SKGF.COM> > Subject: Re: apology > Date sent: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 20:03:10 +0600 > But wait: would Allen Ginsberg have wished us to be silent or to > write? Everyone in their own time and at their own speed, of course, > but David, you haven't been inappropriate or superficial. Let's not > legislate a "correct" mode of grieving or honoring here! Silence is > good and so is writing. The Dharma is capacious enough to hold both-- > as if they weren't one and the same... > > The moment is difficult and strange to be sure, but beautiful. > Allen is beautiful. > > Kent > > > > > > > Date sent: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 20:39:38 -0400 > > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > > From: David Israel <DISRAEL@SKGF.COM> > > Subject: apology > > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > Someone pointed out to me, backchannel, the inappropriateness > > of my superficial dabbling with the cyberRenga, given the gravity > > of the circumstances & the need for due silence (a paraphrase). > > This corrective holds much sense. > > > > To any whom my several posts (or line-appropriations) today may > > have seemed unseemly or offensive, kindly accept my adject > > apology. > > > > yours, > > d.i. > > > > p.s. Susan Wheeler just now writes: > > >Buddhist services Monday, and Jewish Tuesday > > > > in appropriationist mode, that's seem a candidate; but "enough" > > (quoth Francis Brabazon) "has been far too much" > > > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 19:35:37 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997) In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19970405225505.006bb174@bway.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Piping down the valleys wild >Piping songs of pleasant glee >On a cloud I saw a child.. >And he laughing said to me. etc. Charles, I am glad that you quoted that poem. I have been today and yesteday trying to call up all my Allen memories since first talking with him on his return from Asia, 1963. And you reminded me of the time I drove Allen westward thru the streets of Montreal, probably 1969, and he sat beside me and sang that song, pumping on that weird meoleon or whatever it was from India. so I veered off the street and took him and banged on F.R. Scott's door, and introduced the 2 poets, and Frank made one of his famous martinis for us, and I do believe that AG drank his, too. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 22:53:38 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: shoemakers@COFC.EDU Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg / No Apologies In-Reply-To: <l03010d05af6cc9e69d60@[142.58.124.47]> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII No need for apologies, David, as far as I can see. And there was nothing "superficial" about your "dabbling"--that's just *writing*. I think Kent's right that everyone will deal with the news in their own way, and in their own time. As it happens, I feel like writing--out of the sense expressed by others of Allen's death sudden and hard, harder even than might have been expected. I saw/heard Allen "live" on two occasions, most recently at the Orono Confernece in '93. There, thanks to Burt Hatlen's generosity, I got the chance to introduce Allen's tandem reading with Carl Rakosi. That double reading was a moving & beautiful event for me, a bridging and spanning of poetic lives & energies drawing on experience of the better part of the century (Carl 88 at the time). The other time I heard Allen read was when i was an undergrad at U of MD, College Park, ca. '83 or '84. I think Allen must have read, or rather performed, for about an hour and a half or 2 hours--reciting, chanting, singing & playing that little harmonium--or whatever it's called. As i recall, he did it all from memory, no recourse at all to the printed word, a real bard--something i have not heard/seen anyone do since. I made a tape, using a cheap little portable recorder, and just now, remarkably, i managed to dig this tape out of an old box of junk. I rewound it to the beginning of a side, which turned out to be side 2, coming in somewhere in the middle of the reading. The first words are Allen asking a question "Go on...?" asking the audience whether he shld keep going, and the crowd responding w/ rousing affirmation. (As i remember it, it was a not very large room filled to overflowing, people standing in the corners & sitting on the floors, spilling out into the halls--the tape is full of sounds of people gabbing, chatting & laughing between & sometimes during poems.) Then Allen begins talking about the death of his father from cancer, & reads 2 sections from "Don't Grow Old," and then sings/plays "Father Death Blues." My first listen-thru to this sitting at the kitchen table sent a chill up my spine, & then when i tried to play it again the tape began to self-destruct, but i did manage to transcribe Allen's intro to the poems: "1976--On the death of my father, Louis Ginsberg, who was a poet...who was a considerably gifted lyric poet...& for the 10 years before he died, at the age of 80, I gave poetry readings with him & we were relatively close. He died of cancer in 1976, in a relatively philosophic mood, without much pain. So these are a few notes & a song written during his illness & after his death. He was a high school teacher & he used to teach Wordsworth...and, uh, Poe. So I've learned a lot of poetry from him..." [reads sections 3&4 of "Don't Grow Old"] (Even on this very poor tape, his wonderfully warm, expressive, charismatic, humorous, playful voice comes over.) III. Wasted arms, feeble knees 80 years old, hair thin & white cheek bonier than I'd remembered-- head bowed on his neck, eyes opened now and then, he listened-- I read my father Wordsworth's *Intimations of Immortality* [Allen reads following quote w/ deep and comical sonority] "...trailing clouds of glory do we come from God, who is our home..." "That's beautiful," he said, "but it's not true." "When I was a boy, we had a house on Boyd Street, Newark--the backyard was a big empty lot full of bushes and tall grass, I always wondered what was behind those trees. When I grew older, I walked around the block, and found out what was back there-- it was a glue factory." [as read, father's story hits quite funny note of anticlimax, audience laughs--Allen helping them to see this humor even in death] IV. [Reads opening question w/ great, childish credulity] Will that happen to me? Of course, it'll happen to thee. Will my arms wither away? Yes yr arm hair will turn gray. Will my knees grow weak & collapse? Your knees will need crutches perhaps. Will my chest get thin? Your breasts will be hanging skin. Where will go--my teeth? You'll keep the ones beneath. What'll happen to my bones? They'll get mixed up with stones. [Goes on to play & sing "Father Death Blues"...] Steve Shoemaker Steve Shoemaker ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 00:48:50 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: SHOEMAKERS@COFC.EDU Subject: ginsdead.htm MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/html April 5, 1997 Beat Poet Laureate Ginsberg Dies NEW YORK (AP) -- Allen Ginsberg, the poet laureate of the Beat Generation whose writing and lifestyle shaped the music, politics and protests of the next 40 years, died this morning. He was 70. Ginsberg died in his Lower East Side apartment at 2:39 a.m. of a heart attack related to his terminal liver cancer, said Bill Morgan, his friend and archivist. The poet was surrounded by family and friends. Ginsberg suffered from chronic hepatitis for years, which eventually led to cirrhosis of the liver. His diagnosis of terminal liver cancer was made eight days ago and made public on Thursday. He suffered a stroke Thursday night and slipped into a coma. Ginsberg has spent several days in a hospice after the diagnosis, but then decided he wanted to return home. ``He was very energetic,'' Morgan said. ``He wore himself out (Thursday) talking to friends and writing poems.'' He wrote about a dozen short poems on Wednesday. One of the last was titled ``On Fame and Death''; others ran the gamut from nursery rhymes to politics. During the McCarthy era in the 1950s, when TV's married couples slept in separate beds, Ginsberg wrote ``Howl'' -- a profane, graphic poem that dealt with his own homosexuality and communist upbringing. ``I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked, '' began the seminal ``Howl.'' It was dedicated to Carl Solomon, a patient he met during a stay in a psychiatric ward. Ginsberg became America's most popular and recognizable poet, his balding, bearded visage one of the enduring images of the 1950s beatnik explosion of Jack Kerouac, William S. Burroughs and Neal Cassady. The group, disillusioned with conventional society, created their own subculture. Ginsberg's acolytes comprised a who's who of pop culture: Bob Dylan, Yoko Ono, Vaclav Havel, Patti Smith, Michael Stipe and Billy Corgan. Irwin Allen Ginsberg was born June 3, 1926, in Newark, N.J., the second son of poet Louis Ginsberg and his wife, Naomi. The family moved to Paterson, N.J., while Ginsberg was a youngster. Ginsberg intended to become a lawyer and enrolled at Columbia University. But while still a teen-ager, he fell in with a crowd that included Kerouac, Burroughs and Cassady -- the leaders of what became known as the Beat Generation. ``I think it was when I ran into Kerouac and Burroughs when I was 17 that I realized I was talking through an empty skull,'' Ginsberg once said. ``I wasn't thinking my own thoughts or saying my own thoughts.'' Ginsberg's first taste of notoriety came after the publication of ``Howl'' in 1956. Copies of the book were seized by San Francisco police and U.S. Customs officials, and publisher Lawrence Ferlinghetti was charged with publishing an obscene book. Ferlinghetti was acquitted a year later, but the case generated enormous publicity for Ginsberg and his work. Ginsberg was suddenly in demand. One of his other great works, ``Kaddish,'' was a confessional work dealing with his mother's life and death in a mental hospital. It was written, stream of consciousness-style, in his Manhattan apartment, fueled by a combination of amphetamines and morphine. Ginsberg experimented heavily with drugs, taking LSD under the guidance of the late Timothy Leary in the 1960s. As he grew older, Ginsberg became a guru to the counterculture movement. He coined the term ``flower power.'' He was arrested in 1967 for protesting against the Vietnam War in New York, and tear-gassed a year later while protesting at the Democratic convention in Chicago. His National Book Award came in 1973 for ``The Fall of America: Poems of These States, 1965-1971.'' He was a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize in poetry in 1995 for his book, ``Cosmopolitan Greetings: Poems 1986-1992.'' Ginsberg toured with Dylan's Rolling Thunder Revue in 1977, doing spontaneously composed blues poems. He toured Eastern Europe in 1986, receiving an award in the former Yugoslavia, recording with a Hungarian rock band and meeting a congress of young Polish poets. ``In the Eastern bloc, the people realize the governments are up to no good, whereas Americans still maintain that the government is looking after their best interest,'' Ginsberg said at the time. Ginsberg remained vital and active well into his 60s, performing in Manhattan nightclubs and doing poetry readings. Last year, he recorded his poem ``The Ballad of the Skeletons'' with musical backing from Paul McCartney and Philip Glass. He did a video version of the poem, a pre-election political rant. At 69, Ginsberg's video appeared in heavy rotation on MTV's ``Buzz Bin.'' The funeral will be private. In lieu of flowers, donations should be sent to Jewel Heart Buddhist Center in Ann Arbor, Mich. Back to the Archives ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 00:52:49 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM Subject: Allen Ginsberg's Death Tonight at War Resister's Benefit, Grace Paley tells wonderful AG tale, as does David McReynolds, a story of AG at Gem spa, walking out w/ Sunday (appropriately) Times, into a sidewalk junky drama, defused with the offer of a fig newton... Kimiko Hahn reads "tomb" section of Moloch/Howl... David Henderson reads Bob Kaufman's "To Ginsberg Allen" from SOLITUDES CROWDED... I read "Nazi Capish" (from new Longshot), new verses "Amazing Grace," "After Lelon," "Ballad of the Skeletons," and as benediction (we were gathered at Washington Square Church), "America" end, starting with "America you don't really want to go to war." It was a great place to be tonight. WRL is 75 years old next year. All day swamped with grief I just sit, all day swamped with grief. Allen, the great orchestrator, has outdone himself with his passing. BobH ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 14:23:04 +0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Schuchat Simon <schuchat@MAIL.AIT.ORG.TW> Subject: Allen dead MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Summer 1975, I've just moved to New York, with roommate Steve Hamilton go to call on Allen since we're living in the poetry fortress, 437 E. 12th Street, where Allen also lives; we sit in the kitchen and, among a variety of topics, Allen tells us, "you can never experience your own death" what an awful feeling now, so strange to think of him gone ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 23:42:17 -0800 Reply-To: nico vassilakis <subrosa@speakeasy.org> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: nico vassilakis <subrosa@SPEAKEASY.ORG> Subject: eternity queueing MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII o i'd l ike t o to t h r r e o w w o a l f from here goodbye allen ginsberg goodbye paterson and so many things hello everything hello ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 04:36:41 -0500 Reply-To: jzitt@tab.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Joseph Zitt <jzitt@HUMANSYSTEMS.COM> Organization: Human Systems Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg's Death MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Nuyopoman@AOL.COM wrote: > Tonight at War Resister's Benefit, Grace Paley tells wonderful AG tale, All of yesterday and today at the Austin International Poetry Festival, people have been performing pieces for and about Ginsberg (Friday in honor, Saturday in memory). I heard about a wonderful event that erupted at one venue, where various parts of the audience got into chanting sections of his name while other recited bits of his poetry. My group will be performing "Hum Bom" tomorrow night -- we had been thinking of retiring that piece, but it seems appropriate to do it one more time. -- ---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------- |||/ Joseph Zitt ===== jzitt@humansystems.com ===== Human Systems \||| ||/ Austin, Texas! =========== SILENCE: The John Cage Mailing List \|| |/ http://www.realtime.net/~jzitt == <*> <*> == Empty Words == ecto \| ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 09:41:57 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <s346af8a.001@SKGF.COM> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" first time i met ginsberg 1977 he told me how great peter was in bed and quoted the tempest to me. (he was making chicken soup with grapes; i sd, that looks pretty potent, he sd, this so potent magic i do abjure, what's that from. i sd tempest, he sd any student of the tempest is a friend of mine, and are u related to s foster damon. no, i sd, it used to be diamond, i'm half jewish. why only half he sd.) later that summer i spent a few minutes in bed w/ him before i bailed. the last time i saw ginsberg 1996 was at St Marks do for Bob Kaufman. we both presented stuff along w/ many others. (i'd had many encounters w/ him in between, and often he seemed petulant and distracted as i was awkward around him and not of the right gender for commanding his attention. one time i wove him a white silk opera scarf. when i gave it to him he sd what's an opera scarf, i sd it's what they all wear in proust novels, so he seemed happy with it or at least gracious about accepting it.) so, last time i saw ginsberg about a year ago after the kaufman evening's ceremonies i pulled him aside and said, allen i want to tell you something i think you would understand. when i saw bob kaufman's ashes i put some of them in my mouth. he said, yes, that's a very common understandable impulse, eating the ashes of the dead. he was nice, tender as he'd been all evening when recounting tales of kaufman, not petulant and distracted but patient and kind, i thought, he knows he's going to die soon, that' why he's being so nice. then ira cohen? or someone? snapped a photo of us that i would love to have. just last week i was at the ginsberg archives at stanford looking for kaufman stuff, and found some. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 12:32:23 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Loss Glazier <lolpoet@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Subject: Ginsberg Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dear Poetics: We are working on an EPC Ginsberg page related to these posts. (We'll have a link there to the cyber renga page, when I get the URL for that.) Short pieces posted to Poetics will be considered for the tribute compilation; you do not need to send a duplicate of posts to me. If anyone has longer pieces, poems, essays, etc. they'd like to have on the Ginsberg page, please let me know at glazier@acsu.buffalo.edu Also, we're in great need of photos! Please contact me if you have any photos we can borrow for this tribute. More news on this but NOT until week after next. Thanks, Loss ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 12:55:41 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Joel Kuszai <kuszai@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Subject: Re: Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19970406163223.008ef9ec@pop.acsu.buffalo.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII in the interest of salvaging the memory of lesser-known poets, here's goes something that I have been thinking about posting for some time-- I met Chris Ide [1966-1994] when we were first year students at Michigan State University. After departing our first class, Barry Gross' freshman english major required "Intro to the Study of Lit," we went immediately to a coffeeshop where we had a cup of coffee (my first, although it seems hard to imagine now) and discussed poetry, punk rock, and god knows what else. We became instant best- friends and spent a lot of time together reading, writing, talking talking talking and also as young boys are wont to do, drinking and expressing the adolescent ennui of that time in life. We shared a common background in high school introductions to poetry and it was, as has been discussed on this list, the role of the normative-making english teacher who, as if in some sly signal to a radical past, taught Ginsberg's poetry as if it were a forbidden text that was only to be given to truants, drifting creative types, etc. Much of the ginsberg/beat nexus materials existed in my high school library, although often edited through torn-out pages. We found--at a hipster bookstore that was one of the original Borders client stores--everything that we needed. Although I first read him in high school, Chris Ide was my introduction to Ginsberg, whom I was fortunate to have had the opportunity to speak with on a number of occasions. We had a number of interactions that were often quite humourous. I once wrote him an angry letter complaining that his tour through Portland in 1990 was too expensive for a poet to attend (it was $15) and that he was becoming a rockstar/media celebrity and was out of touch with young poets. I was astonished with one of my housemates handed me the phone a week later, saying "it's Allen Ginsberg." He was calling to apologize and offered me free tickets to the reading! In Boulder, 1991, I cornered him at one point asked him why he didn't appreciate Oppen's poetry, at which time he told me that he knew and liked George, but that he never understood his poetry. This blindness, on Allen's part--his inability to read beyond a certain canonical set of texts (I have a copy of an anthology he prepared for a summer session, "Photographic Poetics" in which cubo-futurists and other kinds of European avant-garde works are included but American experimentalists are mostly absent, for obvious reasons, such as his Steiglitz influenced notion of photography)--this limitation is really the great problem with people, like my friend Chris Ide, who become swept up in the greatness of the man and the greatness of the great man theory of literature. While as a poet I think I have learned a great deal from Allen Ginsberg, I have also been led to things that he would never have approved of--and Oppen and Zukofsky are examples of this, or the Creeley of the 70s--etc. This rejection of Allen was an essential part of my growth. [and you can get all crazy about that anxiety game, blah blah blah] My friend Chris really found a friend in these limited ideas of what a poet was or what a poem should be or look like. Also, for Chris, the lifestyle promised in the pages of Keroac's novels or in some of the surrounding mythologies was dionysian and ecstatic harmony with love and the muse, in which people are always young and their bodies as crisp as the teenager who sleeps for hours as if to rest for the inevitably of an eternity. Chris found himself at age 18 attracted to boys of that age and younger and as he got older this became "an impossible love," which as in the Williams poem, "which has no hope of the world and cannot change the world to its delight" (I think it is the poem "Rain"?). Lately, through reading Paul Goodman's writing, I've been returned to these dilemmas of impossible love which terrorized Chris. When Chris died in 1994, he was in recovery from years of methadone treatment for his addiction to heroin. Even while on methadone, he relapsed several times. He had been clean and relapsed. Going immediately to a hospitcal in Chicago, where he was living, he was treated and released. Scheduled for a trip to a rehab center outside of the city the next morning, by agreement he went back to his room in a kind of home for recovering addicts. On the way, he gave in and stopped in Wicker Park to buy a bag, which he snorted when he got back to his room. He had stumbled onto some "bad stuff" that hit the city at that time, killing a dozen or so people within a week. A friend, came to get him in the morning, to go to the clinic. When he didn't respond, his friend (who happened to be African American) asked the person at the door to let him into Chris' room to see what was the matter, alerting the doorperson as to the emergency. He was told (in effect) that because he was African American he wouldn't be admitted to check and see. When family finally intervened and he in his room was found, it was too late. The coroner reported that Chris spent many hours in a coma before passing and that in the morning when his friend to get him, he was probably still alive. Until yesterday, I held Allen responsible for Chris' death. I could go into this in some detail, and it involves Ginsberg sending Chris money at inopportune times, etc. With Allen being gone, I felt that a bit of Chris was even further from earth than when he left. Ginsberg was a champion of his work, which remains unpublished (although underground beat zines have published a few and I think that Lee Renaldo's magazine was going to). I felt and still feel enormous guilt about Chris Ide's death myself. He saw me as entirely academic, I think, and he completely misunderstood the passion required to keep it together in grad school. I don't think he really ever understood why I felt I needed to deal with school seriously, and he never really appreciated the kinds of texts I produced, although I know that he appreciated and loved me. The poems he wrote are of interest to me in a way that I can't really describe. What follows are the first letters that Chris wrote to Ginsberg in the Fall of 1985 and a couple from the Winter and Spring of 1986. They are photocopies that Peter Orlovsky sent to Chris' sister, and I have them on loan from her. The originals would probably be at Stanford. If anyone is interested, I will send more back-channel, as they are a real social document. There are letters and postcards through Spring of 1993. --------------------------------------------------- CHRIS IDE 557 [street address] E. Lansing, MICH 10/31 [1985] 48823 Allen, I'm drunk, have just read the Kaddish and cried. I'm not at home, found it in someone's bedroom, and after reading I just had to write. I always cry when I get to the part of you being 12 yrs old. I'm in love with that Allen Ginsberg, the one that followed R-- to college. I wish I would've known you when 12. Could've had love then. Now 18, loveless, lonely, are you? Did you get last letter? Please write me back sometime, Allen, I would be touched. God, I'm getting drunker, refuse to change paragraphs. This letter probably pathetic, but I'm going to send it anyway tomorrow. Allen I just read "Many Loves" today for first time and was deeply affected close to tears in the desensitized library. I think I love you Allen, don't know how, please don't file me away as another young poet scribbling bullshit kiss ass note to you; there's more, sweet Allen. Yes, I hve just read letters between you & Neal, finished today, depressed, I lay on couch all day thinking of you. I must talk to you, for real, someday. Do you remember talking to me in Ann Arbor after your reading? Talk of dreams of you & of love strangers. Anyway, I'll mail this drunken note tomorrow to you c/o Naropa and I beg that you might write back. Oh god, I am so lonely and sad, in love with the young Allen Ginsberg whose picture from, say, Jack's book, or young Empty Mirror photo I long for. Oh same older wiser but just as Sweet Allen please write to this weak sad young admirer lover poet, I wait. Love, Chris Ide ------------------------------------------------------ 1/23/86 11:59pm Allen-- Maybe you're in Nicaragua now, but I thought i'd take the time to send these poems off to you. Particularly the one that begins with a quote of yous (hope you don't mind). This poem attempts to explain the debt I owe you; how much you've affected my life so unknowningly, maybe just by trying to live yous. Anyway, if i'm ever able to express that debt to you, through my poems, then all of the futile scribling will have been worth it I spose. Anyway, hope to see you before "time," before that "final spontaneous leap." Write if you have a chance. another thanx, -- Chris Ide [1] ------------------------------------------------------ 2/14 1:46pm Allen, Happy valentines day! May the ghost of Rimbaud come kiss you sweetly. Can't tank you enough for sending poems to David Cope-- he liked 'em, wrote back + is printing "cuz I don't know." You don't know how encouraging that is to me. My biggest problem is that I don't hae anyone here whose aesthetics I'm in total agreement with. I have a class w/ Diane Wakoski, who I owe a good deal + trust to an extent -- but she's an admitted Apollonian + is quite critical of mentioning the actual composition of a poem, inside the poem. I've been doing this constantly, and probably always will to some extent--dunno if I can help it, or if I should try to. Seems to me if a poem is merely a hunk of a day, it'll pint a finger at the eternal w/o even trying. Revision is cheap, but revision of the Truth is downright *sleazy*! Sometimes I re-weave things and even though it might make for a better poem, I never feel as good about it. It just that typical ... [words unreadable, end of page]. I dunno-- I just want someone to point a finger + say "You are a poet!" so I can settle down a bit. Enclosed a couple more poems for you to glance at. Sent more to Cope also. A couple of them I am fairly happy with, but it always seems to me that there's a whole side of of me that doesn't come through i.e. the side that is miserable + falls in love with beautiful unobtainable boys--no otther sorrow like that! Hope you are well in the east-- Chris ------------------------------------------------------ 4/16/86 Chris Ide [address] E. Lansing, MICH Allen, This another drunk note, but no regrets this time-- whatever's said is meant. No answer to my last letter ('round valentine's day)--I know, you're busy, but if possible would you send at least a postcard answering this? Appreciate much your giving me Cope's address & mailing my poems to him--have written quite a few times w/ him + am visiting him this weekend--a great poet & a great guy! I was supposed to be goign to Paris in August, but international travel is looking worse & worse, as is most everything politically, and i'm thinking more & more of Naropa Summer session. Am writing to them for $ info. but Cope says I may want to just stay w/whoever I can in Boulder and pick up on the scene as it happens--what do you think? This sounds fine to me, but i'd like to be able to pick up on whatever you're offering--what're you teaching/lecturing on & would I be able to sit in on things if not enrolled in session? Basically what i'm asking is will I be able to see & spend time w/ you--should I enroll or just be in Boulder, etc. -- whadda you think as you're the main reason i'd attend? Here are a cople more poems, please anser if you've time-- Chris Ide [2] ------------------------------------------------------ 5/7/86 10:30 am Allen, Thanks for the kind words on the poems I sent-- encouraging to hear! Here are a couple more--don't bother making specific comments on each when you're exhausted/busy etc., I just like for you to be able to read 'em. As far as sending stuff to NYZ & Paris Review & telling them you suggested to--I haven't done so yet, only because I thought it'd sound like a fishy brag or something-- I mean, I think it's fine for a knowledgeable poet to suggest the work of a youngster, but when the youngster's the one to relay the message, I dunno, I can just see editors sniveling at it. Maybe i'm just being stupid, in which case tell me & i'll go ahead & seend the poems + suggestion out. As far as NYQ--i've been rejected twice by them & D. Cope said in his last letter that he was going to try them for me (after he'd just succeeded in getting a couple more things in print for me: _Action_ (you know Jim Cohn, right?) took 2 poems. Just let me know what I should do about sending that stuff out. I'll get together a batch of poems like you said, & will bring 'em to Boulder this summer--the plan now is to attend 1st week of classes, then stay a week or so w/ friends- -(maybe even arrive a week before classes start)--I'll bring the poems & you can see what you think we can do w/ 'em. When do *you* arrive & how do I get in touch w/ you? Well, all right for now--here's another pic (I hope)--let me know what to do on sending stuf out etc.--Chris You off cigareets yet? I've been slowing way down on drinking, "the old screwy love,"--when's _White Shroud_ coming out? ------------------------------------------------------ [1] this letter contained poems, including: "I need a bed to sleep in, a grave to rest my ashes," sings Allen Ginsberg, American Poetry Review December '85 58 years old now, our Whitman he too will leave behind the earth madly spinning will take that final spontaneous leap, to where Jack Kerouac lies down eith the jazz/blues of the earth will leave behind those of us whose throats are sore from tying to find our voices. Meanwhile, "Howl" is required reading in English 453 and we discuss the "beat generation" as if it were some sort of baseball game "Did Ginsberg get a hi? Kerouac slide into home?" In the classroom we liten to a cassette of Ginsberg reading "Howl" no one runs around the room in tears nothing but blank faces behind desks so that i'm almost embarrassed until the ghost of Jack Kerouac appears rolling around the front of the room with a pint of rotgut, laughing. "I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed" by fear of nuclear devastation tongues drenched with surrealist budwiser escapism guts all aflame with the six o'clock news whose poetry reviews seeped flowery academia-- who'll wear Rimbaud's pants? All of you grad school poets clutching unpublished manuscripts let's drop out of the New Yorker world series and sing in the romantic unpublished streets. 1/23/86 --------------------------------------------------- [2] this letter also contained poems, including: What will *you* do with the rest of my life? I confess that I haven't the urge to work with hand or foot in order to prove myself to the planet or bank. Isn't it enough that I vow to beat my chest & yell for love, an humanity, and all of these four letter words? It's true my hands are lazy--my heart is not; I believe that the tree is there to lie beneath; notice the way the fruit falls without a single plucking finger? Flat on my back, that'll do, let the heart slave over the problems of the sky; the stars are arithmetic enough for me. But no, each time the grass accomodates me I wake to the hounds of reality sniffing at my anus. "I don't see any want ads for poes, do you wanna be a dishwasher all your life? Dishwasher/poet, it's not so bad a title, a drifter, the parents'll say. But don't they see that they too drift towards that place where no dishes are washed? The whole planet adrift in fact-- what a creaky futile barge it becomes with Reagan clutching silo shaped oars and you, you have the nerve to ask "What will you do with the rest of your life?" I was about to ask you the very same question. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 13:25:40 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Andrew D Epstein <ade3@COLUMBIA.EDU> Subject: Re: Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <Pine.GSO.3.95.970406125402.1459C-100000@autarch.acsu.buffalo.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII From Ginsberg's elegy for Frank O'Hara: I want to be there in your garden party in the clouds all of us naked strumming our harps and reading each other new poetry in the boring celestial Friendship Committee Museum. You're in a bad mood? Take an aspirin. In the dumps? I'm falling asleep safe in your thoughtful arms. "City Midnight Junk Strains" ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 14:03:25 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> Subject: for AG MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | ^\sunflower stem to heaven ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 15:54:30 EST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Burt Kimmelman -@NJIT" <kimmelman@ADMIN.NJIT.EDU> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg's Death Bob Holman's remark that Ginsberg was the great orchestrator quintessentially describes my favorite memory of AG. I think it was 1966. I was home from college and hanging out in Washington Square Park in NYC. All of a sudden some people started cheering and otherwise celebrating, shouting that "The War Is Over." People around the park took up the mantra; very soon hundreds of us, with Ginsberg and Corso in the lead, starting marching up Fifth Avenue. As we exited the park, cheering continuously "The War Is Over," people of all kinds, dressed all ways, and of all ages joined us. I remember seeing two middle aged guys greeting each other on the edge of this crazy parade, shaking hands and joining up as they were laughing out loud, obviously enjoying the wonderful pranksterish seriousness of the spontaneous occasion, saying to each other in unison, "Hey the war is over!" By the time we were approaching 14th Street we were at least a thousand strong. The police, for whatever reason, did not try to stop us. We kept on, with these two zany poets in the lead, until we got to 42nd Street, now in the multiple thousands. There, like two possessed visionary field marshalls, the two, conferring at the tops of their lungs, decided to split up, the one leading those who would follow to the United Nations, as a final destination, the other, Allen, to Times Square. I followed him. It was a rainy day, kind of gray, but it was a day of wildly unfounded, Surreal optimism. It was a moment of genius, flamboyance, and lyricism. It now sums up his poetry for me. As Charles B has said, how can one imagine life without Allen? I always found him incredibly generous. He (and that day Corso) was a role model. I remember talking with him some decades later at a poetry function at the MOMA. Our paths had crossed numerous times, but he was someone who met so many people in so many places, for so long. If he would recognize me he didn't go out of his way to show it. Yet over wine and cheese we talked at length that night about various things. He was someone who, it struck me after that night, never wasted a moment of life. He was incredibly smart and interested in EVERYTHING. And he was incredibly gentle. I could go on. I last spoke with him some few years ago at the Orono conference already mentioned here on this list. I came up to him to ask him for some work for Poetry New York. I allowed as how I might be bugging him, but he was quick to point out that, no, as an honored guest, that was his job, to hear me and others like me out. He understood who he was. It was I who was still trying to comprehend the meaning of him. Yes he has been part of the fabric of my life. Who will ever read and sing Blake for us again? Burt Kimmelman ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 16:51:48 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: SSchu30844@AOL.COM Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg's Death I met Ginsberg briefly in an airport van at the end of the Orono poetry conference; we were wedged up against each other, hardly a space in which to breathe. He asked what I'd been speaking on and when I said that I'd given a talk on Hart Crane he said how much he loved Crane's work. Then, that he had his Naropa students read "Atlantis" out loud because the movements of the mouth while reading that poem were so like those of cock-sucking. I've never quite known how to take that remark, though I choose to think of it as representing the words of a man for whom nothing was shameful. He had been a very generous presence at the conference, seemingly in attendance everywhere. Susan ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 17:19:47 -0400 Reply-To: Steven Marks <swmar@conncoll.edu> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Steven Marks <swmar@CONNCOLL.EDU> Subject: Re: Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.95L.970406132304.10376B-100000@aloha.cc.columbia.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Howl, howl, howl! I know when one's dead and when one lives. Pray you undo this button on my fly I heard buzz when I died. Thank you, sir. Steven Marks ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 15:18:25 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Don Cheney <doncheney@GEOCITIES.COM> Subject: First Typo, Best Typo In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19970406163223.008ef9ec@pop.acsu.buffalo.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Today's Sunday LA Times has a wonderful typo. They printed excerpts from several poems including this from "America": I have mystical visions and comic vibrations. Told you he was a funny guy. Don ======================== Visit Don Cheney's Home Page & Clean Neck Shop http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5791 ============================================== ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 15:56:59 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Marjorie Perloff <perloff@LELAND.STANFORD.EDU> Subject: Re: Allen's death In-Reply-To: <199704060502.VAA20702@leland.Stanford.EDU> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII A number of listmembers--Joe Amato, Norman Finkelstein, Cole Swensen, and I were in the middle of a conference in Denver--a conference on relation of poetry to theory--when the news came in that Allen had died. It was truly heart-breaking. I thought immediately of the wonderful way Allen read the lines "To die in Denver...." from "Howl" and of the last time I saw Allen, which was appropriately in a California Supermarket--Gelson's in Pacific Palisades. I was approaching the deli and there was Allen with Stan Grinstein, the art patron, with whom Allen was staying for the Burroughs festival. We were happy to see each other and wandered around the gorgeous store and when we got to the bakery Allen said, "Marjorie, don't tell anyone you saw me in this FANCY grocery store!" But he was half-kidding. It was shortly before his 70th birthday and he was in good spirits and was having dinner with Dennis Hopper. It's a nice memory of someone I always found totally endearing--the way he CARED about his work, your work--everything that was happening... Marjorie P. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 19:02:26 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: henry g <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU> Subject: my Ginsberg story Unlike these other storytellers, I never met Allen Ginsberg, though my (ex) father-in-law John Tagliabue was at Columbia with him & is a sort of Italian-American Maine Shelleyan straight academic double - both of them from north Jersey (Tagliabue's dad was a chauffeur & restaurant owner from Cantu, near lake Como - he himself was born there) & some similarities in their approach to poetry (exuberant, against revision & wasp-anglo refinement, & WHITMAN & China & buddhism) in fact John Tagliabue is another of those poets out there. anyway, this was early 1970s, I was hitchiking around in a sort of private-early-Xtian-gnostic daze, having dropped out of college... was in SF., had just had my guitar stolen & the back of my head bashed in by a huge enormous fat Hells'Angel at the stage door of a Dead concert, where I had gone with my old high school buddies TOM DAVIS & AL FRANKEN of soon-to-be SNL fame... anyway, I was somewhere in SF & met this young Ginsberg protege who had just come out there from NY, he was dressed in a buddist toga type thin g & sandals & carrying a sheaf of poems... told me he loved Ginsberg & followed him around (I thought...poor Ginsberg) & he was heading up to the bookstore, so I tagged along... we got to City Lights, which was closed & he started calling out in this pitiful tone, "Allen...Allen...Allen..." up to the 2nd floo r window - no response. After some time I said to him, hey, why don't you just take these poems and make paper airplanes & THROW them into that window. So we did. & we were able to land some right through the 2nd floor window. My compadre kept moaning out, "Allen...Allen..." & finally 2 heads popped out the window - Ginsberg & Ferlinghetti. They looked at us & smiled for about a minute, didn't say anything - then went back inside. My ever-hopeful poet-pal resumed his mournful calling... so I bid him farewell & headed on my way. What else happened in SF? I played guitar at a healthfood restaurant & made a few bucks. A guy in a very large pink cadillac convertible offered to show me around town, & he did show me Columbus Park at sunset which was lovely...but he was trying to make me while I tried to convert him to my version of Xtianity, so we bid each other farewell... next day I hitched out toward Salt Lake City - that was my 1st & last visit to the beautiful city of SF where I spoke with Jerry Garcia, had my head bashed by a NY Hells Angel, goofed around with the head honchos of the HA Rotary clubs (it was a national convention they were having there at the Dead concert), met a Ginsberg acolyte, met a denizen of that fair city, played my other guitar, & caught a glimpse of Allen Ginsberg. Some of us inhabit the interstices between the road & the roar there's St. Francis on the roof with three sparrows & Martin Luther King (29 yrs before) black milk we drink you today, tomorrow we'll be singing again we'll be singing again we'll be singing again breathe deep it's the whale, it's the trumpets in the sky ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 20:50:13 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Michael Magee <mmagee@DEPT.ENGLISH.UPENN.EDU> Subject: Re: Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <l03020903003d1cf01673@[160.94.60.140]> from "Maria Damon" at Apr 6, 97 09:41:57 am MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I thought it might be nice to hear something about Ginsberg from a younger/new list member, so, here goes: I met Ginsberg I guess about two years ago now when he came to read "Kaddish" at Penn, for the first time in awhile as I understand it. By a mix-up which left him without someone to drive him to Penn Towers and his hotel room, I got a chance to meet him. Bob Perelman and I took him to the hotel and Bob had a class to get to so I walked him up. His heart condition kept him from carrying his own bags and I think Bob thought he might drop dead. There had been some talk about whether he'd even be able to read that day. At the hotel counter he asked for two keys, then held one up at me and said jokingly, "For some lucky boy later." It didn't seem directed towards me or, really, anyone - a kind of nod towards days gone by or a playful attempt to agitate the guy at the counter. He seemed, despite the gesture towards his sexual gamesmenship, a gentle old man. He was very kind, asked me whether I was a poet, what kinds of poems I was writing, who I liked, what my academic work was about, etc, all with a sense of genuine interest, it seemed to me. In the elevator we got into a conversation about Lowell. He told the story of how Lowell came to hear him read "Kaddish" at Harvard (1958, '59?). A third of the way through the reading Lowell got up and left - Ginsberg assumed it was a snub and felt bad about it for years, until 1976 when he decided to ask him about it. They were reading at the 92nd St. Y and Ginsberg asked Lowell why he'd walked out. Lowell said he had been sitting in between several Harvard bigwigs who he knew and had started to cry uncontrollably. Embarrassed, he got up quickly and left. Ginsberg then said he always liked Lowell which surprised me for a moment, thinking of battles between camps, etc, but just as quickly made alot a sense, since it didn't seem just then like this guy standing with me in the elevator could dislike anyone. I brought his bags into his room. He seemed tired and said he better get some rest. I thought of having him sign my Collected Poems which I had in a backpack, but didn't. I had a weird, morbid feeling that I might be the last person to see him alive. Later he read "Kaddish" very beautifully. No idea whether this will sound familiar to anyone but, great poet and poetry aside, I've had a lasting affection for the guy ever since. -Mike Magee ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 20:52:17 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Poetics List <poetics@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Subject: Forwarded mail....Re: Ginsberg MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII sent by mistake to poetics listowner address... ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 06:58:03 -0700 (PDT) From: Jamie Reid <dadababy@jumppoint.com> To: poetics@acsu.buffalo.edu Allen Ginsberg, our great poet and teacher, this saint and holy madman, has died. I first heard of his illness last week without hearing any details, and thought, oh, he will still be with us for years yet. Then George Stanley told me last night that he had been diagnosed with incurable cancer. Together we discussed the need for Vancouver poets to come together and write to him in his extremity expressing our undying gratitude and appreciation for his great life. This afternoon, I spoke to George Bowering on the telephone to begin this process, and George told me Allen had died during the night, and now it is too late. He had been scheduled to read in our city on the very night that he died, but the engagement was cancelled because of his illness, and now we will never see him in the flesh again. He had not visited in our city for many years, and all of us, including a whole new generation of young people who remain interested in his work and vision were looking forward to seeing and hearing him again. The last time I saw him in the flesh and talked to him was in 1963 at the poets' conference here. My wife and I and some friends took Allen on the Grouse Mountain chairlift for an outing. I the day as one of the most beautiful of many beautiful days that summer. Allen carried with him a set of thumb cymbals, which he beat together prayerfully as the chairlift slowly ascended the mountain, delivering us an exalted view of the ocean and the city. I am not at all religious, but Allen was able to inspire in me a sense of the tremendous beauty of the world and the cosmos, and of human beings which has never left me. I don't often speak of the soul, it's something that I barely understand, but the human soul and its universal quality of love was always the substance of Allen's discourse, so I am free to do so today, and I have Allen to thank for this freedom. The silvery, insistent sound of Allen's cymbals echoed off the tops of the mountains. The top of my head seemed to open and become part of the sky. The thundering power of Hare, of Rama, of Krishna, gods I still do not know, seemed imminent, seemed present. Yet the day remained a perfectly ordinary day, and all of us were here on earth, plain beings of human flesh. The night before at a party at my place, saying he liked the way he danced , he had propositioned my friend Dallas Selman, who was accompanying us that morning. But Dallas, who was not gay, put him off by lying, telling him that his wife wouldn't like it if he went with Allen. In the morning, as we set out to drive up the mountain, Allen asked Dallas about his wife, and, stupid me, big mouth, blurted out, "What wife?' There was plenty of silliness and laughter surrounding Allen Ginsberg, but he was serious, and critical, too. I remember he made harsh fun of me later for my "hip" affectations, because that was his way of love. His aim both in his poetry and his life was to shock and to awaken, and he was so momentously successful at his work. The last time I saw him was in Montreal in 1975. Thousands, (literally thousands!) of Quebecois young people came to see him and William Burroughs there, and listened with close attention, even though many of them spoke only French, and they were awakened as they had expected to be, because Allen never stinted in his the speaking of his truth. He came to Vancouver again about 1990, when he gave a reading with Gregory Corso and Michael McClure, I think. But I was living elsewhere and wasn't able to attend. Gregg Simpson, an artist friend who is also a musician and lives close by to me, often speaks with great pride about working as the percussionist in the band that opened the reading. There are many people in Vancouver whose lives have been touched by his presence in ways they will never forget. In the near days to come all of us will be talking together about Allen and remembering what he gave to us from the unparalleled generosity of his American soul, from his grand passion. There are not many poets and poems of which it can be said that they have changed the direction of human life. Leaves of Grass is certainly one such poem, and Allen Ginsberg, through the stewardship of his beloved William Carlos Williams, is the direct inheritor of that wonderful fearless American public democratic voice. The opening lines of HOWL, that holy poem, cannot be erased from the consciousness of North America or the world. From the moment that I first read HOWL, my life was changed forever, and the same is true of almost all my contemporaries and friends. This sexy apocalyptical rant was the clearest and steadiest voice of the visions of a generation.There was a time when I could recite the poem completely off by heart like the Bible itself. Mad as Ginsberg sometimes like to act, had a scholar's knowledge of so many things, of the Jewish rabbinical tradition, of Buddhism, classical and Zen, of Hindu visions, and of Tantric meditations. He was instrumental in awakening an entire generation of America to the fact that there were other powerful forms of knowledge that could enrich the American pragmatic and scientific consciousness and expand the possibilities of human life. From this mix, Ginsberg concocted a stew both flavourful and spicy. And full of a delightful laughter. He never went passive in the world, he was always striving to make an effect, to wring some changes, and even when at his most clown-like, playing, the fool, beneath it and under it all was a deep and important human dignity which commanded respect, but especially love. Official America laughs and makes a joke of this holy fool, but he, in his person and in his work, represents the new soul of the New America which is still being born. For many years he mainly disappeared from the public media, but recently I have seen on television a wonderful documentary about the life and work of William Carlos Williams, in which Allen gives a wise and beautiful analysis and summation of the contradictions within the American society and psyche which were expressed by Allen's great teacher, the hope and the desire for a richer and more humane human life, thwarted by the blindness of official morals and society in America-- "The pure products of America/go crazy." "I have seen the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness." With these and the lines that followed, Ginsberg fashioned a call and a program for a kind of mental and social insurrection which is still going on in America, and there is no going back. Once said, this cannot be cancelled, and the message will be heard by this generation, and the next generation, and the next. Allen cannot die. He has already joined the Immortals. Then again, during the Gulf War, Allen Ginsberg appeared on television, the only one among thousands of Americans who gave their views during those horrifying traumatic months, to speak unequivocally and clearly in the voice of an Old Testament prophet, with the learning of a rabbi, and the deep understanding of the American democratic political tradition, condemning the holocaust visited on the Iraqi people by the merciless bombs of American military power, so unjustifiably, so contrary to the purest ideals of American democracy. It was the speech of a hero, an act of the purest human courage and made me proud that I had once stood in the living presence of this wonderful American human being. That one speech erased forever my skeptical doubts about the power of the truth that Allen Ginsberg carried in his soul and daily spoke, the mightiness of that "queer shoulder" he vowed so many years ago to put to the wheel in hiis poem called "America," tough, unbending speaker of human love that he was. These two television programs and anything else that he has done, should be made available to the world as we think back upon the life of this great poet and the profound knowledge he has given us of America and its soul. It was through Allen Ginsberg and his friends that I came to know so many things I would otherwise have never known. Today, I know I am together with poets in my own country and in the United States, England, The Czech Republic, Slovakia, Russia, Cuba, India, Mexico, Japan--all the places in the world that his monumental love has touched. Allen was instrumental in bringing to the consciousness of ignorant North Americans, the beauty and wisdom of the religious texts of the East, including the Tibetan Book of the Dead. Now Allen is receiving the emanations of all our love assisting his soul in its passage to that other world. Dearest, beloved Allen, I am not alone in loving you: there are thousands world wide who are thinking about you today with love and gratitude. People everywhere are sending you their blessings as you pass into the spirit. All of our shoulders are still at the wheel, still at the work which you showed us must be done, and how to do it, given the example of your own magnificent courage and devotion, the splendour of your awakened human vision. Jamie Reid ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 20:00:33 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Bromige <dcmb@METRO.NET> Subject: Jamie Reid's eulogy for A.G. Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I will backchannel to Jamie my appreciation also, but I want to thank him on the list for his splendid eulogy forwarded to us today. Reading it, I thought of all that AG survived in order to flesh out his three-score-and-ten, while not only keeping his mind but growing in humanity, and I thought of how infectious his spirit, finding as I did a scale and tone in Jamie's eulogy I had too little appreciated, in these many years of our separation, were part of this man's range, but which surely owed something to the topic of his address. By way of postscript to Jamie's posting and those many of others, I'd like to say my Ginsberg piece. While AG and I met several times over the decades, I did not become close with him until we were neighbors in the faculty dorms at Naropa. During those conversations I learned about him firsthand what everyone has been speaking to the list--most notably, of his breadth, humility, and unremitting hunt for the intelligent heart of the world. Through his position and stature as a world leader, he bore the continual brunt of exponential information and once I had to ask him to put aside what he knew of injustice and misery from all over, so that we might feel happier while we talked. Scrupulously obliging, as one hears he so often could be, he did what he could to shut out what must have been a virtually uninterruptible clamor for succor and witness beaming in to his radio-brain. Where AG was concerned, it was not love at first sight for me (the first time we met, in Vancouver in 63, he was wearing white robes and would have preferred to bow, I guess, but reluctantly did shake my hand, saying "Oh, are we still doing that?" : one might have said the same to him!) but at Naropa I found myself on his wavelength, an unforgettable experience.(For which opportunity, which this once I was not so dumb as to reject, my thanks to Anselm Hollo, Anne Waldman, Andrew Schelling and the other Naropa lights.) He and I spoke of his health problems, and he complained of being tired, but he gave off a spry resilience that assured one he was good for a long time yet. That was only 18 months ago. But we see what life he continues to have as anecdote and eulogy flood in; and it was never clearer that he belongs to the ages. Sorry for the length--meant to keep it short but something about Allen can take one over I notice. And thanks again to Jamie for his inspiring words. db ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 01:53:36 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Loss Glazier <lolpoet@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Subject: EPC Correspondence Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" A note that there may be a delay in any correspondence sent to the EPC for the next week to ten days. Please be patient or hold your requests until after the middle of April. Nothing should get lost however - and we'll try to catch up as soon as possible after that. Meanwhile, new resources continue to be added. Stop by and have a look when you get the chance. As always, at http://writing.upenn.edu/epc ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 01:36:09 -0500 Reply-To: FOP-L <FOP-L@VM.CC.PURDUE.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Comments: Resent-From: T-Bone Prone <tbone@ripco.com> Comments: Originally-From: Metaphora <tbone@RIPCO.COM> From: T-Bone Prone <tbone@RIPCO.COM> Subject: Re: Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <m0wDbyU-000JoXB@rci.ripco.com> I am summoned from my bed to the Great City of the Dead -Allen Ginsberg, "White Shroud", composed the night of October 5, 1983 and signed at 6:35 AM. >> << >> << ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 05:51:44 -0500 Reply-To: landers@frontiernet.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Pete Landers <landers@FRONTIERNET.NET> Organization: SkyLark Publishing Company Subject: Re: my Ginsberg story MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Once I was at a gathering in Buffalo, having driven Tom Raworth there from Rochester. Susan Howe was there, too, and Allen Ginsburg and several Buffalodians who are on this list. Somehow along the drive I had developed one of those really nasty neck-ache / sinus headache pains and wasn't able to talk with anyone. I was sitting apart, resting my neck, when I felt hands on my shoulders. It was Allen, concerned about someone he never even met. We exchanged a few words, I thanked him for writing honestly and told him he was an inspiration to me. We talked a little politics. Since then whenever some self-appointed literary didact has tried to make pronouncements about Ginsberg's personality, I have argued. Here was a man who did not give himself airs. He tried his best to live honestly in this crazy world. Pete Landers landers@frontiernet.net ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 08:40:21 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Susan Wheeler <wheeler@IS.NYU.EDU> Subject: Services update Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sitting (four hours) begins this morning at 9:30 at Shambhala, 118 West 22nd Street; private services tomorrow. S. Wheeler ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 09:34:59 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Mark Prejsnar <mprejsn@LAW.EMORY.EDU> Subject: Re: Time Change In-Reply-To: <Pine.HPP.3.94.970404122107.20967G-100000@seaccd.sccd.ctc.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Actually SOME of us, who are stretched rather thin, are not at all happy about the "loss" of a "formerly extra" hour of sleep....What exactly do business interests get out of it by the way? Mark P. On Fri, 4 Apr 1997, Joe Safdie wrote: > > > Congratulations to the citizens of Indianapolis for resisting the > artificial, mechanical construction of "daylight savings" -- it's > all done for business interests -- (though this is the "good" pole, > when we're all supposed to be happy for the "extra" daylight) -- > > (and are) > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 06:07:03 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Douglas <djmess@CINENET.NET> Organization: Sun Moon Books Subject: Allen Ginsberg poem Comments: cc: djmess@sunmoon.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Just a few months ago Allen sent a poem to Sun & Moon Press for inclusion in THE POETS' CALENDAR. I think it sums up his incredible career, and we'd like to offer it as a brief memorial: Multiple Identity Questionnaire "Nature empty, everything's pure; Naturally pure, that's what I am" I'm a jew? a nice jewish boy? A flaky Buddhist, certainly Gay in fact pederast? I'm exaggering? Not only queer an amateur S & M fan, someone should spank me for saying that Columbia Alumnus, class of '48, Beat icon, students tell me. White, if jews are "white race," American by birth, passport and residence Slavic heritage, mama from Vitebsk, father's forebears Kamenetz-Podolska near Lvov. I'm an intellectual! An anti-intellectual, anti academic Distinguished Professor of English, City University of New York, Manhattanite, Brooklyn College Faculty, Another middle class liberal, but lower class second generation immigrant, Upperclass, I own a condo loft, go to art gallery Buddhist vernissage dinner parties with Nicarchos, Rockefeller, and the Luces Oh what a sissy, Professor Four-eyes, can't catch a baseball or drive a car--courageous Shambhala Graduate Warrior! Still student, chela, disciple, my guru Gelek Rinpoche, Myself addressed "Maestro" in Milan, Venice, Napoli because Septuagenarian, got Senior Citizen discount at Alfalfa Healthfoods New York subway-- Mr. Sentient Being! -- Absolutely empty Non-being Non not-being neti neti identity, Maya delusion, Nobodaddy, a nonentity 7/5/96 Naropa Tent Boulder, CO (c) copyright 1997 by Allen Ginsberg All rights reserved. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 07:06:28 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Douglas <djmess@CINENET.NET> Organization: Sun Moon Books Subject: Re. Allen Ginsberg poem Comments: cc: djmess@sunmoon.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit C> From: Douglas <djmess@CINENET.NET> > Organization: Sun Moon Books > Subject: Allen Ginsberg poem > Comments: cc: djmess@sunmoon.com > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > X-PMFLAGS: 34078848 > > Just a few months ago Allen sent a poem to Sun & Moon > Press for inclusion in THE POETS' CALENDAR. > > I think it sums up his incredible career, and we'd > like to offer it as a brief memorial: > > Multiple Identity Questionnaire > > "Nature empty, everything's pure; > Naturally pure, that's what I am" > > I'm a jew? a nice jewish boy? > A flaky Buddhist, certainly > Gay in fact pederast? I'm exaggering? > Not only queer an amateur S & M fan, someone should > spank me for saying that > Columbia Alumnus, class of '48, > Beat icon, students tell me. > White, if jews are "white race," > American by birth, passport and residence > Slavic heritage, mama from Vitebsk, father's > forebears Kamenetz-Podolska near Lvov. > I'm an intellectual! An anti-intellectual, anti academic > Distinguished Professor of English, City University of New > York, > Manhattanite, Brooklyn College Faculty, > Another middle class liberal, > but lower class second generation immigrant, > Upperclass, I own a condo loft, go to art gallery Buddhist > vernissage dinner parties with Nicarchos, > Rockefeller, and the Luces > Oh what a sissy, Professor Four-eyes, can't catch a > baseball or drive a car--courageous Shambhala > Graduate Warrior! > Still student, chela, disciple, my guru Gelek Rinpoche, > Myself addressed "Maestro" in Milan, Venice, Napoli > because Septuagenarian, got Senior Citizen discount > at Alfalfa Healthfoods New York subway-- > Mr. Sentient Being! -- Absolutely empty Non-being Non > not-being neti neti identity, Maya delusion, > Nobodaddy, a nonentity > > 7/5/96 Naropa Tent > Boulder, CO > > (c) copyright 1997 by Allen Ginsberg > All rights reserved. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 09:04:47 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: MAXINE CHERNOFF <maxpaul@SFSU.EDU> Subject: 70th Birthday Party In-Reply-To: <3348FF64.6650@cinenet.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Last summer Paul Hoover and I were teaching at Naropa the week they happened to hold a belated birthday party for Allen. The tone of the toasts at the party was respectful but in summary of his career and I thought a bit tedious to someone who wasn't well (he'd been very ill the week before) and who seemed impatient with direct praise. After he was presented his dietetic cake and asked to say some words, these were the words he said: "This is boring and embarrassing." Candor and practicality were among his strongest attributes, and he didn't forsake them for birthday pomposity. After he was allowed offstage, he became personally very pleasant amd talked to everyone in sight. I felt lucky to attend his less than successful birthday celebration and, like all people on this list, will miss him. Maxine Chernoff ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 09:15:46 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@EMAIL.SJSU.EDU> Subject: Re: One who is still among us In-Reply-To: <199704070050.UAA79472@dept.english.upenn.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Lou Harrison, who has written some memorable verse alongside his unforgettable music, is at last receiving some overdue recognition as he turns eighty. For any of you living or visiting in the Bay area this week, here are a few events: Tuesday noon -- San Jose State concert hall -- open discussion with Harrison Tuesday 8:00 PM -- Tribute concert (call 408-924-4662 for tickets) April 22-23 -- at University of California Santa Cruz 22 -- talk by Leta Miller, author of "Lou Harrison: Composing a World" forthcoming from Oxford -- talk will include playing of tape from 1968 Cabrillo music festival concert at which Harrison's "Peace Pieces" caused an audience uproar (just like the good ole days of Igor & Vaslav in Paris!) 23 -- 80th birthday concert UCSC Recital Hall 8:00 PM for tickets call (408) 459-2787 May 9 & 10 -- San Jose Symphony, Center for the Performing Arts 8:00 PM performance of Harriosn's Symphony #2 along with Ives's Symphony #3 call (408) 288-2828 AND for music fans everywhere -- There is a Lou Harrison web site at: http://www.music.sjsu.edu/Harrison/harrison.html ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 09:24:59 PDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Jerry Rothenberg <jrothenb@CARLA.UCSD.EDU> Subject: San Diego Readings Comments: cc: jrothenb@ucsd.edu For those in the San Diego area or in striking distance thereof, the New Writing Series for April and May includes: Friday, April 11th, 7:30 p.m.: Carolee Schneemann in a performative reading, "Your Dog My Cat or Delirious Arousal of Destruction" (at the Center for Research in Computing & the Arts, UCSD, #408 University Center). Thursday, April 17th, 7:30 p.m.: Raymond Federman & Ron Sukenick (at the UCSD Visual Arts Facility Performance Space, located on Russell Lane). Friday, April 25th, 4:00 p.m.: Lois-Ann Yamanaka (at Visual Arts Facility Performance Space). Wednesday, April 30th, 4:30 p.m., Peter Gizzi & Elizabeth Willis (at Visual Arts Performance Space). Wednesday, May 14th, 4:30 p.m., Ojenke, at Visual Arts Facility Performance Space). Note. On Thursday, April 10th, at 6:30 p.m., Carolee Schneemann will be showing three short recent films ("Known/Unknown," "Interior Scroll: the Cave," and "Instructions per Second") as part of the Glare Screening Series (UCSD Visual Arts Facility Performance Space). All events are free & open to the public. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 12:30:51 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Michael Leddy <cfml@EIU.EDU> Subject: Ginsberg NY Times obit In-Reply-To: <199704070408.XAA03064@ux1.eiu.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I read yesterday's log this morning with the expectation that someone would've commented already on the NYT obituary. But no one has. I didn't expect the Times to get it right, but still-- Wilborn Hampton adds an exclamation point to the title _Howl_ (even though the front page photo has the Facsimile Edition right there, no exclamation point). (A photo on page 21 almost certainly misidentifies someone else as William Burroughs.) Hampton quotes John Leonard (of all people) and Saul Bellow (of all people) on AG's significance as a writer. He describes AG as "a protege of William Carlos Williams." He says that AG "used the celebrity he gained with 'Howl!' to travel widely during the next two decades" (living off his fame, sure). He misspells John Clellon Holmes' name and seems confused about the circumstances concerning _Howl_ and WBAI. The obit seems generally disdainful: "[Ginsberg] declared he had found a new method of poetry. 'All you have to do,' he said, ' is think of anything that comes into your head," etc. And Neal Cassady is identified as "a railway worker who had literary aspirations." The headlines--"Master of Beat Poets" and "Master of the Outrageous" also seem to cast AG as someone not to be taken (all that) seriously. Now I know the work of three Hamptons. I still prefer Lionel and Hawes. (But what did I expect for four dollars?) Michael Leddy Charleston, IL ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 12:26:51 -0600 Reply-To: rwhyte@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Ryan Whyte <rwhyte@FREENET.EDMONTON.AB.CA> Subject: 90 Neuf Zero Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII The drive, the fact it nightly conditions the radio voice tenor Canada Year Nine Seven Stultifying, frequency rue Helmoltz-Hering the black Goethe in the prism bars folds the penitentiary taught them a thing or two that my heart is a random dot stereogram controversy swells like a hidden woman tensor edge the writing of her heart knows the valve control inflation quick inside the virtual of atmospheres in ancient Canada pipeline is father, to the sister pulsing from the arctic neuf zero blank spectrum of gusher ruins farmers fields forever nightly right inside the blunt habitus good gold Merleau taught it to the children of bourgeoisie in their parents' apartments on a planned date metaphysical wall written revolution when it Goe commute impossible rue the day of streets that built the city not the other way around black money is our here our parents' complicity nation quiet zero 1 also, when I drive I think of nothing but you and I drive forever. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 13:50:49 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Re: Ginsberg NY Times obit Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 12:30 PM 4/7/97, Michael Leddy wrote: >I read yesterday's log this morning with the expectation that someone >would've commented already on the NYT obituary. But no one has. I >didn't expect the Times to get it right, but still-- > >Wilborn Hampton adds an exclamation point to the title _Howl_ (even though >the front page photo has the Facsimile Edition right there, no exclamation >point). (A photo on page 21 almost certainly misidentifies someone else >as William Burroughs.) Hampton quotes John Leonard (of all people) and >Saul Bellow (of all people) on AG's significance as a writer. He >describes AG as "a protege of William Carlos Williams." He says that AG >"used the celebrity he gained with 'Howl!' to travel widely during the >next two decades" (living off his fame, sure). He misspells John Clellon >Holmes' name and seems confused about the circumstances concerning _Howl_ >and WBAI. The obit seems generally disdainful: "[Ginsberg] declared he >had found a new method of poetry. 'All you have to do,' he said, ' is >think of anything that comes into your head," etc. And Neal Cassady is >identified as "a railway worker who had literary aspirations." The >headlines--"Master of Beat Poets" and "Master of the Outrageous" also seem >to cast AG as someone not to be taken (all that) seriously. > >Now I know the work of three Hamptons. I still prefer Lionel and Hawes. >(But what did I expect for four dollars?) > >Michael Leddy >Charleston, IL these seem like trivial peccadillos. i was actually surprised by how little there was to complain about in the obit. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 14:33:37 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU> Subject: Re: Ginsberg NY Times obit In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 7 Apr 1997 12:30:51 -0500 from <cfml@EIU.EDU> always ready to defend the status quo... just a few comments on Michael Leddy's comments. the obit could have been better, granted. But it was a far cry from generally disdainful. Why NOT quote laudatory remarks from figures outside of the circle of admirers (i.e. Saul Bellow)? That seems the most objective kind of praise. The photo mentioned certainly WAS Burroughs. Would Ginsberg himself want to be taken ALL THAT SERIOUSLY? Do you want to have it both ways? I thought for a brief time AG WAS a "protege" of Williams - before going to college. I could have this wrong. People know AG 's letter turns up (amazingly!!) in _Paterson_ - not the letter of a disciple, for sure - in fact a critical letter, critical of some myopic aspects of Wms' epic - but it's still the letter of a young writer in dialogue with an older. but hey, let's not have a hash-over debate over the tombs... love, love, & sorrow these days, & joy too yoo too - Henry G ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 15:12:00 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" <pritchpa@SILVERPLUME.IIX.COM> Subject: Re: naked MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN Richard Howard relates (in _Alone With America_, that most parochial of books masquerading as a universal history) how Ginsberg once stood before the assemblage at a literary conference in the 60's and humbly, piously, decently stripped naked - as naked as the self he revealed (and created) in his poems. Whenever I think of Allen Ginsberg I think of that: a theatricality that transcended itself through sheer openess and sweetness. I think of the line from Ruben Dario: "From its own nakedness does the star shine." ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 16:42:26 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Joel Lewis <penwaves@MINDSPRING.COM> Subject: Allen Ginsberg Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I spent a chunk of an afternoon speaking to a reporter from the Newark Star-Ledger talking about Allen (I did an anthology of NJ poets a few years back and I seem to be on every reporter's rolodexs). This beatnik/sex revolutionary/guru stuff seems to be the inevitable way the press sees the story. I hope this is not what he'll be remembered for. I was his student at Naropa in '81 & was friends with him over the last years and was always amazed at his generosity and kindness despite the enormous demands many people put on him. He would tell me at naropa that he wanted to retire and go off to a mountain colorado towrite in peace, but there was another part of him that wanted to be out there. He was much like Sartre -- who used his fame as a way for advocating for his causes and friends. Where would American poetry be now if it where not for Allen's push in the 50's? Although Allen's inability to "get" poets outside his sphere was a source of some humor and consternation at Naropa, Allen did try hard to understand poets like Clark Coolidge and Ron Silliman. As Rexroth once said, he was a radical conservative who made his breakthrough by bringing back the cadences of the Hebrew Bible and Walt Whitman. I must say that I hadn't looked at his work seriously in a number of years. Reviewing the collected, I'm struck by his innovative short lyrics and his use of numerous forms and that his work kept shifting and changing over the years. He was one of the most self-critical of major poets. I once asked him why he rarely read from Reality Sandwiches. He said: "Oh, I just don't think those poems are that good." The best reading I ever heard him do was in the early 80's at the old Brentanno's Books on 8th St. The reading was undepublicized and the audience was mostly st marks poets. Without harmonium or finger cymbals, etc., he stated "I want to read some new poems" and did just that, in quiet (for Allen) voice I don't think we'l see another literary figure with as much influence as Allen had. He was the first living poet I was aware of (age 11 -- those evergreen review posters w/ allen as uncle sam) . It's hard to imagine him not around joel lewis ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 17:11:54 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Kenneth Goldsmith <kennyg@BWAY.NET> Subject: "Kaddish for Allen Ginsberg" Playlist Comments: To: poetics@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" "Unpopular Music with Kenny G." Monday Mornings 9-Noon WFMU, 91.1 FM Serving the NYC/Catskills area ***************************************************************** "Kaddish for Allen Ginsberg" Playlist for Monday April 7, 1997 ***************************************************************** Allen Ginsberg "Father Death Blues" Allen Ginsberg Part 1 of "Kaddish" Fugs "Nothing" Eliane Radigue "Mila's Song in the Rain, Pt. 1" Allen Ginsberg "The End" Eliane Radigue "Mila's Song in the Rain, Pt. 2" Jack Kerouac & Steve Allen "Deadbelly" Irving Jacobson "Az Men Muzsh Muzsh Men" Mystic Fugu Orchestra (John Zorn/Yamantaka Eye) Allen Ginsberg "Kral Majales" Abe Elenkrig's Yiddishe Orchestra "Fon der Choope" (1913) Bob Dylan "Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands" Allen Ginsberg "Infant Joy" Allen Ginsberg "The Little Fish Devours the Big Fish" Tom Waits "Jack & Neal/Califonia Here I Come" Charlie Parker "Carving the Bird" "Footloose in Greenwich Village"--1960 WNYC Broadcast Bob McFadden & Dor "The Beat Generation" David Amram "Pull My Daisy" Allen Ginsberg "Pull My Daisy" William S. Burroughs & Kurt Cobain "The Priest They Called Him" Timothy Leary "You Can Be Anyone This Time Around" Allen Ginsberg "Prayer Blues" Billy Bragg "The Internationale" Allen Ginsberg "Hum Bomb" Brion Gysin "Pistol Poem" Brion Gysin "Pistol Poem Part 2" Brion Gysin "Recalling All Active Agents" Master Musicians of Jojuka "Brahim Jones Jojuka Very Stoned" Paul Bowles "Baptism of Solitude" The Splendid Master Gnawa Musicians of Morroco "La Voix Errante" The Clash & Allen Ginsberg "Capitol Air" The Clash & Allen Ginsberg "Ghetto Defendent" Allen Ginsberg "Birdbrain" Walt Whitman "America" Loseling Dratsang of Drenng Monastery "Ornament for Clear Realization" --------------------------------------------------------------------- Kenny G. http://www.wfmu.org/~kennyg ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 21:26:47 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: John Cayley <cayley@SHADOOF.DEMON.CO.UK> Subject: Cyber/Poetextual Readings in London Comments: cc: ht_lit@spiff.ccs.carleton.ca, british-poets@mailbase.ac.uk, wr-eye-tings@sfu.ca Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" *** with apologies for cross-postings *** Jim Rosenberg Loss Pequen~o Glazier Chris Funkhouser Read, Project & Perform for SubVoicive Poetry Friday 11th April The Three Cups Sandland Street (Holborn Tube) London, UK Admission GBP 5.00 (concessions 2.50) Doors open 8 pm, reading starts 8:15 Warp your geographies by taking this opportunity of a rare visit by US-based proponents of hypertext / cybertext *&* poetext Or, if you're on the other side of the pond, why not make it a reason to take a weekend flight to the world's most happening city? Chris Funkhouser is a musician, writer, broadcaster and computer programmer who has edited and co-produced literary journals on CD-ROM, compact disc, video, the Internet and in print. Recent magazine publications included in _Callaloo_, _Hambone_ and _Talisman_. Loss Pequen~o Glazier, a Tejano native, is a practising Webmaster presently living in the (far) northern Americas. He is Director of the Electronic Poetry Center <http://writing.upenn.edu/epc>. His writing stirs up the sleeping lakes of language that lie among technology, poetics, American Spanish, the pre-Conquest, and the visual. Jim Rosenberg's recent work uses dense interactive overlays of words. On a computer screen the individual layers may be navigated, often via a diagram syntax which allows both structure and direct juxtaposition. Recent publications: _Diffractions through: Thirst weep ransack (frailty) veer tide elegy_ and _The Barrier Frames: Finality crystal shunt curl chant quickening giveaway stare_ (both: Eastgate Systems, 1996); _Intergrams_ (Eastgate, 1993). More details of the subVoicive series of reading in London from: Lawrence Upton <100540.3335@compuserve.com> ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 15:12:45 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@EMAIL.SJSU.EDU> Subject: this week's Inuit show... (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: QUOTED-PRINTABLE page down a bit & you'll find the announcement for a rare screening of a Robbe Grillet film -- and an interesting web site ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Mon, 07 Apr 1997 14:43:44 -0700 From: Geoff Alexander <geoffa@pacbell.net> To: c16Presslist <geoffa@pacbell.net> Subject: this week's Inuit show... Hi friends, Those of you who missed last week=92s show lost out on a real treat as=20 =91Miss cine16=92 presented a fabulous door prize consisting of a copy of = =20 =93Toymaker=94 --- one of worst of the terrible films we showed last week= =20 --- to a randomly drawn (but not quartered) guest. Look forward to more=20 of these shameless promotional gimmicks as we plumb the depths of the 16=20 mm experience. On a more serious note, we=92re going to be including a new feature with=20 your weekly film notes: when possible, we=92ll provide you with web links= =20 to sites containing meaningful background information on a given week=92s= =20 films. This week, for example, you can investigate Canadian=20 government=92s Inuit website for great historical and cultural data, and=20 then visit Marc London=92s Inuit art site for examples of indigenous art=20 and sculpture. And please note that our May 8 show with John Barnes in person will=20 begin at 7 pm --- one half-hour earlier than usual --- to allow adequate=20 time for two hours of film plus your opportunity to ask questions during=20 our live interview with this legendary filmmaker. Best, Geoff ------------------------------------------- =20 PRESS RELEASE 23=20 =20 ----------------------------------- FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE=20 =20 Contact: Geoff Alexander=20 (408) 292-3593=20 PROGRAM NOTES FOR cine16 FILM FESTIVAL'S April 10 program at the=20 downstairs Speakeasy in the Agenda Restaurant & Lounge, downtown San=20 Jose, Thursday at 7:30 pm=20 =91Up north is down south from here: Inuit culture of the Canadian=20 Arctic=92 Web sites of interest: (Canadian Inuit site) =20 http://www.inac.gc.ca/pubs/information/info16.html (Inuit sculpture & art) http://www.total.net/~elcalon/ The Inuit are a nomadic aboriginal group from northeastern Canada=20 comprising some 600 bands speaking derivations of the Inuktitut=20 language. In 1999, the territory of Nunavut will be spun off from the=20 Northwest Territories, and provide more formal representation for the=20 Inuit in the new bi-cultural government residing in the town of=20 Iqaluit, formerly know as Frobisher Bay, Baffin Island. The Inuit have=20 been the subject of many dramatic and fascinating films, and tonight=20 we'll show three of the best. In addition to providing wonderful=20 insight into a little-understood population, these understated films=20 provide a tonic for those of us who have gotten sick and tired of having=20 to listen to new age music and panpipes as musical accompaniment for=20 seemingly every documentary, ethnographic, or zoological film be=20 produced today. =91At the Winter Sea Ice Camp I=92 =91At the Autumn River Camp II=92, both 1969, d. Quentin Brown. In the=20 late 1960's anthropologist Asen Balikci attempted to document=20 traditional customs, including seal hunting and komatiq (dog-sled)=20 making, as they were before the coming of the missionaries and the use=20 of rifles, usually dated at 1919 or so. When these films were made,=20 there were still Inuit who remembered how to do these things, and=20 Balikci and director Quentin Brown made total of nine films. Our two=20 favorites are the savage 'At the Winter Sea Ice Camp I' and 'At the=20 Autumn River Camp II', both outstanding documents in the non-narrated=20 ethnographic tradition, and filmed at minus 10 degrees F. Among other=20 things, the Inuit make a sled out of fish and antlers, and successfully=20 hunt seal living six feet under sea ice. =91Land of the Long Day' (1952), d. Doug Wilkinson. Paradoxically=20 preceding the former films by 17 years, the director shows Inuit customs=20 as they really were in the early 50's. Idlouk, the protagonist,=20 tragically terminated his own life several years after 'Land' was made.=20 This film is not only a fine explanation of the challenges faced by the=20 Inuit, it is also a tribute to the filmmaker working in adverse=20 conditions in which cameras freeze and weather is unpredictable.=20 Future programs include: April 17: =91Trans-Europ Express=92: the 'cine'-roman' of Alain=20 Robbe-Grillet. Rarely do we show feature length films, but tonight is=20 an exception, as the entire program is given to the experimental=20 filmmaker Alain Robbe-Grillet's 'Trans-Europ Express' (1965). This=20 outstanding work is a film within a film as Robbe-Grillet sits in a=20 train car and discusses with his producer and script supervisor a film=20 he'd like to make about a drug deal in Antwerp. A man in fake beard and=20 glasses gets on the train, but the director states he'd rather have J-L=20 Trintignant, who then materializes, and stars, along with Marie-France=20 Pisier, in this fascinating, unusual film in which characters and=20 authors cross each other's paths, yet stay in their own frames of=20 reference. Robbe-Grillet scholar John Leo will present a ten minute=20 introduction to the work of this outstanding writer and filmmaker.=20 John hosts a Robbe-Grillet site; please visit it for more info: http://www.halfaya.org/robbegrillet/ April 24: Judith Bronowski=92s Mexico --- This filmmaker made four=20 outstanding films showcasing historically significant artisans of=20 Mexico. Made in the mid-1970s, they document the work --- and the words=20 of the artists. Tonight we=92ll show three of them: =91Pedro Linares=92= =20 (papier-mache=92 monsters called =91alebrijes=92), =91Manuel Jimenez=92=20 (woodcarver from Oaxaca), and =91Sabina Sanchez=92, an embroidered from=20 Oaxaca. =91Linares=92, incidentally, was shown at =91cine16=92 earlier thi= s=20 year, and is returning by request. We=92ll have one more short on this=20 program, which we=92re hoping will be the fourth in the series, lent by=20 the filmmaker. May 1: To be announced. May 8: SHOW STARTS AT 7 PM. 'Shaw vs. Shakespeare' A tribute to the=20 masterwork of director John Barnes. After reading the complete works=20 of George Bernard Shaw, Barnes wrote, directed, and produced a series of=20 three films narrated by Shaw (brilliantly portrayed by Donald Moffatt),=20 describing how parallel characters (e.g. Julius Caesar, played by=20 Richard Kiley) are treated differently by the two playwrights. We feel=20 this series is one of the highlights of educational cinema: engaging,=20 thoughtful, and intellectually stimulating. This is a rare opportunity=20 to see these three 1/2 films, produced in 1970, presented consecutively. Also shown: 'Portable Phonograph', Barnes' last film, and one of the=20 best. WHO ARE WE?=20 =20 'cine16' is a once-per-week, Thursdays at 7:30 pm cinema focusing on=20 the historical and thematic aspects of 16mm documentary, ethnographic,=20 industrial, and art films. Shows are approximately two hours long, and=20 admission is always free. All shows start at 7:30 pm, but arrive early=20 for seating. We're in the cellar speakeasy at downtown San Jose's=20 Agenda Restaurant & Lounge. Enter through the Agenda Restaurant on=20 South First Street, corner of San Salvador , and ask for 'cine16' in the=20 downstairs speakeasy. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 18:49:10 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "k.a. hehir" <angelo@MUSTANG.UWO.CA> Subject: help In-Reply-To: <v01540b00af6efa0b6402@[205.198.117.110]> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Hello, Could someone please tell me where the idea/notion/line "technician of the sacred" comes from? I know it is the title of one of Jerome Rothenberg's anthologies and is quoted in the commentary on Blake in Poems for the Millennium,but I'm looking for the original source. Thank You, Kevin Hehir ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 21:42:27 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: shoemakers@COFC.EDU Subject: Re: "Kaddish for Allen Ginsberg" Playlist In-Reply-To: <v01540b00af6efa0b6402@[205.198.117.110]> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Kenny--Thanx for posting your playlist. Great show! steve (an ex-dj missing my old "slot," & my old station--if you're ever in Charlottesville, VA, WTJU rules! 91.1 FM--same call # as you, love the left o' the dial!) On Mon, 7 Apr 1997, Kenneth Goldsmith wrote: > "Unpopular Music with Kenny G." > Monday Mornings 9-Noon > WFMU, 91.1 FM > Serving the NYC/Catskills area > > ***************************************************************** > "Kaddish for Allen Ginsberg" > Playlist for Monday April 7, 1997 > ***************************************************************** > > Allen Ginsberg "Father Death Blues" > Allen Ginsberg Part 1 of "Kaddish" > Fugs "Nothing" > > Eliane Radigue "Mila's Song in the Rain, Pt. 1" > Allen Ginsberg "The End" > Eliane Radigue "Mila's Song in the Rain, Pt. 2" > > Jack Kerouac & Steve Allen "Deadbelly" > Irving Jacobson "Az Men Muzsh Muzsh Men" > Mystic Fugu Orchestra (John Zorn/Yamantaka Eye) > Allen Ginsberg "Kral Majales" > Abe Elenkrig's Yiddishe Orchestra "Fon der Choope" (1913) > > Bob Dylan "Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands" > Allen Ginsberg "Infant Joy" > Allen Ginsberg "The Little Fish Devours the Big Fish" > > Tom Waits "Jack & Neal/Califonia Here I Come" > Charlie Parker "Carving the Bird" > "Footloose in Greenwich Village"--1960 WNYC Broadcast > Bob McFadden & Dor "The Beat Generation" > David Amram "Pull My Daisy" > Allen Ginsberg "Pull My Daisy" > > William S. Burroughs & Kurt Cobain "The Priest They Called Him" > Timothy Leary "You Can Be Anyone This Time Around" > Allen Ginsberg "Prayer Blues" > > Billy Bragg "The Internationale" > Allen Ginsberg "Hum Bomb" > Brion Gysin "Pistol Poem" > Brion Gysin "Pistol Poem Part 2" > Brion Gysin "Recalling All Active Agents" > Master Musicians of Jojuka "Brahim Jones Jojuka Very Stoned" > Paul Bowles "Baptism of Solitude" > The Splendid Master Gnawa Musicians of Morroco "La Voix Errante" > > > The Clash & Allen Ginsberg "Capitol Air" > The Clash & Allen Ginsberg "Ghetto Defendent" > Allen Ginsberg "Birdbrain" > > Walt Whitman "America" > Loseling Dratsang of Drenng Monastery "Ornament for Clear Realization" > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > Kenny G. > http://www.wfmu.org/~kennyg > Steve Shoemaker ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 22:37:04 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: CharSSmith@AOL.COM Subject: Re: help Without checking my books, I believe it's either a quote from or a riff off of Mircea Eliade. In a message dated 97-04-07 19:39:02 EDT, you write: << Could someone please tell me where the idea/notion/line "technician of the sacred" comes from? I know it is the title of one of Jerome Rothenberg's anthologies and is quoted in the commentary on Blake in Poems for the Millennium,but I'm looking for the original source. >> ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 22:37:59 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: CharSSmith@AOL.COM Subject: Blaser in Santa Cruz I just got the information for this reading that Kevin mentioned last week, in case anyone in the area can make it: Robin is indeed reading in Santa Cruz on Thursday, April 10, at 4:00 in Kresge College's Seminar Romm 159. charles ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 20:10:58 PDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Jerry Rothenberg <jrothenb@CARLA.UCSD.EDU> Subject: Re: help Comments: cc: jrothenb@ucsd.edu For: Kevin Hehir The source is Eliade's great book, Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy, although I can't recall that he uses the phrase exactly in that way. Rather he speaks of shamans mastering techniques of the sacred, which does of course (or did for me) suggest the other phrase. The excitement in Eliade was that the shamans, as presented therein, were also masters & makers & manipulators of language in such a way as to suggest that we could think of them as proto-poets, & then ... But it was always more complicated than that -- & mysterious -- & that was what the excitement was about ... I don't recall the phrase -- or anything like it -- turning up elsewhere. But then, who knows? With all good wishes, Jerome Rothenberg ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 09:03:06 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Jeff Hansen <Jeff_Hansen@BLAKE.PVT.K12.MN.US> Organization: The Blake School Subject: Poetic Briefs Comments: To: POETICS@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit EXTRA EXTRA EXTRA READ ALL ABOUT IT A new, double issue of Poetic Briefs in chapbook form, entitled "Shadows: Selected Dialogues on Poetics" by Mark Wallace and Jefferson Hansen, is hot off the press. Subscribers will receive theirs within a week or two. Any who would like a copy should send a 6x9' envelop with $1.50 postage to Jeff Hansen / 4055 Yosemite Avenue S / St. Louis Park, MN 55416. Various quotations and paraphrases: "Life is intercourse between mounds of obese flesh." The fastest way to Rome is to go in the other direction. I really think that people on the beach shouldn't swear around children. "I don't know what I believe." I am a machine. Hansen, in an interview with a major television network, said, "We might not be right, but at least we're funny......Some of the time." GET YOURS NOW ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 09:39:55 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Charles Bernstein <bernstei@BWAY.NET> Subject: Boston Area Reading Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" WORD OF MOUTH PRESENTS AN AFTERNOON WITH CHARLES BERNSTEIN. Sunday April 20th, 3:30PM Admission $3.00. Information: Michael Franco 617-648-2226 or 891-5225, Mfranco34@aol.com Location: World Wide Building, artists west second floor, studio #8, 144 moody street, waltham, mass. directions: commuter trains leave n. station at 3:00pm & porter sq. at 3:10pm & arrive in waltham at 3:22pm. (studio is a 3 min walk.) by car from harvard sq. :rt 16 (mt auburn st.) to rt. 20 (main st) to 117 into waltham center . left onto moody st. & turn left just before the bridge parking available . wheel chair accessible . ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 09:05:11 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Re: help In-Reply-To: <9704080310.AA01187@carla.UCSD.EDU> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" speaking of the sacred, for those of you who haven't yet seen jerry's co-edited book The Book, Spiritual Instrument, it's very wonderful. md At 8:10 PM -0700 4/7/97, Jerry Rothenberg wrote: >For: Kevin Hehir > >The source is Eliade's great book, Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of >Ecstasy, although I can't recall that he uses the phrase exactly in that >way. Rather he speaks of shamans mastering techniques of the sacred, >which does of course (or did for me) suggest the other phrase. The >excitement in Eliade was that the shamans, as presented therein, were >also masters & makers & manipulators of language in such a way as >to suggest that we could think of them as proto-poets, & then ... > But it was always more complicated than that -- & mysterious -- >& that was what the excitement was about ... > >I don't recall the phrase -- or anything like it -- turning up elsewhere. >But then, who knows? > >With all good wishes, > >Jerome Rothenberg ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 09:08:18 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Re: Boston Area Reading In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19970408133955.00691f64@bway.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" oh to be in boston now that bernstein's here... sorry to miss it's 5 degrees here in mpls... At 9:39 AM -0400 4/8/97, Charles Bernstein wrote: >WORD OF MOUTH PRESENTS > >AN AFTERNOON WITH CHARLES BERNSTEIN. > >Sunday April 20th, 3:30PM > >Admission $3.00. >Information: Michael Franco 617-648-2226 or 891-5225, Mfranco34@aol.com >Location: World Wide Building, artists west second floor, studio #8, 144 >moody street, waltham, mass. directions: commuter trains leave n. station >at 3:00pm & porter sq. at 3:10pm & arrive in waltham at 3:22pm. (studio is a >3 min walk.) by car from harvard sq. :rt 16 (mt auburn st.) to rt. 20 (main >st) to 117 into waltham center . left onto moody st. & turn left just >before the bridge parking available . wheel chair accessible . ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 09:13:09 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: XCP: the journal!!! In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19970408133955.00691f64@bway.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" hey everybody: the premier issue of Mark Nowak's journal CROSS-CULTURAL POETICS is now out, featuring work by Amiri Baraka, Solomon Deressa, Edwin Torres, Lise McLeod (sp?), Forrest Gander, Elizabeth Burns, Diane Glancy, and many others, an essay by me that's an expansion of the paper Alan Golding delivered for me (THANKS ALAN) at Louisville, and a host of book reviews. for further info, contact MARK NOWAK at manowak@stkate.edu Beset i mean best wishes, md ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 10:20:27 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Sylvester Pollet <pollet@MAINE.MAINE.EDU> Subject: Readings Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" If anyone's passing through Maine, Leo Connellan will be reading in Orono, Univ. Maine, Thurs. April 10, 7 p.m. 120 Little Hall. Reception follows. Free. On April 24, 7 p.m., Ellsworth Public Library, I'll be reading, with Brian Hubbell, Susand Hand Shetterly, and Philip Booth, in a series of readings to celebrate the centennial of the library and National (fill-in-the-blank) Month. Sylvester ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 10:13:12 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU> Subject: Re: Poetic Briefs In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 8 Apr 1997 09:03:06 -0600 from <Jeff_Hansen@BLAKE.PVT.K12.MN.US> On Tue, 8 Apr 1997 09:03:06 -0600 Jeff Hansen said: > >Hansen, in an interview with a major television network, said, "We >might not be right, but at least we're funny......Some of the time." I'm looking forward to reading, & watching the show too. Was struck by a Ginsberg quote in the paper (or was it on the list?) - "You don't need to be right, just candid." (this may not be exact). It reminded me of a mysterious statement Mandelstam made when asked something like, "what is poetry". He said - "Poetry is the poet's sense of being right." - HG "always right (not), always left (out)" ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 11:00:33 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Bromige <dcmb@METRO.NET> Subject: detention with a red headed woman Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" This "subject" from George Bowering refers to a chapter in our collaborative novel, _Piccolo Mondo_, and I am pleased to announce its upcoming publication by New Coachhouse Press, Toronto. Details later, possibly from my co-author. db. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 11:47:04 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA> Subject: Re: detention with a red headed woman In-Reply-To: <v01540b05af6eca13400c@[205.138.228.174]> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >This "subject" from George Bowering refers to a chapter in our >collaborative novel, _Piccolo Mondo_, and I am pleased to announce its >upcoming publication by New Coachhouse Press, Toronto. Details later, >possibly from my co-author. db. Actually the press, reinvented by Stan Bevington, Victor Coleman and Rik Simon, old hands at the original Coach House Press, is called Coach House Books now, for legal reasons. Their books are done both on the Net (beautifully---Coach House was the inventor of anything done with computers in book publishing way back) and in artifact form, also beautifully. You can get at their home page via search. Ask for something like Coach House Books. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 14:54:24 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU Subject: denver conference etc... Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" fresh back from denver, to hundreds of messages... some incredibly touching commentary on allen ginsberg, much appreciated by this list member... being in denver, hearing the news of his death (from marjorie) was, well... "reconcilable (in) differences: the marriage of writers and critics" was a small, friendly conference---i regret, esp. b/c it was small, not having had the occasion to speak more with norman f. and others... seeing marjorie again, meeting chris alexander and linda russo of this list region, and elizabeth franken (not from this list region, but from here in chicago), among the highlights of my time there... and of course seeing the mountains---which i so dearly miss, living now in flatland... perhaps the friendliness of the conference stemmed from it having been put together, in large part, by grad students at du... gerald graff's keynote, "teaching the conflicts between creators and theorists," didn't do much for me... i tried to indicate the problems i had with graff's presentation, but unfortunately my hand was not called upon... not least of such problems being that he made no mention at all of the possibilities of *this* medium for crossing institutional boundaries, for consolidating support among different levels of the academic hierarchy... graff himself struck me as, well, a nice guy... but i'm not sure that he really had all that much to add to the creative-critical split (he was by his own account a bit tentative about his talk), albeit i respect his attempt at least to deal with the classroom, with teaching as such... i left his talk wishing he'd spent a bit more time online---seems to me he hasn't, though maybe i'm mistaken... ensuing discussion, provoked in part by marjorie, seemed to surface graff's decision not to discuss specifically literary formations... for my part, i would have mentioned that the academic scene is now entirely disrupted and fractured by job market considerations, that good work is being done in spite of this fact, but that we need to develop alternative structures for negotiating our conflicts and woes... marjorie's paper, imnsho, was apropos to the conference itself, sifting through the poetic-publishing-cultural implications of kent johnson's probably aka araki yasusada's poetry... marjorie's was a lesson in scholarly thoroughness and insight---not to mention her performance, which was utterly enjoyable... ensuing discussion raised the issue of identity politics and how it functioned in marjorie's paper---a discussion that might be picked up here upon the paper's forthcoming publication (in _the boston review_---right marjorie?)... as to panels: i very much enjoyed carole maso's reading, and laura mullen's reading... otherwise, i was taken by susannah breslin and lily james talk on "postfeminist cyborgs"... these two women have set up a web site, the postfeminist playground, that looks to be provocative and useful: <http://www.pfplayground.com>... there were of course a few papers that seemed to exploit "can poetry matter" issues (yes, but it must be "real") in the expected ways... not much to say here that hasn't already been said... as to the "featured" reading, i was struck by poet and alum heather mchugh's capacity for 'reading' her audience (to borrow from my wife kass fleisher, who was also in attendance)... heather came across as a warm and genuine person of real integrity... her work is certainly more traditional, but her performance, her narrative ruminations as such seemed to me to be very much a part of her reading that evening... kass and i played hookie on sunday (no apologies!) and drove up to lookout mountain, a short jaunt from denver... neither of us had ever visited the buffalo bill museum... it was fun, if a bit hokey, and the view from the top of the mountain, covered in a crystalline white blanket, was invigorating... in all, i'm not certain whether any critics and writers actually reconciled their differences as a result of this conference, but i DO see the conference itself as symptomatic of, hence contributing to, a general awareness that the writerly and the critical are more complex constructions than might at one time have been generally acknowledged... perhaps this itself signals a willingness to talk, accompanied by the demise of certain categorical quibbles, among specific subsets of (largely academic) writers/critics... if power-laden structures are not so easily dismantled, there is nonetheless great value to getting together... the conference organizers evidently (wisely) will put together a listserv to discuss some of the issues that were raised at the conference... stupid me, i forgot to drop off my email address (!)... if any of you 'out there' have info. on the listserv, please post me backchannel... or maybe here is more appropriate... in all, i/we had fun... the one structural problem with the conference was that panel sessions were staged with no 'in between' time, back-to-back... three panels ended at ten o'clock and three more began at ten-o'clock, meaning you had to skip out on panels if you wished to shoot the shit (which i did)... in any case, i judge conferences by their ability to nurture new and existing networks, and in such terms, the conference was a success... best, joe ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 17:19:21 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Joshua N Schuster <jnschust@SAS.UPENN.EDU> Subject: Wieners Celebration MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit JOHN WIENERS reads along with readings and reflections from: Bob Perelman Louis Cabri Joshua Schuster Jeff Wachs Rachel Blau DuPlessis Alan Davies Charley Shively --5pm-- This Friday, Apr. 11th at The Writers House 3805 Locust Walk UPenn, Philadelphia 573-writ and of course everyone is welcome ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 19:07:41 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Charles Bernstein <bernstei@BWAY.NET> Subject: Ginsberg Memorial Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" There will be a memorial for Allen Ginsberg this Saturday, April 12, from 12 to 4, at the Poetry Project, St. Mark's Church, Second Avenue at Tenth Street. No details of the program are currently available. If I get more information, I will pass it on. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 18:07:35 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM> Subject: Taylor Mead / Tony Medina @ Poetry City In-Reply-To: <199704082119.RAA09821@mail2.sas.upenn.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Friday, April 11, 7 pm Poetry City (NY) Taylor Mead reads with Tony Medina 5 Union Square West, 7th Floor ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 21:23:57 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Re: Ginsberg Memorial In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19970408230741.006fc018@bway.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 7:07 PM -0400 4/8/97, Charles Bernstein wrote: >There will be a memorial for Allen Ginsberg this Saturday, April 12, from 12 >to 4, at the Poetry Project, St. Mark's Church, Second Avenue at Tenth >Street. No details of the program are currently available. If I get more >information, I will pass it on. and could we get lots of detailed reviews, those of us who can't be there but are in serious mourning, that'd be great, thanks. i had no idea i'd feel so -- incapacitated, for lack of a better word --by this turn of events. thanks--md ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 22:56:49 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> Subject: 103 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I am in love with Language, Mouthing's all I have That inherently forms of Gauge A measure of Soul or Salve The shadowless Norm or Verb Spatters the Landscape of motion Where Drives inscribe the Kerb Of Name and Revelation Describing further creates A Bind of Attributes Transformed by Men and Fates Inscribed through Institutes Let Nothing hurtle towards Hurdles across the Sound Constrained by mouthed Retorts Quicksand beneath the Ground Let Nothing gyre and turn Across the Platitudes Whole Worlds on fire burn In wayward Latitudes Mouthing's Telos cries And Clara constitutes Ships and countermands Inscribing Institutes And Clara constitutes Black Freighters, real Beauts _______________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 18:38:52 -1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Gabrielle Welford <welford@HAWAII.EDU> Subject: CBS SPEWS - Latest Article by Mumia Abu-Jamal (fwd) Comments: To: mot-l <mot-l@hawaii.edu> Comments: cc: poetics <poetics@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII --------- Begin forwarded message ---------- From: Mumia@aol.com CBS SPEWS Written March 29, 1997 (c) 1997 Mumia Abu-Jamal All Rights Reserved All propaganda has to be popular and Ins to adapt its spiritual level to the perception of the least intelligent of those towards whom it intends to direct itself. --Adolf Hider, Mein Kampf (1933) In its late March 1997 Broadcast of the CBS News Magazine, "48 Hours," the network hit a deadly and diabolical low with its piece 'on the Christian Community in Woodcrest, NY known as the Bruderhof (German for place, or home, of Brothers). Using slick editing techniques, half-lies, and most damaging, juxtaposition with other unrelated stories, "48 Hour" projected the unmistakable and dangerous assertion that the Bruderhof is a cult. This projection took place in a particularly insidious in the same program that featured an opening segment on the mass suicide of 39 members of a group calling itself "Heaven's Gate," in a place called Rancho Santa Fe, California. "Heaven's Gate," which saw itself as millenialist, and inheritors of a new evolutionary entity; perceived their human bodies as encumbrances, as burdens that had to be shed, and when the Hale - Bopp comet came near, they saw it as a sign to "shed their flesh containers." To say the very least, Heaven's Gate-seekers were folks who were immensely alienated from their bodies (according to press accounts the males were Voluntarily castrated), and neither contacted, nor created, families. Taking the quasi-similarities that Heaven's Graters were mostly white, well educated, computer-savvy and remote from general society' and that the Bruderhof shared similar attributes, "48 Hours" launched into a "guilt by similarity,' program, and in the minds of millions created the dangerous notion that those mere similarities amounted to equivalencies arid therefore, one's a cult, so the other must be also. How can a community of thousands of fathers, mothers, farmers and carpenters, who heartily embrace the sacredness of all life, be so cavalierly equated with a little-known, virtually asexual group of 39 people like "Heaven's Gate?" The smart answer, of course, is that a powerful entity like CBS can do it because they can. They are the media, and they do what they want to do daily. So the question becomes, 'Why?" The answer is the Bruderhof's most recent efforts on behalf of life, justice and freedom, most notably on behalf of the writer, and his spiritual family, the revolutionary MOVE organization. It lies in their efforts against the U.S. Death Penalty. It lies in their efforts to practice a Christianity that seeks social justice and is unabashedly critical of white supremacy. It lies in their expression of community. Why then would a show scheduled for April, one which was taped months ago, be rushed on the air opposite the "Heaven's Gate" suicides? Part of it is the unerring lust for the sensational that is at the heart of American media, and much is the interests they represent -- that of the established: the State. The doyen of CBS News, Edward R. Murrow once noted, "Unless we get off our fat surpluses and recognize that television in the main is being used to distract, delude, amuse and insulate us, then television and those who finance it, those who look at it and those who work at it, may see a totally different picture too late." Well, Ed, your colleagues at your old network (CBS) may now intone, "too late," for they have fired an unfair broadside at a group, labeled them without just cause a "cult" that "bears close scrutiny", and endangered them by aligning them with a group that they hold virtually nothing of value in common. For; by utilizing one word, "cult", and putting them in the programmed context of the Heaven's Gaters, they project them in the public mind as other, weird, and dangerous, if not suicidal. In America, as MOVE's example nakedly reflects, people projected as Other can be treated far differently (and even negatively) than so-called "normal" folks. With the arrogance of the media's power of projection, "48 Hours" suggests the Bruderhof held a young woman as a virtual prisoner, neglecting to inform viewers that their youngsters go to high schools and colleges on the outside (even around the world) every day. Does that sound like hostages? Americans are widely and justly suspicious and distrustful of the nation's mass media. They view it as a tool of the wealthy and the, a protector of the status qno. and a fermenter of unjustified fear. CBS did nothing to dissuade them of that view. MAJ --------- End forwarded message ---------- ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 01:25:19 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: JDHollo@AOL.COM Subject: no digests for 2 days? Hi there--Loss--Joel--? Have not received my listserv digest for either yesterday or today-- What's happening? Best, Anselm ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 22:51:55 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Bromige <dcmb@METRO.NET> Subject: Nick, are you there? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Calling Nick Piombino . . . Nick, I t h i n k you're on the List; hope so, I've mislaid your e-ddress. Write me! (Apologies for back channeling in public, y'all) db ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 23:02:06 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Marjorie Perloff <perloff@LELAND.STANFORD.EDU> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <199704090501.WAA26139@leland.Stanford.EDU> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII For those in the South Bay area or even north of it! Maeera Schreiber and Susan Dunn (both on this List) and I are sponsoring, with the help of eager undergrads, a Memorial for Allen this Friday (11th) at noon at White Plaza (between bookstore and Tressider Union--great outdoor space). We plan to have anyone who cares to read a favorite Ginsberg poem or say whatever s/he has to say. If you are coming from outside the campus (drive #280 to Alpine, right on Alpine to Junipero Serra, right on Junipero Serra to Campus Drive East--left on Campus drive into the campus; left on Mayfield to big parking lot from which you can almost see and probably hear activity in White Plaza). If you want to read, please call Ranita at the English Dept, 415-723-2635--so she can put your name on the sign-up sheet we have. It will be quite informal but we did want to do something. Best wishes, Marjorie Perloff ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 23:14:23 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Charles Alexander <chax@THERIVER.COM> Subject: come on down Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Since Maria Damon did mention that it was 5 degrees in Minnesota last night, and since it did get into the upper 70's here in Tucson today, I thought I'd mention that if anyone wants to hop on a plane and fly down this weekend (or drive down or train down or bus down), they might see: Friday, April 11 5pm until 8pm Chax Press & Cynthia Miller Open Studio 101 W. Sixth St., Tucson Books & Paintings & Prints & Broadsides on Display & Available for Purchase After the Open Studio will be live music & dancing, with music by Rainer, followed by Tony & The Torpedos (I know that Rainer is a really marvelous blues guitarist & singer/songwriter; I know nothing about Tony) Saturday, April 12 7pm Karen Mac Cormack & Steve McCaffery Poetry Reading Dinnerware Gallery 135 E. Congress St., Tucson Reception to follow the reading No charge, but donations gladly accepted reading sponsored by Chax Press & POG & looking ahead to May, when it may be somewhere between 80 & 90 degrees here, unless we get a hot spell Saturday, May 17 5pm David Bromige Poetry Reading Dinnerware Gallery 135 E. Congress St., Tucson Reception to follow the reading Sponsored by POG David Bromige will also be giving a workshop on the same weekend charles alexander / chax press / chax@theriver.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 10:12:48 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Maz881@AOL.COM Subject: wind on the way WASHINGTON (Reuter) - A large storm on the sun's surface probably will hit the earth's magnetic field Wednesday with the potential to disrupt communications satellites and power grids, NASA said. ``It's clearly a big event,'' said Don Savage, a spokesman for NASA's Office of Space Science. A large solar flare was blamed for the destruction of a broadcast satellite in January. Savage said matter blown off the face of the sun -- essentially a stream of ionized particles -- was expected to strike a ``glancing blow'' to the magnetic field that shields the Earth more than 100 miles from its surface. He said those who operate sensitive satellites and power grids had been warned to take unspecified steps to safeguard their operations through an established early-warning system that reports ``space weather.'' The solar storm was detected a couple of days ago by the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, a satellite that NASA and the European Space Agency launched in 1995 to keep a constant eye on the sun's surface. Savage said scientists still were calculating the precise arrival time of the solar impact, which was likely to produce a shimmering curtain of multi-colored light called an aurora over the North and South poles. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 10:41:07 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Re: Allen Ginsberg Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" i'll be there in spirit At 11:02 PM 4/8/97, Marjorie Perloff wrote: >For those in the South Bay area or even north of it! > >Maeera Schreiber and Susan Dunn (both on this List) and I are sponsoring, >with the help of eager undergrads, a Memorial for Allen this Friday (11th) >at noon at White Plaza (between bookstore and Tressider Union--great >outdoor space). We plan to have anyone who cares to read a favorite >Ginsberg poem or say whatever s/he has to say. > >If you are coming from outside the campus (drive #280 to Alpine, right on >Alpine to Junipero Serra, right on Junipero Serra to Campus Drive >East--left on Campus drive into the campus; left on Mayfield to big >parking lot from which you can almost see and probably hear activity in >White Plaza). If you want to read, please call Ranita at the English >Dept, 415-723-2635--so she can put your name on the sign-up sheet we have. > >It will be quite informal but we did want to do something. > >Best wishes, >Marjorie Perloff ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 10:43:55 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Re: wind on the way Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" thanks maz, i love this kind of info-thing; i feel compelled to ask the rhetorical question, though: why is this kind of info welcomed, along w/ silly jokes etc, on the poetix list, but when someone wants to talk about pound's or someone else's politics we're scolded that it "has nothing to do with poetix?" seems to me there's some very specific fears afoot that have nothing (and, of course, everything) to do with poetry. At 10:12 AM 4/9/97, Maz881@AOL.COM wrote: > WASHINGTON (Reuter) - A large storm on the sun's surface probably will hit >the earth's magnetic field Wednesday with the potential to disrupt >communications satellites and power grids, NASA said. > > ``It's clearly a big event,'' said Don Savage, a spokesman for NASA's >Office of Space Science. A large solar flare was blamed for the destruction >of a broadcast satellite in January. > > Savage said matter blown off the face of the sun -- essentially a stream >of ionized particles -- was expected to strike a ``glancing blow'' to the >magnetic field that shields the Earth more than 100 miles from its surface. > > He said those who operate sensitive satellites and power grids had been >warned to take unspecified steps to safeguard their operations through an >established early-warning system that reports ``space weather.'' > > The solar storm was detected a couple of days ago by the Solar and >Heliospheric Observatory, a satellite that NASA and the European Space Agency >launched in 1995 to keep a constant eye on the sun's surface. > > Savage said scientists still were calculating the precise arrival time of >the solar impact, which was likely to produce a shimmering curtain of >multi-colored light called an aurora over the North and South poles. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 11:59:06 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: William Burmeister Prod <burmeist@PLHP002.COMM.MOT.COM> Subject: Re: wind on the way In-Reply-To: Maz881@AOL.COM "wind on the way" (Apr 9, 10:12am) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii >WASHINGTON (Reuter) - A large storm on the sun's surface probably will hit >the earth's magnetic field Wednesday with the potential to disrupt >communications satellites and power grids, NASA said. > ``It's clearly a big event,'' said Don Savage, a spokesman for NASA's >Office of Space Science. A large solar flare was blamed for the destruction >of a broadcast satellite in January. > Savage said matter blown off the face of the sun -- essentially a stream >of ionized particles -- was expected to strike a ``glancing blow'' to the >magnetic field that shields the Earth more than 100 miles from its surface. > He said those who operate sensitive satellites and power grids had been >warned to take unspecified steps to safeguard their operations through an >established early-warning system that reports ``space weather.'' > The solar storm was detected a couple of days ago by the Solar and >Heliospheric Observatory, a satellite that NASA and the European Space Agency >launched in 1995 to keep a constant eye on the sun's surface. > Savage said scientists still were calculating the precise arrival time of >the solar impact, which was likely to produce a shimmering curtain of >multi-colored light called an aurora over the North and South poles. storm disrupt potential grids event spokesman flare for broadcast Savage matter blows strike shields fields stream unspecified space sensitive grid reports sun's eye shimmering arrival precise pole impact. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 13:23:51 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: CHRIS MANN <chrisman@INTERPORT.NET> In-Reply-To: <970409101242_-1804311488@emout04.mail.aol.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII for those who want to know, Chris Mann is at The Synagogue Space 108 E 1 7.30 Friday ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 10:41:33 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: The Stranger gets stranger In-Reply-To: <Pine.SUN.3.95.970409132034.8707A-100000@interport.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" For those of you in the Pacific Northwest, check out this week's lit section of Seattle's free weekly The Stranger--it contains articles by both db (on fountain pens) and kk (on John Wieners)--and lots of other interesting sounding stuff. Books editor Matthew Stadler is taking this lit section into new dimensions--i.e., the 90s. Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 13:08:41 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: robert zamsky <rzamsky@UNLGRAD1.UNL.EDU> Subject: Message to Maria D. Content-Type: text Sorry, for posting this to the entire list, but didn't know how else to get a message to maria d. Maria -- I don't know if you remember, but a few months ago I sent you a paper about Aime Cesaire that I had presented at a conference in Minneapolis. I was wondering if you'd received the paper, if you'd had time to read it, and if you found it at all interesting. I'm in a bit of a literary limbo right now, living in Nebraska, and relish any kind of intellectual stimulation I can gather. I'll be moving to Buffalo in May to start my PhD program in English in the fall. While i'm in e-limbo, i can be reached at the following address: racerx1@aol.com Thanks for your time. Robert Zamsky ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 12:05:33 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Carl Lynden Peters <clpeters@SFU.CA> Subject: Re: wind on the way In-Reply-To: <v01540b03af709651ba10@[128.101.215.176]> from "Maria Damon" at Apr 9, 97 10:43:55 am MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > thanks maz, i love this kind of info-thing; i feel compelled to ask the > rhetorical question, though: why is this kind of info welcomed, along w/ > silly jokes etc, on the poetix list, but when someone wants to talk about > pound's or someone else's politics we're scolded that it "has nothing to do > with poetix?" seems to me there's some very specific fears afoot that have > nothing (and, of course, everything) to do with poetry. maria, people here at sfu (save for a guy named george bowering, or is it george bowering) really dump on eliot. perhaps it's because there's a philosophical demon in works that are modern, and we have to know abt it, and not just post-modern it out of existence. c. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 14:22:06 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Poetic Offspring Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" tomorrow nite, thurs at 7, at the weisman museum of art at the U of minnesota, mpls, john mowitt, myself, joseph towns, edmond chow, anna reckin, carla homeister and maria (m.j.) fitzgerald will participate in a program of poetry designed to accompany the "critique of pure abstraction" exhibit currently at the weisman. mowitt will conceptualize abstraction/modernity, talk about mallarme, ponge, and mention language poets; i will talk about ginsberg and the Beats very dramatic rejection of abstraction, though through friendships and shared worlds there is an overlap or at least adjacency with certain abstract expressionist circles (ohara, etc), and i may read some bob kaufman poetry; the others will read from their own work. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 15:33:53 EST5EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: LYNES- KATHERINE <lynes@FAS-ENGLISH.RUTGERS.EDU> Organization: Rutgers University English Dept. Subject: Re: Nick, are you there? okay, so i've been shy long enough: what does "backchanneling" mean? kl, neophyte listserver David Bromige wrote: > Calling Nick Piombino . . . Nick, I t h i n k you're on the List; > hope so, I've mislaid your e-ddress. Write me! > > (Apologies for back channeling in public, y'all) db > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 15:56:08 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: luigi <r.drake@CSU-E.CSUOHIO.EDU> Subject: Re: Nick, are you there? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >okay, so i've been shy long enough: what does "backchanneling" mean? > kl, neophyte listserver > that's where you email your reply to just an individual, rather than to the whole list... it's the polite thing to do if your response is of a personal nature, or otherwise not likely to be of interest to the whole list... luigi ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 15:02:30 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Poetic Offspring The papers sound very intrersting. Would copies be available? > Date sent: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 14:22:06 +1000 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> > Subject: Poetic Offspring > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > tomorrow nite, thurs at 7, at the weisman museum of art at the U of > minnesota, mpls, john mowitt, myself, joseph towns, edmond chow, anna > reckin, carla homeister and maria (m.j.) fitzgerald will participate in a > program of poetry designed to accompany the "critique of pure abstraction" > exhibit currently at the weisman. mowitt will conceptualize > abstraction/modernity, talk about mallarme, ponge, and mention language > poets; i will talk about ginsberg and the Beats very dramatic rejection of > abstraction, though through friendships and shared worlds there is an > overlap or at least adjacency with certain abstract expressionist circles > (ohara, etc), and i may read some bob kaufman poetry; the others will read > from their own work. > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 13:37:05 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Mark Weiss <junction@EARTHLINK.NET> Subject: Re: Nick, are you there? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Courtesy demands that anything salacious, however, should be sent to the whole list. At 03:56 PM 4/8/97 -0600, you wrote: >>okay, so i've been shy long enough: what does "backchanneling" mean? >> kl, neophyte listserver >> > >that's where you email your reply to just an individual, rather than >to the whole list... it's the polite thing to do if your response is >of a personal nature, or otherwise not likely to be of interest to the >whole list... > >luigi > > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 15:59:04 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Re: Poetic Offspring Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" well it's not really a formal thing, we're not spozed to take more than 10 minutes apiece so i doubt there'll be actual papers. if ur in the eighborhodd tho drop by soory abt spelling. At 3:02 PM 4/9/97, KENT JOHNSON wrote: >The papers sound very intrersting. Would copies be available? > >> Date sent: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 14:22:06 +1000 >> Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group >><POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> >> From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> >> Subject: Poetic Offspring >> To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > >> tomorrow nite, thurs at 7, at the weisman museum of art at the U of >> minnesota, mpls, john mowitt, myself, joseph towns, edmond chow, anna >> reckin, carla homeister and maria (m.j.) fitzgerald will participate in a >> program of poetry designed to accompany the "critique of pure abstraction" >> exhibit currently at the weisman. mowitt will conceptualize >> abstraction/modernity, talk about mallarme, ponge, and mention language >> poets; i will talk about ginsberg and the Beats very dramatic rejection of >> abstraction, though through friendships and shared worlds there is an >> overlap or at least adjacency with certain abstract expressionist circles >> (ohara, etc), and i may read some bob kaufman poetry; the others will read >> from their own work. >> ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 17:39:43 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "P.Standard Schaefer" <SSSCHAEFER@AOL.COM> Subject: C.O.N.S. To Nick Piombino, Steve Carl, Avery Burns and others who have asked/been asked: THE COLLEGE OF NEGLECTED SCIENCE (In conjunction with Ribot) is hosting a conference on History (a literary conference). May 2nd and May 3rd on Catalina Island. The conference is open to everyone. Discussion Topics: Friday 3:30 pm FORM-INFORM OR DEFORM moderator: Dennis Phillips Saturday 10:00 am HISTORY AND POLITICS: RE-EVALAUATING THE READER moderator: Paul Vangelisti Saturday 1:30 pm POETRY AND BEAUTY: TRANSGRESSION OR ACCOMODATION Saturday 4:00 p.m CLOSING readings and art viewing on history Discussions, poems, papers will be published in issue #6 of Ribot (pronounced ree-bow). Anyone interested in attending should contact The Catalina Canyon Resort at (800)253-9361 A.S.A.P. to reserve a room. Rooms are $89 per night, two persons per room. Deposit is refundable in 72 hours advance. Ferry tickets need also be purchased to reach Catalina. All questions can be handled by Paul Vangelisti (213) 550-1616. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 18:02:44 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Michael Boughn <mboughn@CHASS.UTORONTO.CA> Subject: Re: wind on the way In-Reply-To: <v01540b03af709651ba10@[128.101.215.176]> from "Maria Damon" at Apr 9, 97 10:43:55 am MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > thanks maz, i love this kind of info-thing; i feel compelled to ask the > rhetorical question, though: why is this kind of info welcomed, along w/ > silly jokes etc, on the poetix list, but when someone wants to talk about > pound's or someone else's politics we're scolded that it "has nothing to do > with poetix?" seems to me there's some very specific fears afoot that have > nothing (and, of course, everything) to do with poetry. Call me bemused, but this representation seems a little self-serving, Maria. Anytime you want to talk about anything, you're welcomed here, as far as I have seen. As far as addessing Dorn's or Pound's or my or your or anybody else's politics--i.e. their work--hooray and hooray. In so far as I, or others, have seemed to scold, it's been when the conversation degenerated into who heard whom say what at the head of a table at some banquet I was never at, and on the basis of which we're all supposed to get together and punch people out. Where I come from there's names for that, but none of them are _political discourse_. The problem for me is that some people seem to be implying that we shouldn't even read certain texts because of moralisitic imputations about the author's character. You want to talk about politics in The Cantos, or politics in Gunslinger or Tales of Gran Apacheria, hey, let's go. Any time. Mike mboughn@chass.utoronto ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 17:13:46 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Steve Carll <sjcarll@SLIP.NET> Subject: Golden Gate Park reading April 5 Comments: To: poetics@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu, maz881@aol.com, CHRIS1929W@aol.com, Levyaa@is.nyu.edu, kunos@lanminds.com, sab5@psu.edu, mwinter@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu, fittermn@is.nyu.edu, wmfuller@ix.netcom.com, lease@HUSC.HARVARD.EDU, daviesk@is4.NYU.EDU, Daniel_Bouchard@hmco.com, drothschild@penguin.com, jdavis@panix.com, jms@acmenet.net, maj6916@u.cc.utah.edu, AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM, jarnot@pipeline.com, lgoodman@acsu.buffalo.edu, lppl@aol.com, kristinb@wired.com, cyanosis@slip.net, aburns@fnbank.com, acornford@igc.org, jmcnally@postoffice.ptd.net, 103730.2033@compuserve.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" (Full disclosure: This was a reading to celebrate the publication of my magazine, _Antenym_) "Greatest reading EVER" some said--no, wait, that was what I was dreaming some said before I woke up Saturday morning. You couldn't have asked for more perfect weather (in San Francisco, anyway) to send the literati out blinking into the sunlight to hear live poetry outdoors. Everyone seemed to find the clearing in the Redwood Grove without getting lost in the wilder regions of the park, and we got started at about 1:30. Chris Daniels was so excited he almost started before I had a chance to introduce him, but relented and let me tell the audience he was about to read. He read translations he did from the Portugese of Max Martins and Fernando Pessoa under a few of his heteronyms. The birds chirped at his every word. Next up was Elizabeth Robinson, who, like me, is in the process of moving. For Elizabeth, this meant she had no final versions of any poems, except the ones in _Antenym 12_. So she read those, plus several draft versions of other poems--these were all from her "EAR" series of poems whose titles and end-rhymes she cut from Edwin Arlington Robinson poems and rewrote the rest of the bodies of. The grass grew at her every word. After the hat passing (thanks to Pat Reed for the hat) Darin DeStefano gave a strong, emotional reading prefaced by the story of an experience he had in this spot in the park involving a friend, a flock of blue jays, a piece of glass, and his guilt feelings at being human in a world of nature. He finished with a beautiful, freshly-written poem with stars and dogs in it, and then, for an encore, performed another new piece with John McNally (on the last day of his visit from New Jersey). "Treason! Treason!" they shouted. The redwoods released perfume to censer their every word. Present aside from Mother Nature and the abovementioned were Benjamin Hollander and his two lovely children, Eric Selland, Mary Sullivan-Roark, Laurel Beymer, Kristin Burkart, Miranda, and George Albon. ********************************** sjcarll@slip.net Steve Carll http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/mags/antenym http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/ezines/antenym In seed- sense the sea stars you out, innermost, forever. --Paul Celan ********************************** ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 17:27:21 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Bromige <dcmb@METRO.NET> Subject: Nick Found Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Many thanks to all who posted in with Signor Piombino's number. db ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 19:33:35 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Christopher Alexander <calexand@ALEXANDRIA.LIB.UTAH.EDU> Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: Nick, are you there? MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT luigi wrrt: > that's where you email your reply to just an individual, rather than > to the whole list... it's the polite thing to do if your response is > of a personal nature, or otherwise not likely to be of interest to the > whole list... you know, luigi, you *could* have backchanneled this. I mean, it's not likely to be of interest to the whole list... (chuckle) chris .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 20:56:07 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Comments: Authenticated sender is <lvr20960@u.cc.utah.edu> From: "linda v. russo" <Linda.Russo@M.CC.UTAH.EDU> Organization: University of Utah Subject: Allen Ginsburg MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT > . . . But we see what life he continues to > have as anecdote and eulogy flood in; and it was never clearer that he > belongs to the ages. . . I was going to refrain from sharing my Ginsburg story, as it is wednesday already -- but I'm appreciating & enjoying & admiring the pileup -- accrued while I was at the DU conference -- which I am just now in the thick of. & since i shared a stage with AG -- here goes: about 5 years he read at the Boston Public Library -- I was one of the last to slip through the door & was being graciously ordered to leave by institutional security musclemen because there were no seats & i was refusing to leave because i was just this one body -- how could i break a fire code? -- the floor in the auditorium does not count as a seat -- I could join the others upstairs and watch him televised! --There were, however, a few unoccupied seats on the stage & AG invited me to take one. I was psyched of course at the time, i had the best seat in the house -- but it wasn't until reading what listservefolks have to say that I realize very few *famous* people would've done that -- would've even thought to do that. -- l. -- linda v. russo linda.russo@m.cc.utah.edu ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 21:38:33 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Christopher Alexander <calexand@ALEXANDRIA.LIB.UTAH.EDU> Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: denver conference etc... MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT joe et. al.-- guess you (joe) got back a lot faster than we did, thanks to "inclimate weather" ["oxymoronic"] in wyoming. ended up stuck in some motel room in cheyenne sunday night that smelled like "air freshener", otherwise known as "carcinogens" ["not as catchy but"]. we both missed work mundane but made it home in one piece despite h3eavy winds & the fact that we were driving a volkswagon. all of which is preparation for saying that since you beat us to the punch er post, & because I'm terribly lazy, I'll just respond. "words fail me", or vice versa. I was a bit more impressed with graff's presentation, though I, too, was dissatisfied to see the adjunctification issue, which should be foremost in our minds, remain at the margins. it does seem that this problem has everything to do with conflict both within & between departments, yet it only came up, in the presentation & the following discussion, obliquely, specifically in reference to the question of a "level playing field", so to speak, i.e., would adjunct faculty dare to dispute tenured profs etc. it's not that the question of institutional power isn't important, particularly with regard to an orientation toward inter-/intra-departmental conflict, but the power question might profitably lead us to other questions, such as why are we allowing this to happen & what are others of us doing about it & what are we going to do about it & when? but graff's emphasis on conflict, if not new to me & probably many others in the audience [at times I felt "preaching to the converted"], is still well-taken. coming as I have through two departments where the rift between scholars, critics, & "creative" writers was/is absolute--& here it might be appropriate to say that where I found marjorie's examples hopeful to say the least, I also consider them exceptional in the extreme--I still think graff's model a very useful one, certainly worth articulating. as far as *this* medium & it's apparent value in facilitating dialogue between the parties in question,--I'll have to consider it. my first reaction is to say that this list plays out its own conflicts, some of them very serious & very important to me, but none quite identical to the institutional discourse graff is looking for. then again, I can think of conversations here that partake of just these problems, as for example Artists Versus Cultural Studies which we had not too long ago & which was pretty good actually. marjorie's paper was exemplary & a real pleasure. I look forward to its publication, which is sure to provoke response on the list, & I look forward to that response. beyond my usual fascination with spurious texts, I have to say that the yasusada work strikes me as a wonderful example of humor in the service of critique--a beautiful time bomb which I'd actually love to teach at some point. apropos of which, I thought bin ramke gave a very good paper on the literary hoax & contemporary notions of authorship, & this on a comically mixed panel, opposite a young man who was apparently arguing for art's facility to help us develop "a decent commonsense" etc at which most of us seemed to shrug our shoulders. sometimes one doesn't know where to begin to dispute. similar experience with the first speaker on joe's panel--who, by the way, that is, joe, gave an great paper, one of the most exciting presentations of the weekend imho, a very strong & well-executed critique of the rhetoric of craft in so-called "creative" writing departments--the hardcopy of which I have at hand & will soon be reading. joe also--humble joe who wouldn't even mention that he had presented--gave one of the best 2 readings that I got to see last weekend, of a piece called "glue" & an excerpt from his forthcoming book which he really ought to tell us about. my other favorite reading was given by laura mullen, from a gothic verse-novel in progress, which work was amazing--I'm an old lovecraft fan, but I had no idea such stuff could actually be, well, so goddamn'd good or interesting, let alone push boundaries other than those of space-time & sanity (but maybe that's an inside joke?). I missed linda russo's reading, (though I was given a preview of the work), but I was there to see her give an excellent paper on the poetry of kathleen fraser & the question of a feminist poetics. whew. I'm almost as tired from writing this post as I am from the whole conference. a few more things: yes, the "postfeminist cyborgs" gave some good readings & a provocative (inflammatory?) presentation, which was also a presentation for their site: www.pfplayground.com I'd highly recommend a visit ["_I'm_ linking up to it..."], though in saying that I certainly don't mean to imply that I'm in full agreement with either the use they make of theory or the conclusions they draw from that use. I have to admit, I was so taken with their "in your face" attitude ["an all us ex-punk rockers"], but it might take me awhile to digest their work. as to a reconciliation? someone mentioned, I mentioned or someone "preaching to the converted"--possibly, but that's a caricature too. in some ways it does seem to me, in fact, that we reproduced the problems we came together to address--exemplified by the opposition of readings & panels, the fact that at least one of the writers I knew there probably didn't attend any of the panels, the way fiction writers would sort of show up as the middle reader in a panel without a lot of discussion as to the relation between the materials at hand, or with, in some cases, a generous amount of defensive posturing. I could, in the spirit of graff's paper, have stood to see more conflict & less silent contradiction--but then again, I didn't stand up to foster it, either. on the other hand, there were some very positive elements to the whole which counterbalance my natural pessimism, if not entirely, a few very good discussions came out of it apropos the dis-/union of writing & theory both institutionally & in the act etc, & I anticipate a few from the conference listserve-- which, by the way, I haven't heard about yet (it's only wednesday), but which I will bring to the attention of this list at such a time as etc. well, apologies are probably in order for such a long posting, if anyone, that is, has actually read this far. one wonders with email. chris .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 22:28:58 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA> Subject: Re: Allen GinsbErg In-Reply-To: <199704100254.UAA16861@gos.oz.cc.utah.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ginsbErg ginsbErg ginsbErg With an E. The way it is written on the covers of his books. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 23:00:10 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: denver conference etc... Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dear Chris Alexander and Joe Amato, hi, it's Kevin Killian. Between the two of you, I now have a feel for what happened at this "Denver Conference." I have to ask, also, did you two fellows reach a consensus with each other about not using capitalization? Or is this a total, adjunct *coincidence*? just kidding, kevin k. By the way, is Lisel Mueller on this list? How about that Lisel walking away with the Pulitzer Prize for poetry! Congratulations, Lisel, and please send your autograph. not kidding, kevin k. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 23:57:34 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Bromige <dcmb@METRO.NET> Subject: The Don Allan Anthology Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Come on, George, the allusion was to the Don Allan Anthology, you know, the one with John Ashberry in it, and Robert Creely, and Charles Olsen, and Denise Leverton. bd. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 16:48:01 +0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Schuchat Simon <schuchat@MAIL.AIT.ORG.TW> Subject: Re: The Don Allan Anthology In-Reply-To: <v01540b00af70d18f5201@[205.138.228.113]> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, David Bromige wrote: > Come on, George, the allusion was to the Don Allan Anthology, you know, the > one with John Ashberry in it, and Robert Creely, and Charles Olsen, and > Denise Leverton. bd. > Right, that's the one with Franco Harris too ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 02:36:39 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Rachel Loden <rloden@CONCENTRIC.NET> Subject: Re: The Don Allan Anthology MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit David Bromige wrote: > > Come on, George, the allusion was to the Don Allan Anthology, you know, the > one with John Ashberry in it, and Robert Creely, and Charles Olsen, and > Denise Leverton. bd. John Weiners, too. Raquel ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 08:10:39 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Sylvester Pollet <pollet@MAINE.MAINE.EDU> Subject: Re: The Don Allan Anthology Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" And let's not forget Joel Oppen! >David Bromige wrote: >> >> Come on, George, the allusion was to the Don Allan Anthology, you know, the >> one with John Ashberry in it, and Robert Creely, and Charles Olsen, and >> Denise Leverton. bd. > >John Weiners, too. > >Raquel ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 08:56:09 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Chris Stroffolino <CHRIS1929W@AOL.COM> Subject: LAURA NYRO (one child born to carry on, etc....) I just heard on the radio this morning that LAURA NYRO (who wrote "I swear there ain't no heaven and I pray there ain't no hell") died on tuesday at the age of 49..... Does anybody know anything about this? What she died of, etc? I'd appreciate any info......"And all I ask of dying is to go naturally...." -----------chris stroffolino ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 09:56:45 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Diane Marie Ward <dward@ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Subject: Re: LAURA NYRO (one child born to carry on, etc....) In-Reply-To: <970410085609_-567858832@emout13.mail.aol.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I believe Dan Rather said last night Nyro had ovarian cancer. Diane-Marie Ward sunny SUNY Buffalo On Thu, 10 Apr 1997, Chris Stroffolino wrote: > I just heard on the radio this morning that LAURA NYRO (who wrote "I swear > there ain't no heaven and I pray there ain't no hell") died on tuesday at the > age of 49..... > Does anybody know anything about this? What she died of, etc? > I'd appreciate any info......"And all I ask of dying is to go naturally...." > -----------chris stroffolino > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 08:04:16 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Douglas Barbour <doug.barbour@UALBERTA.CA> Subject: Re: wind on the way Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Reading this just after Maria's post: Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 11:59:06 -0400 From: William Burmeister Prod <burmeist@PLHP002.COMM.MOT.COM> Subject: Re: wind on the way MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii >WASHINGTON (Reuter) - A large storm on the sun's surface probably will hit >the earth's magnetic field Wednesday with the potential to disrupt >communications satellites and power grids, NASA said. > ``It's clearly a big event,'' said Don Savage, a spokesman for NASA's >Office of Space Science. A large solar flare was blamed for the destruction >of a broadcast satellite in January. > Savage said matter blown off the face of the sun -- essentially a stream >of ionized particles -- was expected to strike a ``glancing blow'' to the >magnetic field that shields the Earth more than 100 miles from its surface. > He said those who operate sensitive satellites and power grids had been >warned to take unspecified steps to safeguard their operations through an >established early-warning system that reports ``space weather.'' > The solar storm was detected a couple of days ago by the Solar and >Heliospheric Observatory, a satellite that NASA and the European Space Agency >launched in 1995 to keep a constant eye on the sun's surface. > Savage said scientists still were calculating the precise arrival time of >the solar impact, which was likely to produce a shimmering curtain of >multi-colored light called an aurora over the North and South poles. storm disrupt potential grids event spokesman flare for broadcast Savage matter blows strike shields fields stream unspecified space sensitive grid reports sun's eye shimmering arrival precise pole impact. I'd have to say that this seems a good enough reason for running such news. But your question strikes home, Maria, & I can only say I find just about everything on the list intriguing on some level or other, but especially I thought the arguments about poetics & politics worth carrying on. ============================================================================= Douglas Barbour the precision of openness Department of English is not a vagueness University of Alberta it is an accumulation Edmonton Alberta T6G 2E5 cumulous (403) 492 2181 FAX:(403) 492 8142 bpNichol H: 436 3320 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 08:12:19 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Christopher Alexander <calexand@ALEXANDRIA.LIB.UTAH.EDU> Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: Allen GinsbErg MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT > With an E. The way it is written on the covers of his books. oh, lighten up fer chrissake gEorgE. or is this one of those instances where I'm misreading your tone, which sounds, from here, distinctly sanctimonious. chris .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 10:20:34 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Field of Roses <charyk@INFORAMP.NET> Subject: Re: LAURA NYRO (one child born to carry on, etc....) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >I just heard on the radio this morning that LAURA NYRO (who wrote "I swear >there ain't no heaven and I pray there ain't no hell") died on tuesday at the >age of 49..... >Does anybody know anything about this? What she died of, etc? >I'd appreciate any info......"And all I ask of dying is to go naturally...." According to Toronto's Globe and Mail, Nyro died on Tuesday at her home in Danbury Conn. She had been battling ovarian cancer. The funeral arrangements, which are expected to be private are as yet incomplete. A sad week of these events. Linda Charyk Rosenfeld ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 08:21:25 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Christopher Alexander <calexand@ALEXANDRIA.LIB.UTAH.EDU> Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: denver conference etc... MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT kevin wrett: > I have to ask, also, did you two fellows reach a consensus with each other > about not using capitalization? Or is this a total, adjunct *coincidence*? actually, kevin,I was intimidated into it by joe in what is clearly an abuse of institutional authority. chris .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 10:22:18 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Steven Marks <swmar@CONNCOLL.EDU> Subject: Re: LAURA NYRO (one child born to carry on, etc....) In-Reply-To: <970410085609_-567858832@emout13.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 10 Apr 1997, Chris Stroffolino wrote: > I just heard on the radio this morning that LAURA NYRO (who wrote "I swear > there ain't no heaven and I pray there ain't no hell") died on tuesday at the > age of 49..... > Does anybody know anything about this? What she died of, etc? > I'd appreciate any info......"And all I ask of dying is to go naturally...." > -----------chris stroffolino > Only what I read in my local paper. She died from ovarian cancer. Had hits with Blood, Sweat and Tears, the Fifth Dimension, and Barbra Streisand! Article said she was one of the first singer-songwriters along with Joni Mitchell. Steven __________________________________________________ Steven Marks http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html __________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 10:35:33 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU> Subject: EPR ? Anybody know what's happening with Electronic Poetry Review? another issue coming out ever? Please backchannel, unless you think your information is of profound importance to the entire list and the southeastern quadrangle of the Milky Way also. Thanks - Captain Kwirk. Henry_Gould@brown.edu p.s. comet approaching up Waterman Ave. they turn left on red in Rhode Island. focus quasar shield factor 10.... NOW. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 10:47:23 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Kellogg <kellogg@ACPUB.DUKE.EDU> Subject: Re: LAURA NYRO (one child born to carry on, etc....) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 08:56 AM 4/10/97 -0400, Chris Stroffolino wrote: >I just heard on the radio this morning that LAURA NYRO (who wrote "I swear >there ain't no heaven and I pray there ain't no hell") died on tuesday at the >age of 49..... >Does anybody know anything about this? What she died of, etc? >I'd appreciate any info......"And all I ask of dying is to go naturally...." Ovarian cancer. Best, David ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ David Kellogg kellogg@acpub.duke.edu Box 90023, Duke University (919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708 FAX (919) 660-4381 http://www.duke.edu/~kellogg/ There is no mantle and it does not descend. --Thomas Kinsella ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 10:07:00 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" <pritchpa@SILVERPLUME.IIX.COM> Subject: Re: LAURA NYRO (one child born to carry Comments: To: Chris Stroffolino <CHRIS1929W@AOL.COM> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN According to the paper, she died of ovarian cancer. A sad loss, indeed. Also in my paper today - did anyone else see this? - a column by the excerable George Will about Ginsberg which made me see red. What a perfect little shit Mr. Will is. Tom Mandel, you are in Washington. Would you please deliver him a way overdue "pop to the puss?" ---------- From: Chris Stroffolino To: POETICS Subject: LAURA NYRO (one child born to carry on, etc....) Date: Thursday, April 10, 1997 8:52AM I just heard on the radio this morning that LAURA NYRO (who wrote "I swear there ain't no heaven and I pray there ain't no hell") died on tuesday at the age of 49..... Does anybody know anything about this? What she died of, etc? I'd appreciate any info......"And all I ask of dying is to go naturally...." -----------chris stroffolino ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 10:20:58 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Re: wind on the way In-Reply-To: <v01540b06af7243961b17@[129.128.238.234]> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" yes indeed douglas it's a wonderful piece and thanks for your words. At 8:04 AM -0600 4/10/97, Douglas Barbour wrote: >Reading this just after Maria's post: > >Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 11:59:06 -0400 >From: William Burmeister Prod <burmeist@PLHP002.COMM.MOT.COM> >Subject: Re: wind on the way >MIME-Version: 1.0 >Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii > >>WASHINGTON (Reuter) - A large storm on the sun's surface probably will hit >>the earth's magnetic field Wednesday with the potential to disrupt >>communications satellites and power grids, NASA said. > >> ``It's clearly a big event,'' said Don Savage, a spokesman for NASA's >>Office of Space Science. A large solar flare was blamed for the destruction >>of a broadcast satellite in January. > >> Savage said matter blown off the face of the sun -- essentially a stream >>of ionized particles -- was expected to strike a ``glancing blow'' to the >>magnetic field that shields the Earth more than 100 miles from its surface. > >> He said those who operate sensitive satellites and power grids had been >>warned to take unspecified steps to safeguard their operations through an >>established early-warning system that reports ``space weather.'' > >> The solar storm was detected a couple of days ago by the Solar and >>Heliospheric Observatory, a satellite that NASA and the European Space Agency >>launched in 1995 to keep a constant eye on the sun's surface. > >> Savage said scientists still were calculating the precise arrival time of >>the solar impact, which was likely to produce a shimmering curtain of >>multi-colored light called an aurora over the North and South poles. > > > > > > storm disrupt potential grids > > > event spokesman flare for > > > broadcast Savage matter blows strike > > > shields fields stream unspecified space > > > sensitive grid reports sun's eye > > > shimmering arrival precise pole impact. > >I'd have to say that this seems a good enough reason for running such news. >But your question strikes home, Maria, & I can only say I find just about >everything on the list intriguing on some level or other, but especially I >thought the arguments about poetics & politics worth carrying on. > >============================================================================== >Douglas Barbour the precision of openness >Department of English is not a vagueness > >University of Alberta it is an accumulation >Edmonton Alberta T6G 2E5 cumulous >(403) 492 2181 FAX:(403) 492 8142 bpNichol >H: 436 3320 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 08:32:24 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: LAURA NYRO (one child born to carry on, etc....) In-Reply-To: <Pine.GUL.3.95.970410102002.18761A-100000@dsys.cc.conncoll.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" It's Kevin Killian. I adored Laura Nyro. I remember my father coming to me, a broken man, knocking on the door of my room, and saying, "Kevin, we know you have a right to listen to whatever music you want, and you're 13 now, but your mother and I have agreed to buy you a car if you promise a) to get out of the house more and b) to surrender those Laura Nyro albums." One of her records (or maybe it was the sleeve) was impressed with a strange haunting perfume. That scent put a spell on me. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 12:25:29 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Daniel Bouchard <Daniel_Bouchard@HMCO.COM> Subject: Will's column/ my reply Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII George F. Will, symptomatic symbol of "the Reagan Revolution" and other malignancies to human existence, will die someday just like Allen Ginsberg. He once wrote of Ginsberg's death with a sneering condescension which proved to readers several things, among them 1) he never read Allen Ginsberg, and 2) he felt threatened by the very IDEA of Ginsberg's work. George F. Will writes of Allen Ginsberg's life in market terms--that of being a "commodity." Confronted with the severe limitations of Will's intellect what is one to do? Will is a columnist who is paid well to write apologias for technocrats, thieves and murderers. Any person whose life work consisted of promoting peace and charity toward his fellows must by necessity be "the enemy." With a change in particulars, Will could have a written a similar column on the death of Christ--'that long-haired preaching radical got His just desserts!' To Ginsberg's credit however, he never claimed to be the Son of God (to my knowledge). George F. Will, soldier of American Values, will be forgotten a month after his death. Allen Ginsberg's poetry will live and grow in the heart's of readers. Fuck George F. Will. daniel_bouchard@hmco.com __________ The Ginsberg Commodity By George F. Will Wednesday, April 9 1997; Page A21 The Washington Post Allen Ginsberg, symptomatic symbol of the "beat generation" and other intellectual fads, died last Saturday at age 70. He once wrote, "I'm so lucky to be nutty." Actually, his pose of paranoia was not luck, it was a sound career move. It became big box office with his famous declamation of his poem "Howl" in San Francisco in 1955. That was the year "Rock Around the Clock," in the soundtrack to the movie "The Blackboard Jungle," helped launch what was to become the third element in the trinity of '60s ecstasies -- sex, drugs and rock-and-roll. Ginsberg made the first two his projects. He composed "Howl" with the help of a cocktail of peyote, amphetamines and Dexedrine. Thirty years later his reward for a career of execrating American values and works was a six-figure contract for a volume of his collected poetry. It is a distinctive American genius, this ability to transmute attempted subversion into a marketable commodity. The adjective "beat" was appropriated by Jack Kerouac from a drug-addicted Times Square thief and male prostitute, who meant by it the condition of being exhausted by existence. (That man's existence must have been wearying.) Kerouac attached the adjective to the noun "generation," emulating Gertrude Stein's identification of the "lost generation" of the 1920s. Soon Life magazine, happy to find some titillating unhappiness in a decade defined by Eisenhower's smile, was writing about the beats as "The Only Revolution Around." That's entertainment. Back then, poetry commanded crowds. In his book "When the Going Was Good: American Life in the 1950s," Jeffrey Hart, now a professor of English at Dartmouth, wrote: "Robert Frost strode onto the stage at Carnegie Hall to a standing ovation from an overflow house. . . . One night in 1957, T. S. Eliot was reading his poems to an overflow audience in Columbia's McMillin Theater. Even faculty members had difficulty getting tickets, and people were crowded into the windows and doors, and listening outside to Eliot over loudspeakers. . . . Dylan Thomas stood at the podium . . . his third American tour in two years." When Ginsberg came to Columbia "there was a vast throng that had been unable to get in. They pounded on the doors and milled around. Ticket-holders entered between lines of police." Today no poet could cause such excitement on any campus, or any other American venue, so complete has been the supplanting of words, written and spoken, by music and movies as preferred modes of communication. One of Ginsberg's young acolytes, Robert Zimmerman of Hibbing, Minn., put the dissenting impulse to music as Bob Dylan. Some beats wrote the way some jazz musicians made music, in the heat of chemically assisted improvisation. Truman Capote's famous dismissal of Kerouac's work -- "That isn't writing at all, it's typing" -- had a point. Granted, Kerouac revised "On the Road" for six years before it was published in 1957. However, fueled by Benzedrine, he wrote the first draft of that novel in 1951 in less than three weeks, as one long single-spaced paragraph -- 120 feet long on 12-foot strips of tracing paper taped together. Here is its beginning: "I first met Dean not long after my wife and I split up. I had just gotten over a serious illness that I won't bother to talk about, except that it had something to do with the miserably weary split-up and my feeling that everything was dead." Does that tone of voice seem familiar? Here is the beginning of a novel published in 1951, the year of Kerouac's typing frenzy: "If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth." Yes, "The Catcher in the Rye." Holden Caulfield, adolescent scold, strong in disapproving "phonies," was a precursor of the beats with their passion for "authenticity," which to Ginsberg meant howling echoes of whatever constituted coffeehouse radicalism of the moment. ("Slaves of Plastic! . . . Striped tie addicts! . . . Whiskey freaks bombed out on 530 billion cigarettes a year. . . . Steak swallowers zonked on Television!") With a talent that rarely rose to mediocrity, but with a flair for vulgar exhibitionism, Ginsberg shrewdly advertised his persona as a symptom of a dysfunctional society. He died full of honors, including a front-page (and a full page inside) obituary in the New York Times, a symptom to the end. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 12:54:36 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Charles Bernstein <bernstei@BWAY.NET> Subject: Re: LAURA NYRO (one child born to carry on, etc....) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Gee, my parents thought I should get out of the house more too! Nyro is being played quite a bit on the radio here in New York City, and especially WFUV; the NYTimes obituary is pretty good. As for that perfume, I checked and there is no trace left on my copy of "Eli and the Thirteenth Confession". The absence of this aroma has conjured for me many blank memories. >It's Kevin Killian. I adored Laura Nyro. I remember my father coming to >me, a broken man, knocking on the door of my room, and saying, "Kevin, we >know you have a right to listen to whatever music you want, and you're 13 >now, but your mother and I have agreed to buy you a car if you promise a) >to get out of the house more and b) to surrender those Laura Nyro albums." > >One of her records (or maybe it was the sleeve) was impressed with a >strange haunting perfume. That scent put a spell on me. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 13:20:15 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Gwyn McVay <gmcvay1@OSF1.GMU.EDU> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply In-Reply-To: <85256475.0058279F.00@krypton.hmco.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII If you recall, Will also dissed Jerry Garcia upon his death in 1995. Will seems to enjoy the rhetorical stance of taking potshots at overweight bearded nearsighted dead guys. (Or maybe it's counterculture heroes who have stayed heroes? nah--) Gwyn ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 12:31:00 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" <pritchpa@SILVERPLUME.IIX.COM> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply Comments: To: Daniel Bouchard <Daniel_Bouchard@HMCO.COM> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN Daniel, that is beautifully, forcifully said. Will's outrageous assault should not go without a public response. I intend to write him personally and I suggest others do the same. For all the difference it will make. Still, better to speak out then mutter in one's room. Patrick Pritchett ---------- From: Daniel Bouchard To: POETICS Subject: Will's column/ my reply Date: Thursday, April 10, 1997 12:15PM George F. Will, symptomatic symbol of "the Reagan Revolution" and other malignancies to human existence, will die someday just like Allen Ginsberg. He once wrote of Ginsberg's death with a sneering condescension which proved to readers several things, among them 1) he never read Allen Ginsberg, and 2) he felt threatened by the very IDEA of Ginsberg's work. George F. Will writes of Allen Ginsberg's life in market terms--that of being a "commodity." Confronted with the severe limitations of Will's intellect what is one to do? Will is a columnist who is paid well to write apologias for technocrats, thieves and murderers. Any person whose life work consisted of promoting peace and charity toward his fellows must by necessity be "the enemy." With a change in particulars, Will could have a written a similar column on the death of Christ--'that long-haired preaching radical got His just desserts!' To Ginsberg's credit however, he never claimed to be the Son of God (to my knowledge). George F. Will, soldier of American Values, will be forgotten a month after his death. Allen Ginsberg's poetry will live and grow in the heart's of readers. Fuck George F. Will. daniel_bouchard@hmco.com ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 12:51:37 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply In-Reply-To: <85256475.0058279F.00@krypton.hmco.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 12:25 PM -0400 4/10/97, Daniel Bouchard wrote: To Ginsberg's credit however, >he never claimed to be the Son of God (to my knowledge). > he should have. (tho no more so than anyone else) the will article is indeed one of the meanest-spirited, pointless wastes of print space i've ever seen.--md ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 11:15:55 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Mark Weiss <junction@EARTHLINK.NET> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Thanks, I guess, for the George Will piece. Indulge me while I say what may be obvious. This is not really about Allen--it's about Allen as symbol for all of the unsettling things that happened in the sixties, with its "trinity of...ecstasies--sex, drugs and rock-and-roll," that caused the "decade defined by Eisenhower's smile" to unravel. It's Will's grand theme, and the grand theme of a lot of conservatives, who ascribe everything that they dislike in America to excessive license, of which anything improvisatory, be it jazz, or Allen's poetry, or _On the Road_, is an example. The intent of the reference to _Catcher in the Rye_ may be opaque to some list members. It's the type case of what went wrong from the point of view of Wills and his like. Not only did it suggest that there might be something wrong with "the decade typified by Eisenhower's smile," filled with "titillating unhappiness" (that rare commodity back then) as it is, but it exposes to the public at large that adolescents (surprise!) are obsessed with sex. And there's a dirty word in it, which was a very rare phenomenon back then, when the postal service often effectively acted as censor by refusing to ship books it found offensive. It was banned from libraries and schools, and teachers got in trouble for assigning it to their classes. _Catcher in the Rye_, like _Howl_ and _On the Road_, were nails in the coffin for the peaceable kingdom as imagined by Wills and company. After their appearance license was abroad in the land: peopled dressed in ways that blurred class and gender distinction, they engaged in civil and not-so-civil disobedience, they had no respect for authority, and they had fun. Sexuality of all kinds came out of the closet, and sublimation as an ideal went out the window. For those who don't remember, Freud had the odd notion that no learning could happen unless the student repressed all sexuality--something like the the idea of a limited life-energy that needs to be husbanded. (The need for this repression was limited, of course, to the middle and upper classes--the working class, which was the vast majority in his day, could, and did, wallow like beasts as much as they wished, in his view.) American conservatives are scandalized by Freud--you mean children are sexual? parents think those things?--but they find the notion of sublimation comforting. But I digress. If only the media had been more responsible, by not publishing the offending books, and certainly by not publicizing them, none of the bad things would have happened. But they were published, and the bad things did happen. And conservative idealogues have been trying to undo the damage by rewriting history ever since. Saddest in Will's piece is his inability to read the words with pleasure. Poor George learned from the Jesuits to appreciate certain rhetorical structures. Somehow he got the idea that those structures were the only ones permitted; I don't think that that's the intent of Jesuit education. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 13:12:18 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Dale Smith <dales@TECHWORKS.COM> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Actually, as pig-headed as Will is, his piece on GinsbErg does attempt to locate the poet within the cultural market in which he participated. And his implication of Ginsberg as a culture industry cynosure is not entirely off the mark. Ginsberg was a cultural icon, a marketable commodity. I remember seeing huge billboards in San Francisco with Ginsberg's image selling Gap khaki pants. His warmth and affability also made him an attractive PR spokesman for a group of writers in the 50's. He attracted the kind of media attention Kerouac would have preferred to avoid. But promotion is, you know, how to stay in business. And poetry is still affected by a relentless economic structure. What's interesting, and what Will doesn't mention, is how the culture industry makes its own social subversion into a marketable commodity. The other relevant moment in the article is when Will writes: " When Ginsberg came to Columbia 'there was a vast throng that had been unable to get in. They pounded on the doors and milled around. Ticket-holders entered between lines of police.' Today no poet could cause such excitement on any campus, or any other American venue, so complete has been the supplanting of words, written and spoken, by music and movies as preferred modes of communication." This is a perfectly candid statement to hear as a poet, but the implication is that Ginsberg's writing is partially responisble for a deterioration in values which has made the market more open to the movies than poetry. Wills doesn't follow up on this point, but I find it an important acknowledgement of poetry's inability to maintain prominence in a market Ginsberg implicitly condoned and benefitted from. Anyway, the rest of Will's piece falls apart with the Kerouac quotes, (he couldn't find Ginsberg quotes?), which are out of place and confusing because, well, Will wants to say Ginsberg sucks, but he can't say 'sucks' in public. All of this leads me, however, to Maria Damon's statement about poetry and politics. How does one fight for social change and still survive as an individual in a corrupt economic system? How do the contradictions of political integrity and economic survival play out in the works of dedicated poets? The contradictory impulses in Ginsberg's life reveal the difficult position facing poets today. Somewhere, between our ideals and the necessity of the dollar, our lives and art are made. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 13:12:51 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Allen GinsbErg Linda: For what it's worth, I've spelled Allen's last name with a "u" instead of an "e" a few times myself. I've blanked and used the wrong letters in other many-covered names as well. (And so, I'm sure, have lots of other fairly well-read people on this list!) Thanks for the thoughtful and warm post on AG in Boston. Kent > Date sent: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 22:28:58 -0700 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA> > Subject: Re: Allen GinsbErg > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > ginsbErg > > ginsbErg > > ginsbErg > > > With an E. The way it is written on the covers of his books. > > > > > George Bowering. > , > 2499 West 37th Ave., > Vancouver, B.C., > Canada V6M 1P4 > > fax: 1-604-266-9000 > e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 13:28:17 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Maria Damon <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: MacLow piece In-Reply-To: <199703261855.AA10336@mail.crl.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" hey guyzies a few weeks ago someone posted a piece by jackson mac low on the list about form/etc that i sem to have deleted. i need it by tonite!!! cd someone repost it please, backchannel, to moi? infiniment gratefullll!!!md ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 11:37:22 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@EMAIL.SJSU.EDU> Subject: Re: The Will of King George In-Reply-To: <85256475.0058279F.00@krypton.hmco.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII One unforgettable moment in "The Life and Times of Allen Ginsberg" is the footage from a Ginsberg appearance on Firing Line as Buckley pronounces Ginsberg "politically naive." Will, of course, got his start as a protege of Buckley (remember the YAF of yore?), and might be presumed to represent what somebody wants us to think of as politcally sophisticated -- Always easier to sneer at that which one has not read carefully -- But there's another moment in the old Buckley show, following Ginsberg's reading of "Wales Visitation," when Buckley, I think sincerely, admits to liking the poem he has just heard (and we can posit all sorts of reasons rooted in Romanticism and the lyric for why that might have happened) -- Not to defend Buckley or to prefer him over Will by any means -- point is, that even that thin veneer of responsiveness to intellect has been stripped from today's "politcal sophistication." and can somebody give me a citation for the Will piece so that I can read it? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 13:09:35 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: michael corbin <evadog@BITSTREAM.NET> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Daniel Bouchard wrote: > Fuck George F. Will. > Yes; Will's bollixed thinking damns commodification of the world; condemns the poet for *producing*(!) commodifiable 'dysfunction' (sic); does so with a sublimated ken for A-BETTER-TIME (perhaps pre-60s, but in any event the proverbial floating signifyer); *and* does all this while performing his usual role as apologete of capital, plutocracy, and the aesthetics of stupefaction. herehere, fuck him. mc ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 15:40:59 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Michael Magee <mmagee@DEPT.ENGLISH.UPENN.EDU> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply In-Reply-To: <85256475.0058279F.00@krypton.hmco.com> from "Daniel Bouchard" at Apr 10, 97 12:25:29 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit George Will, fuck you with your News Week column. George Will, will you for chrissake, stop talking about baseball on Meet the Press - I don't think you've ever picked up a baseball. George Will, you're like Ted Koppel's puny younger brother, both of you part of a profoundly uninteresting yet somehow still annoying family down the street. George Will, you're hair cut looks like Himmler's haircut. George Will, I would like to compare to Heinrich Himmler but its just the haircut, and, I suppose, vaguely, the politics - perhaps you were both sycophants to disastrously stupid world leaders, yes, ok, you're like a very, very small Himmler. George Will, you are idiot-corporate-right yin to Sam Donaldson's pretend-left yang. George Will, I won't even dignify you by asking you when you will be angelic. George Will, Ginsberg loved America which is why he gave it seventy-three lines of complaint. George Will, this is it for you, you get nine lines, more than your worth and I wouldn't put my queer shoulder to you if you were the last pastey-faced, mush-ball conservative in the bar. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 15:52:30 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Maz881@AOL.COM Subject: orbit where are the foci to a typical comet's orbit? i think i remember that ellipses have two centers. why is a comet's orbit stable yet so exageratedly non circular? Is the sun one focus? if so, what is the other one? (i guess i don't have trouble understanding the slightly elliptical orbits of the planets nearby because i can imagine the sun as spead out into two foci.) Bill ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 16:25:04 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Comments: Converted from PROFS to RFC822 format by PUMP V2.2X From: ACGOLD01@ULKYVM.LOUISVILLE.EDU Subject: Doug Messerli's e-address Alan Golding Prof. of English, Univ. of Louisville 502-852-6801; acgold01@ulkyvm.louisville.edu Doug (Messerli)--Could you please back-channel me with your e-address? Thanks. Alan And the customary apologies for using public space on private queries . . . som etimes there seems no other way . . . ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 13:34:47 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA> Subject: Re: The Don Allan Anthology In-Reply-To: <v01540b00af70d18f5201@[205.138.228.113]> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Come on, George, the allusion was to the Don Allan Anthology, you know, the >one with John Ashberry in it, and Robert Creely, and Charles Olsen, and >Denise Leverton. bd. Thanks, Bromide, I needed that reminder. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 13:36:14 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: George Bowering <bowering@SFU.CA> Subject: Re: LAURA NYRO (one child born to carry on, etc....) In-Reply-To: <970410085609_-567858832@emout13.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >I just heard on the radio this morning that LAURA NYRO (who wrote "I swear >there ain't no heaven and I pray there ain't no hell") died on tuesday at the >age of 49..... >Does anybody know anything about this? What she died of, etc? >I'd appreciate any info......"And all I ask of dying is to go naturally...." > -----------chris stroffolino I read that it had something to do with ovarian cancer. That was in the second paragraph of the Vancouver _Sun_ obit, anyway, but I didnt read past that. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 15:38:11 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Will's column But maybe, so hard as it is, we shouldn't get too angry. If AG were here, he might well be doing a compassion meditation, taking in, with each breath, a small bit of Will's deep pain. Kent > Date sent: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 12:25:29 -0400 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > From: Daniel Bouchard <Daniel_Bouchard@HMCO.COM> > Subject: Will's column/ my reply > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > George F. Will, symptomatic symbol of "the Reagan Revolution" and other > malignancies to human existence, will die someday just like Allen Ginsberg. > He once wrote of Ginsberg's death with a sneering condescension which > proved to readers several things, among them 1) he never read Allen > Ginsberg, and 2) he felt threatened by the very IDEA of Ginsberg's work. > > George F. Will writes of Allen Ginsberg's life in market terms--that of > being a "commodity." Confronted with the severe limitations of Will's > intellect what is one to do? Will is a columnist who is paid well to write > apologias for technocrats, thieves and murderers. Any person whose life > work consisted of promoting peace and charity toward his fellows must by > necessity be "the enemy." With a change in particulars, Will could have a > written a similar column on the death of Christ--'that long-haired > preaching radical got His just desserts!' To Ginsberg's credit however, > he never claimed to be the Son of God (to my knowledge). > > George F. Will, soldier of American Values, will be forgotten a month after > his death. > > Allen Ginsberg's poetry will live and grow > in the heart's of readers. > > Fuck George F. Will. > > > daniel_bouchard@hmco.com > > > > __________ > > The Ginsberg Commodity > > By George F. Will > > Wednesday, April 9 1997; Page A21 > The Washington Post > > Allen Ginsberg, symptomatic symbol of the "beat > generation" and other intellectual fads, died > last Saturday at age 70. He once wrote, "I'm so > lucky to be nutty." Actually, his pose of > paranoia was not luck, it was a sound career move. > > It became big box office with his famous > declamation of his poem "Howl" in San Francisco in > 1955. That was the year "Rock Around the Clock," > in the soundtrack to the movie "The > Blackboard Jungle," helped launch what was to > become the third element in the trinity of '60s > ecstasies -- sex, drugs and rock-and-roll. > Ginsberg made the first two his projects. He > composed "Howl" with the help of a cocktail of > peyote, amphetamines and Dexedrine. > > Thirty years later his reward for a career of > execrating American values and works was a > six-figure contract for a volume of his collected > poetry. It is a distinctive American genius, this > ability to transmute attempted subversion into a > marketable commodity. > > The adjective "beat" was appropriated by Jack > Kerouac from a drug-addicted Times Square > thief and male prostitute, who meant by it the > condition of being exhausted by existence. (That > man's existence must have been wearying.) Kerouac > attached the adjective to the noun > "generation," emulating Gertrude Stein's > identification of the "lost generation" of the 1920s. > Soon Life magazine, happy to find some titillating > unhappiness in a decade defined by > Eisenhower's smile, was writing about the beats as > "The Only Revolution Around." That's > entertainment. > > Back then, poetry commanded crowds. In his book > "When the Going Was Good: American > Life in the 1950s," Jeffrey Hart, now a professor > of English at Dartmouth, wrote: > > "Robert Frost strode onto the stage at Carnegie > Hall to a standing ovation from an overflow > house. . . . One night in 1957, T. S. Eliot was > reading his poems to an overflow audience in > Columbia's McMillin Theater. Even faculty members > had difficulty getting tickets, and people > were crowded into the windows and doors, and > listening outside to Eliot over loudspeakers. . > . . Dylan Thomas stood at the podium . . . his > third American tour in two years." > > When Ginsberg came to Columbia "there was a vast > throng that had been unable to get in. > They pounded on the doors and milled around. > Ticket-holders entered between lines of > police." > > Today no poet could cause such excitement on any > campus, or any other American venue, so > complete has been the supplanting of words, > written and spoken, by music and movies as > preferred modes of communication. One of > Ginsberg's young acolytes, Robert Zimmerman of > Hibbing, Minn., put the dissenting impulse to > music as Bob Dylan. > > Some beats wrote the way some jazz musicians made > music, in the heat of chemically assisted > improvisation. Truman Capote's famous dismissal of > Kerouac's work -- "That isn't writing at > all, it's typing" -- had a point. Granted, Kerouac > revised "On the Road" for six years before it > was published in 1957. However, fueled by > Benzedrine, he wrote the first draft of that novel > in 1951 in less than three weeks, as one long > single-spaced paragraph -- 120 feet long on > 12-foot strips of tracing paper taped together. > Here is its beginning: > > "I first met Dean not long after my wife and I > split up. I had just gotten over a serious illness > that I won't bother to talk about, except that it > had something to do with the miserably weary > split-up and my feeling that everything was dead." > > Does that tone of voice seem familiar? Here is the > beginning of a novel published in 1951, the > year of Kerouac's typing frenzy: > > "If you really want to hear about it, the first > thing you'll probably want to know is where I was > born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and > how my parents were occupied and all > before they had me, and all that David Copperfield > kind of crap, but I don't feel like going > into it, if you want to know the truth." > > Yes, "The Catcher in the Rye." Holden Caulfield, > adolescent scold, strong in disapproving > "phonies," was a precursor of the beats with their > passion for "authenticity," which to Ginsberg > meant howling echoes of whatever constituted > coffeehouse radicalism of the moment. > ("Slaves of Plastic! . . . Striped tie addicts! . > . . Whiskey freaks bombed out on 530 billion > cigarettes a year. . . . Steak swallowers zonked > on Television!") With a talent that rarely rose > to mediocrity, but with a flair for vulgar > exhibitionism, Ginsberg shrewdly advertised his > persona as a symptom of a dysfunctional society. > He died full of honors, including a > front-page (and a full page inside) obituary in > the New York Times, a symptom to the end. > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 13:51:24 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Bromige <dcmb@METRO.NET> Subject: Will's inches of ink Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Gwyn: I don't remember AG as "overweight". However, he shared those other characteristics you list, with Garcia (plus which, they were both diabetic, an affliction, however,* not confined to prophets of the Body Paradise. But I think you're correct, they were 60s charismatics who retained their power to move people by the thousands (esp. people who know they are alienated from themselves, and know some of the causes, like "free market economies"). Obviously, the powers that be have given considerable attention to preventing any repeat of 60's communitas-in-insurgency, making sure no charismatic leaders can unite opposition to the destruction of the world by money. To acknowledge Ginsberg as heroic can only encourage others to walk in his steps. George Will is part of money's calculation to maintain repression. Dirty work, but he has it to do. Support your local PBS radio! db * cris cheek : are these 'honky commas'? Blame Haberdashers' Aske's! thanks for yr latest posting, mate. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 16:24:24 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Dale Smith <dales@TECHWORKS.COM> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I apologize if you receive this message twice. I don't think it went through the first time: ************************************* Actually, as pig-headed as Will is, his piece on GinsbErg does attempt to locate the poet within the cultural market in which he participated. And his implication of Ginsberg as a culture industry cynosure is not entirely off the mark. Ginsberg was a cultural icon, a marketable commodity. I remember seeing huge billboards in San Francisco with Ginsberg's image selling Gap khaki pants. His warmth and affability also made him an attractive PR spokesman for a group of writers in the 50's. He attracted the kind of media attention Kerouac would have preferred to avoid. But promotion is, you know, how to stay in business. And poetry is still affected by a relentless economic structure. What's interesting, and what Will doesn't mention, is how the culture industry makes its own social subversion into a marketable commodity. The other relevant moment in the article is when Will writes: " When Ginsberg came to Columbia 'there was a vast throng that had been unable to get in. They pounded on the doors and milled around. Ticket-holders entered between lines of police.' Today no poet could cause such excitement on any campus, or any other American venue, so complete has been the supplanting of words, written and spoken, by music and movies as preferred modes of communication." This is a perfectly candid statement to hear as a poet, but the implication is that Ginsberg's writing is partially responisble for a deterioration in values which has made the market more open to the movies than poetry. Will doesn't follow up on this point, but I find it an important acknowledgement of poetry's inability to maintain prominence in a market Ginsberg condoned and benefitted from. Anyway, the rest of Will's piece falls apart with the Kerouac quotes, (he couldn't find Ginsberg quotes?), which are out of place and confusing because, well, Will wants to say Ginsberg sucks, but he can't say 'sucks' in public. All of this leads me, however, to Maria Damon's statement about poetry and politics. How does one fight for social change and still survive as an individual in a corrupt economic system? How do the contradictions of political integrity and economic survival play out in the works of dedicated poets? The contradictory impulses in Ginsberg's life reveal the difficult position facing poets today. Somewhere, between our ideals and the necessity of the dollar, our lives and art are made. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 17:52:49 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Mainstream <Cadbury@COMPUSERVE.COM> Subject: conference ---------- Forwarded Message ---------- From: INTERNET:AREN6056@bureau.ucc.ie, INTERNET:AREN6056@bureau.ucc.ie TO: Me, Cadbury DATE: 10/04/97 13:23 RE: conference Sender: AREN6056@bureau.ucc.ie Received: from bureau.ucc.ie (bureau.ucc.ie [143.239.1.2]) by hil-img-4.compuserve.com (8.6.10/5.950515) id NAA07708; Thu, 10 Apr 1997 13:07:24 -0400 From: <AREN6056@bureau.ucc.ie> Received: from BUREAU.UCC.IE by BUREAU.UCC.IE (PMDF #3468 ) id <01IHJH3OAU8W008BQ7@BUREAU.UCC.IE>; Thu, 10 Apr 1997 12:53:04 BST Date: 10 Apr 1997 12:53:04 -0300 (BST) Subject: conference To: Cadbury@compuserve.com Message-id: <01IHJH3OB3W2008BQ7@BUREAU.UCC.IE> X-Envelope-to: Cadbury@compuserve.com X-VMS-To: IN%"Cadbury@compuserve.com" MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Dear mr Upton, I want to let you know about a forthcoming conference on Irish experimental poetry which will take place in University College Cork on April 26, in venue W9.It will start at 10.30 and will finish at 6.30. It will be a mix of poetry readings and academic papers given Trevor Joyce, Geoffrey Squires, Catherine Walsh, Maurice Scully, Billy Mills to name a few. The aim of the conference is to celebrate the 30th anniversary of New Writers Press, it is also significant in that it is the first of its kind ever to be held in this country.I am giving you this information because I was told that you advertise arts events on the in- ternet. We would appreciate it if you would advertise this notice and if you require any more information, please contact me at my e-mail address which is listed above. Thankyou,Yours, Catriona Ryan. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 17:06:06 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Mark Weiss <junction@EARTHLINK.NET> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Actually, I don't think that these were contradictory impulses for Allen. He took as his project witnessing the external as well as the internal; as a result reactions to the larger sphere just naturally get expressed in his work. And I certainly see no evidence in the work that Allen, consumate self-promoter that he was, ever censored so much as a comma to make a buck. Incidentally, you would think from Will's piece that Allen had faked his public stances and his poetry in order to prosper, and that he had succeeded in doing so from the late 50s on. I remember some years ago reading a survey of the economics of being a poet. At the time Allen was the only poet in America who claimed to support himself as a poet. His income that year was 12 grand, on which he supported himself and quite a few others in the scant luxury that the East Village afforded before the yuppies arrived. It wasn't until relatively late in his life, when he began teaching regularly (and his W2 no longer said "poet") that he made a middleclass income. And the book contract for the collected came very late in his life. How does one fight for social change and still survive as an >individual in a corrupt economic system? How do the contradictions of >political integrity and economic survival play out in the works of >dedicated poets? The contradictory impulses in Ginsberg's life reveal the >difficult position facing poets today. Somewhere, between our ideals and >the necessity of the dollar, our lives and art are made. > > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 20:53:58 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply Dale: Yours is a very intelligent and provocative statement, opening a discussion that I suspect Ginsbeurg would have welcomed about himself. Just one question to throw out as first thought, though not necessarily the better one: this "cultural market" that you charge Ginsbuerg as being complicit in-- where do you see its, as they say, horizon? Did Ginsbeurg, in other words, step over some kind of threshold that you and I (cleaner in life than him) haven't? What is the qualitative differuence, as you see it, between choosing to buy Gap pants and posing in them? And when we, for example, choose to polemicize on this list, are we not engaging in a gesture that is as fully inscribed in the cultural market as Ginsbuerg's marketing of his image? I know, I know, you talk about the "gap" between ideals and necessity, and you seem to grant that we all inhabit that and must necessarily negotiate, but isn't it a bit too easy for "uncommodified" poets to criticize across the gap between life and death, and say that the dead guy sold out when we haven't, even though you acknowledge that we've all sold out, inevitably, a little bit? Aren't all of us (each of us, including you with your careful post) also, at least in portion, marketing an image here? (I mean Dale Smith, upping those guys and gals who are oblivious to their chiselled engravings within the poetry money market, but not Dale, who sees the gap between ideals and necessity, and thus has the banked- track on freedom. voom.) Dale,I'll say this: I would like, when I say something on this list, to impress, to have people think: "Boy, that Kent Johnson sounds really interesting, I wonder what he is really like.." Wishful thinking, I'm sure, but I would like my posts to contribute, little by little, to a great poetry job somewhere, or to being invited to the party I never get invited to, to having an even modest cultural status I haven't yet had, to be thought of as a list insider who is known to be an insider by those who aren't. There, I said it! (And why, exactly, does it mildly startle every single one of you who just read this that I said this?) I am wearing Gap pants right now as I write, and whatever you are or aren't wearing Dale, you are, by reading this, between your ideals and the necessity of the dollar, being called on by Ginsbuerg, in his koan-billboard, to think a little more deeply about your own critical certainties. Again,this is first, quick thought. One I may well regret, post-partum, as I think Rachel Loden perceptively put it a week or so ago. but thanks for provoking it. Keunt Date sent: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 13:12:18 +0100 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > From: Dale Smith <dales@TECHWORKS.COM> > Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > Actually, as pig-headed as Will is, his piece on GinsbErg does attempt to > locate the poet within the cultural market in which he participated. And > his implication of Ginsberg as a culture industry cynosure is not entirely > off the mark. Ginsberg was a cultural icon, a marketable commodity. I > remember seeing huge billboards in San Francisco with Ginsberg's image > selling Gap khaki pants. His warmth and affability also made him an > attractive PR spokesman for a group of writers in the 50's. He attracted > the kind of media attention Kerouac would have preferred to avoid. But > promotion is, you know, how to stay in business. And poetry is still > affected by a relentless economic structure. What's interesting, and what > Will doesn't mention, is how the culture industry makes its own social > subversion into a marketable commodity. > > The other relevant moment in the article is when Will writes: > > " When Ginsberg came to Columbia 'there was a vast throng that had > been unable to get in. They pounded on the doors and milled around. > Ticket-holders entered between lines of police.' > > Today no poet could cause such excitement on any campus, or any > other American venue, so complete has been the supplanting of words, > written and spoken, by music and movies as preferred modes of > communication." > > This is a perfectly candid statement to hear as a poet, but the implication > is that Ginsberg's writing is partially responisble for a deterioration in > values which has made the market more open to the movies than poetry. > Wills doesn't follow up on this point, but I find it an important > acknowledgement of poetry's inability to maintain prominence in a market > Ginsberg implicitly condoned and benefitted from. > > Anyway, the rest of Will's piece falls apart with the Kerouac quotes, (he > couldn't find Ginsberg quotes?), which are out of place and confusing > because, well, Will wants to say Ginsberg sucks, but he can't say 'sucks' > in public. > All of this leads me, however, to Maria Damon's statement about poetry and > politics. How does one fight for social change and still survive as an > individual in a corrupt economic system? How do the contradictions of > political integrity and economic survival play out in the works of > dedicated poets? The contradictory impulses in Ginsberg's life reveal the > difficult position facing poets today. Somewhere, between our ideals and > the necessity of the dollar, our lives and art are made. > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 23:16:29 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> Subject: John Barton Wolgamot MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII What ever happened to JBW? To the JBW Society? Alan _______________________________________________________________________ URL: http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html MIRROR: http://www.anu.edu.au/english/index.html TELEPHONE 718-857-3671 IMAGES: http://www.cs.unca.edu/~davidson/pix/ CUSEEME 166.84.250.149 ADDRESS: 432 Dean St., Brooklyn, NY, USA, 11217 Editor, BEING ON LINE ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 22:38:28 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: SSchu30844@AOL.COM Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply I haven't read the Ginsberg piece by George Will, but I am looking forward to reading it with and against his recent defense of the Baltimore Orioles' Roberto Alomar (as I recall, Will proposed to his second wife at home plate--my god!--in Camden Yards) for spitting on the umpire last season. Will goes out of his way to attack umpires in this piece and to defend Alomar. Apparently, Will is a non-paid member of the Baltimore Orioles' board. Which leads me to my modest proposal: why not put the man on the poetics list and conflict his interests a bit? Susan (whose Cards are off to their worst start in history) ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 21:40:02 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Bromige <dcmb@METRO.NET> Subject: Don Allan Anthology Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Thats ok, Boring, think nothing of it. db ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 10 Apr 1997 02:16:33 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: David Bromige <dcmb@METRO.NET> Subject: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, in the 2nd circle Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Susan : Are you surprised that G Wills didnt propose to his wife until he got to home plate? Should he have proposed right after he got to second base? * * * * As for AG, while not denying to him remarkable powers of forethought and networking, I'd say he came by them "honestly" in the sense that he trusted himself to act the way he wanted himself to act, and that after many many other upshots of such conduct thru decades, he sold his archive for a cool mill to stanford. It was no more than Moloch owed him. I'd certainly place this transaction in the category "The Contradictions of Capitalism," but not without a "so what>" remainder. I dont think that John Ashbery, who must have realized almost as much cash from his total immersion in poetry, is the least bit likely to be criticized for doing so. I find it harder to keep abreast of Ashbery's poetry, just that there is so much in it, that won't yield to a quick scan. But it probably doesnt as bluntly deplore capitalist malpractice, as AG's does. If so, it is very differently encoded, and not in a sinister way, but because Ashbery is a great individual human being who, to one view of it, can't help but be who he is, but who knows all he has learned concerning what to do with that perhaps burdensome nexus of knowledge. So is it the gap between avowed belief and actual practice that distresses some of our number here? Are we back at Pound the poet vs. Pound the fascist? Is it Ginsberg the Ghandi figure vs. Ginsberg the US millionaire? (These arent the rhetorical figures, mind made up, they may sound to be. I'm asking. And Sure, the poor soul not yet cold in his grave.) Is it bad for poets to make money, as it is bad for RC priests to make love to their congregation? For poets of a certain, evident kind of social commitment--also, therefore, a kind of censorship? How are we going to deal with this? Is it just something we're gonna have to forget (B. Dylan, "Clothesline Saga") or is it something one way or another we're going to try to legislate for? If so, we shall need to be willing to support our poets, and, I think, w/o regard to the value we personally find in their writing. The commodification of Ginsberg surely had more energy from the Other side than from AG. The energy from AG was NOT primarily directed towards this end. He surfed it well once the wave was there. As have a number of other poets living and dead. I dont want to fly off on this tangent, the way our soc'y requires of an artist an identifiable style, "Oh yeah, he's the one who does squiggles & dots," it's pathetic, reprehensibly a shrinking of life in its variousness, and stems (but this is another argument for another day) from the mounting ascension to primacy of the snapshot, even if only of a President on a greenback. But who is there to reprehend, to witness such reprehension. Just put the funds in my account. I'll decide on my charities later, thanks. Despite the scuttlebutt, people get famous because about them is something we need. This covers even Lorraine Bobbit. It may be down to Chance, but it's no accident. You or I might have opted to pay Ginsberg in kind (from each according), not having much money, but imagine wanting to repay his crackling energy and feeling you only have money to do it with. It's difficult for people to feel indebted w/o trying to do something abt it. Au fond, he made people feel good--in his case, literate persons of some awareness concerning soc'y. If we are going to continue the ancient practice of rewards, why not have rewarded AG for his impromptu existence, so responsibly coped with? I guess all this is to suggest that commodity isnt the bottom line, the inescapable circumscription of our lives--if it were, there'd be no naming it. AG included the commodity, but the commodity does not include, w/o remainder, AG. db ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 10:26:27 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: cris cheek <cris@SLANG.DEMON.CO.UK> Subject: Re: Bromide's 'honky commas' Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Hi db, * hereabouts these are blinks black and white blinded by the light traffic * their colors are subjects of overinterpretation / implied as in 'honky commas' or * comas or * come as you are love and love cris ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 08:14:24 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: henry <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply In-Reply-To: Message of Thu, 10 Apr 1997 12:51:37 -0500 from <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> it's called "stomping on your enemy's grave". Usually the living dead are specially hired for that purpose. - Henry G. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 08:20:33 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: henry <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU> Subject: Re: orbit In-Reply-To: Message of Thu, 10 Apr 1997 15:52:30 -0400 from <Maz881@AOL.COM> is this another orbituary? George Will, will you please george up. George Will, your motha was a car salesman for the Edsel when Allen Ginsberg was a protege of a potato. George Will, Shake your brocolli experiment offa my check-out line. George Will, hey, do you like MY poem? Huh? What the... - Jack Spandrift Jack's new CD, "Cowboys Rain Cowshit on the Plain" is available (in Spain only) from Teatro Bouncayore Czech Productions, El Raygonner, Wyo. Send money now. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 08:30:58 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: jarnot@PIPELINE.COM Subject: allen g. the millionaire Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" well, the thing is, allen was never a millionaire. when he got money from stanford for his archives he had enough to finally get a place on the lower east side with elevator access for himself and his step-mother. and he immediately went out and bought some salvation army couches to furnish the place. the money that allen made as a poet always went back into the community-- he kept a lot of poets and artists from living on the street. yours, lisa ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 10:00:59 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Michael Magee <mmagee@DEPT.ENGLISH.UPENN.EDU> Subject: Ginsberg and the Gap In-Reply-To: <199703260835.DAA06996@dept.english.upenn.edu> from "Louis Cabri" at Mar 26, 97 03:35:32 am MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit For what it's worth, I once, as a beginning grad student not knowing my place, asked Ginsberg about the Gap Ad (even going so far as to remind him that the Gap was utterly complicit in the Asian child-labor catastrophes which were prominent in the news at the time). To his credit, he didn't duck the question. He said he had a good deal of doubt about his decision, that he had rejected the Gap many times, but had, the last time, decided that donating the money (I think to Naropa?) would do more good than harm. He then went on to a talk about his complicity in the marketplace, a monologue not unlike the dialogue we've been having about AG & capitalism. -Mike. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 10:24:02 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Charles Bernstein <bernstei@BWAY.NET> Subject: New York City Poetry Calendar Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" The New York City Poetry Calendar is now on-line: http://www.nynow.com/poetry/ ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 09:35:04 CST6CDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Hank Lazer <hlazer@AS.UA.EDU> Organization: The University of Alabama Subject: Re: AG & the columnists If you think that the Will version of Ginsberg was lame, see today's column by Paul Ginsburg (a columnist via Arkansas, whose columns appear in places like The Tuscaloosa News, a NY Times owned newspaper). PG's claim (which I read hastily & angrily early this morning) is that AG is a personality but NOT A POET. That AG's poems aren't really poetry. That interest in AG's poetry is symptomatic of "our" swerve away from "real" "great" poetry. That AG's poetry will soon fade from view, and then "we" can return to reading truly "great" poetry again. Makes me uncertain: scream, or barf. Of course, much of AG's poetry stems from prior examples of what I think of as "poetry": Blake, Whitman, and the Prophets of the Old Testament. I hope others on the List run across PG's column.... Hank Lazer ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 10:13:58 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Dale Smith <dales@TECHWORKS.COM> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Kent: My impulse for writing in response to Will's article had to do with the recurring "fuck-you" posts which I find stupid and irresponsible. Will's article is grossly unfair, if not evil and pernicious, but telling Will to fuck himself behind his back, or not, simply confirms his belief in the poverty of cultural values today. So I picked up scant points of his which seemed appropriate and acknowledged that much of the rest of the article had no value at all. As for your questions: "Just one question to throw out as first thought, though not necessarily the better one: this "cultural market" that you charge Ginsbuerg as being complicit in-- where do you see its, as they say, horizon? Did Ginsbeurg, in other words, step over some kind of threshold that you and I (cleaner in life than him) haven't? What is the qualitative differuence, as you see it, between choosing to buy Gap pants and posing in them? And when we, for example, choose to polemicize on this list, are we not engaging in a gesture that is as fully inscribed in the cultural market as Ginsbuerg's marketing of his image? I know, I know, you talk about the "gap" between ideals and necessity, and you seem to grant that we all inhabit that and must necessarily negotiate, but isn't it a bit too easy for "uncommodified" poets to criticize across the gap between life and death, and say that the dead guy sold out when we haven't, even though you acknowledge that we've all sold out, inevitably, a little bit?" Ginsberg didn't step through any threshold. There is no threshold, as far as I can tell. We're all implicated in cultural and economic market practices. Whether posing for Gap pants or wearing them makes no difference. But if you endorse a certain product while simultaneously engaging in social activism, then the irony of that position will be noticed, whether it's right or wrong. Will's article pointed out this contradiction in a cultural industry Will, Ginsberg, myself-anyone who writes-is a part of. This position is magnified with Ginsberg, however, so he's an easy target for people like Will who act as if they are themselves beyond reproach. And, by the way, I never said Ginsberg sold out and I don't even think I implied it, and if I did, well, that's my fault as a critical writer. And I'm sad he's dead but his death is the occasion for such moments as these and I think as much meaning should be milked from debate rather than saturating ourselves only with warm platitudes. "Aren't all of us (each of us, including you with your careful post) also, at least in portion, marketing an image here? (I mean Dale Smith, upping those guys and gals who are oblivious to their chiselled engravings within the poetry money market, but not Dale, who sees the gap between ideals and necessity, and thus has the banked- track on freedom. voom.)" I guess e-mail posts could be viewed as "marketing an image" rather than provoking debate. Touch=E9. I'm not trying to "up" anybody. The occasion of my post was, again, George Will's unflattering and unjust article on Ginsberg's death. With the same amount of fame I'm sure many of us, self included, would be held up for critical scrutiny, just and unjust alike. "I would like my posts to contribute, little by little, to a great poetry job somewhere, or to being invited to the party I never get invited to, to having an even modest cultural status I haven't yet had, to be thought of as a list insider who is known to be an insider by those who aren't. There, I said it! (And why, exactly, does it mildly startle every single one of you who just read this that I said this?)" Hey, the above sounds good to me too, except the part about being a "list insider," whatever that means. "I am wearing Gap pants right now as I write, and whatever you are or aren't wearing Dale, you are, by reading this, between your ideals and the necessity of the dollar, being called on by Ginsbuerg, in his koan-billboard, to think a little more deeply about your own critical certainties. Again,this is first, quick thought. One I may well regret, post-partum, as I think Rachel Loden perceptively put it a week or so ago." Actually, I'm wearing a burlap sack and beating myself with a stick. "but thanks for provoking..." No problem. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 10:24:18 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Jerry McGuire <jlm8047@USL.EDU> Subject: searching Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Can anyone provide info on interviews with or articles about Michael Franti, hiphop/performance poet? (My knowledge so scarce right now that Franti may be anything _but_ a hiphop/performance poet.) And as to Laura Nyro: I was dropping acid weekly as a member of _your_ US Air Force (sleep well tonight . . . ) when she first sang those wrenching things that were prettified by the cover artists mentioned above (and "covering" rarely seemed like such a blanket job). Down by the grapevine . . . I was at Denver, too, and found those large, lumpy, pointed earth constructions on the horizon an interesting variation from the daily experience of bayou life. The grad students were mountain-water-sweet and industrious beyond any reasonable expectation, the panels, though crowded together, made good space for non-traditional approaches to the metatextual metissage, and a fair mix of dispositions got to crow and strut, not too obnoxiously. I agree that Graff felt a little underprepared (yet over-rehearsed) in delivering his plea for "conversation" between theory types and C.W. types (I was the guy who said that it might be more productive to continue the present spectrum of relations from sleeping together to contempt (can't we all just not get along?). As to Marjorie Perloff, I thought the presentation on "Yasusada" was just the kind of thing to send most of us crawling back to our departments with our scholarly tails between our critical legs; but its conclusion--that all the goofy phenomena of publication and appreciation surrounding those texts could somehow be attributed to (and _blamed on_, if you think the whole business was somehow distasteful) "Identity Theory" seemed a leap-and-a-half: no self-respecting postcolonial practitioner, for instance, would have slept through the signs of bogusness (or alibied her/his way around not having done some fact-checking) that Perloff held to be at issue. Can't we all just leave each other the hell alone? And now I find my head hurting a little from all the G_Will, inc., stuff, as if hacking at (up?) his "prose" somehow could ease the etc. And of course, for some it can. Do keep in mind his lifelong difficulty, though (innate? learned?), at parsing lyric thought into anything but the, uh, categories of daily columnar preachifyin'-to-the-converted: remember his o'er-hasty embrace of that ringing celebration of Deep American Virtu, "Born in the USA." Or, really now, is this just a headachey way of iterating a replicant fuck you? Yrs, Jerry McGuire ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 10:40:46 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" <damon001@MAROON.TC.UMN.EDU> Subject: Re: allen g. the millionaire Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 8:30 AM 4/11/97, jarnot@PIPELINE.COM wrote: >well, the thing is, allen was never a millionaire. when he got money from >stanford for his archives he had enough to finally get a place on the lower >east side with elevator access for himself and his step-mother. and he >immediately went out and bought some salvation army couches to furnish the >place. the money that allen made as a poet always went back into the >community-- he kept a lot of poets and artists from living on the street. >yours, lisa thanks lisa: this ressentiment of someone who's gotten famous and made enough $ at 70 to finally live with half the luxury that many of us (who teach, for example) take for granted is most unseemly. not that we can't ask questions about commodification and compromise, but the edge of bad faith that can creep in (bigtime, in george will's case, for example) is very distasteful and distracting.--md ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 10:32:00 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" <pritchpa@SILVERPLUME.IIX.COM> Subject: Re: allen g. the millionaire Comments: To: jarnot <jarnot@PIPELINE.COM> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN Yes and perhaps this has been mentioned already but as I recall the money from the Gap ads was donated to some or other cause, Tibetan Buddhists in exile I believe. Patrick Pritchett ---------- From: jarnot To: POETICS Subject: allen g. the millionaire Date: Friday, April 11, 1997 9:15AM well, the thing is, allen was never a millionaire. when he got money from stanford for his archives he had enough to finally get a place on the lower east side with elevator access for himself and his step-mother. and he immediately went out and bought some salvation army couches to furnish the place. the money that allen made as a poet always went back into the community-- he kept a lot of poets and artists from living on the street. yours, lisa ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 11:44:47 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Charles Bernstein <bernstei@BWAY.NET> Subject: Re: Ginsberg and the Gap Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" If you look at that ad, in tiny type running vertically on the side, it does say that the proceeds from the use of the photo have been donated to Naropa. Since I have always believe the smallest type in an ad is the most important I appreciated this bit of counter-information. There was nothing similar in the other Gap ads in the series. > He said he had a good deal of doubt about his >decision, that he had rejected the Gap many times, but had, the last time, >decided that donating the money (I think to Naropa?) would do more good >than harm. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 11:59:19 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Piombino/Simon <ts20@COLUMBIA.EDU> Subject: Planned Parenthood Benefit Reading In-Reply-To: <199704111401.KAA82326@dept.english.upenn.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII FYI Corinne Robins, Liz Fodaski and Nick Piombino will be reading on Friday, April 25, 7:30 p.m., $7 (contribution) at Poets For Choice/ Ceres Gallery 584 Broadway, Suite 306, (212) 226-4725 All invited to reception afterwards ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 14:54:35 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Mark Prejsnar <mprejsn@LAW.EMORY.EDU> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply In-Reply-To: <970410223705_-668428723@emout17.mail.aol.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Interesting, Susan...I don't suspose Will mentions the one really interesting bit of gossip in the baseball world about that incident..That Hirschbeck used a homophobic word, and that that's the reason for the spitting (...I guess in that case he should feel grateful it wasn't Tom Mandel he was addressing, or the response might have been more solid); this cropped up on Atlanta radio some time ago, but was really given credence by a spot Peter Gammons did two weeks ago on ESPN, where he kept uneasily and paraphrastically saying that "there are just some words you don't use to someone from a Latin culture.." and finally narrowing it down to references to a singular "word" that you shouldn't ever use to someone from a Latin culture (..the "f" word presumably). Gammons knows most of what's going on in baseball, so I take it that that's strong confirmation. From both a poet's and a political activist's point of view, the whole affair becomes fascinating, in that there is this EVENT people talk about, and then (maybe) this VERBAL act at the very heart of it all, that NO ONE WILL MENTION..the word made evasion and silence. Mark Prejsnar (whose Braves are facing a true fight for their lives in their division, for the first time in living memory.) On Thu, 10 Apr 1997 SSchu30844@AOL.COM wrote: > I haven't read the Ginsberg piece by George Will, but I am looking forward to > reading it with and against his recent defense of the Baltimore Orioles' > Roberto Alomar (as I recall, Will proposed to his second wife at home > plate--my god!--in Camden Yards) for spitting on the umpire last season. > Will goes out of his way to attack umpires in this piece and to defend > Alomar. Apparently, Will is a non-paid member of the Baltimore Orioles' > board. Which leads me to my modest proposal: why not put the man on the > poetics list and conflict his interests a bit? > > Susan > (whose Cards are off to their worst start in history) > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 13:00:40 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Comments: Authenticated sender is <lvr20960@u.cc.utah.edu> From: "linda v. russo" <Linda.Russo@M.CC.UTAH.EDU> Organization: University of Utah Subject: Re: The Don Allan Anthology MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT To the Mr.'s Bromige, Alexander, Johnson & Bowering (not to make you sound like a law firm or anything): thanks for the words -- now that i look at it, it doesn't look quite right with a 'u'. I'm usually much more adroit & academic in checking these things. I do wonder though abt. the vitriol? (maria damon where are you?!) I can't consciously recall such copyediting in the 6 long months or so i've been a member on the list. -- l. > Come on, George, the allusion was to the Don Allan Anthology, you know, the > one with John Ashberry in it, and Robert Creely, and Charles Olsen, and > Denise Leverton. bd. > > -- linda v. russo linda.russo@m.cc.utah.edu ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 15:18:01 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Michael Boughn <mboughn@CHASS.UTORONTO.CA> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply In-Reply-To: <POETICS%97041108274208@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> from "henry" at Apr 11, 97 08:14:24 am MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > it's called "stomping on your enemy's grave". Usually the living dead are > specially hired for that purpose. > > - Henry G. > Isn't this the battle for history, and wasn't Allen Ginsberg always on the frontlines, for better or for worse? Which is why the GWs hate him so much. How would he have responded to Wills? I don't think with anger . . . Did anyone else see the obit in the NY Post? It opened something like "Allen Ginsberg, who wrested poetry away from the academics and returned it to the people . . ." Mike mboughn@chass.utoronto.ca ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 15:29:38 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM Subject: Readings Samantha Coerbell, Edwin Torres, Shirley LeFlore and Bob Holman at Washington University (St Louis) Frida and Sat, April 11 and 12, 8pm. Bob Holman at KGB's, across from LaMama on E 4th, Mon., April 14 8pm. Will be reading "Bard in Bardo" poems. BH ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 15:33:28 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: William Burmeister Prod <burmeist@PLHP002.COMM.MOT.COM> Subject: Re: orbit In-Reply-To: Maz881@AOL.COM "orbit" (Apr 10, 3:52pm) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii >where are the foci to a typical comet's orbit? i think i remember that >ellipses have two centers. why is a comet's orbit stable yet so exageratedly >non circular? Is the sun one focus? if so, what is the other one? >(i guess i don't have trouble understanding the slightly elliptical orbits of >the planets nearby because i can imagine the sun as spead out into two foci.) >Bill You're right in that ellipses have two foci, and I'm no celestial mechanic, but the sun can be considered to be at or near one of the foci. I say near because there are many comets where the sun is actually between the vertex and the near focal point. There is another geometrical focal point, but whether or not there is something "there" has been an open topic for speculation (ie the Oort cloud idea, or like cpt. Kwirk, "there's something out there..."). The "something out there" forming the other focal point is not necessary for an elliptical orbit to take place though. The orbits of all solar system bodies have constantly, from the beginning, been perturbed by mutual gravitation so that the orbits intersect one another and elongate (become eccentric). The smaller bodies having the most eccentric orbits. Mercury has a very eccentric orbit for example.Hope that helps. Bill B. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 16:16:51 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: William Burmeister Prod <burmeist@PLHP002.COMM.MOT.COM> Subject: G. Swill caught perturbating infragrante delicto In-Reply-To: henry <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU> "Re: orbit" (Apr 11, 8:20am) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Dear sir, Could you send me a copy of Jack Spandrift's new CD, "Cowboys Rain Cowshit on the Plain" from Teatro Bouncayore Czech Productions. I am not able to enclose money right now since I am a little short. You can look for my 2 cents worth in my next review. -George Swill >George Will, will you please george up. >George Will, your motha was a car salesman for the Edsel when Allen Ginsberg was a protege of a potato. >George Will, Shake your brocolli experiment offa my check-out line. >George Will, hey, do you like MY poem? Huh? What the... >- Jack Spandrift >Jack's new CD, "Cowboys Rain Cowshit on the Plain" is available (in Spain >only) from Teatro Bouncayore Czech Productions, El Raygonner, Wyo. >Send money now. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 13:35:08 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Rachel Loden <rloden@CONCENTRIC.NET> Subject: Re: orbit Comments: cc: Maz881@AOL.COM MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Bill Luoma wrote: > where are the foci to a typical comet's orbit? i think i remember that > ellipses have two centers. why is a comet's orbit stable yet so exageratedly > non circular? Is the sun one focus? if so, what is the other one? > > (i guess i don't have trouble understanding the slightly elliptical orbits of > the planets nearby because i can imagine the sun as spead out into two foci.) Resident logician writes: It's about the ancient theory of conic sections, and Kepler's laws of planetary motion. Think of a plane slicing through a cone --- if it is orthogonal to the axis of the cone, you get a circle. If you tilt a bit, you get an ellipse. Tilt more, and you get curves that are not closed (parabolas and hyperbolas) --- if your comet is on one of them, it will never come back. Given that Hale-Bopp is in the habit of coming back, albeit infrequently, it must be on an elliptical orbit that is very elongated. Kepler's laws apply: the sun must be one of the foci of the ellipse. What happens to the other focus? It is, of course, a mathematical abstraction, and in a sense it is not in use. There is only one sun, and the sun's gravitational pull is both necessary and sufficient to keep a comet on an elliptical orbit. Kepler's laws can be easily derived from Newton's ("the two body problem"), as an exercise in pure mathematics. I remember it being said that the Hale-Bopp orbit is roughly perpendicular to the plane of the solar system. This may explain its relatively quick entry and exit. Jussi Ketonen jussik@viewstar.com jussi@steam.stanford.edu ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 14:49:03 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Hugh Steinberg <hsteinberg@INFOREL.COM> Subject: Re: AG & the columnists Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Yeah, so the world is full of jerks. What else is new? I think all the post-mortem arguments about Ginsberg only point to his immense vitality as a poet and as a cultural figure, the linkage of which has become increasingly rare in popular American culture. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 17:05:32 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Thomas M. Orange" <tmorange@BOSSHOG.ARTS.UWO.CA> Subject: Re: belated respects Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII (oops! forgot the envoy....) the blue lamped boulevards, sky night upright pushing a thistle machine across flatlands, entering Coast Range light (or) across flatlands, entering Coast Range light upright pushing a thistle machine the blue lamped boulevards, sky night (as you wish) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 13:57:19 PDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Hoa Nguyen <nguyenhoa@HOTMAIL.COM> Subject: Ginsberg Content-Type: text/plain (This is my first post on the list) The following is an excerpt from a post by Kent Johnson. It is an incredibly honest personal statement and I feel that it requires particular attention. In a dialogue about poetry, A. Ginsberg, and whether it is possible *not* to participate in the corrupt market system we are necessarily a part of, he said, among many things: Dale, I'll say this: I would like, when I say >something on this list, to impress, to have people think: "Boy, that >Kent Johnson sounds really interesting, I wonder what he is really >like.." Wishful thinking, I'm sure, but I would like my posts to >contribute, little by little, to >a great poetry job somewhere, or to being invited to the party I never >get invited to, to having an even modest cultural status I >haven't yet had, to be thought of as a list insider who is known to >be an insider by those who aren't. There, I said it! (And why, >exactly, does it mildly >startle every single one of you who just read this that I said this?) I think it may startle because of its stunning honesty. And it comments on the discussion at hand-- that is: how one can be an artist, activist, and socially responsible while simultaneously complicit in the very structures that one wishes to expose and inform against. I am glad that the obvious was said-- that participation in this "utopian" arena for dialogue is not outside the market system we (myself included) engage in every moment, not outside structures and institutions of power. While we strive to engage in something that may illuminate or transform through ideas, art, or creating a community-- we cannot *escape* the conditions we live in. And in the preceding sentence I illustrated this very thought-- that as a woman of color I cannot be *outside* prejudice or racism--that inescapably is contained even in the language I use -- using the word "illuminate" valuing light/white-ness.--writing in a language of colonialism, using my expensive computer, using and using energy, etc. It is a contradiction. I think exposing this is tantamount to transforming it-- and I think that is what we are doing, that it *is* a process. I do not understand why engaging in the dialectic leads people to believe one is "charging" someone of something. (Although, as I have read in the archives, finger-pointing / wanting-to-punch-someone-in-the-mouth morality policing, does occur). --------------------------------------------------------- Get Your *Web-Based* Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com --------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 17:21:28 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Daniel Bouchard <Daniel_Bouchard@HMCO.COM> Subject: Re: Will's column Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII "America, go fuck yourself with your atom bomb." --Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997) "America, I'm not sorry." --same guy Dales, I'm not sorry if you think my "fuck George F. Will" is "stupid and irresponsible." I'm not sorry if you think my "fuck George F. Will" "confirms his belief in the poverty of cultural values today." If he could define them, and if I could take the time to read them, I'm sure I could have a grand time mocking them for the amusement of the Poetics list. If you think my "fuck George F. Will" is an act of cowardice because it was "behind his back" let me assure that I would love to have the opportunity to meet the man and enjoy a real conversation, in which I may or may not use the oh-so-shocking "F" word, depending on the amount of sneering condescension he emits. You are obviously impressed with George F. Will's authority to the extent that in a worthless diatribe in which he shits on a man's life work you find "scant points . . . which seemed appropriate." Which points were they Dales? The ones that implicate all writers and activists in "cultural and economic market practices." Are you taking a correspondence course with George F. Will? You said, "his death is the occasion for such moments as these and I think as much meaning should be milked from debate rather than saturating ourselves only with warm platitudes." Yes, let's debate and milk (milk?) the moment and we may learn something from one another, but don't begin by telling ME to settle down and be reasonable because it only makes me more angry. daniel_bouchard@hmco.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 14:30:19 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Mark Weiss <junction@EARTHLINK.NET> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" That we're all implicated in the system constitutes a platitude in my book. I haven't taken its temperature. I'm wearing 501s, but that's because I'm hipper than you guys. >Ginsberg didn't step through any threshold. There is no threshold, as far >as I can tell. We're all implicated in cultural and economic market >practices. Whether posing for Gap pants or wearing them makes no >difference. But if you endorse a certain product while simultaneously >engaging in social activism, then the irony of that position will be >noticed, whether it's right or wrong. Will's article pointed out this >contradiction in a cultural industry Will, Ginsberg, myself-anyone who >writes-is a part of. This position is magnified with Ginsberg, however, so >he's an easy target for people like Will who act as if they are themselves >beyond reproach. And, by the way, I never said Ginsberg sold out and I >don't even think I implied it, and if I did, well, that's my fault as a >critical writer. And I'm sad he's dead but his death is the occasion for >such moments as these and I think as much meaning should be milked from >debate rather than saturating ourselves only with warm platitudes. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 16:51:12 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Thomas M. Orange" <tmorange@BOSSHOG.ARTS.UWO.CA> Subject: belated respects Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sestina for Ginzberg ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ brushfire's smokey mass in dusk light, pull out and slowly roll condensers of small Sony TV machine marble pillars in the Rector's open window on Chicago Midwinter night, canyon path crowded with thistle sun's bright red ball on thistle into the bottom please light enwired rusty w/resistances giant night courtyard at the end roll Clark & Halstead brushed with Rector's fern blue daisy, glassy machine horizon purple with earth-cloud, machine master lunge it again, thistle grass leafspears morning glory Rector's marble-white street in light this week's snow grill lights roll grass, pale morningglory night chanting to Shiva in the night and withdraw to the machine hillside perched over clearing All roll the walled city of thistle blinking at the corner decades light scattered on a granite Rector's car-cabin. Pacific Gas high Rector's tip please please master night branches lifting up papery seedhusks, light Dubrovnik -- all the fleet machine ago Smokestack poked above roofs thistle hill bells clanging under roll voltage antennae trailing thin wires roll fuck me again with Rector's parasolspiked Fern Tramping together thistle sunk, Empire foundered, Doges night & watertower standing still above machine gray sea cliffs, dry light ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 10:02:39 +1200 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: DS <dpsalmon@IHUG.CO.NZ> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Yes? But who is going to do it? Said the Mouse. >Daniel Bouchard wrote: > >> Fuck George F. Will. >herehere, fuck him. > >mc > > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 18:09:18 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply Dale Smith wrote: > Will's article is grossly unfair, if not evil and pernicious, >but telling Will to fuck himself behind his back, or not, simply confirms >his belief in the poverty of cultural values today. The point is our telling Will to fuck himself or not has absolutely no consequence. Personally I think it more appropriate to ask him to shut up about something of which he knows nothing. Fucking is so lovely after all. A deluge of letters of the oh shut up fool variety might at least raise his eyebrow. Will came in my place of employ on Tuesday (his office is two blocks away), the day after I'd got back from going to New York to sit w/ Allen G. I have NOTHING to say to George Will. He represents the obligatory violence of mass media controled society. I do not think he is aware of this as he is so thoroughly indoctrinated. The man, tho human, is lost to that part of being human which Ginsberg & so many other artists-- what's the right word here-- give? represent? create? In any case there is as much reason to feel sorry for George Will as to be angry-- to make a living spewing the idiot venom, this cannot be good for any "soul." --Rod ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 04:56:04 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Charles Alexander <chax@THERIVER.COM> Subject: possibility? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" If anyone is interested in coming to Tucson -- I just heard of a small casita (although big enough to be a one-bedroom apt. w/small art studio) which has just become available and is for rent for only $250/month. It's in the middle of South Tucson, which isn't everybody's favorite part of town, but it's on the same property as some of my favorite people in all of Tucson -- Alex Garza, sculptor, who directs a program in which "at risk" teenagers make public art, mostly mosaic murals; and his spouse, Yolanda Galvan, a visual artist/illustrator who works at an organization called Southwest Parks & Monuments. And if anyone is REALLY interested, it might be a good way to become a Chax Press intern/apprentice for several months (or more) on a parttime basis, working on handmade book projects and press administrative work, have a very inexpensive place to live with room for one's own art studio or writing studio, and still have plenty of time to find another job which would more than pay the rent. Yes, it's all a bit complicated, but I thought I'd mention it. Charles Alexander charles alexander / chax press / chax@theriver.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 17:41:58 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Hugh Steinberg <hsteinberg@INFOREL.COM> Subject: Re: Planned Parenthood Benefit Reading Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" This may seem really obvious of me, but when addresses of events are listed on the list, could the city please be included? Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 21:10:50 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: SSchu30844@AOL.COM Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply David B--the comment on where George Will made his proposal came from an instant fear that a man so conservative might say, "a woman's place is at home plate," that's all. I doubt he'd say that about second base, though he is surely off base (or just base) about most things. Thanks to Maxine Chernoff for mentioning that I'll be giving a reading in San Francisco. It's on May 1 at 7:30 at the Cafe Sapore (in North Beach somewhere), and I'll be reading with John Noto. I'd love to meet list members there or elsewhere. Susan (from Honolulu, which doesn't change its time either) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 22:19:02 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: henry gould <AP201070@BROWNVM.BROWN.EDU> Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 11 Apr 1997 10:13:58 +0100 from <dales@techwrks.com> fame - critique joke - serious $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ gap - hole knee - crotch essay - guessay insider? email - demon square - hip Ginsberg - Ginsberg, Jr. bug? flog - fog (fghrist's sake) etc. - gnats flood - Fargo bug spray?? ice - dike Faust - stuff one-up, stupid? * ? glory... - - Jack Spandrift Jack's new CD, "How to become a Millionaire without Taking your Spurs Off in Bed, plus Interviews with Famous People On Tape and WORMS on HOOKS For BAIT if you Like to FISH", is available from Cootie Productions, POB 2399999990-etxc, Bronx, NY 10035. The question is, how to order, that is, what's it worth to you. Faust paid a lot down but ended up regretting the whole deal. You can also pay on installment - send a toad's eye, one ear of a wet bowl of cornmeal mush, and three dollars/mo. It might get to you? Well, scratch where it itches, bro. Death rides in mighty record companies. p.s. George Will = Ol' Wrigglee Allen Ginsberg = L' B'ggar Senile ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 22:15:17 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Jordan Davis <jdavis@PANIX.COM> Subject: POETPOETRRYCITRYCITTYY MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Kim Stian Kiman dman Br Bim Sterian Kefans oems in The Poe and Kiosk se and Kiosk ms in The Im Pespercipient Goooren D GoodLorenman Xquisite Corppoems in Exq E uisite Corpse Poems in E and Kiosk Teachers &eachers & WWriters CWriters Colollaborativelaborative 5 Union SqUnion Squ uare West,are West, 7 7th Floor 7th Floor Friday, Aprriday, April ril 18, 7-8: 18, 7-8:3030 p.m. 0 p.m. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 22:55:20 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply Speaking of this image/commodity thing, there's a passage from Michael Palmer's last book that seems to connect, though I'm baffled as to precisely how. That would be the point, I guess. How to read this? It makes me jealous: I wish I would have thought of it for my death poem. "I too have an image for sale. It is the image of a poem." Kent > Date sent: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 10:13:58 +0100 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > From: Dale Smith <dales@TECHWORKS.COM> > Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > Kent: > > My impulse for writing in response to Will's article had to do with the > recurring "fuck-you" posts which I find stupid and irresponsible. Will's > article is grossly unfair, if not evil and pernicious, but telling Will to > fuck himself behind his back, or not, simply confirms his belief in the > poverty of cultural values today. So I picked up scant points of his which > seemed appropriate and acknowledged that much of the rest of the article > had no value at all. As for your questions: > > "Just one question to throw out as first thought, though > not necessarily the better one: this "cultural market" that you > charge Ginsbuerg as being complicit in-- where do you see its, as they > say, horizon? Did Ginsbeurg, in other words, step over some kind of > threshold that you and I (cleaner in life than him) haven't? What is > the qualitative differuence, as you see it, between choosing to buy > Gap pants and posing in them? And when we, for example, choose to > polemicize on this list, are we not engaging in a gesture that is as > fully inscribed in the cultural market as Ginsbuerg's marketing of his > image? I know, I know, you talk about the "gap" between ideals and > necessity, and you seem to grant that we all inhabit that and must > necessarily negotiate, but isn't it a bit too easy for "uncommodified" > poets to criticize across the gap between life and death, and say > that the dead guy sold out when we haven't, even though you > acknowledge that we've all sold out, inevitably, a little bit?" > > Ginsberg didn't step through any threshold. There is no threshold, as far > as I can tell. We're all implicated in cultural and economic market > practices. Whether posing for Gap pants or wearing them makes no > difference. But if you endorse a certain product while simultaneously > engaging in social activism, then the irony of that position will be > noticed, whether it's right or wrong. Will's article pointed out this > contradiction in a cultural industry Will, Ginsberg, myself-anyone who > writes-is a part of. This position is magnified with Ginsberg, however, so > he's an easy target for people like Will who act as if they are themselves > beyond reproach. And, by the way, I never said Ginsberg sold out and I > don't even think I implied it, and if I did, well, that's my fault as a > critical writer. And I'm sad he's dead but his death is the occasion for > such moments as these and I think as much meaning should be milked from > debate rather than saturating ourselves only with warm platitudes. > > "Aren't all of us (each of us, including you with your careful > post) also, at least in portion, marketing an image here? (I mean Dale > Smith, upping those guys and gals who are oblivious to their > chiselled engravings within the poetry money market, but not Dale, who > sees the gap between ideals and necessity, and thus has the banked- > track on freedom. voom.)" > > I guess e-mail posts could be viewed as "marketing an image" rather than > provoking debate. Touche. I'm not trying to "up" anybody. The occasion > of my post was, again, George Will's unflattering and unjust article on > Ginsberg's death. With the same amount of fame I'm sure many of us, self > included, would be held up for critical scrutiny, just and unjust alike. > > "I would like my posts to contribute, little by little, to > a great poetry job somewhere, or to being invited to the party I never > get invited to, to having an even modest cultural status I > haven't yet had, to be thought of as a list insider who is known to > be an insider by those who aren't. There, I said it! (And why, > exactly, does it mildly startle every single one of you who just read this > that I said this?)" > > Hey, the above sounds good to me too, except the part about being a "list > insider," whatever that means. > > "I am wearing Gap pants right now as I write, and whatever you are or > aren't wearing Dale, you are, by reading this, between your > ideals and the necessity of the dollar, being called on by Ginsbuerg, > in his koan-billboard, to think a little more deeply > about your own critical certainties. Again,this is first, quick > thought. One I may well regret, post-partum, as I think Rachel > Loden perceptively put it a week or so ago." > > Actually, I'm wearing a burlap sack and beating myself with a stick. > > "but thanks for provoking..." > > No problem. > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 23:41:37 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: ginsberg and snyder Gary Snyder lectured and read here in Freeport, Illinois tonight. It was quite incredible, frankly. He finished by reading/singing the magpie poem, prefacing it with a long, moving eulogy for AG. When he started to choke-up, he said it was his asthma, which disappointed me a little bit, but that's ok. Inclement weather of the worst kind, but still over 150 people in attendance, maybe a couple dozen of them farmers who came because (my romantic leftist mind hopes) the lecture was entitled "The Relationship between Capitalism, Ethics, and the Environment." Probably, though, because Gary was billed to be introduced by my beloved friend, Dan Smith, a Freeport poet with a very big local following and who's a dairy farmer well-known for his "sustainable ag" practices (new book, _Home Land_, out from Bottom Dog Press). As I was driving him to Dan's house where he spent the morning, Gary told me of a long telephone talk he had with AG two days before Allen died. At the time, Allen was operating under the impression of two to six months. Gary said that AG was "sad but not overly so," and was "a bit pissed-off that he'd just put this new kitchen into his apartment and now was barely going to get to use it." Then he changed the subject. As you approach Dan's farm, there is a trailer surounded with 50 or 60 carcasses of cars, some of them 40's and 50's models. I noticed that Snyder was looking intently at this sight (the infamous "white trash" Bechtel household). Then he said with the utmost conviction: "Now there is some really really good stuff." By the way, I haven't seen any posts about this: does everyone know that _Mountains and Rivers without End_ was awarded the Bollingen a few weeks back? I'm driving Gary to the airport tomorrow and I'm going to askl him what he thinks about Allen posing for the Gap ad. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 23:59:02 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: The Don Allan Anthology Linda: I'm not sure why you put me in the same law firm as Bromage and Boring. I was the guy who said to not pay any attention to the lawyers specializing in copyright and said nice post! Or are you referring to my "ue" and "eu" inserts into Ginsberg in my reply to Dale Smith? I did this only as a little riposte to Attorney Boring, who had slammed his fist repeatedly against the table objecting E E E E E E! Sorry if my message was not clear. Kent > Priority: normal > Date sent: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 13:00:40 +0000 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > From: "linda v. russo" <Linda.Russo@M.CC.UTAH.EDU> > Organization: University of Utah > Subject: Re: The Don Allan Anthology > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > To the Mr.'s Bromige, Alexander, Johnson & Bowering (not to make > you sound like a law firm or anything): > > thanks for the words -- now that i look at it, it doesn't > look quite right with a 'u'. I'm usually much more > adroit & academic in checking these things. I do wonder > though abt. the vitriol? (maria damon where are you?!) > I can't consciously recall such copyediting in the 6 long > months or so i've been a member on the list. -- l. > > > > Come on, George, the allusion was to the Don Allan Anthology, you know, the > > one with John Ashberry in it, and Robert Creely, and Charles Olsen, and > > Denise Leverton. bd. > > > > > -- > linda v. russo > linda.russo@m.cc.utah.edu > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 22:13:33 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" <anielsen@EMAIL.SJSU.EDU> Subject: Re: SouthBay Comments: To: Charles Bernstein <bernstei@BWAY.NET> In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19970411154447.00712908@bway.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Notice to all San Francisco and points south -- Hank Lazer, often of this list, will appear in a poetry reading at the Stanford University Book Store on Friday May 2, at 4:00 PM I'll expect to see y'all there ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 00:18:51 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: orbit Actually, "astronomical" language like this seems very apropos and useful to the discussion of poems, no? > Date sent: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 15:33:28 -0400 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> > From: William Burmeister Prod <burmeist@PLHP002.COMM.MOT.COM> > Subject: Re: orbit > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > >where are the foci to a typical comet's orbit? i think i remember that > >ellipses have two centers. why is a comet's orbit stable yet so exageratedly > >non circular? Is the sun one focus? if so, what is the other one? > > >(i guess i don't have trouble understanding the slightly elliptical orbits of > >the planets nearby because i can imagine the sun as spead out into two foci.) > > >Bill > > > > You're right in that ellipses have two foci, and I'm no celestial mechanic, but > the sun can be considered to be at or near one of the foci. I say near because > there are many comets where the sun is actually between the vertex and the near > focal point. There is another geometrical focal point, but whether or not there > is something "there" has been an open topic for speculation (ie the Oort cloud > idea, or like cpt. Kwirk, "there's something out there..."). The "something out > there" forming the other focal point is not necessary for an elliptical orbit > to take place though. The orbits of all solar system bodies have constantly, > from the beginning, been perturbed by mutual gravitation so that the orbits > intersect one another and elongate (become eccentric). The smaller bodies > having the most eccentric orbits. Mercury has a very eccentric orbit for > example.Hope that helps. > > Bill B. > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 00:54:23 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: KENT JOHNSON <KJOHNSON@STUDENT.HIGHLAND.CC.IL.US> Organization: Highland Community College Subject: on being angry at george will Where is the will you are angry at? (AG, accompanied by harmonium) ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 04:09:24 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> Sender: UB Poetics discussion group <POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU> From: Alan Jen Sondheim <sondheim@PANIX.COM> Subject: lure/id MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII - (As Netscape Communicator extends email into multi-media, poetics will change or retreat. This isn't concrete poetry, but the full and broken textual body. The .htm below is an artifact.) <HTML> <TITLE>lurid communicator haunts the wires Playing with the elaboration inherent in the baroque elements of rococo Netscape Communicator all evening, this critic observes the beginning of email-rubble, in the littoral sense of stumbling across font and color, link and extension, sound and sight. Email transforms into transitive term, translucent, flailing across Websites; email loses internal flow as transitivity constantly jumps the tracks. As we play, push further borders, phenomenological 'world of the text' ruptures, opening jewelry and seduction. What I would give to see you naked cum in my inbox! The inner speech or vocality of language is lost; the (digital) world intrudes in the sense of the ikonic (every digital image is ikonic). Play skitters formations across the surface surfeit. In the midst of things, disturbances. The world is lost. What you can read here, what is your name, your tool, belonging as well, yet:

Yet can you imagine the _event_ of swollen.jpg, not yet included, Jennifer, flush with the screen, rupturing the text with the potential for _her_ visible body, not yet produced, reproduced in _this_ space, but already a deterioration of text, the world shattered by swollen.pink.jpg as you would no longer say, breathless, lured or seduced into the product-production of Jennifer-capital-Alan.

--------------------------------------------------------------- _________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 09:34:41 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dave Zauhar Subject: Re: Will's column Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" actually, the strangest obituary I've heard in the electronic media occured on an Altoona/Johnstown Pennsylvania station. An anchorwoman coiffed to look like a humanoid version of Miss Polly Purebred concluded the 7 second piece (part of the "around the world in a minute" feature common to most local newscasts) by saying, "Ginsberg's poetry grew out of his homosexual experiences and his communistic upbringing." For a brief moment, I had a sense of what it was like to be alive during the 1950s (especially given the production values of this particular newscast). Dave Zauhar, whose Pirates organization would embarrass a slow-pitch softball team ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 09:24:38 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <199704112057.NAA04761@f14.hotmail.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 1:57 PM -0700 4/11/97, Hoa Nguyen wrote, quoting kent johnson: > >Dale, I'll say this: I would like, when I say >>something on this list, to impress, to have people think: "Boy, that >>Kent Johnson sounds really interesting, I wonder what he is really >>like.." Wishful thinking, I'm sure, but I would like my posts to >>contribute, little by little, to >>a great poetry job somewhere, or to being invited to the party I never >>get invited to, to having an even modest cultural status I >>haven't yet had, to be thought of as a list insider who is known to >>be an insider by those who aren't. There, I said it! (And why, >>exactly, does it mildly >>startle every single one of you who just read this that I said this?) why wd this startle? it falls well within the continuum of normal human cerebration. what startles is the ungrounded assumption that i am startled. candor is appreciated. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 09:32:33 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply In-Reply-To: <970411180918_973259630@emout02.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 6:09 PM -0400 4/11/97, AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM wrote: etc i agree. the focus has become what an asshole george will is, rather than anything abt ginsberg. will's shortcomings are not exceptional and don't warrant much time and energy. why waste time on his mean-spirited nonsense? ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 09:47:40 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" speaking of sports, i took in When We Were Kings this past week. it's got some fun poetry in it, and reminded me of when i was a little girl and the Clay/Liston fight was gonna be on. (it was memorable to me cuz we didn't have a tv, but we were at a ski lodge for a week and the ski lodge had a tv, so everything on tv that week sticks in my mind). the newscasters kept reading a poem clay had written for the occasion and i adored it. can anybody post that poem here? free copies of *my* book and the new cross-cultural poetix to the person who obliges.--md At 2:54 PM -0400 4/11/97, Mark Prejsnar wrote: >Interesting, Susan...I don't suspose Will mentions the one really >interesting bit of gossip in the baseball world about that incident..That >Hirschbeck used a homophobic word, and that that's the reason for the >spitting (...I guess in that case he should feel grateful it wasn't Tom >Mandel he was addressing, or the response might have been more solid); >this cropped up on Atlanta radio some time ago, but was really given >credence by a spot Peter Gammons did two weeks ago on ESPN, where he kept >uneasily and paraphrastically saying that "there are just some words you >don't use to someone from a Latin culture.." and finally narrowing it down >to references to a singular "word" that you shouldn't ever use to someone >from a Latin culture (..the "f" word presumably). Gammons knows most of >what's going on in baseball, so I take it that that's strong confirmation. >>From both a poet's and a political activist's point of view, the whole >affair becomes fascinating, in that there is this EVENT people talk about, >and then (maybe) this VERBAL act at the very heart of it all, that NO ONE >WILL MENTION..the word made evasion and silence. > >Mark Prejsnar >(whose Braves are facing a true fight >for their lives in their division, >for the first time in living memory.) > >On Thu, 10 Apr 1997 SSchu30844@AOL.COM wrote: > >> I haven't read the Ginsberg piece by George Will, but I am looking >>forward to >> reading it with and against his recent defense of the Baltimore Orioles' >> Roberto Alomar (as I recall, Will proposed to his second wife at home >> plate--my god!--in Camden Yards) for spitting on the umpire last season. >> Will goes out of his way to attack umpires in this piece and to defend >> Alomar. Apparently, Will is a non-paid member of the Baltimore Orioles' >> board. Which leads me to my modest proposal: why not put the man on the >> poetics list and conflict his interests a bit? >> >> Susan >> (whose Cards are off to their worst start in history) >> ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 08:09:55 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Ginsberg, Nyro, & media coverage for the arts Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Charles Bernstein wrote: >Nyro is being played quite a bit on the radio here in New York City, & others have written or implied similarly about both Ginsberg & Nyro. When I hear a recording by someone I'm interested in on almost ANY radio station, NPR or otherwise, I assume that the artist has died, 'cause otherwise the work w0uldn't be on the air. Herb Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 08:30:23 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: The Don Allan Apology Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I have already apologized to Linda Russo back-channel for whatever vitriol exists in my joke-posting (Allan, Creely, Olsen, Leverton). I explained to her that when at play with Mr.Bowering, I can get carried away, and that I was joshing h i m , neglectful of the fact that like it or not I was also tweaking her. I even suggested she post in to "Mr.Bromide and Mr.Boring" thanking them for their "correction". She was too nice to do so, but by an odd coincidence, Mr. B himself addressed me on the list as the one, and there I was with a snappy comeback, the other, ready to hand. Indeed, as Adorno observed, names are frozen laughter, and the displacement of a single letter can release it. This makes typos in names stick out further than typos in other words, and may explain the energy Linda Russo's "GinsbUrg" has drawn. db ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 11:59:01 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Keith Norris Subject: Re: Will's column In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT yus, GW is a mincey trifle, but the public do listen. More than once, I've heard his sun am posture brickbatted into the knoxville eveninews as news as is. don't like the argument that a "fuck you" or punchy proposal is queing up in the line george set the markers for. false fancy rhetor george--this is much the same argument which says any loud protest against the good governor of tn simply shows him how right he is about whiney college teachers: "if we calm down he might leave us with demoralized pants but pants, oh, pants!" No--GW the frightened coddled clam needs a few well-writ fucks -- mine, ill-writ but posing as other, in mail. Keith -=-=-=-=-= Keith Norris | knorris@pstcc.cc.tn.us English Department PSTCC Knoxville, TN 37933 (423) 539-7140 ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 10:10:43 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Kent wrrt: > this "cultural market" that you > charge Ginsb[...]erg as being complicit in--where do you see its, as > they say, horizon? Did Ginsbe[...]rg, in other words, step over some > kind of threshold that you and I (cleaner in life than him) haven't? > What is the qualitative differ[...]ence, as you see it, between > choosing to buy Gap pants and posing in them? it seems to me that part of the problem here is that we've started, already, from too general a category, or perhaps in plain confusion, with the term "cultural market". while we've acknowledged the market structure of the "cultural" (itself a blanket term)--cultural capital etc a la bourdieu--we've also conflated the two fields on the basis of that structure, which should be accounted autonomous, at least to the best of our ability to do so. so it's both less clear & more clear than presented. ["playing for time"]["doesn't have an answer, does he?"] I mean, yes, there is a difference between "marketing an image" on the poetics list, or in any social-institutional setting--ie, vying for cultural capital, which is a part of our activities here, whether debate or reminiscence, or foolin' around foolery--& participating in an advertisment--which involves an exchange of "real", ie, monetary capital--, & for a company that, as noted by Michael Mcgee, came to be recognized-- though not, I'm certain, before Ginsberg agreed to do the ad--as complicit in the exploitation of child-labor in Southeast Asia. not just an evaluative difference, ie, in terms of what I value or de-value by my judgements, particularly as they are informed by my awareness of the crimes of commodity capitalism, & the accompanying guilt over my own (platitudinous) participation in the maintenance of the same, but a demonstrable difference. ["demonstrable as in rhymes-with-objective?"]. what I mean is that my own feeling about the difference between the two activities is that, at worst, we, by participating on this list are engaged by our participation in a discourse which legitimates an institution that we all believe in; whereas Ginsberg, by posing for the Gap ad, is participating not only in self-promotion, the promotion of Allen Ginsberg as a cultural phenomenon--the accumulation of cultural capital on a different field--, or the support & possibly the promotion of Naropa, but directly in the maintenance of commodity capitalism as it's represented by the Gap--ie, making a direct statement, as it were, of support for the current economic system, which is, as Dale points out, ironically opposed to the Ginsberg more generally familiar. that's not so much of a criticism as it sounds; clearly, as, again, Michael Mcgee's post indicates, Ginsberg was well aware of the intersection of these two fields in his act, & the contradictions that intersection involved, & so not necessarily acting as a "sell-out" or a "capitalist stooge" (remember that Bloom County of a few years back? we still have some Penguin Love t-shirts available). in fact, that's not at all where I mean to locate the above statements, in a sort of disappointed rock fan accusation of heresy, or in the quest for a more saintly canon. nor do I think Dale was expressing any other than the sort of puzzlement that I am, or that Ginsberg himself evidently expressed. note: "puzzlement" as in trying a difficult problem by experiment, not a disappointed confusion or the like. Dale wrttttt: >Ginsberg didn't step through any threshold. There is no threshold, >as far as I can tell. We're all implicated in cultural and economic >market practices. without wanting to initiate a witch hunt, I think it's fair to say that Ginsberg *did* cross a sort of line, the line from the accumulation of cultural capital & what that entails, to the accumulation, for whatever good reason--& he had reasons which he felt were sufficient--, of monetary capital & what that entails. again--sorry if I sound defensive, but the point might easily be misunderstood--this isn't hurtful surprise at Ginsberg having Taken Money--which I'd gladly take if it were offered from ["any offers yet?"]--as much as it is to point up the difference, as I see it, between--well, ie, the Gap not so much between ideals & necessity, as between "the economy" & the/a cultural economy, or vice versa. & maybe that's not such a long gap, either, as the excerpt that Kent brings from At Passages indicates, which is not to say that care needn't be taken in handling that difference, but that it is worth pointing out, as does Dale in his post, the culture industry's ability to turn rebellion to a profit. the small print Ginsberg apparently insisted on may have worked against that agenda, in a "bid" to subvert, however incompletely, the Gap's attempt to use his recognizable counter-culture status-- which isn't, I think, much different from Levi Strauss' attempt to buy the graffiti www site, mentioned here a few months back--, but the incompleteness of that subversion is apparent in the fact that the small print merely contributes to that status in association with the Gap. in other words, even this gesture, made specifically against the context in which Ginsberg appears modeling Gap pants, can be read as furthering the aims of the Gap, Inc. (?) as much as those of Ginsberg or Naropa. but I think that's less a criticism of Ginsberg (as on the cover of his books?) than all of us, or none. (quick detour from puzzlement to feeling pessimistic). & my intuition, from M. Mcgee's post, is that Ginsberg would have looked favorably on our consideration of that problem, particularly as it might (any minute now) swing toward a collective self-examination, & away from a game of othering the Other. though, if there's anything of which I can be certain, it's that Ginsberg would have us conduct ourselves with a bit more humor & compassion, even in the face of gravest circumstance. ["gravest...?"] "love my rhetoric? try Pixidium, the capsular fruit that dehisces so the upper part falls off just like a cap. no more messy furnit" as to the difference between posing for an advertisment for the Gap & wearing pants with the Gap label: in this matter, or, I should say, in this particular case, there's not such a difference. (I'm wearing Levi's 501s, which can be read any number of ways, really, & a cheap, pink, ink-stained t-shirt made by some company called Rivet). more than anything, the danger here is that we might return to the "what are you wearing" thread. or we could talk about the difference in terms of the potential intersection of fields. but I'm not about to. by the way, Kent, I, for one, do look forward to your posts, &, were I to have a party, would surely invite you. that's not likely, however, as I live where I do live, & so couldn't expect much of a turnout, despite my own carefully written posts etc. "still in Utah? try American Hairlines luxurious or stain removal: cream those blemishes away" or better, "want a *real* sense of what it's like to be alive in the 1950s?" because George Will is practically a RED COMMIE in Utahn's terms. best, chris supposed by some to be *working*, & not merely *at work* .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 12:18:57 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Piombino/Simon Subject: Re: Planned Parenthood Benefit Reading In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Thank you for your careful reading of my posting regarding the Planned Parenthood Benefit/ Poets for Choice Reading The reading will be held in New York, New York, borough of Manhattan The Ceres Gallery is located at 584 Broadway, suite 306, near Prince Street in SoHo, telephone (212)226-4725 (this is quite near to the Prince Street stop on the RR train or the N train) For those of you who may have missed the first posting the readers are Corinne Robins, Liz Fodaski and Nick Piombino It will be held on April 25 at 7:30 p.m. ($7 Contribution) Fri, 11 Apr 1997, Hugh Steinberg wrote: > This may seem really obvious of me, but when addresses of events are listed > on the list, could the city please be included? > > Hugh Steinberg > > > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 10:44:08 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: on being angry at george will MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT > Where is the will you are angry at? "verily, Reverend Sir, it is the hair of the head, I mean his hair-brained, no its..." chris .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 12:55:28 -0400 Reply-To: Jennifer Ashton Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jennifer Ashton Subject: Lyn Hejinian's address MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Would anyone be willing to backchannel me with Lyn Hejinian's snail mail address? (Or academic affiliation?) Many thanks. Jennifer Ashton Johns Hopkins University ashto_j@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 11:03:33 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: The Don Allan Anthology MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Notice to All: as the council for the defensive, I wish to register my objection to your libellous assertion that the said Mr. Alexander is in any way infirm or Boring. actually, we're registered at Sharper Image. I'm hoping for the radio-controlled Waterford Crystal Dish & a setting for 12 with gravy boat & silver croquet mallets. as for the vitriol, it comes & goes, but mostly the pain is in my left leg & my ass. signed, A Lawyerly Type .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 13:29:52 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 10 Apr 1997 to 11 Apr 1997 Holman in NY BOB HOLMAN, ANNA RABINOWITZ 7:30pm, Poetry Series/KGB, 85 E. 4th St., (212) 505-3360. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 13:30:56 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM Subject: Holman Reading Holman in NYC with Date of Event This Time BOB HOLMAN, ANNA RABINOWITZ Mon, April 14 7:30pm, Poetry Series/KGB, 85 E. 4th St., (212) 505-3360. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 11:06:11 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" In 1991 I was teaching a modern lit course in Tucson. We were discussing a novella by Platonov called "Dzan" (which, by the way, I strongly recommend) by the Russian writer Platonov. Platonov, who was no fool and suffered plenty under Stalin, was both a dedicated, revolutionary believer in the sort of humane socialism to which the Soviet government often gave lip service even at the worst of times and a christian of sorts (or at least friendly to christian symbolism). The hero of "Dzan" is something like a communist St. Francis. My students had a hard time understanding the idea that a communist, or even a socialist, could harbor benign or altruistic motives--both words were, in their experience, expletives and little more. As one woman, an adult student of maybe 35, put it, "I was always taught that all communists are evil." The kids were even more perplexed. Maybe the world wasn't so simply divided into good and evil. History, for them, had been rewritten to exclude the idealism that the bolshevik rulers manupulated for their own ends but that surely motivated many of their followers--a fair proportion of the world's population--and that offered an alternative vision, however impractical, of human posibilities. It had been rewritten at the movies, on television, and in the popular press. The 60s has been rewritten and domesticated by the fashion-mongers, who make big bucks off of retro radicalism as a fashion statement: clothing whose major virtue was that it cost almost nothing, blurred class distinctions and broke the hold of fashion has become a class marker for those who can afford it. You can book a tour on a hippie bus and do hippie things--a great way to meet other singles, I'm told. As for politics, there's a whole industry devoted to rewriting that, and George Will is in its employ. Saying fuck you to George Will won't get us anywhere. The reason it's important to answer him is that he and his are rewriting the recent past, our own experience of the world. Answering him here doesn't do a whole lot of good--it's mostly preaching to the choir. But it's not a bad thing to do in our classes. It's why I teach a lot of history whatever the course bulletin says I'm teaching. Those who don't know history may not be doomed to repeat it, but they are doomed to having it misappropriated. At 09:32 AM 4/12/97 -0500, you wrote: >At 6:09 PM -0400 4/11/97, AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM wrote: >etc > >i agree. the focus has become what an asshole george will is, rather than >anything abt ginsberg. will's shortcomings are not exceptional and don't >warrant much time and energy. why waste time on his mean-spirited nonsense? > > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 14:50:00 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" Subject: Re: buy this book! MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN Been reading Aldon Nielsen's most excellent new "slim vol." - STEPPING RAZOR and want to urge listmembers - if you haven't sent your check to Rod Smith yet, what are you waiting for? From: Translations From The Rubric To enter a world out of loss Is to carry a lack before you To impose an emptiness as a place for faith To place before you a thing of the past The world will not stand for Patrick Pritchett ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 12:50:48 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" For some reason my recent postings to the list, such as they are, are arriving 8-12 hours after sent, which effectively excludes me from this discussion. Strange feeling of invisibility. So herein a second attempt at what follows. Sorry for any redundance. In 1991 I was teaching a modern lit course in Tucson. We were discussing a novella by Platonov called "Dzan" (which, by the way, I strongly recommend) by the Russian writer Platonov. Platonov, who was no fool and suffered plenty under Stalin, was both a dedicated, revolutionary believer in the sort of humane socialism to which the Soviet government often gave lip service even at the worst of times and a christian of sorts (or at least friendly to christian symbolism). The hero of "Dzan" is something like a communist St. Francis. My students had a hard time understanding the idea that a communist, or even a socialist, could harbor benign or altruistic motives--both words were, in their experience, expletives and little more. As one woman, an adult student of maybe 35, put it, "I was always taught that all communists are evil." The kids were even more perplexed. Maybe the world wasn't so simply divided into good and evil. History, for them, had been rewritten to exclude the idealism that the bolshevik rulers manupulated for their own ends but that surely motivated many of their followers--a fair proportion of the world's population--and that offered an alternative vision, however impractical, of human posibilities. It had been rewritten at the movies, on television, and in the popular press. The 60s has been rewritten and domesticated by the fashion-mongers, who make big bucks off of retro radicalism as a fashion statement: clothing whose major virtue was that it cost almost nothing, blurred class distinctions and broke the hold of fashion has become a class marker for those who can afford it. You can book a tour on a hippie bus and do hippie things--a great way to meet other singles, I'm told. As for politics, there's a whole industry devoted to rewriting that, and George Will is in its employ. Saying fuck you to George Will won't get us anywhere. The reason it's important to answer him is that he and his are rewriting the recent past, our own experience of the world. Answering him here doesn't do a whole lot of good--it's mostly preaching to the choir. But it's not a bad thing to do in our classes. It's why I teach a lot of history whatever the course bulletin says I'm teaching. Those who don't know history may not be doomed to repeat it, but they are doomed to having it misappropriated. At 09:32 AM 4/12/97 -0500, you wrote: >At 6:09 PM -0400 4/11/97, AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM wrote: >etc > >i agree. the focus has become what an asshole george will is, rather than >anything abt ginsberg. will's shortcomings are not exceptional and don't >warrant much time and energy. why waste time on his mean-spirited nonsense? > > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 19:02:16 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Piombino/Simon Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, in the 2nd circle In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII At the risk of stating the obvious, perhaps some of our concerns about Wills' obit grow out of a feeling of becoming worried not only about the loss of a very important poet, but also a great leader. AG used his literary notoriety extremely effectively for excellent causes. Like many other poets and artists he stood up non-violently against the Government's war in Vietnam. Today's media avoids the process of creating revolutionary figures like Ginsberg. We are grieving, in this cruel April of a Nazional Poetry Month, not only the loss of a great poet ,but one of the last of the media revolutionaries that helped save this country from disaster. I think this is sad also because a heavier responsibility falls on us survivors. The most astounding thing about AG is that he insisted on making all this look like fun! Best wishes, Nick ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 18:39:46 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: snyder/gap/ginsberg Took Snyder to the airport bus today and told him about the Will article. He didn't know about it. He said, "Really? Good. That's good. This will help start up a bigger discussion about Allen." I told him about the many heartfelt, moving statements about Allen on this list. He said, "Really? Good. That's Charles Bernstein's creation, right? Hmmmm... Good, good..." Snyder really is a warm and impressive guy. He's reading at Harvard May 1 for those of you in that area. When he sings some of his poems, he sounds like Pete Seeger. I mentioned here yesterday that magpie poem he sang for AG. When it's over he says, "And then the magpie flew away." Hey Chris Alexander, that was some tour de force with the last post. And I don't care if you're in Utah. I've never been invited to a party in Utah. Call me. cardinals in spring snow, Kent ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 19:51:18 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Hale-Bopp Forward Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" This one just arrived via my Harbormaster, so I'm sure it's legit. Sylvester Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 17:46:29 -0400 X-Sender: sailing@hypernet.com Mime-Version: 1.0 To: POLLET@MAINE.maine.edu From: John P Blake Subject: Fwd: DELAYED MESSAGE >Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 07:09:40 -0400 (EDT) >From: Sco4star@aol.com >To: sailing@hypernet.com >Subject: Fwd: DELAYED MESSAGE > > >--------------------- >Forwarded message: >Subj: Fwd: DELAYED MESSAGE >Date: 97-04-11 15:59:01 EDT >From: DaTravron >To: ALMDEW,Sco4star,Tupple >To: rtodd@ttlc.com > > >--------------------- >Forwarded message: >From: wilford@submepp.navy.mil >To: bookmann@cybertours.com, clg@coastlinegraphics.com, DaTravron@aol.com, >kwinterb@awinc.com, patterss@hqacccc.langley.af.mil >Date: 97-04-11 07:46:02 EDT > > > > >______________________________ Forward Header >__________________________________ >Subject: DELAYED MESSAGE >Author: Boucher_P@elsva.com (Boucher_Peter) at internet >Date: 4/10/97 1:14 PM > > > From: The Supreme Commander, Next Level (i.e., Big Giant Head) > To: Heaven's Gate Personnel > > Due to extensive tail winds caused by the comet HALE-BOPP, the pickup > of the 39 passengers has been delayed until the year 2224 when we pass > by the planet Earth again. > > DO NOT EAT THE PUDDING AT THIS TIME > - repeat- > > DO NOT EAT THE PUDDING ... > > > ------------------------------------------------------------ John P Blake sailing@hypernet.com ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 20:35:50 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dave Zauhar Subject: Re: The poetry of Muhammad Ali Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >speaking of sports, i took in When We Were Kings this past week. it's got >some fun poetry in it, and reminded me of when i was a little girl and the >Clay/Liston fight was gonna be on. (it was memorable to me cuz we didn't >have a tv, but we were at a ski lodge for a week and the ski lodge had a >tv, so everything on tv that week sticks in my mind). the newscasters kept >reading a poem clay had written for the occasion and i adored it. can >anybody post that poem here? free copies of *my* book and the new >cross-cultural poetix to the person who obliges.--md Damn. I can only recall another classic from the Ali oeuvre: I'll say it again I've said it before Archie Moore'll go down in four I doubt if that even qualifies me for an offprint of a journal article. Dave Zauhar ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 20:38:11 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: GWAG It's easy now to look back with historical hindsight & conflate or deflate the Gap between Bob Dylan & Allen Ginsberg on the cybernet revolution front. But no one has been able to deny the pivotal importance of Dan Bouchard's post of early april 1997 in which he wrote, "fuck you George Will". The repercussions have been endless, the ramifications proliferate dissertationly in a dizzying pyrotechnic of etc. Dan, did you mean by this - I mean, were you conscious when you put on those overalls so to speak - of the immense sea-change about to take place? I think you were. I want to tell a personal anecdote about Dan: this must have been in about 2004 - he was confronted by a pack of nouveau-zelot-heads with microphones - & he EMPATHIZED with thier CONCERNS - I KNOW he THOUGHT TWICE before he lifted that pack of million-yen contributions & tossed it into the Yangtzee. Henry Gould, (remember him?), before he died in that fatal sewing accident (those needles...) in 1999, often said - in those quaint little Spandrift posts of his - "Dan's o.k. He'll make a good Chairman, whatever they say." No one can obligerate the truth of that modest observation, at least at this late hour, not by any means (or ends, for that matter). Shantih shantih shantih - Eric Blarnes ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 19:57:16 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: Ginsberg > Date sent: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 09:24:38 -0500 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group > From: Maria Damon > Subject: Re: Ginsberg > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > At 1:57 PM -0700 4/11/97, Hoa Nguyen wrote, quoting kent johnson: > > > >Dale, I'll say this: I would like, when I say > >>something on this list, to impress, to have people think: "Boy, that > >>Kent Johnson sounds really interesting, I wonder what he is really > >>like.." Wishful thinking, I'm sure, but I would like my posts to > >>contribute, little by little, to > >>a great poetry job somewhere, or to being invited to the party I never > >>get invited to, to having an even modest cultural status I > >>haven't yet had, to be thought of as a list insider who is known to > >>be an insider by those who aren't. There, I said it! (And why, > >>exactly, does it mildly > >>startle every single one of you who just read this that I said this?) > > > why wd this startle? it falls well within the continuum of normal human > cerebration. what startles is the ungrounded assumption that i am > startled... Well, then, so it startled, right? Kent ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 20:37:29 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: cardinal in spring snow? Thought I'd share this which I just got from a friend in response to my post to the list re: Gary Snyder. My reply follows his waka and wise caution: >baby panda in boiling pot screaming then quiet >running shoe under bed smeared with dogshit >penis ringed with Copenhagen stains > Don't let that giddy zensnyder experience make you > sentimental-eye-zed, oh kent on sawed- > off branch plummeting toward cardinal in spring snow. > --Love, The Underdolt > But hey, love, if I'm going to crash in a heap and take the whole empire down with me, why not engage in a little hero worship to salve the pain. Heil Snyder!!! (ps: and who's the cutie-pie that does Copenhagen?) keunt ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 23:03:22 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dean Taciuch Subject: Re: Will's column/ my reply In-Reply-To: <199704121806.LAA23120@sweden.it.earthlink.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >My students had a hard time understanding the idea >that a communist, or even a socialist, could harbor benign or altruistic >motives--both words were, in their experience, expletives and little more. >As one woman, an adult student of maybe 35, put it, "I was always taught >that all communists are evil." The kids were even more perplexed. Maybe the >world wasn't so simply divided into good and evil. >History, for them, had been rewritten to exclude the idealism that the >bolshevik rulers manupulated for their own ends but that surely motivated >many of their followers--a fair proportion of the world's population--and >that offered an alternative vision, however impractical, of human >posibilities. It had been rewritten at the movies, on television, and in the >popular press. >The 60s has been rewritten and domesticated by the fashion-mongers, who make >big bucks off of retro radicalism as a fashion statement: clothing whose >major virtue was that it cost almost nothing, blurred class distinctions and >broke the hold of fashion has become a class marker for those who can afford >it. You can book a tour on a hippie bus and do hippie things--a great way to >meet other singles, I'm told. As for politics, there's a whole industry >devoted to rewriting that, and George Will is in its employ. >Saying fuck you to George Will won't get us anywhere. The reason it's >important to answer him is that he and his are rewriting the recent past, >our own experience of the world. >Answering him here doesn't do a whole lot of good--it's mostly preaching to >the choir. But it's not a bad thing to do in our classes. It's why I teach a >lot of history whatever the course bulletin says I'm teaching. Those who >don't know history may not be doomed to repeat it, but they are doomed to >having it misappropriated. > Every time I teach a lit course I teach the history as well. In the standard AmLit sequence, I always go into the history of the American Communist party of the 1920s, for example. The students for the most part know nothing about it (though a few do, and that number seems to be increasing). The simple Communism (bad)/Democracy (good) dichtomy has been absorbed by people who don't even know what these words mean. I see it too when I teach the early American course--the actual writings of "the Founding fathers" surprise them--especially Thomas Paine's writrings on religion. They've been told in High School (?) what's in these texts but haven't examined them themselves. This semester, I'm teaching American Poetry 1950-1965 for Sophomores. When the news of Ginsberg's health first came through last Friday, I was preparing notes for a class discussion of O'Hara's _Lunch Poems_. We closed with the last poem, "Fantasy" (dedicated to the health of Allen Ginsberg). Over the weekend the announcement of Ginsberg's death came over the list, and on the news. This week's class included a discussion of the Will column (which several of my students had seen) and the responses here on this list (which I brought in--a few I even posted to the web page I set up for the class). This course is listed as "Literature and Society" so I've had plenty of opportunity to discuss the late fifties/early sixties era in the class. Mark Weiss is correct when he points out how this era has been rewritten. But it isn't just the 60s. Dean ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 23:22:38 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Thomas Bell Subject: ginsberg and snyder Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Gary Snyder lectured and read here in Freeport, Illinois tonight. It ... KENT JOHNSON wrote. Does using adjacent urinals in two different states at two times 25 years apart count as a reverent or irreverent memory? Or is this sexist or too personal? tom bell GS and i - not to implicate others. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 23:22:41 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Thomas Bell Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Maria Damon wrote >At 6:09 PM -0400 4/11/97, AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM wrote: >etc >i agree. the focus has become what an asshole george will is, rather than >anything abt ginsberg. will's shortcomings are not exceptional and don't >warrant much time and energy. why waste time on his mean-spirited nonsense? as do i. AG was responsible for my family. My wife correctly identified him in a multiple-choice come on letter sent when he gave a reading in the mid seventies. (He was in a temporary eclipse as a "commodity" and too few of the students at that time had any idea who he was, had been, and would be). AG range/renga impulse unsquandering infinite egrets he tom bell ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 00:29:17 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Stephen Vincent Subject: Re: The poetry of Muhammad Ali A guess: Was it the one with alliterative off-rhymes - front and back ("float/sting" & "butterfly/bee") "float like a butterfly, sting like a bee" ?? Cheers, Stephen Vincent ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 02:48:27 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: MAXINE CHERNOFF Subject: History Is Rewritten In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Speaking of history being rewritten, I shuddered a few years ago that my daughter's brand new history book (jr high level) had as much information on Grenada (2 paragraphs) as it did on the Viet Nam War. And try to find a single text for kids taught in the regular curriculum that even mentions the American Labor Movement. So no wonder that when they arrive in college, they are maybe aware of Allen G as MTV celeb instead of fine poet and political activist. My solution at home: tell my kids about alternate history, take them to events that proliferate the truth about American political policy, etc. It's an odd consciousness reflected in those books as well, very inconsistent. My younger sons are now being taught about Japanese internment camps, slave rebellions before the Civil War, etc., (younger kids and newer book still) but no change in the omissions cited above. Maxine Chernoff ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 07:22:53 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Mandel Subject: George may choose Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I'd been unable to read the list for about 3 weeks (swamped) when Allen died and I began to stick my nose in again to the daily digest. I missed, but someone has mentioned to me, Pat Pritchett suggesting that I punch George Will in the nose. Using, apparently, the pop I'd put aside for poor Ed Dorn's snoot were he to say bad things to me (he hasn't -- rest easy). I'll get to George in a moment. I think the outpouring of sentiment about AG was wonderful. I first encountered him when, a just-teen unfledged poet, I attended the now-famous (and then-fabulous) Big Table reading in Chicago. He had such a dark and liquid voice alive. He was poetry incarnate, how could anyone ever doubt him a poet? What an idea! Odd, however, is the debate about his status as "a millionaire." His image on a GAP ad. I haven't seen much of this debate, but it seems pathetic to me. Actually, I'd heard that Allen was dismayed to be offered one mil only for his papers. I kind of agree. I think the library that bought them got a hell of a deal. That is, they'll be worth a lot more to the institution. As to AG associating himself with a corporation "utterly complicit" in Asian child labor, so does everyone on this list whether knowingly or not. If virtually every pair of sneakers available comes from that context, is virtue defined by going shoeless? And should that be Allen shoeless, or you. How'd the coffee bean get in your cup -- picked by union labor? The question is whether you work against what you think is objectionable. I don't know how Allen Ginsberg could have worked harder to fight the ugliness that has risen and risen in our time. Speaking of "ugliness... risen in our time" -- I think it would only be fair to give George Will his choice of weapons. George, my second Pat Pritchett will be in touch with your second. Should George choose pistols, I'll insist on cap. Should he choose wit, I'll ask David Bromige to represent me. Tom Mandel Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com ******************************************************** Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com 4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 ******************************************************** Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 10:09:53 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Free Subject: Anne Waldman's AG poem MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Subscribers to this list may be interested to know that Anne Waldman's poem "Notes on Sitting Beside a Noble Corpse" is posted at http://members.aol.com/mongobear/private/Ginsberg/Waldman.html George Free ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 09:48:04 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Ginsberg In-Reply-To: <2542290374F@student.highland.cc.il.us> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 7:57 PM +0600 4/12/97, KENT JOHNSON wrote: >> Date sent: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 09:24:38 -0500 >> Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group >> >> From: Maria Damon >> Subject: Re: Ginsberg >> To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > >> At 1:57 PM -0700 4/11/97, Hoa Nguyen wrote, quoting kent johnson: >> > >> >Dale, I'll say this: I would like, when I say >> >>something on this list, to impress, to have people think: "Boy, that >> >>Kent Johnson sounds really interesting, I wonder what he is really >> >>like.." Wishful thinking, I'm sure, but I would like my posts to >> >>contribute, little by little, to >> >>a great poetry job somewhere, or to being invited to the party I never >> >>get invited to, to having an even modest cultural status I >> >>haven't yet had, to be thought of as a list insider who is known to >> >>be an insider by those who aren't. There, I said it! (And why, >> >>exactly, does it mildly >> >>startle every single one of you who just read this that I said this?) >> >> >> why wd this startle? it falls well within the continuum of normal human >> cerebration. what startles is the ungrounded assumption that i am >> startled... > >Well, then, so it startled, right? > >Kent nah... ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 10:02:23 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: The poetry of Muhammad Ali In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 8:35 PM -0500 4/12/97, Dave Zauhar wrote: >>speaking of sports, i took in When We Were Kings this past week. it's got >>some fun poetry in it, and reminded me of when i was a little girl and the >>Clay/Liston fight was gonna be on. (it was memorable to me cuz we didn't >>have a tv, but we were at a ski lodge for a week and the ski lodge had a >>tv, so everything on tv that week sticks in my mind). the newscasters kept >>reading a poem clay had written for the occasion and i adored it. can >>anybody post that poem here? free copies of *my* book and the new >>cross-cultural poetix to the person who obliges.--md > >Damn. I can only recall another classic from the Ali oeuvre: > >I'll say it again >I've said it before >Archie Moore'll >go down in four > >I doubt if that even qualifies me for an offprint of a journal article. > >Dave Zauhar dave, i'll send u an off print of an article on gertrude stein and jewish social science, if you send your snail mail address. just what you've always wanted, n'est-ce pas? ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 10:06:41 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: History Is Rewritten In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" howard zinn's book A People's History of the United States or some such is very good for this purpose. it's thick tho, which may intimidate some hs students, but very readable and an eye-opener. At 2:48 AM -0700 4/13/97, MAXINE CHERNOFF wrote: >Speaking of history being rewritten, I shuddered a few years ago that my >daughter's brand new history book (jr high level) had as much information >on Grenada (2 paragraphs) as it did on the Viet Nam War. And try to find >a single text for kids taught in the regular curriculum that even mentions >the American Labor Movement. So no wonder that when they arrive in >college, they are maybe aware of Allen G as MTV celeb instead of fine poet >and political activist. My solution at home: tell my kids about alternate >history, take them to events that proliferate the truth about American >political policy, etc. > >It's an odd consciousness reflected in those books as well, very >inconsistent. My younger sons are now being taught about Japanese >internment camps, slave rebellions before the Civil War, etc., (younger >kids and newer book still) but no change in the omissions cited above. > >Maxine Chernoff ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 10:12:48 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: George may choose In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970413072253.006cc360@cais.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" tom mandel, this is a terrific post, amen all around, i like your spirit. i toast you with my organic cooperatively harvested altura coffee (a poor substitute for peet's but one of the consequences of my midwestern exile). At 7:22 AM -0500 4/13/97, Tom Mandel wrote: >I'd been unable to read the list for about 3 weeks (swamped) when Allen >died and I began to stick my nose in again to the daily digest. I missed, but >someone has mentioned to me, Pat Pritchett suggesting that I punch George Will >in the nose. Using, apparently, the pop I'd put aside for poor Ed Dorn's snoot >were he to say bad things to me (he hasn't -- rest easy). > >I'll get to George in a moment. > >I think the outpouring of sentiment about AG was wonderful. I first >encountered >him when, a just-teen unfledged poet, I attended the now-famous (and >then-fabulous) >Big Table reading in Chicago. He had such a dark and liquid voice alive. He >was >poetry incarnate, how could anyone ever doubt him a poet? What an idea! > >Odd, however, is the debate about his status as "a millionaire." His image >on a GAP >ad. I haven't seen much of this debate, but it seems pathetic to me. >Actually, I'd >heard that Allen was dismayed to be offered one mil only for his papers. I >kind of >agree. I think the library that bought them got a hell of a deal. That is, >they'll >be worth a lot more to the institution. > >As to AG associating himself with a corporation "utterly complicit" in >Asian child >labor, so does everyone on this list whether knowingly or not. If virtually >every >pair of sneakers available comes from that context, is virtue defined by >going shoeless? And should that be Allen shoeless, or you. How'd the coffee >bean >get in your cup -- picked by union labor? > >The question is whether you work against what you think is objectionable. I >don't know how Allen Ginsberg could have worked harder to fight the ugliness >that has risen and risen in our time. > >Speaking of "ugliness... risen in our time" -- I think it would only be fair >to give George Will his choice of weapons. George, my second Pat Pritchett >will be in touch with your second. > >Should George choose pistols, I'll insist on cap. Should he choose wit, I'll >ask David Bromige to represent me. > >Tom Mandel > > > > >Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com >******************************************************** >Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com >4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 >Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 >******************************************************** > Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 14:52:54 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bobbie West Subject: Re: History is Rewritten Maria Damon wrote: >howard zinn's book A People's History of the United States or some such is >very good for this purpose. it's thick tho, which may intimidate some hs >students, but very readable and an eye-opener. There's also _Labor's Untold Story_ by Richard O. Boyer and Herbert M. Morais, (published by the United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of America, New York, 1965) though I don't know if it's still in print. Bobbie West ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 15:51:15 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Keith Norris Subject: Re: ali In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Maria Damon, --these three Ali poems turned up in a brief web search--none specifically attached to either of the Liston fights, though. Got _Dark End..._ already--other books and articles I haven't read threaten my already iffy "normal human cerebration" at this late date in dissertation. If this earns a prize, send only in August after I've defended. I think I'll go worry about the tone of this mail and how it impacts my future now... Cheers, Keith #1 It all started twenty years past, The greatest of them was born at last. The very first words from his Louisville lips, "I'm pretty as a picture, and there's no one I can't whip." #2 Joe's gonna come out smokin', And I ain't gonna be joking', I'll be peckin and pokin'. Pourin' water on his smokin'. This might shock and amaze ya, But I'll retire Joe Frazier! #3 This is the story about a man With iron fists and a beautiful tan He talks a lot indeed Of a powerful punch and blinding speed. The boxing game was slowly dying, And fight promoters were bitterly crying For someone, somewhere, to come along With a better and a different tone. Cheers, Keith -=-=-=-=-= Keith Norris | knorris@pstcc.cc.tn.us English Department PSTCC Knoxville, TN 37933 (423) 539-7140 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 14:04:48 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "linda v. russo" Organization: University of Utah Subject: Will/[my]reply MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT "Speaking of this image/commodity thing, there's a passage from [Bill Knott] that seems to connect, though I'm baffled as to precisely how. That would be the point, I guess. How to read this? It makes me jealous: I wish I would have thought of it for my death poem. ["Going to sleep, I cross my hands on my chest. They will place my hands like this. It will look as though I'm flying into myself."] [--l.] -- linda v. russo linda.russo@m.cc.utah.edu ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 14:04:48 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "linda v. russo" Organization: University of Utah Subject: Re: The Don Allan Apology MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT actually -- i thought it would make my reply sound too much like a victorian pornographic novel. db wrote: > I even suggested she post in to "Mr.Bromide and Mr.Boring" > thanking them for their "correction". She was too nice to do so . . -- linda v. russo linda.russo@m.cc.utah.edu ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 13:15:11 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: Triumph and the Will Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Thank you, Tom. But my recollection of your conversation (which we sorely miss, old chum) suggests you wd do better in a duel of wits with Will to bat for yourself. But whether you or I. it'll be like shooting goldfish in a rainbarrel. I agree re the anecdotal testimony re Allen. (oops! or is it Alan? Allan? -- George, George Bowering, while you're up, would you go the the Ginsberg section of my bookshelves, check that out? Thanks George!) Some of the best reading on the List, in my brief months upon it. The Will part is not so good--would be better if he were on the list I think. I know I posted re-him, but I was one over the eight that night & forget what I wrote. If it cd now be regarded as vitriol-free, I'd like to continue the naming of contributors to the Don Allan Anthology (or Apology). How abt Jackson McLow, Michael Mac Lure, Gary Spicer and Jack Snyder? And of course, Jerome Rothenburg. dbde ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 13:44:06 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: History is Rewritten In-Reply-To: <970413145240_-1167964688@emout10.mail.aol.com> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT in a recent post (i forgot who) someone stated that young people seem interested/more interested in labor issues communism etc . . . and i think that although i am somewhat concerned at the willful forgetfulness of younger generations about critical histories--feminism in particular--i think its great that individuals are attempting to bring a more radical edge to the mainstream: watching rage against the machine on mtv the other day i saw a new video about mexican/migrant workers that was very in your face. not that i like everything they do/say but i admire their efforts to educate/entertain. jeffrey timmons ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 16:31:24 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU Subject: reading list... Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" well it's spring anyway (despite the weather we've been having here in the midwest), so it's as good a time as any to note some books recently rec'd, by poetics list members (you're all such a prolific lot!), all of which i've only dipped into thus far and all of which look to be well-worth the price of admission: first, to second patrick's acclaim, aldon nielsen's _stepping razor_... doug barbour's _story for a saskatchewan night_... mark scroggin's (ed) _upper limit music_... aldon nielsen's (slow down will ya?!) _black chant_... marjorie perloff's _wittgenstein's ladder_... linda russo's _constellation voice_... bob perelman's _the marginalization of poetry_... walter lew's (ed) _premonitions_... pierre joris's translation of celan's _breathturn_... & not from this list region (i think!): joseph duemer's _static_... johanna drucker's _the visible word_... carolyn heilbrun's bio, _the education of a woman: the life of gloria steinem_... finally, i finally picked up my own copy of whitman's _specimen days & collect_, and am browsing through (whitman is always stimulating reading for me)... anyway, whew!... you guyz & galz are incredible!... /// joe ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 15:26:20 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Re: John Barton Wolgamot Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I only know of the Robert Ashley piece "In Sara, Mencken, Christ and Beethoven There Were Men and Women", in which Ashley intones a text by Wolgamot against electronic sounds designed by Ashley & Paul DeMarinis. Pardon my ignorance, but what else did Wolgamot do? >What ever happened to JBW? To the JBW Society? > >Alan Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 18:29:48 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Louis Cabri Subject: Re: AG & the columnists In-Reply-To: <2E16DF47F7A@as.ua.edu> from "Hank Lazer" at Apr 11, 97 09:35:04 am MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hank, I agree The newspaper obit you mention -- the "personality-not-a-poet" line -- don't you think that argument was structured into initial reception of "New American W" itself -- both the 1960 anthology & the moment those poets occupied in so timely a way, AG included? I think it's clearly there in Robert Pack's intro to his edited section of New Poets from England and America--the retrenchment response (1962?) to the Allen antho. If you get media attention and use the media as AG did, then you are automatically disqualified as a poet. It's an argument that ironically for the newspaper journalist puts poetry back into a gown, no longer in the town, where it can be equally scorned by an identical sort of reporter as decorative timelessness much like Wedgewood. Reading backwards through the last week's post, Louis ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 18:40:03 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dave Zauhar Subject: Re: History is Rewritten Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Maria Damon wrote: > >>howard zinn's book A People's History of the United States or some such is >>very good for this purpose. it's thick tho, which may intimidate some hs >>students, but very readable and an eye-opener. > > >There's also _Labor's Untold Story_ by Richard O. Boyer and Herbert M. >Morais, (published by the United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of >America, New York, 1965) though I don't know if it's still in print. > >Bobbie West _Lies My Teacher Told Me_ would probably be accessible to most highschool kids, so that might be another good place to start. DZ ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 18:39:56 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Gwyn McVay Subject: Re: The Don Allan Apology In-Reply-To: <199704132001.OAA05111@cor.oz.cc.utah.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII More like something Frank O'Hara's old roommate Edward Gorey would illustrate. On Sun, 13 Apr 1997, linda v. russo wrote: > actually -- i thought it would make my reply sound too much > like a victorian pornographic novel. > > db wrote: > > I even suggested she post in to "Mr.Bromide and Mr.Boring" > > thanking them for their "correction". She was too nice to do so . . > > -- > linda v. russo > linda.russo@m.cc.utah.edu > ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 16:50:48 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: History Is Rewritten Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" It's all a matter of point of view, Maxine. Think of the unimaginable consequences had we lost the war in Grenada. At 02:48 AM 4/13/97 -0700, you wrote: >Speaking of history being rewritten, I shuddered a few years ago that my >daughter's brand new history book (jr high level) had as much information >on Grenada (2 paragraphs) as it did on the Viet Nam War. And try to find >a single text for kids taught in the regular curriculum that even mentions >the American Labor Movement. So no wonder that when they arrive in >college, they are maybe aware of Allen G as MTV celeb instead of fine poet >and political activist. My solution at home: tell my kids about alternate >history, take them to events that proliferate the truth about American >political policy, etc. > >It's an odd consciousness reflected in those books as well, very >inconsistent. My younger sons are now being taught about Japanese >internment camps, slave rebellions before the Civil War, etc., (younger >kids and newer book still) but no change in the omissions cited above. > >Maxine Chernoff > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 00:31:36 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: cris cheek Subject: Election news Comments: To: Multiple recipients of list POETICS Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" For those with an interest in the choice facing the current electorate in the UK, note that tens of thousands of mostly (but by no means all) younger people marched in London yesterday. Most prominent of the banners were those reading FUCK MIDDLE ENGLAND FUCK THE ELECTION TONY BLAIR WE ARE YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE one favorite wore a red vest reading 'Legal Observer' gives me some slight hope love and love cris ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 18:36:05 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steve Carll Subject: Change of Address Comments: To: poetics@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu, wr-eye-tings@sfu.ca, maz881@aol.com, CHRIS1929W@aol.com, Levyaa@is.nyu.edu, kunos@lanminds.com, sab5@psu.edu, mwinter@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu, fittermn@is.nyu.edu, wmfuller@ix.netcom.com, lease@HUSC.HARVARD.EDU, daviesk@is4.NYU.EDU, Daniel_Bouchard@hmco.com, drothschild@penguin.com, jdavis@panix.com, jms@acmenet.net, maj6916@u.cc.utah.edu, AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM, jarnot@pipeline.com, lgoodman@acsu.buffalo.edu, lppl@aol.com, eskiles@slip.net, mbates@s3.sonnet.com, mmscott@gsbpop.uchicago.edu, 6500dtpt@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu, jaukee@slip.net, basinski@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu, ninthlab@aol.com, israfel@uci.edu, dcmb@metro.net, mburger@adobe.com, kristinb@wired.com, hgburrus@msn.com, chadwick@crl.com, leechapman@aol.com, cah@sonic.net, vent@sirius.com, sscollis@sfu.ca, acornford@igc.org, leslie@researchmag.com, nd@panix.com, jday@uclink.berkeley.edu, jdebrot@aol.com, billder@fluxion.com, jdonahue@ups.edu, steven_evans@brown.edu, jasfoley@aol.com, gfoust@osf1.gmu.edu, peter_gizzi@macmail.ucsc.edu, chrisko@sirius.com, jeg48@columbia.edu, dgolumbi@sas.upenn.edu, distguill@aol.com, mvh2@columbia.edu, olmsted@crl.com, cynthia.huntington@mac.dartmouth.edu, beu1@columbia.edu, andrew_joron@sfbayguardian.com, hlazer@as.ua.edu, juxta43781@aol.com, zorlook@aol.com, tlovell@sfsu.edu, 75323.740@compuserve.com, swmar@conncoll.edu, bam4c@virginia.edu, jmcnally@postoffice.ptd.net, dmelt@ccnet.com, murphym@earthlink.com, nguyenhoa@hotmail.com, el500005@brownvm.brown.edu, jnoble@ccvm.sunysb.edu, john_r._noto@sfbayguardian.com, petersm@coral.indstate.edu, spettet@vaxa.stevens-tech.edu, quarterm@unixg.ubc.ca, raphael@aracnet.com, 103730.2033@compuserve.com, kit_robinson@peoplesoft.com, jross@tmn.com, jays@sirius.com, selby@slip.net, 75477.2255@compuserve.com, ashurin@mercury.sfsu.edu, lisas@ncgate.newcollege.edu, shari.sperling@hairclub.uucp.netcom.com, bstrang@sfsu.edu, 102573.414@compuserve.com, tomt@ch1.ch.pdx.edu, tunguka@mail.idt.net, xerxes999@aol.com, pvangel@mail.idt.net, jet@interfaceic.com, jrlw@west.net, gondola@deltanet.com, monkeys@easystreet.com, tubesox@sirius.com, jfcobin@aol.com, acorn@sirius.com, ghabas@ncgate.newcollege.edu, lehall@umd5.umd.edu, gothic@panix.com, 103667.110@compuserve.com, rjm@merkle.baaqmd.gov, vrgnamgnta@aol.com, pearlman@intergate.tracy.k12.ca.us, celeste@slip.net, mdean@crl.com, fraz@tao.sosc.osshe.edu, sam@europa.com, kmstockd@uci.edu, bill.wilcox@hq.nasa.gov Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Whereas hitherto, the postal address for Steve Carll, Antenym magazine, and Bathysphere Press were 106 Fair Oaks St. #3, San Francisco, CA 94110-2951 Henceforward, said postal address shall be 106 Fair Oaks St. #1. All other loci remain the same (relatively speaking). Thank you. ********************************** sjcarll@slip.net Steve Carll http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/mags/antenym http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/ezines/antenym In seed- sense the sea stars you out, innermost, forever. --Paul Celan ********************************** ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 20:39:51 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: ali In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" keith, these are all charming but not "THE" poem. don't worry abt tone. career still intact. i won't burden you w/ reprints; i understand perfectly. At 3:51 PM -0500 4/13/97, Keith Norris wrote: >Maria Damon, > >--these three Ali poems turned up in a brief web search--none specifically >attached to either of the Liston fights, though. > >Got _Dark End..._ already--other books and articles I haven't read >threaten my already iffy "normal human cerebration" at this late date in >dissertation. If this earns a prize, send only in August after I've >defended. I think I'll go worry about the tone of this mail and how it >impacts my future now... > >Cheers, >Keith > >#1 >It all started twenty years past, >The greatest of them was born at last. >The very first words from his Louisville lips, >"I'm pretty as a picture, and there's no one I can't whip." > >#2 >Joe's gonna come out smokin', >And I ain't gonna be joking', >I'll be peckin and pokin'. >Pourin' water on his smokin'. >This might shock and amaze ya, >But I'll retire Joe Frazier! > >#3 >This is the story about a man >With iron fists and a beautiful tan >He talks a lot indeed >Of a powerful punch and blinding speed. > >The boxing game was slowly dying, >And fight promoters were bitterly crying >For someone, somewhere, to come along >With a better and a different tone. > >Cheers, > >Keith > >-=-=-=-=-= > >Keith Norris | knorris@pstcc.cc.tn.us >English Department PSTCC >Knoxville, TN 37933 >(423) 539-7140 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 22:40:57 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: Re: John Barton Wolgamot In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII He wrote a long piece, of which that was a line or the title - I forget - an amazing poem decades ago, Keith Waldrop was a member of the Society, and I joined - one had to reference him out of context... And I wondered if anyone else had come across his writing. Alan On Sun, 13 Apr 1997, Herb Levy wrote: > I only know of the Robert Ashley piece "In Sara, Mencken, Christ and > Beethoven There Were Men and Women", in which Ashley intones a text by > Wolgamot against electronic sounds designed by Ashley & Paul DeMarinis. > Pardon my ignorance, but what else did Wolgamot do? > > >What ever happened to JBW? To the JBW Society? > > > >Alan > > > Herb Levy > herb@eskimo.com > _______________________________________________________________________ URL: http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html MIRROR: http://www.anu.edu.au/english/index.html TELEPHONE 718-857-3671 IMAGES: http://www.cs.unca.edu/~davidson/pix/ CUSEEME 166.84.250.149 ADDRESS: 432 Dean St., Brooklyn, NY, USA, 11217 Editor, BEING ON LINE ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 21:15:45 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: michael corbin Subject: Re: History is Rewritten MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Dave Zauhar wrote: > _Lies My Teacher Told Me_ would probably be accessible to most highschool > kids, so that might be another good place to start. > A nice text for secondary ed and beyond is the _Who Built America? Working People & The Nation's Economy, Politics, Culture & Society_ in two volumes from the American Social History Project at CUNY. The founder of the project is Herbert Gutman. The 'text' can also be had on CD with lots of pedegogically provocative pictures, songs etc. for the multi-media prepared computer. I've used this in teaching literacy classes because of its explicit historical/political editorial commitments and general accessibility. mc ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 00:32:45 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Chris Stroffolino Subject: So How did The Weiners I mean Wieners event go? In philadelphia, I mean......chris stroffolino ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 12 Apr 1997 22:02:09 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: Reading backwards Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Louis, the Hall Pack Simpson anthology _New Poets of England & America_ came out in 1958, preceding the Allen by nearly two years. There may have been a later edition, post - Allen, that incl. one or 2 of the Allen poets - Creeley? But HPS were there firstest, though not with the mostest. Frost did the intro, all the poets were under 40 (they'll be under 80, today), & they wrote like, well, like Ur-Neo-Formalists. Some handful went on to fame and considerable fortune. Kingsley Amis, Robert Bly, Donald Davie, Thom Gunn, Hall himself, Anthony Hecht, Geoffrey Hill, John Hollander, Elizabeth Jennings, Donald Justice, Philip Larkin, Robert Lowell, James Merrill, W.S.Merwin, Howard Nemerov, Adrienne Cecile Rich, Jon Silkin, W.Dewitt Snodgrass,May Swenson, Reed Whittemore, Richard Wilbur and James Wright, names to conjure with & not any list of mere retrenchers. It was remarkable to those of us just entering the scene to have 2 anthologies purporting to present the best of current american poetry coming out, with not one poet in both books. These days, of course, we are accustomed to such divisions. Hope this helps, Louis. db ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 22:21:01 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: The Don Allan Anthology In-Reply-To: <2402A17272A@student.highland.cc.il.us> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" my whole take on the misspelling of Allen's name was not just to do with carelessness; it was also to do with respect. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 22:30:31 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: foundling fathers In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > I see it too >when I teach the early American course--the actual writings of "the >Founding fathers" surprise them--especially Thomas Paine's writrings on >religion. They've been told in High School (?) what's in these texts but >haven't examined them themselves. Yeah, this semestr I did that with the declaration of Independence, and enjoyed the complaint against george III for being nice to the bloodthirsty savages. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 13 Apr 1997 22:31:20 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: ginsberg and snyder In-Reply-To: <199704130322.XAA16730@SMTP.USIT.NET> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Does using adjacent urinals in two different states Where is that possible? George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 00:07:04 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: Reading backwards Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" On this subject _A Contoversy of Poets_, edited by Robt Kelly and I forget whoall, was an attempt either to bridge the gap or to mark the boundaries. As I remember, Kelly chose the poets from the establishment side, his conventional poet coeditor chose the poets I like to read. It's a half-interesting book. At 10:02 PM 4/12/97 -0500, you wrote: >Louis, the Hall Pack Simpson anthology _New Poets of England & America_ >came out in 1958, preceding the Allen by nearly two years. There may have >been a later edition, post - Allen, that incl. one or 2 of the Allen >poets - Creeley? But HPS were there firstest, though not with the mostest. >Frost did the intro, all the poets were under 40 (they'll be under 80, >today), & they wrote like, well, like Ur-Neo-Formalists. Some handful went >on to fame and considerable fortune. Kingsley Amis, Robert Bly, Donald >Davie, Thom Gunn, Hall himself, Anthony Hecht, Geoffrey Hill, John >Hollander, Elizabeth Jennings, Donald Justice, Philip Larkin, Robert >Lowell, James Merrill, W.S.Merwin, Howard Nemerov, Adrienne Cecile Rich, >Jon Silkin, W.Dewitt Snodgrass,May Swenson, Reed Whittemore, Richard Wilbur >and James Wright, names to conjure with & not any list of mere retrenchers. > > >It was remarkable to those of us just entering the scene to have 2 >anthologies purporting to present the best of current american poetry >coming out, with not one poet in both books. These days, of course, we are >accustomed to such divisions. > >Hope this helps, Louis. db > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 06:44:06 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Re: Reading backwards MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Mark Weiss wrote: > > On this subject _A Contoversy of Poets_, edited by Robt Kelly and I forget > whoall, was an attempt either to bridge the gap or to mark the boundaries. > As I remember, Kelly chose the poets from the establishment side, his > conventional poet coeditor chose the poets I like to read. T'was the other way around, Mark, unless Mac Low, Blackburn, Blaser, Dorn, Enslin, Leroi Jones, Gerrit Lansing, Levertov, Olson, Oppenheimer, Rochelle Owens, Rothenberg, Zukofsky are the establishment poets, while Peter Burr, Peter Davison, Donal Finkel, Anthony Hecht, Daniel Hoffman, Galway Kinnell, XJ Kennedy, Laurence Lieberman, Robert Pack, WD Snodgrass, Robert Sward etc. are the poets you like to read. Pierre -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 04:22:42 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christine Palma Subject: Re: media coverage for the arts(long reply) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Herb Levy wrote: >When I hear a recording by someone I'm interested in on almost ANY radio >station, NPR or otherwise, I assume that the artist has died, 'cause >otherwise the work w0uldn't be on the air. I've been an evesdropper on this list for about 8 months or so, and I feel compelled to chime in and also to introduce myself... Herb Levy's comment touches close to home. When I finished up my undergraduate degree in English almost three years ago, I felt a big void in my education. I felt that I'd been introduced to work, poetry and fiction, representative of what is academically "embraced" and that the bulk of what I had studied for the past four years was not contemporary work. I am saying this even though I understand that a big goal of the curriculum in English depts. is to give students an historical grounding of literature. I would never trade in this education. But still, I questioned the relevance of what I'd been told to read. I felt that the contemporary work I'd become acquainted with through my classes was not "dangerous writing" and I felt that that the selection of work took on an academic cast because there was such a narrow selection of writers. Somehow when I looked at my bookshelf and the bookshelves of other English majors at other colleges, I saw the same books, books that were supposed to be on the bleeding edge of creative writing. How could we all be reading the same books? Could they really be that alternative or different or more importantly "contemporary," if most universities were teaching the same authors. I wondered how a silent consensus could have formed about who the important writers of today are. Isn't a canon of contemporary writers a contradiction. It would be easy for an aspiring writer or a reader who aspires to understand the tone of contemporary writing to just accept these people and look to them as the thematic (moral) and styllistic voice of our time. What's worse is to accept the opposite condition of this, that perhaps it's very difficult today to stumble upon a relevant writer who enjoys obscurity as a result of work that breaks so radically from what's taught in the university system, or worse still, that it's impossible because they don't exist. I felt estranged from what I'd just gotten a degree in. This bothered me enough that I decided I would produce and host a radio show about poetry, literary fiction and performance and fill in the gap. The format is open, but usually the guests read their work for the bulk of the program and the discussion is on the climate of creative writing and not on an analysis of the particular pieces they've just read. The best part for me is that good writers recommend good writers and are so excited to share them. Also coming across people with interesting work, but who don't have any immediate aspirations to publish, ie. closet writers. I feel as though I can now make the connection between what I've gotten academically with the diversity of what I've encountered. And I can now be thankful for the survey classes and Norton Anthology for giving me a body of work to relate it to. I've also made it a point to educate myself on what the media coverage for the arts is like. I'm in Los Angeles so I can only speak for Los Angeles. I think the climate has changed in the past few years and that arts and literary programs broadcasting to Los Angeles are breaking out of the after-midnight airtime ghetto. For the first year, I had an 11 PM to 2 AM weekly timeslot. Now I am on at 8 PM. At other public stations, we had Wanda Coleman at KPFK doing Poetry Connection also at 8 PM. KCRW out of Santa Monica College has Michael Silverblatt hosting Bookworm during the day! 2 PM. KCRW has also made the full broadcasts of his shows available for download at their website (www.kcrw.org) and the sound quality is fine. I think there is a growing public demand for arts programming and an awareness of the radio's and internet's potential to meet that. Part of this is due to independent publishing houses putting out spoken word releases and these getting into Virgin Megastore and the like. A small non-profit experimental audio group in New York called Tellus/Harvestworks which puts out recordings like those of Paul Bowles and John Cage and Shelley Hirsh is now at my local record store. The internet will certainly improve public access... it's convenient. I don't know how long this particular list has been around, but I sure would have welcomed it five years ago. A radio show, an e-mail list, streaming audio, they can do wonders. Christine ______________ christine palma christine@DRUMandBASS.com samples: high-bandwidth, communications, bpm, asia in the yr 2000, fractal structures, cu-seeme fuzzy, memory encapsulated, radio, a sculpture in every living room, a sculpture in every park, a sculpture in every body, cyborgs, e-mail, letterpress, return to drawing, kitchensink genetics, mindoro, coincidence, encaustic, pedestrian's rights, sleep depriviation high, the moon . . . ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 07:27:30 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Boughn Subject: Re: History is Rewritten In-Reply-To: from "Jeffrey W. Timmons" at Apr 13, 97 01:44:06 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > in a recent post (i forgot who) someone stated that young people seem > interested/more interested in labor issues communism etc . . . and i > think that although i am somewhat concerned at the willful forgetfulness > of younger generations about critical histories--feminism in > particular--i think its great that individuals are attempting to bring a > more radical edge to the mainstream I don't quite follow this thread. Have "the schools" ever provided information to students about the labour movement, radical political movements, feminism, vegetarianism, spitritualism? Certainly not in my experience (50s and 60s). The closest we ever got was one class in the 9th grade that mentioned the merging of the AFL and the CIO. Like sex and drugs, you've always had to find out about that stuff on your own, haven't you? Unless you grew up in a family where it was part of your family values. Where it seems to me to get really dicey is in the open rewriting of events like the Viet Nam war. I remember in the early 80's reading in a high school text book in Santa Cruz, California, that the war was "started" by an unprovoked attack by North Viet Namese on American ships in the Gulf of Tonkin. And that the heroic American resistance was led by Paul Bunyan and his blue ox, Babe. Mike mboughn@chass.utoronto.ca ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 07:41:20 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: yo marjorie! In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" does anyone have perloff's e-mail address? i tried to respond to a personal msg and it got bounced back. very puzzled, md ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 07:44:43 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: The poetry of Muhammad Ali In-Reply-To: <970413002916_-1066957240@emout08.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 12:29 AM -0400 4/13/97, Stephen Vincent wrote: >A guess: Was it the one with alliterative off-rhymes - front and back >("float/sting" & "butterfly/bee") > >"float like a butterfly, >sting like a bee" > >?? > >Cheers, > >Stephen Vincent i don't think so, that was later. nonetheless, if you'd like a copy of XCP, i'll send you one.--md ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 08:01:40 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: yo marjorie! Hi Maria: perloff@leland.stanford.edu Kent > Date sent: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 07:41:20 -0500 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group > From: Maria Damon > Subject: yo marjorie! > To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > does anyone have perloff's e-mail address? i tried to respond to a personal > msg and it got bounced back. very puzzled, md > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 08:15:35 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Change of Address Comments: cc: wr-eye-tings@sfu.ca, maz881@aol.com, CHRIS1929W@aol.com, Levyaa@is.nyu.edu, kunos@lanminds.com, sab5@PSU.EDU, mwinter@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu, fittermn@is.nyu.edu, wmfuller@ix.netcom.com, lease@husc.harvard.edu, daviesk@is4.NYU.EDU, Daniel_Bouchard@hmco.com, drothschild@penguin.com, jdavis@panix.com, jms@acmenet.net, maj6916@u.cc.utah.edu, AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM, jarnot@pipeline.com, lgoodman@acsu.buffalo.edu, lppl@aol.com, eskiles@slip.net, mbates@s3.sonnet.com, mmscott@gsbpop.uchicago.edu, 6500dtpt@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu, jaukee@slip.net, basinski@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu, ninthlab@aol.com, israfel@uci.edu, dcmb@metro.net, mburger@adobe.com, kristinb@wired.com, hgburrus@msn.com, chadwick@crl.com, leechapman@aol.com, cah@sonic.net, vent@sirius.com, sscollis@sfu.ca, acornford@igc.org, leslie@researchmag.com, nd@panix.com, jday@uclink.berkeley.edu, jdebrot@aol.com, billder@fluxion.com, jdonahue@ups.edu, steven_evans@brown.edu, jasfoley@aol.com, gfoust@osf1.gmu.edu, peter_gizzi@macmail.ucsc.edu, chrisko@sirius.com, jeg48@columbia.edu, dgolumbi@sas.upenn.edu, distguill@aol.com, mvh2@columbia.edu, olmsted@crl.com, cynthia.huntington@mac.dartmouth.edu, beu1@columbia.edu, andrew_joron@sfbayguardian.com, hlazer@as.ua.edu, juxta43781@aol.com, zorlook@aol.com, tlovell@sfsu.edu, 75323.740@CompuServe.COM, swmar@conncoll.edu, bam4c@virginia.edu, jmcnally@postoffice.ptd.net, dmelt@ccnet.com, murphym@earthlink.com, nguyenhoa@hotmail.com, el500005@brownvm.brown.edu, jnoble@ccvm.sunysb.edu, john_r._noto@sfbayguardian.com, petersm@coral.indstate.edu, spettet@vaxa.stevens-tech.edu, quarterm@unixg.ubc.ca, raphael@aracnet.com, 103730.2033@CompuServe.COM, kit_robinson@peoplesoft.com, jross@tmn.com, jays@sirius.com, selby@slip.net, 75477.2255@CompuServe.COM, ashurin@mercury.sfsu.edu, lisas@ncgate.newcollege.edu, shari.sperling@hairclub.uucp.netcom.com, bstrang@sfsu.edu, 102573.414@CompuServe.COM, tomt@ch1.ch.pdx.edu, tunguka@idt.net, xerxes999@aol.com, pvangel@idt.net, jet@interfaceic.com, jrlw@west.net, gondola@deltanet.com, monkeys@easystreet.com, tubesox@sirius.com, jfcobin@aol.com, acorn@sirius.com, ghabas@ncgate.newcollege.edu, lehall@umd5.umd.edu, gothic@panix.com, 103667.110@CompuServe.COM, rjm@merkle.baaqmd.gov, vrgnamgnta@aol.com, pearlman@intergate.tracy.k12.ca.us, celeste@slip.net, mdean@crl.com, fraz@tao.sosc.osshe.edu, sam@europa.com, kmstockd@uci.edu, bill.wilcox@hq.nasa.gov In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970413183605.0069965c@pop.slip.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" LAST CHANCE !!CALL FOR PAPERS!! Conference: Cross-Cultural Poetics Dates: October 16-19, 1997 Place: University of Minnesota, Minneapolis Campus Keynote Speakers: Kamau Brathwaite, Diane Glancy, Dennis Tedlock, Kirin Narayan, David Antin Despite artificial disciplinary barriers, ethnographers & poets have in recent years come to realize how similar their projects are. Cross-Cultural Poetics seeks to address the increasingly untenable boundaries between poetic & ethnographic practices. The conference will focus on the role of poetry in the on-going discourses of multiculturalism, ethnography, and literary theory and practice. While recent years have seen a debate in "how culture is written (about)" and most of these debates make extensive use of the term "poetics," poetic discourse itself has not been foregrounded in these debates. Construing the term "poetry" fairly broadly, we invite poets and scholars working in a broad range of fields -- anthropology, urban studies, ethnic studies, folklore, literature and literary theory, sociology, history, publishing, film, American studies, performance studies, ethnomusicology, cultural studies, etc. -- to propose readings, papers or panels that address the topic of cross-cultural poetics. the following are suggested topics, but you need not feel limited to them: - Comparative Poetries &/or Poetic Traditions - Oral/Literate Interfaces or Standoffs - Anthropological Methodologies Applied to Poetic Texts, Communities, Events, or Individual Poems or Poets - Ethnography as Poetry/Poetry as Ethnography - Ethnic, Folkloric & Vernacular Poetries - Poetry as Cultural & Social Praxis - Poetry as Cultural & Social Critique - Constituting Communities through Poetic Activity - Poetry as Mass Culture - Poetry & the Public Sphere -Poetry and Politics - The Anthropology of Writing & the Writing of Anthropology - Representing Self/Other - Issues in Cultural Translation - "Ethnopoetics": Reappraisals? - Poetry & Other Media (Song Lyrics, Music, Film, Movement, Visual Arts, etc.) - Close Readings of &/or Listenings to Ethnographic Documents - The Poetics of Thick Description - Ritual, Play, etc. as Elements in Poetic Composition - The Act of Inscription: Fieldnotes, Notebooks, etc. - The Cultural Migration of Texts - Hybridization of Genres & Traditions -Trans/post/supra national Poetix? PAPERS (and Writing Samples for people wanting to read) AND PANEL PROPOSALS (a 1-2-page abstract) should be sent by April 15, 1997 to Maria Damon, English Dept., 207 Lind Hall, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis MN 55455. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 08:36:40 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU Subject: michael dorris... Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" just heard on npr that michael dorris is dead, evidently from suicide... can anybody tell me more about this -- how, possibly why, etc.?... what was he doing in new hampshire again?... /// joe ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 08:49:34 CST6CDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hank Lazer Organization: The University of Alabama Subject: Re: foundling fathers George-- My eight year old son asked me the other day, "what exactly is the Decoration of Independence?" Hank Lazer ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 07:54:22 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: History Is Rewritten MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT > howard zinn's book A People's History of the United States or some such is > very good for this purpose. it's thick tho, which may intimidate some hs > students, but very readable and an eye-opener. yes, this one is definitely worth a peek. it's worth noting that zinn, who teaches at boston university, has suffered more than a bit for his political practice. a few years back, president silber (who has now left the univ. for a prominent position in MA public ed--talk about frightening), in what is probably the most recent, & most prominent instance of the university administration's usually quiet campaign against zinn & the left in general, tried to have him fired when, refusing to cross the picket line of the then-striking clerical workers, zinn held his classes off campus. chris .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 09:00:46 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Re: yo marjorie! Sorry. Had meant to post the message to Maria Damon back-channel. > Priority: normal > Date sent: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 08:01:40 +0600 > Send reply to: UB Poetics discussion group > From: KENT JOHNSON > Organization: Highland Community College > Subject: Re: yo marjorie! To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 08:15:41 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: Triumph and the Will MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT > If it cd now be regarded as vitriol-free, I'd like to continue the naming > of contributors to the Don Allan Anthology (or Apology). How abt Jackson > McLow, Michael Mac Lure, Gary Spicer and Jack Snyder? And of course, Jerome > Rothenburg. I thought it was Jack & Gary Spider, the Spider bros. or was it Jack Spader--father of Famed Hollywood Actor James Spader? chris .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 09:43:25 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dale Smith Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, in the 2nd circle Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >We are grieving, in this cruel April >of a Nazional Poetry Month, not only the loss of a great poet ,but one of >the last of the media revolutionaries that helped save this country from >disaster. What disasters have been spared? The social, political, and aesthetic reality of this country today resembles Victorian England more than ever. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 10:09:39 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dale Smith Subject: Re: Will's column Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Daniel Bouchard- If you read my posts you will notice that I did not address you. I addressed several "fuck-you" posts from the list. Mabe you should go back and reread those posts before you begin accusing me of being symathetic with Gearge Will. Yours is a very fascist response, cruel and totalizing in an attempt to voice a pathetic and deluded sense of frustration at my Will/Ginsberg comments. In the future I suggest a LITTLE forethought and attention in your replies. >"America, go fuck yourself with your atom bomb." > --Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997) > >"America, I'm not sorry." > --same guy > > >Dales, > >I'm not sorry if you think my "fuck George F. Will" >is "stupid and irresponsible." > >I'm not sorry if you think my "fuck George F. Will" >"confirms his belief in the poverty of cultural values today." > >If he could define them, and if I could take the time to read them, I'm >sure I could have a grand time mocking them for the amusement of the >Poetics list. > >If you think my "fuck George F. Will" is an act of cowardice because it was >"behind his back" let me assure that I would love to have the opportunity >to meet the man and enjoy a real conversation, in which I may or may not >use the oh-so-shocking "F" word, depending on the amount of sneering >condescension he emits. > >You are obviously impressed with George F. Will's authority to the extent >that in a worthless diatribe in which he shits on a man's life work you >find "scant points . . . which seemed appropriate." Which points were they >Dales? The ones that implicate all writers and activists in "cultural and >economic market practices." Are you taking a correspondence course with >George F. Will? > >You said, "his death is the occasion for such moments as these and I think >as much meaning should be milked from debate rather than saturating >ourselves only with warm platitudes." > >Yes, let's debate and milk (milk?) the moment and we may learn something >from one another, but don't begin by telling ME to settle down and be >reasonable because it only makes me more angry. > > >daniel_bouchard@hmco.com ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 10:15:00 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" Subject: Re: George may choose Comments: To: Tom Mandel MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN Just call me, "The Man Who Seconded The Second Of The Other Man." ---------- From: Tom Mandel To: POETICS Subject: George may choose Date: Sunday, April 13, 1997 6:45AM Speaking of "ugliness... risen in our time" -- I think it would only be fair to give George Will his choice of weapons. George, my second Pat Pritchett will be in touch with your second. Should George choose pistols, I'll insist on cap. Should he choose wit, I'll ask David Bromige to represent me. Tom Mandel Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com ******************************************************** Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com 4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 ******************************************************** Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 11:16:00 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, in the 2nd circle In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 14 Apr 1997 09:43:25 +0100 from On Mon, 14 Apr 1997 09:43:25 +0100 Dale Smith said: > >What disasters have been spared? The social, political, and aesthetic >reality of this country today resembles Victorian England more than ever. By George, a truer word was never said, old boy. I was chatting with Lawn Tennison over a bit of cricket by the hearth just the other p.m. The pocky old bard was bemoaning his beloved Hal, as usual. I said to him, "try some of this, old chap". "What ho, a new port?" says he. "No such thing as a new port," pshawed I. "No, it's a bit of that rawther rambunctious poet, G.M. Hopkins. Wild, wild, wild versical exp- perimentation, I must say. See what you think." The old boy took the volume, but I'm afraid I haven't heard anything more since - believe he doddered off to sleep before having a good look at it. - Eric Blarnes ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 11:44:14 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Bouchard Subject: excerpt Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII "Fuck is a dirty word But it comes out clean." -- Jack Kerouac ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 12:07:14 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Will's Column Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Not to get in the middle of personal name-calling exchanges, but my response to Will's column (which I haven't read & don't intend to seek out) is to let lying dogs sleep. sp ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 12:02:20 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Piombino/Simon Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, in the 2nd circle Comments: To: Dale Smith In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII The disaster I was thinking of was the disaster of complicit silence. By taking a stand in the public light, Allen Ginsberg and others helped move many people from a position of passivity to one of also taking a stand, in non-violent acts such a draft-card burning, etc. Your point is well taken from the standpoint of social outcomes, and the current social reality..My concern is: how will we move out of a position of passivity today? Especially without Allen Ginsberg to lead. I feel that this makes his loss especially heavy. Thank you for your clarifying response.On Mon, 14 Apr 1997, Dale Smith wrote: > >We are grieving, in this cruel April > >of a Nazional Poetry Month, not only the loss of a great poet ,but one of > >the last of the media revolutionaries that helped save this country from > >disaster. > > What disasters have been spared? The social, political, and aesthetic > reality of this country today resembles Victorian England more than ever. > > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 12:33:38 EST5EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: LYNES- KATHERINE Organization: Rutgers University English Dept. Subject: Re: Planned Parenthood Benefit Reading yes, please. this is a good idea [in case we're taking votes....]. katherine. > This may seem really obvious of me, but when addresses of events are listed > on the list, could the city please be included? > > Hugh Steinberg > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 09:47:02 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: yuri-g Subject: Re: Lyn Hejinian's address Comments: To: Jennifer Ashton In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Sat, 12 Apr 1997, Jennifer Ashton wrote: > Would anyone be willing to backchannel me with Lyn Hejinian's snail mail > address? (Or academic affiliation?) Many thanks. > > Jennifer Ashton > Johns Hopkins University > ashto_j@jhunix.hcf.jhu.edu i know she's working at new college in san francisco -joanna> "thrilled with my deathlessness, thrilled with this endlessness I dice and bury, come Poet shut up eat my word, and taste my mouth in your ear." -Allen Ginsberg ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 12:48:53 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: Will's column In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 14 Apr 1997 10:09:39 +0100 from On Mon, 14 Apr 1997 10:09:39 +0100 Dale Smith said: Yours is a very fascist response, >cruel and totalizing in an attempt to voice a pathetic and deluded sense of >frustration at my Will/Ginsberg comments. In the future I suggest a LITTLE >forethought and attention in your replies. > I say old boy, you might consult the 1846 OED on the term "fascist" - this is entry #37: FASCIST(adj.): one who accuses others of "fascism" in a blithe, freewheeling, & fithergildering manner. In future I suggest a MITE more philological research on your part before slanging the noodle quite so scriptoshedly! Those who live in gashouses, as they say, should [f-rt] advisedly! - Eric Blarnes "As for 'f--king' - our servants will say that for us." - Lord Allen Gridberg, 1st Earl of Chongebongalay p.s. Lord Allen's Solicitor, Reginald Stubbs, has noted in Black's Law Digest for April 1897, that the use of the words "f-k" or "f-t" or their linguistic derivatives by members of the ruling class is protected under the Imperial Dominoes & Speech Act of Her Majesty Queen Vicky of 1854. Just so you know. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 11:17:31 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: michael corbin Subject: Re: History is Rewritten MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Christopher Alexander wrote: > > > howard zinn's book A People's History of the United States or some such is > > very good for this purpose. it's thick tho, which may intimidate some hs > > students, but very readable and an eye-opener. > > yes, this one is definitely worth a peek. > it's worth noting that zinn, who teaches > at boston university, has suffered more > than a bit for his political practice. a few > years back, president silber (who has > now left the univ. for a prominent position > in MA public ed--talk about frightening), > in what is probably the most recent, & > most prominent instance of the university > administration's usually quiet campaign > against zinn & the left in general, tried to > have him fired when, refusing to cross > the picket line of the then-striking clerical > workers, zinn held his classes off campus. > While I agree that _People's History_ is good, it does suffer from its strength. That is, the birds-eye view narrative of the 'people's history'. Yet along the lines of your anecdote, Zinn's memoir _You Can't be Neutral on a Moving Train: A Personal History of Our Times_ published in '94 is, I think, more engaging as it narrates from a Zinn's-eye view as it were. While perhaps memoir-as-genre has blurred into the cliche excesses of an unrequited romance with a unitary subjectivity, Zinn stears clear of the pits of irony, bathos, the cynical and golden-age-ism. More, it is the narrative of how a political engagement with the world is precisely that which calls into being one's subjectivity. Indeed, (to make another connection---perhaps of 'threads') it is not much of a stretch and not without benefit to see the paths of Zinn and Ginsberg as quite similar. Roughly contemporaries traversing much of the same geographic and psychic space of the american imperium of the 20th century; steadfast in their fuck-you's; living without regrets for their engagements with the world; and damanding a different future through their work and their very bodies. Of course they speak in different tongues. But tongues perhaps scrawled on the same rosetta stone. mc ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 10:08:08 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, in the 2nd circle In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 12:02 PM -0400 4/14/97, Piombino/Simon wrote: >My concern is: how >will we move out of a position of passivity today? Especially >without Allen Ginsberg to lead. This totalizing "we" is problematic to me. Personally, Ginsberg never lead me anywhere (even though I had a poster of him on my bedroom wall when I was in high school)--and I think his influence is marginal to large "marginal" populations. As I see it, he embodied alienation for a bunch of white guys (and a few women such as Maria D.), a fine thing to do--but other people have embodied that for other groups and will continue to. Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 13:13:47 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Bouchard Subject: Fifth Column Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Dear Fellow List Members: As has been the pattern for the past two years, the SEND button on my Mail program responds with a shock of ambiguity each time I touch it & post to the Poetics List. Successive efforts don't deaden the nerves; in fact, the sensation consistently grows more painfully apparent. One way I have found to counter this negative impact is a smaller group correspondence--a "sub" poetics list, where the talk is considered amongst friends--even those I haven't yet met in person. And valuable as smaller groups are, I still find great value in the larger list--more voices in the room: disparate, redundant, informative, entertaining, illuminating, drab & trite. This List still has plenty of promise and potential to fill as a powerful resource in the arts community. I would much rather hear of Allen Ginsberg's failing health from Charles Bernstein than from an Associated Press release--not to mention a news column from GFW. I would rather hear about who read in San Francisco over the weekend from Steve Carll than . . . than what? -- you either hear it from Steve (or Kevin) or you don't hear it. My original "reply" to Will's column was an outburst-- a parody of his own writing on AG--- a catharsis, fun, meant to shame GFW (for what that's worth) more than to invite serious discussion on how the media reacts to poetry, etc. etc. I think that saying "Fuck George F. Will" at the end (NOT "Fuck you George Will"-- there is a difference) is a rather standard (and fitting) epigram. And finally, while I am aware that some of my posts have pissed off many people on the List, I will remind you that I have not (and do not) engage(d) in name calling. This is the most serious note I have ever posted. May God forgive me, if She remembers my name. daniel_bouchard@hmco.com Not to get in the middle of personal name-calling exchanges, but my response to Will's column (which I haven't read & don't intend to seek out) is to let lying dogs sleep. sp ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 14:13:50 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Eliza McGrand- CVA Guest Subject: Re: Fifth Column dear daniel: this is god. i do, indeed, remember your name. what i can't seem to remember is that columnist fellow's name, which is odd since he mentions my family often -- must be a freudian slip... god ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 13:09:54 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dale Smith Subject: Re: Will's column Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I do apologize for the fascist remark. But I don't use that word lightly, as you, Gould, suggest. As you so adroitly suggest, there are many definitions to the word. What we have at times on this list is more like a high school gang of creeps posturing and screaming at one another. I was under the impression that this list was open to dialogue and conversation. Not totalitarian exegesis (Bouchard) slandering the intentions of those who post critical comments to the list. I didn't realize there's no space for dissenting opinions. >On Mon, 14 Apr 1997 10:09:39 +0100 Dale Smith said: > Yours is a very fascist response, >>cruel and totalizing in an attempt to voice a pathetic and deluded sense of >>frustration at my Will/Ginsberg comments. In the future I suggest a LITTLE >>forethought and attention in your replies. >> > >I say old boy, you might consult the 1846 OED on the term "fascist" - this is >entry #37: FASCIST(adj.): one who accuses others of "fascism" in a blithe, >freewheeling, & fithergildering manner. > >In future I suggest a MITE more philological research on your part before >slanging the noodle quite so scriptoshedly! Those who live in gashouses, >as they say, should [f-rt] advisedly! >- Eric Blarnes > >"As for 'f--king' - our servants will say that for us." >- Lord Allen Gridberg, 1st Earl of Chongebongalay > >p.s. Lord Allen's Solicitor, Reginald Stubbs, has noted in Black's Law >Digest for April 1897, that the use of the words "f-k" or "f-t" or >their linguistic derivatives by members of the ruling class is protected >under the Imperial Dominoes & Speech Act of Her Majesty Queen Vicky >of 1854. Just so you know. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 13:17:40 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU Subject: Re: Fifth Column Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" well doggonit, i wasn't gonna post in on the fuck-you's, but what the heck... i mean, what's wrong with a few fuck-you's anyway?... depends on the tone?... oh fuck you... and fuck you too... and fuck you too too... and fuck me... and what the fuck, why the fuck not?... fuck it... it's fucking-A-fucking-OK-with-me... i 'get' the rhetorical gesture on d bouchard's part, expect the rest of you to too... but in any case, heck---mebbe somebody OUGHT to tell george will to go fuck hisself f2f... i know---that's really another matter... still, if it were up to me, i'd like to say it very casually, in front of a large audience... to wit: "oh george, pleez go fuck yourself... pretty pleez?" i mean, just very very gently, softspokenly even... and smiling... "oh fuck you george, oh fuck you and your bow-tie tactics..." anyway... not even two cents' worth, i know, but heck... of course, i don't think we should be busy insulting one another, but i'd hate to feel that we're operating under some language strictures or some such around here, fer chrissakes... and in any case, i can learn from those who are opposed to the fuck you's too, so really no hard feelings at all, wrt anybody... so to say it as nicely as i can muster, from the heart: fuck all of us/// best, joe ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 13:53:20 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, in the 2nd circle Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 10:08 AM 4/14/97, dbkk@sirius.com wrote: >At 12:02 PM -0400 4/14/97, Piombino/Simon wrote: >>My concern is: how >>will we move out of a position of passivity today? Especially >>without Allen Ginsberg to lead. > >This totalizing "we" is problematic to me. Personally, Ginsberg never lead >me anywhere (even though I had a poster of him on my bedroom wall when I >was in high school)--and I think his influence is marginal to large >"marginal" populations. As I see it, he embodied alienation for a bunch of >white guys (and a few women such as Maria D.), a fine thing to do--but >other people have embodied that for other groups and will continue to. > >Dodie hi dodie, i certainly see your point and have no desire to add to the sense of totalizing. ag did mean a lot to me, but i'm certainly aware that he didn't have that significance for others.... xo, md ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 15:30:11 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Magee Subject: Re: Will's column In-Reply-To: from "Dale Smith" at Apr 14, 97 01:09:54 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit "What we have at times on this list is more like a high school gang of creeps posturing and screaming at one another." - Dale Look, my parents are out of town this weekend, and I'm havin' a *major* jammin' party, but if any of you geeks who hang out with George Will try to bust in, I'll call the cops myself, then I'll meet you at your locker on Monday and knock you into next week! -Mike. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 14:20:53 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Imaginary Interview Question In-Reply-To: <85256479.005BF2E5.00@krypton.hmco.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Q: Do you work on one poem at a time, or do you work on several at once? Or do you just write, and make poems from the writing later? I suppose this will seem naive, but I wonder if there are poets who do not begin work on a new poem until they have finished the poem at hand -- ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 15:39:15 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Bouchard Subject: What I Want: An Essay Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII What I want is to exercise my right to throw potato salad at CCNY lecturers on Dadaism . . . (or their cyberspace equivalients). daniel_bouchard@hmco.com Dear Daniel Bouchard: It seems to me that this message was/is meant to intimidate anyone who may comment or critique on this list, especially if you understand them to be differing from your point of view or responding to something you said. Mocking someone's name? (see below) I do not think that Dale was "obvious[ly] impressed by George Will". (see below). Will you mock my name? Will you write that I am defending George Will? Do you really want a debate or for everyone to go along with you? (These are real questions.) >Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 17:21:28 -0400 >From: Daniel Bouchard >Subject: Re: Will's column >To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > >"America, go fuck yourself with your atom bomb." > --Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997) > >"America, I'm not sorry." > --same guy > > >Dales, > >I'm not sorry if you think my "fuck George F. Will" >is "stupid and irresponsible." > >I'm not sorry if you think my "fuck George F. Will" >"confirms his belief in the poverty of cultural values today." > >If he could define them, and if I could take the time to read them, I'm >sure I could have a grand time mocking them for the amusement of the >Poetics list. > >If you think my "fuck George F. Will" is an act of cowardice because it was >"behind his back" let me assure that I would love to have the opportunity >to meet the man and enjoy a real conversation, in which I may or may not >use the oh-so-shocking "F" word, depending on the amount of sneering >condescension he emits. > >You are obviously impressed with George F. Will's authority to the extent >that in a worthless diatribe in which he shits on a man's life work you >find "scant points . . . which seemed appropriate." Which points were they >Dales? The ones that implicate all writers and activists in "cultural and >economic market practices." Are you taking a correspondence course with >George F. Will? > >You said, "his death is the occasion for such moments as these and I think >as much meaning should be milked from debate rather than saturating >ourselves only with warm platitudes." > >Yes, let's debate and milk (milk?) the moment and we may learn something >from one another, but don't begin by telling ME to settle down and be >reasonable because it only makes me more angry. > > >daniel_bouchard@hmco.com > --------------------------------------------------------- Get Your *Web-Based* Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com --------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 15:39:23 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Bouchard Subject: What I Want: An Essay Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII What I want is to exercise my right to throw potato salad at CCNY lecturers on Dadaism . . . (or their cyberspace equivalents). daniel_bouchard@hmco.com Dear Daniel Bouchard: It seems to me that this message was/is meant to intimidate anyone who may comment or critique on this list, especially if you understand them to be differing from your point of view or responding to something you said. Mocking someone's name? (see below) I do not think that Dale was "obvious[ly] impressed by George Will". (see below). Will you mock my name? Will you write that I am defending George Will? Do you really want a debate or for everyone to go along with you? (These are real questions.) >Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 17:21:28 -0400 >From: Daniel Bouchard >Subject: Re: Will's column >To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > >"America, go fuck yourself with your atom bomb." > --Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997) > >"America, I'm not sorry." > --same guy > > >Dales, > >I'm not sorry if you think my "fuck George F. Will" >is "stupid and irresponsible." > >I'm not sorry if you think my "fuck George F. Will" >"confirms his belief in the poverty of cultural values today." > >If he could define them, and if I could take the time to read them, I'm >sure I could have a grand time mocking them for the amusement of the >Poetics list. > >If you think my "fuck George F. Will" is an act of cowardice because it was >"behind his back" let me assure that I would love to have the opportunity >to meet the man and enjoy a real conversation, in which I may or may not >use the oh-so-shocking "F" word, depending on the amount of sneering >condescension he emits. > >You are obviously impressed with George F. Will's authority to the extent >that in a worthless diatribe in which he shits on a man's life work you >find "scant points . . . which seemed appropriate." Which points were they >Dales? The ones that implicate all writers and activists in "cultural and >economic market practices." Are you taking a correspondence course with >George F. Will? > >You said, "his death is the occasion for such moments as these and I think >as much meaning should be milked from debate rather than saturating >ourselves only with warm platitudes." > >Yes, let's debate and milk (milk?) the moment and we may learn something >from one another, but don't begin by telling ME to settle down and be >reasonable because it only makes me more angry. > > >daniel_bouchard@hmco.com > --------------------------------------------------------- Get Your *Web-Based* Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com --------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 15:51:23 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Boughn Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, In-Reply-To: from "Maria Damon" at Apr 14, 97 01:53:20 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit >My concern is: how >will we move out of a position of passivity today? Especially >without Allen Ginsberg to lead. Yikes, you think you need a leader? This is moving out of a position of passivity? Mike mboughn@chass.utoronto.ca ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 12:52:24 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: Fifth Column In-Reply-To: <199704141817.NAA00161@charlie.cns.iit.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 1:17 PM -0500 4/14/97, amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU wrote: >well doggonit, i wasn't gonna post in on the fuck-you's, but what the >heck... i mean, what's wrong with a few fuck-you's anyway?... depends on >the tone?... This tread reminds me of last month when Simon Pettet came over for pizza and it seemed to me (though this is far from accurate) that every other word out of his mouth was "fucking," and I felt so jealous because in my life I'm simply not allowed to talk that way. One of those reasons why my writing is so vital for my survival. Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 12:59:19 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, in the 2nd circle In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 1:53 PM +1000 4/14/97, Maria Damon (Maria Damon) wrote: >hi dodie, i certainly see your point and have no desire to add to the sense >of totalizing. Maria, I wasn't suggesting you were. You of all people would be sensitive about NOT doing this. Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 16:14:34 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: Will's column In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 14 Apr 1997 15:30:11 -0400 from On Mon, 14 Apr 1997 15:30:11 -0400 Michael Magee said: >"What we have at times on this list is more like a >high school gang of creeps posturing and screaming at one another." - Dale > >Look, my parents are out of town this weekend, and I'm havin' a *major* >jammin' party, but if any of you geeks who hang out with George Will try >to bust in, I'll call the cops myself, then I'll meet you at your locker >on Monday and knock you into next week! I say fellows, settle down over there across the ocean sea. I believe it's time for you all to do your taxes, am I right? Is this what's got you all pothered & smithered? Why, I'll put on the gloves myself if it's a question of defending Queen Vicky, lads. Cheerio - Eric Blarnes p.s. Eric Blarnes won a Queenly Salutations Ribbon in the Hertforshire Pugilistic Engagements for 1884. Just so you know. [He never attended "High School"] pps. er... any of you blokes or lasses read any poetry lately? Swinburne's latest is... shall we say... long in the golden tooth? ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 16:31:07 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Yeah, me for one. Very rarely move on until I'm done. Though sometimes in the middle an idea for another appears, or a section I take out might begin to germinate like a cutting. But I finish the first one first, just make a note alongside so as to remember. sp >Q: Do you work on one poem at a time, or do you work on several at once? >Or do you just write, and make poems from the writing later? I suppose >this will seem naive, but I wonder if there are poets who do not begin >work on a new poem until they have finished the poem at hand -- ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 14:23:21 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: Will's column MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Michael Magee wrrrrrrrrrrrt: > Look, my parents are out of town this weekend, and I'm havin' a *major* > jammin' party, but if any of you geeks who hang out with George Will try > to bust in, I'll call the cops myself, then I'll meet you at your locker > on Monday and knock you into next week! are me & Kent invited? I'll bring all my hardcore records, & I've got some killer weed. only--can I crash at your place? chris .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 16:23:01 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 14 Apr 1997 14:20:53 -0400 from I work on one at a time (but then I'm ambidextrous). But one often becomes many (i.e. a set of some kind). Henry "Al Tennisshorts" Gould p.s. let's hear from some outside my circle on this one, hey? I mean Spandrift, Blarnes, cool it for a while - let the lurkers cometh fortheth) ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 16:37:11 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Another Imaginary Interview Question Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Q. I see. But isn't it important to make sure to anticipate your detractors? To demonstrate that what appears to be at best oblique and at worst allegorical is actual a valid and independent choice? Not that you have to kowtow to your independence... ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 16:40:50 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Don Cheney Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Q: Do you work on one poem at a time, or do you work on several at once? >Or do you just write, and make poems from the writing later? I suppose >this will seem naive, but I wonder if there are poets who do not begin >work on a new poem until they have finished the poem at hand -- jordan i love this question. i've been thinking about my writing process and how it (inevitably?) mirrors my life. in life i have to consciously stop my self from doing more than one thing at a time, starting one project and then starting another in the middle of the first project. and i don't always stop my self from doing this. and the same thing happens in writing. and i think it is the same process. i start a piece of writing and if it's flowing i will continue. if it's not i may start up another project. i think this is very different than when i was in my 20's and seems to have to do with my state of mind and state of leisure. i had more leisure time in my 20's than i do now at 38. but what role does age play in this separate from leisure time? don't know. i suspect that it does play a role. maybe i'm becoming more scatterbrained (i love that word) with age. if you check out my web page you will find two prose projects stalled ("The Crystal Lava" a translation of Hammett's THE GLASS KEY and "The Profanity of the Lambs" which is a reworking of some god-awful Harold Robbins novel or other). and they've been stalled for quite a while. and i haven't put on the web another prose re-working, this one from R.L. Stine's GOOSEBUMPS series for kids--THIS IS GRADE A MONSTER SOUP! i think i've titled it. stalled, stalled, stalled. still, i also have works that i've worked straight through without starting another work. but i do not have any rules about not starting another work until a certain work is finished. i'd love to hear from people who do have that rule. intriguing. don =================================== Don Cheney San Diego, CA, USA http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5791 doncheney@geocities.com =================================== ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 15:58:04 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, in the 2nd circle Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" actually, i didn't think you were suggesting i was. i just wanted to be sure you knew that you had my sympathies. xo, md At 12:59 PM 4/14/97, dbkk@SIRIUS.COM wrote: >At 1:53 PM +1000 4/14/97, Maria Damon (Maria Damon) wrote: > >>hi dodie, i certainly see your point and have no desire to add to the sense >>of totalizing. > >Maria, I wasn't suggesting you were. You of all people would be sensitive >about NOT doing this. > >Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 16:58:19 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: William Burmeister Prod Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question In-Reply-To: Jordan Davis "Imaginary Interview Question" (Apr 14, 2:20pm) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii >Q: Do you work on one poem at a time, or do you work on several at once? >Or do you just write, and make poems from the writing later? I suppose >this will seem naive, but I wonder if there are poets who do not begin >work on a new poem until they have finished the poem at hand -- I suppose there may be, but for many, I can imagine that not beginning a new poem until the poem at hand is finished would mean that far fewer poems get written, and perhaps that the spontaneous creation process would be frustrated. Of course, this begs the question of when a poem is actually "finished." Bill B. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 17:45:51 EST5EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: LYNES- KATHERINE Organization: Rutgers University English Dept. Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question okay, all right.... pressure, always pressure.... i work on several at a time.... sometimes for years, sometimes for days. i seem to need time for it to gel. i think that i work on more than one poem at once because while writing one poem, other lines come out of it, too much of a tangent to be all in one, sometimes.... back to lurking [the moniker [and no i'm not looking up the spelling of that] of which i'm not sure i like....] kl > I work on one at a time (but then I'm ambidextrous). But one often > becomes many (i.e. a set of some kind). > > Henry "Al Tennisshorts" Gould > > p.s. let's hear from some outside my circle on this one, hey? I mean > Spandrift, Blarnes, cool it for a while - let the lurkers cometh fortheth) > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 15:12:28 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT > Q: Do you work on one poem at a time, or do you work on several at once? I work on one at a time-- how's that for scintillating discourse: "me, too". that's ok, / I never wanted to be "scintillating" anyway. too dangerous. actually I like the sylvester's "cuttings"-- my work does seem to splinter outward in that way, so that fragments occur in mid-piece which then go on to engender other work. actually I'm making it up. I'm not a writer I'm a brush salesman--2 of them, I'm 2 brush salesmen. & lots & lots of stuff falls on the floor around my desk, never to be seen again. chris .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 16:33:05 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Matthias Regan Subject: Re: PPBR - addresses of events Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > >> This may seem really obvious of me, but when addresses of events are listed >> on the list, could the city please be included? hank you. It drives me nuts to not know even if the city most likely turns out not mine Matthias Regan Northwestern University Department of Chemistry Phone: 847/467-2132 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 16:59:47 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Matthias Regan Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" 1 at a time because if I'm writing one and put it aside to work on another that suddenly occurs, it stays aside. I keep all the poems begun but not continued in various folders with the promise of returning to them. But I have never done that so far. But then there is no fast and hard rule (perhaps I'm too young, perhaps not observant enough)--rather I am recently suprised at how consistently different the process of writing each poem is: some go from beginning to end, straight through, like what working on a musical score must be, then the next ones get together all ass backwards like a collage--some I can never go back to after two days work on them and for better or worse (the latter) that is as done as they get. Then the next one will seem to require just a little work once a day for a month. In that whole time I won't work on anything else unless a) I don't really take it seriously or b) I don't like the present project and am willing to sacrifice it. For quite a few years I fought to maintain a schedule and regular writing practice, but that seems to increase frustration and never produced more work of higher quality, just more work. (Which is important too, in a way.) So now I write only when I *really* want to and by default only work on one thing at a time. I always write completely off the cuff. What do others do? > >>Q: Do you work on one poem at a time, or do you work on several at once? >>Or do you just write, and make poems from the writing later? I suppose >>this will seem naive, but I wonder if there are poets who do not begin >>work on a new poem until they have finished the poem at hand -- > > Matthias Regan Northwestern University Department of Chemistry Phone: 847/467-2132 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 15:23:58 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: What I Want: An Essay Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I don't know about Bouchard, but speaking for myself, I want everyone to go along with me as vehemently as possible, but I'm resigned to the fact that the best I'm likely to get is debate. At 03:39 PM 4/14/97 -0400, you wrote: >What I want is to exercise my right to throw potato salad at CCNY lecturers > on Dadaism . . . (or their cyberspace equivalients). > >daniel_bouchard@hmco.com > > > > > >Dear Daniel Bouchard: > >It seems to me that this message was/is meant to intimidate anyone who may >comment or critique on this list, especially if you understand them to be >differing from your point of view or responding to something you said. >Mocking someone's name? (see below) I do not think that Dale was >"obvious[ly] impressed by George Will". (see below). > >Will you mock my name? Will you write that I am defending George Will? Do >you really want a debate or for everyone to go along with you? (These are >real >questions.) > > >>Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 17:21:28 -0400 >>From: Daniel Bouchard >>Subject: Re: Will's column >>To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU >> >>"America, go fuck yourself with your atom bomb." >> --Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997) >> >>"America, I'm not sorry." >> --same guy >> >> >>Dales, >> >>I'm not sorry if you think my "fuck George F. Will" >>is "stupid and irresponsible." >> >>I'm not sorry if you think my "fuck George F. Will" >>"confirms his belief in the poverty of cultural values today." >> >>If he could define them, and if I could take the time to read them, I'm >>sure I could have a grand time mocking them for the amusement of the >>Poetics list. >> >>If you think my "fuck George F. Will" is an act of cowardice because it >was >"behind his back" let me assure that I would love to have the >opportunity >to meet the man and enjoy a real conversation, in which I may >or may not >use the oh-so-shocking "F" word, depending on the amount of >sneering >condescension he emits. >> >>You are obviously impressed with George F. Will's authority to the extent >>that in a worthless diatribe in which he shits on a man's life work you >>find "scant points . . . which seemed appropriate." Which points were >they >Dales? The ones that implicate all writers and activists in "cultural >and >economic market practices." Are you taking a correspondence course >with >>George F. Will? >> >>You said, "his death is the occasion for such moments as these and I think >>as much meaning should be milked from debate rather than saturating >>ourselves only with warm platitudes." >> >>Yes, let's debate and milk (milk?) the moment and we may learn something >>from one another, but don't begin by telling ME to settle down and be >>reasonable because it only makes me more angry. >> >> >>daniel_bouchard@hmco.com >> > > > >--------------------------------------------------------- >Get Your *Web-Based* Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com >--------------------------------------------------------- > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 15:24:02 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: History is Rewritten Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" While perhaps memoir-as-genre has blurred into the cliche >excesses of an unrequited romance with a unitary subjectivity... Is this translatable into English? Speaking of translations: Of course they speak in different >tongues. But tongues perhaps scrawled on the same rosetta stone. Some weird Egyptian stuff. Too kinky for me. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 19:40:31 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Keith Norris Subject: read my will at the houseparty MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT ok remember, if you use the washing machine as icebucket--clean it out afterwards. [threadshift] I took D. Bouchard's fuck GW as imperative--and so I sent will a 'fuck-you,' a noun, a written remonstrance without, in this case, the word 'fuck.' --that'd be bad rhetorical game, eh, GW'd win. And we can't have that. How long you think before GW and the sunday breakfast crowd hear too much poetry and, having learned a valuable lesson from Allen G., find someone to market, some voice acceptable to the academy, something we can call traditional to draw those crowds, sell those tickets--the beast, I think, has already been to Bethlehem. Allen G scared GW and ilk--his poetry had the rhythm necessary to carry a catalog of disaster home to America's doorstep...sit there...love that doorstep...till somethin' human came out the door. I don't hear America singing but when I read some of you folks 'round here I hear/see/taste/consume a language that brings it home. Look MA! Left and postmod--no hands! But y'all couldn't make generous assumptions about my send-a-fu-to-GW post--in emotional haste and in bad form I posted w/out introductions. Keith here. Found this list a little while ago--and was overwhelmed to hear names/ideas chatted up that are privately familiar and well-chewed. As when you (you?) ask for Brave Combo in the record store and the clerk knows who you're talking about and introduces you to her complete collection including bootlegged tapes made at the Lewisville TX county fair, 1986. That recognition. That fear and delight. That gum-popping pause. Regardless of how you feel about f---, I'm happy to sit here and listen to conversation that feels right from voices I trust by reputation or have started to get an ear-for-here. Nice place--arguments and all. Wish I had found it earlier. yrs. Keith [thread turn again--->re: On Mon, 14 Apr 1997, Michael Magee wrote: > "What we have at times on this list is more like a > high school gang of creeps posturing and screaming at one another." - Dale > > Look, my parents are out of town this weekend, and I'm havin' a *major* > jammin' party, but if any of you geeks who hang out with George Will try > to bust in, I'll call the cops myself, then I'll meet you at your locker > on Monday and knock you into next week! > > -Mike. > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 21:27:06 -0400 Reply-To: BobGrumman@nut-n-but.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bob Grumman Subject: Possible Omissions in the Now-Classical Anthologies MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit As a multi-unanthologized poet well past forty, I wondered what the group's consensus might be on the editorial sensitivity of the Hall Pack Simpson and Allen anthologies: do you think any consequential poets of the time were omitted from both? I could only think of one, quickly: Robert Lax. Allen skipped him again in 1982, and so did the recent Norton Postmodern. --Bob G ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 18:50:12 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: History is Rewritten In-Reply-To: <199704141127.HAA09723@chass.utoronto.ca> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On Mon, 14 Apr 1997, Michael Boughn wrote: > I don't quite follow this thread. Have "the schools" ever provided > information to students about the labour movement, radical political > movements, feminism, vegetarianism, spitritualism? Certainly not in my > experience (50s and 60s). no they dont youre right. and yes we do have to find it on our own. but i think what i was responding to was the desire for a more polyphonic political discourse: more channels more choices more alternatives. the aspect this thread straggled from was wills dissing ag and the desire for some r e s p e c t (to the tune please) for those willfully purged alternatives that ag might represent. mb you are quite right: but cant i hope that political and cultural opposition be granted its token role in a dialogic community? rather than mercilessly and ritualistically vomited from the body/politic? naive yes i know. sometimes it happens. then i go back to doing the same thing to "theM." jeffrey timmons ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 19:01:46 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, in the 2nd circle In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On Mon, 14 Apr 1997 dodie wrote: > This totalizing "we" is problematic to me. ok. > As I see it, he embodied alienation for a bunch of white guys (and a > few women such as Maria D.), a fine thing to do--but other people have > embodied that for other groups and will continue to. objection! please define "white." i dont bite. jeffrey timmons ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 09:12:21 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Jordan Davis wrote: > > Q: Do you work on one poem at a time, or do you work on several at once? > Or do you just write, and make poems from the writing later? I suppose > this will seem naive, but I wonder if there are poets who do not begin > work on a new poem until they have finished the poem at hand -- On several at once. While new poems/fragments/work is being handwritten into notebooks, older stuff (there's a several weeks, sometimes several months lag between the hand & the keyboard) is being typed up, then printed, then revised & keyed in again. As a book takes shape more reworking is being done from the perspective of the book. Simultaneously it often happens that a given work, older or newer, gets retooled, expanded/contracted, for specific purposes beyond the writing desk -- i.e. right now taking off on an older piece as it is proving to be the matrix for generating a text to be performed with dancers & music by an electronic composer. It seems important to me to permitp the work to stay in flux, nomadic, in that way -- or some of it, the most open, as much simply comes & is & remains what it is. -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 23:25:51 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM Subject: Ginsberg the Rock Star <> Excuse me, Maxine? Are you suggesting better for kids never to have heard of Allen at all then to have seen the video of "The Ballad of the Skeletons" on MTV? I love to hear from the kids who found their way to Allen's because of that exposure. It does happen! Cheers, Bob Ho ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 21:13:49 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, in the 2nd circle In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 3:58 PM +1000 4/14/97, Maria Damon (Maria Damon) wrote: >actually, i didn't think you were suggesting i was. i just wanted to be >sure you knew that you had my sympathies. xo, md Ironically, I just received a very moving e-mail from Simon P. about his being present at AG's deathbed, holding his hand, and then the Buddhist service. So now I feel guilty about being so flip about AG, like instant karma's gonna get me. Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 22:47:24 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KYLE CONNER/LRC-CAHS Subject: Re: So How did The Weiners I mean Wieners event go? In-Reply-To: <970414003240_84622661@emout07.mail.aol.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII yes Chris, the Wieners reading... for me was fantastic. was the first time i saw him read. There was quite a lineup of readers before him, which gave us all (about 30 people or so) the opportunity to observe John as he is, an angel caught between two worlds. He ferreted through various papers and books he had in a large dingy bag he carried, subvocalized and laughed at points, to what only he knew, and wandered through several books from a bookshelf behind him. This provided interesting counterpoint to the criticism and poems being read in his honor. At points he tuned in to a humorous phrase from one of the speakers, or a curious pause from Charles Shively (who himself read from a very interesting and involved review/memoir/prosepoem of the printing of Wieners' book (i think it was _From Behind the State Capitol_...or the Collected) that was printed in an issue of _FagRag_. John's reading seemed to exemplify exactly what he has stated as being his poetic project, that his life would be the source of his poetry, that he could somehow blur the boundaries of life and art. He began reading from his newly published journals, _707 Scott Street, for Billie Holiday_, and it seemed at first that the text was unfamiliar to him. (For those of you who don't know, Wieners has had a long history of mental illness, and his current diagnosis is schizoprenia.) He paused at points, and jumped around the text. He then opened a large tome which i assumed was his Collected Poems (i've never seen it). From this point on one could never be sure where one poem ended and the next began. At one point John read from a small strip of paper, almost to himself, the address of some hotel. At another, he unfolded an oversized piece of paper crammed with words, read a line or two, paused uncertainly, put it away and opened up a book. His sharp and self-conscious wit emerged at points, as when in the midst of ferreting through his papers he said, "I am not a fetishist," eliciting much laughter from the audience. It was quite amazing, a seemless flow of living art, complete immersion in himself and the moment. After about twenty minutes, he abruptly said, "I think that's all for now," and finished. bless him. p.s. thanks Josh for posting that notice. I wouldn't have known about the reading without it. Keep 'em coming! fraternitas, kyle conner ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 22:13:11 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: Fascists and others In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Hey, when I went to sleep, all you ASAmericans were calling each other Cummunists. Now I wake up 30 years later, and you are calling each other Fascists. You know, I think we can take that as a good sign. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 11:09:32 +0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Schuchat Simon Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Mon, 14 Apr 1997, Jordan Davis wrote: > Q: Do you work on one poem at a time, or do you work on several at once? > Or do you just write, and make poems from the writing later? I suppose > this will seem naive, but I wonder if there are poets who do not begin > work on a new poem until they have finished the poem at hand -- > sometime in the early twentieth century, Paul Valery replied: A: Poems are never finished, only abandoned. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 04:26:32 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: Perloff on Yasusada MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Marjorie Perloff's article "In Search of the Authentic Other: the Araki Yasusada 'hoax' and what it reveals about the politics of poetic identity," is available on the web at: http://www-polisci.mit.edu/BostonReview/BR22.2/Perloff.html It is, as you might imagine, fascinating, especially in present company, and will start (or renew) many arguments. Rachel L. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 07:38:16 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mainstream Subject: advert Announcing publication of two issues of Sub Voicive Poetry in one week Sub Voicive Poetry 1997 number 6 texts by David Miller / Gad Hollander with a front cover by Andrew Bick Sub Voicive Poetry 1997 number 7 Chris Funkhouser / Loss Glazier / Jim Rosenberg Each issue one pound fifty pence sterling payable to Lawrence Upton Both issues as one order two pounds fifty pence sterling payable to Lawrence Upton Overseas rate available on application ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 00:26:38 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: Decoding My Life (Come to This) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Decoding My Life (Film Fissure Five Flesh With Wizard Work Writing): A AIR, AVI Aarhus Addenda, Address: Advisor Aesthetics Also American Americans An,ode, Analysis Angelina Annihilation: Antler, Arsenal, Art, Artforum, Articles Artistic Artweek, As Atlanta Avatars, Before Beginning Being Benefit, Benefit, Best Beyond Board Book Border, Brown Brussels, Bykert Cal. Camcorder Canadian Center Characterizations Chatter Cheap Cincinnati, Cinema City Co-Organizer, Collective College Columns Comoderator Concordia Conferences Connecticut Consultant, Contact/Proofs, Contamination, Contributing Contributor, Correspondent Crash, Creative Culture Curator, Current Cut Cyberspace, DARE, Dalhousie Dallas Dead Debrisfilm, Decomposition: Disorders Drug, Dundas ETR, Editorial Electron- ic Email: Emory Essay Exhibitionist, Experimental Experimental Export FTI, Faculty Family Fashion, Fear Fellow Feminism Fever, Film Fissure Five Flesh, Flexibility, Flux Foundation Founder, Fractured Franklin Frontera Full Future Gain Geography Geography/Postmodernism/Body, George Geyser, Give Global God, Gotham Grants Greetings Group Guest, Hallwalls Hammond Harbourfront, Hartford Headed Hebrew History Hole, Hollywood, Horizons How Huntington Hymen, Image Images Immobilization, In Inaugural Incorrect: Individuals: Inquisition, Intermedia Internet Interview Into Introduction Jager Joual Juarez, KERA, KNON Karen Keynote Kitchen, L.A. LUBO Landscape, Lang/Parsons Liberte Light Limelight, Liner Linguistic Lips, Lists, Live London Lousiana Lumina, M, MIRROR MOMA, Male, Marcia Margaret, Mass. Mat- rix Media Melbourne, Member Millennium, Mills Miscellaneous: Misrecogni- tions, Muck, Museum NEA NY Naropa Nature Negative Net Net-Body Neural New Newark Newcastle-upon-Tyne Newport Newsletter Nexus, Nina No No Noise North Nova Nova O.K. Oberlin Old On On-Line Ontario Option, Orange Organ- izer, PCM2-MOO, Paint, Panel/Screening, Parachute, Paris Part-Time Parti- cipant, Participating Patricia Peachtree Perforations, Persona Phenomen- ology Photographs Planet Poems, Polymorphous Pornography: Postmodernism Ppress Presence President, Producer/originator, Providence Public Public- ations Queer-e, RISD Real Resonances, Review Reviewer, Revised Rhode Rit- ual, Robbed S.P.E., S8, SMU, SNAP San San Schizz, School Second Selec- tions, Sequestered Sexuality Sheridan Sick Singular Sleazy Soho Some Sounds, South-Eastern Southern Spinthariscope, Square Squeaky Squeaky Squealer, St. St. Stolen Strata, Summary Suny Super T'Other Talk Talking Telephone: Testimony Textbook Texts, The Theater, Thought, Thread Throat, Town Transcription Tre Trivial Two U.A., UCLA UCSD, UNCA, URL UT Umberto University Unnerving Untitled Upstairs, Using Various Vehicule, Victor Video Village Virtual Voyeurism, WBRU Warwick Watching Wesleyan Western Whitney Williams Winnipeg With Wizard Work Writing Wupatki, X-Art Yale ZBS [Note: _Hole,_ _____________________________________ amino, cd or __________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 01:26:22 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joshua N Schuster Subject: wieners evening MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Event went wonderfully, a bigger audience than usual, John was patient enought of sit thru everyone's welcome, well, maybe an hour or so of introductions. Charley Shively, if someone is not familiar with him, gives beautiful readings. John read for about 20 mins, poems read with clippings, ads, other poems, notes on envelopes. We have the whole event video stocked. I think we are planning to collect the papers and transcribe the rest for some act of not forgetting. John, btw, is feeling better, can read and enjoy new audiences, can still floor and flush any audience, and has a good deal of confidence to pace himself. Alan Davies spoke some and read the next day, catching me offguard with his sparer serial lyrics, more like zen in the wake of haste. Bob Perelman, Louis Cabri, and Rachel Blau DuPlessis, all on this list, all gave great talks, opening straight into the issues of insanity, embodying, sexuality. The evening was instense and a pleasure. Hopefully these sorts of events will find him more comfortable with a public, keep us reading him, keep him hoping and publishing (there are still piles of journals and unpublished poems). -Josh Schuster ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 07:38:20 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mainstream Subject: advert RWC announces the reprint of RWC 35 / Ken Edwards - BRUISED RATIONALS. Two pounds and fifty pence payable sterling to Lawrence Upton. Price includes postage. Send to 32 Downside Rd, Sutton, Surrey SM2 5HP. Overseas rates available on request. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 08:48:18 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Poetics List Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 7 Apr 1997 to 8 Apr 1997 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I've been away from my post for a few days--here is something waiting for me upon my return... jk ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 14:58:20 -0400 (EDT) From: JDHollo@aol.com To: poetics@acsu.buffalo.edu Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 7 Apr 1997 to 8 Apr 1997 (fwd) [...] _________________________________________________ I. M. A. G. brave old lion gone out of reach now through the one door awaits us all now turn his pages: door upon door upon door Anselm Hollo ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 06:20:23 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Re: media coverage for the arts(long reply) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Christine Palma, I love radio. I've done programming and fund-raising for community stations on & off for fifteen of the last twenty years. It's a great medium, full of amazing potential, but all-too-often this potential is unrealized and in general this situation is getting worse. Christina, you're VERY lucky to live in an area in which you not only have a good Pacifica station, but also community stations like KCRW which haven't entirely bought into the NPR model of narrowing the program content to widen the audience size. The areas around New York (hi Kenny) & San Francisco are similarly blessed. The rest of us in the States get very spotty service from our "public" broadcasters in terms of adventurous arts, poetry or otherwise. Most radio stations who broadcast stories about Ginsberg's death hadn't presented Ginsberg's work on the air (if they ever had) since the multiple CD boxset of recordings was released and, hence, newsworthy. How many radio stations regularly broadcast poetry with roots in the experimental tradition? How many broadcast such poetry mainstreamed within their regular programming, rather than in a specialty program aired a few hours every week or once or twice a month? How many broadcast ANY poetry (even mainstream crap) at ANY time? In general "public" stations in the States are focusing more on increasing their market share and less on serving diverse underserved communities. The result is homogenous & bland "classical" (no vocal music, no weird contemporary music, just oceans of pretty music), "jazz" (nothing weird, please, what would Wynton say, & often nothing old enough to not be in stereo), or "alternative pop" music (the oxymoronic label says it all, if it doesn't a drum kit and an electric guitar forget about it) stations. "Public" stations are dropping specialty programs, focusing on a specific format, and coverage of all but the most mainstream events is declining, cause they might alienate those folks in the upscale demographic that the station's advertisers (oops, I mean underwriters) pay to reach throughout the day. That these stations ARE often better than the other media in a given area, is more a sign of how bad the other media have become, rather than how great these stations really are. There are still many wonderful individuals involved in public, and especially community, radio (we can't do without them & they deserve all the support we can give them), and isolated stations even outside of major markets can be quite good, but increasingly every non-mainstream interview or feature has to be justified, usually by tying it to a product or event. Even with this kind of tie-in, this stuff is rarely distributed nationally and is almost never actually produced by NPR. The vast majority of adventurous programming available for stations via satellite is independently produced by folks who must rent satellite time from NPR for distribution, & then most stations don't broadcast it anyway. How many people on this list heard LINEbreak, the radio series produced by Charles Bernstein & Martin Spinelli, on a radio station in their area? Martin, do you know how many stations aired the series? For thaat matter how many programs have been downloaded how many times from the EPC Web site? Christina, it sounds like what you're doing is cool, but most of us don't have this range of radio options where we live. I've really got to go finish up some other folks taxes now, talk to you later. Bests, Herb >Herb Levy wrote: > >>When I hear a recording by someone I'm interested in on almost ANY radio >>station, NPR or otherwise, I assume that the artist has died, 'cause >>otherwise the work w0uldn't be on the air. > >I've been an evesdropper on this list for about 8 months or so, and I feel >compelled to chime in and also to introduce myself... Herb Levy's comment >touches close to home. > >When I finished up my undergraduate degree in English almost three years >ago, I felt a big void in my education. I felt that I'd been introduced to >work, poetry and fiction, representative of what is academically "embraced" >and that the bulk of what I had studied for the past four years was not >contemporary work. I am saying this even though I understand that a big >goal of the curriculum in English depts. is to give students an historical >grounding of literature. I would never trade in this education. But >still, I questioned the relevance of what I'd been told to read. I felt >that the contemporary work I'd become acquainted with through my classes >was not "dangerous writing" and I felt that that the selection of work took >on an academic cast because there was such a narrow selection of writers. >Somehow when I looked at my bookshelf and the bookshelves of other English >majors at other colleges, I saw the same books, books that were supposed to >be on the bleeding edge of creative writing. How could we all be reading >the same books? Could they really be that alternative or different or more >importantly "contemporary," if most universities were teaching the same >authors. I wondered how a silent consensus could have formed about who the >important writers of today are. Isn't a canon of contemporary writers a >contradiction. It would be easy for an aspiring writer or a reader who >aspires to understand the tone of contemporary writing to just accept these >people and look to them as the thematic (moral) and styllistic voice of our >time. What's worse is to accept the opposite condition of this, that >perhaps it's very difficult today to stumble upon a relevant writer who >enjoys obscurity as a result of work that breaks so radically from what's >taught in the university system, or worse still, that it's impossible >because they don't exist. > >I felt estranged from what I'd just gotten a degree in. This bothered me >enough that I decided I would produce and host a radio show about poetry, >literary fiction and performance and fill in the gap. The format is open, >but usually the guests read their work for the bulk of the program and the >discussion is on the climate of creative writing and not on an analysis of >the particular pieces they've just read. The best part for me is that good >writers recommend good writers and are so excited to share them. Also >coming across people with interesting work, but who don't have any >immediate aspirations to publish, ie. closet writers. I feel as though I >can now make the connection between what I've gotten academically with the >diversity of what I've encountered. And I can now be thankful for the >survey classes and Norton Anthology for giving me a body of work to relate >it to. > >I've also made it a point to educate myself on what the media coverage for >the arts is like. I'm in Los Angeles so I can only speak for Los Angeles. >I think the climate has changed in the past few years and that arts and >literary programs broadcasting to Los Angeles are breaking out of the >after-midnight airtime ghetto. For the first year, I had an 11 PM to 2 AM >weekly timeslot. Now I am on at 8 PM. At other public stations, we had >Wanda Coleman at KPFK doing Poetry Connection also at 8 PM. KCRW out of >Santa Monica College has Michael Silverblatt hosting Bookworm during the >day! 2 PM. KCRW has also made the full broadcasts of his shows available >for download at their website (www.kcrw.org) and the sound quality is fine. > >I think there is a growing public demand for arts programming and an >awareness of the radio's and internet's potential to meet that. Part of >this is due to independent publishing houses putting out spoken word >releases and these getting into Virgin Megastore and the like. A small >non-profit experimental audio group in New York called Tellus/Harvestworks >which puts out recordings like those of Paul Bowles and John Cage and >Shelley Hirsh is now at my local record store. > >The internet will certainly improve public access... it's convenient. I >don't know how long this particular list has been around, but I sure would >have welcomed it five years ago. A radio show, an e-mail list, streaming >audio, they can do wonders. > >Christine > >______________ >christine palma >christine@DRUMandBASS.com > >samples: high-bandwidth, communications, bpm, asia in the yr 2000, fractal >structures, cu-seeme fuzzy, memory encapsulated, radio, a sculpture in >every living room, a sculpture in every park, a sculpture in every body, >cyborgs, e-mail, letterpress, return to drawing, kitchensink genetics, >mindoro, coincidence, encaustic, pedestrian's rights, sleep depriviation >high, the moon . . . Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 09:34:03 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Mandel Subject: dale and daniel Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dale Smith and Daniel Bouchard -- I think you two are being irritated not by each other but by inherent limits in how email transfers context of meaning and intention, i.e. not very well. Perhaps a brief phone call? not meaning to meddle, but I've had enough evidence of intelligence and good intention on both your parts to want to get the pebble out of your shoes. Tom Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com ******************************************************** Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com 4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 ******************************************************** Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 10:24:44 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Wallace Subject: Is anybody still discussing Bob Perelman MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Susan Schultz' take in the new WITZ on Bob Perelman's MARGINALIZATION OF POETRY led me back to that text again with some questions I'm still trying to figure out. On the one hand, can someone explain to me where exactly Bob, in distinguishing Charles Bernstein as "envisioning a group of textual enclaves as standing in for politics" and Kamau Braithwaite as creating a poetry leading to the possibility of new alternative "nations," obviously priveleges Braithwaite's project over Bernstein's? I keep looking for that but am not seeing it--can someone point me to what I'm missing? Is it in the idea that Bernstein's attempt to refigure language intends to function on an "anarchic" level that can't (according to Perelman) reach outside the academic context, whereas Braithwaite's is seeking a more broad-based constituency? I would disagree with that reading if Bob is making it, but I can't quite find the sentence where he directly states that this IS his argument. Actually, one problem I do feel like I'm having with THE MARGINALIZATION OF POETRY is the way in which Bob seems to be reducing the various purposes of the poetry of Bernstein, Braithwaite AND Andrews to their function SOLELY as ideological critique--he seems, at times, to be arguing that there's NO element of their poetry not focused on offering ideological critique. He seems to be reducing the variety of this work to various means of "storming the capitol." Furthermore, am I right in thinking that he comes dangerously close to seeing the work of these writers as having a SINGULAR CENTER--Bernstein wants "textual anarchy," Braithwaite wants "alternative nation states," and all of Andrews' work is a complete assault on any possibility of identity? Interesting on this subject is Jeffrey Nealon's DOUBLE READING: POSTMODERNISM AFTER DECONSTRUCTION. Nealon takes a number of academic critics to task (George Hartley among others) for not reading the POETRY of language poetry (in all its potential multiplicity, ambiguity, and contradiction) but instead trying to reduce all the poets involved to a single cultural critique which they are all engaged in. Curious then (if my reading here is even partly correct) that Bob, who is a poet also, should seem at least in part to be engaging in this same kind of reduction (language poetry is simply MAKING A SERIES OF POINTS about social reality, POINTS WHICH CAN THEN BE EVALUATED ON WHETHER THEY ADD UP TO A SINGULAR CORRECTNESS. Susan Schultz' essay is interesting also for noting that Perelman lumps a number of women poets associated with language poetry into the same chapter; Schultz sees Perelman being more sympathetic to their practice on the one hand, while possibily ghettoizing it (and certainly keeping it something of a side issue) at the same time, and she asks for the motivation for that placing. So, my questions are these: are there places where Perelman is not as singularly judgemental (Braithwaite over Bernstein) as he seems? Or is the heart of the book an attempt to reduce the variability of poetic practice to a singular, centered ideological critique, and to see its various subjects as falling short because they finally have a limited singular center? But what if they were not intending to have such a center? What if poetry is not ONLY ideological critique by other means? Mark Wallace /----------------------------------------------------------------------------\ | | | mdw@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu | | GWU: | | http://gwis2.circ.gwu.edu/~mdw | | EPC: | | http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/wallace | |____________________________________________________________________________| ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 09:27:45 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Mandel Subject: float/sting Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" "float like a butterfly sting like a bee" was spoken by one of Muhammed's cornermen, not by him. I can't believe I'm forgetting the guy's name (like forgetting what is in one panel of a favorite stained glass emblazoned on brain); I'll probably wake up with it at 2am.... was it Bundini Brown? Tom Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com ******************************************************** Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com 4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 ******************************************************** Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 16:25:06 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Matthias Regan Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg in Victorian England: The Opera Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dale Smith wrote: > >What disasters have been spared? The social, political, and aesthetic >reality of this country today resembles Victorian England more than ever. > This seems like a strange thing to say. What do you have in mind? Matthias Regan Northwestern University Department of Chemistry Phone: 847/467-2132 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 08:59:03 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Douglas Barbour Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Gee, I'd have to agree with William Burmeister, who seems dead on for me: "I suppose there may be, but for many, I can imagine that not beginning a new poem until the poem at hand is finished would mean that far fewer poems get written, and perhaps that the spontaneous creation process would be frustrated. Of course, this begs the question of when a poem is actually "finished." Bill B" Also, what Don Cheney said about loss of leisure time. So I write as mucha s I can of a poem at a time, but also find larger series are begun & then I may or may not keep at them in tandem, & at whatever times ============================================================================= Douglas Barbour the precision of openness Department of English is not a vagueness University of Alberta it is an accumulation Edmonton Alberta T6G 2E5 cumulous (403) 492 2181 FAX:(403) 492 8142 bpNichol H: 436 3320 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 11:56:54 PDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hoa Nguyen Subject: Re: Will's column/ Daniel Bouchard Content-Type: text/plain (Sorry if I have posted this twice--I can't tell--- my service is a bit slow) Dear Daniel Bouchard: It seems to me that this message was/is meant to intimidate anyone who may comment or critique on this list, especially if you understand them to be differing from your point of view or responding to something you said. Mocking someone's name? (see below) I do not think that Dale was "obvious[ly] impressed by George Will". (see below). Will you mock my name? Will you write that I am defending George Will? Do you really want a debate or for everyone to go along with you? (These are real questions.) Hoa Nguyen >Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 17:21:28 -0400 >From: Daniel Bouchard >Subject: Re: Will's column >To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > >"America, go fuck yourself with your atom bomb." > --Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997) > >"America, I'm not sorry." > --same guy > > >Dales, > >I'm not sorry if you think my "fuck George F. Will" >is "stupid and irresponsible." > >I'm not sorry if you think my "fuck George F. Will" >"confirms his belief in the poverty of cultural values today." > >If he could define them, and if I could take the time to read them, I'm >sure I could have a grand time mocking them for the amusement of the Poetics list. >If you think my "fuck George F. Will" is an act of cowardice because it was >"behind his back" let me assure that I would love to have the >opportunity >to meet the man and enjoy a real conversation, in which I may >or may not >use the oh-so-shocking "F" word, depending on the amount of >sneering >condescension he emits. >You are obviously impressed with George F. Will's authority to the extent >>that in a worthless diatribe in which he shits on a man's life work you >>find "scant points . . . which seemed appropriate." Which points were they >Dales? The ones that implicate all writers and activists in "cultural >and >economic market practices." Are you taking a correspondence course >with George F. Will? You said, "his death is the occasion for such moments as these and I think >as much meaning should be milked from debate rather than saturating >ourselves only with warm platitudes." > >Yes, let's debate and milk (milk?) the moment and we may learn something >from one another, but don't begin by telling ME to settle down and be >reasonable because it only makes me more angry. > > >daniel_bouchard@hmco.com >> > > > >--------------------------------------------------------- >Get Your *Web-Based* Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com >--------------------------------------------------------- > > > > --------------------------------------------------------- Get Your *Web-Based* Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com --------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 10:20:50 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Safdie Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Mon, 14 Apr 1997, Jordan Davis wrote: > Q: Do you work on one poem at a time, or do you work on several at once? > Or do you just write, and make poems from the writing later? I suppose > this will seem naive, but I wonder if there are poets who do not begin > work on a new poem until they have finished the poem at hand -- > What a nice query! I've been writing in series for so long that I don't know anymore what an individual or occasional poem looks like -- this has been going on for almost eight years now -- the demands of the sequence dictate what comes next, so I could be (and am) working on three or more at once -- plus constant journal scribbling, which more often than not yields the raw material . . . Lovely to talk about the how, as well as the what . . . ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 17:27:05 GMT+0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: bertram mourits Subject: the poetry of Muhammad Ali MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT md requested: >the newscasters kept >reading a poem clay had written for the occasion and i adored it. can >anybody post that poem here? I'm not sure I got the right thing, but this was published in the Dutch literary journal Randstad in 1964: It all started twenty years past The greatest of them all was born at last The very first words from his Lousville lips, 'I'm as pretty as a picture and there's no one I can't whip.' Then he said in a voice that sounded rough, 'Im as strong as an ox and twice as tough.' The name of this champ, I might as well say, No other than the greatest, Cassius Clay. He predicts the round in which he's gonna win And that's the way his career has been. He knocks them all out in the round he'll call, And that's why he's called the greatest of them all. bertram.mourits@let.ruu.nl ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 14:46:39 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Eliza McGrand- CVA Guest Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question i warm up, often, by editing/revising a poem in progress, and then start working out a new poem once i'm limber. always have a number of poems in revision. e ps if i waited till i'd finished poem at hand i'd never finish anything... i typically revise something around 35 to 60 times (i.e. re-read and look for /at problem spots, change/shift, move around, reword) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 13:20:22 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Kubie Subject: Knott/AG MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Linda Russo-- re that Bill Knott seeming to "connect" somehow. Grudgingly returned his Niomi poems to the library a few days ago so I can't quote directly but his "To American Poets" was in front of me with AG's death in the news--something like: "your name will be an open secret" (and) "everywhere we will be finishing the poems you broke away from" RK ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 15:21:06 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: hello poetics wake up! MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII test PS Friday April 18 at 7 pm Brian Kim Stefans (ed. Arras) and Loren Goodman (contains sulfites) read their poetry at POETRY CITY which is in the offices of Teachers & Writers Collaborative, 5 Union Sq W, 7th floor, NYC. end of test ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 10:13:59 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: bruja Subject: Re: poem... (fwd) Comments: To: POETICS@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu, fop MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > > > >I will paint a mural of a thousand >birds, wings intertwining, fighting >for flight, >two pecking feathers, >two carrying thread, >sleeping against wind, melting to ground >with wax dripping grace, landing >waterside >and heart side, >tear like eyes open, pulled, >never forward, >dripping paint my brush will scatter nests, >eggs will damage, >lie horizontal on ground not earth, ? >I will scatter to sky >my mural, >like ashes fall secretly >on window sills >ha! >not even that will remain. > > > > > >-joanna > > > > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 23:03:07 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM Subject: Re: WBA <<_Who Built America? Working People & The Nation's Economy, Politics, Culture & Society_ in two volumes from the American Social History Project at CUNY. The founder of the project is Herbert Gutman. The 'text' can also be had on CD with lots of pedegogically provocative pictures, songs etc. for the multi-media prepared computer.>> ....is actually one of the best CD-ROMs I've seen. Voyager, which I think is out of business, put it out. There's a great section on gay history deep in the interface, but of course some Funda-mentalist found it, and it's been banned in some high schools. Holman ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 22:43:11 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Thomas Bell Subject: Re: ginsberg and snyder Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" "When?" is the question. At two different times or in a different dimension. tom At 10:31 PM 4/13/97 -0700, George Bowering wrote: >>Does using adjacent urinals in two different states > >Where is that possible? > > > > >George Bowering. > , >2499 West 37th Ave., >Vancouver, B.C., >Canada V6M 1P4 > >fax: 1-604-266-9000 >e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca > > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 20:08:21 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Alexander Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question In-Reply-To: <33534683.7C0A@cnsunix.albany.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 09:12 AM 4/15/97 +0000, you wrote: >Jordan Davis wrote: >> >> Q: Do you work on one poem at a time, or do you work on several at once? >> Or do you just write, and make poems from the writing later? I suppose >> this will seem naive, but I wonder if there are poets who do not begin >> work on a new poem until they have finished the poem at hand -- Usually several at once, but sometimes can get going on one which takes virtually all the attention for weeks at a time. Most often for the last 6 years each of the "several" is a fairly long work, in sections or not, and sometimes there's going back and forth within a work. And then someone will ask for something, and there may be looking through new and old work, and working on something again. If that someone asking is a choreographer or video artist, perhaps there will be some attention put to the particular use and collaboration involved, and perhaps something entirely new will begin, amid the others already going on. And sometimes there will be a time when all will cease for a few weeks -- not a block of any kind, more of a respite, perhaps, or perhaps more attention to making books or reading or some other act which usually doesn't seem that separate from the poems. And often books seem to take shape almost from the first conception of a work, but not always does such a book finally come together. And that brings about the question of how/when a work "ends," which is another discussion entirely. charles charles alexander / chax press / chax@theriver.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 20:16:44 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Alexander Subject: Re: float/sting In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970415092745.0071a668@cais.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 09:27 AM 4/15/97 -0500, you wrote: >"float like a butterfly >sting like a bee" > >was spoken by one of Muhammed's cornermen, not by him. I can't >believe I'm forgetting the guy's name (like forgetting what is >in one panel of a favorite stained glass emblazoned on brain); >I'll probably wake up with it at 2am.... > >was it Bundini Brown? > >Tom Yes, Bundini Brown And, perhaps later, the song which I've heard played on AM radio as recently as a couple of years ago Muhammad Muhammad Ali float like a butterfly sting like a bee Muhammad a black superman who calls to the other guy I'm A-a-li -- catch me if you can That's all the lyrics I can remember -- are there more? charles charles alexander / chax press / chax@theriver.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 22:16:59 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: michael corbin Subject: Re: History is Rewritten MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Mark Weiss wrote: > > While perhaps memoir-as-genre has blurred into the cliche > >excesses of an unrequited romance with a unitary subjectivity... > > Is this translatable into English? Why yes, indeed. However translation is so, shall we say, unstable. Therefore, following da Vinci in the Codex Leicester and elsewhere, I have produced a more adequate method of rendering translation from the original in this text. That is, hold the text to the mirror, cover your left eye to occlude the perception of depth and then, counter-intuitively, read only one letter at a time and all will be made clear. > Speaking of translations: > > Of course they speak in different > >tongues. But tongues perhaps scrawled on the same rosetta stone. > > Some weird Egyptian stuff. Too kinky for me. Latex is available for those with untranslatable safety concerns. Further, beyond its prophylactic benefits it has possibilities all its own for new philological exploration. Kink, as always, is optional. mc ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 23:04:58 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question In-Reply-To: <33534683.7C0A@cnsunix.albany.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I do one at a time and finish it at the same time or scrap it so it's like breathing theory. Then it's gone. There's no work in it. Alan _______________________________________________________________________ URL: http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html MIRROR: http://www.anu.edu.au/english/index.html TELEPHONE 718-857-3671 IMAGES: http://www.cs.unca.edu/~davidson/pix/ CUSEEME 166.84.250.149 ADDRESS: 432 Dean St., Brooklyn, NY, USA, 11217 Editor, BEING ON LINE ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 01:11:03 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steven Marks Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > > Q: Do you work on one poem at a time, or do you work on several at once? > Or do you just write, and make poems from the writing later? I suppose > this will seem naive, but I wonder if there are poets who do not begin > work on a new poem until they have finished the poem at hand > -- > Many at a time, plus reviews and essays and journal entries. Poems come out in spurts. And when the spring dries up, I move on to another poem. Almost all of my poems, however, first begin as prose. I notice that a couple of others write this way and I think I remember that this is the way that Yeats wrote. I find that this is the best way to get down what I want to say; almost as if I'm writing a letter to myself to be read at some point in the future. Having that frame to work in keeps me to the task far better than setting out to write a poem from scratch, so to speak. Strangely, or perhaps not, the prose-to-poetry method results in far less stilted form and language. I can follow the first-choice, best-choice path with no obscuring of the trail from rewriting. At least for me, this is what happens. What about others who write from a prose frame? cheers, Steven __________________________________________________ Steven Marks http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html __________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 02:15:58 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Stephen Vincent Subject: Re: float/sting Charles Alexander quoting Tom Mandel posted: >"float like a butterfly >sting like a bee" > >was spoken by one of Muhammed's cornermen, not by him. I can't >believe I'm forgetting the guy's name (like forgetting what is >in one panel of a favorite stained glass emblazoned on brain); >I'll probably wake up with it at 2am.... > >was it Bundini Brown? > >Tom >Yes, Bundini Brown >And, perhaps later, the song which I've heard played on AM >radio as recently as a couple of years ago "Muhammad Muhammad Ali float like a butterfly sting like a bee Muhammad a black superman who calls to the other guy I'm A-a-li -- catch me if you can" Charles, are you referring to a more contemporary song that appropriates from the Budini Brown heraldry(!?). And was the Brown piece put up while Ali was still Cassius Clay? If so, the "Ali" in the more recent song wd be an example of history re-writ. Tom M., indeed, referred to the song in the time of "Muhammed" rather than time of "Clay". I somehow think of the butterfly/bee combination as part of the Casius moment - before the religious change. Except in its awe of the power of language, within its youthful boast, it's a rhyme that shows little sign of any need for religio-humility. I remember being knocked out by it - in the middle of incredible upheaval, it was so fresh, stood up and cut right thru everything. And then just hung there -- gem like -- in the air. I guess one of us shd go out and find 'the book' with the real facts. Cheers, Stephen Vincent ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 00:18:11 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Q: Do you work on one poem at a time, or do you work on several at once? >Or do you just write, and make poems from the writing later? I suppose >this will seem naive, but I wonder if there are poets who do not begin >work on a new poem until they have finished the poem at hand -- All three. Am currently writing daily ten line poems (sit down, crank it out, one or two spot revisions, then move on to the next one). Also am constantly tinkering with older stuff, usually after I get 'em back with rejection slips attached. I also bring a journal to readings and write while people read, a combination of what I hear and what I'm thinking (similar to what Mac Low does). Chopped, spindled and spliced, this becomes source material for the rest of my poems. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 03:13:38 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: MAXINE CHERNOFF Subject: Re: Ginsberg the Rock Star In-Reply-To: <970414230001_-1066746966@emout08.mail.aol.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Bob : How nice to have insomnia (3 am), wake up, and find myself addressed on our list. Of course, one can arrive at the existence of Allen G by many paths and never to have arrived is worse. But it is simply the case that context does limit one's initial understanding of a person or thing and that the medium by which one discovers a writer, televison included, can limit or "flatten" one's sense of the whole. An interested viewer could replay a video of AG again and again, but sitting with his work in book form and reading it is another experience, I'd venture. Reading allows for a fuller initiation pehaps? Maxine Chernoff On Mon, 14 Apr 1997 Nuyopoman@AOL.COM wrote: > < college, they are maybe aware of Allen G as MTV celeb instead of fine poet > and political activist. My solution at home: tell my kids about alternate > history, take them to events that proliferate the truth about American > political policy, etc.>> > > > Excuse me, Maxine? Are you suggesting better for kids never to have heard of > Allen at all then to have seen the video of "The Ballad of the Skeletons" on > MTV? > > I love to hear from the kids who found their way to Allen's because of that > exposure. It does happen! > > Cheers, > > Bob Ho > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 08:15:16 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Henry Gould Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question Interesting how many people write many things at once (although even more interesting all the side comments on composition). It still comes down to one at a time for me, until it's finished (although often come back later & use the needle pliers). Why just one at a time? I can think of 2 reasons: 1st, a poem seems like an "event" to me - like an occasion or an experience. 2nd as Isaiah Berlin pointed out, everyone's either a fox or a hedgehog. & I'm a conehead. & that "one" may be just one poem, or a series that takes months & has me writing in the other room at 3 am. or other uncomfortable situations. - Gould "we write to keep the tsetse flies off the ox" - Jack Spandrift "writing? Isn't that something we did in public school?" - Eric Blarnes ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 07:46:39 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: advert In-Reply-To: <199704150738_MC2-1450-CA4@compuserve.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" yo, can any of you brits help me out w/ something? apparently there was a superb documentary on lenny bruce on britain's radio 3 last march or feb. i need it!! how can i go about getting atape or a transcript? bests, maria d At 7:38 AM -0400 4/15/97, Mainstream wrote: >RWC announces the reprint of RWC 35 / Ken Edwards - BRUISED RATIONALS. Two >pounds and fifty pence payable sterling to Lawrence Upton. Price includes >postage. Send to 32 Downside Rd, Sutton, Surrey SM2 5HP. Overseas rates >available on request. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 07:50:58 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: float/sting In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970415092745.0071a668@cais.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" still no clear answers on the clay/liston fight poem. here's another quiz (i desperately need the answer to): what's that line that goes "imaginary somethings with real something in them" i think the word "toadstools" is in there somewhere. md At 9:27 AM -0500 4/15/97, Tom Mandel wrote: >"float like a butterfly >sting like a bee" > >was spoken by one of Muhammed's cornermen, not by him. I can't >believe I'm forgetting the guy's name (like forgetting what is >in one panel of a favorite stained glass emblazoned on brain); >I'll probably wake up with it at 2am.... > >was it Bundini Brown? > >Tom > > > >Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com >******************************************************** >Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com >4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 >Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 >******************************************************** > Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 08:52:16 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Zimmerman Subject: Re: float/sting MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Maria Damon wrote: > > still no clear answers on the clay/liston fight poem. here's another quiz > (i desperately need the answer to): what's that line that goes "imaginary > somethings with real something in them" i think the word "toadstools" is in > there somewhere. > md > > At 9:27 AM -0500 4/15/97, Tom Mandel wrote: > >"float like a butterfly > >sting like a bee" > > > >was spoken by one of Muhammed's cornermen, not by him. I can't > >believe I'm forgetting the guy's name (like forgetting what is > >in one panel of a favorite stained glass emblazoned on brain); > >I'll probably wake up with it at 2am.... > > > >was it Bundini Brown? > > > >Tom > > > > > > > >Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com > >******************************************************** > >Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com > >4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 > >Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 > >******************************************************** > > Join the Caucus ConversationMaria, That's "imaginary gardens with real toads in them" --from Marianne Moore's "Poetry" [the one that begins "I, too, dislike it"]. --Dan Zimmerman ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 07:41:36 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Boughn Subject: Re: History is Rewritten In-Reply-To: from "Jeffrey W. Timmons" at Apr 14, 97 06:50:12 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > i think what i was responding to was the desire for a more polyphonic > political discourse: more channels more choices more alternatives. the > aspect this thread straggled from was wills dissing ag and the desire for > some r e s p e c t (to the tune please) for those willfully purged > alternatives that ag might represent. mb you are quite right: but cant i > hope that political and cultural opposition be granted its token role in > a dialogic community? Of course, Jeffrey, you can have all the utopian dreams you want. I was just objecting to a certain "what's wrong with young people these days, they don't know anything about the IWW or whatever" thread that crept into this exchange. Power to the people, Mike mboughn@chass.utoronto.ca ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 08:07:20 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: float/sting In-Reply-To: <3354F5B0.65C1@tribeca.ios.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" cool, daniel z: what would you like: a copy of my gertrude stein article, a copy of my book, or a copy of the new journal CrossCultural Poetix? At 8:52 AM -0700 4/16/97, Daniel Zimmerman wrote: >Maria Damon wrote: >> >> still no clear answers on the clay/liston fight poem. here's another quiz >> (i desperately need the answer to): what's that line that goes "imaginary >> somethings with real something in them" i think the word "toadstools" is in >> there somewhere. >> md >> >> At 9:27 AM -0500 4/15/97, Tom Mandel wrote: >> >"float like a butterfly >> >sting like a bee" >> > >> >was spoken by one of Muhammed's cornermen, not by him. I can't >> >believe I'm forgetting the guy's name (like forgetting what is >> >in one panel of a favorite stained glass emblazoned on brain); >> >I'll probably wake up with it at 2am.... >> > >> >was it Bundini Brown? >> > >> >Tom >> > >> > >> > >> >Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com >> >******************************************************** >> >Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com >> >4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 >> >Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 >> >******************************************************** >> > Join the Caucus ConversationMaria, > That's "imaginary gardens with real toads in them" >--from Marianne Moore's "Poetry" [the one that begins "I, too, dislike >it"]. >--Dan Zimmerman ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 10:45:32 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: Is anybody still discussing Bob Perelman In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Mark Wallace-- I haven't seen Susan's piece yet. Perelman's book on the other hand was very interesting and useful to me. He may respond himself here...But it seems to me the Marg. of Poetry is not reductive with regard to any given poet's work. It suggests tentative areas of engagement and characterization. I think Perelman's wish to get at a certain audience and a certain niche, which involves carefully articulated academic-sounding anayses, may be mistaken for brusque pigeon-holing. To my ear that is not what's going on. I also feel that as a public figure at the head of "LangPo, the historical phenomenon" he is determined to show plenty of skepticism about its claims, where they are weak or incomplete--thus the emphasis on the limits of certain poets. However, I agree with the passage I've retained below. There is a tendency sometimes (in BP's Marginalization and among other folks) to assume that a focused cultural and political agenda is the REASON for a poet doing her particular work. I had some great backchannel exchanges with Joe Safdie which involved (as I see it) this problematic assumption. This crops up in a somewhat different form in Golding's brilliant From Outlaw to Classic (which I strongly recommend, and which I only heard of 'cause he's on this list and mentioned it in passing)--There he sometimes suggests that "avant-garde" poetry will lose it's reason for being if it becomes too accepted institutionally, if it has no "center" or maybe no right-wing, to respond against. This seems to be to be putting the pegasus before the cart...Vital poetry is made (like vital painting, dance or music) for its own fervid intensity as human activity, involving a particular physical medium. It isn't primarily a form of insurgency against the current cultural hegemonies. A given poet (;like many on this list) may be compelled, because of historical junctures, to be in opposition to those who hold institutional power in the poetry world...But that isn't why most of us write. Likewise (it is a different point, but they **are** parallel) most radical poets are not trying exclusively to power social change thru verse; many different calculations go into our choices, and while all are implicated in politics, few are reducible to it. As a long-time socialist activist and a poet, I feel each engagement must be allowed its own set of rooms, its own problematic shape. Mark P. Atlanta On Tue, 15 Apr 1997, Mark Wallace wrote: > > Actually, one problem I do feel like I'm having with THE > MARGINALIZATION OF POETRY is the way in which Bob seems to be reducing > the various purposes of the poetry of Bernstein, Braithwaite AND Andrews > to their function SOLELY as ideological critique--he seems, at times, to > be arguing that there's NO element of their poetry not focused on > offering ideological critique. He seems to be reducing the variety of > this work to various means of "storming the capitol." ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 10:16:31 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU Subject: Re: Is anybody still discussing Bob Perelman Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" mark, in partial reply to your well-put questions: pp. 93-4, _the marginalization of poetry_: "it would be easy enough simultaneously to award the palm to the revolutionary commitment of _x/self_ and to dismiss bernstein's anarchy. i can imagine that a subtle, self-aware, and humorous caliban makes a more attractive figure for many than a self-shattering "humpty dumpty" ... who seems to say little more than "words can be spelled however i choose to spell them." braithwaite's words exist in history, to the point where a revolutionary life becomes the embodiment of the verb of saying ... by extension, the act of writing _x/self_ can be seen as a parallel revolutionary act. such a statement, however, requires a major caveat. "by extension" masks a problem: the idea of revolutionary writing is based on a revolutionary reading of it, which in turn is based on the academic security of intellectual flexibility. and bernstein, despite his many gestures of renunciation, also wants power, at least in a more local academic arena..." (my ellipses)... i'm not certain the implicit critique here of bernstein's poetic 'position' vis-a-vis braithwaite's doesn't fudge somewhat (even as it illuminates) what *appears* to be a privileging of some wider, less "local" (and more urgent?) "history" somehow implicit in braithwaite's "revolutionary" impulse... the question would seem to turn on the sort of poetic agency "embodied" by bernstein and braithwaite (which is not to say "identity")... how does agency operate in the bernstein readership vis-a-vis the braithwaite (yes there is overlap, of course)... but it may be that it's the "revolutionary," in fact, that gives trouble in this context (an academic context, finally, given that bob's book is on princeton up, which of course seeps now into poetics---a somewhat more complicated context)... i'm thinking of what current notions of "revolutionary" might entail, readership-wise, as well as "anarchy"---regarding which i am tempted to say that so many counter-cultures have been effectively foreclosed upon in the past two decades (and then some)... try this on---obliquely, by way of getting 'at' the humor in bernstein (and really---not an 'apologist' for charles here, just trying to get a handle on his agency, which may not be a matter merely of presumed "Self"-shatter, exactly): "the humor of the oppressed is a funky thing that runs slantwise through sorrow and self-pity, a funny sideways nuance of irony and self-mockery: coming out of the black community, descending to from the remains of the east european yiddish ghettos. nobody writes 'light verse' any more. but there is humor and play and mockery and exaggeration in the most serious poems. because if you're trying to write in some way of your whole life with the whole person ... well, it's pretty absurd. you have to dig yourself, your own absurdity." (author's ellipsis)... it's marge piercy, from "tom eliot meets the hulk at little big horn: the political economy of poetry," marge piercy and dick lourie... in _triquarterly_ no. 23/24, winter/spring 1972, special issue on "literature in revolution"; p. 89... best, joe ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 11:27:10 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Boughn Subject: Re: float/sting In-Reply-To: from "Maria Damon" at Apr 16, 97 07:50:58 am MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > here's another quiz > (i desperately need the answer to): what's that line that goes "imaginary > somethings with real something in them" i think the word "toadstools" is in > there somewhere. > md > It's Marianne Moore, Maria, in "Poetry": . . . One must make a / distinction / however: when dragged into prominence by half poets, the result is / not poetry, / nor till the poets among us can be / 'literalisits of / the imagination'--above / insolence and triviality and can present // for inspection, 'imaginary gardens with real toads in them', shall we / have / it. Mike mboughn@chass.utoronto.ca ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 11:51:51 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Issa Clubb Subject: Re: WBA In-Reply-To: <970414230003_112008874@emout10.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >....is actually one of the best CD-ROMs I've seen. Voyager, which I think is >out of business, put it out. There's a great section on gay history deep in >the interface, but of course some Funda-mentalist found it, and it's been >banned in some high schools. Thanks for the plug, but we're still very much in business. We had a well-publicized 'restructuring' or whatever you call it these days, that resulted in the ouster of founder and figurehead Bob Stein & the cutting of the nominal CD-ROM production department. But we're still making CDROMs, almost as many as last year in fact, including... ta dah!... WBA II. But don't get too excited, it's not done yet -- in fact I probably shouldn't be mentioning it. As for the gay cowboys, it was Apple who tried to drop it from a bundle, we made a federal case out of it and they backed down. Pretty fun stuff, all in all (when you win). It might be banned in some high schools, I don't know -- probably more for the frontier abortionist stuff... And as for Jordan's question, I've been working on the same piece for 5 years now, trying to find the proper medium for it. I think I've settled on hypertextual-book length-video-poem. That I'll then print onto a series of Tshirts. Or something. --issa _________________________ Issa Clubb Voyager Art Dept. mailto:issa@voyagerco.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 03:34:06 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Alexander Subject: Re: float/sting In-Reply-To: <970416021252_-1870774833@emout18.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Charles, are you referring to a more contemporary song that appropriates from >the Budini Brown heraldry(!?). And was the Brown piece put up while Ali was >still Cassius Clay? If so, the "Ali" in the more recent song wd be an example >of history re-writ. Tom M., indeed, referred to the song in the time of > "Muhammed" rather than time of "Clay". Yes, I guess I am, and a pretty bad song at that. I have no idea when the song came out. But it certainly must be history re-writ. charles charles alexander / chax press / chax@theriver.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 11:43:01 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU Subject: Re: Is anybody still discussing Bob Perelman Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" oh shit: that first "to" in the piercy quote should be "too"... sorry!... best, joe ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 12:48:25 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joel Kuszai Subject: Help! MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII if anyone out there can help me find the following people, I would appreciate it greatly (e-mail or snail mail will do): 1. Thomas Orange of UWO 2. Taylor Stoehr and as a matter of trivia (a student of mine is writing a paper on Yoko Ono): whatever happened to Tony Cox and their daughter? it seems like I had a longer list before I sat down to write this. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 12:45:42 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Franco Subject: CHARLES BERNSTEIN IN BOSTON MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=unknown-8bit Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit The Word of Mouth reading series presents AN AFTERNOON WITH CHARLES BERNSTEIN. DATE : SUNDAY, April 20th TIME: 3:30pm PLACE: WORLD WIDE BUILDING, ARTISTS WEST, SECOND FLOOR, Studio #8, 144 Moody St. Waltham Ma.{Waltham Center} ADMISSION: $3.00 WHEEL CHAIR ACCESSIBLE SPONSOR: WORD OF MOUTH READING SERIES Phone for information: 617 648-2226 (Or 891-5225 Day of reading only) e-mail Mfranco@aol.com THE DETAILS: LOCATION: WORLD WIDE BUILDING: 144 MOODY ST. WALTHAM MA. [ARTISTS WEST, SECOND FLOOR, STUDIO # 8]. HOW TO GET THERE: COMMUTER RAIL [N. STATION OR PORTER SQ. TRAINS LEAVE AT 3pm (N. STATION) OR 3:10PM (PORTER SQ.). STUDIOS ARE A 3 MIN WALK FROM THE STATION. BY CAR: MOODY ST IS JUST OFF OF WALTHAM COMMON. FREE PARKING AVAILABLE. Many Thanks, �.. Michael Franco/ WoM ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 11:59:25 EST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: simon@CVAX.IPFW.INDIANA.EDU Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question I'm usually working on two or three, but they're at different "stages" (whateve that means), at least, they were started at different times. But what I've also found is that, without planning to, the poem I'm working on "most" is, almost always, in some way, connected to the prose piece I'll also be working on. I'm always working poems and prose at the same time. beth simon ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 13:13:11 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM Subject: _perhaps this is a rescue fantasy_ by Heather Fuller now available: _perhaps this is a rescue fantasy_ by Heather Fuller "Heather Fuller's lines are 'moves' being made, as if in her peripheral vision where everything's happening. Her 'moves' are in this periphery 'on their own': "I saw Graceland in the narrow of a morning." The poems start out before we read them; or as if simultaneous, to one side of us-- "I watch for entering words / never running away but into Out." One has the sense of the reader being the speaker who at once does not know, hasn't pre-formed, what is being said (and what is going to be). The writing is "the cut and joining when you are speaker and not knowing." --Leslie Scalapino "For Heather Fuller enjamb north-south-street-lettres smarts in the narralyrical riff space full of humor & attention & rage. "I don't fuck pronouns and no visits from scribes," she writes. That is, "_Dear Formalist_ . . . woman arrested for lying under sculpture. . . the sculpture _Fish Out of Water._" Meanwhile, "I make love in the most irrelevant places." That is, "_Please ask to be reseated if you think you lack the strength_" for this rescue fantasy." --Joan Retallack $10 postpaid 72 pages 1-890311-00-6 Orders to: Edge Books POBox 25642 Washington, DC 20007 thanks. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 12:26:29 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dale Smith Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg in Victorian England: The Opera Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Matthias Regan- I simply meant to imply that in certain ways today our social milieu shares many traits with those of Victorian England. The most obvious is the pervasive social usage of "niceness" as a way to avoid critical dialogue. Although the surface is pleasant-"that was a nice poem, a nice reading, a nice (fill in the blank)-hidden hostilities remain directly unspoken. The Middle English usage of the word-'foolish'-descended from prior French and Latin cognates meaning 'ignorant' or 'not knowing.' It's interesting to hear 'nice' so over-used in today's contexts. Also, while today's climate feels more open in certain respects than in the past, we still live in a market economy narrowly defined by a monopoly of political, social, and cultural interests. I feel I'm not being specific enough, however, within this space of e-mail comminication. What I've written is too general and I haven't connected to anything concrete. My point in writing the post you quote was to learn what disasters had been spared by 'media revolutionaries.' I was addressing Piombino's vague statement with my own. I'd be happy to backchannel re: this issue, if you'd like. I don't think it's worth wasting much space. I had Raymond Williams' The Country and The City in mind when I posted. >>What disasters have been spared? The social, political, and aesthetic >>reality of this country today resembles Victorian England more than ever. >> > > This seems like a strange thing to say. What do you have in mind? > >Matthias Regan >Northwestern University >Department of Chemistry >Phone: 847/467-2132 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 11:10:10 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: The is-anybody-still-discussing thread Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Given civilization, artists embody its discontents. Since many institutions find their stability and perpetuation in suppressing the news of discontents, there are bound to be conflicts between artists and insitutions, even where those institutions are largely made up of artists or of those who would facilitate art. While I'm sweeping generalizations around,I'll add that art has a shock to it, but that by the time that comes to be a "shock va l u e ," we pass from nakedness to The Nude, and eventually, Dada rests in the Museum, whose calm framing does a lot to tranquilize shock. I don't like to sound aloof, but I doubt that there's a whole lot to be done to alter this dynamic, even in a more liberal, open society than we'll likely see again in my lifetime. Perspective is always the joker, and poets who work within institutions frequently are nominated to help out with further institutions, where they learn the value (a real value!) of compromise, and the way of life this can become must place their art-selves in considerable jeopardy. Its easier to kid yourself, harder to find the foul rag-&-bone yard--or blissful indifference--of the heart of the matter of human being. There might be more, a lot more, to say on this topic, but on a busy list, it's best, I feel, to keep ostings fairly brief. db ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 13:14:07 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christina Fairbank Chirot Subject: Re: Will's column/Plus ca change . . . In-Reply-To: <199704151856.LAA12568@f40.hotmail.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII "Poetry America was born before us & will live after us--and would've been visible for every eye to see but for the scientists of poetry & sociologists of Academy measuring the vast mind with monkey calipers & teaspsoons of ink--" Allen Ginsberg Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose . . . George Will's column, the attendant brou-haha--it doesn't make Norman Podhoretz's attack on the Beats "The Know Nothing Bohemians" seem so far distant. an underappreciated aspect of Ginsberg, Kerouac, Burroughs, Snyder, Whalen, DiPrima et als work is the serious independent scholarship and study it continues to inspire--in many fields--in many ways--by many people--in poetry, languages, history, religion, philosophy, music--at two Kerouac Birthday celebrations and Ginsberg memorial at Woodland Pattern here in Milwaukee--this much in evidence, spanning now a number of generations-- "Poetry America was born before us & will live after us" as Ginsberg wrote--whatever Will or Podhoretz & Co. say-- (note that Will, a Cubs fan, must be having a rough time of late himself--what with the eleven game losing streak to open the season--but then, there again, with the Cubs--plus ca change . . .) dbc ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 14:32:02 EST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Keith Tuma Subject: Re: Is anybody still discussing Bob Perelman In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 16 Apr 1997 11:43:01 -0500 from I don't think Bob P privileges Brathwaite (that's without an "i" said the pedant) over Bernstein. That Bernstein "wants power" goes without saying: who doesn't? As I read it, Bob P's point involves the mediations of the "academy" to which both writers are more or less subject. The contrast worth making is between the (mostly) dispersive energies of CB's practice and the gathering energies of Brathwaite's. This contrast is itself made (not in exactly this way) by CB in his remarks on KB in "Poetics of the Americas." What would be worth contesting in Bob P's reading of KB, and also in CB's reading of KB, is their sense of KB's practice as singular (this is related to mark's point but not the same point). I take it that much of X/Self has little to do with "nation-language" at least as KB has defined it, that there is indeed a "vernacular" present in the poem and that it is this vernacular that grounds "nation-language" and the utopian identity politics the poem is imagining. I take it too that--elsewhere--there is something else going on, more related to dispersing than gathering. Caliban as rebel, Caliban as hero: dispersing and gathering both. What Bob P acknowledges but does not to my thinking stress enough is the Caribbean location of KB's project. Different issues there than the ones CB must face. And when KB's text enters into USAmerican contexts it is something else. For a shameless plug I'll mention that I've discussed some of these issues in an essay in paul naylor's _River City_. This is too brief, perhaps cryptic, but i've a thousand things to do today. And anyway as i read Mark the real force of his question to Bob involves matters other than the remarks on KB and CB. keith tuma ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 14:59:28 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: Re: Will's column/Plus ca change . . . In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Wed, 16 Apr 1997, Christina Fairbank Chirot wrote: > an underappreciated aspect of Ginsberg, Kerouac, Burroughs, > Snyder, Whalen, DiPrima et als work is the serious independent scholarship > and study it continues to inspire--in many fields--in many ways--by many > people--in poetry, languages, history, religion, philosophy, music--at > two Kerouac Birthday celebrations and Ginsberg memorial at Woodland > Pattern here in Milwaukee--this much in evidence, spanning now a number > of generations-- > I would say this is definitely true - at least for me in relation to Di Prima and her earliest work like Dinners and Nightmares, which seemed much more interesting to me than any other lit of that period (and still does to some extent) - and her trajectory through the years has taught me a lot - just finished rereading Revolutionary Letters though which reifies the NME to such an extent that HE disappears into monolith and we are always painted as the good guys and I'm as corrupt as they come, we're all, and can't identify - Alan - but these thinkings wouldn't otherwise surface - ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 14:15:00 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" Subject: FW: The Greatest MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN I pray my server is swift today... Clay comes out to meet Liston And Liston starts to retreat If Liston goes any further He'll end up in a ringside seat Clay swings with a left Clay swings with a right Look at young Cassius Carry the fight Liston keeps backing But there's not enough room It's a matter of time There, Clay lowers the boom Now Clay swings with a right What a beautiful swing And the punch raises the bear Clear out of the ring Liston is still rising And the ref wears a frown For he can't start the counting Till Sonny comes down Now Liston disappears from view The crowd is getting frantic But our radar stations have picked him up He's somewhere over the Atlantic Who would have thought When they came to the fight That they'd witness the launching Of a human satellite Yes the crowd did not dream When they lay down their money That they would see A total eclipse of the Sonny I am the greatest! ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 15:12:43 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Zimmerman Subject: Re: float/sting MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Maria Damon wrote: > > cool, daniel z: what would you like: a copy of my gertrude stein article, a > copy of my book, or a copy of the new journal CrossCultural Poetix? > > At 8:52 AM -0700 4/16/97, Daniel Zimmerman wrote: > >Maria Damon wrote: > >> > >> still no clear answers on the clay/liston fight poem. here's another quiz > >> (i desperately need the answer to): what's that line that goes "imaginary > >> somethings with real something in them" i think the word "toadstools" is in > >> there somewhere. > >> md > >> > >> At 9:27 AM -0500 4/15/97, Tom Mandel wrote: > >> >"float like a butterfly > >> >sting like a bee" > >> > > >> >was spoken by one of Muhammed's cornermen, not by him. I can't > >> >believe I'm forgetting the guy's name (like forgetting what is > >> >in one panel of a favorite stained glass emblazoned on brain); > >> >I'll probably wake up with it at 2am.... > >> > > >> >was it Bundini Brown? > >> > > >> >Tom > >> > > >> > > >> > > >> >Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com > >> >******************************************************** > >> >Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com > >> >4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 > >> >Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 > >> >******************************************************** > >> > Join the Caucus ConversationMaria, > > That's "imaginary gardens with real toads in them" > >--from Marianne Moore's "Poetry" [the one that begins "I, too, dislike > >it"]. > >--Dan Zimmerman Thanks for the offer, Maria; how about a trade? I've just published a book, Blue Horitals (Amman, Jordan: Oasii, 1997), with my late friend & teacher Jack Clarke [7 poems by each of us]. Give me a snail mail address & I'll send you a copy. You could send me whatever you like best. My address: 485 Parsonage Road Edison, NJ 08837 Ma�ana, Dan Zimmerman, Real Toad ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 15:11:41 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry g Subject: Re: The is-anybody-still-discussing thread In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 15 Apr 1997 11:10:10 -0500 from what if art is a process. not automatically a process of discontent. something else. & enlisting it in vanguard of discontent/truth-seeking/ rebellion ends up hiding the truth as much as revealing it. what if the process leads to a more radical truth if discontent is not taken as a given (thus leading to all the institutionalized hypocrisies & comedies DB alluded to). we've had these non-arguments over huge- abstractions before. [exhale] yes, troubled humanity, I have once again dissected "art" & lifted it in conformtent formcontaldehyde for your dispection. Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 14:42:38 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Bernstein Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg in Victorian England: The Opera Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >I simply meant to imply that in certain ways today our social milieu shares >many traits with those of Victorian England. . . . >My point in writing the post you quote was to learn >what disasters had been spared by 'media revolutionaries.' A hundred years ago Oscar Wilde -- a writer perhaps even more celebrated in Victorian England than Allen Ginsberg in postwar America -- was hounded to death while at the very height of his fame and at the top of his magnificent form. Allen Ginsberg, and to be sure many others, courageously refused to be bashed down by the perverts who would end a person's life and career because of their sexual orientation or lifestyle. He was part of a massive cultural movement to make what happened to Wilde if not unthinkable at least unacceptable in the U S of A. He did this not by presenting "positive" images of being gay or smoking pot but by presenting by turns joyous and defiant images of these things and a number of others. Wilde ends his days in jail and then disgrace. Ginsberg is celebrated even in the pages that reviled him -- the Times, the New Yorker, &c -- I write that not because it is not well known to the people on this list, but because it bears repeating. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 14:06:13 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: float/sting Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" With all these postings on Ali, I wonder if anyone has published a book of his collected works? It'd be a kick to read. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 15:39:00 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" Subject: Re: float/sting Comments: To: Hugh Steinberg MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN Not to my knowledge. Thomas Hauser's book on Ali is the one to read - an oral bio. And Ali himself came out with his autobio _The Greatest_. Wilfrid Sheed has also done a fine photo-essay book on him - prob. out of print. His poems appear here & there. George Plimpton has a piece about the meeting he arranged between Marianne Moore and then Cassius Clay - to tie together both of Maria Damon's recent queries. It's quite amusingly related, as I recall - but the event, in which they worked together on a poem - was an anti-climax, acc. to Plimp. Patrick Pritchett ---------- From: Hugh Steinberg To: POETICS Subject: Re: float/sting Date: Wednesday, April 16, 1997 3:28PM With all these postings on Ali, I wonder if anyone has published a book of his collected works? It'd be a kick to read. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 15:53:58 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" Subject: Re: float/sting Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 2:06 PM 4/16/97, Hugh Steinberg wrote: >With all these postings on Ali, I wonder if anyone has published a book of >his collected works? It'd be a kick to read. > >Hugh Steinberg yes indeed; does anyone know of such a volume?--md ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 13:52:58 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg in Victorian England: The Opera Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Along with our national flag, anthem, bird, miss, mrs, etc, we have at the moment a national psychological strategu--passive aggression--and a national affect--the smirk. At 12:26 PM 4/16/97 +0100, you wrote: >Matthias Regan- > >I simply meant to imply that in certain ways today our social milieu shares >many traits with those of Victorian England. The most obvious is the >pervasive social usage of "niceness" as a way to avoid critical dialogue. >Although the surface is pleasant-"that was a nice poem, a nice reading, a >nice (fill in the blank)-hidden hostilities remain directly unspoken. The >Middle English usage of the word-'foolish'-descended from prior French and >Latin cognates meaning 'ignorant' or 'not knowing.' It's interesting to >hear 'nice' so over-used in today's contexts. > >Also, while today's climate feels more open in certain respects than in the >past, we still live in a market economy narrowly defined by a monopoly of >political, social, and cultural interests. > >I feel I'm not being specific enough, however, within this space of e-mail >comminication. What I've written is too general and I haven't connected to >anything concrete. My point in writing the post you quote was to learn >what disasters had been spared by 'media revolutionaries.' I was >addressing Piombino's vague statement with my own. I'd be happy to >backchannel re: this issue, if you'd like. I don't think it's worth >wasting much space. I had Raymond Williams' The Country and The City in >mind when I posted. > > >>>What disasters have been spared? The social, political, and aesthetic >>>reality of this country today resembles Victorian England more than ever. >>> >> >> This seems like a strange thing to say. What do you have in mind? >> >>Matthias Regan >>Northwestern University >>Department of Chemistry >>Phone: 847/467-2132 > > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 13:47:17 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Reiner Subject: found poem Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII (Intro: It's not unusual for web site designers to place "keywords" into a page's actual html code so that search engines like Alta Vista or Infoseek will index the page in response to a word or phrase typed in as a query by you or me. These keywords are not visible, but the search engines will still register their presence. In fact, the more times the word is used, the higher the ranking of the page in the index of "hits.". What follows is a list of keywords from the Heaven's Gate site, which I have copied from its Home Page source code. I present here it as a found poem, without any extra linebreaks or whatnot... --Chris R.) --------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 14:02:56 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: Is anybody still discussing Bob Perelman Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To an outsider this continues to be very weird. Two of the parties, Bernstein and perelman, are on the list. Why do we theorize about what one meant about the other and what the other may think of it? Isn't this like talking about people in the room as if they weren't there? Why don't we just query them for their own input? At 02:32 PM 4/16/97 EST, you wrote: >I don't think Bob P privileges Brathwaite (that's without an "i" said the >pedant) over Bernstein. That Bernstein "wants power" goes without saying: who >doesn't? As I read it, Bob P's point involves the mediations of the "academy" >to which both writers are more or less subject. The contrast worth making is >between the (mostly) dispersive energies of CB's practice and the gathering >energies of Brathwaite's. This contrast is itself made (not in exactly this >way) by CB in his remarks on KB in "Poetics of the Americas." What would be >worth contesting in Bob P's reading of KB, and also in CB's reading of KB, is >their sense of KB's practice as singular (this is related to mark's point but >not the same point). I take it that much of X/Self has little to do with >"nation-language" at least as KB has defined it, that there is indeed a >"vernacular" present in the poem and that it is this vernacular that grounds >"nation-language" and the utopian identity politics the poem is imagining. I >take it too that--elsewhere--there is something else going on, more related to >dispersing than gathering. Caliban as rebel, Caliban as hero: dispersing and >gathering both. What Bob P acknowledges but does not to my thinking stress >enough is the Caribbean location of KB's project. Different issues there than >the ones CB must face. And when KB's text enters into USAmerican contexts it >is something else. For a shameless plug I'll mention that I've discussed >some of these issues in an essay in paul naylor's _River City_. > >This is too brief, perhaps cryptic, but i've a thousand things to do today. And >anyway as i read Mark the real force of his question to Bob involves matters >other than the remarks on KB and CB. > >keith tuma > > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 17:10:11 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Nationalismo In-Reply-To: <199704162052.NAA00876@iceland.it.earthlink.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Mark Weiss's proposition below is not true; rather than the nation, it characterizes itself. Or, as a mystery bonus allusion for cross-readers of POETICS and CAP-L, the nation is just what you say -- the world is ugly and the people are sad. Jordan On Wed, 16 Apr 1997, Mark Weiss wrote: > Along with our national flag, anthem, bird, miss, mrs, etc, we have at the > moment a national psychological strategu--passive aggression--and a national > affect--the smirk. > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 17:14:45 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dave Zauhar Subject: Re: FW: The Greatest (a variant reading, perhaps) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Pat P. Had the swifter server, but here's another Ali poem on Liston: This is a story about a man With Iron Fists and a beautiful tan. He talks a lot indeed, Of a powerful punch and blinding speed. The boxing game was slowly dying, And fight promoters were bitterly crying For someone somewhere to come along With a better and different tone. Patterson was dull, quiet and sad, And Sonny Liston was just as bad. Along came a kid named Cassius Clay, Who said, "I'll take Liston's title away." His athletic genius cannot be denied. In a very short time He Spread far and wide. There's an impression you get Watching him fight. He plays cat and mouse Then turns out the light. This colorful fighter is something to see, And the Greatest Heavyweight Champion I know he will be. And, another variation on the theme of Sonny Liston, shorter and w/ slanter rhymes. King Liston will stay Only until he meets Cassius Clay. Moore fell in Four, Liston In eight. Finally, a poem that resulted in death threats: Keep asking me, no matter how long, on the war in Viet Nam, I'll sing this song: I ain't got no quarrel with the Viet Cong. Dave Zauhar, mostly quoting Muhammad Ali ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 17:38:43 -0400 Reply-To: Jordan Davis Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Re: Is anybody still dissing In-Reply-To: <199704162102.OAA29055@denmark.it.earthlink.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Mark -- Sorry about the hostile tone of that last post. Guess I was enacting exactly what I was criticizing again (whoops!). But once again to quibble -- does it make sense to speak of outsiders on a listserv? Seems more like there are readers who indicate that they have read _by writing back_, and then there are readers who either read and it's enough, or else they just keep deleting until they see a subject they like. It is a topic, all right, the anger of poets who are entering a discussion. That said, I agree, the rhetoric of posts about list members (and the subsequent silence) _is_ kind of funny. It's not exactly like watching bear-baiting... Bob Perelman, doesn't it happen to you every few weeks? On Wed, 16 Apr 1997, Mark Weiss wrote: > To an outsider this continues to be very weird. Two of the parties, ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 14:49:00 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Safdie Subject: Re: The is-anybody-still-discussing thread In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Tue, 15 Apr 1997, David Bromige wrote (in part): . . . we pass from nakedness to The Nude, and eventually, Dada rests in the Museum, whose calm framing does a lot to tranquilize shock. I don't like to sound aloof, but I doubt that there's a whole lot to be done to alter this dynamic . . . poets who work within institutions frequently are nominated to help out with further institutions, where they learn the value (a real value!) of compromise, and the way of life this can become must place their art-selves in considerable jeopardy. Its easier to kid yourself, harder to find the foul rag-&-bone yard--or blissful indifference--of the heart of the matter of human being. Gosh, David, where did this come from? Am I misreading you by seeing this as a statement of futility, of one's art inevitably coming to nothing, of tragic (even) melancholy? How are you feeling today? Compromise is certainly a virtue in faculty meetings and marriages, but I doubt whether any good poem ever arose out of it. Are you saying that any poet who works in an institution, MUST, necessarily, give up the poetic urges, the rag-and-bone shop, of one's art self? And thus compromise? Do you feel you've done this? Granted, it's unbearably easy to kid one's self, but if any art I'm lucky enough to create can come only at the expense of my official duties at this institution or any other -- I'll quit! I'll let my wife support me! (Just kidding, Sara). Your post reminded me of Jim Carroll's unjustifiably neglected first rock-'n-roll album (circa 1980); there's a song on it that has the lyric: But it ain't no contribution To rely on the institution To justify your chosen art To sanction your boredom And let you play out your part (loud guitar strums) I admire your dictum regarding short posts, but I sure would like to hear more about this . . . ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 14:54:51 -0700 Reply-To: Joe Safdie Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Safdie Subject: Re: Will's column/Plus ca change . . . In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Wed, 16 Apr 1997, Christina (?) Fairbank Chirot wrote: (note that Will, a Cubs fan, must be having a rough time of late himself--what with the eleven game losing streak to open the season--but then, there again, with the Cubs--plus ca change . . .) That's the fifth baseball reference in the last week (I've been counting). I really hope nobody's offended, because . . . The Giants are in first place! (This may be the only time this season I'll be able to say that). By the way, do we have another Jennifer/Alan situation with this post. Are you David, Christina, or both? ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 15:11:30 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: ginsberg and snyder In-Reply-To: <199704160243.WAA21783@SMTP.USIT.NET> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >"When?" is the question. At two different times or in a different dimension. >tom >At 10:31 PM 4/13/97 -0700, George Bowering wrote: >>>Does using adjacent urinals in two different states >> >>Where is that possible? >> Well, it would have to be in some can on a state line, wouldnt it? George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 15:15:26 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: Moore In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >still no clear answers on the clay/liston fight poem. here's another quiz >(i desperately need the answer to): what's that line that goes "imaginary >somethings with real something in them" i think the word "toadstools" is in >there somewhere. >md > Oh, yr going to get 523 answers on this one, Maria. It was the first statement on poetics I ever heard, when I was a lonely school kid on the desert. Marianne Moore. (1) garden (2) toad George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 17:34:14 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Ken Edwards Subject: Ginsberg PS I've been having difficulty getting my messages bounced back (I hope it's sorted now) so I'm a bit late with this, but I was reminded when Ginsberg died of my report to this list of the Albert Hall gig he starred in, in London, back in Oct 95; I quote myself: "I find his first poem incredibly moving in its wry, humorous acceptance of death and dissolution ("What a mess I am, Allen Ginsberg"; "Allen Ginsberg warns you: don't follow my path to extinction")." Seems like he saw it coming from way off. In the midst of a UK general election campaign that is unprecedentedly dismal in its hypocrisy, cant and soundbite-count, I long for some of that honesty & humanity. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 18:14:16 EST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Keith Tuma Subject: Re: Is anybody still discussing Bob Perelman In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 16 Apr 1997 14:02:56 -0700 from Mark-- If I want to ask Bob "Hey do you privilege Brathwaite over Bernstein in that book of yours?" I'll ask him. Then we'll have a new text I'll come to some sort of conclusion about. I was venturing an opinion about part of another one already published and X/Self itself--in response to Wallace's post. No bear-baiting involved (hi Jordan, I'm talking about you now, as well as *to* you but look a few people are listening either way)--just bull. Asking people questions directly and out of the blue in this forum--"Hey Bob do you privilege Brathwaite over Bernstein in that book of yours?"--now that would be strange. Kind of like writing a review and mailing it to someone with a bill attached, and a note saying that you must respond now or else. Sometimes texts authored by members of the list and not the text of the list itself becomes the object of discussion, no? Perhaps it is awkward. Perhaps it is simply inevitable--after all, you are all so prolific in this electronic world and beyond it. all best-- keith tuma who lives eight miles from a town (college corner, indiana/ohio) where it's possible to piss in two states at once though he's never never tried to do so, being content to piss in two states of mind ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 11:06:45 +1200 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: DS Subject: Re: Is anybody still discussing Bob Perelman Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" With apologies i ask this prurient question. If you had to stand in one state & piss into the other - which would be the more likely recipient. Dan >keith tuma >who lives eight miles from a town (college corner, indiana/ohio) where it's >possible to piss in two states at once though he's never never tried to do so, >being content to piss in two states of mind > > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 15 Apr 1997 16:52:04 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: If this is still under discussion . . . Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Yes, Joe, I think you're misreading me. [under these conditions] ...CONSIDERABLE jeopardy. ....It's easiER to kid yourself ....It's hardER to find.... This is not "a statement of futility, of one's art inevitably coming to nothing, of tragic (even) melancholy." I think your next sentence, "How are you feeling today?" Is ad hominem. Do I feel I've done this? What, arrived at conclusions you impute to me, that are not supported by the actual words I used? I fail to see the parallel between my posting and Jim Carroll's delightful rock lyrics. There is no guitar strumming in my observations. Jack Spicer said, and unfortunately my disorderly record-keeping allows only my paraphrase (and we see how tricky they can be), "the more you know as a poet, the more furniture there is in the room, the harder it is to get in and out of it." I only testify from my observations of many careers, that have institiutionalized themselves with their success. I had never considered that my own answered to this category. Obviously, "its all relative." But what powers I have, are my own--there's no leg up I could give anybody, except to blurb their book. Tragic? How about Beckett's "I cant go on. I'll go on." That makes more sense to me. Tragic is compromised with posturings. Hope this clarifies. db ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 17:10:17 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: AARON SHURIN Subject: Re: Paging Mr. Mossin In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII With apologies to listers, Andrew Mossin if you're currently out there will you backchannel me with your e-mail address? Thanks. Aaron Shurin ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 20:47:35 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: if not to lurk Hi all -- d.i. here, back from many days in California -- a place more fond for distance -- [to any in SF area, highly recommended: Leonard Pitt & Ruth Zaporah's "Secuction" (A Traveling Jewish Theatre, Artaud Project, thru May 4), co-directed by Rinde Eckert): think [Hollywood-sprach here] Godot meets Chaplain & dances the Tango . . . but I've emerged from nonbeing for this comment -- ~ ~ ~ start ~ ~ ~ Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 17:45:51 EST5EDT From: LYNES- KATHERINE Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question okay, all right.... pressure, always pressure.... i work on several at a time.... Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: erratum for: > highly recommended ... Leonard Pitt & Ruth Zaporah's "Secuction" read: > . . . "Seduction" that would be Seduction, Kansas -- a train-stop (the near-wordless, much-voiceful, gesturesome piece takes place on the train platform) also: in a Borders Books down on the Santa Monica mall noted Kevin Killian's volume while purchasing Rudyard Kipling's tip of the hat to Sir Gould for recent "we are Victorians" ruminance BUT NOTE: email has spawned / is spawning what is (to my mind) clearly a neo-Victorian [in far from perjorative sense, gentlefolk] sense of epistolary practice -- wherein the lettered gentleman or gentlewoman might aptly & suitably expect to pass four or five hours of an evening reading & composing letters -- something scarcely seen till this medium hs brought back -- I opine -- the good ghost of it . . . . d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 20:26:42 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: The New Party Speaking of Howard Zinn, does anyone know anything about the New Party? I saw an ad a couple weeks back where Zinn is listed as a "member" along with Noam Chomsky, Cornel West, Barbara Ehrenreich, Jim Hightower, and other prominent others. I've also seen the NP championed by Alexander Cockburn in the Nation, talking about them winning a few dozen local elections around thecountry in the past couple years or so. What's the history? How does this group differ, say, from the new Labor Party founded in Philly, or "Nader's" Green party? What would be the sticking points to overcome before a possible electoral alliance, for example? (Nader got half a million in only 26 states, so such unity might have eventual ground-breaking results?) Ten years ago I could draw a fractal family tree of every little left splinter group in the country since James Cannon marched out of the CPUSA politburo singing the Internationale. Now I don't even know where this glitzy and well-appointed New Party came from. A DSA leap into third party politics? I feel left out and don't want the revolution to start without me. Info Ron Silliman? Mark Presjnar? Curious, Kent ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 08:02:01 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jeff Hansen Organization: The Blake School Subject: Bromige-Safdie MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit David bromige insists on the seemingly inevitable and continuous struggle between art and institutions. Safdie wonders if he is saying that art is futile. I sympathize with David's position. It seems to me that expecting our poetry to transcend the ideological, material, and social spheres of institutions and everyday interactions is what is futile. Placing too high a demand on poetry, asking too much of it -- the descendants of Shelley's "poets are the unaknowledged legislators ..." -- makes poetry futile. By insisting that it is embedded in the same network/nest of forces as other activities is to see it more accurately, to recognize its strengths and weaknesses rather than hoping for what is not there and ending with futility. My sense is that most poems come out of implicit, rather than explicit, compromise. The compromise happened long before the moment of writing, in the poet's absorbing, thinking about, and coming to terms with the myriad poetical, social, and institutional forces impinging on him or her. To be able to write means to have already compromised, and to have forgotten. Jeff ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 22:55:33 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: History is Rewritten In-Reply-To: <199704161141.HAA03603@chass.utoronto.ca> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On Wed, 16 Apr 1997, Michael Boughn wrote: > Of course, Jeffrey, you can have all the utopian dreams you want. ill pass on the utopian dreams--im too much of a ironic pragmatist--but ill have some of the brie please. jeffrey timmons ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 22:30:08 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: Is anybody still discussing Bob Perelman In-Reply-To: <199704162306.LAA06874@ihug.co.nz> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >With apologies i ask this prurient question. > >If you had to stand in one state & piss into the other - which would be the >more likely recipient. > >Dan > >>keith tuma >>who lives eight miles from a town (college corner, indiana/ohio) where it's >>possible to piss in two states at once though he's never never tried to >>do so, >>being content to piss in two states of mind Here's what I want to know: is that claim a manifestation of patriarchal hegemony? George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 22:22:08 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KYLE CONNER/LRC-CAHS Subject: Re: found poem In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Christopher (Chris?) thanks for the heaven's gate found poem. chilling, to say the least. the droning repetition seems appropriate in characterizing a sort of religious denial. if one keeps repeating the words, no other ideas can get in. kyle conner ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 21:23:22 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg in Victorian England: The Opera In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 16 Apr 1997 13:52:58 -0700 from On Wed, 16 Apr 1997 13:52:58 -0700 Mark Weiss said: >Along with our national flag, anthem, bird, miss, mrs, etc, we have at the >moment a national psychological strategu--passive aggression--and a national >affect--the smirk. Do I detect a smirk on the end of this critique? Is this an example of the iterative function of criticism in a de-centered sensorium? Or is that just me again - smirking? - Errant Blarndrift (whose Grandmother, Florence Hale Ainsworth, was born on the 4th of July, 1900, was a member of the D.A.R., and whose grandson Errant loves the Stars & Stripes along with the Union Jackdrift.) (& Allen Ginsberg, the Leader of the Cultural Revolution, can go fly a Pantoum over the United Gaps of America) ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 07:44:48 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Keith Norris Subject: roofless in seattle In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT A poet/review writer friend o mine needs a decent day job (temp work uncertain--no time for reading 700 page novels), and/or apt./place to live w/out deposit. In Seattle. Backpost if you've got ideas...sorry for the instrusion...back to discussion. Keith -=-=-=-=-= Keith Norris | knorris@pstcc.cc.tn.us English Department PSTCC Knoxville, TN 37933 (423) 539-7140 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 08:02:29 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg in Victorian England: The Opera In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 16 Apr 1997 14:42:38 -0400 from On Wed, 16 Apr 1997 14:42:38 -0400 Charles Bernstein said: Allen Ginsberg, and to be sure many others, courageously refused to be >bashed down by the perverts who would end a person's life and career because >of their sexual orientation or lifestyle. He was part of a massive cultural >movement to make what happened to Wilde if not unthinkable at least >unacceptable in the U S of A. He did this not by presenting "positive" >images of being gay or smoking pot but by presenting by turns joyous and >defiant images of these things and a number of others. Wilde ends his days >in jail and then disgrace. Ginsberg is celebrated even in the pages that >reviled him -- the Times, the New Yorker, &c -- Could it be said then that from a historical perspective Ginsberg and other leaders of the 60s represent the dialectical flip-side of American rugged individualism? Individual liberty (in terms of "lifestyle") over social and political "correctness"? The same movement expressed in different form in the confessional poetry of the time and the ego styles of the 70s. Since then, the self and her/his authorial intentions have gone out of fashion, both on the left and the right. On the latter we have bland traditionalist focus on superficialities of technique, on the former turgid avant-garde focus on superficialities of technique. - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 10:19:43 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: Is anybody still discussing Bob Perelman In-Reply-To: <199704162102.OAA29055@denmark.it.earthlink.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Well actually Mark that gets at something which is a real live issue about this space, and other spaces like it...I don't think cybersocialspace functions in quite the way you think..I suspect that how it functions is more in flux and more contested than your post states. These two are also widely-known poet/theorists, and the discussion is not about them as people, but about their published books...I don't believe they should feel *compelled* to intervene in a discussion of their work, at least not right away..(they may wanna wait till something really pisses them off ;)...) There is a constant push and pull between two structures of feeling: that cybersocialspace is like being in a room in a fairly intimate conversation, involving maybe half a dozen people; and that on the contrary it is very public and very widely-scrutinized, and much like debates and exchanges published on paper on various subjects. Your post suggests the former; I personally think that if people reflect for a minute they'll realize that the truth is closer to the latter idea. I think it's great for us to be able to ask CB and BP to respond to what folks have posted...But frankly I don't think they're obligated to, any more than they are obligated to respond by letter to every discussion of their work in a little mag or an academic journal. Ask 'em, by all means. But my take on public electro-discussion is, that it is suggesting we can't discuss their work that is "very weird." Remember that this is a public not a highly personal space, no matter what it feels like at times. Mark P. On Wed, 16 Apr 1997, Mark Weiss wrote: > To an outsider this continues to be very weird. Two of the parties, > Bernstein and perelman, are on the list. Why do we theorize about what one > meant about the other and what the other may think of it? Isn't this like > talking about people in the room as if they weren't there? Why don't we just > query them for their own input? > > At 02:32 PM 4/16/97 EST, you wrote: > >I don't think Bob P privileges Brathwaite (that's without an "i" said the > >pedant) over Bernstein. That Bernstein "wants power" goes without saying: who > >doesn't? As I read it, Bob P's point involves the mediations of the "academy" > >to which both writers are more or less subject. The contrast worth making is > >between the (mostly) dispersive energies of CB's practice and the gathering > >energies of Brathwaite's. This contrast is itself made (not in exactly this > >way) by CB in his remarks on KB in "Poetics of the Americas." What would be > >worth contesting in Bob P's reading of KB, and also in CB's reading of KB, is > >their sense of KB's practice as singular (this is related to mark's point but > >not the same point). I take it that much of X/Self has little to do with > >"nation-language" at least as KB has defined it, that there is indeed a > >"vernacular" present in the poem and that it is this vernacular that grounds > >"nation-language" and the utopian identity politics the poem is imagining. I > >take it too that--elsewhere--there is something else going on, more related to > >dispersing than gathering. Caliban as rebel, Caliban as hero: dispersing and > >gathering both. What Bob P acknowledges but does not to my thinking stress > >enough is the Caribbean location of KB's project. Different issues there than > >the ones CB must face. And when KB's text enters into USAmerican contexts it > >is something else. For a shameless plug I'll mention that I've discussed > >some of these issues in an essay in paul naylor's _River City_. > > > >This is too brief, perhaps cryptic, but i've a thousand things to do today. And > >anyway as i read Mark the real force of his question to Bob involves matters > >other than the remarks on KB and CB. > > > >keith tuma > > > > > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 08:30:30 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Keith Norris Subject: Re: Is anybody still discussing Bob Perelman In-Reply-To: <970416.185021.EST.KWTUMA@miamiu.muohio.edu> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT elbow(kind/delicious)into Perelman/Brathwaite/Bernstein chat-- As I read/write my way through Perelman's _Marginalization_, second time through spur(n)ed by this discussion, it (text in bathrobe) seems an in-house leftist critique of language writing. joining Andrews _P&M&P&P_ in negotiation of non-essentialist argument for essential political space. Perelman's value of Brathwaite over Bernstein is use-value, possibility instead of danger of reification in Bernstein's "utopian politics of liberated textuality" (P 90)? Sidebar: Eagleton's _Illusions of postmod_ seems to allow more room for a leftist poetmodern poetics than other recent marxist critique-- Perelman's readerly/writerly distinctions dance well there, I think. Yes? Keith -=-=-=-=-= Keith Norris | knorris@pstcc.cc.tn.us English Department PSTCC Knoxville, TN 37933 (423) 539-7140 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 09:31:41 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jerry McGuire Subject: Re: POETICS Digest - 15 Apr 1997 to 16 Apr 1997 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" what's that line that goes "imaginary somethings with real something in them" i think the word "toadstools" is in there somewhere. M.D.--what a great quiz! But it really ought to be a contest--my entry: Imaginary prisons with real George Wills in them (toadstools extra) . . . Jerry ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 09:52:43 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Matthias Regan Subject: Re: found poem Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Chris R.-- Just to say, I tend to be very suspicious of found poems because usually they arn't really found (but cropped in some way) or aren't very good (compared, say, to Antin's) but I was shocked by this one! It is very moving, especially the way the line breaks worked, with the first "second coming" interrupting the "freedom" line and "extraterrestrial" carrying over into "millennium" twice--I didn't even need your explanation of the real reason for multiple words--though I think it contributes to the poem-- the repition reminds me of prayer, of designating a certain kind of strength to words, a weight--so that like a rosary the effect is directly related to the number. Thank you! _________________________________________________ meta name="keywords" content="Heaven's Gate, Heaven's Gate, Heaven's Gate, Heaven's Gate, Heaven's Gate, Heaven's Gate, ufo, ufo, ufo, ufo, ufo, ufo, space alien, space alien, space alien, space alien, space alien, space alien, extraterrestrial, extraterrestrial, extraterrestrial, extraterrestrial, extraterrestrial, extraterrestrial, millennium, millennium, millennium, millennium, millennium, millennium, millennium, misinformation, misinformation, misinformation, misinformation, misinformation, misinformation, freedom, freedom, freedom, freedom, freedom, freedom, second coming, second coming, second coming, second coming, second coming, second coming, angels, angels, angels, angels, angels, angels, end times, end times, end times, end times, end times, end times, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, God, God, God, God, God, God" ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 11:46:11 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Franco Subject: Joe Dunn Sad news in this morning that Joe Dunn passed away this week- "I have not given love to the house. I love you The house tells me to leave me alone and sit because that is all I am. I told the house I can be like something if I allowed it and the house said Bullshit..." Joe Dunn- The Better Dream House- White Rabbit-1968 M Franco ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 10:33:15 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: michael corbin Subject: Re: If this is still under discussion . . . MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit David Bromige wrote: > > > Tragic? How about Beckett's "I cant go on. I'll go on." That makes more > sense to me. Tragic is compromised with posturings. > An excellent and important distinction. Cioran writes well of this precisely in regard to Beckett. In _The Temptation to Exist_ he inveighs on the "Contagion of Tragedy": "It is not pity, it is envy the tragic hero inspires in us, that lucky devil whose sufferings we devour as if we were entitled to them and he had cheated us of them. . . . Armed with his fate and rushing toward his defeat faster than he, we spare him at most a superior smile, while we reserve to ourselves alone the merits of the fault of the murder, the remorse, or expiation." And those compromised postures--the murderer, the manque of remorse, the politician of expiation the . . . poet, abject; abject poetics--are struck in the mise-en-scene of the often falsely meaningful shorthand of 'institutions'. Like some black-hole that we by definition can't see, but by necessity *believe* in (what would it mean not to believe, what would it mean to say "How are you feeling today?") has a mass so great that even sweetness and light fail to obtain escape velocities. But we can pre-tend, praetendere. "Estragon (suddenly furious): Recognize! What is there to recognize? All my lousy life I've crawled about in the mud! And you talk to me about scenery! (Looking widely about him) Look at this muckheap! I've never stirred from it! . . . You and your landscapes! Tell me about the worms!" mc ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 12:31:28 EST5EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: LYNES- KATHERINE Organization: Rutgers University English Dept. Subject: Re: if not to lurk perhaps skimmer? naw. good idea, we do need, at least, i need a new word for the activity of reading and not responding to much if not most of the posts.... [of course, i don't have much to say about standing in one state or time zone and peeing in/into another.....] i am, however, about half serious at least about being uncomfortable with the lurker title, but am too tired from our annual english department party [dnacing til midnight] to comment too much in length [and i'm trying to keep these short] or to come up with a more imaginative moniker.... lurker to me and to many women i know [and to some men, i'm sure, but, david letterman aside, the majority of "stalker objects" or victims are women], is a bit too close to stalker..... lurking beneath this, of course, are the trappings of electronic listserves.... so many posts, only so much time to read them much less respond.... but, enough excuses/reasons..... back to work. will have to [insert verb here] later. katherine. > Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 20:47:35 -0400 > Subject: if not to lurk I've emerged from nonbeing for this comment -- > Subject: Re: Imaginary Interview Question > > okay, all right.... pressure, always pressure.... i work on several at a > time.... back to lurking [the moniker [and no i'm not looking up the spelling of that] > of which i'm not sure i like....] kl > ~ ~ ~ end ~ ~ ~ > > so, how about neologize a newer, more congenial self-descriptive? > > if not to lurk, then what? > > back to surveying > back to minding the shop > > back to the woods of silence > back to the original language > > returning now to the ghostly gaze > hush! a spectre in the silent haze > > back to death's chair, reading life > > cybernetic study > primal position > uncarved block > > watchtower lookout aerie ledge > back to the corner back to the bayou > > back to the audience (quitting the stage) > hie me to the boxseat > or (pace Byrne) back into the box > > ? or . . . > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 10:34:33 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Safdie Subject: Re: If this is still under discussion . . . In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII David, Believe me, I'm VERY glad to find out that I've misinterpreted you; I did note the qualifications you used, even in your original message, but still thought (and think) that you were making a provocative generalization that -- as you said -- warranted more comment. My question only inquired if you were making that generalization based on your own experience, and yes, that has now been clarified! I thought "ad hominem" meant an argument -- mud slinging, as it were -- "against the man." Did you think I was doing that? Please: your presence on this list is an unqualified delight, and, as one correspondent mentioned to me not long ago, you raise the practice of E-mails to an art form! I would still be interesting in hearing, from others, how the practice of working at an institution -- and, indeed, "institutionalizing" one's career, which is another issue -- affects the practice of one's art-self. All best, Joe ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 13:25:17 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: robert zamsky Subject: Re: The is-anybody-still-discussing thread In-Reply-To: from "henry g" at Apr 16, 97 03:11:41 pm Content-Type: text BRAVO! rob zamsky> > what if art is a process. not automatically a process of discontent. > something else. & enlisting it in vanguard of discontent/truth-seeking/ > rebellion ends up hiding the truth as much as revealing it. what if > the process leads to a more radical truth if discontent is not taken > as a given (thus leading to all the institutionalized hypocrisies & > comedies DB alluded to). we've had these non-arguments over huge- > abstractions before. [exhale] yes, troubled humanity, I have once again > dissected "art" & lifted it in conformtent formcontaldehyde for your > dispection. > > Henry Gould > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 13:18:25 EST5EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: LYNES- KATHERINE Organization: Rutgers University English Dept. Subject: Re: if not to lurk addendum to previous post about lurking.... how about hoverer? hovering? " to hang fluttering in the air, to remain suspended over a place or object, to move to and fro near a place, to be in a state of uncertainty, irresolution, or suspense" and i would add, to be in a state of too much to do-ness, not not caring... kl in response to david israel: > so, how about neologize a newer, more congenial self-descriptive? > > if not to lurk, then what? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 13:44:44 PDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hoa Nguyen Subject: Re: What is white Comments: To: Timmons@ASU.EDU Content-Type: text/plain Dear Jeffery Timmons: Ok, I'll bite-- but first a couple of questions... "Objection"? Why objection? Are you looking for an answer or making a point? This is my answer, if one is wanted-- I have been asked this question before by European-Americans ("Whites")-- and it usually comes up when I talk about my experiences as a woman of color. For example, when I describe how it feels to be the only poet of color in a given magazine or at a poetry reading-- I am sometimes asked "Isn't white a color?" I started this response by asking a question-- because it has been my experience that when white people ask me this, it is a way of trying to deny my experiences of difference-- to dodge the everyday priledges of belonging in the white world that white people have (without often knowing they have it). So I would like to know why you asked. Is it because you don't understand what is meant or are you challenging the construction of whiteness and if so how come you are choosing to go about it? So, my answer is: white people are people of European heritage (A.G., I recall wrote he was "white if Jewish people are white"). Also, I have been very curious about the magazine "Race Traitor" -- plan to buy it when I have more money-- and was wondering if anyone on this list could please fill me in-- tell me more about their philosophy behind their "rejection of whiteness" (or correct me if I have that wrong). Is anyone here involved with that journal? >Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 19:01:46 -0700 >From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" >Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, > in the 2nd circle >To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > >On Mon, 14 Apr 1997 dodie wrote: > >> This totalizing "we" is problematic to me. > >ok. > >> As I see it, he embodied alienation for a bunch of white guys (and a >> few women such as Maria D.), a fine thing to do--but other people have >> embodied that for other groups and will continue to. > >objection! please define "white." i dont bite. > >jeffrey timmons > --------------------------------------------------------- Get Your *Web-Based* Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com --------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 17:43:00 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Thomas Bell Subject: Re: found poem Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Does this use of misinformation mean that they knowingly bought their own. tom bell At 01:47 PM 4/16/97 -0700, Christopher Reiner wrote: What follows is a list of keywords from the Heaven's Gate >site, which I have copied from its Home Page source code. I present here >it as a found poem, without any extra linebreaks or whatnot... >--Chris R.) >misinformation, misinformation, > >misinformation, misinformation, misinformation, misinformation, ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 17:43:03 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Thomas Bell Subject: Re: ginsberg and snyder Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 03:11 PM 4/16/97 -0700, George Bowering wrote: >>"When?" is the question. At two different times or in a different dimension. >>tom >>At 10:31 PM 4/13/97 -0700, George Bowering wrote: >>>>Does using adjacent urinals in two different states >>> >>>Where is that possible? >>> > >Well, it would have to be in some can on a state line, wouldnt it? > If it was urinal rather than urinals? How long can we continue this before it becomes a found poem? tom ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 16:40:35 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Begin migration of all users to new MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Dodie-- just wanted to offer a belated thanks for your post on Ginsberg: > This totalizing "we" is problematic to me. Personally, Ginsberg never > lead me anywhere (even though I had a poster of him on my bedroom wall > when I was in high school)--and I think his influence is marginal to > large "marginal" populations. As I see it, he embodied alienation for > a bunch of white guys (and a few women such as Maria D.), a fine thing > to do--but other people have embodied that for other groups and will > continue to. I know you ended up feeling a little regretful of this post (why do we worry so much on Poetics?)-- all the more reason to say "thanks". I was beginning to feel a bit awkward, as my experience of Ginsberg, despite the importance of his work, is perfectly, if unintentionally, evoked by the poster you mention. Which isn't to come down too hard on him--as I said in my earlier post, this isn't a case of disappointed rock fan syndrome. ["Joe Strummer once said he cared..."]. It's more that, having grown up in the Reagan era, the kind of optimism Ginsberg seems, in part, to represent-- it just wasn't available to me, &, to a great extent still isn't. However I may have appreciated his work, it couldn't compare as politicized art to, for example, The Minutemen. ["If--if Reagan played disco..."]. That situation could explain, in part, my attraction to, for instance, Bourdieu as a post-Marxist, & the conflict model that's implicit or explicit, variously, in his work. The social field as site of continuous struggle versus (what I'd like to believe in) the Revolution that signals the end of history as we have known it. Not that I mean to ascribe this position, or this subject- position to you (I assume you're older than I am--most of the more vocal listmembers seem to be), nor am I thanking you for "speaking up for" me--I didn't speak up more because I felt like maybe I was pissing on the parade, or the procession, as the case may be. But I thought I'd, I don't know, say "hi & I liked your post". best, Chris ps--You & Kevin did receive those books I sent, right? They should have arrived some time ago, but the postal service here doesn't seem to be terribly reliable. .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 16:46:49 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Oh, dammit not again MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Apologies to all for just having posted a $!#$% personal message to the list. It's supposed to be for Dodie, so I hope you read it, Dodie. The rest of you--well, whatever. Or maybe this is a hoax post & I'm just trying to spice things up a bit. $%#!, Chris .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 16:27:19 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, in the 2nd circle Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dodie wrote, towards the beginning of the week: >Ironically, I just received a very moving e-mail from Simon P. about his >being present at AG's deathbed, holding his hand, and then the Buddhist >service. So now I feel guilty about being so flip about AG, like instant >karma's gonna get me. You've got no reason to feel guilty, Dodie. You wrote that Ginsberg wasn't a huge liberating force for you regardless of the general tenor of the list lately & that just seemed honest. You weren't dissing him, just calling attention to the fact that alternatives to the mainstream are no more monolithic than the culture to which they're alternatives. And, as this list gets ever larger, it's always going to be a good thing to be reminded that each of us doesn't have the same tastes, hard as that is to believe at times. & I'm giving up trying to read the rest of the posts that I let sit during tax season now. Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 17:42:23 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "linda v. russo" Organization: University of Utah Subject: Re: History Is A Rumor MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT & I heard BU assigned him a horrid office in a basement somewhere -- perhaps a rumor, but one i tend to believe, since there are many conceivable rumors abt that institution, such as silber admitting a disproportional number (in terms of their average) of international/minority students to pump up his image as a welcoming mulitculturalist in preparation for running for mayor. > > howard zinn's book A People's History of the United States or some such is > > very good for this purpose. it's thick tho, which may intimidate some hs > > students, but very readable and an eye-opener. > > yes, this one is definitely worth a peek. > it's worth noting that zinn, who teaches > at boston university, has suffered more > than a bit for his political practice. a few > years back, president silber (who has > now left the univ. for a prominent position > in MA public ed--talk about frightening), > in what is probably the most recent, & > most prominent instance of the university > administration's usually quiet campaign > against zinn & the left in general, tried to > have him fired when, refusing to cross > the picket line of the then-striking clerical > workers, zinn held his classes off campus. > > chris > .. > christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective > calexand@alexandria.lib.edu / ************************* > > http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce > > Hey!! > Now Available for a mere $4: > _constellation voice_ by linda russo > > -- linda v. russo linda.russo@m.cc.utah.edu ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 17:42:23 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "linda v. russo" Organization: University of Utah Subject: Re: Knott/AG MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Rachel -- thanks for bringing that up. Before I jump in & lose list readership let me say you'll be glad to know that Knott has a new & selected coming out from Boa editions SOON. "To American Poets" seems to be written, in part, _to_ AG, or at least to his 'generation' of poets -- which both is & isn't BK's generation. I don't know when it was written, but _The Naomi Poems_ was published in 1968. The poem you quote from is beautiful, both praising & criticising American poets from Pound & WCW to the 'vietnam generation' for being -- well, American poets, at a time when "there's no time left to write poems" and "The world is not divided into your schools of poetry." We both don't need poetry and need it and need it to do more. The lines -- from which you paraphrase -- seem to me appropriately elegiac: . . .You are not important. Your black mountains, solitary farms, LSD trains. Don't forget: you are important. If you fail, there will be no-one left to say so. If you succeed, there will also be a great silence. Your names, an open secret in all hearts, no-one will say. But everywhere they will be finishing the poems you broke away from. -- l. > Linda Russo-- > > re that Bill Knott seeming to "connect" somehow. Grudgingly returned his > Niomi poems to the library a few days ago so I can't quote directly but > his "To American Poets" was in front of me with AG's death in the > news--something like: > > "your name will be an open secret" > > (and) > > "everywhere we will be finishing the poems you broke away from" > > RK > > -- linda v. russo linda.russo@m.cc.utah.edu ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 18:10:17 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Small Press Traffic Subject: McCaffery and Willis rock SF Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Small Press Traffic presents Steve McCaffery and Elizabeth Willis SATURDAY April 19 7:30 p.m. New College Cultural Center 766 Valencia St, San Francisco (between 18th & 19th) _____________________________________________ Small Press Traffic Literary Arts Center 766 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415/437-3454 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 17:52:46 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: What is white Comments: To: Hoa Nguyen In-Reply-To: <199704172044.NAA23621@f41.hotmail.com> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On Thu, 17 Apr 1997, Hoa Nguyen wrote: > "Objection"? Why objection? > Are you looking for an answer or making a point? i objected to the use of "white" in dodies post: it seemed reactive and not very useful--in fact counter-productive if i might say so. esp since i felt that if anyone would never be accused of being complicit with whatever "white" stands for (bland mediocre meaningless oppressive tradition whatever) it was ginsburg. white was used in a homogenizing fashion that failed to be attentive to the pluralities that term is used to organize and did not recognize the virtually indistinct category it is. of course it does have a powerful political resonance > I have been asked this question before by European-Americans ("Whites")-- and it > usually comes up when I talk about my experiences as a woman of color. For > example, when I describe how it feels to be the only poet of color in a given > magazine or at a poetry reading-- I am sometimes asked "Isn't white a color?" if i understand you you are suggesting that some believe the color "white" to represent a culture? if that is so i would respond by suggesting that "white" cannot and should not be so easily equated with either a distinct culture and that its conflation with "european-americans" is virtually to use a term that is hopeless riven by differences and contrasts. not very useful in the end. > So I would like to know why you asked. Is it because you don't understand > what is meant or are you challenging the construction of whiteness and > if so how come you are choosing to go about it? challenging. because in the end if as critics of various political affliations vaguely represented as "left" we are not able to identify allies and compatriots or people sympatico and perpetuate the idea that an important (counter) cultural figure like ginsburg is "white" and therefore not politically acceptable we lose a valuable ally and more importantly a historical challenge that paved the way for "other" forms of difference. perhaps dodie is right: maybe ag is representative of a particular formation of white male alienation but rejecting it out of hand also risks tossing out for mistaken reasons i believe something of great value. sorry im not being specific enough about that value: i leave that for others. for now. > So, my answer is: white people are people of European heritage (A.G., I > recall wrote he was "white if Jewish people are white"). a rather contingent construction dont you think? suggests the ambivalence of that inclusion in that larger category. if.... and europe geez how does one make sense of that ethnogeography? where do you draw the boundaries there? there are as much differences as similarities it seems to me. ok heres my (tentative) conclusion: race is semantically and epistemologically more complicated than the linguistic and conceptual categories used to discuss it. itd be more useful i think to be aware of that. did i make any sense? did i stumble into a morass? do i need a rope--either to pull me out or string me up? have i gone on too long? yes. jeffrey timmons ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 17:56:04 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: What is white Comments: To: Hoa Nguyen In-Reply-To: <199704172044.NAA23621@f41.hotmail.com> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT uh dodie--didnt have your address--just wanted to say i was dissing you. i just latched on to your use of that term and i realize you backed off a bit from it in a later post. i wish things would be posted quicker. i hope i havent offended you or anything. if so you have my assurances i have written with intentions of respect. jeffrey timmons ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 21:18:16 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: If this is still under discussion . . . In-Reply-To: Message of Thu, 17 Apr 1997 10:33:15 -0700 from "All art which excites in us the feeling of joy is so far comic and according as this feeling of joy is excited by whatever is substantial or accidental, general or fortuitous, in human fortunes the art is to be judged more or less excellent: and even tragic art may be said to participate in the nature of comic art so far as the possession of a work of tragic art excites in us the feeling of joy. From this is may be seen that tragedy is the imperfect manner, and comedy the perfect manner, in art." - James Joyce ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 19:00:37 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: What is white In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT SORRY SORRY SORRY I MEANT WAS NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT DISSING YOU. UG. I NEED TO LEARN HOW TO FORM CONTRACTIONS!!!! SORRY DODIE. I AM SELF-FLAGELLATING RIGHT NOW. On Thu, 17 Apr 1997, Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: > uh dodie--didnt have your address--just wanted to say i was dissing you. > i just latched on to your use of that term and i realize you backed off a > bit from it in a later post. i wish things would be posted quicker. i > hope i havent offended you or anything. if so you have my assurances i > have written with intentions of respect. > > jeffrey timmons > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 21:27:43 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Henry Gould Subject: recommended scholarship A few months ago, in response to a "what next?" query from Ron Silliman I outlined at obtuse angle and length about a "Providence School" of poetry. Without getting into the semi-mystical maunderings which I'm sure nobody wants to listen to ever again, I can say that the basic kernel was to propose a kind of poetry based on a "different" metaphysics from the popular postmodern blend of what I called nominalism or anti-realism; the idea is that the poet accepts more or less as a given that there is a real ordered universe outside our language systems which language, more or less accurately, is able to represent. This is realism. I've discovered a new book which considers James Joyce's work from a parallel perspective. Now Joyce, as you know, is an avatar of postmodernist critics & theorists. There is a strong stream of postmodern/avant-garde/ deconstructive/feminist criticism which claims Joyce as model & percursor. So I want to recommend the following book. It's not the product of an aging bitter departmental new critic fluffhead, either (and it's not by Blasing, folks!!). _The Word According to James Joyce_, by Cordell Yee, Bucknell UP, 1997 Though I'm only partway through, part of his argument is that, contra many many critics, Joyce never forsook his roots in Aristotelian realism, modified by his own discoveries in 20th cent. "process metaphysics" with respect to the ability of language to represent what is real. & in hopes of forestalling purely political pre-judgements, I quote the following: "As far as the political implications of Joyce's works are concerned, I have no quarrel with anti-authoritarianism or feminism. I do question whether those political impulses are necessarily tied to a rejection of the linguistic practices that make representation possible." This sentence doesn't offer much in isolation, but it points to an issue fairly relevant to the divide, say, between theoretical-left writing theorists & other leftish writers (the whole langpo/Apex of the M debate). I want to emphasize that Yee doesn't seem to have a tendentious axe to grind, but he takes issue with a lot of Joyce scholarship because he's actually interested in authorial intention & is trying to discover what JOYCE was up to (& not so much what his playful interpreters want to bend him into). It's a new jumping-off place. - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 19:06:21 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: Is anybody still discussing Bob Perelman Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Note that what I found weird was arguments about what a third party who is present meant, in the simplest sense, by his words. At a certain point it becomes silly not to ask. I did not mean to imply that the discussion of words or ideas was weird, and I certainly don't think that a query need be answered (although it could make for quite a discussion). Nor was I responding to just this post. I am mum on the subject hereafter and will not be provoked to speech (unless maybe I'm discussed in the third person). At 10:19 AM 4/17/97 -0400, you wrote: >Well actually Mark that gets at something which is a real live issue about >this space, and other spaces like it...I don't think cybersocialspace >functions in quite the way you think..I suspect that how it functions is >more in flux and more contested than your post states. These two are also >widely-known poet/theorists, and the discussion is not about them as >people, but about their published books...I don't believe they should feel >*compelled* to intervene in a discussion of their work, at least not right >away..(they may wanna wait till something really pisses them off ;)...) > >There is a constant push and pull between two structures of feeling: that >cybersocialspace is like being in a room in a fairly intimate >conversation, involving maybe half a dozen people; and that on the >contrary it is very public and very widely-scrutinized, and much like >debates and exchanges published on paper on various subjects. Your post >suggests the former; I personally think that if people reflect for a >minute they'll realize that the truth is closer to the latter idea. I >think it's great for us to be able to ask CB and BP to respond to what >folks have posted...But frankly I don't think they're obligated to, any >more than they are obligated to respond by letter to every discussion of >their work in a little mag or an academic journal. Ask 'em, by all means. >But my take on public electro-discussion is, that it is suggesting we >can't discuss their work that is "very weird." Remember that this is a >public not a highly personal space, no matter what it feels like at >times. > >Mark P. > >On Wed, 16 Apr 1997, Mark Weiss wrote: > >> To an outsider this continues to be very weird. Two of the parties, >> Bernstein and perelman, are on the list. Why do we theorize about what one >> meant about the other and what the other may think of it? Isn't this like >> talking about people in the room as if they weren't there? Why don't we just >> query them for their own input? >> >> At 02:32 PM 4/16/97 EST, you wrote: >> >I don't think Bob P privileges Brathwaite (that's without an "i" said the >> >pedant) over Bernstein. That Bernstein "wants power" goes without saying: who >> >doesn't? As I read it, Bob P's point involves the mediations of the "academy" >> >to which both writers are more or less subject. The contrast worth making is >> >between the (mostly) dispersive energies of CB's practice and the gathering >> >energies of Brathwaite's. This contrast is itself made (not in exactly this >> >way) by CB in his remarks on KB in "Poetics of the Americas." What would be >> >worth contesting in Bob P's reading of KB, and also in CB's reading of KB, is >> >their sense of KB's practice as singular (this is related to mark's point but >> >not the same point). I take it that much of X/Self has little to do with >> >"nation-language" at least as KB has defined it, that there is indeed a >> >"vernacular" present in the poem and that it is this vernacular that grounds >> >"nation-language" and the utopian identity politics the poem is imagining. I >> >take it too that--elsewhere--there is something else going on, more related to >> >dispersing than gathering. Caliban as rebel, Caliban as hero: dispersing and >> >gathering both. What Bob P acknowledges but does not to my thinking stress >> >enough is the Caribbean location of KB's project. Different issues there than >> >the ones CB must face. And when KB's text enters into USAmerican contexts it >> >is something else. For a shameless plug I'll mention that I've discussed >> >some of these issues in an essay in paul naylor's _River City_. >> > >> >This is too brief, perhaps cryptic, but i've a thousand things to do today. And >> >anyway as i read Mark the real force of his question to Bob involves matters >> >other than the remarks on KB and CB. >> > >> >keith tuma >> > >> > >> > > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 22:08:19 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: Bromige-Safdie In-Reply-To: Message of Thu, 17 Apr 1997 08:02:01 -0500 from On Thu, 17 Apr 1997 08:02:01 -0500 Jeff Hansen said: > >My sense is that most poems come out of implicit, rather than explicit, >compromise. The compromise happened long before the moment of writing, >in the poet's absorbing, thinking about, and coming to terms with the >myriad poetical, social, and institutional forces impinging on him or >her. > >To be able to write means to have already compromised, and to have >forgotten. > I like the non-heroic good sense of this, yet find myself disagreeing. Maybe I don't quite get what you're saying. To write well - seems like hard work, not compromise & forgetting. Or perhaps you mean the writer compromises everything BUT writing? & the feeling of futility - is this an effect of culture-glut? Or this compromise is wisdom, not betrayal. "The artist must raise everything to a higher level: ...like a pump...has inside...a great pipe that reaches down into the entrails of things, the deepest layers. ...sucks up what was lying down there below, dim and unnoticed, and brings it out in great jets to the sunlight." (Flaubert) - Henry G. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 22:28:20 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: Re: Begin migration of all users to new here fetching out a turn of phrase in Chris Alexander's note-of-thanks re: Dodie's articulate ambiguity anent AG -- Christopher: << Dodie-- just wanted to offer a belated thanks for your post on Ginsberg . . . I didn't speak up more because I felt like maybe I was pissing on the parade, or the procession, as the case may be. . . . >> this calls to mind words from Tom Mandel, worth citing in the instant instance. Thus: | To the dead, beyond imitation of life, | we must report something | different from poets before us, | raining tropes on their | parade | of idle words. *Tremors | bring tears, longing ends in grief.* Tom Mandel, "Communication Through Hints" (asterisks denoting italics; -- btw I've been curious as to source of the "Tremors" line, as this seems poss. an actual quotation [whether from Chinese or Greek, god, Tom, or some erudite other might know], tho equally poss. faux; -- but I've not read the book entire as yet, wherein such deail cd. be disclosed) incidental poetics note: Theory seeming: poetry is to be understood as (especially) addressed to the dead -- for their enjoyment / amusement / & suchlike, eh? (Not, seems, a "morbid poetics" -- but arguably a "sorta elegiac"?) { anyhow: from a Sun & Moon vol. not here on hand [I've these few lines bec. I'd snatched ''em for epigraph to an elegy I wrote for Lynne Beyer, some couple years ago] . . . (Mandel vol.'s among more recent & includes word "Law" in title - bibliography through hints) } d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 22:08:51 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: Re: found poem or: a (perhaps) unconscious act of protest, so to say? yes: why would one *wish* to be Yahoo!'d by a seeker of misinfo? strange things, horatio, in yer html d.i. >>> Thomas Bell 04/17/97 05:43pm >>> Does this use of misinformation mean that they knowingly bought their own. tom bell At 01:47 PM 4/16/97 -0700, Christopher Reiner wrote: What follows is a list of keywords from the Heaven's Gate >site, which I have copied from its Home Page source code. I present here >it as a found poem, without any extra linebreaks or whatnot... >--Chris R.) >misinformation, misinformation, > >misinformation, misinformation, misinformation, misinformation, ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 21:52:18 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Carl Lynden Peters Subject: Re: found poem In-Reply-To: from "Christopher Reiner" at Apr 16, 97 01:47:17 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit here's a found poem. it was writ on the top margin of an exam on romantic poetry that i just read. students wrote their exams earlier this morning: (it's 8:30 am. 8:30 am. 8:30 am. 8:30 am. 8:30 am) that's a wonderful piece! ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 00:47:30 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: if this is still under discussion Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" But "secuction" is good. Surely a word that Ginsberg would like. A secret, seductive concoction of return-of-the-repressed, hiccuping, cocksucking by the Secaucus 7, suction masters & section doctors, etcetera. Just what Flaubert in Henry's quote is talking about, and certainly art is a process, but when I wrote "Discontents" I was suggestion an origin for that process. For as someone said, writing is hard work, although the joy ("secuction!") can be great. Something h a s to come out. Were you there when it all came out? Ginsberg came out early. Something out of sight deep inside is going to come out any . . . time . . .NOW! It doesnt erupt from the author, does it? It appears to erupt from the sentence, to the erupting reader. It hadn't been part of our content, it had been dis-content, denied & hidden content or mine or yours, & now, it's all over the papers, all over the newssheets. Barely civilized, it was, until we saw how expected it had, all along, (honky commas) been. Honky commas sit on it so as it wont blow, blow away. Until we began to tame it, to domesticate it, find ways to compromise with it, married to it must live with it, must alter it misunderstand it deny it ignore it. Must ask if its author got out of bed on the wrong side the morning of the night he made this *object* this non-ad-hominumizable object, this un homicidal ding-an-sich, this ding in his fender, "it just [not simply] happened to me as it were or was." As I-were-or-was was watching. "Will have to [insert verb here] later" is also good, thanks Katherine Lynes. Lets say the verb, whichever, is the process Henry mentions. We dont know what it is yet but we know to leave a place for it, and we know to cover up that place (read as a sentence without brackets, the reader finds nothing open.) Robin Blaser : "poets are the deodorant pucks in the urinal of life." In any state, simultaneously. A suggestion that poetry is in the pisser, pissoir that is. But with its nose towards the stars, blossoms in an appletree. Keep remembering to spell, so that it isnt just masterbation. (Geoffrey Timmons, stop flagellating yourself! You'll wake Mister Bowering, and he'll be thumping the lectern with his shoe again.) With the Don Allan Anthology, apologies to Don M-for-Modern-follows-the Postmodern Allen. Ectoplasm keeps leaking out of the parentheses into the above-board sentences, the open-faced sentences, and you got some on your pants! Now they'll all know . . what they already knew. They knew it of themselves. Now they know you know it of yourself, they'll know they know it of themselves. Then deny it. Go back and do it over. I love you, all of you. That's art for you. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 06:31:44 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Boughn Subject: Re: recommended scholarship In-Reply-To: from "Henry Gould" at Apr 17, 97 09:27:43 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit The NEWS just in this A.M.--the Universe has an AXIS. The movement of LIGHT is not uniform. There is an UP and a DOWN, folks, all the way to Sirius and back, and we're IN IT. I think this recent discovery may be irrefutable proof of the efficacy of Providence School Metapophysics. Yikes, Henry, how do you do it? Mike mboughn@chass.utoronto.ca ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 08:09:57 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Keith Norris Subject: Re: The New Party In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Check out www.newparty.org I'm a member--feel free to backpost me for info... -=-=-=-=-= Keith Norris | knorris@pstcc.cc.tn.us English Department PSTCC Knoxville, TN 37933 (423) 539-7140 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 08:00:19 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: recommended scholarship In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 18 Apr 1997 06:31:44 -0400 from On Fri, 18 Apr 1997 06:31:44 -0400 Michael Boughn said: >The NEWS just in this A.M.--the Universe has an AXIS. The movement of >LIGHT is not uniform. There is an UP and a DOWN, folks, all the way to >Sirius and back, and we're IN IT. > >I think this recent discovery may be irrefutable proof of the efficacy of >Providence School Metapophysics. Yikes, Henry, how do you do it? Well, to tell the truth, some of you may be old enough to remember the "We Were There" series of history books. "We were There at the Alamo" . "We were there at Valley Forge". etc. Back in 1962 or thereabouts I read one called "We Were There When They Invented the Frisbee". Everything else just seemed to click. And no, David Bromige, secuction is not one of the 4 Major Squeezes which set the cosmos in motion. This is my authoritative comment on that subject. (I'm sure Jack & Eric will want to get in on that one, though.) - Henry Hale Gould (the Hale stands for "comet") (not the bathroom cleanser, either. poetry is not plumbing. Flaubert can have his fruity yogurt.) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 08:28:02 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: if this is still under discussion In-Reply-To: Message of Thu, 17 Apr 1997 00:47:30 -0500 from On Thu, 17 Apr 1997 00:47:30 -0500 David Bromige said: >early. Something out of sight deep inside is going to come out any . . . >time . . .NOW! It doesnt erupt from the author, does it? It appears to >erupt from the sentence, to the erupting reader. It hadn't been part of our >content, it had been dis-content, denied & hidden content or mine or yours, >& now, it's all over the papers, all over the newssheets. Barely civilized, >it was, until we saw how expected it had, all along, (honky commas) been. >Honky commas sit on it so as it wont blow, blow away. Until we began to >tame it, to domesticate it, find ways to compromise with it, married to it >must live with it, must alter it misunderstand it deny it ignore it. Must At the Russ-Amer Hoboken conference Elena Shvarts mentioned her interest in scandal as the force of change in society. Her example was not repressed/exposed desire but the virgin birth of Christ [whatever you make of that]. I point this out as an example of a different way of poetic thinking from that which reigns in the West [i.e. sexuality as the master-key to the Meaning of Life & the Blakean One-Eyed Vision of our discontented so-called artists]. - Henry Gould "sex is for coyotes" - Jack Spandrift "sex? Isn't that something we read about in public school?" - Eric Blarnes ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 08:14:38 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jeff Hansen Organization: The Blake School Subject: safdie-bromige MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Henry Gould asked me how a writer is involved in compromise and forgetting. To write a poem is dependent on a whole series of experiences prior to the writing. Most of the ones relevant to writing focus on poetry, poetry traditions, and the interface between poetry and other aspects of life -- politics, living situation, nature, weather, advertising, etc, the list varies depending ont the individual. Before writing, the poet has already committed to certain positions within all these forces, a position necessarily wrought with compromise since the forces impinging are myriad. But to write, the poet cannot focus on these forces and the necessary compromise. The poet must put one word after another. While sometimes hard work (though I think of writing as more often joyful) this is the forgetting: Not focusing on the foundation, the foundation necessarily composed of compromise, that makes writing possible. This is all to say that I don't believe in individual vision, and that writing is irreducibly social. Best to all, jeff ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 06:56:11 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Alexander Subject: Re: Begin migration of all users to new In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >| To the dead, beyond imitation of life, >| we must report something >| different from poets before us, >| raining tropes on their >| parade >| of idle words. *Tremors >| bring tears, longing ends in grief.* > >Tom Mandel, "Communication Through Hints" I'd snatched ''em for epigraph to an elegy I wrote for Lynne Beyer, >some couple years ago] . . . (Mandel vol.'s among more recent & includes >word "Law" in title > - bibliography through hints) } >d.i. > > Letters of the Law, from Sun & Moon Press charles alexander / chax press / chax@theriver.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 08:59:53 CST6CDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hank Lazer Organization: The University of Alabama Subject: Re: monk, t. Can someone(s) on the List recommend to me a good biography of Thelonious Monk? Preferably one that's in print... Thanks. Hank Lazer ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 10:34:23 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Don Cheney Subject: Re: found poem In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" i have a collection of found poems (found at work also), NOTES TO MY SELF, on the net at: http://www.geocities.com/Paris/5791/notes.html don >(Intro: It's not unusual for web site designers to place "keywords" into >a page's actual html code so that search engines like Alta Vista or >Infoseek will index the page in response to a word or phrase typed in as >a query by you or me. These keywords are not visible, but the search >engines will still register their presence. In fact, the more times the >word is used, the higher the ranking of the page in the index of >"hits.". What follows is a list of keywords from the Heaven's Gate >site, which I have copied from its Home Page source code. I present here >it as a found poem, without any extra linebreaks or whatnot... >--Chris R.) > >--------------------------------------------------------------- > > > > > > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 10:37:17 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: if this is still under discussion Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > >Robin Blaser : "poets are the deodorant pucks in the urinal of life." I love that quote, David, but borrowing the feminist perspective, maybe that's what certain of our listers mean when they say they're tired of being pissed on by male poets! p.s. could you under-the-table me your snail-mail address? thanks, sp ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 11:05:30 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: if not to lurk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Hoverer is too hard to say, too many syllables. I agree, lurk has sinister connotations, unwarranted here. Look/looker would seem to have fewer, though maybe some old-timey slang ones:"She's a real looker!" I'll keep thinking. It's a good quest. sp >addendum to previous post about lurking.... > >how about hoverer? hovering? " to hang fluttering in the air, to remain >suspended over a place or object, to move to and fro near a place, to >be in a state of uncertainty, irresolution, or suspense" and i would >add, to be in a state of too much to do-ness, not not caring... > >kl > >in response to david israel: > >> so, how about neologize a newer, more congenial self-descriptive? >> >> if not to lurk, then what? ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 08:08:50 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: Joe Dunn In-Reply-To: <970417114446_-1535482950@emout13.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 11:46 AM -0400 4/17/97, Michael Franco wrote: >Sad news in this morning that Joe Dunn passed away this week- Dear Michael, it's Kevin Killian, thanks for letting us know about Joe Dunn's death. He was, I think, a wonderful writer, and one of the nicest people I've ever met. His friends and admirers were all, I suppose, waiting for the other shoe to fall, but this is still awfully sad. I hope more of his work sees its way into print. "The third word is 'eros' Who will cling to you every birthright Bringing your heart substance. Whomever you touch will love you, Will feel the cling of His touch upon you Like sunlight scattered over an ancient mirror." --Jack Spicer, "Five Words for Joe Dunn on his Twenty-Second Birthday" ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 08:15:26 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Re: What is white Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Hoa Nguyen asks: >Also, I have been very curious about the magazine "Race Traitor" -- plan to buy >it when I have more money-- and was wondering if anyone on this list could >please fill me in-- tell me more about their philosophy behind their "rejection >of whiteness" (or correct me if I have that wrong). Is anyone here involved >with that journal? I'm not involved with the mag, but you should be able to get it, or at least the collection of writings drawn from it published under the same name, at a library. The main thrust of their philosophy is that race is not a biological fact, but a social construct, largely developed in the US in place of the (more common in Europe at least) nationalistic views used to exclude folks from social & political communities. "White", "Black", and "Asian" are vague terms that deny the complex dynamics of ethnic, national, personal, cultural, etc. influences that come into play in an individual's life. There aren't monolithic cultures that are White, Black, or Asian, but many cultural affects that get lost when these more generic terms become the center of discussion. Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 08:15:42 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Re: monk, t. Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Can someone(s) on the List recommend to me a good biography of >Thelonious Monk? Preferably one that's in print... Thanks. > >Hank Lazer Hank, I'm pretty sure there isn't a book-length bio published yet. There are some useful (though, depending on how detailed you need this, probably very spotty) articles/interviews in various magazines like downbeat, and check collections of occasional pieces by Whitney Bailliet, Martin Williams, etc. Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 10:59:48 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: safdie-bromige In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 18 Apr 1997 08:14:38 -0500 from On Fri, 18 Apr 1997 08:14:38 -0500 Jeff Hansen said: > >This is all to say that I don't believe in individual vision, and that >writing is irreducibly social. If there's no individual vision, then the social is a one-eyed beast. I too subscribe to the belief that humanity is one Being, that you are me and I am you and we are all Jack Spandrift, as Eric Blarnes once put it (in his personal memoir, _Living? Isn't that Something...?_ Univ. of Left Overbie Press, 1994), and that this one reality is the key to social justice as well as joy. NEVERTHELESS there's a big difference between the stoplight at 1st and Hennepin and the stoplight that used to be at Cedar & Riverside, and it's that DIFFUDIFFURANCE that the artist as INDUVINDUHYOU-ALL is trying SO HARD to get at in her depiction of STERN & DAFT REALITY. - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 10:33:52 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" Subject: call for essays Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Mime-Version: 1.0 Approved-By: Center for Advanced Feminist Studies Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 10:16:11 -0500 Reply-To: Center for Advanced Feminist Studies Sender: Affiliated Faculty - CAFS From: Center for Advanced Feminist Studies Subject: wsais-pdl: WISE-L: CFP Feminisms and Internationalism Comments: To: cafs-stu@tc.umn.edu To: Multiple recipients of list CAFS-F2 > > > >>> CALL FOR PAPERS FOR A > >>> SPECIAL ISSUE OF GENDER & HISTORY > >>> ON FEMINISMS AND INTERNATIONALISM > >>> > >>>Submissions are invited for a special issue of Gender & History to be > >>>published in 1998 on the theme of Feminisms and Internationalism. The > >>>editors for the special issue seek essays which address the theme of the > >>>history of internationalism in feminist theory and praxis, possibly > >>>including the following topics: the ways in which "internationalism" has > >>>been conceived historically within feminism and women's movements; the > >>>nature of and historical shifts within "imperial" feminisms; changes in > the > >>>meaning of feminist internationalism both preceding and following the end > of > >>>most formal empires in the 20th century; the challenges to, and the > >>>reformulations of, internationalism within feminism by women of colour and > >>>by women from colonized or formerly colonized countries; the fragmentation > >>>of internationalism in response to a growing emphasis on local over global > >>>contexts of struggle as well as on a variety of different feminisms > instead > >>>of a singular feminism; and the context for the reemergence of > >>>internationalism within feminisms and women's movements as a result of the > >>>new modes of globalization in the late 20th century. > >>> > >>>Essays should be around 9,000 words in length. To submit a manuscript, > send > >>>three copies plus an abstract and a separate title page with name, address > >>>and contact information. Other details of form and style for submitted > >>>manuscripts can be found in Gender & History. Deadline for submissions is > 15 > >>>December 1997. > >>> > >>>Manuscripts may be sent to any of the three editors for the special issue: > >>> > >>>Mrinalini Sinha, > >>>North American Co-Editor, Gender and History, > >>>Department of History, > >>>Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, IL 62901-4519 > >>>USA > >>>Phone: (618) 453-4391 > >>>Fax: (618) 453-5440 > >>>Email: Sinha@SIU.EDU > >>> > >>>Donna J. Guy, Angela Woollacott > >>>Special issue guest co-editor, Special issue guest > co-editor, > >>>Department of History, Department of History, > >>>University of Arizona, Case Western Reserve > >>University, > >>>Social Science Building, 10900 Euclid Ave., > >>>Tucson, AZ 85721 Cleveland, OH 44106-7107 > >>>USA USA > >>>Phone: (520) 621-1586 Phone: (216) 368-4165 > >>>Fax: (520) 293-2635 Fax: (216) 368-4681 > >>>Email: DJG@CCIT.ARIZONA.EDU Email: axw11@po.cwru.edu > > > > ************ > > ezekiel@univ-paris12.fr > > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 11:11:28 EST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Keith Tuma Subject: Re: Is anybody still discussing Bob Perelman In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 16 Apr 1997 22:30:08 -0700 from On Wed, 16 Apr 1997 22:30:08 -0700 George Bowering said: >>With apologies i ask this prurient question. >> >>If you had to stand in one state & piss into the other - which would be the >>more likely recipient. >> >>Dan >> >>>keith tuma >>>who lives eight miles from a town (college corner, indiana/ohio) where it's >>>possible to piss in two states at once though he's never never tried to >>>do so, >>>being content to piss in two states of mind > > >Here's what I want to know: is that claim a manifestation of patriarchal >hegemony? > > > I remember a Barthelme novel, _The Dead Father_, asking this same question. As I recall the DF can manifest patriarchal hegemony only by standing in Ohio and pissing into Nebraska. As for Dan's question, I'm afraid I have too little philosophy to answer it. My friend the pataphysician, though, tells me the answer is: Pat Riley. > > >George Bowering. > , >2499 West 37th Ave., >Vancouver, B.C., >Canada V6M 1P4 > >fax: 1-604-266-9000 >e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 12:07:38 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: safdie-bromige Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" For once, I'm with you, Henry! And besides, I don't believe anything is irreducibly anything. sp >On Fri, 18 Apr 1997 08:14:38 -0500 Jeff Hansen said: >> >>This is all to say that I don't believe in individual vision, and that >>writing is irreducibly social. > >If there's no individual vision, then the social is a one-eyed beast. >I too subscribe to the belief that humanity is one Being, that you are >me and I am you and we are all Jack Spandrift, as Eric Blarnes once put >it (in his personal memoir, _Living? Isn't that Something...?_ >Univ. of Left Overbie Press, 1994), and that this one reality is the >key to social justice as well as joy. NEVERTHELESS there's a big >difference between the stoplight at 1st and Hennepin and the stoplight >that used to be at Cedar & Riverside, and it's that DIFFUDIFFURANCE >that the artist as INDUVINDUHYOU-ALL is trying SO HARD to get at >in her depiction of STERN & DAFT REALITY. - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 11:05:00 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" Subject: Re: What is white Comments: To: Herb Levy MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN This was more or less the same argument, I seem to recall, made by Ashley Montagu and Aldous Huxley in a book they co-wrote in the 1940's. ---------- From: Herb Levy To: POETICS Subject: Re: What is white Date: Friday, April 18, 1997 10:40AM Hoa Nguyen asks: >Also, I have been very curious about the magazine "Race Traitor" -- plan to buy >it when I have more money-- and was wondering if anyone on this list could >please fill me in-- tell me more about their philosophy behind their "rejection >of whiteness" (or correct me if I have that wrong). Is anyone here involved >with that journal? I'm not involved with the mag, but you should be able to get it, or at least the collection of writings drawn from it published under the same name, at a library. The main thrust of their philosophy is that race is not a biological fact, but a social construct, largely developed in the US in place of the (more common in Europe at least) nationalistic views used to exclude folks from social & political communities. "White", "Black", and "Asian" are vague terms that deny the complex dynamics of ethnic, national, personal, cultural, etc. influences that come into play in an individual's life. There aren't monolithic cultures that are White, Black, or Asian, but many cultural affects that get lost when these more generic terms become the center of discussion. Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 10:21:21 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: Bromige-Safdie MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Jeff wrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrttttt: > It seems to me that expecting our > poetry to transcend the ideological, material, and social spheres of > institutions and everyday interactions is what is futile. Placing too > high a demand on poetry, asking too much of it -- the descendants of > Shelley's "poets are the unaknowledged legislators ..." -- makes poetry > futile. By insisting that it is embedded in the same network/nest of > forces as other activities is to see it more accurately, to recognize > its strengths and weaknesses rather than hoping for what is not there > and ending with futility. Writing situated as critique (SOMETIMES) versus writing writing which refuses/represses its site (site as in scope-barrel-trigger) or claims 'outsider' status--noncomplicity ["this is Art" or "it's just art, man"] or ["I wasn't doing anything, honest"], i.e., nothing to be complicit with. Q: Situation as--what? Production or reception? "I mean to say this" or "this means this". Or both & how do they differ, exactly? Or, possibly, to fetch together two current threads (so alter both): | To the dead, beyond imitation of life, | we must report something | different from poets before us, | raining tropes on their | parade | of idle words. *Tremors | bring tears, longing ends in grief.* Unless that's just an excuse to repeat these lines--which repetition needs no excuse. Thanks to David Israel for posting this piece of Tom's work--& thanks to Tom for obvious reasons. Chris .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 12:33:16 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dave Zauhar Subject: Re: if not to lurk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" spectator? and it's various permutations (as in "hi. I've been spectating on this list for 6 years now. . .")? DZ >Hoverer is too hard to say, too many syllables. I agree, lurk has sinister >connotations, unwarranted here. Look/looker would seem to have fewer, >though maybe some old-timey slang ones:"She's a real looker!" I'll keep >thinking. It's a good quest. sp > > >>addendum to previous post about lurking.... >> >>how about hoverer? hovering? " to hang fluttering in the air, to remain >>suspended over a place or object, to move to and fro near a place, to >>be in a state of uncertainty, irresolution, or suspense" and i would >>add, to be in a state of too much to do-ness, not not caring... >> >>kl >> >>in response to david israel: >> >>> so, how about neologize a newer, more congenial self-descriptive? >>> >>> if not to lurk, then what? ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 12:37:20 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Boughn Subject: Re: if this is still under discussion In-Reply-To: from "henry gould" at Apr 18, 97 08:28:02 am MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > At the Russ-Amer Hoboken conference Elena Shvarts mentioned her interest > in scandal as the force of change in society. Her example was not > repressed/exposed desire but the virgin birth of Christ [whatever you > make of that]. I point this out as an example of a different > way of poetic thinking from that which reigns in the West [i.e. sexuality > as the master-key to the Meaning of Life & the Blakean One-Eyed Vision > of our discontented so-called artists]. > - Henry Gould > > "sex is for coyotes" > - Jack Spandrift > > "sex? Isn't that something we read about in public school?" > - Eric Blarnes "You leave out the true animal bearing of the species and in the end . . . you pay for it by sex." --Charles Olson ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 12:47:58 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Re: monk, t. MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Herb Levy wrote: > > >Can someone(s) on the List recommend to me a good biography of > >Thelonious Monk? Preferably one that's in print... Thanks. > > > >Hank Lazer > > Hank, > > I'm pretty sure there isn't a book-length bio published yet. There are > some useful (though, depending on how detailed you need this, probably very > spotty) articles/interviews in various magazines like downbeat, and check > collections of occasional pieces by Whitney Bailliet, Martin Williams, etc. > > Herb Levy > herb@eskimo.com Yeap, I believe Herb is right. There is however one full-length book (in French) on Monk I know of: _Thelonious Monk_ by the French poet Yves Buin (P.O.L., Paris 1988 -- probably out of print by now, though i can't be sure, got my copy when it came out). It isn't a biography nor a musicologic treaty, rather it tries to for a poetics of Monk � & succeeds brilliantly. Somebody should translate it & publish it here! -- Pierre oops -- just did a quick search on ocl worldwide catalogue & these items came up, the first one a bio in English I haven't seen yet: AUTHOR: Gourse, Leslie. | TITLE: Straight, no chaser : | the life and genius of Thelonious Monk / | PLACE: New York : |PUBLISHER: Schirmer Books, | YEAR: 1997 & given as a biography & this: AUTHOR: Kteily-O'Sullivan, Laila Rose. | TITLE: Klangfarben, rhythmic displacement, and economy of means | a theoretical study of the works of Thelonious Monk / | YEAR: 1990 | PUB TYPE: Book | FORMAT: iv, 73 leaves : ill. | NOTES: "13-42773." | Thesis (Mus. M.)--University of North Texas, 1990. | Includes bibliographical references (leaves 70-73). & AUTHOR: Raschka, Christopher. | TITLE: Mysterious Thelonious / | PLACE: New York : |PUBLISHER: Orchard Books, | YEAR: 1997 | PUB TYPE: Book Matches the tones of the diatonic scale to the values of the | color wheel in presenting a portrait of the work of the Afro- | American jazz musician and composer of "Mysterioso." | ISBN: 0531300579 0531330575 (lib. bdg.) | SUBJECT: Monk, Thelonious -- Pictorial works -- Juvenile literature. | Monk, Thelonious. | Musicians. | Jazz. | Afro-Americans -- Biography. AUTHOR: Wilde, Laurent de | TITLE: Monk / | PLACE: Paris : |PUBLISHER: Gallimard, | YEAR: 1996 | PUB TYPE: Book AUTHOR: Ponzio, Jacques. | TITLE: Blue Monk : | un portrait de Thelonious : essai / | PLACE: Arles : |PUBLISHER: Actes sud, | YEAR: 1995 | PUB TYPE: Book ACCESSION: 32711912 | TITLE: Contemporary musicians : | profiles of the people in music. Volume 6 / | PLACE: Detroit, Mich. : |PUBLISHER: Gale Research, Inc., | YEAR: 1992 | PUB TYPE: Book | NOTES: Includes bibliographical references and indexes ACCESSION: 17952626 | AUTHOR: Fitterling, Thomas. | TITLE: Thelonious Monk : | sein Leben, seine Musik, seine Schallplatten / | PLACE: Waakirchen : |PUBLISHER: Oreos, | YEAR: 1987 | PUB TYPE: Book | FORMAT: 175 p. : ill., music ; 24 cm. -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 12:20:01 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Matthias Regan Subject: the PostModern Dilemma Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" imaginary toadstools with real toadstools inside them ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 11:07:05 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: found poem MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT > (it's 8:30 am. 8:30 am. 8:30 am. 8:30 am. 8:30 am) "do you know where your answers are?" Chris .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 13:08:27 -0400 Reply-To: Steven Marks Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steven Marks Subject: Re: Bromige-Safdie In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 17 Apr 1997, Jeff Hansen wrote: > My sense is that most poems come out of implicit, rather than explicit, > compromise. The compromise happened long before the moment of writing, > in the poet's absorbing, thinking about, and coming to terms with the > myriad poetical, social, and institutional forces impinging on him or > her. > > To be able to write means to have already compromised, and to have > forgotten. I'm mostly in agreement with what Jeff says here. If I didn't forget the inevitable compromises I have to make (many of which I'm barely aware of (and at what level willfully, I'm not sure)), then I'd never write anything. I'd fill pages with my imbedded parentheses. No, I wouldn't even get that far. Yes, writing necessarily comes from a social construct in my view. I cringe at the suffering genius model. BUT, isn't the act of forgetting perhaps an act of individuation? Perhaps the place where we "show" (surely not in full consciousness) how we have wove and been woven by the social web. Of course, this activity may just be a lie we tell ourselves to get through the night. As Donne said: "Oh what a web we weave when first practice to deceive." Steven (I think) __________________________________________________ Steven Marks http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html __________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 10:09:16 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: What is white In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 8:15 AM -0800 4/18/97, Herb Levy wrote: >"White", "Black", and "Asian" are vague terms that deny the complex >dynamics of ethnic, national, personal, cultural, etc. influences that come >into play in an individual's life. There aren't monolithic cultures that >are White, Black, or Asian, but many cultural affects that get lost when >these more generic terms become the center of discussion. Herb et al, I haven't been reading the list this past week because I had a grant due, but KK dutifully saved and showed me every post that made any kind of response to what I posted. I think he should start a cottage business doing this for people on the list. It's a great service. KK's Filterarma. I wish you'd send a copy of your post to SPT's funders, where in many cases I have to count everybody in the above groups you mention, as well as "Hispanic" (which I was told during an arts adminstration seminar not to use because it is a bad word invented during the Regan administration) and the mysterious category "Other." Then I am required to give hard numbers and percentages of total for board, staff, constituency served. These are called Diversity Statistics. No questions about income levels and class these days--I think for two reasons, the first being the obvious one that Marxism is over and class is no longer sexy. But, then, more problematically, I think a lot of condescension is implicit is this model--all whites are priviledged and all Blacks, Asians, Hispanics and Others are downtrodden innocents who need to be raised up by the Great White Funders--there's a kind of noble savage tone to the whole project. I think is is apparent in a lot of what gets funded--sophisticated and formally challenging writing is not going to seduce anybody into throwing bucks at it. It seems there is a desire to turn writing back to a folk art--like it's very difficult to get money to support "professional" writers--rather money is given to projects which help people who wouldn't normally write express their feelings about their downtrodden state--and everybody feels good. Of course, it's possible that some members of this downtrodden category will then move to the professional category, but that's not the goal of these projects. I'm not saying that these projects are unworthy of funding, I'm just saying that there doesn't seem to be much left over for projects that would promote the development of professional writers, and so the only way to get training is that area more and more seems to be by entering the elite of graduate writing programs (and to come out the other end with no marketable skills and owing tens of thousands of dollars). I am someone who benefited greatly from free public writing programs. And I know the word professional is problematic, but I'm trying to grunt towards some kinds of distinctions here--and I know any time anybody does such a thing they're opening themselves to attack (attack, in a polite middle class way, of course--I wouldn't expect anything rude here). SPT is asked to hand out evaluation questionaires at our events where the audience is supposed to check off what group they belong to. Audience members were continually indicating on the questionnaires that they found these categories problematic and reductive, so, following the example of another group, we changed our questionnaire to read something like, "We're often asked to provide these statistics by our funders, so please . . ." To clarify: I *am* in favor of providing a broad racial mix in the people I program--and I've been taking steps to broaden that mix futher. This is something I think is good (and which has resulted in some great events), not something I do grudgingly. Of course these categories are reductive--but my point is that to say these categories aren't real is to not live in the real world--and further, since they are so vastly operative in the world, I think that it would be difficult not to have internalized them and see the world through them--no matter how much you disapprove of them. Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 13:09:15 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Kristin Gallagher Subject: Re: The New Party In-Reply-To: from "Keith Norris" at Apr 18, 97 08:09:57 am MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit the new party isn't necessarily starting the revolution. they are more like continuing the *new* left, which is not as radically about ending globalized capitalism. they have great ideas, but don't seem to focus on poverty and its increase as a result of global cap as a central issue. if ending globalized capitalism is your thing, then philly's labor party might be more up your alley. i think the new party is more about trying to involve the *people* of labor and green interests in democracy and maybe socializing a few things. . . . this of course is just my reading . . . . ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 13:09:41 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: William Burmeister Prod Subject: Re: if this is still under discussion In-Reply-To: David Bromige "if this is still under discussion" (Apr 17, 12:47am) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii >Robin Blaser : "poets are the deodorant pucks in the urinal of life." Hmmm. May be the same guy who once wrote in the porta-toilet: Thank you, your shit Is our bread & butter. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 13:12:11 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steven Marks Subject: Re: if not to lurk In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII How about gazer? Same number of syllables as lurker. No negative associations; even a gentle one of stargazing, and I don't mean Hollywood. tryingly, Steven On Fri, 18 Apr 1997, Dave Zauhar wrote: > spectator? and it's various permutations (as in "hi. I've been spectating > on this list for 6 years now. . .")? > > DZ > > >Hoverer is too hard to say, too many syllables. I agree, lurk has sinister > >connotations, unwarranted here. Look/looker would seem to have fewer, > >though maybe some old-timey slang ones:"She's a real looker!" I'll keep > >thinking. It's a good quest. sp > > > > > >>addendum to previous post about lurking.... > >> > >>how about hoverer? hovering? " to hang fluttering in the air, to remain > >>suspended over a place or object, to move to and fro near a place, to > >>be in a state of uncertainty, irresolution, or suspense" and i would > >>add, to be in a state of too much to do-ness, not not caring... > >> > >>kl > >> > >>in response to david israel: > >> > >>> so, how about neologize a newer, more congenial self-descriptive? > >>> > >>> if not to lurk, then what? > __________________________________________________ Steven Marks http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html __________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 13:15:59 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Boughn Subject: Re: safdie-bromige In-Reply-To: from "Sylvester Pollet" at Apr 18, 97 12:07:38 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit >On Fri, 18 Apr 1997 08:14:38 -0500 Jeff Hansen said: > >This is all to say that I don't believe in individual vision, and that >writing is irreducibly social. This seems a rather overly simplistic binarism, Jeff. "If the 'poem' of _otherness_ is already begun _infrapsychisme_, our art must equal this 'reseau de telecommunication'; for, as de Beauregard says, 'in it exist "les futurs contingents en acte" but we are unconscious of them.' . . . "The poet does not dwell upon the absence of harmony in historical isolation, as does the contemporary philosopher; he can speak before he knows, and this act connects him to the 'spirit of man' which Olson says 'is always ahead of his ideas.' A transitional period of disharmony, regarded not situatively but morphogenetically, may even contain a new _given_: 'Communal insanity ceases to be insanity'. Paz writes: Destruction was my Beatrice, Mallarme says in a letter to a friend; at the end of the journey the poet does not contemplate the Idea, symbol or archetype of the universe, but a space in which a constellation appears: his poem. "This place of emergence is in keeping with the Minoan gesture of epiphany, which distinguishes it from modern 'primitive' practices that attempt to induce epiphany by a non-ordering intervention instead of a non-central position." --John Clarke, _From Feathers to Iron_: 152. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 13:12:41 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: if this is still under discussion In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 18 Apr 1997 12:37:20 -0400 from On Fri, 18 Apr 1997 12:37:20 -0400 Michael Boughn said: > > "You leave out the true animal bearing of the species and in > the end . . . you pay for it by sex." > > --Charles Olson He got that from Freud, didn't he? Sounds like a quote from Freud's late essay, "Surfer Coyotes and Their Discontents". There's always somebody who understands our true animal bearing. Thoth was an owl. Pith was a dog. Somehow it's always clarified at the podium in some sort of lecture, by some explainer or other with wolf hair. (FERAL BIPED - CAUTION) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 13:22:03 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: The New Party In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII WARNING: LONG POST ON POLITIX, IN RESPONSE TO KENT'S QUERY Kent-- I've been active off and on with the New Party. I might be more active if they were a presence in Georgia, as they are *extremely* oriented toward building right now at the local level. A few people (in Wisconsin?? in the midwest) founded it about 7 (?) years ago; the guiding light is generally considered to be Joel Rodgers, a poli sci academic by trade, who has authored or co-authored many of their public statements. There was a quite impressive essay in the Nation, which to some extent constituted a founding gesture as far as much of the country was concerned, and got hundreds of people (including myself) hooked up with the party. Their platform is in flux and very vague, which has pissed off lots of people on the left, and led to many attacks. The NP says that this is because ultimately they want the folks who are building the party to draw up its detailed credo, and it is still in very formative stages. They claim I think a couple of thousand members, some of whom are of course paper. They have very active chapters in some major cities like Chicago. Their early, tentative outlines of belief/strategy emphasize elections and include what I would call a classic social-democratic set of details. One of their defining features is belief in a tactic called fusion..This would involve placing a candidate (usually a Democrat) on the ballot (for anything from school board to President) under the New Party as well as her own party...The theory is that as the NP swings people to the left, it could demonstarate that it had been indispensible to gettng and keeping that cadidate in office...Said cadidate would then (tho' a Demo and usually quite unwilling) be forced to move invreasingly to the left, to retain NP support and not lose the next election. Fusion was outlawed in most states to help crush the Socialists, Populists and other left electoralist force early in this century. They are hoping to overturn those laws. My modified admiration for them is based on the fact that (at least at first) they were articulating a pretty forthright left/social-democrat attack on the Republicrat structure, which I hoped would pry activists and working class people away from the Democratic obscenity. It remains to be seen, in my estimation, whether they can deliver on that promise. Where they are active with ten or more members they have won city council and similar type elections (sometimes in loose coalition with left-leaning local Demo's) with impressive results. They seem in my experience to be doing better than most leftists of the past two decades at drawing in **real** working class people of all races. (The main argument in favor of fusion, in my opionion, and maybe in favor of the NP, is that most workers who haven't sunk deep into despair, who are somewhat harder to mobilize, still believe the media that the Republicrats are and **can only be** the one and only game in town..Fusion offers a way to draw in folks like that, while they still half-believe that only a vote for a Demo. is not "thrown away." Many friends of mine, including those who think the immediate way forward is mainly electoral (a debateable point certainly), now suspect that the NP is going to repeat the trajectory of Democratic Socialists of America, and become a sunday tea-club entirely subservient for all practical purposes to the Democratic wing of the Republicrats, and thus dead as a political force. I'm not convinced of that, yet. I totally agree with you that there should be an IMMEDIATE merger of all reasonably left parties that think the way forward is (partly) electoral: most green formations, the New Party, the Labor Party, Campaign for a New Tomorrow, and others...(A considerable number are involved with the Independent Progressive Political Action Network, a half-step toward unity, which I've been involved with recently; but many are only half-committed..) Much more could be said, but that's the general outlines of one (highly personal) response to them...They have a good website. As for the Labor Party, which you mention, until their naitonal leadership wholly endorses activism/membership by folks outside certified union locals, and commits to running its own cadidates, it remains a pretty limited option for most of us...And again, many (including some of its own members) believe with considerable reason that as long as it says it is a "party" but won't field its own cadidates, it is going to be simply a wing of the Clintonian ultra-right Demos, as is so much of the labor movement which is responsible for founding it. At the moment, from what I can see, that's a more compelling accusation than the similar one against the NP.. Mark P. Atlanta On Wed, 16 Apr 1997, KENT JOHNSON wrote: > Speaking of Howard Zinn, does anyone know anything about the New > Party? I saw an ad a couple weeks back where Zinn is listed as a > "member" along with Noam Chomsky, Cornel West, Barbara Ehrenreich, > Jim Hightower, and other prominent others. I've also seen the NP > championed by Alexander Cockburn in the Nation, talking about them > winning a few dozen local elections around thecountry in the past > couple years or so. > > What's the history? How does this group differ, say, from the new > Labor Party founded in Philly, or "Nader's" Green party? What would be > the sticking points to overcome before a possible electoral > alliance, for example? (Nader got half a million in only 26 states, > so such unity might have eventual ground-breaking results?) Ten years > ago I could draw a fractal family tree of every little left > splinter group in the country since James Cannon marched out of the > CPUSA politburo singing the Internationale. Now I don't even know > where this glitzy and well-appointed New Party came from. A DSA leap > into third party politics? > > I feel left out and don't want the revolution to start without me. > > Info Ron Silliman? Mark Presjnar? Curious, > > Kent > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 10:32:11 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: the PostModern Dilemma Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" and inside the innermost a dab of foiegras yum yum At 12:20 PM 4/18/97 -0500, you wrote: >imaginary toadstools with >real toadstools inside them > > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 10:51:47 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: if this is still under discussion Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" For years I thought it would be a good thing to write a "folk" tale. Did that (too long to quote). Then a fortune cookie :"If you have broken this cookie with your fingers/ don't lick them." (actually had cookies made with that in them for a party). Recently I thought i'd invent a bathroom graffito, see if it had legs--start it in a few places and watch the spread: "Better to light a match than to curse the methane." Any volunteers for the experiment, my blessings upon you. Is incitement to graffiti against the law? At 01:09 PM 4/18/97 -0400, you wrote: >>Robin Blaser : "poets are the deodorant pucks in the urinal of life." > >Hmmm. May be the same guy who once wrote in the porta-toilet: > >Thank you, your shit >Is our bread & butter. > > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 10:56:11 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: What is white In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 5:56 PM -0700 4/17/97, Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: >uh dodie--didnt have your address--just wanted to say i was[n't] dissing you. >i just latched on to your use of that term Jeffery, As I remember it, I said "white guys" in my original post. It's interesting that you latched onto "white." Why not deconstruct "guys," why not lauch into gender performance here? No offense take. x, Dodie ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 14:01:41 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: SSchu30844@AOL.COM Subject: Re: monk, t. There's a young scholar at NYU, whose name I can't remember, who is currently writing a biography of Monk. He was featured on PBS recently in a program about the lives of minority faculty across the country. Try the American Studies department there for an update? Susan ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 11:07:47 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Safdie Subject: Re: monk, t. In-Reply-To: <33576D7F.6189@cnsunix.albany.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Pierre, What exactly is the "ocl worldwide catalogue" and how can one attain access to it? It seems -- from what it gave you about Monk -- a most useful database! Joe ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 14:18:44 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: if not to lurk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Yes, that's better than my looker, Steve. But it makes me think of another possibility, grazer. to graze. gaze does often have the subtext of awe, which would be hard to maintain some days! sp >How about gazer? Same number of syllables as lurker. No negative >associations; even a gentle one of stargazing, and I don't mean Hollywood. > >tryingly, >Steven > > >On Fri, 18 Apr 1997, Dave Zauhar wrote: > >> spectator? and it's various permutations (as in "hi. I've been spectating >> on this list for 6 years now. . .")? >> >> DZ >> >> >Hoverer is too hard to say, too many syllables. I agree, lurk has sinister >> >connotations, unwarranted here. Look/looker would seem to have fewer, >> >though maybe some old-timey slang ones:"She's a real looker!" I'll keep >> >thinking. It's a good quest. sp >> > >> > >> >>addendum to previous post about lurking.... >> >> >> >>how about hoverer? hovering? " to hang fluttering in the air, to remain >> >>suspended over a place or object, to move to and fro near a place, to >> >>be in a state of uncertainty, irresolution, or suspense" and i would >> >>add, to be in a state of too much to do-ness, not not caring... >> >> >> >>kl >> >> >> >>in response to david israel: >> >> >> >>> so, how about neologize a newer, more congenial self-descriptive? >> >>> >> >>> if not to lurk, then what? >> > >__________________________________________________ > Steven Marks > > http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html >__________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 14:26:33 -0400 Reply-To: Joseph Lease Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joseph Lease Subject: Re: What is white In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII ps: I was stuck by Ginsberg's line in the poem that Douglas Messerli posted recently (a fine poem, by the way): G is answering "multiple identity" question form and says white if Jews are white: I'm really not meaning to start a thread with this (please lets not) only to repeat it (probably for Maria): On Fri, 18 Apr 1997 dbkk@SIRIUS.COM wrote: > At 5:56 PM -0700 4/17/97, Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: > >uh dodie--didnt have your address--just wanted to say i was[n't] dissing you. > >i just latched on to your use of that term > > Jeffery, > > As I remember it, I said "white guys" in my original post. It's > interesting that you latched onto "white." Why not deconstruct "guys," why > not lauch into gender performance here? > > No offense take. > > x, > Dodie > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 13:20:48 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dale Smith Subject: Re: What is white Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" jeffrey timmons wrote: >ok heres my (tentative) conclusion: race is semantically and >epistemologically more complicated than the linguistic and conceptual >categories used to discuss it. itd be more useful i think to be aware of >that. did i make any sense? did i stumble into a morass? do i need a >rope--either to pull me out or string me up? have i gone on too long? yes. It seems like this kind of intellectualized and evasive answer neglects to address the positions of race as they actually function. In addition to the semantic, epistemological, linguistic, and conceptual categories mentioned, there happen to be physical, emotional, and social realities which are met through daily experiences rather than through cerebral--distant--contemplation. Whiteness is a construct, but it's also a reality I live with. Which ever way you think about it, skin says a lot. A body reveals certain traits--Asian, African, European--but it doesn't always give you details of national heritage or even ethnicity, as in a country like Burundi. A white person's categorical discussion of race pretty much reveals the problems Hoa pointed out in her post. Whites own the show, producing their whiteness through their own terms rather than listening and responding to whiteness as others experience it. Finally, it is more than a bit ironic for a white person to determine a "useful" vocabulary for racial discussion. It seems like the appropriate response to questions of race would be not to retreat into vague conceptual terms, but to engage them in a more heart-felt way. As it is, the above seems dismissive and casual, and it removes personal experience from the complicated issues surrounding race. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 14:36:09 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Franco Subject: Re: Joe Dunn Dear Kevin Michael Franco here & your so right "He was, I think, a wonderful writer, and one of the nicest people I've ever met." When he first showed up at Word of Mouth I landed on him to tell him how important the White Rabbit books and the DREAM HOUSE had been for me- actually embarassed him I think - He was struck that we even knew what he had done & who he was. He without question agreed to be the ghost of Lorca for my AFTER LORCA reading- we put him on tape and set the recorded in the midst of the room... his wonderful twang wrapping around the words- and just last summer in introducing Gerrit Lansing and Ken Irby he recounted what just about every younger or older poet in the room was up to... he was just simply a fine man a fine poet & any one interested in Boston, SF or just poetry & having a life in poerty- regardless of prizes or "fame" would have a grand time looking into his work all best Michael "On the branches of Laurel Saw two shadowy pigeons. One of them was the sun The other the moon" spicer- a trans. for Joe Dunn ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 14:39:24 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Peter Jaeger Subject: Re: if not to lurk In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Fri, 18 Apr 1997, Steven Marks wrote: > How about gazer? Same number of syllables as lurker. No negative > associations; even a gentle one of stargazing, and I don't mean Hollywood. > gazer seems a bit too psychoanalytic . . . what about something more pastoral, like "grazer," as in "I'm a grazer in the open fields of poetics... peter ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 14:41:51 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joseph Lease Subject: Re: safdie-bromige In-Reply-To: <199704181716.NAA24939@chass.utoronto.ca> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII well in my opinion you are both absolutely right and it's an extremely generative question to be sure: it's really not an either/or: for example one might say: I don't believe in glorifying individual vision or I don't believe that individual vision can best be looked at as a stable quality but rather as a flux constructed by power and specific cultural and historical entanglements or I don't believe in forgetting that individual vision is also part of political textuality or or or On Fri, 18 Apr 1997, Michael Boughn wrote: > >On Fri, 18 Apr 1997 08:14:38 -0500 Jeff Hansen said: > > > >This is all to say that I don't believe in individual vision, and that > >writing is irreducibly social. > > This seems a rather overly simplistic binarism, Jeff. > > "If the 'poem' of _otherness_ is already begun _infrapsychisme_, our > art must equal this 'reseau de telecommunication'; for, as de > Beauregard says, 'in it exist "les futurs contingents en acte" but we are > unconscious of them.' > > . . . > > "The poet does not dwell upon the absence of harmony in historical > isolation, as does the contemporary philosopher; he can speak before > he knows, and this act connects him to the 'spirit of man' which Olson > says 'is always ahead of his ideas.' A transitional period of > disharmony, regarded not situatively but morphogenetically, may even > contain a new _given_: 'Communal insanity ceases to be insanity'. Paz > writes: > Destruction was my Beatrice, Mallarme says in a letter to a > friend; at the end of the journey the poet does not > contemplate the Idea, symbol or archetype of the universe, but > a space in which a constellation appears: his poem. > > "This place of emergence is in keeping with the Minoan gesture of > epiphany, which distinguishes it from modern 'primitive' practices that > attempt to induce epiphany by a non-ordering intervention instead of a > non-central position." > > --John Clarke, _From Feathers to Iron_: 152. > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 14:44:51 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: William Burmeister Prod Subject: Re: if this is still under discussion In-Reply-To: Mark Weiss "Re: if this is still under discussion" (Apr 18, 10:51am) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii On Apr 18, 10:51am, Mark Weiss wrote: > Subject: Re: if this is still under discussion > For years I thought it would be a good thing to write a "folk" tale. Did > that (too long to quote). Then a fortune cookie :"If you have broken this > cookie with your fingers/ don't lick them." (actually had cookies made with > that in them for a party). Recently I thought i'd invent a bathroom > graffito, see if it had legs--start it in a few places and watch the spread: > "Better to light a match than to curse the methane." Any volunteers for the > experiment, my blessings upon you. > > Is incitement to graffiti against the law? > > At 01:09 PM 4/18/97 -0400, you wrote: > >>Robin Blaser : "poets are the deodorant pucks in the urinal of life." > > > >Hmmm. May be the same guy who once wrote in the porta-toilet: > > > >Thank you, your shit > >Is our bread & butter. Where I went to high school, there was such a poet: The Shithouse Poet. He may be well travelled (I suspect). The one piece I remember, They paint these walls To hide my pen, But the shithouse poet Strikes again. -The Shithouse Poet (aka Jack Spandrift) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 14:47:19 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joseph Lease Subject: Re: safdie-bromige In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Fri, 18 Apr 1997, Joseph Lease wrote: > well in my opinion you are both absolutely right and it's an extremely > generative question to be sure: > > it's really not an either/or: > > for example one might say: > > I don't believe in glorifying individual vision > > or > > I don't believe that individual vision can best be looked at as a stable > quality but rather as a flux constructed by power and specific cultural > and historical entanglements > > or > > I don't believe in forgetting that individual vision is also part of > political textuality > > or or or > > and and and and and the point being something like is there a specific critique and or history that can be done BETTER WITHOUT taking into account both subjectivity and identities, which are plural and in motion ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 15:12:20 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: if not to lurk In-Reply-To: Message of Fri, 18 Apr 1997 14:39:24 -0400 from grazer - a bit too bovine. how about "ruminant"? same problem. how about ringsider? combines insider & grin. if you're not grinning you can always go outside for some fresh air [hack, hack] Jack Spandrift "floats like a tub, stings like a lemon" ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 14:21:07 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christina Fairbank Chirot Subject: Re: if not to lurk In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII how about stalker that old movie "They Walk Among Us" or stealth er (just to inject some hyperbolic paranoia) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 15:27:25 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: Re: if not to lurk -Reply well, there is also "auditing" -- or for that matter, "reading" -- one could be a "consumer" or an "imbiber" or a "tippler" or a "totler" [sp?, as in tea-totling] -- a listserv totler (taking in the totality of discourse) which makes one wonder abt. origins of "tea-totler" (if specifically contra tippler or other such alcoholicals) -- a watcher of posts, a seer of sentences . . . . ? (i'm still not satisfied in this name-quest) d.i. p.s.: grazer does, of course, have specific yuppie-dieting connotations -- (poss. not overbearing ones, but they're there; but must say "grazer" does have some things in its favor -- a chewer of listserv cud) a cud-chewer? -- any other bovine (or other barnyard) techno-speak? >>> Peter Jaeger at 04/18/97 02:39pm wrote: > gazer seems a bit too psychoanalytic . . . what about something more > pastoral, like "grazer," as in "I'm a grazer in the open fields of poetics... ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 12:36:03 PDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hoa Nguyen Subject: Re: what is white Content-Type: text/plain On Thursday April 17 Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: ..."white was used in a homogenizing fashion that failed to be attentive to the pluralities that term is used to organize and did not recognize the virtually indistinct category it is. of course it does have a powerful political resonance" Maybe it would be appropriate to address exactly what this "resonance" is. and what is the "it"? I agree that the term is impenetrable and tricky-- Melville's whale-- and at the same time the "resonance" is what I live with everyday of my life. I understand that "white" is a "concept" designed to divide and imbue power-- to other others-- I am at the receiving end of this in many palpable ways, whether it is people (potential landlords, employers etc.) not getting calling me back because of my "foreign" name or people acting shocked at my perfect English and then "Welcoming" me to America or people saying "You know I know a Vietnamese man. He is *very* intelligent" or people asking me if my parents know kung-fu. Each time I said "people" in the previous, I meant white people. It is not a very satisfying term for me either. I don't know what else to call the experience I have with "white" Americans. ..."race is semantically and epistemologically more complicated that the linguistic and conceptual categories used to discuss it. itd be more useful i think to be aware of that" I am very aware of race and its complications-- you wield incredible privilege as you speak of race as you do above. Race is not a concept to me in my daily experiences. --------------------------------------------------------- Get Your *Web-Based* Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com --------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 14:58:43 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: if not to lurk -Reply Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >well, there is also "auditing" -- >or for that matter, "reading" -- >one could be a "consumer" or an "imbiber" or a "tippler" or a "totler" >[sp?, as in tea-totling] -- I like "reader" best so far. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 15:59:20 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: Re: if not to lurk / stalker Interestingly, "stalker" -- in the great metaphysical sci-fi film by Andre Tarkovsky (based, I think, on novel by Stanislav Lem (presumably titled, like the film, *Stalker*?)-- as was likewise the other great Tarkovsky sci-fi film *Solaris*) -- "stalker", I say, in said film, denoted the fellow who was a guide to the regions of mystery (ergo, something of a guru character, while also an outlaw of a benign sort) -- of course, I don't know what Russian (from Tarkovsky) or Polish (from Lem?) word this English "stalker" translates -- but the English word, there, seemed more along the lines of "stalking the wild mushrooms" -- one who is knowledgeable of the esoterica of a natural environment of some type (the particular natural environment, in this case, being of "The Zone" -- the region of land that it was officially forbidden to visit . . . .) not sure this is support for the nominative candidacy (candidative nomination??) of "stalker" in lieu of "lurker" -- just vital info & idle chit-chat (can you tell the diff ?) d.i. >>> Christina Fairbank Chirot 04/18/97 03:21pm >>> how about stalker that old movie "They Walk Among Us" or stealth er (just to inject some hyperbolic paranoia) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 16:05:43 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Zimmerman Subject: Re: What is white MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hoa Nguyen wrote: > > Dear Jeffery Timmons: > > Ok, I'll bite-- > > but first a couple of questions... > > "Objection"? Why objection? > Are you looking for an answer or making a point? > > This is my answer, if one is wanted-- > > I have been asked this question before by European-Americans ("Whites")-- and it > usually comes up when I talk about my experiences as a woman of color. For > example, when I describe how it feels to be the only poet of color in a given > magazine or at a poetry reading-- I am sometimes asked "Isn't white a color?" > > I started this response by asking a question-- because it has been my experience > that when white people ask me this, it is a way of trying to deny my experiences > of difference-- to dodge the everyday priledges of belonging in the white world > that white people have (without often knowing they have it). So I would like to > know why you asked. Is it because you don't understand what is meant or are you > challenging the construction of whiteness and if so how come you are choosing to > go about it? > > So, my answer is: white people are people of European heritage (A.G., I recall > wrote he was "white if Jewish people are white"). > > Also, I have been very curious about the magazine "Race Traitor" -- plan to buy > it when I have more money-- and was wondering if anyone on this list could > please fill me in-- tell me more about their philosophy behind their "rejection > of whiteness" (or correct me if I have that wrong). Is anyone here involved > with that journal? > > >Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 19:01:46 -0700 > >From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" > >Subject: Re: George Wills and the Imago of Alan Ginsbuerg, > > in the 2nd circle > >To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU > > > >On Mon, 14 Apr 1997 dodie wrote: > > > >> This totalizing "we" is problematic to me. > > > >ok. > > > >> As I see it, he embodied alienation for a bunch of white guys (and a > >> few women such as Maria D.), a fine thing to do--but other people have > >> embodied that for other groups and will continue to. > > > >objection! please define "white." i dont bite. > > > >jeffrey timmons > > > > --------------------------------------------------------- > Get Your *Web-Based* Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com > ---------------------------------------------------------For what it's worth, in a huge, multi-decade study of the history of human genetics which looked at populations in situ before 1492, Luca Cavalli-Sforza and his colleagues report, among other things, that the genes found in Europeans derive 65% from Asia, 35% from Africa--i.e., that there are no chacteristically European [& perhaps no or few characteristically white] genes. So much for _that_ basis of racism! It seems to me that if we think of ourselves in our complete diachrony--at least back pre-Ice, pre-cave--we can think of each other so, too, & slough the too-tight "social constructs" [of race, gender, whatever] for whose construction we bear no primary responsibility, & take our own ancient humanity into our own hands, regardless of what others would have us do with it, to shape ourselves to uses outstripping even the "dromological" rocket-sled Paul Virilio sees us strapped to. In a shade of the pale, Dan Zimmerman ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 16:24:38 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Matthias Regan Subject: Re: if not to lurk -Reply Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >(i'm still not satisfied in this name-quest) The problem might be LURK was best in the first place. From the viewpoint of non-LURKers (in one sense we are all LURKers most of the time) LURK captures the sudden reveal - "Ive been here for years!" (CLOAKed) - and for the LURKER LURK is nice because of MUCK and RAKE and LURCH and LUCK, all of which are very applicable to what's going on: skimming the boring stuff is like RAKING THE MUCK, LUCK and LURCH refer to stumbling over a post you want to write about and for saying something that demonstrates you haven't a clue what's going on. I do it all the time. Matthias Regan Northwestern University Department of Chemistry Phone: 847/467-2132 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 17:41:01 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dave Zauhar Subject: Re: monk, t. Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Would this be Robin Kelley? DZ >There's a young scholar at NYU, whose name I can't remember, who is currently >writing a biography of Monk. He was featured on PBS recently in a program >about the lives of minority faculty across the country. Try the American >Studies department there for an update? > >Susan ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 10:20:13 +1200 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: DS Subject: Re: What is white Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" all dead white guise At 10:56 AM 4/18/97 -0700, you wrote: >At 5:56 PM -0700 4/17/97, Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: >>uh dodie--didnt have your address--just wanted to say i was[n't] dissing you. >>i just latched on to your use of that term > >Jeffery, > >As I remember it, I said "white guys" in my original post. It's >interesting that you latched onto "white." Why not deconstruct "guys," why >not lauch into gender performance here? > >No offense take. > >x, >Dodie > > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 20:08:15 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: if not to lurk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" peter--I like it, I like it (as you'll see from an independent posting!) sylvester >On Fri, 18 Apr 1997, Steven Marks wrote: > >> How about gazer? Same number of syllables as lurker. No negative >> associations; even a gentle one of stargazing, and I don't mean Hollywood. >> > >gazer seems a bit too psychoanalytic . . . what about something more >pastoral, like "grazer," as in "I'm a grazer in the open fields of >poetics... > > >peter ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 20:08:18 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: if not to lurk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Well, I kind of liked the bovine (passivity). And doesn't ringsider combine insider with gnir? Or am I being too literal? Your poem is wonderful--too bad Liston didn't think of that. S. >grazer - a bit too bovine. how about "ruminant"? same problem. > >how about ringsider? combines insider & grin. if you're not grinning >you can always go outside for some fresh air [hack, hack] > >Jack Spandrift > >"floats like a tub, >stings like a lemon" ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 13:06:53 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: Bromige-Safdie Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sounds like a position to occupy in American football. Isnt it "tangled web," and wasnt it Robbie Burns? or Shakespeare? Was it really Donne, or were you, Steven Marks, embodying your point about forgetting and the individual (a provocative one, btw)? "Remember to spell" was a gesture in my piece, towards what i think Jeff may have meant, and you may have, by "compromise." I recall a student (and he wasnt entirely alone in his notion of the individual) who insisted a word could mean, in his poetry, precisely what he wanted it to mean, w/o reference to any dictionary or any common parlance. Some of his classmates told him he was "just jacking off"--as though there were something bad about jacking off. But lets take that (not masturbation, but deliberately uncommunicative behavior) as one pole of poetry, and then, say, Eddie Guest as the other pole. Consider the distribution along this axis in terms of accessiblity, and one sense of compromise will be clear Of course, Henry, repressed material -- dis-contented material -- will show variation from individual to individual. Some of us have our sexuality all worked thru or out, we dont feel uneasy or irritable when its discussed, and can feel or affect indifference about it. I'm that way myself, I merely use sexual reference because I've noticed others often enjoy it. But patriotism is missing from my palette altogether, and will probably erupt from my shadow in the most primitive way one of these poems. Other examples I could have used: that our civilization survives thru murder & enslavement, but that it manages to keep that out of sight most of the time, or at least, unnamed and disembodied; or that if Beale Street could talk, if Beale Street could talk, married men would have to take their beds & walk. But I guess that's the ugly head of sex being reared again. Darn this Occident! I should go live in Thailand, where they have other stuff under their minds. Safdie-Bromige makes me feel like a catch or a belt, but hey, I can live with it. db ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 18:18:49 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: if not to lurk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I graze on the list because I'm too cowed. At 02:18 PM 4/18/97 -0400, you wrote: >Yes, that's better than my looker, Steve. But it makes me think of another >possibility, grazer. to graze. gaze does often have the subtext of awe, >which would be hard to maintain some days! sp > >>How about gazer? Same number of syllables as lurker. No negative >>associations; even a gentle one of stargazing, and I don't mean Hollywood. >> >>tryingly, >>Steven >> >> >>On Fri, 18 Apr 1997, Dave Zauhar wrote: >> >>> spectator? and it's various permutations (as in "hi. I've been spectating >>> on this list for 6 years now. . .")? >>> >>> DZ >>> >>> >Hoverer is too hard to say, too many syllables. I agree, lurk has sinister >>> >connotations, unwarranted here. Look/looker would seem to have fewer, >>> >though maybe some old-timey slang ones:"She's a real looker!" I'll keep >>> >thinking. It's a good quest. sp >>> > >>> > >>> >>addendum to previous post about lurking.... >>> >> >>> >>how about hoverer? hovering? " to hang fluttering in the air, to remain >>> >>suspended over a place or object, to move to and fro near a place, to >>> >>be in a state of uncertainty, irresolution, or suspense" and i would >>> >>add, to be in a state of too much to do-ness, not not caring... >>> >> >>> >>kl >>> >> >>> >>in response to david israel: >>> >> >>> >>> so, how about neologize a newer, more congenial self-descriptive? >>> >>> >>> >>> if not to lurk, then what? >>> >> >>__________________________________________________ >> Steven Marks >> >> http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html >>__________________________________________________ > > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 19:16:25 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: Is anybody still discussing Bob Perelman In-Reply-To: <970418.112512.EST.KWTUMA@miamiu.muohio.edu> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On Fri, 18 Apr 1997, Keith Tuma wrote: > I remember a Barthelme novel, _The Dead Father_, asking this same question. As > I recall the DF can manifest patriarchal hegemony only by standing in Ohio and > pissing into Nebraska. dead but still with us. still with us but dead. something to that effect. jeffrey timmons ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 22:38:53 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: L+A+N+G+P+O and New Party Mark and Kristin: Thanks for the replies on the New Party. For what it's worth Kristin, I was being facetious about the revolution starting without me. I do think that's going to be a while, and I'm sure that the New Party (if global capitalism is brought to an end by something other than a giant asteroid) won't be its red wedge. Why do you see the new Labor Party as "more promising" of overthrowing "global capitalism"? Do you mean its present leadership and current program offer this hope, or do you mean that a political party in this country firmly grounded in working class organizations is an absolute prerequisite for smashing the rule of capital? (geez, now do you all see what I mean about the asteroid? What's coming first?) But Mark: one of the things I find interesting about the NP is that it has apparently gathered old CPers like Zinn, DSA types like Hightower, radical Christians like West, and real independents like Chomsky together under a common banner. Of course, these are just big names, but in the protracted context of the U.S. left's sectarian provincialism, the symbolism of such a gathering doesn't seem insignificant? Is Zinn's presence indicative of a broader CP presence in the NP? Have they all "fused" into it? (Why wouldn't they? The CPUSA's been a loyal social-democratic party ever since Hitler stabbeb Stalin in the back.) And glad to hear from someone who has hung in there through these very "unsocialist" times (and it *will* eventually surely be au courant again to be anti-capitalist!) that the question of unity amongst new and viable left organizations seems to be in the discussion. But don't you think that if such unity comes to be, Mark, that this conspiratorial "fusion" crap should go out the window? Easy for me to say after ten or so years of drawing a Trotskyist pension I guess,(though I can at least say I was an active member in '85 of the San Jose state farm militia in northern Managua, Nicaragua, even if I did wet my pants the one time we came under [heavy] fire). But if there is a "Republicrat" political structure, and if the two parties are primarily there to give vent to the incestual squabbles of this country's ruling class, why participate in the "obscenity", as you put it, of what's going on? Why try to "pull" local Democrats to the "left" via some kind of elaborate electoral blackmail when one can present an honest and unwatered program to the public, stating clearly that there is no hope ever of any kind of true change as long as we keep voting for the parties of imperialism? (is that term still in use?) Why not say clearly that those who are the most reprehensible of all are those "progressive" sophisticates who know the score, but still are seduced to vote for Carter, Mondale, Dukakis, Clinton, and seduce otheres to do so, just so we can have a little lesser evil? (ok, so we got the lesser evil with Clinton--how's it such a breakthrough over Bush? Explain to me what is so different.) I underestimated my numbers in my last post when I said that Nader got half a million votes--he got about 700,000 in 26 states and he barely campaigned. The point would be that this intimates the potential of principled, radical gestures on the local and national arenas, if only intelligent progressives woudl stop doing 69 with the Democrats. If there's going to be a Deb's-like resurgence of independent, radical politics in this country it's going to require a simple but firm step outside the hall of mirrors we're given, don't you think? But what does this have to do with poetry, especially since I titled this post as I did? (I can picture Maria Damon with one of her inevitable two-liners, asking). well, simply this: I've been on this list for about five months now, and I have been startled that there is apparently such little interest in discussing issues related to how poets might integrate themselves into issues of broader political commitment. This seems strange to me since the background to the very existence of this list is a community of poets in 70's and 80's trying to figure out how the act of writing might lead and be led into a broader understanding of political engagement. If the Language movement is evolving into other things, it seems to me (and please correct me if I'm off) to be evolving into a diffuse kind of aestheticism that can go on for weeks slamming Ed Dorn as a fascist, talk intricately about the institutional implications of Bernstein's and Perelman's poetics, but say virtually nothing at all when an honorable publisher of avant-garde writing (the FC2 affair, which happens, luckily, to have come to temporary close) is under government attack and makes an appeal for solidarity. What am I saying Mark Presjnar? I'm rambling, but I think I'm onto something, even if few will respond, because, after all, it's just me. Kent > X-PMFLAGS: 34078848 0 > > WARNING: LONG POST ON POLITIX, > IN RESPONSE TO KENT'S QUERY > > > > Kent-- > > I've been active off and on with the New Party. I might be more active if > they were a presence in Georgia, as they are *extremely* oriented toward > building right now at the local level. A few people (in Wisconsin?? in > the midwest) founded it about 7 (?) years ago; the guiding light is > generally considered to be Joel Rodgers, a poli sci academic by trade, who > has authored or co-authored many of their public statements. There was a > quite impressive essay in the Nation, which to some extent constituted a > founding gesture as far as much of the country was concerned, and got > hundreds of people (including myself) hooked up with the party. > > Their platform is in flux and very vague, which has pissed off lots of > people on the left, and led to many attacks. The NP says that this is > because ultimately they want the folks who are building the party to draw > up its detailed credo, and it is still in very formative stages. They > claim I think a couple of thousand members, some of whom are of course > paper. They have very active chapters in some major cities like Chicago. > Their early, tentative outlines of belief/strategy emphasize elections and > include what I would call a classic social-democratic set of details. > One of their defining features is belief in a tactic called fusion..This > would involve placing a candidate (usually a Democrat) on the ballot (for > anything from school board to President) under the New Party as well as > her own party...The theory is that as the NP swings people to the left, it > could demonstarate that it had been indispensible to gettng and keeping > that cadidate in office...Said cadidate would then (tho' a Demo and > usually quite unwilling) be forced to move invreasingly to the left, to > retain NP support and not lose the next election. Fusion was outlawed in > most states to help crush the Socialists, Populists and other left > electoralist force early in this century. They are hoping to overturn > those laws. > > My modified admiration for them is based on the fact that (at least at > first) they were articulating a pretty forthright left/social-democrat > attack on the Republicrat structure, which I hoped would pry activists and > working class people away from the Democratic obscenity. It remains to be > seen, in my estimation, whether they can deliver on that promise. Where > they are active with ten or more members they have won city council and > similar type elections (sometimes in loose coalition with left-leaning > local Demo's) with impressive results. They seem in my experience to be > doing better than most leftists of the past two decades at drawing in > **real** working class people of all races. (The main argument in favor > of fusion, in my opionion, and maybe in favor of the NP, is that most > workers who haven't sunk deep into despair, who are somewhat harder to > mobilize, still believe the media that the Republicrats are and **can only > be** the one and only game in town..Fusion offers a way to draw in folks > like that, while they still half-believe that only a vote for a Demo. is > not "thrown away." Many friends of mine, including those who think the > immediate way forward is mainly electoral (a debateable point certainly), > now suspect that the NP is going to repeat the trajectory of Democratic > Socialists of America, and become a sunday tea-club entirely subservient > for all practical purposes to the Democratic wing of the Republicrats, and > thus dead as a political force. I'm not convinced of that, yet. I > totally agree with you that there should be an IMMEDIATE merger of all > reasonably left parties that think the way forward is (partly) electoral: > most green formations, the New Party, the Labor Party, Campaign for a New > Tomorrow, and others...(A considerable number are involved with the > Independent Progressive Political Action Network, a half-step toward > unity, which I've been involved with recently; but many are only > half-committed..) > > Much more could be said, but that's the general outlines of one (highly > personal) response to them...They have a good website. As for the Labor > Party, which you mention, until their naitonal leadership wholly endorses > activism/membership by folks outside certified union locals, and commits > to running its own cadidates, it remains a pretty limited option for most > of us...And again, many (including some of its own members) believe with > considerable reason that as long as it says it is a "party" but won't > field its own cadidates, it is going to be simply a wing of the Clintonian > ultra-right Demos, as is so much of the labor movement which is > responsible for founding it. At the moment, from what I can see, that's a > more compelling accusation than the similar one against the NP.. > > Mark P. > Atlanta > > > On Wed, 16 Apr 1997, KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > > Speaking of Howard Zinn, does anyone know anything about the New > > Party? I saw an ad a couple weeks back where Zinn is listed as a > > "member" along with Noam Chomsky, Cornel West, Barbara Ehrenreich, > > Jim Hightower, and other prominent others. I've also seen the NP > > championed by Alexander Cockburn in the Nation, talking about them > > winning a few dozen local elections around thecountry in the past > > couple years or so. > > > > What's the history? How does this group differ, say, from the new > > Labor Party founded in Philly, or "Nader's" Green party? What would be > > the sticking points to overcome before a possible electoral > > alliance, for example? (Nader got half a million in only 26 states, > > so such unity might have eventual ground-breaking results?) Ten years > > ago I could draw a fractal family tree of every little left > > splinter group in the country since James Cannon marched out of the > > CPUSA politburo singing the Internationale. Now I don't even know > > where this glitzy and well-appointed New Party came from. A DSA leap > > into third party politics? > > > > I feel left out and don't want the revolution to start without me. > > > > Info Ron Silliman? Mark Presjnar? Curious, > > > > Kent > > > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 01:19:42 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Nicole Markotic Subject: helene cixous In-Reply-To: from "David Bromige" at Apr 17, 97 01:06:53 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit For anyone interested... Last week, I went to hear Helene Cixous give a paper. The title was something like (apparently she had several versions and permutations of this title on the poster, which I never saw): "My Menagerie & Philosophy: Stigmata." It's funny, but at first I wasn't sure what she was doing. She seemed to be relating a reminiscence about her childhood pet dog and how it bit her, yet this was not a short story, it had been billed as an academic talk. Now, I'm not one to quibble over genre distinctions, still, I didn't think she would be relating the circumstances surrounding her dog's death for merely fictional purposes. But gradually as she talked I realized how immense a thing she was doing, how complex, and how extraordinary to posit the dog's body as text for what was going on around her and her family, growing up in Algeria. To begin at the beginning: She started by mentioning such writers as St. Augustine, Proust, Joyce, and Genet, all as introductions for a literary history of stigmata. She talked about stigmata as being (or her previously thinking of stigmata as being) very catholic, very masculine. And, as it is something that happens to the body without the body's control, one could consider circumcision a form of stigmata. In the same way, violent inscription on the body leaves psychosomatic symptoms and scars. This intro lead into her talk on her dog Fibbs (Phipps?), and how his rage and teeth marked her left foot, his bite became a pain imbedded on her brain. Basically, her family (Jewish, French-speaking) lived within what was then known as Arab Algeria. They were tolerated because her father was a doctor and helped the surrounding neighbours. But once he died, their neighbours began turning against them, for being Jewish and for being "French." The anger and hatred took the form of everyday verbal and physical (rocks thrown at them, etc.) abuse. The dog, too, was abused and did not understand why. Eventually, it began to attack its attackers, and the family had to chain it up within the yard. "We chained up our own incarnation," she said, "we beat the innocent." She thought the dog didn't understand because she didn't understand. The dog became a chained up cross waiting for her in the yard. Fibbs represented a love that was twisted, bloody, criminal. And proved that to live is to survive in chains. "We're all in the process of becoming mean dogs," Cixous said, "one bites one's brother, one bites oneself." She felt, eventually, that she was not his sister (though she had longed for a baby brother when their father brought the dog home), but his assassin. When the dog bit her, his bite was penetrating; a hideous attachment. She realized he was her own raving twin. And at that moment, there was a slight beating on the inside of her brain, a minuscule wound that would not close. An ornament. Poison, she realized, is not hate, but weak love. Somehow, she failed the dog, abandoned it in terror and pity. She did not rush into the flames to save her dog/child. The dog was Job: it had ticks that it suffered from horribly, soft vampires that suckled the dog to death. Neither she nor the dog knew where to go to prevent death from arriving. And, as she would not give her life for him, she could not be there in his death (after biting her, he ran out into the street). Fibbs died because he was outraged at the injustice that surrounded him, yet helpless to do anything but rage. And a wound, at least, brings a sense of immediacy into an intolerable situation. She concluded with the words, "I did not love him there in the garden of war. Not yet, but later." I think it's really fascinating the way, by merely describing her childhood relationship with a problematic pet, Cixous managed not only to discuss a volatile political situation, but also to posit a narrative and analysis of stigmata and how we expect the body to recall violent and emotional events. Just thought I'd post this for those interested but unable to attend. Cheers, Nicole Markotic ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 02:05:09 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: JDHollo@AOL.COM Subject: Sandhyabasha, from a while back This is Anselm Hollo. Colleagues Anne Waldman and Andrew Schelling (who promise to acquire e-mail capability *soon*) have asked me to forward the following in re the Sanskrit Poetics thread: (Anne:) Yes, the somewhat free use of the term "sandhyabasha" doesn't come particularly from a reading of Eliade and was never used or recorded to my knowledge by Kerouac or Ginsberg or other confreres. I had Andrew Schelling's expanded sense of the term and my own desire to present the idea of a secret code--perhaps intuited by other initiates (see the collaboration "Pull My Daisy". We are certainly aware of the literal definitions. Apologies for taking poetic liberties. This only encourages me to more dialogue with the scholars. "Ulatbamsi," more literally upsidedown is probably more accurate term. And of course there's "dakini script" which is what some poets think they're onto, not to mention the sense of poem as "terma," or hidden treasure. What do you think? Not on the Net yet; this intervention is courtesy of Anselm Hollo who alerted me to the discussion. (Andrew:) Confess I'm the source for Waldman's use of the Sanskrit term sandhyabasha. It is quite unlikely Kerouac ever encountered the term, certainly he never used it. Anne ws employing it as a way to line up Kerouac "goofiness" (playful duplicity in language) with older Tantric traditions. Her "upside down" skips across to another word, another tradition, ulatbamshi--which I know best from Charlotte Vaudeville's scholarly work on Kabir--who of course did not write in Sanskrit. I've tended to use the term sandhyabasha without much concern for getting right its original Sanskrit usage. This I hope is okay since nobody knows precisely what it meant in the old days. Hence debate about whether it is sandhya- (twilight) or sandha- (intentional) speech. I've tried to give it a contemporary spin: poetry as a place where language has the "conjoint" (lit. sandhya-) lights of day and night, waking & dreaming--goofiness or double-meaning--as opposed to secret initiate language. I gave my essay book published in Indi the title Twilight Speech. Its USA publication I'd hoped would have the same title, but Leslie Scalapino who published it was alerted by Philip Whalen to how close the term sounds to "twilight sleep" which he said is what women go into when they have spinals for Caesarean sections. So Leslie insisted we come up with another title. As for the Masson/Merwin book, it is a good collaboration. Masson's introduction particularly fine. The choice of poems is surprising--even inspired--though Merwin doesn't know the language so he can swim a bit with tone and meaning. Masson was once upon a time a terrific Sanskritist, but on occasions sloppy. Notice for instance the opening verse to his introduction, which is not in any Sanskrit anyone I know has been able to decode. Not even Masson when I took it to him and said what the hell's this. Said he thinks he got it from his guru. End of Waldman/Schelling transmission (Andrew ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 03:14:06 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: helene cixous Comments: cc: Nicole Markotic MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Nicole -- thanks for the detailed & interesting notes -- I'd only, some time ago, glanced at one of Cixous' books; this does make me want to return to it (or look at others) . . . She seems to remind me a bit (or in a general way) of that other interesting academic experimentalist (so to say), Ann Carson . . . best, d.i. > Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 01:19:42 -0400 > From: Nicole Markotic > For anyone interested... > > Last week, I went to hear Helene Cixous give a paper. . . . . , ......., 1.................., \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/\0/\/////////////////////...' .o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o.o....' ///\\\\\\/////////\/\\\o///\/\\\\\\\\\//////\\\...' .David..........Raphael..........Israel...' [ &/or.office......disrael@skgf.com ] {telephonic.location.202/882-1179} |"...sleuthing out all clues, blues & news"| \\\//////\\\\\\\\\/\///&\\\/\/////////\\\\\\///..' ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 00:54:18 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: swimmers In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Oh I wish I were in California. You would take me to a soccer game. We would have shrimp and lemon ona patio. I could teach you the lyric and you could tell me how to make an English e Oh that would be fun. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 04:06:37 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "k.a. hehir" Subject: of Cheezheads and poetry MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII PoemspoesypoesieposseposessivepronounpossiblypretensiouspretendpoemS the Ever delicious Whippet Lounge presents: kim dawn Kevin Cheezberger Hehir Wayne Woodman Carey Weinberg Charles Glasspool Steve Ford Lynn Cooper Corwyn Liam Birch Melissa Godwalt Naturally pure, that's all I am. Allen Ginsberg(1926-1997) At the Embassy Hotel 732 Dundas Street 438-7127 londonOnt ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 07:47:30 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Re: monk, t. MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Joe Safdie wrote: > > Pierre, > > What exactly is the "ocl worldwide catalogue" and how can one attain > access to it? It seems -- from what it gave you about Monk -- a most > useful database! > > Joe Joe -- the OCLC WorldCat a worldwide database that many university libraries subscribe to, which is how I have access to it. its wepage (but I think you need to be a paid subscriber is: http://www.ref.oclc.org:2000/). -- Pierre -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 09:34:40 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Golumbia Subject: Re: if not to lurk / stalker In-Reply-To: from "David Israel" at Apr 18, 97 03:59:20 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit David Israel wrote: > > Interestingly, "stalker" -- in the great metaphysical sci-fi film by Andre > Tarkovsky (based, I think, on novel by Stanislav Lem (presumably titled, > like the film, *Stalker*?)-- as was likewise the other great Tarkovsky > sci-fi film *Solaris*) -- "stalker", I say, in said film, denoted the fellow STALKER -- as brilliant a movie I know of -- based on the novel ROADSIDE PICNIC by the "Strugatsky Brothers" (Arkady and Boris Strugatsky), Russians. In his MICROWORLDS Lem has an essay on ROADSIDE PICNIC (I believe there are other associations between Lem and the Strugatskys as well). Was released in US translation in late 70s/early 80s along with several other of their books. Very interesting -- but Tarkovsky makes its content quite a bit more "metaphysical" than is the book, which on my reading suffered a bit from that excessive sense of ironic humor from which some of Lem's work also suffers. ROADSIDE PICNIC, if I remember aright, actually says what's in the Zone -- it was more fun not to know (exactly). -- dgolumbi@sas.upenn.edu David Golumbia ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 14:37:50 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "F.A. Templeton" Subject: CCCP MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: QUOTED-PRINTABLE C C C P 7 (Cambridge Conference of Contemporary Poetry) _________________________________________________________ 25-27 April, King's College (Keynes Hall) _________________________________________ FRI: 8 pm Jennifer Moxley, John Tranter SAT: 11 am Pierre-Yves Soucy, Staffan Soderblum 2 pm Papers & discussion: Steve Evans and Jean Khalfa 8 pm Emmanuel Hocquart, Grace Lake, Karen Mac Cormack SUN: 2 pm Performance: Fiona Templeton (in the McCrum Theatre, Corpus Christi College) 4 pm David Chaloner, Deanna Ferguson 7 pm Allen Fisher, Dominique Grandmont, Tracy Ryan All events =A34 (=A32.50 concs), except Saturday afternoon, which is =A33 (= =A32 concs). Tickets at the door or reservations in advance from Ian Patterson, King's College, Cambridge CB2 1ST. For more details contact Ian Patterson 01223-331196 or Peter Riley 01223-327-455. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 08:54:31 CST6CDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hank Lazer Organization: The University of Alabama Subject: Re: monk, t. Thanks to one & all, and especially Herb & Pierre, for the info on Monk biographies.... Hank Lazer ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 09:10:16 CST6CDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hank Lazer Organization: The University of Alabama Subject: offer, discounts Judith Knight (marketing, University of Alabama Press) has asked me to pass along the following offer to the Poetics List. Mark Scroggins' new book is excellent--essays by Barry Ahearn, Michael Campbell, Norman Finkelstein, Burton Hatlen, Kent Johnson, Ming-Qian Ma, Alec Marsh, Ira Nadel, Marnie Parsons, Peter Quartermain, Mark Scroggins, Steve Shoemaker, and Susan Vanderborg.... Fine spring/summer reading? On fine paper, resistant to the stains and smears of tanning oil, croissants, coffee, cream cheese.... Hank Lazer The University of Alabama Press offers a special 20% discount on selected titles for the Poetics List. Upper Limit Music: The Writing of Louis Zukofsky Mark Scroggins, editor Scroggins presents the first collected critical essays to examine all aspects of Zukofsky's writings in all periods of his career. Upper Limit Music is an essential contribution to readings of 20th-century poetry and will prove an important resource for readers and critics of Zukofsky. 304 pages, ISBN 0-8173-0826-1, 1997, $34.95 paper, discount price $27.96 The Seductions of Emily Dickinson Robert McClure Smith Relocating Dickinson within her own culture, Smith reveals both the genius and the continuing impact of this poet's "rhetoric of seduction." "One of the very best readings of this enigmatic poet ever."--CHOICE CHOICE OUTSTANDING ACADEMIC BOOK FOR 1996 RECIPIENT OF THE 1994 ELIZABETH AGEE PRIZE IN AMERICAN LITERATURE 232 pages, ISBN 0-8173-0905-5, 1997, $24.95 paper, discount price $19.96 Songs of Degrees Essays on Contemporary Poetry and Poetics John Taggart With an introduction by Marjorie Perloff A collection of 19 related essays on contemporary American poetry and poetics, published as journal articles between 1975 and 1989, by poet and theorist John Taggart. By focusing on the work of several major and less well-known American experimental poets from the 1930s to the present, Taggart not only traces the origins and evolution of this experimental tendency in recent poetry, but also develops new theoretical tools for reading and appreciating these innovative and complex works. "Taggart's insights . . . are invaluable, for he blends appreciation with analysis, information with inspiration, and logic with imagination."--Philosophy and Literature 272 pages, ISBN 0-8173-0713-3, 1994, $29.95 paper, discount price $23.96 Apocalypse and After: Modern Strategy and Postmodern Tactics in Pound, Williams, and Zukofsky Bruce Comens Comens examines the maturation of modernism into postmodernism through the works of these three major American poets. "This study provides lucid readings of these three poets, and it is valuable to anyone interested in them or in further definitions of modernism and postmodernism more generally."--American Literature 232 pages, ISBN 0-8173-0732-X, 1995, $23.95 paper, discount price $19.16 The Tribe of John: Ashbery and Contemporary Poetry Susan M. Schultz, editor The Tribe of John contributes significantly to how we understand both Ashbery and, more broadly, the complex dynamics of "influence." These essays focus on the new generation of postmodern poets who are indebted to Ashbery's work. "It is a rare critical collection that sends one to the poetry itself (while remaining interesting in its own right)."--Taproot Review 288 pages, ISBN 0-8173-0767-2, 1995, $28.95 paper, discount price $23.16 What Is a Poet? Hank Lazer, editor Eleven major American poets and critics discuss American poetry and the difficult relationship between poetry and criticism. Participants include: Charles Altieri, Charles Bernstein, Kenneth Burke, Donald Hall, David Ignatow, Hank Lazer, Denise Levertov, Marjorie Perloff, Louis Simpson, Gerald Stern, and Helen Vendler. "This book is not only definitive, but it will initiate a dialogue that will continue."--Richard Jackson, editor, The Poetry Miscellany 296 pages, ISBN 0-8173-0325-1, 1987, $32.50 cloth, discount price $26.00 SPECIAL POETICS LISTSERV ORDERFORM EXPIRES 1 JUNE 1997 You MUST use this orderform to get the 20% discount e-mail jknight@uapress.ua.edu FAX (205)348-9201 or The University of Alabama Press, Box 870380, Tuscaloosa, Al 35487-0380 Quantity------Book titles-------------------------------------Price---------Total ___________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________ Residents of Alabama add 4% sales tax____________________________ $4.00 postage for first book, and .50 each additional_________________ --------------------------- Total_________ (Make checks payable to The University of Alabama Press) Bill me through VISA______MasterCard_______Discover___________ Account Number_________________________________Exp_________ Day phone________________e-mail_____________________________ Name______________________________________________________ Address____________________________________________________ City, State, Zip______________________________________________ Ship to: (if different) Name______________________________________________________ Address____________________________________________________ City, State, Zip______________________________________________ If you would like to be sent a catalog of publications check here__________ If you would like your name and e-mail placed on the distribution list for direct electronic announcements of future publications please provide the following information: Name___________________________e-mail________________________ Subjects of interest______________________________________________ Judith Knight Assistant Director for Marketing and Editor The University of Alabama Press Box 870380 Tuscaloosa, Alabama 35487-0380 (205)348-1568, FAX (205)348-9201 e-mail jknight@uapress.ua.edu ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 10:44:10 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Gwyn McVay Subject: Re: Sandhyabasha, from a while back In-Reply-To: <970419020508_184105453@emout05.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII The many associations raised by Anne and Andrew--much gratitude for the time they took--include one I think is particularly interesting: Philip Whalen's tipoff about "twilight speech/twilight sleep," which brings up whole new associations--the liminal states of consciousness: just waking, just sleeping, neither waking nor sleeping. On the list of exercises Bernadette Mayer culled from work at St. Mark's is a direction to write something every day as you are just waking or just falling asleep. Gwyn sleeping furiously (like Noam Chomsky's "colorless green ideas") ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 11:39:27 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Magee Subject: New party, etc In-Reply-To: <3F97617D28@student.highland.cc.il.us> from "KENT JOHNSON" at Apr 18, 97 10:38:53 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Kent wrote: "Why not say clearly that those who are the most reprehensible of all are those "progressive" sophisticates who know the score, but still are seduced to vote for Carter, Mondale, Dukakis, Clinton, and seduce otheres to do so, just so we can have a little lesser evil? (ok, so we got the lesser evil with Clinton--how's it such a breakthrough over Bush? Explain to me what is so different.)" I didn't expect to be playing devil's advocate here (or even responding) but I really do question this logic. I find the New Party very interesting, particularly as a grass roots project that might put up local candidates, etc. I've been paying attention to West's writing/project for a long time and his participation makes me all the more interested. What I'm most familiar with is his engagement with American pragmatism which he says at its best "consists of a future oriented instrumentalism that tries to deploy thought as a wepon to enable more effective action. Its basic impulse is a plebeian radicalism that fuels an antipatrician rebeliousness for the moral aim of enriching individuals and expanding democracy." So, ok, back to Kent's stipulation. If one buys West's description of the"aim," is bashing "progressive sophisticates" who voted for Clinton really a useful way to direct your words and attention? Clinton over Dole or Bush may not have made a big difference to many people on this list but the cuts those Republicans would have made or allowed in education and a host of other social programs would have deeply affected many Americans. Likewise on race: its widely believed that Clinton's Affirmative Action speech written by he and Stephanopolos saved that program - its was effectively dead on the floor until he used public opinion polls (those things we all love to scoff at) to scare conservatives into not tanking it. I think these things matter. I want to stress that I am *by no means* a huge Clinton fan - I disagree with him at least on a weekly basis about something. But I find our contrarian attitude toward maninstream politics facile. Ironically we end up saying roughly the same things about, say, Clinton, or Democrats generally, that the right is saying about them: namely, that they suck. I don't see how this can be productive: save the venom for the people who are really, consciously, deviously and cynically, trying to fuck up this country. If Dole hadn't been such a schmuck Nader's votes in California could have landed us with a Republican president who would have done a shitload of damage. I didn't vote for Nader because I suspect his penchant for self- promotion and because, yeah, I thought it'd be pissing in the wind. Does that make me an inconsequential "sophisticate" and "the most reprehensible"? I hope we all have bigger fish to fry. -Mike. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 11:02:05 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: axis of the universe This recent news re: the universe actually having an axis: Does that mean that all these posts I've been writing with my toes while standing on my head were _really_ written upside down? Kent ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 09:59:18 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: New party, etc Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Let me add a couple and make a brief comment. Greater evil means two more Clarence Thomases on the court. Greater evil means southeast Utah becomes the world's largest open-pit mine. Greater evil means starwars. Clinton is hard to swallow, but it's better than shooting yourself in the foot. If a third, or fourth or fifth, party wants to be effective nationally, it better start as "a grass roots project that might put up local candidates." That's called an infrastructure. Not only would it be hard to win a wider election without such an organization, but if by some fluke a Perot, say, were to get elected he would be essentially powerless, having no elected allies whatsoever. Obviously, like Kent, I think, I'm not one of those who think that violent overthrow, with all the fun that would be for the uncomprehending millions who could stand to lose a little weight anyway, is particularly likely as an avenue for change. At 11:39 AM 4/19/97 -0400, you wrote: >Kent wrote: "Why not say clearly that those who are >the most reprehensible of all are those "progressive" sophisticates >who know the score, but still are seduced to vote for Carter, >Mondale, Dukakis, Clinton, and seduce otheres to do so, just so we >can have a little lesser evil? (ok, so we got the lesser evil with >Clinton--how's it such a breakthrough over Bush? Explain to me >what is so different.)" > >I didn't expect to be playing devil's advocate here (or even >responding) but I really do question this logic. I find the New Party >very interesting, particularly as a grass roots project that might put >up local candidates, etc. I've been paying attention to West's >writing/project for a long time and his participation makes me all the >more interested. What I'm most familiar with is his engagement with >American pragmatism which he says at its best "consists of a future >oriented instrumentalism that tries to deploy thought as a wepon to >enable more effective action. Its basic impulse is a plebeian >radicalism that fuels an antipatrician rebeliousness for the moral aim >of enriching individuals and expanding democracy." So, ok, back to >Kent's stipulation. If one buys West's description of the"aim," is >bashing "progressive sophisticates" who voted for Clinton really a >useful way to direct your words and attention? Clinton over Dole or >Bush may not have made a big difference to many people on this >list but the cuts those Republicans would have made or allowed in >education and a host of other social programs would have deeply >affected many Americans. Likewise on race: its widely believed that >Clinton's Affirmative Action speech written by he and Stephanopolos >saved that program - its was effectively dead on the floor until he >used public opinion polls (those things we all love to scoff at) to >scare conservatives into not tanking it. I think these things matter. I >want to stress that I am *by no means* a huge Clinton fan - I >disagree with him at least on a weekly basis about something. But I >find our contrarian attitude toward maninstream politics facile. >Ironically we end up saying roughly the same things about, say, >Clinton, or Democrats generally, that the right is saying about them: >namely, that they suck. I don't see how this can be productive: save >the venom for the people who are really, consciously, deviously and >cynically, trying to fuck up this country. If Dole hadn't been such a >schmuck Nader's votes in California could have landed us with a >Republican president who would have done a shitload of damage. I >didn't vote for Nader because I suspect his penchant for self- >promotion and because, yeah, I thought it'd be pissing in the wind. >Does that make me an inconsequential "sophisticate" and "the most >reprehensible"? I hope we all have bigger fish to fry. > >-Mike. > > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 15:00:21 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry g Subject: Re: Bromige-Safdie In-Reply-To: Message of Thu, 17 Apr 1997 13:06:53 -0500 from Nothing there I disagree with, David - in fact I think Rene Girard's anthropological theories about civilization being IN ESSENCE repressed mob violence are astonishing, if not totally convincing. I just think that 1) art is not essentially free expression of discontent (I know you didn't say that anyway); and 2) sex is not exactly repressed content anymore in our world. It's become a repressive single-minded culture-ordering conventionality. O tempus, o mores, whatever that means. - Henry Gould "Henry Gould is a coyote" - Jack Spandrift "all my verse utilizes conventional rhyme & metre, and is rated PG-13" - Eric Blarnes ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 12:49:50 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steve Carll Subject: Canessa Park reading cancelled Comments: To: poetics@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Avery Burns has asked me to post a message that the Fanny Howe/Robert Grenier reading scheduled for Sunday, April 20 at Canessa Park in San Francisco has been cancelled. ********************************** sjcarll@slip.net Steve Carll http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/mags/antenym http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/ezines/antenym In seed- sense the sea stars you out, innermost, forever. --Paul Celan ********************************** ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 14:30:41 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: axis of the universe Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >This recent news re: the universe actually having an axis: Does that >mean that all these posts I've been writing with my toes while >standing on my head were _really_ written upside down? > >Kent That depends on where your head is at. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 17:12:49 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark W Scroggins Subject: Re: offer, discounts In-Reply-To: <3A1092F78F4@as.ua.edu> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT I can only blushingly concur with Hark's assessment of _Upper Limit Music_; unfortunately, it doesn't go quite as well with tanning oil as one might wish... Mark Scroggins (lying on the beach as you receive this) ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 17:33:40 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Henry Gould When the goldfinch like rising dough suddenly moves, as a heart throbs, anger peppers its clever cloak and its nightcap blackens with rage. The cage is a hundred bars of lies the perch and the little plank are slanderous. Everything in the world is inside out, and there is the Salamanca forest for disobedient, clever birds. O. Mandelstam (trans. R & E McKane) _The Voronezh Notebooks_ (Bloodaxe Bks, 1996) ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 14:45:25 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: divers Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" George, was that posting meant to be backchanneled to me? True, I frequently suffer from what the shrinks used to term "Ideas of reference", true, California i s full of swimmers, but theyre not all English and you did ask to be taught the English e . Unfoprtunately, old chum, I havent the faintest notion what an English e is. But I do wish you were here. If youre trying to cadge an invite, its always open house to Bowering at the Bromige hovel. I'll throw another woodchip on the barbie. Thanks, Nicole Markotic, for that fine full summary of the cixous talk. Are you now in Philly and not Calgary, or did you post this via a Philly friend? Okay, Henry, indeed we have repressive desublimation (Herbert Marcuse's term, I believe, we read him a lot in the 60s) all over the set now, its what i called a short poem of mine whose only other line plays with Freud's "a child is being beaten," only i substitute "eaten". Jeffrey Timmons: I believe I spelled you Geoffrey the other day. Apologies. The Dead Father who "is dead but still with us, still with us but dead" gives me the chance to plug "Weekend at Bernie's II", a movie I find hilarious whenever dead Bernie comes to "life" as the reggae begins. Anyone else out there--lurker, hoverer, Peeping Tom or Tomasina; E's-dropper, snooper, lazybones, one-of-few-words, freeloader, attendant spirit, spear-carrier, old mole--share my enthusiasm for this no doubt lousy flick? "Playful duplicity in language"--Andrew, that's right up my alley, do I need a sanskrit scholar or is there a handy translation? (This has probably been mentioned already, but I was skimming). Skimming, was t h a t what you meant to write, George Bowering? db. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 17:51:10 -0400 Reply-To: Steven Marks Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steven Marks Subject: Re: helene cixous In-Reply-To: <199704190519.BAA78052@dept.english.upenn.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Thanks, Nicole for your recap of the Cixous talk. My introduction to her was through the Brazilian writer, Clarice Lispector, of whom she has written a great deal. In fact, Cixous has seen her as an exemplary writer of ecriture feminine. If you or others on the list have not read Lispector, I would recommend her with as much enthusiasm as Cixous does. Try _Selected Cronicas_, just out from New Directions. best, Steven __________________________________________________ Steven Marks http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html __________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 18:02:28 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: TELNET JENNIFER-MOO 111.112.113.114 6666 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII TELNET JENNIFER-MOO 111.112.113.114 6666: divide on the carboniferous valley in iced-blue mountainside how can i divide and divide clit mosses, ice and slopes festoon, elide i do will make address in tears she parted in her dark red dress divide by leaving, but i stay, close upon the mountaintop, above the furrowed cwm, alone there are me here recuperating consequences, assimilations, heights and fear i no you he she we they turn dreams that crags brought down to slither into day i did forget a mention, striations and this straddled hearth waters pull down dress beyond the tidal pool, the dry land's dearth i am sorry if i want you where world is actual, green groceries through me she he or we they i against the strata welkin, sward, soma, mead, or sky i divide and divide and divide you know that's beneath me rats and panties, above me crags and bats how jennifer came when jennifer came when fluorescent homes, your dark red dress and then now i will write to no one you turned, slit furrows of your breasts in sun now lit nipples shadowed, moss springs beneath me wow i will write to no one i page and multiply beneath your breasts in sun ______________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 19:57:25 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Thompson Subject: Re: Sandhyabasha, from a while back Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I am one of the Sanskritists who responded to David Israel's query re this term. I'm not surprised that Kerouac didn't read Eliade, whose books on yoga and shamanism appeared in accessible English editions only in the sixties [although an early English edition appeared in 1958]. However, I am *very* surprised to hear that none of his confreres were reading Eliade. Besides the explicit reference to Eliade in Rothenberg's 1968 book, I recall discussions of archaic poetics which I had in the 70's with Diane Di Prima, from which I got the impression that she, and her confreres, were definitely familiar with Eliade. Perhaps my memory is unreliable, or perhaps I was generalizing from what appeared to me to be her obvious familiarity with Eliade's ideas. George Thompson ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 20:24:40 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Kellogg Subject: Re: Perloff on Yasusada Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 04:26 AM 4/15/97 -0700, Rachel Loden wrote: >Marjorie Perloff's article "In Search of the Authentic Other: the Araki >Yasusada 'hoax' and what it reveals about the politics of poetic >identity," is available on the web at: > >http://www-polisci.mit.edu/BostonReview/BR22.2/Perloff.html > >It is, as you might imagine, fascinating, especially in present company, >and will start (or renew) many arguments. I've just read the article and find it typically excellent on many counts; especially in the way it contextualizes Yasusada through other Japanese poets, it's pretty much an education in itself. I _do_ think that some of its argument regarding poetic identity is a bit strained, since the editorial stances of _Arial_ and _APR_, for example, -- both of which published Yasusada poems -- are quite divergent. That strand of the argument seems to me to have more to do with Marjorie's current concerns in general than with the Yasusada issue in particular. I would like to know what Kent Johnson (who's on this list) thinks of the piece. But given his generally nimble responses to queries on this score, I don't imagine he'll be all that direct. ;-) I have two other questions: 1) are the Yasusada poems going to be published in book form? I would hope so. 2) what comparisons should be drawn between the Yasusada and the Sokal affairs? Cheers, David ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ David Kellogg kellogg@acpub.duke.edu Box 90023, Duke University (919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708 FAX (919) 660-4381 http://www.duke.edu/~kellogg/ There is no mantle and it does not descend. --Thomas Kinsella ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 21:07:19 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dave Zauhar Subject: Re: Perloff on Yasusada Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >I have two other questions: > >1) are the Yasusada poems going to be published in book form? I would hope so. > >2) what comparisons should be drawn between the Yasusada and the Sokal >affairs? I can't answer number one except to say, I hope so too. As for number two, I would just say there is one key difference: The poems of Yasusada "fooled" the editors because they were good poems (I seem to remember Bob Perelman's MLA paper addressing this issue in more historical detail than I can muster). On the other hand, Sokal's _Social Text_ piece (should have) embarrassed the editors because it is clearly not a compentently-written article. Regardless, of whether Sokal only decided it was a hoax _post facto_, as Andrew Ross maintains, it should never have been published in the first place (and indeed, if the author had been a graduate student or a physicist at North Dakota State or someplace as marginal, then if would have been returned w/o a serious reading). Yours in the starry dynamo Dave Zauhar ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 22:11:06 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: Ann Carson Comments: cc: Hugh Steinberg MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Poetas, this morning, in a note anent Nicole Markotic's precis of Helene Cixous' "paper presentation," I remarked (tangentially) -- > She seems to remind me a bit (or in a general way) of that other > interesting academic experimentalist (so to say), Ann Carson . . . Hugh Steinberg backchanneled a one-sentence (well, two sentence) question, inquiring abt. said Carson. I've written out a somewhat rambling (but poss. useful withal) reply/ -- and it doesn't seem I'd be breaching principles of nettiquette in this instance if I flip this from back-channel to front-burner -- which I'll do only bec. I like Carson's work and suspect others may share this interest. I'm sure there are apt to be others more versed in Carson than am I; but here's what little I know so far . . . Hugh, -- you ask, > Could you tell me more about Ann Carson? Where to start, etc. I'll tell you what bit I know, which is somewhat anecdotal. First to note, am quite sorry I missed a reading here in DC by Carson -- she recently appeared at the rather distinguished venues (& pricy -- one of few places that'll charge, I think, $12 for privilege of hearing a poet): the Folger Shakespeare Library -- sharing the bill with John Ashbery no less. Anway, my encounters w/ Carson began when I chanced on her remarkable book EROS: THE BITTERSWEET at a booshop some six years ago. I browsed, purchased, read it thru, & straightaway read it thru a 2nd time (rare for a slowish reader like me) -- I don't have a copy of this volume on hand at this point (and it's been, now, some years since reading) -- but Carson's EROS made an impression, lingers in mind, and seems to bid for a further re-read. The main topics are the "nature of": knowledge love reading writing and to explore this terrain, Carson relies on sources from the classical Greek (mostly) -- especially (as I recall) on both Socrates and Sappho. Her citations and elucidations of both of these (very dissimilar) writers seem superb. Also recall an interesting discussion of a section of the Odyssey involving an anecdote that seemed to reflect on the "nature of writing per se" -- or some such. She translates and elucidates the poem from Sappho with image of an apple on the high branch (beyond reach) to discuss the nature of desire and its relationship to knowledge -- a fine discussion which deepened my appreciation & regard for Sappho, must say. Similarly, her creative consideration of certain passages from Socrates seemed both delightful & brilliant. One felt, with this vol., that one was in the presence of a mind discovering genuine things, making fine leaps, and sharing it all in a way that proved neither off-putting (for its specificity) nor muddled (for its breadth). Poss. a model of the book-length essay. I next encountered Carson's work in the pages of *The American Poetry Review.* (If one were to pore over issues of that publication of the past half-dozen years, I think one would find a number of items from Ann Carson. I've not, unfortunately, much kept up with APR in the past couple years -- but I recall seeing two or three presentations of Carson's work -- her translations as well as her own poems -- within the span of a year or two, prob. circa '93). Carson's poems engaged (in at least one instance) the "idea of God" in interesting & likeable (to me) ways. Her translations seemed rather quirky in (likewise) likeable ways -- for instance, I recall a (supposed) translation that made reference to Deng Xiaoping and tossed out some mention of "small bottle" (this would be a likely, literal rendering of xiao-ping -- at least there is a xiao which means small & a ping which means bottle) -- and now I'm not at all sure whether this was (supposed to be) a "translation" from Chinese or rather (equally likely) from ancient Greek! (I think it was the latter.) Notwithstanding this playful sort of anachronism, I recall being left with the impression of a lively (& "good") translation . . . I've also seen -- somewher in some bookstore -- a cassette recording of Carson's lecture on some or other classics topic (unfortunately didn't snap it up). Further: In the [Village] Voice Literary Supplement -- abt. 3 years ago? -- there appeared an article that amounted to an awestruck appreciation of Carson's intellect & writing. (This article may've included some bit of an interview with her.) Ann Carson is based at a University in Canada (McGill, I think), where she's a professor of Classics. From all evidence I've seen, she's a new breed of classicist -- or perhaps a breed apart. I look forward to further enjoyment of her writing; the above is what I know at the moment. best, d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 23:14:28 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Gwyn McVay Subject: Re: Perloff on Yasusada In-Reply-To: <199704200024.UAA28697@argus.acpub.duke.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII >>>_Arial_ David K., I have to jump in & be one of the pedantic ones--Arial is a font, & /Aerial/ the name of the mag--& I do not think the one is set in the other-- but when counting resemblances, what about the Ern Malley affair in Australia? I think the comparisons are many & ripe. Yours, Gwyn ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 23:38:13 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Kellogg Subject: Re: Perloff on Yasusada In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > David K., I have to jump in & be one of the pedantic ones--Arial is a > font, & /Aerial/ the name of the mag--& I do not think the one is set in > the other-- Righto -- ma faute. I always misspell it, tho I had a copy of the Barrett Watten issue right by my desk. > but when counting resemblances, what about the Ern Malley affair in > Australia? I think the comparisons are many & ripe. Lemme preface this by disagreeing a but with Dave Zauhar on Sokal. It is a lot of things, but one thing it ain't is an incompetently written article. I agree that it should of course have been rejected, but the fact that it wasn't has, as even Ross's self-justifying account of his role in the fiasco suggested, a lot to do with the expectations created by Sokal's position as physicist. Sokal's hoax has different purposes, of course, and it's not nearly as subtle as the Yasusada case, but I think the differences there are of degree rather than kind. Not so with Malley methinks. First off, of course, Malley was created to ridicule the editors of _Angry Penguins_ in a wholesale fashion, and the poems were notoriously composed in -- what? -- an afternoon? Yasusada seems much more carefully constructed; it obviously took a long time to put him together -- although both "poets" include clues to their nonexistence in the poetic texts (and in Yasusada's case, in the notes and English exercises in APR). Further, Yasusada is _not_ lampooning anything, at least as I understand that; he seems to exist more as an insider critique, to raise questions rather than attack practices. Another question about Yasusada comes to mind. Perloff's article nicely points out some words, like "scubadiver," in the poems that are obviously anachronistic. She also cites a poem dated 1945 that contains the term "big bang". Does anybody know when the term was coined? Theories about the universe expanding were based on Edmund Halley's observations and arose I think in the late 1920's. And the Catholic Church officially embraced the Big Bang as a proof of God in 1951. So when _did_ the term arise? If it's late (1945-1950, say) then "big bang" is also anachronistic. Cheers, David ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ David Kellogg Duke University kellogg@acpub.duke.edu University Writing Program (919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708 FAX (919) 660-4381 http://www.duke.edu/~kellogg/ There is no mantle and it does not descend. -- Thomas Kinsella ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 11:11:45 +0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rebecca Weldon Subject: Angkarn by Ginsberg Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" The Poet's Testament I wrap the sky around myself to keep away the cold and eat starlight late at night to take the place of rice. Dewdrops scatter below the sky for me to find and drink, and out my poems flow to greet the morn, to last the age. My heart, sacrificed to its grave, gains unworldly powers; the spirit flies to lands of dreams the far side of the sky. It seeks divinity in Heaven and brings it back to earth to soothe the sand and grass, bringing happiness, bringing peace. My purpose in composing poems is to salvage the soul. -Angkarn Kalyanapong translated by Allen Ginsberg. I came across this translation in "Three Thai Poets", 1978, Sathirakoses-Nagapradipa Foundation, Bangkok In the preface, S. Sivaraksa states that Angkarn, Naowarat Pongpaibool and Witayakorn Chiengkul partipated in ASEAN Poetry 78 held in Jakarta, Indonesia that July. Angkarn's expenses were, in part, defrayed by a Ford Foundation grant. The Sathirakoses-Nagapradipa Foundation published the bilingual "Three Thai Poets" (Thai-English) to mark the event. The above poem was first published in the Social Science Review of Silapakorn University in 1962. The English translation also appeared in Tenggara (Malaysia), Solidarity (Philippines) and Quadrant (Australia). Does anyone know the year it was translated (the year is not provided in this edition)? Although the English translation does not take the traditional Thai form, Ginsberg communicated the sentiment superbly, proving that it takes a poet to translate one. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 00:20:56 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steven Marks Subject: Re: Ann Carson In-Reply-To: <199704200212.WAA29390@wizard.wizard.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII David, your memory of Anne Carson's _Eros: The Bittersweet_ is quite good. I'm no expert on her or things Classical, but this is a book that I hope to reread as well. I read this book in connection with a review I wrote of her book _Plainwater_ which contains a stimulating mixture of poems and essays. And it is delightfully never clear which is which. The review was at the web site for the Boston Book Review, but I don't think it is there anymore. For anybody who might want to read it, it's at my home page at the address below. Click on "Reviews" when you get to the welcome page. Here's two samples from _Plainwater_ (Knopf). The first doesn't do the lines justice since they are in different type faces and sizes in the book. fr. 22 Half Moon He awakens early. Half moon through the pines at dawn sharp as a girl's ribcage. And the second sample from "Mimnermos: The Brainsex Paintings" ...I can't distill my history into this or that home truth and go plunging ahead composing miniature versions of the cosmos to fill the slots in your question and answer period it's not that I don't pity you it's not that I don't understand your human face is smiling at me for some reason it's not that I don't know there is an act of interpretation demanded now by which we could all move to the limits of the logic inherent in this activity and peer over the edge but everytime I start in everytime I everytime you see I would have to tell the whole story all over again or else lie... As I typed the above, I realized where some of the idea I had about forgetting (or ignoring as Hugh suggested to me backchannel) and individuation comes from. Geez, I'm just full of recommendations today! __________________________________________________ Steven Marks http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html __________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 14:25:14 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Philip Mead Subject: Re: Perloff on Yasusada In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Not so with Malley methinks. First off, of course, Malley was created to >ridicule the editors of _Angry Penguins_ in a wholesale fashion, and the >poems were notoriously composed in -- what? -- an afternoon? Yasusada >seems much more carefully constructed; it obviously took a long time to >put him together -- although both "poets" include clues to their >nonexistence in the poetic texts (and in Yasusada's case, in the notes and >English exercises in APR). Further, Yasusada is _not_ lampooning >anything, at least as I understand that; he seems to exist more as an >insider critique, to raise questions rather than attack practices. Yes, the immediate target of the Malley hoax was Max Harris and John Reed, editors of _Angry Penguins_, although as McAuley and Stewart stated, they were the epigones, in their view. Their real target was Herbert Read, as critic/advocate of the avant-garde and the English Apocalyptic group. But the hoax broke before the English half of the target could be drawn in. But David's point about the careful construction of Yasusada vs. Malley probably needs the rider that while the Malley poems were written in an afternoon (apart from the first one, "Durer: Innsbruck 1495"), the context was English Apocalyptic writing, latter-day surrealism, automatic writing etc. That is, the chief virtue of the Malley poems as McAuley and Stewart (the perpetrators) argued was that they were produced _without_ the "sovereign power of the shaping intellect." So it was exactly the free play of the unconscious/imagination together with textual pastiche that produced "hoax," that is, bad, poetry. The problem, of course, was that, as Harris, Sidney Nolan, and many young Australian poets in the more than fifty years since the hoax have recognised, it was exactly the eruption of the unconscious (or whatever we want to term it) and the zany pastiche (picked up by Kenneth Koch for _Locus Solus_ as a piece of [homoerotic?] collaboration) that gave the poems their strange appeal and resonances (as well as their bathetic clunks). "Ern Malley" became, and remains, a kind of rallying point for radical modernist, postmodern and avant-garde writing in Australia. For the moralising anti-modernists of mid-century Australian literature, Ern Malley represents the the possibility of an entirely amoral art. (Max Harris was prosecuted for pusblishing obscene material, that is, poetry of indeterminate meaning.) In a chapter I'm currently writing, I argue that in fact Malley becomes the _authentic_ origin of Australian (post)modernism. Anyone thinking of embarking on a hoax should study the reception of historical hoaxes, they never seem to have quite the effects they were designed to. Philip Mead Philip Mead Department of English & European Languages & Literatures University of Tasmania GPO Box 252-82 Hobart TAS 7001 Australia (03) 6226 2352 (voice) (03) 6226 7631 (fax) ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 00:38:58 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: stalker / Tarkovsky / Lao Tse / synchronicity Comments: cc: David Golumbia MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT David Golumbia -- thanks for your detailed info abt. Stalker & Roadside Picknick -- I'd never heard of the latter novel. I guess Tarkovsky's films Stalker & Solaris seem a pair -- a suite of two, so to say -- & hence my (wrong) assumption abt. authorship of the novel behind the former (since Lem had written the Solaris novel). Speaking of Andre Tarkovsky, these literary references in his work have especially interested me: * in STALKER, he gives -- in mystic voiceover (I think while the camera is doing slow pans of water & objects in water -- something the camera does a lot of in this film; -- all this by way of giving some sense of "what life is like" in "the ZONE) -- a few well-known verses from the Tao Te Ching [Dao de Jing] attributed to Lao-Tse. It's been years since I've seen the film (or read the TTC), but as I recall, the lines quoted [w/o attribution] are those that compare the Tao to water . . . noting water's pliancy, mobility -- it always seeks the lowest place (etc.) . . . * in THE SACRIFICE (which was Tarkovsky's final film -- he made 7 movies in his life, before succombing to cancer, in the mid-'80s) -- there's a curious and (I'd say) significant reference to the work of Carl Jung. One tends to feel a kinship w/ Jung (if not actual influence) in Tarkovsky's work generally -- and in this late case, one finds, it seems, a sort of hat-tip by the filmmaker, saying, in effect: yes, it's to Jung that I'm referring here. More specifically, the anecdote in question is found in (if I recall aright) a footnote in one of Jung's essays on the topic of Synchronicity (CGJ's own coinage for what he termed "acausal connections"; -- I don't much care for his "acausal" arguments -- he was bending over backwards trying to justify basic subtle matters for his skeptical rationalist milieu -- but anyway the material of synchronicity is, even so, fascinating & important) . . . anyway, early on in the movie, the postman -- who rides a bicycle and delivers a medieval map of the world, as a birthday present to the eccentric chap whose birthday is to be celebrated in the course of the weekend chronicled in the film -- this postman remarks that he is a "collector of incidents." What kind of incidents?, he's asked. By way of answer, he tell's Jung's anecdote. He says, this is the sort of incident I collect (& tells the tale). The tale involves a woman during the 2nd world war (early on), who went to have a photograph of her son taken. But due to war circumstances, she had to fell the country the very next day, was separated from her son -- and never had the film developed (it was abandoned with much else). Years later, in America, she sits for a photograph herself. The photo is developed, and it proves to be a double-exposure: her image is combined with that of her son (the film having never been developed, but, rather, re-used) . . . the postman tells this story, as an example of one of the many incidents he has "collected" (meaning, it seems, researched & verified) -- and by this means, the filmmaker serves to signal the viewer that THIS is close to the essential matter to be delved into as the film unfolds . . . . best, d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 01:30:19 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Jennifer oozing white death PILL="#MEDACANE" BGCOLOR="#BILE" STARE AT ME="#SHAME" TVSTARE AT ME="#0000FF" ASTARTESTARE AT ME="#FF0000" BACKGROUND="windowpane.jpg"< >H3<>BSTARE AT ME/BSTARE AT ME A HREF="#gg"<.>/A A NAME="gg"<>/A IMG SRC="ooze.jpg" TONGUE=7 TEETH=160 GUMS=200 IMG SRC="dead_hell.jpg" ? TONGUE=5 TEETH=143 GUMS=167<>IMG SRC="legs.jpg" TONGUE=10 TEETH=100 GUMS=100<>A HREF="slip them in.htm"/A< >A HREF="legs.htm" /A<>/H3< ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 22:45:06 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: no, well I mean yes Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dear DaVID indeed that message was sposed to be backchannelled to you, and what I did was reply to a message of yrs, and as it was addressed mainly to me, I hadnt noticed that it was on the net, so it just goes to show: you never can tell. My brain is busted because I have been marking for 3 weeks, and also because I got a heartshaped box of Valentine's chocolates for 69c Canadian, and ate them all and there was only one chewy one. Now, is that fair? And I had gone to that store to get a flashlight, so life is confusing, and i am giving them F. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 18 Apr 1997 23:44:21 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: Well no I mean yes Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dear George, University gets out so early in Canada, or is it only BC? When I attended UBC, I was told we got out that early because we were wanted in the forests to fell things. Was that T, or F? So these 3 weeks of hell open upon a paradise of summer hols. What will you do with yourself now the stake has gone thru the heart of another academic year? Travel? Lie on the beach at Kits? Garden? Speaking of hearts, that was naughty of you to scarf every last chocki & not save any for your sweetie. --Does Valentine's Day fall six weeks later in Canada, the way your Thanksgiving is six weeks earlier? It has to do with the northern seasons, I suppose. People's plumbing stays frozen until April? F, T? Broms ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 00:10:09 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: yasusada I'd meant to mention in my last response to David K. that for those interested there is an intelligent exchange about Yasusada in the recent issue of the fine, upstart Countermeasures, and there is another "introductory" article in the November issue of Lingua Franca, and two pieces by Eliot Weinberger in the VLS/Village Voice. There're some other things from abroad too, which I can provide info on backchannel to those interested. Chris Reiner's appropriatly samizdat-like Witz will be publishing a long essay on AY by Mikhail Epstein, Russia's preeminent critic of poetry, and Joe Napora's next BullHead will have a special discussion section in their next issue, though the other special section there on Jack Clarke will be just as or more important. The Boston Review will have a number of people responding to Marjorie Perloff's essay in their next issue, though I don't know who they will be. (feeling genuinely sorry for those trying to apologize for class collaboration), Kent ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 02:32:53 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: Perloff on Yasusada Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" David Kellogg Writes: >Another question about Yasusada comes to mind. Perloff's article nicely >points out some words, like "scubadiver," in the poems that are obviously >anachronistic. She also cites a poem dated 1945 that contains the term >"big bang". Does anybody know when the term was coined? Theories about >the universe expanding were based on Edmund Halley's observations and >arose I think in the late 1920's. And the Catholic Church officially >embraced the Big Bang as a proof of God in 1951. So when _did_ the term >arise? If it's late (1945-1950, say) then "big bang" is also >anachronistic. According to Timothy Ferris's book "Coming of Age in the Milky Way," the term "Big Bang" was coined by astrophysicist and science fiction author Fred Hoyle as a derisive commentary on Georges Lemaitre's theory that the universe began as a singularity which erupted in what Lemaitre called the "Big Noise" in a 1933 New York Times magazine article. Unfortunately, Ferris doesn't cite a date when Hoyle first used "Big Bang" in public. Hoyle published his book on the steady state theory in 1948, so my hunch is that it's not quite an anachronism. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 11:05:33 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: John Kinsella Subject: CCCP, Cixous, and J.H. Prynne In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Unfortunately Deanna Ferguson will not be able to appear as advertised on the CCCP programme which Fiona Templeton just posted, but there will be readings from her work during the scheduled appearance time. _Salt_ will also look to carry some of her poems next year. Talking of _Salt_, I enjoyed the posting regarding Helene Cixous; the August issue of _Salt_ carries (both in French & in trans- lation) a fascinating piece called "Savoir" by Cixous, which any "short-sighted" readers out there will especially appreciate. Also, for those interested in progress reports re the Folio(Salt) publication of J.H. Prynne's _Complete Poems_, we have an Australian release date of late August and a US/UK release date of late October. Fremantle Arts Centre Press are combining with Folio on distribution so we'll get the book everywhere. Oh, and great news, there's a new manuscript of Prynne's that Equipage hopes to publish in time for the CCCP and that has also been included in the Complete Poems - "For The Monogram". The opening epigram goes: "Why should the dog ever be displeased _spontaneously_?" -- Leibniz, _Theodicy_, intro. by Austin Farrer (1951). All the best Yours John Kinsella ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 08:31:50 -0400 Reply-To: BobGrumman@nut-n-but.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bob Grumman Subject: Re: A Word For Lurker MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Weird, after several days of reading others' attempts to find the right word for a person auditing, or lurking through(?), or g(r)azing on, or cetera, this site/discussion, and being irritated with myself for not thinking of anything to contribute, I've suddenly remembered that the proper word already exists: SURFER! Or am I really out of it? But if "surfer" is the right word, it taxonomizes very neatly into the two main types involved: the SERFER (or commie sympathizer) and the PSURFER (or degenerate apolitical intellectual). Should I go back to bed? Bob G. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 09:21:34 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Field of Roses Subject: Re: no, well I mean yes Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >My brain is busted because I have been marking for 3 weeks, and also >because I got a heartshaped box of Valentine's chocolates for 69c Canadian, >and ate them all and there was only one chewy one. Now, is that fair? And I >had gone to that store to get a flashlight, so life is confusing, and i am >giving them F. gee george, hardened by one caramel? "everyone starts with a c" - bpNichol Linda Charyk Rosenfeld ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 10:21:52 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM Subject: Re: Perloff on Yasusada >I would just say there is one key difference: The poems of Yasusada >"fooled" the editors because they were good poems Dave Z-- As I believe the first editor to have published Yasusada I should chime in that in fact I wasn't "fooled" precisely because the piece was so good. I said so to a number of people at the time. There are moments in the piece that are just a little too perfect, & the speakers a little too well informed for no one in the community to have heard of them (that's how it struck me in 1990, anyway). I published it because I thought it good, discursively & aesthetically, though I was quite curious about its origin. Oh, & it's _Aerial_, not Arial-- which is actually a new one, usually people misspell it Ariel. --Rod Smith ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 11:36:38 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dave Zauhar Subject: Re: Perloff on Yasusada Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Thanks to Rod Smith for the editor's eye view of the event. I'd just like to point out that I put scare quotes around "fooled" to account for what were obvously a wide range of reactions to subsequent revelations, as well as to a variety of possible initial responses upon first encountering the poems. Not very precise, but I had just gotten home from a 6-7 hour happy hour. However, I stand by my initial assessment of Sokal's article, in spite of not having access right now to Social Text to help me make my case. Finally, I wonder if anyone has ever thought about how one's perception that a poet might be an invention alters perception of the work. Ted Berrigan and Ron Padgett (according to Padgett's memoir) assumed that F.T. Prince was such a poet. I remember reading _Ted_ when it came out then looking for Prince's work, and upon finding it, being convinced that Prince was another Ern Malley, so much so that when I encountered his entry in a DIctionary of Literary Biography, my first reaction was to say, "ha, fooled them!" But as the artist currently known as F.T. Prince put it: "To the vigilance of my exertions a lax pause" Dave Zauhar >>I would just say there is one key difference: The poems of Yasusada >>"fooled" the editors because they were good poems > >Dave Z-- >As I believe the first editor to have published Yasusada I should chime in >that in fact I wasn't "fooled" precisely because the piece was so good. I >said so to a number of people at the time. There are moments in the piece >that are just a little too perfect, & the speakers a little too well informed >for no one in the community to have heard of them (that's how it struck me in >1990, anyway). I published it because I thought it good, discursively & >aesthetically, though I was quite curious about its origin. Oh, & it's >_Aerial_, not Arial-- which is actually a new one, usually people misspell it >Ariel. > > >--Rod Smith ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 10:00:05 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Ryan Whyte Subject: in no time Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII The edges of a prison are delineated by aluminum siding like the zipping of wet rag along a striated vinyl tablecloth. Populated by ghosts, Obelisk watched at the perimeter while shades enforced their very existence upon small children huddling. With splashing gravel Cars move over arterial routes, shuttling Hosts of shades who won't give you the time of day. Disengaged from the homestead the night radio transmits George Grant's words among fields indifferent to electricity. Moving shades make way, leaving wakes to toss mustard aloft. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 12:59:09 -0400 Reply-To: BobGrumman@nut-n-but.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bob Grumman Subject: Withdrawel of "surfer" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sylvester Pollet just e-mailed me the correct definition of "surfer," to wit, one who moves from website to website, rather than one who lurks through a single site. So I withdraw my suggestion. Too late to go back to bed, though. --Bob ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 12:22:10 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: the withdrawal of surfer Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" May I suggest *sufferer*, in the sense of Jesus' "suffer the little children to come unto me." db ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 16:19:14 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: the withdrawal of surfer Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" David, That's pretty close to what I imagine the experience to be (of just listening/reading). But maybe it's not spelled that way--more like a pine or spruce, soughing as the wind(y) pass through it? More as in "those poor soughin' bastids!" sp >May I suggest *sufferer*, in the sense of Jesus' "suffer the little >children to come unto me." db ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 14:07:43 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: What white In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Fri, 18 Apr 1997, Dale Smith wrote: timmons: > >ok heres my (tentative) conclusion: race is semantically and > >epistemologically more complicated than the linguistic and conceptual > >categories used to discuss it. itd be more useful i think to be aware of > >that. > > It seems like this kind of intellectualized and evasive answer neglects to > address the positions of race as they actually function. no quite the opposite actually: it encourages one to be aware (dare i say sensitive?) to the permutations of difference and the difficulties of making ethno-assumptions. i dont apologize for an "intellectualized" answer and i dont accept as "evasive" an attempt to separate the wheat from the chaff--as it were. your point of addressing "the positions of race as they function" is taken to heart--however much the criticism of "cerebral--distant--contemplation" is inaccurate. i like to think of my self as somewhat influenced by enlightenment practices: the general AND the particular. > A body reveals certain traits--Asian, African, European--but it doesn't > always give you details of national heritage or even ethnicity, as in a > country like Burundi. > A white person's categorical discussion of race > pretty much reveals the problems Hoa pointed out in her post. this two statements evoke for me precisely the difficulties i mentioned in my post: that the racialized body is both a sign of ethnicity but problematically ambiguous. to which i suggested that our language for talking about this is simply not adequate to the experience and the experienced experience of race--which is to say that we are saying the same thing in different words. but while you alluded to this ambiguity of race you also insist upon it--which is not to say you are inconsistent but that the language of race necessitates both an attention (as you say) to the lived experience of race but (as i say) an attentiveness to where that language fails to address the ambiguities complexities difficulties of differences. > Finally, it is more than a bit ironic for a white person to determine a > "useful" vocabulary for racial discussion. i hope youre not making assumptions about race on-line: its hard to see not to mention the fact that the inscription of race on the body is itself always subject to interpretive ambiguity. > It seems like the appropriate > response to questions of race would be not to retreat into vague conceptual > terms, but to engage them in a more heart-felt way. As it is, the above > seems dismissive and casual, and it removes personal experience from the > complicated issues surrounding race. well referring to my post as "vague conceptual terms" that are "dismissive and casual" in favor of a rather sentimentalized language of the "heart" whose idiom is "personal experience" runs the risk not only of alienating your interlocutor but of particularizing any discussion of race into an my experience versus youre experience. a rather habermasian dilemma if i do say so. in the end this post raises these thoughts for me: first that i hope that i didnt seem too harsh in my original look at the use made of "white guys." second that an idiom mediating particularized languages of experience--the "heart"--and the "intellectualized" analysis of such epistemo-linguisitc concepts is necessary. best jeffrey timmons ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 14:11:47 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: What is white In-Reply-To: <199704182220.KAA23618@ihug.co.nz> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Sat, 19 Apr 1997, dodie wrote: > all dead white guise > >As I remember it, I said "white guys" in my original post. It's > >interesting that you latched onto "white." Why not deconstruct "guys," why > >not lauch into gender performance here? given time. > >No offense take. taken none is. jeffrey ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 17:56:49 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark W Scroggins Subject: Re: Ann Carson In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT There's also a lovely review of _Eros the Bittersweet_ in Guy Davenport's latest collection of essays, _The Hunter Gracchus_. He does a nice job of tracking the connections between knowledge & eroticism in Carson's book. & that's Anne Carson with an "e." Mark Scroggins ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 17:24:59 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Bowering and Bromige test This is partly a test to see if this gets on before three messages I posted last night do. But while I'm testing, I thought I'd ask if anyone else found the B&B sex-play repartee over the past few months to be very suspicious. I, for one, do. In fact, I'm convinced these witty and sexed-up massages (oops, I meant E), are encrypted and hide more serious meanings, and I've begun to go back over them, using a variety of cryptographic techniques, including some of the methods pioneered by de Saussure in his late hunts for anagrams embedded into Latin verse. So far, I have been stymied, but I do think a broadly anagrammatic approach is the key (reading backwards and acrostically, I am now satisfied, is barking up the wrong tree). If anyone shares my concern, or has suggestions on reading techniques that might prove fruitful, please let me know. The truth is that this little game has gone on for too long. And the use of erotic longing to obscure real motives only ends up cheapening sex. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 19:07:23 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: Bowering and Bromige test Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Gee, Kent, I'm not sure about the encryption, but I always thought erotic longing WAS a real motive. Are you telling me (& Freud) it isn't? perplexedly, sp >If anyone shares my concern, or has suggestions on reading techniques >that might prove fruitful, please let me know. The truth is that >this little game has gone on for too long. And the use of erotic >longing to obscure real motives only ends up cheapening sex. > >Kent ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 16:27:38 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" Subject: Re: The Whatness of Whiteness In-Reply-To: <199704190420.VAA09004@email.sjsu.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I've just had the rather odd experience of going directly from the conference on the construction and possible undoing of whiteness held at Berkeley to the meeting of the College Language Association in Atlanta, and will, as several have asked me to do, provide BRIEF reports on both in the coming days -- The conference on whiteness turned out to be the most ethnically and racially integrated academic conference I have ever attended -- On the other hand, white academics continue to absent themselves from the meetings of the College Language Association -- whatever we might think of race in America, it's clear that many people who might be considered "white" choose their company in the same old ways -- More directly to Hoa Nguyen's questions -- _If _Race Traitor_ were only arguing the social construction of race there would be considerably less controversy about their platform -- I would second the note that you might try to get the Routledge collected traitors at your nearby university library -- BUT also -- last year in the _American Quarterly_, Shelly Fisher Fishkin offered, with bibliography, a fairly accurate summary of the recent critical and socio/political works examining the evolution of "whiteness" in American culture -- I can get the exact citation for you if you want me to (could perhaps even mail you a xerox, since I have it here somewhere in these piles of books) -- ______ Bob Perelman: Does "this" happen often to you? ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 21:49:51 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: desublimation; Eliade David, thank you for the technical term for what I was describing : "repressive desublimation". I'm glad you were reading your Marcuse back in the 60s. Too bad the best you can do after 30 years is a feeble one-liner. That's called Marcusing time, if you want to make puns. - Jack Spandrift at his most snarling re: Eliade. Did anyone see the article by Umberto Eco in a recent NY Review of Bks about Eliade's connections with a Romanian fascist secret police organization & the unsolved murder of a young grad student of his who was beginning to distance himself from the master (the student was also Romanian). Unsolved murder in Chicago. Myth is murder, according to Prof. Girard. What say, ethno-poeticians? - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 22:21:26 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: back to drawing board / (if not to lurk) Comments: cc: Bob Grumman MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Bob Grumman writes -- > Sylvester Pollet just e-mailed me the correct definition of > "surfer," to wit, one who moves from website to website, rather than > one who lurks through a single site. So I withdraw my suggestion. > Too late to go back to bed, though. > --Bob Glad someone pointed that out; but still, the surfer idea leads to other maritime possibilities . . . . we know "cruiser" won't work; nor "sailor" -- but there must be something seaworthy & saltsome, wavedashed & current -- back to treading water? ("I've been treading these past weeks, and just thought I'd land ashore here for a brief comment . . . ") there's IDLING (as what a car does, when it's not engaging the road, but is still running); -- then, what is it when one looks out the window & takes in the scenery? -- there's scanning (but this already has its techn-meanings); snooping (naw); scoping (?); smelling the coffee / sniffing the flowers, sauntering the walkway, walking the dog, reading the funny papers . . . lot of verbs & objects . . . I've been high-beaming thru this listserv for a while, and thought I'd just brake to say . . . okay, back to beamin' . . . have been on a walkabout . . . have had a good look/see . . . to scope? -- to scope, perchance to preen ; (aye, there's the shrub) d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 22:28:50 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: desublimation; Eliade MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Henry saith -- > re: Eliade. Did anyone see the article by Umberto Eco in a recent > NY Review of Bks didn't, but wd. like to -- wouldn't have more particular ref, wd. ya? > . . . . about Eliade's connections with a Romanian fascist > secret police organization & the unsolved murder of a young grad > student of his who was beginning to distance himself from the master yikes -- (I thought the guy was s'posed to've really mellowed . . .) > (the student was also Romanian). Unsolved murder in Chicago. Myth > is murder, according to Prof. Girard. What say, ethno-poeticians? - I've no idea what Girard might mean by that (nor who that Prof. may be, for that matter); but it's interesting that Eco (w/ his "Name of the Rose" interest in intrigues) would unearth -- and so provacatively -- broadcasst this (poss. "real life") tale -- a thing one wd. think old Umberto would decidedly NOT do except if he felt there were (likely?) something to it. strange things, Horatio Gouldernstern, in your philosophy class . . . d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 22:55:16 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: Bowering and Bromige test / cryptonite MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT from Kent Johnson . . . . > using a variety of cryptographic techniques, including some of the > methods pioneered by de Saussure . . . . (reading backwards > and acrostically, I am now satisfied, is barking up the wrong tree). > > If anyone . . . . has suggestions on reading techniques that might > prove fruitful, please let me know. as I recall (from suburban televideo upbringing), the haploid/hapless quasi-antihero Maxwell Smart once mentioned a method he'd tried applying to a suspect novel: reading every 3rd word. His success, it seems, was little better than that you report. And to boot, he found it partricularly hard to follow the storyline that way. But your post calls to mind the 1st paragraph of William Gass's interesting-looking essay in the April issue of Harper's. (I read only the first few paragraphs while eating my brown rice in Union Station . . . so can't vouch for the bonafides of the whole essay) -- this is the 1st essay Gass has had in Harper's Magazine since an excellent one back in '94 . . . . [ you cd. call this the Smart / Gass post; okay, back into the box. ] d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 00:47:43 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: SSchu30844@AOL.COM Subject: Re: monk, t. Yes, I think it must have been Robin Kelley who's writing the Monk biography. Susan ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 23:22:34 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: back to drawing board / (if not to lurk) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Glad someone pointed that out; but still, the surfer idea leads to >other maritime possibilities . . . . > Stowaways? Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 22:33:27 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: o tempus o mores Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Henry, I believe the latin translates as "a goalless draw between your temper and your manners." --Peter Punster, at his feeblest. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 23:44:17 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: desublimation; Eliade Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Henry Gould wrote: >re: Eliade. Did anyone see the article by Umberto Eco in a recent NY >Review of Bks about Eliade's connections with a Romanian fascist secret >police organization & the unsolved murder of a young grad student of his >who was beginning to distance himself from the master (the student was >also Romanian). Unsolved murder in Chicago. There was a feature on this in the Chicago Reader several months ago. >Myth is murder, according to Prof. Girard. What say, ethno-poeticians? Am not an ethno-poetician (at least I don't think I am) but if myth is a form of societal dreaming, it's reasonable to assume some of those dreams will be nightmares. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 22:57:24 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: Bowering and Bromige test In-Reply-To: <6A5DF2458D@student.highland.cc.il.us> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Here's a hint to Kent re the obfuscated messages. David would not want me to do this, but I cant help myself. You will understand more of our repartee if you have a look in any decent introduction to the Korean language. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 00:55:32 -0600 Reply-To: rwhyte@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Ryan Whyte Subject: set on roam Comments: To: FOP Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII [these poems are part of a meditation on technology, containment, responsibility, solitude, and some other phenomenologies] following from another consideration of the subject shady cotton pools and her hair swelters, a tent is likely. However there's the other possibility whose borders are marked with eyeshadow, sticky Call them up because you've got the number. Connect to the cellular net and don't lose this conception; she sells her eggs for black suns, and I'd like to be tied up, which is something else altogether ends will not be met which means that other sacrifice have to do; marriage will be counseled, offshore, away from the traitors and unkempt backbenchers. Seeing what I mean, the likeliness of your being found is quite high as long as you keep the phone set on roam. At the same time, and let's shift gears here, connectibility guarantees that what you say will come to pass, usually within a day or two. the keys to prisoners are rattling on the clip on the belt by the phone which is also battery-powered. Current projections put the unconscious on the alert hair shirt is kept, searched then passed across borderline states. Drawing in spittle, shareholders in this venture hold her hair in high esteem tenting meetings held about the future. Records like skin diseased, Nietzschian, against the motorized projection screen - lenticular and that is I emphasize a way of seeing nicene creed, balanced against the write offs of this quarter. Speaking about the city, no less, the ancient quiescence of which is estimable by today's standards ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 02:13:38 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: cheapening sex in an inflationary spiral Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I was so glad when george posted & didnt say the reason we'd been cheapening sex lately was cause as old farts we have to pay too much for it. George can be very vulgar, & that is certainly vulgar. But george, I think its best to admit our code isnt Korean, its Canadian, eh? And its best to admit we bin caught w our pants round our ankles. Its a first offense, & i think we should throw ourselves on the mercy of the court. I intend to talk abt how busy i've bin w civic duties of late, writing letters to the local papers & going to weekly meetings and stomping the precincts to prevent the wrongful annexation of orchard-land to build an industrial park on the edge of town, how i had to make a speech to the Local Agency Formation County Organization while they were all doing good imitations of my firstyear students during Melville, how we had to put on a mixer/art auction to raise money to pay for the lawsuit and how i've been gathering stuff for the yardsale next weekend, humping mattresses into flatbed trucks, for the same purpose, against big odds: 4 of the 5 city council members cldnt be more for it if they were in the pockets of the developer (i'm probably speaking metaphorically about now, the council is too big for that), and theres a law now that allows the city cxouncils to pass on the costs of any lawsuit to the developer, which is a bad law because it encourages the council to vote irrespnsibly, as they did in this case, the EIR is the most flawed i've ever seen, the traffic engineer in reporting that the 2500/day extra cartrips this industrial park will generate. neglected to factor in that each year, an extra 880 car trip/p.d. go thru Sebastopol. And the waste storage ponds planned wont be nearly large enough to contain effluent from the parkinglots once the big storms hit in the winter.Its ribbon development, which our recently approved General Plan forbids, meanwhile theres an industrial park already built 43 miles away in Santa Rosa w plenty of empty buildings, and I cd go & on about this, not my first venture into grassroots politics, but i wont, because who wants long postings, and also because i want to address your defense, George, you must tell of how hard you work at SFU, and of needing at the same time to be nursing your wife as you are doing thru a serious illness, while traveling the world in behalf of Canadian Lit; and how all this hard work, requiring stern sublimation, made us crack up : and then we just throw ourselves on the magistrate's mercy & hope he hasnt recently been made to look foolish in public by a colleague on some judicial matter in such a way that he's looking for some easy butt to kick. I'd say its always best to make a clean breast of it, but I'm worried that the superfluous sexual energy encoded in language would render that cliche, in context, suspect. But in any case, George, we must see to it that our heavily (but not heavily enough) encrypted desire for one another is kept strictly in the back channels henceforth. We wouldnt want the Listmaster, a man notorious for his playlessness, and who always stands by the fixed meanings he imparts to his words, delivering an officious censure to us on the parade ground. Au revoir, cherie--j'embarrass ton rep. db. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 02:21:04 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: ps to the subject-title with sex in it Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" the industrial park already built, the obvious site for the o'reilly business, is not 43 miles away, but 4.3. ((o sure. Its really just another code!) db. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 08:32:08 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: desublimation/eliade I regret last post of mine. Sorry, David B., for the bile. & sorry list for having to listen in. DB has started me thinking about this in a new way. Re; Eliade article - sorry, David I., I can't give you more specifics - I think it was in the latest or next-to-latest NY Review of Books. And Eco didn't unearth the story - he's just reviewing a book about it by a Romanian author. "Myth is murder" is just shorthand for Rene Girard's massive all-encompassing theory of human culture & nature. He theorizes that the roots of human culture & even intelligence (by way of the ability to name & make distinctions) is rooted in "mimetic desire" (the desire for something the value of which is enhanced only because someone ELSE has it). That in social situation this triangle leads to endless back-&-forth feuding, & cultures solve this problem via the scapegoat mechanism; that underlying all culture-organizing myths lies mob violence & the scapegoat victim - myths are a kind of utilitarian bad faith or disguise which promote the victim to culture hero & thus salve the guilt of the community & maintain the system at the same time. Girard argues that Biblical religion exposes this mechanism & thus opens the possibility for breaking the vicious circle via understanding. I think there is some truth to the idea - paralleled in a purely literary sense in Auerbach's thesis that the Bible began our sense of "ordinary reality" in literature - that the Bible represents a comic, de-glorified divinity - subversive to mythology. There are a ton of books about all this. (One could argue though that some forms of Christianity - & probably other religions too - try to have it both ways, & the circle goes on). But I agree with Walt Whitman, folks: Let's Not Argue About Religion. (hey, it's National Poetry Month.) - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 08:11:07 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: desublimation; Eliade In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" henry, i assumed this was a joke. am i wrong? At 11:44 PM -0600 4/20/97, Hugh Steinberg wrote: >Henry Gould wrote: > >>re: Eliade. Did anyone see the article by Umberto Eco in a recent NY >>Review of Bks about Eliade's connections with a Romanian fascist secret >>police organization & the unsolved murder of a young grad student of his >>who was beginning to distance himself from the master (the student was >>also Romanian). Unsolved murder in Chicago. > >There was a feature on this in the Chicago Reader several months ago. > >>Myth is murder, according to Prof. Girard. What say, ethno-poeticians? > >Am not an ethno-poetician (at least I don't think I am) but if myth is a >form of societal dreaming, it's reasonable to assume some of those dreams >will be nightmares. > >Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 08:14:21 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: cheapening sex in an inflationary spiral In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" personally, i think you old codgers are kinda cool, as long as i can understand your jokes. but rachel loden, o Lady of the Poetic Twilight of the Dogs, where art thou in all this? yr the greatest,the Muhammad Ali of poeticsleaze!--md At 2:13 AM -0500 4/20/97, David Bromige wrote: >I was so glad when george posted & didnt say the reason we'd been >cheapening sex lately was cause as old farts we have to pay too much for >it. George can be very vulgar, & that is certainly vulgar. But george, I >think its best to admit our code isnt Korean, its Canadian, eh? And its >best to admit we bin caught w our pants round our ankles. Its a first >offense, & i think we should throw ourselves on the mercy of the court. I >intend to talk abt how busy i've bin w civic duties of late, writing >letters to the local papers & going to weekly meetings and stomping the >precincts to prevent the wrongful annexation of orchard-land to build an >industrial park on the edge of town, how i had to make a speech to the >Local Agency Formation County Organization while they were all doing good >imitations of my firstyear students during Melville, how we had to put on a >mixer/art auction to raise money to pay for the lawsuit and how i've been >gathering stuff for the yardsale next weekend, humping mattresses into >flatbed trucks, for the same purpose, against big odds: 4 of the 5 city >council members cldnt be more for it if they were in the pockets of the >developer (i'm probably speaking metaphorically about now, the council is >too big for that), and theres a law now that allows the city cxouncils to >pass on the costs of any lawsuit to the developer, which is a bad law >because it encourages the council to vote irrespnsibly, as they did in this >case, the EIR is the most flawed i've ever seen, the traffic engineer in >reporting that the 2500/day extra cartrips this industrial park will >generate. neglected to factor in that each year, an extra 880 car trip/p.d. >go thru Sebastopol. And the waste storage ponds planned wont be nearly >large enough to contain effluent from the parkinglots once the big storms >hit in the winter.Its ribbon development, which our recently approved >General Plan forbids, meanwhile theres an industrial park already built 43 >miles away in Santa Rosa w plenty of empty buildings, and I cd go & on >about this, not my first venture into grassroots politics, but i wont, >because who wants long postings, and also because i want to address your >defense, George, you must tell of how hard you work at SFU, and of needing >at the same time to be nursing your wife as you are doing thru a serious >illness, while traveling the world in behalf of Canadian Lit; and how all >this hard work, requiring stern sublimation, made us crack up : and then we >just throw ourselves on the magistrate's mercy & hope he hasnt recently >been made to look foolish in public by a colleague on some judicial matter >in such a way that he's looking for some easy butt to kick. I'd say its >always best to make a clean breast of it, but I'm worried that the >superfluous sexual energy encoded in language would render that cliche, in >context, suspect. But in any case, George, we must see to it that our >heavily (but not heavily enough) encrypted desire for one another is kept >strictly in the back channels henceforth. We wouldnt want the Listmaster, a >man notorious for his playlessness, and who always stands by the fixed >meanings he imparts to his words, delivering an officious censure to us on >the parade ground. Au revoir, cherie--j'embarrass ton rep. db. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 08:19:48 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: monk, t. In-Reply-To: <970421004742_-266935983@emout05.mail.aol.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 12:47 AM -0400 4/21/97, SSchu30844@AOL.COM wrote: >Yes, I think it must have been Robin Kelley who's writing the Monk biography. > >Susan this would really be interesting, since Kelley is an historian specializing, i believe, in Black labor history in the South. he's smart as hell, so any bio he'd write will be terrific i'm sure. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 08:40:29 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: What white In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 2:07 PM -0700 4/20/97, Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: >On Fri, 18 Apr 1997, Dale Smith wrote: > >timmons: >> >ok heres my (tentative) conclusion: race is semantically and >> >epistemologically more complicated than the linguistic and conceptual >> >categories used to discuss it. itd be more useful i think to be aware of >> >that. >> >> It seems like this kind of intellectualized and evasive answer neglects to >> address the positions of race as they actually function. > >no quite the opposite actually: it encourages one to be aware (dare i say >sensitive?) to the permutations of difference and the difficulties of >making ethno-assumptions. i dont apologize for an "intellectualized" >answer and i dont accept as "evasive" an attempt to separate the wheat >from the chaff--as it were. your point of addressing "the positions of >race as they function" is taken to heart--however much the criticism of >"cerebral--distant--contemplation" is inaccurate. i like to think of my >self as somewhat influenced by enlightenment practices: the general AND >the particular. > >> A body reveals certain traits--Asian, African, European--but it doesn't >> always give you details of national heritage or even ethnicity, as in a >> country like Burundi. > >> A white person's categorical discussion of race >> pretty much reveals the problems Hoa pointed out in her post. > >this two statements evoke for me precisely the difficulties i mentioned >in my post: that the racialized body is both a sign of ethnicity but >problematically ambiguous. to which i suggested that our language for >talking about this is simply not adequate to the experience and the >experienced experience of race--which is to say that we are saying the >same thing in different words. but while you alluded to this ambiguity >of race you also insist upon it--which is not to say you are inconsistent >but that the language of race necessitates both an attention (as you say) >to the lived experience of race but (as i say) an attentiveness to where >that language fails to address the ambiguities complexities difficulties >of differences. > >> Finally, it is more than a bit ironic for a white person to determine a >> "useful" vocabulary for racial discussion. > >i hope youre not making assumptions about race on-line: its hard to see >not to mention the fact that the inscription of race on the body is >itself always subject to interpretive ambiguity. > >> It seems like the appropriate >> response to questions of race would be not to retreat into vague conceptual >> terms, but to engage them in a more heart-felt way. As it is, the above >> seems dismissive and casual, and it removes personal experience from the >> complicated issues surrounding race. > >well referring to my post as "vague conceptual terms" that are >"dismissive and casual" in favor of a rather sentimentalized language of >the "heart" whose idiom is "personal experience" runs the risk not >only of alienating your interlocutor but of particularizing any discussion of >race into an my experience versus youre experience. a rather habermasian >dilemma if i do say so. > >in the end this post raises these thoughts for me: first that i hope that >i didnt seem too harsh in my original look at the use made of "white >guys." second that an idiom mediating particularized languages of >experience--the "heart"--and the "intellectualized" analysis of such >epistemo-linguisitc concepts is necessary. > >best > >jeffrey timmons jeffrey and dale: it's a truism by now that race is socially constructed. however, there are real privileges (for white folks) and disenfranchisements (for folks of color) assigned to those various social constructions. so to use the "construction" argument as to deny the real effects of racism and the real privileges of whiteness is a real problem. most of the "white" critical race theorists who are problematizing "whiteness" are doing so not to avoid taking responsibility for their privilege but precisely to take responsibility and take steps, as aldon pointed out in his "whatness of whiteness" post, to dissolve its mystical powers of privilege-granting. it is this taking responsibility that seems a little lacking in your posts, jeffrey. what you say about construction is true, but to use that argument to deny the material/ experiential effects of racism on people of color seems...well...evasive, as if you feel personally attacked and need to defend yourself. there's a wonderful article by george lipsitz in American Quarterly about a year ago, where he coins the term "possessive investment in whiteness" and explains how gov't policies that started in Roosevelt's time have affected the gap in life opportunities,material wellbeing, etc. between whites and blacks. this takes the argument out of the psycho-emotional "i feel hurt that i'm being charged w/ racism just cuz i appear to be white" realm that makes so many otherwise wellmeaning white people balk at a serious study of white privilege. being jewish (not technically, as my mother wasnt, but identifying as such) in america has complicated this issue for me. in europe, where most american jews came from, weren't white. here, we are. so here, we have to take responsibility for our white privilege without forgetting that it's a contingent category. we're "honorary whites," or "sort-of" white, or "white for now." it points up exactly how arbitrary the categories are. but --i can get a loan for a house no problem, i can buy property in certain parts of town, it was assumed i'd go to college (and i did), etc. etc. blah blah blah. i'm babbling now. no offense meant; just an intervention, perhaps inappropriate. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 09:52:27 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Re: desublimation/eliade MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Henry -- I read Girard's work with wonder & pleasure as it came out over the years, especially the early books. When, however, he got to his final theory by which ALL the trouble in the world is explained/resolved by ONE shopworn idea (the scape-goat) & ONE solution (a just as shopworn xtian possibility) I gave up in anger: his turns out to be one more single-narrative alabi explanation more attuned to totalizing 19th century desires than to the reality of this century. The evangelical arrogance of a man calling his magnum opus "Of things hidden since the foundation of the world" � things which he then of course claims to reveal for the first time to us befuddled mortal masses � is more than I am willing to put up with. -- Pierre ps. have read elsewhere about the Eliade caper. difficult to disentangle the arcana of rumanian secret service stuff. am suspending belief til the cows come home on that one which don't mean I cldn't see our myth-worker involved in unsavory hanky-panky. That breed seems inclined to totalizing gestures -- remember Jung's brushes with fascismo. -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 09:50:36 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steven Marks Subject: Re: desublimation; Eliade In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Eco article is in April 10, 1997 issue of NYRB. It's called "Murder in Chicago." I didn't read it so I can't add anything. Well, I suppose I could, but as Nixon reminded us: "That would be wrong." God, I hope that was Nixon and not Carter. Or Gore. My quote machine has been a rye lately. Cheers on a finally warm Monday morning, Steven On Mon, 21 Apr 1997, Maria Damon wrote: > henry, i assumed this was a joke. am i wrong? > > At 11:44 PM -0600 4/20/97, Hugh Steinberg wrote: > >Henry Gould wrote: > > > >>re: Eliade. Did anyone see the article by Umberto Eco in a recent NY > >>Review of Bks about Eliade's connections with a Romanian fascist secret > >>police organization & the unsolved murder of a young grad student of his > >>who was beginning to distance himself from the master (the student was > >>also Romanian). Unsolved murder in Chicago. > > > >There was a feature on this in the Chicago Reader several months ago. > > > >>Myth is murder, according to Prof. Girard. What say, ethno-poeticians? > > > >Am not an ethno-poetician (at least I don't think I am) but if myth is a > >form of societal dreaming, it's reasonable to assume some of those dreams > >will be nightmares. > > > >Hugh Steinberg > __________________________________________________ Steven Marks http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html __________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 08:10:27 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: michael corbin Subject: Re: desublimation/eliade MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit henry gould wrote: > > I regret last post of mine. Sorry, David B., for the bile. & sorry list > for having to listen in. DB has started me thinking about this in a new way. > > Re; Eliade article - sorry, David I., I can't give you more specifics - I > think it was in the latest or next-to-latest NY Review of Books. And > Eco didn't unearth the story - he's just reviewing a book about it by a > Romanian author. NYRB dated April 10, the "Spring Books Issue. The book under review by Eco is _Eros, Magic, and the Murder of Professor Culianu_ Northwestern U press. The author is Ted Anton who I believe is at Depaul University and not Romanian. Eliade's connection with the fascist Romanian Iron Guard and Culianu's attempt to come to terms with this is part of a sordid reconstruction of events that led to his execution style killing. Eco, I guess had some brief connection with Culianu, but the review is rather flat, taking the book to task for tending toward the sensational. Although its hard to see how this story could be anything less, even if it is, in the last instance, simply the banal evil of Ceausescu-esque censorship of Romanian dissent. mc ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 10:34:31 -0400 Reply-To: Mark Prejsnar Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: Perloff on Yasusada In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I really look forward to Philip Read's writing on the Malley thing, which has always struck me as fascinating....I'd like to point out what I consider a neat (in several senses) parallel instance. I still feel that perhaps I disagree with most posters here, on Perelman's Marginalization, including Susan in her excellent discussion (I got Witz on Saturday--Thanx, Chris Reiner!)...In the sense that I read the tone of the book as less putting-down of many of the poets discussed, than others do......But here I'd like to point out one of my favorite passages in the book, where BP discusses a poem (in Writers & Poets magazine?) which was intended as an angry debunking of LongPo..Like the Malley poets, the author stressed that the short lyric was written without effort or revision, in (in her case) a few seconds. Perelman demonstrates (correctly, in my opinion) that the poem shoots its author in the foot in just the way the Malley work has often been thought (by their opponents) to shoot its authors...The lyric can be read as quite intelligent, entertaining and meaningful. I rather like it, myself. Its author may have been demonstrating precisely the opposite of what she intended (namely, that non-mainstream "avant-garde" styles are inherently meaningless and worthless ways to write verse)..At the very least (and this is what I always thought the Malley affair represented) the "parody" language poem shows that parodic attack never demolishes a poetic style you dislike..... the only people who will "see the light" in response to your parody will be the folks who already agreed with your loathing of the style... Mark P. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 08:59:41 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: michael corbin Subject: Re: What white MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Maria Damon wrote: > in > europe, where most american jews came from, weren't white. here, we are. > so here, we have to take responsibility for our white privilege without > forgetting that it's a contingent category. we're "honorary whites," or > "sort-of" white, or "white for now." it points up exactly how arbitrary the > categories are. but --i can get a loan for a house no problem, i can buy > property in certain parts of town, it was assumed i'd go to college (and i > did), Along these lines Noel Ignatiev (co-editor of _Race Traitor_) published _How the Irish Became White_ examining in fine historical detail the dynamic M. Damon refers to. _Race Traitor_'s subhead is "a journal of the new abolitionism". It is theoretically eclectic in its treatment(s) of social construction-ism. however it is precisely about active and activist attempts at confronting the very real manifestations of racism, rather than the straw-man dance around 'PC', multi-cultural-ism etc. and other bugbears that lather up discussions of injured liberal locus communis. One of the journal's strengths is the space given to young folks. mc ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 09:06:42 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Wallace Subject: who is social, individual, or a writer MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Actually, I think Henry Gould and some others are missing the implications of Jefferson Hansen's suggestion that writing is a social rather than individual phenomena, and I want to elaborate on the reasons I'm with Jeff on this one. Historically, inside the traditions of western philosophy and culture, to speak very generally, the "individual" refers to the idea that the human being has a single, unified consciousness that exists without any level of social mediation--individuals are BORN as themselves, as unified, and then come into contact with a social environment. There is a lot of writing that takes apart this notion of the individual--I'm not sure I want to say more here than that the work of Foucault and many others focuses on how the notion of the individual IS ITSELF A SOCIAL CREATION. But let's assume, for the moment, that Henry's evocation of the "individual" is a less naive notion; that what he means, rather, is that despite the various levels of social interaction to which individuals are subjected (and to which they respond in and perhaps beyond that subjection), there still remains a PARTICULAR vision that comes forth from this particular consciousness, which marks that consciousness as individual in the sense that its ideas and productions are exactly that, PARTICULAR. This seems perhaps a more workable notion of the individual as existing in a kind of social specificity that is not totally accountable to group consciousness. That might seem a better notion of the individual, except that it seems to me that there is a further problem. WHILE IT MAY BE TRUE THAT SOME PART OF A WRITER'S PRODUCTION MAY COME FROM A UNIQUE PLACE THAT CANNOT WHOLLY BE ACCOUNTED FOR BY AN EXAMINATION OF THAT WRITER'S SOCIAL FRAME, IT'S NOT CLEAR THAT ANYTHING ABOUT THIS PARTICULARITY CAN BE MARKED AS A KIND OF SINGULAR CONSCIOUSNESS THAT COULD BE TERMED INDIVIDUAL. That is, if some part of consciousness and production remains opaque to, resistant to, unreclaimable by the contextualization of a social frame, there is equally no proof that this "resistant" proportion of productive consciousness has anything unified about it. In fact, the attempt to describe this fundamentally opaque site, whose status cannot be determined except through the language to which it remains opaque, as a notion of INDIVIDUALITY is precisely an attempt to unify it, unless one wants to retain the term "individuality" to apply to something not singular, not unified, and resistant to description. But it seems to me that "individuality" is by no means sufficent to describe such a field of activity, especially as it is a term already compromised by its prior use as a notion of unified, non-social consciousness that is central to the mechanics of late capitalist cultural domination. Of course, whether such a field of activity really exists as resistant to the social is itself an intensely important question. I would take Jeff to mean, in this case, that such a site of resistance, were it to exist or not, DOES NOT FORM A SIGNIFICANT GROUND FROM WHICH THE ACTIVITY OF WRITERS FOR INSTANCE EMERGES. Its opaqueness to the social either does not exist at all, or is no more than an undifferentiated residue which is at best a minor and indecipherable part of the creative process, especially when compared to the power of social ideology. I suppose the signficance of this opaque site to creativity could be debated, but again, I see no way to describe it as "individual," because I see no way to think of it as a site of any sort of unified consciousness. Clearly, the history of 20th century philosophy, psychoanalysis, and cultural studies (and how all these fields are also altered by feminism) has been much taken with this history of the status of the subect and its (potential?) residues. There are no individuals. Mark Wallace /----------------------------------------------------------------------------\ | | | mdw@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu | | GWU: | | http://gwis2.circ.gwu.edu/~mdw | | EPC: | | http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/wallace | |____________________________________________________________________________| ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 07:54:14 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: no no nanook(ie) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit As a general rule, Maria, I try to stay out of places where Canadians are dropping their pants. Rachel L. >But george, I >think its best to admit our code isnt Korean, its Canadian, eh? And its >best to admit we bin caught w our pants round our ankles. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 10:07:46 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: L+A+N+G+P+O and New Party In-Reply-To: <3F97617D28@student.highland.cc.il.us> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Two reponses, Kent--- On Fri, 18 Apr 1997, KENT JOHNSON wrote: > > But Mark: one of the things I find interesting about the NP is that it > has apparently gathered old CPers like Zinn, DSA types like > Hightower, radical Christians like West, and real independents like > Chomsky together under a common banner. Of course, these are just big > names, but in the protracted context of the U.S. left's sectarian > provincialism, the symbolism of such a gathering doesn't > seem insignificant? Is Zinn's presence indicative of a broader CP > presence in the NP? Have they all "fused" into it? (Why wouldn't they? > The CPUSA's been a loyal social-democratic party ever since Hitler > stabbeb Stalin in the back.) In my opinion...Well, there are some very long possible answers. The short answer in my opinion is: because world (stalinist) Communism was so central to the left, many serious attempts at building a sort-of-socialist alternative include old CP'ers. For the most part, it's nothing more significant (or sinister) than that. This was true of the New American Movement in the 1970's, a socialist party of some promise that melded into DSOC to creat DSA (and the promise faded); and of many other similar groupings. One constant in doing political work from 1968 to the present is, that you find people with this kind of background among the most committed and constant activists you're working with. S > > And glad to hear from someone who has hung in there through these > very "unsocialist" times (and it *will* eventually surely be au > courant again to be anti-capitalist!) that the question of unity > amongst new and viable left organizations seems to be in the > discussion. But don't you think that if such unity comes to be, Mark, > that this conspiratorial "fusion" crap should go out the window? and if the two > parties are primarily there to give vent to the incestual squabbles > of this country's ruling class, why participate in the "obscenity", > as you put it, of what's going on? The answer to that's easy, in my opinion (and was already contained in my first post on this)--Because it might help us reach many of the working people who still think the Republicrat structure is the one way to work if you are going to be "realistic". But if instead you want to try founding another flaming red revolutionary grouping, please be my guest. I might join! But I myself work full time or more at a day job, do labor activism, and consider my work as a poet and editor to my my "real" life's work--I can't quite manage the energy to found my own party! So I support any initiative that MIGHT move us forward..And like the Jesse Jackson campaigns AT FIRST (I hasten to add) the NP looks like it MIGHT have some small contribution to make in this direction. You work with the left you have; and I have always felt that the truely best left would be: 1. revolutionary; and 2. very much NON-leninist. As no such formation now exists that in my opinion is any good, I lend my support to whatever flawed initiatives I see people attempting out there. Mark P. Atlanta ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 11:10:30 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Gwyn McVay Subject: Re: What white In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII re contingent whiteness: David Mura has said that Asians sometimes get to be considered honorary whites and sit in the front of the bus--as long as they don't ever get the illusion that they'll get to drive the bus. Gwyn ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 09:18:57 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: Perloff on Yasusada MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Philip wwrott: > "Ern Malley" became, and remains, a kind of rallying point for radical > modernist, postmodern and avant-garde writing in Australia. For the > moralising anti-modernists of mid-century Australian literature, Ern Malley > represents the the possibility of an entirely amoral art. (Max Harris was > prosecuted for pusblishing obscene material, that is, poetry of > indeterminate meaning.) In a chapter I'm currently writing, I argue that in > fact Malley becomes the _authentic_ origin of Australian (post)modernism. I wonder if you (or anyone, really) can direct those of us who are not familiar with the Ern Malley affair (which does have a distinctly Victorian ring, thus put) to a few salient (primary &/or secondary) sources. I assume there's a lot of writing on this one out there, somewhere, but possibly in more fugitive publications, & so not, for instance, indexed in the MLA database. Chris .. christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu / ************************* http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce Hey!! Now Available for a mere $4: _constellation voice_ by linda russo ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 10:41:37 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" Subject: Re: desublimation/eliade Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable interesting; i went to stanford as a grad student partly cuz i was so taken w/ girard's work; then when i got there, i tried to sit in on a few classes of his and just couldn't, for reasons mentioned below. everything came back to the same old story, which ratified Christianity. he was/is a charming character however, with a very large, large head. his two mantras, to be said in a heavy french accent were, "Very strannnnnge!" and "But it's so obvioos!" accent on the last syllable of obviooos. These two descriptors applied to every anthropological anecdote at his disposition; first strange, then, with the application of his theory, rendered "so obvioos." At 7:52 PM 4/21/97, Pierre Joris wrote: >Henry -- I read Girard's work with wonder & pleasure as it came out over >the years, especially the early books. When, however, he got to his >final theory by which ALL the trouble in the world is explained/resolved >by ONE shopworn idea (the scape-goat) & ONE solution (a just as shopworn >xtian possibility) I gave up in anger: his turns out to be one more >single-narrative alabi explanation more attuned to totalizing 19th >century desires than to the reality of this century. The evangelical >arrogance of a man calling his magnum opus "Of things hidden since the >foundation of the world" =97 things which he then of course claims to >reveal for the first time to us befuddled mortal masses =97 is more than I >am willing to put up with. -- Pierre > >ps. have read elsewhere about the Eliade caper. difficult to disentangle >the arcana of rumanian secret service stuff. am suspending belief til >the cows come home on that one which don't mean I cldn't see our >myth-worker involved in unsavory hanky-panky. That breed seems inclined >to totalizing gestures -- remember Jung's brushes with fascismo. >-- >=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D= =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D >pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 >tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu >http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ >--------------------------------------------------------------------------- >Everything that allows men to become rooted, through >values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in >_one_ language, is the principle of alienation which >constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, >[...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality >and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose >it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot >=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D= =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 08:32:01 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" Subject: Re: back to drawing board / (if not to lurk) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Sun, 20 Apr 1997, Hugh Steinberg wrote: > >Glad someone pointed that out; but still, the surfer idea leads to > >other maritime possibilities . . . . > > > Stowaways? > > Hugh Steinberg > lubbers? ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 10:37:41 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: awol This is another test. One of my messages posted yesterday and three from day before have vanished. One a response to David Kellog's query re: Yasusada's book, another on Culianu's murder, another a valentine to Alan Jen Sondheim, and another reporting what I think is a breakthrough on my efforts to decode B&B's hidden messages. Isn't it too much of a coincidence that just as I expose Bowering and Bromige, my messages start going AWOL? I feel like the guy who was seated first in the restaurant, and then has to watch as everyone else gets served (served, get it?) before him. But this is worse than that. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 09:28:29 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: (Perloff on Yasusada) footnote/spinoff/response to Mark Prejsnar/Bob P-threaders may also note , uh, "On parody" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" 'The only people who will "see the light" in respondse to your parody will be those who already agreed with your loathing of the style.' Hallelujah, Mark Prejsnar, I couldnt agree more. Would add, however, that "seeing the light" isnt the only pleasure one can take in a parody. One can enjoy "Burnt Norton" and still enjoy "Charred Whitlow" (by Henry reed, is it? Too busy or lazy to look it up). I've seen parodies of writers I greatly admire that have been outrageously funny. It seems to me its something akin to the potential funniness of names--parody can throw limitation into a new light, we see the something mechanical about style, and Bergson in "On Laughter" makes sense to me when he remarks that one thing that can be funny is when human beings act in a mechanical way.Or the comedy routine is "a machine"...Chaplin appears, theres an open hole in the street, we know its only a matter of time before he falls down it . . that example is likely from someone other than Bergson, huh? Cant recall my source there, sorry. Any style has the limitations of its virtues, and if a parody can detach us from its charisma for a moment, we can laugh at it without, however, "seeing the light" & expunging that poet or that poem from our hearts.(I recall the thread on the List months since, concerning "Stopping by Woods" being sung to the tune of "Hernando's Hideaway". Poems from _The Shropshire Lad_ too, I think Bowering posted in, cd also go to that tune.) One of my favorite parodies is by Kenneth Koch, and has fun with WCW's "This is just to say" : "This is just to say/ I'm sorry I broke both yr arms at the dance last night/ but I wanted you on the wards, where _I_ am the doctor." The chief problem w the parody Bob P alludes to, is that it isnt a good parody. It's not well-written. And given its authorship, how cd it have been? Even that is faintly funny. db. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 12:53:45 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Kristin Gallagher Subject: Re: New party, etc In-Reply-To: <199704191659.JAA00578@norway.it.earthlink.net> from "Mark Weiss" at Apr 19, 97 09:59:18 am MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit gone for weekend, glad to get back to all these interesting messages. >They (the NP) seem in my experience to be >doing better than most leftists of the past two decades at drawing in >**real** working class people of all races. not sure what to make of this claim. the new party's base seems to be primarily in the intelligencia at this point. the philly branch of the labor party (detroits is also pretty successful) has succeeded in umbrella-ing a wide variety of activist groups LED by poor people. >Why do you see the new >Labor Party as "more promising" of overthrowing "global capitalism"? >Do you mean its present leadership and current program offer this >hope, or do you mean that a political party in this country firmly >grounded in working class organizations is an absolute prerequisite >grounded in working class organizations is an absolute prerequisite >for smashing the rule of capital? here the latter is the crux of the matter. people who have nothing to lose are less likely to compromise with the present system. while i like the new party's ideas, (see the following) >Their (NP)platform is in flux and very vague, which has pissed off lots of >people on the left, and led to many attacks. The NP says that this is >because ultimately they want the folks who are building the party to draw >up its detailed credo, if they do not succeed in overturning the fusion thing, they may not make it electorally. if they overturn the anti-fusion thing, but only mostly have the intelligencia behind them, then it is possible that (see following) >the NP is going to repeat the trajectory of Democratic >Socialists of America, and become a sunday tea-club entirely subservient >for all practical purposes to the Democratic wing of the Republicrats, and >thus dead as a political force. as for the labor party . . . . >until their naitonal leadership wholly endorses >activism/membership by folks outside certified union locals, and commits >to running its own cadidates, it remains a pretty limited option for most >of us... they ARE committed to running their own candidates, but only after they have built a larger and INDEPENDENT funding base. projected start date: 3 years. thus the following statement >considerable reason that as long as it says it is a "party" but won't >field its own cadidates, it is going to be simply a wing of the Clintonian >ultra-right Demos, is false. the NP's ideas and efforts are commendable and have potential, but the future is unclear. at some point labor movements such as the one in philly, which consists mostly of groups that are poor-led and poor-organized and strives for independent funding, may be a necessary alternative. they are highly organized and quite serious and quite clear about how *they, personally* are getting fucked over. this summer some members plan to march from the liberty bell to the united nations. last summer they marched from the liberty bell to harrisburg(which is a lot farther than the UN). against (economic) human rights abuses in USA. unfortunately our local news doesnt like to give them any press . . . . let alone getting an article in *the nation*. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 09:56:16 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: desublimation/eliade Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Bravo Pierre! Grandiosity does get tiresome. At 09:52 AM 4/21/97 +0000, you wrote: >Henry -- I read Girard's work with wonder & pleasure as it came out over >the years, especially the early books. When, however, he got to his >final theory by which ALL the trouble in the world is explained/resolved >by ONE shopworn idea (the scape-goat) & ONE solution (a just as shopworn >xtian possibility) I gave up in anger: his turns out to be one more >single-narrative alabi explanation more attuned to totalizing 19th >century desires than to the reality of this century. The evangelical >arrogance of a man calling his magnum opus "Of things hidden since the >foundation of the world" =97 things which he then of course claims to >reveal for the first time to us befuddled mortal masses =97 is more than I >am willing to put up with. -- Pierre > >ps. have read elsewhere about the Eliade caper. difficult to disentangle >the arcana of rumanian secret service stuff. am suspending belief til >the cows come home on that one which don't mean I cldn't see our >myth-worker involved in unsavory hanky-panky. That breed seems inclined >to totalizing gestures -- remember Jung's brushes with fascismo. >-- >=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D= =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D >pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 >tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu >http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ >--------------------------------------------------------------------------- >Everything that allows men to become rooted, through >values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in >_one_ language, is the principle of alienation which >constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, >[...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality >and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose >it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot >=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D= =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 12:58:38 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: RaeA100900@AOL.COM Subject: Talisman Dear List: Here's a practical question. Can someone give me Talisman (Ed Foster)'s current address. Channel me - back door or front. Rae Armantrout ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 13:00:21 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: Perloff on Yasusada Comments: To: Christopher Alexander In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Chris-- The Ern Malley Affair / Michael Heyward. London : Faber & Faber, 1993. currently in print in the U.S. in a Faber paperback for $12.95, according to Books-in-Print. your friendly librarian poet, Mark Prejsnar Atlanta On Mon, 21 Apr 1997, Christopher Alexander wrote: > Philip wwrott: > > "Ern Malley" became, and remains, a kind of rallying point for radical > > modernist, postmodern and avant-garde writing in Australia. For the > > moralising anti-modernists of mid-century Australian literature, Ern Malley > > represents the the possibility of an entirely amoral art. (Max Harris was > > prosecuted for pusblishing obscene material, that is, poetry of > > indeterminate meaning.) In a chapter I'm currently writing, I argue that in > > fact Malley becomes the _authentic_ origin of Australian (post)modernism. > > I wonder if you (or anyone, really) can direct those of us > who are not familiar with the Ern Malley affair (which > does have a distinctly Victorian ring, thus put) to a few > salient (primary &/or secondary) sources. I assume there's > a lot of writing on this one out there, somewhere, but > possibly in more fugitive publications, & so not, for instance, > indexed in the MLA database. > > Chris > .. > christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective > calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu / ************************* > > http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce > > Hey!! > Now Available for a mere $4: > _constellation voice_ by linda russo > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 13:13:08 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Magee Subject: Re: who is social, individual, or a writer In-Reply-To: from "Mark Wallace" at Apr 21, 97 09:06:42 am MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Mark wrote: "a notion of INDIVIDUALITY is precisely an attempt to unify it, unless one wants to retain the term "individuality" to apply to something not singular, not unified, and resistant to description. But it seems to me that "individuality" is by no means sufficent to describe such a field of activity, especially as it is a term already compromised by its prior use as a notion of unified, non-social consciousness that is central to the mechanics of late capitalist cultural domination... I see no way to describe it as "individual," because I see no way to think of it as a site of any sort of unified consciousness...There are no individuals." Perhaps the word "individuality" is the real problem here. There's a great number of writers/thinkers who attempt to posit selfhood as "not singular, not unified, and resistant to description." For instance Emerson: "I know better than to claim any completeness for my picture. I am a fragment and this is a fragment of me." Or Creeley: "I am struck by the situation of schizophrenia wherein the experience of body may so place the hands or feet or anus in the consciousness so affected, that no communal agreement as to their location is possible." These seem to me attempts to posit a self which is both contingent and multiple, and certainly resistant to description, description not only of "individuality" but also any description which would merely collapse self into a particular collective. I would argue that these kinds of positionings are both infused with social consciousness and highly resistant of any attempts to construct something resembling, say, "rugged individualism." -Mike. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 10:19:46 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: What white Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Try buying a house in Tuxedo Park or Lake Forest. Institutional antisemitism may be down, but it's not out. Here's a quaint bit of white American folklore that I've known all my life and that's still current in a lot of places: "What do you get if you turn a Jew inside out? A nigger." I remember as a young child puzzling over the mechanics of that one. At 08:59 AM 4/21/97 -0700, you wrote: >Maria Damon wrote: > >> in >> europe, where most american jews came from, weren't white. here, we are. >> so here, we have to take responsibility for our white privilege without >> forgetting that it's a contingent category. we're "honorary whites," or >> "sort-of" white, or "white for now." it points up exactly how arbitrary the >> categories are. but --i can get a loan for a house no problem, i can buy >> property in certain parts of town, it was assumed i'd go to college (and i >> did), > >Along these lines Noel Ignatiev (co-editor of _Race Traitor_) published >_How the Irish Became White_ examining in fine historical detail the >dynamic M. Damon refers to. > >_Race Traitor_'s subhead is "a journal of the new abolitionism". It is >theoretically eclectic in its treatment(s) of social construction-ism. >however it is precisely about active and activist attempts at >confronting the very real manifestations of racism, rather than the >straw-man dance around 'PC', multi-cultural-ism etc. and other bugbears >that lather up discussions of injured liberal locus communis. One of the >journal's strengths is the space given to young folks. > >mc > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 12:30:04 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" Subject: Re: no no nanook(ie) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ah. compris. At 7:54 AM 4/21/97, Rachel Loden wrote: >As a general rule, Maria, I try to stay out of places where Canadians >are dropping their pants. > >Rachel L. > >>But george, I >>think its best to admit our code isnt Korean, its Canadian, eh? And its >>best to admit we bin caught w our pants round our ankles. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 13:29:15 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: back to drawing board / (if not to lurk) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" That might do it, Aldon. List-lubbers, i.e. lovers, but not quite in the swim. I lub it! sp >On Sun, 20 Apr 1997, Hugh Steinberg wrote: > >> >Glad someone pointed that out; but still, the surfer idea leads to >> >other maritime possibilities . . . . >> > >> Stowaways? >> >> Hugh Steinberg >> > >lubbers? ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 13:19:28 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: Girard I'm about where you are on it, Pierre. These total theories get a little much. But he is subtle & sure can pick apart a myth. - HG ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 13:33:58 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: awol Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Kent--this one called awol got through loud & clear. I feel like I read the others, but maybe not, if they were follow-ups. the restaurant sounds like part of the whiteness thread. sp >This is another test. One of my messages posted yesterday and >three from day before have vanished. One a response to David Kellog's >query re: Yasusada's book, another on Culianu's murder, another a >valentine to Alan Jen Sondheim, and another reporting what I think is >a breakthrough on my efforts to decode B&B's hidden messages. Isn't >it too much of a coincidence that just as I expose Bowering and >Bromige, my messages start going AWOL? > >I feel like the guy who was seated first in the restaurant, and then >has to watch as everyone else gets served (served, get it?) before >him. But this is worse than that. > >Kent ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 10:33:35 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: who is social, individual, or a writer Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Silly me. I've always thought that, though I live in the social world, blah blah blah, how I make my way through it might be different, individual, even if there's no such person as the unsocialized urperson. To say that all of my significant movements are in detail socially determined sounds an awful lot like recycled calvinism. This may be naive (I love the use of naive as an expletive). Of course, none of these assertions are "proveable." It's entirely possible that we are all programmed by aliens for their amusement. At 09:06 AM 4/21/97 -0400, you wrote: > Actually, I think Henry Gould and some others are missing the >implications of Jefferson Hansen's suggestion that writing is a social >rather than individual phenomena, and I want to elaborate on the reasons >I'm with Jeff on this one. > > Historically, inside the traditions of western philosophy and >culture, to speak very generally, the "individual" refers to the idea that >the human being has a single, unified consciousness that exists without >any level of social mediation--individuals are BORN as themselves, as >unified, and then come into contact with a social environment. There is a >lot of writing that takes apart this notion of the individual--I'm not >sure I want to say more here than that the work of Foucault and many >others focuses on how the notion of the individual IS ITSELF A SOCIAL >CREATION. > > But let's assume, for the moment, that Henry's evocation of the >"individual" is a less naive notion; that what he means, rather, is that >despite the various levels of social interaction to which individuals are >subjected (and to which they respond in and perhaps beyond that >subjection), there still remains a PARTICULAR vision that comes forth from >this particular consciousness, which marks that consciousness as >individual in the sense that its ideas and productions are exactly that, >PARTICULAR. This seems perhaps a more workable notion of the individual as >existing in a kind of social specificity that is not totally accountable >to group consciousness. > > That might seem a better notion of the individual, except that it >seems to me that there is a further problem. WHILE IT MAY BE TRUE THAT >SOME PART OF A WRITER'S PRODUCTION MAY COME FROM A UNIQUE PLACE THAT >CANNOT WHOLLY BE ACCOUNTED FOR BY AN EXAMINATION OF THAT WRITER'S SOCIAL >FRAME, IT'S NOT CLEAR THAT ANYTHING ABOUT THIS PARTICULARITY CAN BE MARKED >AS A KIND OF SINGULAR CONSCIOUSNESS THAT COULD BE TERMED INDIVIDUAL. That >is, if some part of consciousness and production remains opaque to, >resistant to, unreclaimable by the contextualization of a social frame, >there is equally no proof that this "resistant" proportion of productive >consciousness has anything unified about it. In fact, the attempt to >describe this fundamentally opaque site, whose status cannot be determined >except through the language to which it remains opaque, as a notion of >INDIVIDUALITY is precisely an attempt to unify it, unless one wants to >retain the term "individuality" to apply to something not singular, not >unified, and resistant to description. But it seems to me that >"individuality" is by no means sufficent to describe such a field of >activity, especially as it is a term already compromised by its prior use >as a notion of unified, non-social consciousness that is central to the >mechanics of late capitalist cultural domination. > > Of course, whether such a field of activity really exists as >resistant to the social is itself an intensely important question. I would >take Jeff to mean, in this case, that such a site of resistance, were it >to exist or not, DOES NOT FORM A SIGNIFICANT GROUND FROM WHICH THE >ACTIVITY OF WRITERS FOR INSTANCE EMERGES. Its opaqueness to the social >either does not exist at all, or is no more than an undifferentiated >residue which is at best a minor and indecipherable part of the creative >process, especially when compared to the power of social ideology. I >suppose the signficance of this opaque site to creativity could be >debated, but again, I see no way to describe it as "individual," because I >see no way to think of it as a site of any sort of unified consciousness. > > Clearly, the history of 20th century philosophy, psychoanalysis, >and cultural studies (and how all these fields are also altered by >feminism) has been much taken with this history of the status of the >subect and its (potential?) residues. > > There are no individuals. > > > Mark Wallace > >/----------------------------------------------------------------------------\ >| | >| mdw@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu | >| GWU: | >| http://gwis2.circ.gwu.edu/~mdw | >| EPC: | >| http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/wallace | >|____________________________________________________________________________| > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 13:25:10 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: who is social, etc. The position opened by Jeff & enlarged upon by Mark is one I have a hard time understanding! Of course there's been a ton of critical theory on the "place" where the "subject" swerves off into ambiguity, or the Other, or the self-contradictory; and in a time of "identity politics" as well as commodified "personal" poetry, the idea that the individual is not only not important but does not exist holds, I suppose, a certain gleam of provocative interest. Moreover, as I understand the poetic process, it's certainly not just a matter of "self-expression" or self-imitation - it's an exploratory breaking-down & reconfiguring. "You must lose yourself to find yourself", as the proverb goes. But how does this theory relate, say, to the news report this week, who knows how accurate it is, about a recent scientific study that advances the notion that the skills which activate human intelligence are instilled by age one & based on the amount of spoken interaction the child has with loving parents? I suppose you could read this either way - but what does it mean for Mark's "power of social ideology" if the child is primed for it by age one? In my view individuality is not a phenomenon in isolation, & has never been described as such in classical philosophy, as Mark claims. "Man is the civic animal." (Aristotle) "Man is the companionable animal." (Dante) How's that for classics? But the reification (in ideology) of "social forces" to the point of nullifying the sense of individuality seems way off base to me. The whole trend of our century has been toward these totalizing ideas and against the concept of the Person. My own PERSONAL viewpoint is that individuality is the GIST, the very TASTE of the SALT OF THE EARTH which brings the DIGNITY of the PERSON to the POINT, the ESSENCE of political efficacy & meaning - and that this DIGNITY of the HUMAN PERSON is the shadow of the DIVINE ANALOGY which the unity of the HUMAN RACE displays in all its glory. HUMANITY is the living MANIFESTATION of the DIVINE IMAGE. Thank you, & good night. & don't leave out the dolphins, neither - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 13:52:24 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "GRAHAM W. FOUST" Subject: serfing In-Reply-To: <9704210400.AA10450@osf1.gmu.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII There are, of course, "hodads," i.e. nonsurfers who frequent surfing beaches pretending to be surfers. Don't know what art is, but I know what I lurk. Graham wearing: Ocean Pacific t-shirt, Jams, thick glasses dredging: up old threads ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 14:34:26 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: Talisman Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Front, please. It's public info, and I need it too! sp >Dear List: > > Here's a practical question. Can someone give me Talisman (Ed Foster)'s >current address. Channel me - back door or front. > > Rae Armantrout ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 14:12:00 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" Subject: Re: who is social, individual, or a writer Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 10:33 AM 4/21/97, Mark Weiss wrote: >Silly me. I've always thought that, though I live in the social world, blah >blah blah, how I make my way through it might be different, individual, even >if there's no such person as the unsocialized urperson. To say that all of >my significant movements are in detail socially determined sounds an awful >lot like recycled calvinism. This may be naive (I love the use of naive as >an expletive). does expletive mean simply pejorative? i didn't think so. i thought it had a more specific meaning which wd make the term "naive" not an expletive. can some etymologist or grammarian explain what, exactly, an expletive is? ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 14:57:54 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: (Perloff on Yasusada) footnote/spinoff/response to Mark Prejsnar/Bob P-threaders may also note , uh, "On parody" In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Yup--I agree with this....Much the point, in some ways, of the instances people have been discussing (not Yasusada, but the others): try to use parody as a cudgel and it tends to ricochet back at ya...But within a community of shared concerns, it can be illuminating play. On Sun, 20 Apr 1997, David Bromige wrote: > 'The only people who will "see the light" in respondse to your parody will > be those who already agreed with your loathing of the style.' Hallelujah, > Mark Prejsnar, I couldnt agree more. Would add, however, that "seeing the > light" isnt the only pleasure one can take in a parody. One can enjoy > "Burnt Norton" and still enjoy "Charred Whitlow" (by Henry reed, is it? Too > busy or lazy to look it up). I've seen parodies of writers I greatly admire > that have been outrageously funny. It seems to me its something akin to the > potential funniness of names--parody can throw limitation into a new light, > we see the something mechanical about style, and Bergson in "On Laughter" > makes sense to me when he remarks that one thing that can be funny is when > human beings act in a mechanical way.Or the comedy routine is "a > machine"...Chaplin appears, theres an open hole in the street, we know its > only a matter of time before he falls down it . . that example is likely > from someone other than Bergson, huh? Cant recall my source there, sorry. > Any style has the limitations of its virtues, and if a parody can detach us > from its charisma for a moment, we can laugh at it without, however, > "seeing the light" & expunging that poet or that poem from our hearts.(I > recall the thread on the List months since, concerning "Stopping by Woods" > being sung to the tune of "Hernando's Hideaway". Poems from _The Shropshire > Lad_ too, I think Bowering posted in, cd also go to that tune.) One of my > favorite parodies is by Kenneth Koch, and has fun with WCW's "This is just > to say" : "This is just to say/ I'm sorry I broke both yr arms at the dance > last night/ but I wanted you on the wards, where _I_ am the doctor." The > chief problem w the parody Bob P alludes to, is that it isnt a good parody. > It's not well-written. And given its authorship, how cd it have been? Even > that is faintly funny. db. > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 15:11:01 -0400 Reply-To: Mark Prejsnar Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: New party, etc In-Reply-To: <199704211653.MAA16672@pobox.upenn.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Kristin-- You may be overgeneralizing from your local experience...Some NP chapters seem to be less exclusively "intellectuals" than the one you've encountered..But that's just as impression. Certainly I'll say this: the day I replied to Kent's initial posting, I happened to get a call from a NP person, a rather arrogant and ignorant fellow, practising what was well-critiqued in a Nation article a year or two ago as "boiler-room leftism"--i.e. "We don't care what you feel or believe or if you're an activist or want to be...Just give us a bunch of your spare money, preferably enough to be a paper member of our organization." He actually read to me from his little sheet that they have ten thousand members and hope to have 20,000 within a year...Needless to say, all but 200 or 300 of these are on paper, not active, just as with DSA. So I think I can agree with you and others who have suggested that the NP is very likely to have problems. I ESPECIALLY agree with your comment that without a legal victory in the fusion case before the Supreme COurt right now they won't have that well-grounded a tactical approach, and will falter.. I'm very excited about your comments re the Labor Party, Kristin; the things you write about their presence and activities in Philly are very encouraging indeed..Thanx for the comments and information Mark Prejsnar Atlanta ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 15:13:19 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Magee Subject: Re: who is social, etc. In-Reply-To: from "henry gould" at Apr 21, 97 01:25:10 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Henry wrote: "In my view individuality is not a phenomenon in isolation, & has never been described as such in classical philosophy, as Mark claims. "Man is the civic animal." (Aristotle) "Man is the companionable animal." (Dante) How's that for classics? But the reification (in ideology) of "social forces" to the point of nullifying the sense of individuality seems way off base to me. The whole trend of our century has been toward these totalizing ideas and against the concept of the Person." I'd agree, and add that the emphasis of the "civic" which Henry cites has *at least* as dubious a history as any emphasis of individuality one can find. It accounts for what Cornel West has called "the metaphysical residues in Marx: the Hegelian-inspired penchant toward totalizing history, universalizing collectivities, and simplifying emancipation." I'd suggest that one doesn't have to have a unified sense of the individual in order to reject these "metaphysical residues," residues which I think have been profoundly harmful to both "individuals" and their various collectives. -Mike. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 15:28:39 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: who is social, etc. In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 21 Apr 1997 13:25:10 EDT from I canna resist emphasizing a little further. If you deny individuality exists in the writing process, you might as well deny the importance or even existence of individuality per se. Is this what you're saying? Nothing personal - but I find this a malignant doctrine. Deny the existence of the individual & you might as well start the train cars rolling for the camps. Nothing personal - I sense from M & J's posts over the years that you are both young serious-minded fellows of good character & strong feeling & ideals - maybe you even look alike!!! But this retread of the negation of the human individual comes from reading too many books in political science, fellas. & you is wrong. Now please don't accuse me of heatin' up the rhetoric, cause I ain't. I just look at Stalinism & Fascism & all manner of superior authoritarian- isms & hear the same noises. & I agree in advance that Individualism could also become some kinda twisted anti-human ideology. & profit & property have justified their stealth on half-notions of the individual. But don't throw out the BABY with the... - Henry G. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 13:25:40 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" Subject: Re: Misc. Proj. In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII while decentering "this" subject in the bar of the Atlanta Colony Square Sheraton the other day "I" was handed the first two copies of a publication titled _Misc. Proj._ by a congeries of social forces identified as Mark Prejsnar. Read same on plane back to San Ho, and want to commend them to your collective and perhaps occasionally individual attentions. #1 includes some intriguing poetry by one "Cal Taubman" who may or may not be a real "person" but whose poems I liked much -- also Mark's reviews of two recent Sun & Moon anthologies and several journals and web sites. #2 ("incomprehension is the subtitle") has some good Mark P. poems, the journal watch & "surfing for poetry" features and other delectables -- $3.50 will get you a four issue sub. to this newsletter (you don't have to fly to Atlnata to get it as I did, at least "I" think "I" got it) -- address is: Misc. Proj. c/o Prejsnar 641 N. Highland Ave. N.E. #11 Atlanta, GA 30306 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 17:12:16 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Zimmerman Subject: Re: who is social, individual, or a writer MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Maria Damon (Maria Damon) wrote: > > At 10:33 AM 4/21/97, Mark Weiss wrote: > >Silly me. I've always thought that, though I live in the social world, blah > >blah blah, how I make my way through it might be different, individual, even > >if there's no such person as the unsocialized urperson. To say that all of > >my significant movements are in detail socially determined sounds an awful > >lot like recycled calvinism. This may be naive (I love the use of naive as > >an expletive). > > does expletive mean simply pejorative? i didn't think so. i thought it had > a more specific meaning which wd make the term "naive" not an expletive. > can some etymologist or grammarian explain what, exactly, an expletive is? OK: expletive. n. 1. An exclamation or oath, especially one that is profane or obscene. 2a. A word or phrase added to a line of verse or a sentence in order to ease syntax or rhythm but not to add any meaning. b. a word that stands in place of and anticipates a following word or phrase; for example, the word _it_ is an expletive in the sentence _It is nice to see you._ ~adj. Also expletory. Added or inserted in order to fill out something, such as a metrical line or a sentence. [Late Latin _expletivus_,from Latin _expletus_, past participle of _explere_, to fill out' _ex-_, out + _plere_, to fill. [Tormont Webster's Illust. Encyclopedic Dict.] How's them apples? [or, "A former pletive--like, a former pletive spaghetti." --Iron Jay] Dan Zimmerman ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 16:12:44 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dale Smith Subject: Re: who is social, etc. Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I have to agree with Gould. I should keep my trap shut on this. I'm no philosopher. But to say that individuality does not exist in the writing process fails to acknowledge, to my mind, deeper manifestations of human individuality outside the act of writing. Even if some one conclusively proved that the individual is a social construction, so what? That should feed the individual with even deeper personal insights into his or her relationship with a larger group. With writing--with any creative act--a person takes action due to a personal impulse, a will to engage something outside the self. I'm sure one's will consists of more than only social conditioning. But even if it didn't, that would be all the more reason for the individual to engage the world with all of his or her idiosyncratic, chaotic, and impulsive gestures. It's been a while since I read it, but isn't that similar to the situation of Dostoevsky's character in Notes from Underground? In the end I feel that, as Pound said, it's better to gamble an opinion than to humbly submit to that with which you disagree. Anyway, that's my two cents, for what it's worth. I don't like these kinds of theoretical gambits, but I believe these discussions should take place on occasion to help possibly clarify, if only to ourselves, our own pretenses for writing at all. >I canna resist emphasizing a little further. If you deny individuality >exists in the writing process, you might as well deny the importance >or even existence of individuality per se. Is this what you're saying? > >Nothing personal - but I find this a malignant doctrine. Deny the existence >of the individual & you might as well start the train cars rolling for the >camps. Nothing personal - I sense from M & J's posts over the years that >you are both young serious-minded fellows of good character & strong >feeling & ideals - maybe you even look alike!!! But this retread of >the negation of the human individual comes from reading too many >books in political science, fellas. & you is wrong. > >Now please don't accuse me of heatin' up the rhetoric, cause I ain't. >I just look at Stalinism & Fascism & all manner of superior authoritarian- >isms & hear the same noises. & I agree in advance that Individualism could >also become some kinda twisted anti-human ideology. & profit & property >have justified their stealth on half-notions of the individual. But >don't throw out the BABY with the... >- Henry G. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 15:02:05 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: who is social, etc. Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Here's a plea from a guy named Mark: there's more than one of us out here. Please use a last initial (or an honorific title or heroic attribute) to identify. I got an instant case of heartburn from the following. I bet this applies to other names as well. At 01:25 PM 4/21/97 EDT, you wrote: >The position opened by Jeff & enlarged upon by Mark is one I have a hard >time understanding! Of course there's been a ton of critical theory >on the "place" where the "subject" swerves off into ambiguity, or the >Other, or the self-contradictory; and in a time of "identity politics" >as well as commodified "personal" poetry, the idea that the individual >is not only not important but does not exist holds, I suppose, a certain >gleam of provocative interest. Moreover, as I understand the poetic >process, it's certainly not just a matter of "self-expression" or >self-imitation - it's an exploratory breaking-down & reconfiguring. >"You must lose yourself to find yourself", as the proverb goes. > >But how does this theory relate, say, to the news report this week, >who knows how accurate it is, about a recent scientific study that >advances the notion that the skills which activate human intelligence >are instilled by age one & based on the amount of spoken interaction >the child has with loving parents? I suppose you could read this >either way - but what does it mean for Mark's "power of social ideology" >if the child is primed for it by age one? > >In my view individuality is not a phenomenon in isolation, & has never been >described as such in classical philosophy, as Mark claims. "Man is the >civic animal." (Aristotle) "Man is the companionable animal." (Dante) >How's that for classics? But the reification (in ideology) of "social >forces" to the point of nullifying the sense of individuality seems >way off base to me. The whole trend of our century has been toward these >totalizing ideas and against the concept of the Person. My own PERSONAL >viewpoint is that individuality is the GIST, the very TASTE of the SALT OF >THE EARTH which brings the DIGNITY of the PERSON to the POINT, the ESSENCE >of political efficacy & meaning - and that this DIGNITY of the HUMAN PERSON >is the shadow of the DIVINE ANALOGY which the unity of the HUMAN RACE >displays in all its glory. HUMANITY is the living MANIFESTATION of the >DIVINE IMAGE. Thank you, & good night. & don't leave out the dolphins, neither >- Henry Gould > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 16:36:46 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: no no nanook(ie) In-Reply-To: <335B7F96.7954@concentric.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >As a general rule, Maria, I try to stay out of places where Canadians >are dropping their pants. > >Rachel L. Yeah, that's what you say NOW. Bromige told me about Granby, Quebec. So you got to see the boxers with the little anchor design, eh? George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 20:11:07 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Susan Wheeler Subject: Romana Huk Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Romana, if you're on-list, would you email me directly? I'm off list temporarily and can't find your address. Thanks. Susan Wheeler wheeler@is.nyu.edu 37 Washington Square West #10A New York, New York 10011 (212) 254-3984 phone/fax ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 18:54:26 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: re-post re: Yasusada I had sent the below as a reply to David's Kellogg's query on future book publication of Yasusada. It (with three other posts, including a crucial update on the B&B decoding which I'm also going to re-type) never got on the list after numerous tries, so I think the original is somehow corrupted--thus my re-typing without David's original message titled "Re: Perloff on Yasusada." It's transparently obvious to me now that B&B are working directly with Joel Kuszai, or else they have somehow infected the sending function of my machine. I've just installed a new anti-jamming system, so maybe I'll get around them this time... On 4/19 David wrote in part: "I would like to know what Kent Johnson (who's on this list) thinks of the piece [Marjorie Perloff's Boston Review essay]. But given his generally nimble responses to queries on this score, I don't imagine he'll be all that direct.... Are the Yasusada poems going to be published in book form? I would hope so." I replied: David: Doubled Flowering: From the Notebooks of Araki Yasusada, will be published by James Sherry's Roof this fall--the complete manuscript of poems, letters, and marginalia, along with a "critical appendix." But I have to ask what you mean by my "generally nimble responses to queries on this score," since the truth is that no one has ever asked me anything on this list and thus I have responded to nothing! On the Sokal thing, it's the hope of those involved in the Yasusada that it won't be reduced to that level. Yasusada is much more than a trick. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 20:15:21 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "P.Standard Schaefer" Subject: Re: Talisman ED FOSTER Talisman House Publishers PO Box 3157 Jersey City, NJ 07303-3157 tel(201)938-0698 fax(201)938-1693 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 17:26:26 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: lubbers Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" So that one might well hail: "Ahoy there, ye listlubbers!" As the list lists, to starboard or port, ask these ex-lurkers to rush to place their weight on the side thats lifting out of the water. Well done, Aldon. But will language prove amenable to a good idea, after years of practice? db ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 20:29:02 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Kellogg Subject: Re: Perloff on Yasusada In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Mon, 21 Apr 1997, Mark Prejsnar wrote: > > Chris-- > > The Ern Malley Affair / Michael Heyward. > London : Faber & Faber, 1993. > currently in print in the U.S. in a Faber paperback for $12.95, according > to Books-in-Print. And it's a great story, and well told too. Cheers, David ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ David Kellogg Duke University kellogg@acpub.duke.edu University Writing Program (919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708 FAX (919) 660-4381 http://www.duke.edu/~kellogg/ There is no mantle and it does not descend. -- Thomas Kinsella ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 10:29:26 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Philip Mead Subject: Re: Perloff on Yasusada In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Heyward's book is strong on archival and original research, but not so strong on readings of the poems and the cultural signficance of Malley. See my review article: "Cultural Pathology: What Ern Malley Means," _Australian Literary Studies_ 17.1 (May 1995): 83-88. If this is difficult for any interested US readers to track down, please backchannel to me personally. Philip > >The Ern Malley Affair / Michael Heyward. >London : Faber & Faber, 1993. >currently in print in the U.S. in a Faber paperback for $12.95, according >to Books-in-Print. > >your friendly librarian poet, > >Mark Prejsnar >Atlanta > > >On Mon, 21 Apr 1997, Christopher Alexander wrote: > >> Philip wwrott: >> > "Ern Malley" became, and remains, a kind of rallying point for radical >> > modernist, postmodern and avant-garde writing in Australia. For the >> > moralising anti-modernists of mid-century Australian literature, Ern >>Malley >> > represents the the possibility of an entirely amoral art. (Max Harris was >> > prosecuted for pusblishing obscene material, that is, poetry of >> > indeterminate meaning.) In a chapter I'm currently writing, I argue >>that in >> > fact Malley becomes the _authentic_ origin of Australian (post)modernism. >> >> I wonder if you (or anyone, really) can direct those of us >> who are not familiar with the Ern Malley affair (which >> does have a distinctly Victorian ring, thus put) to a few >> salient (primary &/or secondary) sources. I assume there's >> a lot of writing on this one out there, somewhere, but >> possibly in more fugitive publications, & so not, for instance, >> indexed in the MLA database. >> >> Chris >> .. >> christopher alexander, etc. / nominative press collective >> calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu / ************************* >> >> http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce >> >> Hey!! >> Now Available for a mere $4: >> _constellation voice_ by linda russo >> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Philip Mead Department of English & European Languages & Literatures University of Tasmania GPO Box 252-82 Hobart TAS 7001 Australia (03) 6226 2352 (tel) (03) 6226 7631 (fax) http://www.utas.edu.au/docs/humsoc/deell/1menu/3STAFFlink.htm#PhilipMead ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 15:03:12 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: who is social, individual, or a writer Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Yr right, and I'll amend: I love the use of naive as a pejorative. At 02:12 PM 4/21/97 +1000, you wrote: >At 10:33 AM 4/21/97, Mark Weiss wrote: >>Silly me. I've always thought that, though I live in the social world, blah >>blah blah, how I make my way through it might be different, individual, even >>if there's no such person as the unsocialized urperson. To say that all of >>my significant movements are in detail socially determined sounds an awful >>lot like recycled calvinism. This may be naive (I love the use of naive as >>an expletive). > > >does expletive mean simply pejorative? i didn't think so. i thought it had >a more specific meaning which wd make the term "naive" not an expletive. >can some etymologist or grammarian explain what, exactly, an expletive is? > > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 18:42:45 PDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jerry Rothenberg I tried to send this the back way but got it thrown back, so might as well do it up front. (jr) dear Henry Gould -- I thought your letter on the question of the individual was right on -- a defense, I take it, of what has long been an endangered species. And on the matter of what �ethno-poeticians� say about Eliade's fascism or fascist connections, I would guess it's pretty much what they (or we) would say about Pound's or any others' support of murder or mayhem. About E�s writings otherwise, the Shamanism book was of particular use to me when I was in need of something like that -- as a compilation, from my perspective, of forms of language & experience that resembled in traditional contexts what Rimbaud projected as the "absolutely modern." And the term "technicians of the sacred," which I came away with, gave me something to think about -- alternately with fear & wonder. Anyway, this to say I read you with interest in this strange medium. With best, Jerome Rothenberg jrothenb@ucsd.edu ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 16:07:49 -1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Gabrielle Welford Subject: The Implications of Public Policy (fwd) Comments: To: hawaii , arnolde@hawaii.edu, bakerd@hawaii.edu, bft@hawaii.edu, bkige@hawaii.edu, budgetcrisis-l , caron@hawaii.edu, cfrankli@hawaii.edu, cward@hawaii.edu, Dhira DiBiase , Norma LaRene Despain , susan crane , egg-l@hawaii.edu, ethelw@hawaii.edu, fand@hawaii.edu, foltz@hawaii.edu, fujikane@hawaii.edu, grow-l , haram@hawaii.edu, heberle@hawaii.edu, hershinow@aol.com, hilgers@hawaii.edu, jcarroll@hawaii.edu, jkellogg@hawaii.edu, jmarsell@hawaii.edu, joanp@hawaii.edu, jyin@hawaii.edu, lelyons@hawaii.edu, mahe@hawaii.edu, miriam@hawaii.edu, mot-l@hawaii.edu, natec , nealson@hawaii.edu, nettell@hawaii.edu, nicholso@hawaii.edu, nmower@hawaii.edu, omealy@hawaii.edu, rhsu@hawaii.edu, rodneym@hawaii.edu, rshapard@hawaii.edu, rwilson@hawaii.edu, schab@hawaii.edu, sibley@hawaii.edu, simson@hawaii.edu, snkn@hawaii.edu, Susan Schultz , story-l@hawaii.edu, tcarroll@hawaii.edu, ulu-l@hawaii.edu, vjs@uhheph.phys.hawaii.edu, vwayne@hawaii.edu, whitlock@hawaii.edu, wom-l Comments: cc: poetics MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Mon, 14 Apr 1997 15:34:46 -0700 (PDT) From: APIHIN - Dong Suh Blink, Grandma, Please..." By Andrew Lam, Pacific News Service "Please, Grandma, blink, just blink, please," my mother says, but Grandma only smiles. Then she says, "Bye, bye," her wheelchair gleaming in the sunlight. "Bye, bye." It is all the English that she remembers. "Alright, Grandma," I say, taking over, "if blinking's too hard, try to nod. Nod, please, it's important. Very important." We hold our breaths and wait. Nothing. No blink, no nod. Only that constant beatific smile. My mother finally throws her hands up and sighs. "This is it. We are doomed." Grandma must learn to blink or nod her head at the right time. If she fails to do so in front the officer from the Immigration and Naturalization Service, she may die. I am not exaggerating. Without the much coveted U.S. citizenship, she'll be cut off from the health care that had kept her alive for the last decade. Blink, grandma, please. The problem is that Grandma's once sharp mind has dwindled to that of an infant, peppered with sporadic moments of lucidity. She's 87, diabetic and severely senile. Since a stroke left her partially paralyzed several years ago, she has resided in a convalescent home where attendants regularly measure her blood and inject the insulin she needs. As a legal immigrant who has lived here for more than two decades, she is qualified for U.S. citizenship. In 1994 Congress passed a law that exempted seriously disabled immigrants from English proficiency and civics requirements. Then, last month, the INS issued new rules removing that exemption. The INS says it will be flexible about ways that these immigrants can take the oath. Blinking or nodding, they say, will suffice. But what seems to the INS an easy, even a charitable solution is more like cruel and unusual punishment to mentally handicapped immigrants. How can a person suffering Alzheimer's disease nod at the right moment? Can you teach a mentally retarded child to blink, pretending to understand that he's taking an oath? And can people in comas or completely gone into their own worlds possibly grasp that a single gesture has such enormous significance. The situation would be sardonically funny in a play or movie -- Samuel Beckett, I should think, or perhaps Stanley Kubrick. But this is not make-believe; this is the new American reality for hundreds of thousands of immigrant families like mine. Blink, grandma, please. Of course, if Grandma is thrown out of the convalescent home she will be far from a life on the street: we take care of our own. But how well? And how long? My parents are not rich. They worked for decades to achieve a modest middle class life, complete with a home in the suburbs. But they are both in their late 60s and can't possibly perform round-the-clock care - let alone medical duties. It comes down to this: If Grandma fails to blink at the right time she will not become an American citizen. Then the government may take away her health care. If that happens, my parents may have to sell their home, the sum of their labor, to pay for her medical treatment. Then after all the money's gone, what? Blink, grandma, please. This woman, gray haired, smiling in the sunlight, survived two wars in Vietnam. She had seen enough horrors to last ten lifetimes -- including having her home bombed twice by American planes. She raised four children on her own when her husband died at the age of 34 and, after we fled to America 22 years ago, babysat her grandchildren, cooked and cleaned. In her mid seventies, she decided to go back to school to study English. "Never give up," she often told her grandchildren, "when there is still work you must finish it." Her strong values passed down to three generations, all now hard-working Americans. But in her twilight, my grandmother is faced with something she can not possibly fight: The banal bureaucracy of the U.S. government. Blink, grandma, please. Last year, some of my aunts and uncles voted for Proposition 187, the "anti-illegal immigrant initiative," hoping to draw the line between legal and illegal. But they soon discovered that line did not hold. It has becomes clear to us all that the anti-immigrant purge makes no such distinctions and is going after the weakest link -- the aged immigrants, those who could not vote, or have no public voice. But will it stop there? If we are ready to force retarded and senile immigrants to blink and nod before we care for them, then we ourselves have already shut our eyes. As anti-immigrant sentiment grows, we no longer recognize ourselves as a nation of immigrants. When a society hides behind bureaucracy to do its dirty work the only logical outcome is cruelty. "OK, grandma, let's pretend I'm the American officer, " I say. "when I read you the oath, you blink or nod, OK? Try it." But Grandma only smiles. "Bye, bye," she says. She seems so small and frail and far away, fading into nothingness under glaring California sunlight. "Bye, bye." COPYRIGHT PACIFIC NEWS SERVICE pacificnews@igc.org 450 Mission Street, Room 204 San Francisco, CA 94105 415-243-4364 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 21:14:27 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Alexander Subject: Re: lodging for Poetry and the Public Sphere In-Reply-To: <9703190728.ZM16199@niflheim.rutgers.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dear Kathy: At the last minute here my lodging plans seem to be collapsing. I was going to stay with friends in Philadelphia & commute by train. But now (I won't go into all the reasons) that seems to be impossible. Bob Perelman has offered me space in his hotel room, with Alan Golding, pending Alan's assent. I'm willing to take a pallet on a floor, or even just a floor if it comes to that. And of course I will contribute my share. I have emailed Alan asking him. But I also thought I ought to email you in case you have other ideas or suggestions, or perhaps know someone else who has no roommate and wants one, or someone who has cancelled . . . any help is very much appreciated, and I am sorry to be such a pain at this late date when you must have much else to think about. all best wishes, and I look forward to meeting you. charles alexander charles alexander / chax press / chax@theriver.com ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 21:35:09 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Alexander Subject: message to the wrong place In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970420211427.0069fbcc@theriver.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" oops. again, perhaps for the third time in as many years, I sent a personal message to the wrong place. Very sorry. charles charles alexander / chax press / chax@theriver.com ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 22:55:59 -0500 Reply-To: balong@ipa.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Brent Long Organization: Self Subject: Frank Stanford MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Anybody familiar with Frank Stanford's work? If so, please reply. I have written a web page about him and am interested in hearing from others who have read his work, or who know people affiliated with the Lost Roads Project. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 21:41:08 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: dbkk@SIRIUS.COM Subject: Re: lodging for Poetry and the Public Sphere In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970420211427.0069fbcc@theriver.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dear Charles, I hope you find somewhere to stay at the Rutgers conference, but your message posted publicly in error failed to say anything mean about either Bob Perelman or Alan Golding! You owe all of us on the Poetics List a second apology for failing to provide us with the ultimate *frisson de la net.* >Dear Kathy: > >At the last minute here my lodging plans seem to be collapsing. I was going >to stay with friends in Philadelphia & commute by train. But now (I won't >go into all the reasons) that seems to be impossible. > >Bob Perelman has offered me space in his hotel room HERE WAS YOUR CHANCE TO SAY--"I would rather eat carpet tacks than share a hotel room with Bob Perelman." with Alan Golding, >pending Alan's assent. I'm willing to take a pallet on a floor, or even >just a floor if it comes to that. And of course I will contribute my share. >I have emailed Alan asking him HERE WAS YOUR CHANCE TO SAY, --"But Alan is so cheap he begrudges even the price of an e-mail, and his prostate has become so enlarged I fear he will step on me during one of his fifty trips to the bathroom during each long New Jersey night." Oops, I had better stop now, I'm getting into this too much, and speak as a fond admirer of Alan, Bob and Charles, Good luck everyone, XXX Kevin Killian ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 00:40:35 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Comments: cc: jrothenb@ucsd.edu Jerry R. addresses Henry G. -- >...Anyway, this to say I read you with interest in this strange medium. I've been reading Henry w/ interest in this strange medium, too -- the chap keeps saying notable stuff. Seems one might infer, JR, you're new to the mode (& presumably, to the Poetics listserv); -- ergo, as a bystander to the immediate exchange but withal a denizen of the deep [according to a now-current trope, by some semi-consensus anyway] -- I'l presume to say: welcome! best, d.i. (p.s.: As for Eliade, the most influential / interesting book, for me, has been *The Myth of the Eternal Return*; -- ceratinly influenced, for instance, ways in which I understood the work of Meredith Monk & those of her ilk.) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 05:42:32 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: rsillima@IX.NETCOM.COM Subject: Two thoughts Comments: To: poetics@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii 1) Has anyone of late thought to mention what a terrific series Sylvester Pollet's Backwoods Broadsides is? If not, let me be the first. Real chapbooks on a single sheet of paper (and without seeming crowded). Many are by poets who are simultaneously widely published but genuinely underappreciated (Enslin, Rochelle Owens, Bern Porter, Anne Tardos, Andrew Schelling, Schwerner coming up soon). 2) Has anyone else noted the genuinely bad start with which the Cubs began their year? I have a theory, called "The Curse of George Will." My evidence is that the Cubs were unable to win until after the big Ginsberg memorial at Temple Emmanuel in San Francisco was complete. The Cubs' minor league teams also have the worst cumulative record in baseball. Jack Spicer would have appreciated this form of torture. Ron Silliman Ron Silliman When this you see 262 Orchard Road Remember me Paoli, PA 19301-1116 (610) 251-2214 (610) 293-6099 (o) (610) 293-5506 (fax) rsillima@ix.netcom.com rsillima@tssc.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 06:47:28 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Boughn Subject: Re: who is social, etc. In-Reply-To: from "henry gould" at Apr 21, 97 03:28:39 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit The Present Is a Boat --for David and Gail Matlin "folded deep into the science of invisibility synonym for men and women --David Matlin, Dressed in Protective Fashion "No man has any longer, the permission of maintaining the armor of his distance. The thing must be dragged into the light. The wheels of the sun must be unstuck." --Charles Olson, "History" (1952) "Sometimes the ship was replaced by a plough, and the rustic ceremony of Plough Monday in England is a relic of the same religious rite performed in honour of the Teutonic Isis." --Sabine Baring-Gould, Curious Myths of the Middle Ages The present is a boat, in which flies gather, and yet there is room for more, distance that is, to get away from all things coming into their own, bumping even into their husks left from before, the former time serving as tenebrous sea for the sluggish movement of differentiation, what puts us, the rowers, in phase at last, & without wine or sex, the pleasure of being heard after all the din has ceased, history made small, cut out of all this here to make sail. --John Clarke, In the Analogy, Book 2 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 07:13:14 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Magee Subject: Re: who is social, etc. In-Reply-To: from "Dale Smith" at Apr 21, 97 04:12:44 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Dale wrote: "I'm sure one's will consists of more than only social conditioning. But even if it didn't, that would be all the more reason for the individual to engage the world with all of his or her idiosyncratic, chaotic, and impulsive gestures." One more Creeley quote (I've been reading his essays) in reference to this: "I want to give witness not to the thought of myself - that specious concept of identity - but, rather, to what I am as simple agency, a thing evidently alive by virtue of such activity." That seems about right to me. -Mike. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 08:07:45 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: who is social, etc. In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 21 Apr 1997 15:02:05 -0700 from On Mon, 21 Apr 1997 15:02:05 -0700 Mark Weiss said: >Here's a plea from a guy named Mark: there's more than one of us out here. >Please use a last initial (or an honorific title or heroic attribute) to >identify. I got an instant case of heartburn from the following. >I bet this applies to other names as well. O.k., Mark of the Junction. - Henry of the Brown (as my Uncle George used to sing: "What's the color of horse manure? Brown, Brown, Brown.") ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 08:17:51 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: Two thoughts In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 22 Apr 1997 05:42:32 -0500 from second the motion on the Backwoods series. A great idea & very well- produced. We're thinking of following suit down here in the (little) city. - Henry of Providence ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 05:29:50 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: Re: no no nanook(ie) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit George Bowering wrote: > Yeah, that's what you say NOW. Bromige told me about Granby, Quebec. So you > got to see the boxers with the little anchor design, eh? Nah. But I guess we know who DID get a good hard look at them. Rachel ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 08:23:29 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: who is social, etc. In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 22 Apr 1997 07:13:14 -0400 from On Tue, 22 Apr 1997 07:13:14 -0400 Michael Magee said: > >One more Creeley quote (I've been reading his essays) in reference to >this: "I want to give witness not to the thought of myself - that specious >concept of identity - but, rather, to what I am as simple agency, a thing >evidently alive by virtue of such activity." > >That seems about right to me. There is an article in today's NY Times science section about biologists' take on the concept of the self. Unsurprisingly, they see it as a deep- seated social survival mechanism (by deep-seated I mean back to the membrane separating individual amoebae). They also differentiate between cold-blooded reptiles, which have a basically defensive, passive response to environment, & mammals, whose warm-bloodedness allows for more initiative & creativity. As far as humans go, they focus on the symbiosis of self & social environment; the stronger the sense of individuality, the more complex & "successful" the survival in the community. There's more but I just skimmed it. Remember Joe Poet, or was it Josephine? The one who always pushed to the front of the line at the open mike & read his poem about how he felt after he stubbed his toe on a fire hydrant & what it meant for his neighborhood, city, nation, cosmos? Remember? Remember? God, his poems were lousy. Mandelstam talks about poetry as a surging force, pre-existing. & yet particularly in his Voronezh poems (a new translation, _Voronezh Notebooks_ from Bloodaxe Bks, is out there. Mandelstam is the greatest) the "lyric" is personal, personal, wild, wild, personal, surviving voice, surviving challenging & submitting to & condemning his coyote-enemy, Stalin. I think the practice of any kind of work for any length of time brings anonymity - the ego getting caught up in the form of the work - but I think his denial of self here is a little... uh.... oh shut up for a while, Henry [Blarnes here]... Henry, go draft a mule & join the ass-backwards brigade [Spandrift talkin]... ok. ok. guys. I'm gonna shut muh trap for three days & then rise from the keyboard. [Gould] ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 09:09:07 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: lubbers Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I like lubber, lubbing. "What'd you do today, dear?" "Lubbed." But then I had another brilliant idea--ask that group to name themselves. Great paradox, as none can propose a name without leaving the group! Hah! sp > So that one might well hail: "Ahoy there, ye listlubbers!" As the >list lists, to starboard or port, ask these ex-lurkers to rush to place >their weight on the side thats lifting out of the water. Well done, Aldon. >But will language prove amenable to a good idea, after years of practice? >db ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 09:08:50 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "David W. Clippinger" Subject: talisman Comments: To: UB Poetics discussion group MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Talisman address: Ed Foster Talisman Box 3157 Jersey City, NJ 07303-3157 All best, David Clippinger ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 09:19:57 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: Two thoughts Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Thanks, Ron. The two latest have just gone out, #26 A Real Toad, by Jennifer Craig Pixley (the allusion to Marianne Moore recently discussed) and #27 Between Ourselves, by Peter Money. July will bring Zwyczaj/Mark Nowak, and Family Tree/Mary de Rachewiltz. October, Armand Schwerner & Amiri Baraka. Anyone on the list can have a free sample (they sell for a buck apiece ppd.) or subscribe for $10. Sylvester Pollet RR 5 Box 3630 Ellsworth ME 04605. >1) Has anyone of late thought to mention what a terrific series Sylvester >Pollet's Backwoods Broadsides is? If not, let me be the first. Real >chapbooks on a single sheet of paper (and without seeming crowded). Many are >by poets who are simultaneously widely published but genuinely >underappreciated (Enslin, Rochelle Owens, Bern Porter, Anne Tardos, Andrew >Schelling, Schwerner coming up soon). > >2) Has anyone else noted the genuinely bad start with which the Cubs began >their year? I have a theory, called "The Curse of George Will." My evidence >is that the Cubs were unable to win until after the big Ginsberg memorial at >Temple Emmanuel in San Francisco was complete. The Cubs' minor league teams >also have the worst cumulative record in baseball. Jack Spicer would have >appreciated this form of torture. > >Ron Silliman > >Ron Silliman When this you see >262 Orchard Road Remember me >Paoli, PA 19301-1116 >(610) 251-2214 >(610) 293-6099 (o) >(610) 293-5506 (fax) >rsillima@ix.netcom.com >rsillima@tssc.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 08:17:49 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jeff Hansen Organization: The Blake School MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit henry gould writes: I canna resist emphasizing a little further. If you deny individuality exists in the writing process, you might as well deny the importance or even existence of individuality per se. Is this what you're saying? Nothing personal - but I find this a malignant doctrine. Deny the existence of the individual & you might as well start the train cars rolling for the camps. Nothing personal - I sense from M & J's posts over the years that you are both young serious-minded fellows of good character & strong feeling & ideals - maybe you even look alike!!! But this retread of the negation of the human individual comes from reading too many books in political science, fellas. & you is wrong. Now please don't accuse me of heatin' up the rhetoric, cause I ain't. I just look at Stalinism & Fascism & all manner of superior authoritarian- isms & hear the same noises. & I agree in advance that Individualism could also become some kinda twisted anti-human ideology. & profit & property have justified their stealth on half-notions of the individual. But don't throw out the BABY with the... - Henry G. I better respond to this one. Whoa! 1. Mark W. discussed individualism and the Western tradition. My use of the term is different than his: I think of "individualism" in its current manifestation, as emanating from certain strains of Romanticism, the most obvious example of which is Coleridge's "Kubla Khan." I agree that individualism is not around, at least not in the same form, in earlier periods. 2. Henry--any ideology can be used to send people to death camps. My guess is that more people have been killed in the names of Karl Marx and Jesus Christ than in the names of all the rest of humanity combined. Both were more interested in liberation than repression. The tyrants grab hold of any ideology that will work and use it to hurt. Let's not fool ourselves: ideas for tyrants are not as important as they are for us thinking types. For them, they are no different than a brick, baton, bullet or bomb. 3. I believe in improvisation, transfiguration, torquing, twisting, and altering given social materials. Some of the materials forge us -- the ones we forget -- and some we act upon. If you want to call this work individualism, be my guest (as Conrad Hilton would say.) 4. Funny to find myself here -- in graduate school my interest in pragmatist philosophy, before the big resurgence in John Dewey studies, caused me to be called "naive" by Continental theory heads who didn't think I was taking the "Death of the Author" far enough. 5. Five years ago, Mark Wallace and I began a dialogue with the clause "there is no such think as Language" as a way of critiquing the totalizing and structuralist tendencies of much of Continental Theory. We advocated the messiness of languages, plural, instead. 6. Henry -- It follows from 5 that you're aiming at the wrong "culprits." Find the "real" ones. 7. About babies and temperments -- of course there is something natural here. I've been around too many to believe in tabula rasa. Then again, it's a long walk from genetic predisposition to Romantic Individualism. 8. No hard feelings -- i luv it when the rhetoric heats up. Let down your hair and drop trousers, gang! Best, Jeff P.S. Neither Mark nor I intend on trying to send people to death camps any time soon. Nor do we plan on aiding any individual or regime who does attempt to do so. In fact, our tendency would be to oppose such an individual or regime. I can only speak for myself on this one, but I would do so by any means necessary. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 08:36:34 -0500 Reply-To: balong@ipa.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Brent Long Organization: Self MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Thank you, Henry! ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 09:28:16 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 22 Apr 1997 08:17:49 -0500 from On Tue, 22 Apr 1997 08:17:49 -0500 Jeff Hansen said: > >2. Henry--any ideology can be used to send people to death camps. My >guess is that more people have been killed in the names of Karl Marx >and Jesus Christ than in the names of all the rest of humanity >combined. Both were more interested in liberation than repression. >The tyrants grab hold of any ideology that will work and use it to >hurt. Let's not fool ourselves: ideas for tyrants are not as >important as they are for us thinking types. For them, they are no >different than a brick, baton, bullet or bomb. This is a very important point. But you have to be an individual to stand up to them. > >5. Five years ago, Mark Wallace and I began a dialogue with the clause >"there is no such think as Language" as a way of critiquing the >totalizing and structuralist tendencies of much of Continental Theory. >We advocated the messiness of languages, plural, instead. I agree with you guys there. There is no such thing as language. See my 400 pp. post on the Language Chat List for further extended commentary on this position. > >7. About babies and temperments -- of course there is something >natural here. I've been around too many to believe in tabula rasa. >Then again, it's a long walk from genetic predisposition to Romantic >Individualism. But it's an even longer stretch from Romantic Individualism to McDonald's in Dinkytown. And an even LONGER stretch from there to what you guys said: "the individual does not exist." > >P.S. Neither Mark nor I intend on trying to send people to death camps >any time soon. Nor do we plan on aiding any individual or regime who >does attempt to do so. In fact, our tendency would be to oppose such an >individual or regime. I can only speak for myself on this one, but I >would do so by any means necessary. A word (in non-language) to the entire list: see how I get people talkin? Just accuse them of sending people to camps! (I learned this at boy scout camp) - the temporarily non-existent Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 09:58:52 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Wallace Subject: "the divine analogy which is the unity of the human race"? MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Mark Weiss, Henry Gould and others: Thanks for your lively responses to my recent post. I'm sorry to have to continue to argue with you here. Mark: Quite simply, to say that one is socially constructed says nothing about one's ability to respond to social constructedness, and to effect change. Rather, one might construct a social notion of that field of activity reduced to the term "individual" as a SOCIAL site where various kinds of social activities are focused and rearranged. As M. Magee (do I have this name right?) points out, there is already a history of literary discussion of this kind of social activity of the human. I would suggest also the work of ERVING GOFFMAN, who in books like SOCIAL INTERACTION and others works very particularly with the notion of what he calls "face work," constructing in the process an idea of human identity as a series of responsive gestures to social phenomena, gestures that can include many types of resistance, rewriting, and possibility. But none of these possibilities are EXTRA-SOCIAL; rather, Goffman's idea is that "personality" (choose what word you will) is this SERIES OF PERFORMATIVE SOCIAL CHOICES). Henry: I appreciate your appreciation of my "youthful seriousness"--I'd thank you for your "adult seriousness" if I was sure that you were any older than I am. Perhaps I should have been more particular in my detailing of philsophical history; yes, it's true that Greek philosphy does not create the modern notion of the individual. I think it's more traditional to start with Descartes in this regard, moving up through Kant, etc. But I'm not sure I want to go into details here. Rather, it seems to me that in such phrases as "the divine analogy which is the unity of the human race," and "individuality is the gist" and "humanity is the living manifestation of the divine image" simply repeats the western history of a coercive "center elsewhere" that posits its goal of reducing all difference to the sameness of "individuality" in the name of a divinity to which it claims access. I have no problems with considering the possibilities in the sacred, per se: rather, I have intense problems with the philosophy and cultural critique you launch in the name of a divinity which you understand as "unity," but in which I see no presence of any unity. As to whether one goes to news reports for the details of scientific surveys (and indeed whether one goes to such surveys as the authoritative source on what constitutes the life of the human (I do NOT say individual), I'll leave it up to you to decide whether or not those sources are disinterested and trusthworthy, or biased by social factors. But again, thanks for your response on this; it's made clear to me that our differences here are profound. My apologies for my inability, on this modem, to correct typos. Mark Wallace /----------------------------------------------------------------------------\ | | | mdw@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu | | GWU: | | http://gwis2.circ.gwu.edu/~mdw | | EPC: | | http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/wallace | |____________________________________________________________________________| ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 09:02:04 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: amato@CHARLIE.CNS.IIT.EDU Subject: Re: who is social, etc. Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" henry, your last remarks about the individual struck me as perfectly appropriate for earth day!... in any case, and not to sound at all aloof here, i can't really see the controversy i've been reading re invidual VS. social -- henry, jeff, mark, others -- to the extent that recourse to the social, even in the hands of somebody like foucault, need not do away with human agency... sure, agency would seem to take a beating, as it were, when one considers any larger, group context, esp. in historical terms (whether social or ecological)... of course there is a sense that one is already written, even as one writes, owing largely to the social dimension of language practices... but, but the question of the individual is surely a matter of continual negotiation, yes? (sorry for this word, btw, "negotiation"---it's a bit too fashionable, too currency-driven perhaps, but i'll stick with it)... in fact, one could say that the self, whatever it is or they are, is always in the midst of processes of self-negotiation (by which i do mean to invoke some cognitive processing too)... you get human agency, and the creative, in the work of raymond williams, just as you get it in dewey... you get individual agency in bateson, even as you get it in spivak... what one does with one's sense of agency, or individuality, is another matter... i suppose, setting aside empirical research, this is what most interests me---what our obligations, responsibilities, possibilities are as individual agencies (and as a species) who are so caught up in our various social-ecological-cosmic (to be just a bit oracular here) settings... which opens more to that other thread---"what is white?"---and could open into another, more eco/onto-oriented thread too---what is human?... but you really can't ask one question, i think, without reflecting on the other, esp. when you consider that, in the u.s. not all that long ago, those who were non-white were "officially" considered by many to be non or sub-human, and surely not full-fledged "citizens"... i mean, it's in bringing ourselves to ourselves, whatever we are and whoever we think we are---as anything but a solipsistic gesture---that things get complicated, no?... anyway, happy earth day, folks, and a belated happy passover!... best, joe ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 10:13:16 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM Subject: http://poetry.miningco.com I seem to have become a miner, like my grandfather. A Jew in New York Like everybody else, I wasn't a Jew Until I came to New York. In Portland, OR, The other day, a young Latina asked me If I were Jewyorican. Papa and Bubby Came from Ukraine, landed in Brooklyn, Settled in Harlan, KY, and named my father Benjamin Franklin. My mother, the offspring Of a coalminer, married Ben, the only Jew In town. He didn't last. Ma remarried. In kindergarten, in Cincinnati, instead Of moving to the afternoon session the second Semester, I stayed in Morning and changed my name. This is the year 5755. In Chinese it is Year Of the Dog. I am 45 years old, and learned that The time between Rosh Hashona and Yom Kippur Are the Days of Awe. Moody and gray, with dashes Of absolute clarity, I love these days. Cleansing The summer's sweat from the streets of New York, I always think of the Year beginning in September. "That's when school starts." A holdover from Youth. This year, 1994, for the first time I thought, Hey, it's the real New Year, and I am a real Jew. A real Jew, and a real coalminer's son, too. Bob Holman's Mining Company site is http://poetry.miningco.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 09:32:26 -0500 Reply-To: balong@ipa.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Brent Long Organization: Self Subject: Re: http://poetry.miningco.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Very nice, Bob. Heard you, Brenda, and Lisa had a great time in Hollywood. I had a blast having Wammo stay here a couple of months ago, but DAMN!...too much testosterone for just one man, don't you think? Anyway, take care. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 09:54:22 +0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: hasta la vista Joel Kuszai informs me that there is something wrong with my server and that I probably haven't been receiving most of the list postings for the past number of days. So if any of my messages have appeared more than once, I do apologize--I haven't seen but one or two of my own appear in the past week or so. I'm going to unsub for a while and try to flounder through until semester's and summer term's end, but I can be reached (I hope!) backchannel. For what it's worth, the thing about "feeling sorry for the class collaborationists" was just a silly comment. I happen to have become in my mid-years that lowest form of homo-politicus: an armchair social-democrat. And by the way, David B and George B, I've given up on trying to decode your postings--tantalizing clues, but I now understand that the key is too buried and beyond my reach. You guys are just plain good. Kent ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 10:49:56 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: "the divine analogy which is the unity of the human race"? In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 22 Apr 1997 09:58:52 -0400 from On Tue, 22 Apr 1997 09:58:52 -0400 Mark Wallace said: > > Henry: I appreciate your appreciation of my "youthful >seriousness"--I'd thank you for your "adult seriousness" if I was sure >that you were any older than I am. Perhaps I should have been more >particular in my detailing of philsophical history; yes, it's true that >Greek philosphy does not create the modern notion of the individual. I >think it's more traditional to start with Descartes in this regard, moving >up through Kant, etc. But I'm not sure I want to go into details here. >Rather, it seems to me that in such phrases as "the divine analogy which >is the unity of the human race," and "individuality is the gist" and >"humanity is the living manifestation of the divine image" simply repeats >the western history of a coercive "center elsewhere" that posits its goal >of reducing all difference to the sameness of "individuality" in the name >of a divinity to which it claims access. I have no problems with >considering the possibilities in the sacred, per se: rather, I have >intense problems with the philosophy and cultural critique you launch in >the name of a divinity which you understand as "unity," but in which I see >no presence of any unity. Well, you can lump Descartes & Judeo-Christianity together if you want, but it's pretty lumpy. Descartes "think therefore I am" ego is a truncated version of what I'm talking about. What I'm talking about is not exactly western: it's probably most directly & simply presented in Byzantine art: humanity as the mirror-imago of spirit. It's not an other-centered divinity: it's many-in-one. And it's not necessarily anthropomorphic in another (differe nt) truncated sense. The mirror-image acknowledges the imageless, the unrepresentable, the-- "I am". - Uncle Nobodaddy ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 10:59:58 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: who is social, etc. In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 22 Apr 1997 09:02:04 -0500 from Agent, yeah. How many of you know that poet extraordinaire some say father of the english pentameter was a secret agent? Christopher Marlowe. We may not be individuals, Mark of D.C. & Jeff of Minneysnapolis, but we're all agents under the cloak. How about that for a lurkers moniker? Agent. I'm just listening in: I'm an agent. - Henry Bigmouth of Smallstate (not a gent, neither. a-gent) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 11:36:28 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Re: who is social, etc. MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit henry wrote: > > Agent, yeah. How many of you know that poet extraordinaire some say father > of the english pentameter was a secret agent? Christopher Marlowe. > We may not be individuals, Mark of D.C. & Jeff of Minneysnapolis, > but we're all agents under the cloak. How about that for a lurkers > moniker? Agent. I'm just listening in: I'm an agent. > - Henry Bigmouth of Smallstate (not a gent, neither. a-gent) & when is someone going to reprint Muriel Rukeyser's _The Traces of thomas Harriot_ which has gorgeous chapters on said Chris Marlowe & the unfunny end he came to. --Pierre -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 07:05:56 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Douglas Organization: Sun Moon Books Subject: new Sun & Moon titles Comments: cc: djmess@sunmoon.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Sun & Moon Press is happy to announce the publication of three new titles, which, as usual, we will offer those on the Poetics List a 20% discount. NOTHING THE SUN CANNOT EXPLAIN: 20 CONTEMPORARY BRAZILIAN POETS, edited by Michael Palmer, R�gis Bonvicino and Nelson Ascher, with a Foreword by Joao Almino. Contains work by 20 younger Brazilian poets, including Duda Machado, Paulo Leminski, R�gis Bonvicino, Arnaldo Antunes, and Claudia Roquette-Pinto. Bi-lingual, English and Portuguese. 312 pages, $15.95. This is the second of Sun & Moon's International Anthology series. FRAME (1971-1990), by Barrett Watten. Finally comes the long-awaited collection of the work of Barrett Watten, including OPERA--WORKS, DECAY, 1-10, PLASMA/PARALLELES/"X," COMPLETE THOUGHT, CONDUIT, and the previously uncollected texts, CITY FIELDS and FRAME. Paperback $13.95 (336 pages). THE CRITIC AS ARTIST, by Oscar Wilde The third offering of Green Interger's series of prose writings, Wilde's great essay is as fresh today as it was upon its original publication in 1888. $9.95 As usual, you can order directly through E-Mail at djmess@sunmoon.com or djmess@cinenet.net or through our E-mail on our website: www.sunmoon.com Douglas Messerli ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 11:58:59 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Rukeyser Reprints In-Reply-To: <335CA2BC.3D83@cnsunix.albany.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Pierre == Muriel Rukeyser's being celebrated here at Teachers & Writers on May 8 (reservations required, call now). I'll ask Jan Heller-Levi, the editor of the MR Reader and instigator behind the recent string of MR reprints (I think), whether the book you mention is coming back. ##Jordan On Tue, 22 Apr 1997, Pierre Joris wrote: > henry wrote: > > > > Agent, yeah. How many of you know that poet extraordinaire some say father > > of the english pentameter was a secret agent? Christopher Marlowe. > > We may not be individuals, Mark of D.C. & Jeff of Minneysnapolis, > > but we're all agents under the cloak. How about that for a lurkers > > moniker? Agent. I'm just listening in: I'm an agent. > > - Henry Bigmouth of Smallstate (not a gent, neither. a-gent) > > & when is someone going to reprint Muriel Rukeyser's _The Traces of > thomas Harriot_ which has gorgeous chapters on said Chris Marlowe & the > unfunny end he came to. --Pierre > -- > ========================================= > pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 > tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu > http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ > --------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Everything that allows men to become rooted, through > values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in > _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which > constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, > [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality > and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose > it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot > ========================================== > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 12:07:24 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: E Berrigan & M Owen at Poem Town In-Reply-To: <335CC5C4.3AD4@cinenet.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII POETS Ed mund Ber rigan and Mau reen Owe n read their poetry at POETRY CITY (NY) in the offices of Teachers & Writers Collaborative 5 Union Square West 7th Floor THURSDAY APRIL 24 7 - 8:30 PM upcoming events Friday May 2 Galaxy Craze / Bruce Morrow Friday May 9 Trish Hampl / Tracie Morris Friday May 16 Bob Holman / Douglas Rothschild ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 09:09:03 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: no no nanook(ie) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" This "Subject" is one of my alltime favorites for its knotting of various possible and (barely?) relevant threads--i wonder herb@_eskimo_ hasnt responded. But what a bad lot you are, Maria, Rachel and (no surprise here!) george. No sooner do I turn over a new leaf than I find--oh, no, one of those!--under it. Here I am, trying to go straight, not to offend moral sensibilities, and the three of you, trying to yank me back to the old days (like that time in Quebec!) I must deny the boxer-shorts canard. Anybody who knows me well will tell you that I only wear jockeys or bikinis. I was wearing jockeys the one and only time Bowering saw me in my underwear. He walked into my room at his house while I was getting dressed. He read the brand name on the front of my jockeys and said, "Everlast! By the time she sees your underwear, she's already committed--you should put that sign on the front of your pants!" The first step in giving up alcohol and other abusive substances, is to let all of your acquaintance know some of the details of your life during addiction. I post this message because I am on the 12-step program away from double entendere and sex-cheapening obtrusions into this place of serious discussion and debate.For as long as my ex-partners in these activities continue to post sucrrilous allegations, I shall oblige my recovery guru by posting one more detail of their shameless but shameful activities. yrs in sobriety & chasteness, db. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 10:30:02 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Miekal And Subject: Re: Frank Stanford Comments: To: balong@ipa.net MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Brent Long wrote: > > Anybody familiar with Frank Stanford's work? If so, please reply. I > have written a web page about him and am interested in hearing from > others who have read his work, or who know people affiliated with the > Lost Roads Project. Just a quik yah to Frank Stanford's longpoem You, which I remember reading in the late 70s, & damn if Ive even seen another copy of it again since then. Still in print? Miekal who lubs & snarks in the background as spring has popped, & someone has to choose between getting the trees in the ground or being boiled & canned in this otherworld listserv.... -- @#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@#@# Dreamtime Village website: http://net22.com/dreamtime QAZINGULAZA: And/Was/Wakest website: http://net22.com/qazingulaza e-mail for DT & And/Was: dtv@mwt.net ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 12:37:30 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Wallace Subject: more divinity MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII A last word on my earlier post: I had to run to class, and so could not finish (or carefully edit) my remarks. "Individuality" is in no way the creation of something "divine," rather, individuality is a social concept with a specific history, usually but not always the history of claiming "MAN" as the centralized authority over all experience, however that "MAN" is related to the "divine" (usually, in this history, the "divine" is what gave "man" his primacy). This specific history of the individual is directly tied to the history of /----------------------------------------------------------------------------\ | | | mdw@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu | | GWU: | | http://gwis2.circ.gwu.edu/~mdw | | EPC: | | http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/wallace | |____________________________________________________________________________| ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 12:31:58 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Kellogg Subject: Re: re-post re: Yasusada Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 06:54 PM 4/21/97 +0600, KENT JOHNSON wrote: > >David: >Doubled Flowering: From the Notebooks of Araki Yasusada, will be >published by James Sherry's Roof this fall--the complete >manuscript of poems, letters, and marginalia, along with a "critical >appendix." But I have to ask what you mean by my "generally nimble >responses to queries on this score," since the truth is that no one >has ever asked me anything on this list and thus I have responded to >nothing! On the Sokal thing, it's the hope of those involved in the >Yasusada that it won't be reduced to that level. Yasusada is much >more than a trick. Kent, Glad to hear the notebooks are being published. As for "nimble responses" etc., I was recalling -- probably badly -- a sense in the Lingua Franca article that you had been somewhat, well, cagey. If they never contacted you, or if I remembered wrongly, I apologize. (On the other hand, I also recall quite admiring the stance I perceived.) Of course, the Sokal event is different. But the evasion of responsibility by the editors of Social Text is not, I think, any more obtuse than the retraction of Yasusada by APR. Yasusada is more than a trick, yes, and more than Sokal. Cheers, David ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ David Kellogg kellogg@acpub.duke.edu Box 90023, Duke University (919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708 FAX (919) 660-4381 http://www.duke.edu/~kellogg/ There is no mantle and it does not descend. --Thomas Kinsella ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 09:39:18 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: william marsh Subject: Cubbies Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" 2) Has anyone else noted the genuinely bad start with which the Cubs began >their year? I have a theory, called "The Curse of George Will." My evidence >is that the Cubs were unable to win until after the big Ginsberg memorial at >Temple Emmanuel in San Francisco was complete. The Cubs' minor league teams >also have the worst cumulative record in baseball. Jack Spicer would have >appreciated this form of torture. Karmic balancing of the remarkable winningness of Jordan, et al. And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a similar love of BASKETball? bill marsh ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 12:44:47 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Wallace Subject: divine continued MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII The history of the individual is directly tied to the history of economic and racial exploitation that marks the history of capitalism; "individuality" becomes the basis for a class of owners to manipulate workers in the name of the "individual's" freedom to seize resources (a process usually referred to as "the right to make a profit"). The "individual" posits a notion of human beings as self-contained, discrete, brought into existence by a divine declaration, and not responsible to anyting beyond their own individuality. I see nothing in the process of creation that is "individual," if one means by that self-contained, discrete, and in any sense absolute rather than provisional. Creativity emerges in responsiveness, contact, that place where the human mind finds itself not singular and individual but IN RELATION TO THE WORLD. There are no individuals--I guess I'm going to have to say that again. Mark Wallace /----------------------------------------------------------------------------\ | | | mdw@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu | | GWU: | | http://gwis2.circ.gwu.edu/~mdw | | EPC: | | http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/wallace | |____________________________________________________________________________| ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 10:08:30 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: who is social, etc. Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To Quick Henry: Mark of the Junction is good. Mark of the Beast would also be acceptable. At 08:07 AM 4/22/97 EDT, you wrote: >On Mon, 21 Apr 1997 15:02:05 -0700 Mark Weiss said: >>Here's a plea from a guy named Mark: there's more than one of us out here. >>Please use a last initial (or an honorific title or heroic attribute) to >>identify. I got an instant case of heartburn from the following. >>I bet this applies to other names as well. > >O.k., Mark of the Junction. >- Henry of the Brown > >(as my Uncle George used to sing: "What's the color of horse manure? >Brown, Brown, Brown.") > > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 12:17:48 -0500 Reply-To: balong@ipa.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Brent Long Organization: Self Subject: Re: divine continued MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Mark: "Capitalism" becomes the basis for a class of owners to manipulate others, not "individuality". Not only is the process of creation individual, but so is the process of interpretation. We have all looked at a work of art, be it literary or otherwise, and formed our own interpretation of that work. However, the artists alone knows how he/she intended for the work to be seen, because the artist, as an individual, gave birth to the work. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 13:28:32 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Don Cheney Subject: Re: "As a matter of fact, i do, Cubby" In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.32.19970422163918.00743128@nunic.nu.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >>And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a >>similar love of BASKETball? certainly! the only reason i have cable tv is to watch the nba all year, the playoffs in their entirety, the bulls in particular and any soccer i can catch. yet missed what i heard was an excellent mexico/usa world cup prelim match on sunday (busy coaching 4 on 4 soccer and emphasizing to the kids the similarities with basketball). what i've seen of mexico makes me think they're very good so the u.s. matching them 2-2 speaks well for the u.s. the mexican team is fast and precise on offense. fun to watch. as for basketball, the bulls are vulnerable without rodman and kukoc that is for sure. what's bad for me is that those two are my favorites to watch, kukoc on offense and rodman at both ends. and what of the lakers? eddie jones is the bomb. he's like the mexican soccer team: fast, precise and fun to watch. and if clyde, hakeem and sir charles are up for it they could make a run. don >2) Has anyone else noted the genuinely bad start with which the Cubs began >their year? I have a theory, called "The Curse of George Will." My evidence >is that the Cubs were unable to win until after the big Ginsberg memorial at >Temple Emmanuel in San Francisco was complete. The Cubs' minor league teams >also have the worst cumulative record in baseball. Jack Spicer would have >appreciated this form of torture. > >>Karmic balancing of the remarkable winningness of Jordan, et al. >> >>And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a >>similar love of BASKETball? >> >>bill marsh ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 13:33:35 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Don Cheney Subject: Re: divine continued In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > I see nothing in the process of creation that is "individual," if >one means by that self-contained, discrete, and in any sense absolute >rather than provisional. Creativity emerges in responsiveness, contact, >that place where the human mind finds itself not singular and individual >but IN RELATION TO THE WORLD. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 13:40:31 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Don Cheney Subject: Re: divine continued Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" accidentally hit the Send button on eudora and sent this to poetix. sorry. don >Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 10:34:06 >To: UB Poetics discussion group >From: Don Cheney >Subject: Re: divine continued >In-Reply-To: > > >> I see nothing in the process of creation that is "individual," if >>one means by that self-contained, discrete, and in any sense absolute >>rather than provisional. Creativity emerges in responsiveness, contact, >>that place where the human mind finds itself not singular and individual >>but IN RELATION TO THE WORLD. > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 10:44:36 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jean Day Subject: Reading in San Francisco Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Once again, for all in the Bay Area: Jean Day and Barrett Watten Saturday April 26, 8 pm New Langton Arts 1246 Folsom St. San Francisco (415) 626-5416 (This is another marathon weekend, with events at Small Press Traffic on Friday night and at Canessa Park on Sunday afternoon--I don't have the specifics with me--Dodie? Avery?) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 13:32:18 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: divine continued In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 22 Apr 1997 12:44:47 -0400 from "Individuals" are not to blame for the fact that corporations increase their clout in the legal system through the mechanism of the "corporate individual". Nor in my view has socialism (based on the concept that the individual is subservient to the whole) proved very successful in practice. I still think the good bishops were on the right track in their documents on the US economy of 10 yrs ago - accepting private ownership as fostering efficiency, responsibility, and a buffer against the state; yet demystifying capitalism as the best of all possible worlds. They provided a pretty thorough critique of capitalism & called for an ethos of stewardship & communal responsibility based on democratic governance. It's easy to scoff at them as establishment ameliorators - but then, it's easy to scoff, period. You try coming up with a better plan. & they did it all while honoring the idea of the Person as the heart of the whole matter. This has nothing to do with my "metaphysical" bent on this subject; I'm not a Catholic; I looked into this issue during my community organizing days. - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 11:05:43 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" Subject: Re: no no not not In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Ten years ago David Bromige was a guest at my home in Washington, D.C. where he was giving a reading that week. After he left, I found that he had left behind a pair of black bikini briefs and a pair of glasses that seemed to magnify things out of all proportion. I had no way of knowing at the time that he had made the decision to leave all such things behind. I wish him well on steps five through twelve. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 13:34:00 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dale Smith Subject: Re: divine continued Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Mark Wallace- You wrote: > The history of the individual is directly tied to the history of >economic and racial exploitation that marks the history of capitalism; >"individuality" becomes the basis for a class of owners to manipulate >workers in the name of the "individual's" freedom to seize resources (a >process usually referred to as "the right to make a profit"). The >"individual" posits a notion of human beings as self-contained, discrete, >brought into existence by a divine declaration, and not responsible to >anyting beyond their own individuality. > > I see nothing in the process of creation that is "individual," if >one means by that self-contained, discrete, and in any sense absolute >rather than provisional. Creativity emerges in responsiveness, contact, >that place where the human mind finds itself not singular and individual >but IN RELATION TO THE WORLD. > > There are no individuals--I guess I'm going to have to say that >again. > > Why should a concept of the individual necessarily be the "creation of something divine?" Also, what is troubling about positing "'MAN' as the centralized authority over all experience?" And why do the above descriptions of the "individual" seem so flat, dissected, and clinical? Why do you narrowly label the individual as something "self-contained, discrete, and in any sense absolute rather than provisional?" And if Capitalism still exists, how did the individual slip away, if the individual, as you mention, is a construction by which Capital perpetuates itself? In such a society, it seems that the lyric voice of personal suffering would offer a more valid proof of individual struggle in the face of mounting opposition. Personally, I think Capital needs the concepts of the social in order to flatten the greater dimensions of the individual. Social constructions erase deeper, more ancient impulses, wherever they come from, in order to pacify the present capitalist structure. I do not like using this kind of highfallutin, distant and conceptual language. But what you, Mark Wallace lack, as well as myself in this instance, is personal testimony, concrete examples, a language dedicated, like good poetry, to the contradictions and myriad pressures of experience. Maybe there is a place in philosophy for this kind of language. But I do not understand the benefit, indeed the truth, in your statement, "there are no individuals." Dale ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 13:42:21 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: that marianne moore poem In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" in my house i find no copy of that "i too dislike it" poem by m. moore that has the imaginary gardens w/ real toads in them line in it. cd someone rise to the occsaion and e it to me today?i need it for my rutgers pappr, and i'm leaving tmw. xo in perpetuity--md ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 15:36:10 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: that marianne moore poem Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Maria, it's too damn long to type. Look in almost any anthology. In the Norton third ed. Shorter it's on p. 590. The title is "Poetry," is that what you're looking under? It's the last stanza you want. sp >in my house i find no copy of that "i too dislike it" poem by m. moore that >has the imaginary gardens w/ real toads in them line in it. cd someone >rise to the occsaion and e it to me today?i need it for my rutgers pappr, >and i'm leaving tmw. xo in perpetuity--md ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 15:39:29 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: that marianne moore poem Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" In the fat Norton 2nd (of Amer Lit) it's on 1182-83. sp >in my house i find no copy of that "i too dislike it" poem by m. moore that >has the imaginary gardens w/ real toads in them line in it. cd someone >rise to the occsaion and e it to me today?i need it for my rutgers pappr, >and i'm leaving tmw. xo in perpetuity--md ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 15:30:58 EST5EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: LYNES- KATHERINE Organization: Rutgers University English Dept. Subject: Re: back to drawing board / (if not to lurk) just can't leaf this one alone.... i'm into flitting, myself, these days, which may be barking up the wrong tree, but as a flitterer, my responses to the posts ebbs and phloems.... kl > david israel wrote: > > to scope? -- to scope, perchance to preen ; > (aye, there's the shrub) > > d.i. > . > ..... > ............ > \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > > david raphael israel < > >> washington d.c. << > | davidi@wizard.net (home) > | disrael@skgf.com (office) > ========================= > | thy centuries follow each other > | perfecting a small wild flower > | (Tagore) > //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 15:39:55 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Stephen Vincent Subject: Re: no no nanook(ie) Nanook of the South - are we watching a new Canadian documentary? By the way David (B), best of luck in going after those Sebastapol Light Industrial Park Developers. May you catch at least one of them with their pants down. But be careful, Land Developers are notorious for wearing Everlast and some of their ecological screws can be, indeed (at least in our lifetime), seemingly eternal. Cheers, Stephen Vincent ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 15:38:35 EST5EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: LYNES- KATHERINE Organization: Rutgers University English Dept. Subject: Re: who is social, individual, or a writer >maria damon wrote: > > does expletive mean simply pejorative? i didn't think so. i thought it had > a more specific meaning which wd make the term "naive" not an expletive. > can some etymologist or grammarian explain what, exactly, an expletive is? > one of the senses of expletive is "a word which is obscene or profane" -- your call as to whether that is perjorative or not... but expletive also means a word that serves as a filler, something to fill a vacancy, as in [insert verb here]... kl ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 15:45:35 EST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Burt Kimmelman -@NJIT" Subject: Re: that marianne moore poem maria, "i too dislike it" is the opening shot of mm's "Of Poetry" poem. burt and so is the other imagery, if memory is serving me right. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 15:48:15 EST5EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: LYNES- KATHERINE Organization: Rutgers University English Dept. Subject: Re: back to drawing board / (if not to lurk) does this mean that we blubber when our finally written response posts don't show up? kl Sylvester Pollet > That might do it, Aldon. List-lubbers, i.e. lovers, but not quite in the > swim. I lub it! sp ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 16:09:11 EST5EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: LYNES- KATHERINE Organization: Rutgers University English Dept. Subject: Re: that marianne moore poem maria-- i don't have my marianne moore in front of me [what a picture that is] but i do know that she has 2 versions of that poem: one which is just a few lines long, the other which is much longer. the short one is the last one written/revised. look in the back of the collected poems [poetry?] of mm, it usually has the longer version in it. if that doesn't work, try an older norton? best-- kl > in my house i find no copy of that "i too dislike it" poem by m. moore that > has the imaginary gardens w/ real toads in them line in it. cd someone > rise to the occsaion and e it to me today?i need it for my rutgers pappr, > and i'm leaving tmw. xo in perpetuity--md > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 13:46:56 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: Kilgore Trout says In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I think that subconsciously, my lifelong pal David Bromige really gets it. That a gap between serious discussions here of cosmology and eidetics--and little scabrous stories about our sexualized history---is just a gap in perception. Words delight me, and so do sentences (and so do those little gestures Rachel makes, but that is another question). So if ten slow words oft creep in one dull line, then I dont care whether I am hearing the dictates of the creator of the universe or the latest poem from Bukowski, forget it. But if I hear something delightful, the caroming of a word off someone's discarded comma, so that there is a discernible pinnng!, then I'm yr man. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 16:04:36 EST5EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: LYNES- KATHERINE Organization: Rutgers University English Dept. Subject: Re: Rukeyser Reprints Jordan Davis wrote: > Pierre == Muriel Rukeyser's being celebrated here at Teachers & Writers on > May 8 (reservations required, call now). where is "here"? kl ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 13:52:39 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: ReHoops In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.32.19970422163918.00743128@nunic.nu.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a >similar love of BASKETball? > >bill marsh Victor Coleman has always been a big fan of NCAA basketball. He is a big Syracuse fan, for some reason. Some friends and I always have in January a cvommittment to writing down our predictions of the final 4. My friends did terrible this year because of the hype for Kansas and Cincinatti/ they didnt get any. I got 2 right: Arizona and kentucky. But really, I am an NBA fan, more properly a Cavs and Sonics fan. But that Victor Coleman: he gets pictures of basketballs on the covers of his books. He sleeps beside a basketball. Nice smell. "Wake up and smell the basketball," as his ex-girlfreind painted in a painting I have. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 17:43:50 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bobbie West Subject: horse apples Henry Gould wrote: >(as my Uncle George used to sing: "What's the color of horse manure? >Brown, Brown, Brown.") As we all know, the color of horse manure depends on whether it's fresh or well-aged. Uncle George obviously prefers the well-aged variety, since fresh horse apples are green, green, green. B.W. (a former surf lurker grazing on Henry's turf.) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 15:21:13 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: who is social, etc. Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" On April 22, Henry Gould wrote: >Remember Joe Poet, or was it Josephine? The one who always pushed to the >front of the line at the open mike & read his poem about how he felt after >he stubbed his toe on a fire hydrant & what it meant for his neighborhood, >city, nation, cosmos? Remember? Remember? God, his poems were lousy. > Yeah, and I also remember his twin cousin Shirley (or was it Stanley), who always read last at the open mike, who read the poem about stubbed toes on fire hydrants and their meaning in the cosmos in a sort of shy, half-terrified whisper. They were also terrible. Having been to scads of open mikes, of course most of 'em were terrible. But every so often a poem or even a line would break through that was wonderous. And I'd always recommend reading at the front of the open mike: that way there will still be folks around to hear your poem about the fire hydrant and your lovely, hurt toes. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 13:56:00 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: no no not not In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Ten years ago David Bromige was a guest at my home in Washington, D.C. >where he was giving a reading that week. After he left, I found that he >had left behind a pair of black bikini briefs and a pair of glasses that >seemed to magnify things out of all proportion. I had no way of knowing >at the time that he had made the decision to leave all such things behind. >I wish him well on steps five through twelve. I dont like to have to point such things out, but did you make the obvious connection between Bromige's sleazy underpants and the MAGnifying glasses? I'll bet that Rachel and Maria saw the connection immediately. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 17:31:27 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Re: "As a matter of fact, i do, Cubby" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit > > And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a > love of BASKETball? > Well, not in this household, but back on the WC, San Diego way, Quincy Troupe, son of a basketball player, player near-pro himself til is knee quit on him, has had basketball themes run through his work all along. In fact there's a concert at RPI in Troy (that's in Nueva York, not Asia Minor) tomorrow (& that's a pitch to the crowd in the Albany area) by composer & trombonist George Lewis with a new composition using one of Quincy's poems, with electronic innerjections of lines by Jordan, especially the one he used when he quit briefly (to try his hand at baseball): "I can live without it." By the way the Cubbies were good enough to win 2 over my Mets, lawdie lawd, though just half an hour ago the latter finished an excellent game beating the Reds 7 to 2. It's been 60 degrees all day long & it won't freeze tonight, the Mets won one, its parse-over day & thus no teaching, martini hour is fast approaching, the individual vs the social match is a draw at half-time, I hope bromige will wear them funny shorts when he comes through Albany in the fall,unless of course he'd had to hock them to get bowering out of Canada -- what a sweet one it has been! -- Pierre -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 14:00:01 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: that marianne moore poem In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >in my house i find no copy of that "i too dislike it" poem by m. moore that >has the imaginary gardens w/ real toads in them line in it. cd someone >rise to the occsaion and e it to me today?i need it for my rutgers pappr, >and i'm leaving tmw. xo in perpetuity--md I would think that most Nortons have it. It is Moore's most often reprinted poem. It's called "Poetry", and dates from 1921. the year before Eliot's big news. Hmm. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 14:00:32 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: marianne moore's poems Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Maria & fellow-Listers & -lubbers, there are 2 versions. One,, too long to type, as sp says, the other, very short, 4 lines I think, all mm left of it in one of the more drastic acts of revision by any poet. Those 4 lines I have neither by heart nor bookshelf. PS Katharine, interesting that an expletive can look like something deleted. (2) lubbers, as in "lubbers come back to me," "Lubber, when you're near me," "When your lubber has gone", and on & on. PPS The 50-posts-per-day limit is unfair to Westerners, esp to BC ,Oregon, Washington state & California residents. Unless we're insomniacs, the dice of the day's debate are loaded against us. Would like to see some proportional representation system worked out to redress this imbalance. You c o u l d place a ceiling upon the number of postings by an (excuse the term) individual per day. db ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 18:07:11 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Stephen Vincent Subject: Re: Rukeyser Reprints Off the hearsay hand, I gather the Rukeyser archive was recently acquired by the Library of Congress. Cheers, Stephen Vincent ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 13:44:14 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Bromige Subject: no no i want them back says this individual Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Aldon, i need those magnify-things-out-of-all-proportion spectacles back! I'm looking for a silver lining. That other item was my swimsuit. Actually, keep that. It wouldnt fit me any more. I've been eating tons of these great new potato chips called Kettle, & they have magnified me out of all proportion. Mark Wallace, always interested in what you have to say. But puzzled, today,to hear there's no such thing as an individual, so let me try to match up what I think with that assertion. Para One (above) was written by an individual, or by someone who has learned how to sound like an individual. He learned that from the stuff all over the scatter we call society. Much of that stuff was commonly available, some of it (family ways) was not. But how he learned it, the way in which he picked it up, & so, what he did with it . . . isnt that down to a genetic template as individual as your fingerprints? Well yes it is and so I think, Mark cant be meaning _that_, when he writes "individual". Your parents (or caregivers during infancy) encourage/discourage the manifestations of this template, thus shape it until it feels like "nature". As your life proceeds, this shaping will largely determine what you cause to happen to you. But there is something there from the womb they have to work with, no? "Individual" I recall in the Am. Heritage Dictionary as "undividable". Not from soc'y, but from itself. You can sound like anyone, if you're a good mimic, but who is that who is sounding like anyone? Why am I having such a hard time grasping this, when it sounds so straightforward for you? If there is so individual, there is no sin. Great! But the categories of sin precede capitalism. In fact capitalism requires some of those preexisting categories of behavior--Greed and Avarice--for its continued infliction of itself upon us poor suffering mortals; mortals, we all die but each faces his death as an individual, alone. Aldon, wearing only a pair of magnfiying glasses & swimtrunks! You, here? db ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 16:33:19 -0700 Reply-To: "Aldon L. Nielsen" Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" Subject: Re: A Tale of Two Cities (part one): Berkeley White In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.16.19970422103406.3bdfb27a@mail.geocities.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII While the organizers of the conference on "The Making and Unmaking of Whiteness" at UC Berkeley did not bother to send any notices of the affair to my CSU campus, notice was posted in enough places that the media and certain professional opponents of "social construction" "ism" got wind of it in advance. The day before the conference began, the San Jose Mercury News ran a piece titled "Furor Erupts over Cal scholar's conference on 'whiteness'." While I appreciated the use of quotation marks in the head, I was confused by the same head's suggestion that only one Cal scholar was in possession of the conference. In the Mercury News article, "race scholar" Shelby Steele was quoted as asking, from his perch in the Hoover Tower at Stanford, "What else is ethnic studies going to do to justify their existence? They've not produced anything in a critical way, just celebratory. It opens the door to this kind of garbage." "Race scholar" Shelby Steele is apparantly unaware that back in the days when Charles Olson worked for the ethnic interests section of the Democratic Party, "ethnic Studies," where it existed at all, was given almost exclusively to the study of people who would today be termed "white." I'm not really clear how the putatively celebratory nature of ethnic studies is supposed to have opened the door to the garbage of studying the construction of whiteness either, but then I'm still a bit dim from all this reading and teaching I have to do every day. The same article quoted KLLC disc jockey "Vinnie" as remarking, "When I see another white person walking down the street, I don't say, 'Hey, that person's on my team,'" and I suspect he was telling the truth. Anyway, that will give you a sense of the social representation of the conference on the social representation of whiteness. The media were on hand in impressive numbers as the conferenc opened, talked to one another loudly through the early presentations, collared a few organizers for sound bites and then had the good grace to leave. The conference was opened by Elaine Kim, Michael Omi and Jose David Saldivar, who remarked on the fact that a trio of "non-whites" (a term that was denounced every three hours by members of the audience) was introducing a conference studying whiteness. The first negative reaction I had to the conference program came when I realized that there would be no discussion of poetry anywhere in the three days of the proceedings. Then I recognized just how marginalized literature in general would be at the conference. It seemed that much of the productive debate about racial discourse in writing had simply not been read by those organizing the meetings. An oddity in my eyes -- in a nation that has often defined literature as a category not available to "non-whites" (see T. Jefferson on that), here it seemed that white people had little to do with writing at all! The first panel, on popular culture, had some interesting work. My sense was that the grad. students on the panel had the most exciting material in hand. Josh Kun's paper, titled "The Yiddish Are Coming! Mickey Katz and American Whiteness," was great stuff -- and he played some fine Klezmer to an audience who mostly hadn't heard it before. (and if you've never heard Katz sing "Don't Let the Schmaltz Get in Your Eyes" you ain't heard nothing yet!) Annalee Newitz was quite good on "The Whiteness of the Police." Eric Lott and Fred Pfeil gave pretty good talks, but they were for the most part elaborations of work that they have produced previously. The audience responses to the first panel set the tone for the remainder of the week-end. There were several quite good questions and observations from people who had obviously listened carefully and thoughtfully, interspersed among the diatribes from those who thought either that the whole conference was just one more way for white elitists to control discussion (despite the evident integration of the entire conference), and those who believe that the mere existence of academic conferences is just one more means by which the oppressive bourgeois apparatus prevents true revolutionary action from taking place. Panel Two included rather bland presentations of interview work done by Michelle Fine and Lois Wise, and more intriguing talks by Cameron McCarthy (on "suburban resentment and the representation of the inner-city in film and television") and Aida Hurtado on "taming (becoming) the savage: white ethnic appropriation in the construction of whiteness" [what I sometimes term the "Pocahontas Perplex"]. The last panel of the first day included both the worst of times and the best of times. Cheryl Harris, whose "Whiteness as Property" is a touchstone of Critical Legal and Race Theory work, gave an exemplary (and very literary I might add) reading of legal rhetoric in court decisions regarding race. Walter Benn Michaels, on the other hand, delivered himself of exactly the sort of procrustean redefinitions and misreadings that mar his recent book _Our America_. According to Michaels, race cannot be a social construction because it is a mistake. (One wonders why it cannot be both. One wonders why those who have made this mistake don't apologize [though I resist the apologia mode in these discussions as it plays right into the media's ((as in the Mercury news the day before)) tendency to portray any discussion of the subject of racism as "white apology.") The continuing problem in Michaels's work on this subject is his tendency always to reduce race to something that somehow inheres in the individual (despite his frequent disclaimers that he is not proposing an individualist perspective); as several of his fellow panelists tried to point out to him, the idea that race is relational _means_ that it persists in the language beyond the body of the individual. I will now hurry things along a bit, as some of you are in digest mode and paging rapidly to the next post. On Saturday Howard Winant gave a rambling talk that pretty much replayed the work he's done with Omi. Ruth Frankenburg talked about locating research on whiteness, Caren Kaplan gave a very incisive talk on commodity feminsim in an era of globalization, and Nancy Scheper-Hughes went on interminably about her field work in South Africa. (An instance of an interesting subject made boring by the mode of presentation.) The second panel of the second day was titled "Queering Whiteness, Querying the Self." Allan Berube talked about "How Gay Stays White," perhaps the most "confessional" of the papers presented at the conference. Jasbit Puar demonstrated once more that the grad. students were doing some of the best work in these areas, Yvonne Yarbro-Bejarno recited a sequence of nostrums, and John Powell of Minnesota led the crowd through a careful, but informal exploration of "The Fluidity of Self and the Stability of Race," the highlight, for me at least, of that panel. The last panel I was able to attend was titled "Critical Studies of Whiteness." Noel Ignatiev was unable to present his paper, so a Berkeley staff member read if in his place. It wasn't so much a critical study as it was a restatement of the _Race Traitor_ platform. I have a general sympathy with Ignatiev, but I doubt that reifying blackness is a good way to unmake whiteness. The term "New Abolitionists" has its merits, until you recollect some of the peculiar racial ideas of some among the old abolitionists (remember Garrison and others telling Douglass he should just tell his story and leave the theory to them!) And I'm not at all sure it's true that racism is the major prop of capitalism in the United States, though it's one hell of an accomplice -- Other papers wrapping up the day included Mab Segrest's autobiographical "memoirs of a race traitor" talk on "The Souls of White Folk" and David Wellman's "Whiteness as a Site of Contestation." David Roediger, again from Minnesota (and just why are there so many experts on whiteness from Minnesota?), gave a much-needed reminder in the form of his paper "Studying Whiteness: An African-American tradition," in which he quickly sketched some of the more important stages in the development of "whiteness" studies by black authors, including most prominently the Du Bois of "The Souls of White Folk." Michael Rogin was amusing in the role of absent-minded professor as he commented on the papers and fielded questions from the audience. Which included a not-entirely unexpexted disruption. A fellow who announced that he called himself Thorsson ("I reject my Christian name") interrupted Mab Segrest to denounce the entire proceedings as an affront to Euro-Americans. Turned out he was there in cooperation with Dale Warner, a fellow who represents himself as head of a European American activist organization. I'd had prior experience of Mr. Warner. After a talk I gave in San Jose, he sent letters to senior faculty at my university (I was not yet tenured), on the letterhead of his law firm, denouncing me as among the 15% [where DOES he get these numbers] of European Americans who are "deeply twisted, pathologically self-loathing," and therefore unfit to teach at a university. This in response to my public invitation to white Americans to work with white Americans to end racism. [This was echoed in the Mercury News article, by the way, when radio talk-show host Michael Savage said of the conference organizers: "They're self-hating fools. They'll be happy when whites are on the cotton plantation." I'm not making this up, guys -- guess he didn't know white people had always been on the cotton plantation.] Sunday morning featured a session on the "Histories of Whiteness," which I had to miss -- Troy Duster made closing remarks, and then, despite the closing remarks having already been made over lunch, there was scheduled an open discussion titled: "The Unmaking of Whiteness: Where Do We Go from Here?" I was intrigued by the first person plural of that, assuming it meant "we" who might want to unmake whiteness, but I was even more intrigued wondering just where the "here" is in that question. But I was already flying to L.A. by then, and will have to wait for others to tell me what happened. tune in next time for "On the Wings of Atalanta," or "College Language Association Meets the Black College Spring Break Freaknik," and will somebodies after Rutgers please tell us absolutely everything? ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 08:29:54 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: that marianne moore poem In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" thanks to everyone who responded; about 4 folks or more actually typed the poem into the machine, others offered to fax, others gave page #s in anthologies or directed me to websites. you guys are the greatest research team ever! i now head off to sunny new brunswick, armed avec la grande poeme de la moore. my paper's unmanageably long, ungepachet, unwieldy...please be nice, yall who'll be there, xo md ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 16:24:27 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: What white In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Mon, 21 Apr 1997, Maria Damon wrote: > most of the "white" critical race theorists who are problematizing > "whiteness" are doing so not to avoid taking responsibility for their > privilege but precisely to take responsibility and take steps, as aldon > pointed out in his "whatness of whiteness" post, to dissolve its mystical > powers of privilege-granting. it is this taking responsibility that seems > a little lacking in your posts, jeffrey. what you say about construction > is true, but to use that argument to deny the material/ experiential > effects of racism on people of color seems...well...evasive, as if you feel > personally attacked and need to defend yourself. i dont feel attacked. really. i hoped to say to dale that referring to my posts as "intellectualized" was an out of hand dismissal. i was/am in complete agreement that there are material/experiental effects of race. this was the thrust of my last post where i agreed with dales comments on this matter (and bodies which). i dont quite understand why if what im saying does not resemble what other "white" theorists do--not taking responsibility for privilege--my comments are lacking some essential dimension of that discourse. should i be saying it like them? perhaps i might learn something from them but.... i think its important to remember that i objected to how easily ginsberg was collapsed into a category of "white guys"--and that i intended to reflect upon the difficulty of using that denomination to identify him. i dont think thats such a difficult position to accede to. thanks for your post maria. jeffrey timmons ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 17:29:33 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: what is white In-Reply-To: <199704181936.MAA17096@f26.hotmail.com> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Fri, 18 Apr 1997, Hoa Nguyen wrote: > On Thursday April 17 Jeffrey W. Timmons wrote: > > ..."white was used in a homogenizing fashion that failed to be attentive to > the pluralities that term is used to organize and did not recognize the > virtually indistinct category it is. of course it does have a powerful > political resonance" > > Maybe it would be appropriate to address exactly what this "resonance" is. > and what is the "it"? with "resonance" i wanted to suggest that it carries a rather negative connotations. i dont want to sound like dinesh d'sousa here but "white" is often used as a derogatory appellation. no i do not believe in "reverse" discrimination. im not one of "those." really. it: white. it should be used in brackets i think or under erasure--its effects are still present but under stress. thats good. > I agree that the term is impenetrable and tricky-- Melville's whale-- and at the > same time the "resonance" is what I live with everyday of my life. I understand > that "white" is a "concept" designed to divide and imbue power-- .... > Each time I said "people" in the previous, I meant white people. It is not a > very satisfying term for me either. I don't know what else to call the > experience I have with "white" Americans. i wont deny your experience and i think that your comments here suggest my own need to re-think my own responses in relation to what you have to say about this. im not trying to own them to my self but say that i think i have something to learn from what you have to say here. id like to think that "white" is something that stands between us perhaps. i as much as you perhaps would like not to have to negotiate its effects and shapes in our lives. i am very uncomfortable with it at times--as much as it creates privileges for me. living in nw washington dc off and on i recognize the geographic determinations of race but though i found it comfortable to live in a "white" area of the city (i later moved to se capitol hill where there is a greater mix of people) i was also greatly disturbed by the wealth and extravagance and often blatant excessive grossness of money. if "white" is that sort of privilege (and more) i would rather not be included. you know? > ..."race is semantically and epistemologically more complicated that the > linguistic and conceptual categories used to discuss it. itd be more useful i > think to be aware of that" > > I am very aware of race and its complications-- you wield incredible > privilege as you speak of race as you do above. Race is not a concept to > me in my daily experiences. id like to hear more from you on this actually. im not sure i understand. my first response is that its would seem to me that i should wield that privilege and wield it responsibily (and i hope i have). race is not a concept: ok. i understand it is a lived experience. at the same time i believe that words like white hispanic asian indian do not do justice to the "daily experiences" you refer to. you said you are uncomfortable with "white" assumptions about your race and its implications: such assumptions (on the part of whites) are the effect of the limited semantic/linguistic tools we--?!--have for talking about cultural differences. i hope i was clear about this last point: i just think a better language could be used/developed for talking about race than the generalizations of categories we use to do so. sorry to take up so much space. jeffrey timmons ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 17:49:52 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: who is social, etc. In-Reply-To: <199704221402.JAA00271@charlie.cns.iit.edu> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII if i hazard a reckless summary bear with me: but the vaguely humanist yearnings in some postings on this thread and the post-humanist critiques of the former lead me to wonder if there is not a need (being filled?) for a post-humanist humanism. if so what name does it go by? what i mean is that there seems to be this rather humanist nostalgia for some sort of meaning and significance defined by a universalist particularization of the individual that competes with a post-structuralist decentering of the individual. in this discursive encounter i wonder if there is a way of reconciling these discourses. i believe charles altieri takes on this issue somewhere--is someone up on his stuff? jeffrey ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 09:50:26 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Brenda Ellen Uchman Subject: Poem for Rent MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Poet Demands State Senate Pay Rent for Poem For Immediate Release: April 23, 1997 For additional information contact: Brendan Lorber 212/533-9317 lungfull@interport.net Poet and publisher Brendan Lorber is adding his voice to the protest against the end of rent regulations in New York. This Wednesday he will send a poem to every state senator on behalf of the millions of tenants who will be forced from their homes if regulations are terminated. But he isn't just giving the legislators a piece of his mind -- he's renting it to them. "Poem for Rent" is a 12-page page booklet with drawings by Lorber throughout. The back cover explains, "This spacious well-lit poem with western exposure and plenty of closet space is the property of Brendan Lorber. It is being rented to you." Underneath is a request that the senators remit payment according to one of three rental plans. If they are in favor of rent control, the book is theirs for 15 cents a month. If they prefer rent-stabilization it's an affordable 25 cents. If they are against all regulations the book is $1,500 a month. "The senators should pay whatever they think is right," Lorber said. "If a majority opposes regulations, the senate will owe me about $45,000 by the first of May." Asked if he thought the state legislature would actually pay their rent, he said, "Well I hope the senators don't turn out to be a gang of squatters." "Poem for Rent" is an ironic poem that challenges the senate to consider the effect of its actions. With a refrain of "Cast your ballots," Lorber unfolds a litany of injuries New York City will suffer if regulations expire: from increased homelessness to the exodus of the city's working & middle class. Even parking will become more difficult, with families living in their cars. Both landlords and tenant groups agree that rents will skyrocket with deregulation. The only thing standing between hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers and the street is the state legislature. And "Poem for Rent" is an indication that New Yorkers won't stand by silently while their representatives fail to represent them. In the poem, Lorber writes, "Who'll live here after I'm cast / from my one-bedroom with brick wall view? / Maybe Governor Pataki after he's voted from office." Discussing the situation, he added, "What makes New York unique is the diversity of its residents. Once we're forced out, what's left?" "Unless we all act now, tourguides of the future will say, 'Welcome to New York City, the only city in America populated solely by millionaires and homeless people. To the north is Harlem, a vibrant center of the African-American community before the African-Americans were forced out. To the south is the Village, home to thousands of the country's most talented writers and artists before they too were forced out. Across the East River is Brooklyn, called the City of Churches before all the parishioners were evicted. And here is Central Park, the emerald prize of the city before it became the world's largest shantytown.'" Brendan Lorber, 27, is a New York native, raised in Greenwich Village. His work has appeared in the Village Voice and the Chicago Tribune as well as numerous other publications. He is also the publisher and editor of LUNGFULL!Magazine, a national literary journal that supports emerging and established writers. He has performed his work throughout the country and in Australia and has made numerous radio and television appearances. # # # ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 03:07:43 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joseph Zitt Organization: Human Systems Subject: Re: http://poetry.miningco.com Comments: To: Nuyopoman@AOL.COM MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Nuyopoman@AOL.COM wrote: > Like everybody else, I wasn't a Jew > Until I came to New York. In Portland, OR, Hm. I sometimes feel like I wasn't as much a Jew until I moved *out* of New York, to a place where being Jewish was something distinctive that had to be explained to people. I only started to really grok Jewishness when I had something to contrast it too. I'm looking forward to your performance at the Knitting Factory Seder tonight. I'll be tuning into the Webcast, as I did last night. -- ---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------1---------- |||/ Joseph Zitt ===== jzitt@humansystems.com ===== Human Systems \||| ||/ Austin, Texas! =========== SILENCE: The John Cage Mailing List \|| |/ http://www.realtime.net/~jzitt == <*> <*> == Empty Words == ecto \| ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 09:11:48 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Wallace Subject: individuality and capitalism MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII For anybody interested in looking at the relation between individuality and capitalism Max Weber's THE PROTESTANT WORK ETHIC AND THE SPIRIT OF CAPITALISM traces this relation, and his other work follows through on many of the implications of that book. For Weber, the work ethic begins in a communal process of self-denial, opposed to individualism, that allows the group to build business and capitalist power through a devotion to continued profits at the expense of self-gratification. In later phases of this development, the increasing profits of the capitalist economy erode the original communal base, fostering the idea of individual success at the expense of the group--and thus, in the long run, destroying its own power system. In this reading, then, capitalism creates individualism, while at the same time individualism creates a new form of capitalism, one based on indulgence of the self at the expense even of the power of the business--a capitalist ethic that, in this country, finally became utterly dominant in the era of leveraged buyouts and corporate raiders, who often found that they could make more individual profits by DESTROYING businesses that were making too much money. Certain of Weber's takes on particular matters have been shown to be false; nonetheless, I've seen no successful rejection of its basic thesis. Cornell West, for one, continues to look to Weber's work as one of the main bases of his own thinking about capitalism. Mark Wallace /----------------------------------------------------------------------------\ | | | mdw@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu | | GWU: | | http://gwis2.circ.gwu.edu/~mdw | | EPC: | | http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/wallace | |____________________________________________________________________________| ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 07:02:14 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Re: no no nanook(ie) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >This "Subject" is one of my alltime favorites for its knotting of various >possible and (barely?) relevant threads--i wonder herb@_eskimo_ hasnt >responded. Oh, jeez, I'm slow sometimes. nanook/eskimo I don't think of "eskimo" in as a word. I rarely even see it at all. It's just part of a label that I never have to type, it's the default in the settings for my e-mail program. & when I turned 58, way back when, someone had to point out to me the synchronicity of living on NE 58th St. Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 21:00:59 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Looking for Mr. Goodba--no, Joe Napora MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Alright, Joe Napora, come on out, I give up. I've been looking through the archive for any mention of *BullHead* & how to get it but I just can't seem to find it, even on the mag list (Thank you, Spencer Selby) posted last October, nor can I find your address for that matter. We all know you're in here somewhere, so "don't you think it would be best for all concerned if we just took care of this matter quietly right now?" Chris .. Christopher Alexander, etc. nominative press collective 160S 1300E #16 Salt Lake City UT 84102 calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu n/formation issue 1.1 now online: http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 18:50:13 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: divine continued In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Tue, 22 Apr 1997, Dale Smith wrote: > I do not like using this kind of highfallutin, distant and conceptual > language. but youre not. > But what you, Mark Wallace lack, as well as myself in this > instance, is personal testimony, concrete examples, a language dedicated, > like good poetry, to the contradictions and myriad pressures of experience. "i drive a truck all day [like everyone else who earns their living] and when i come home and turn on the tv [like everyone else who owns a tv] and watch friends [like everyone else on thursday nights] i get really pissed at those nike commercials with william burroughs [like everyone else who....] because he aint even writing and making a big pay check." jeffrey timmonss/snommit yerffej ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 20:25:16 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: no no nanook(ie) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit David Bromige wrote: > This "Subject" is one of my alltime favorites for its knotting of various > possible and (barely?) relevant threads--i wonder herb@_eskimo_ hasnt > responded. Dear David, Herb (being a man of some refinement) never enters these sordid revels--probably still disgusted at being assigned fictional custody of a certain "object" during the Bowering wars of last summer. Speaking of objects, underwear, and the man, are you sure you mean Everlast and not EverReady? RL "Just when I thought I was out, t h e y p u l l m e b a c k i n !" --Michael Corleone in Godfather 3 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 20:30:09 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Re: no no nanook(ie) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >This "Subject" is one of my alltime favorites for its knotting of various >possible and (barely?) relevant threads--i wonder herb@_eskimo_ hasnt >responded. Huh? But David, I don't think I've ever seen any Canadian underwear. (Robert Mittenthal has, on occasion, mentioned a pair of dainty hand-washables that was left in his spare room by some visiting, uh, dignitary in the early Subtext@Speakeasy days. But despite Robert's offers/threats, I've never set eyes on this particular artifact.) Oh, wait, come to think of it, I'm actually wearing Canadian underwear right now, as I type this. If, that is, the t-shirt of BlaserCon '94 counts as such. Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 20:13:33 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Alexander Subject: chax site Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dear Poetics Folk: Chax Press now has a web site which can be found at http://personal.riverusers.com/~chax/ It's brand new. Most of the kinks have been worked out, but on 3 of the 9 pages there are several images which take some time to download -- hopefully not enough time to go & get a cup of coffee. Anyone (Loss, Chris Alexander, Pierre, others?) who wants to make a link, please do. I've linked to some of you, but am open to other suggestions as well. The first 10 people ordering books from the web site, via email, will be given a 50% discount on orders. Prices are on the site. I'll let you know whether or not you were among the first ten. Also announcing: a new book: The Tongue Moves Talk by Karen Mac Cormack $11 plus $2 shipping & handling But all ordering from Poetics before May 10 may have this book for $9, including shipping & handling. More details about the book are on the web site. And please email responses to this offer directly to me at chax@theriver.com From now until the middle of next week I have my poetics set on nomail. charles alexander charles alexander / chax press / chax@theriver.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 10:48:00 EST Reply-To: rreynold@rci.rutgers.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: Rebecca Reynolds Organization: Rutgers University Subject: Re: articulated skeletons Perhaps I am more of an individual as I lurk, or flit? (Or flitter.) But note that flitting is always shy of fitting . . . And what does happen if I a-r-t-i-culate myself? Enter the "social contract" (to become bone)? Or is my skin my individuality? At what point do I become responsible for the form (or content?) of myself? This flesh is my appetite, my fondness for . . . Shall I be lost if you find me? Rebecca (without doubt) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 13:11:17 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: "the divine analogy which is the unity of the human race"? Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I had hoped to leave this discussion to Henry the Brown, who has been doing just fine, but I guess I'll have to wade in. This question is a set of chinese boxes. No "proof" is possible, because we all, and all the phenonmena we muster to one side or the other, could be merely ideas in the mind of god. For the sake of argument, I put aside such conversation-stoppers. Where to begin? Personality and individuality are not interchangeable terms. However generated, personality is socially perceived, individuality is individually perceived. We write critiques of romantic individualism, not romantic personalitism. If Goffman mixes these two terms up, throw the book out. Personality, how one presents oneself and is perceived, is certainly partly a social construct, and varies according to social situation: I'm a different person with different people. But it's not entirely, nor even overwhelmingly, a social construct. Chemistry and genetics also count. Personality, as anyone who has ever experienced a chemical alteration to the brain, self-induced or otherwise, knows, is a most fragile thing: the peaceable can become violent, the shy demonstrative, etc. "You're a different person when you're (fill in condition or substance)," those who observe us most consistently and intimately will say. Chemical balances change constantly. Sometimes a spike in a given substance in the brain will lead to surprising behavior that may be considered inappropriate in a given social context: we run off with the neighbor's dog. When the chemistry returns to baseline we consider more objectively our relationship with said beast. There are, of course, social/cultural determinants to how we express these changes. In a dogless context we run off with the cat. As for genetics, we all know of children who, despite being raised in what would appear to be the same environment, behave, from the womb, quite differently. But it's fair to argue that no two children are really raised in the same environment--differences of nurture, no matter how small, could explain differences of personality, no matter how large. That's why twin studies have been so valuable. Studies of identical twins raised apart from birth have been going on, in this country and Japan (where, traditionally, twins were separated at birth and raised apart), since the twenties. Consistently, the twins studied show remarkable similarities of personality, down to such seemingly inconsequential matters as color preferences. In more serious matters, like the incidence of schizophrenia, the findings have been striking: if one twin is schizophrenic, there is a 50% likelihood that the other will be, regardless of who raises each child. In fraternal twins the likelihood is the same as in the general population. This finding has been the impetus for all of the exciting work being done to try to identify the genetic mechanisms that predispose to schizophrenia. Individualism is a separate subject. Baseline--altho our personalities may change, altho the social value placed on the concept of the individual and the role that the individual plays within a society may change, all humans in all cultures who are not afflicted with certain severe and quite specific brain dysfunctions experience themselves as individuals--possessed of a continuing internal narrative that is different from the narrative of the next guy over. A major concern of the narrative is the constant negotiation and renegotiation of relationships with the world outside the individual--the establishment of boundaries and the terms for cooperation, and a critique of the social determinants of one's conceptualization of self. Most of us have a series of different identities--as individual, family member, community member, citizen, etc. The emphasis on one or the other identity is usually functional, or a remnant of when it was functional. Depending upon the social context, social cohesion or individual freedom of action may be more valued in a given culture at a given moment. Cooperation is stressed and idealized when a high degree of cooperation is necessary for survival, individual freedom may be stressed when times are more flush. And individuality may be idealized as a protest against the limitations imposed by functionally obsolete social restrictions (caste, class and the like). Neither individualism nor romantic individualism begin with the romantics, although they certainly are good examples of my last point. I think one can find literary traces of both going back to the greeks, and as a social reality it probably goes back to the beginning of the evolution of consciousness. Heroic oral narratives by and about living individuals exist in almost all non-literate cultures. But I'll stick with recent western culture. Living at a time when existing sociopolitical structures were less and less functional, any good 16th century calvinist accepted both that his own good or bad fortune indicated something about him as an individual and that it was dependent upon a destiny which he could not alter. Whether or not he prayed in the company of others, his primary relationship to god was one to one. A century later, after the English civil war, Dryden has the hero Almanzor (in The Conquest of Granada) echo Milton's Satan when he declares that "I alone am king of me." Satan, who remains rebellious, is demonstrably wrong (look what happens to him). Almanzor, after doing no end of damage to the society in which he lives, submits his individual will to the power of the state (across the water Le Cid did the same), reflecting, in the wake of the civil war, the danger to society posed by heroic individualism, as Dryden and many others saw it. At issue is the balance between the needs and rights of the individual and the needs and rights of the society. In current American society, many of us, myself included, react to what we perceive as the ideological abandonment of cooperation and the overemphasis on unbridled individualism (Donald Trump: "I alone am king of me") that makes concerted action almost impossible by emphasizing the social over the individual. But to parse individual motivations so fine as to see nothing but social determination seems to me to partake more of theology than social theory. Any objection on behalf of individuality can be countered by one on behalf of social determinism, usw, and we're left deciding who comes up with the last turtle. Enough. New fields and pastures new. At 09:58 AM 4/22/97 -0400, you wrote: >Mark Weiss, Henry Gould and others: > > Thanks for your lively responses to my recent post. I'm sorry to >have to continue to argue with you here. > > Mark: Quite simply, to say that one is socially constructed says >nothing about one's ability to respond to social constructedness, and to >effect change. Rather, one might construct a social notion of that field >of activity reduced to the term "individual" as a SOCIAL site where >various kinds of social activities are focused and rearranged. As M. Magee >(do I have this name right?) points out, there is already a history of >literary discussion of this kind of social activity of the human. I would >suggest also the work of ERVING GOFFMAN, who in books like SOCIAL >INTERACTION and others works very particularly with the notion of what he >calls "face work," constructing in the process an idea of human identity >as a series of responsive gestures to social phenomena, gestures that can >include many types of resistance, rewriting, and possibility. But none of >these possibilities are EXTRA-SOCIAL; rather, Goffman's idea is that >"personality" (choose what word you will) is this SERIES OF PERFORMATIVE >SOCIAL CHOICES). > > Henry: I appreciate your appreciation of my "youthful >seriousness"--I'd thank you for your "adult seriousness" if I was sure >that you were any older than I am. Perhaps I should have been more >particular in my detailing of philsophical history; yes, it's true that >Greek philosphy does not create the modern notion of the individual. I >think it's more traditional to start with Descartes in this regard, moving >up through Kant, etc. But I'm not sure I want to go into details here. >Rather, it seems to me that in such phrases as "the divine analogy which >is the unity of the human race," and "individuality is the gist" and >"humanity is the living manifestation of the divine image" simply repeats >the western history of a coercive "center elsewhere" that posits its goal >of reducing all difference to the sameness of "individuality" in the name >of a divinity to which it claims access. I have no problems with >considering the possibilities in the sacred, per se: rather, I have >intense problems with the philosophy and cultural critique you launch in >the name of a divinity which you understand as "unity," but in which I see >no presence of any unity. > > As to whether one goes to news reports for the details of >scientific surveys (and indeed whether one goes to such surveys as the >authoritative source on what constitutes the life of the human (I do NOT >say individual), I'll leave it up to you to decide whether or not those >sources are disinterested and trusthworthy, or biased by social factors. > > But again, thanks for your response on this; it's made clear to me >that our differences here are profound. > > My apologies for my inability, on this modem, to correct typos. > > Mark Wallace > > >/----------------------------------------------------------------------------\ >| | >| mdw@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu | >| GWU: | >| http://gwis2.circ.gwu.edu/~mdw | >| EPC: | >| http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/wallace | >|____________________________________________________________________________| > > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 08:23:05 +0900 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Nicoll Subject: Ms. Moore's "Poetry" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Maria & anyone else who'd like an ascii version: ---------------------------------------------------- Marianne Moore Poetry I, too, dislike it: there are things that are important beyond all this fiddle. Reading it, however, with a perfect contempt for it, one discovers in it after all, a place for the genuine. Hands that can grasp, eyes that can dilate, hair that can rise if it must, these things are important not because a high-sounding interpretation can be put upon them but because they are useful. When they become so derivative as to become unintelligible, the same thing may be said for all of us, that we do not admire what we cannot understand: the bat holding upside down or in quest of something to eat, elephants pushing, a wild horse taking a roll, a tireless wolf under a tree, the immovable critic twitching his skin like a horse that feels a flea, the base- ball fan, the statistician- nor is it valid to discriminate against 'business documents and school-books'; all these phnomena are important. One must make a distinction however: when dragged into prominence by half poets, the result is not poetry, nor till the poets among us can be 'literalists of the imagination' - above insolence and triviality and can present for inspection, imaginary gardens with real toads in them, shall we have it. In the meantime, if you demand on the one hand, the raw material of poetry in all its rawness and that which is on the other hand genuine, then you are interested in poetry. (1921, 1935) Text and format follows the version of Selected Poems (1935). -------------------------------------------------------- Hugh Nicoll, Miyazaki Municipal University, Funatsuka 1-1-2, Miyazaki-shi 880 JAPAN vox: 81-985-20-2000, ext 1306, fax: 81-985-20-4807 email: hnicoll@miyazaki-mu.ac.jp ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 11:34:56 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Bernstein Subject: Welcome Message Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Rev. 3-4-97 ____________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Poetics List & The Electronic Poetry Center sponsored by The Poetics Program, Department of English, Faculty of Art & Letters, of the State University of New York, Buffalo ____________________________________________________________________ http://writing.upenn.edu/epc ____________________________________________________________________ _______Contents___________ 1. About the Poetics List 2. Subscriptions 3. Cautions 4. Digest Option 5. Temporarily turning off Poetics mail 6. Who's Subscribed 7. The Electronic Poetry Center (EPC) 8. Poetics Archives at EPC 9. Publishers & Editors Read This! [This document was prepared by Charles Bernstein (bernstei@bway.net), Loss Pequen~o Glazier (glazier@acsu.buffalo.edu), and in coopeartion with Joel Kuszai (poetics@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. The Poetics List, while committed to openness, is moderated. While individual posts of participants are sent directly to all subscribers, we continue to work to promote the editorial function of this project. The definition of that project, while provisional, and while open to continual redefinition by list participants, is nonetheless aversive to a generalized discussion of poetry. Rather, our aim is to support, inform, and extend those directions in poetry that are committed to innovations, renovations, and investigations of form and/or/as content, to the questioning of received forms and styles, and to the creation of the otherwise unimagined, untried, unexpected, improbable, and impossible. The "list owner" of Poetics is Charles Bernstein: contact him for further information. Joel Kuszai is list manager. For subscription information contact us at POETICS@acsu.buffalo.edu. ____________________________________________________________________ 2. Subscriptions The list has open subscriptions. You can subscribe (sub) or unsubscribe (unsub) by sending a one-line message, with no subject line, to: listserv@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu the one-line message should say: unsub poetics {or} sub poetics Jill Jillway (replacing Jill Jillway with your own name; but note: do not use your name to unsub) We will be sent a notice of all subscription activity. * If you are having difficulty unsubscribing, please note: Sometimes your e-mail address may be changed slightly by your system administrator. If this happens you will not be able to send messages to Poetics or to unsubscribe, although you will continue to get your Poetics mail. To avoid this, unsub from the old address and resub from the new address. If you can no longer do this there is a solution if you use Eudora (an e-mail program that is available free at shareware sites): from the Tools menu select "Options" and then select set-up for "Sending Mail": you can substitute your old address here and send the unsub message. The most frequent problem with subscriptions is bounced messages. If your system is often down or if you have a low disk quota, Poetics messages may get bounced. Please try avoid having messages from the list returned to us. If the problem is low disk quota, you may wish to request an increase from your system administrator. (You may wish to argue that this subscription is part of your scholarly communication!) You may also wish to consider obtaining a commercial account. ____________________________________________________________________ 3. Cautions Please do not send attachments or include extremely long documents in a post, since this may make it difficult for those who get the list via "digest" or who cannot always decode attached or specially formatted files. In addition to being archived at the EPC, some posts to Poetics (especially reviews, obituary notices, announcements, etc.) may also become part of specific EPC subject areas. Brief reviews of poetry events and publications are always welcome. (See section 7.) Please do not send inquiries to the list to get an individual subscribers address. To get this information, see section 6. If you want someone to send out information to the list as a whole, or supply information missing from an post, or thank someone for posting something you requested, please send the request or comment to the individual backchannel, not to the whole list. ____________________________________________________________________ 4. Digest Option The Poetics List can send a large number of individual messages to your account to each day! If you would prefer to receive ONE message each day, which would include all messages posted to the list for that day, you can use the digest option. Send this one-line message (no subject line) to listserv@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu set poetics digest NOTE:!! Send this message to "listserv" not to Poetics or as a reply to this message!! You can switch back to individual messages by sending this message: set poetics mail ____________________________________________________________________ 5. Temporarily turning off Poetics mail Do not leave your Poetics subscription "active" if you are going to be away for any extended period of time! Your account may become flooded and you may lose not only Poetics messages but other important mail. You can temporarily turn off your Poetics subscription by sending a message to "listserv." set poetics nomail & turn it on again with: set poetics mail When you return you can check or download missed postings from the Poetics archive. (See 8 below.) ____________________________________________________________________ 6. Who's Subscribed To see who is subscribed to Poetics, send an e-mail message to listserv@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu; leave the "Subject" line of the e-mail message blank. In the body of your e-mail message type: review poetics or review POETICS by name (which will give you the list alphabetically by name) You will be sent within a reasonable amount of time (by return e-mail) a rather long list containing the names and e-mail addresses of Poetics subscribers. This list is alphabetized by server not name. Please do not send a message to the list asking for the address of a specific subscriber. ____________________________________________________________________ 7. What is the Electronic Poetry Center? our URL is http://writing.upenn.edu/epc The mission of this World-Wide Web based electronic poetry center is to serve as a hypertextual gateway to the extraordinary range of activity in formally innovative writing in the United States and the world. The Center provides access to the burgeoning number of electronic resources in the new poetries including RIF/T and other electronic poetry journals, the POETICS List archives, an AUTHOR library of electronic poetic texts, and direct connections to numerous related electronic RESOURCES. The Center also provides information about contemporary print little magazines and SMALL PRESSES engaged in poetry and poetics. And we have an extensive collection of soundfiles of poets' reading their work, as well as the archive of LINEbreak, the radio interview series. The EPC is directed by Loss Pequen~o Glazier. ____________________________________________________________________ 8. Poetics Archives via EPC Go to the EPC and select Poetics from the opening screen. Follow the links to Poetics Archives. You may browse the archives by month and year or search them for specific information. Your interface will allow you to print or download any of these files. Or set your browser to go directly to: http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/poetics/archive ____________________________________________________________________ 9. Publishers & Editors Read This! PUBLISHERS & EDITORS: Our listings of poetry and poetics information is open and available to you. We are trying to make access to printed publications as easy as possible to our users and ENCOURAGE you to participate! Send a list of your press/publications to 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: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 11:06:03 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Matthias Regan Subject: Two thoughts: Backwoods Broadsides Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sylvester Pollet & List-- Let me add my voice in praise of Backwoods Broadsides--I have been grossly neglecting a variety of correspondences & near the top of this list for months has been a thank you to SP for his carefully edited & beautifully presented series. The latest two ("A Real Toad" & "Between Ourselves") arrived last week & are as absorbing as the back issues I selected before. The length of the broadsides is fascinating: Peter Money's has as many poems as a short chap book, while Anne Tardos presents a group of drawings which, unfolded, might be one image: so SP has taken two pieces of paper & turned one into a drawing you could hang on your wall and the other into a book you'd keep in your shelf-- I explain it poorly but order them and see for yourself! Matthias ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 11:32:24 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KYLE CONNER/LRC-CAHS Subject: Re: New Brunswick/Rutgers fete In-Reply-To: <71247BC7AE0@fas-english.rutgers.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Does anyone know anything about the upcoming poetry fete this weeknd att Rutgers-New Brunswick, such as hoo win ware $? info greatly appreciated. one could backchannel me. yours, kyle conner ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 11:30:57 EST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: simon@CVAX.IPFW.INDIANA.EDU Subject: Re: ReHoops "Fast Break" comes to mind. beth simon ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 12:42:08 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dave Zauhar Subject: Re: "As a matter of fact, i do, Cubby" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >> >> And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a >> love of BASKETball? >> > >Well, not in this household, but back on the WC, San Diego way, Quincy >Troupe, son of a basketball player, player near-pro himself til is knee >quit on him, has had basketball themes run through his work all along. Is this true? (not the stuff about the themes, etc). I know that Quincy Troupe's father, Quincy Trouppe, played in the Negro leagues from 1930 until their demise (for the KC Monarchs, Homestead Greys, the Chicago American Giants, and others), and then briefly in the majors. This wouldn't leave much time to play basketball seriously. But then again, in those days you didn't get rich playing baseball, esp. in the Negro Leagues, so I can see where he would have had to barnstorm at hoops too, to make a living. Dave Zauhar ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 13:02:31 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joseph Lease Subject: Re: Two thoughts: Backwoods Broadsides In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.16.19970423160603.371f645c@mercury.chem.nwu.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I just want to add my praise for SP's wonderful backwoods broadsides: strong and eloquent and independent work, tremendously valuable ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 13:03:46 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Bouchard Subject: Re: Poem for Rent Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Good for Brendan Lorber! & May what happened in Massachusetts, not come to pass in New York. Since rent control was banned in Massachusetts, former rent control tenants (aka "protected status") have faced rent increases anywhere from 50-300%. What have cities done to help all the people who are now vulnerable to "market rates?" Nuttin. Except, in Cambridge at least, the city has set up a board to "assist" people in moving out of their apartments and, since all the rents in the city have skyrocketed, effectively move out of the city. Left on their own, city government does this kind of thing, and then they praise themselves for it in the press. There are alternatives though (for anyone in NY, or anywhere else facing this situation). Last week, after months of campaigning, tenant organizing, lobbying, etc., a group called the Eviction Free Zone saw through city council orders in Cambridge that 1) transferred over 1 and 1/2 million dollars into the Affordable Housing Fund (from the "free cash" coffer) and 2) designed a transfer tax on residential sales in Cambridge--with the first $300,000 exempted that will provide a substantial revenue for replenishing affordable housing funds. This is going to the State House in a week or so, where Governor Weld has already stated that he will veto ANY taxation bill that does not have a local referendum attached to it. So in the drafting of the bill, the EFZ insisted that such a referendum be attached. We are very confident of being able to see that it passes in the fall. Next on the agenda is securing a 20 million dollar bond for the immediate purchase of apartment buildings on the market to be made permanently affordable housing. It's incredible the arguments that were made against all of our efforts. I am growing confident that the real estate interest is second in power in this country only to the military/defense interest. One argument: "if we put through this transfer tax it will hinder young and struggling families from buying homes in Cambridge." A glance at the Sunday house advertisements indicate the median price range for a house in this city to be well beyond the means of any "young and struggling families." In fact, I have come across more than enough families who have lived in Cambridge all their lives and who cannot afford it anymore. Their children will have to settle elsewhere. Anyway, it's been a long road, and it's certainly far from over. Hours of meetings and talk complicated by time given for both Creole and Hispanic translators, etc. But it can be done, and good luck to anyone facing this dismal prospect. Back channel me if you want more info. on the work we've done here. daniel_bouchard@hmco.com Brenda, How can I get a copy of Lorber's poem? ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 10:07:07 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steve Carll Subject: April is the Readingest Month Comments: To: poetics@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu, maz881@aol.com, CHRIS1929W@aol.com, Levyaa@is.nyu.edu, kunos@lanminds.com, sab5@psu.edu, mwinter@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu, fittermn@is.nyu.edu, wmfuller@ix.netcom.com, lease@HUSC.HARVARD.EDU, daviesk@is4.NYU.EDU, Daniel_Bouchard@hmco.com, drothschild@penguin.com, jdavis@panix.com, jms@acmenet.net, maj6916@u.cc.utah.edu, AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM, jarnot@pipeline.com, lgoodman@acsu.buffalo.edu, lppl@aol.com, jaukee@slip.net, aburns@fnbank.com, acornford@igc.org, cyanosis@slip.net, olmsted@crl.com, andrew_joron@sfbg.com, peacock99@aol.com, 102573.414@compuserve.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday (April 12th-15th) constituted a grand slam of poetry to rival January's Triple Crown. Saturday in Golden Gate Park was the 2nd Antenym contributors' reading. Although the weather was a mite cloudier than the previous Saturday, it was fairly warm and there were plenty of critters about to punctuate the readings, including a beautiful orange feral cat (recently feral, apparently: still had a collar) and an insistent quail. Douglas Powell went first, reading several witty and smart poems from which I'd like to quote, but someone had borrowed my pen, so the only one I can regale you with is the one he spun off of Ginsburg, which went something like this: the mind is a shapely genital, and a face is a fig leaf. Then recent S.F. transplant Rob Hale, who had several family members in attendance, got up in a sharp suit and read from a series which has several pieces in _Antenym_ 12: these days have been mauve--but that doesn't sound possible the mesh of so many laws allows the big fish to go free in a small room, a large heart enclosed in a body my country is a model of water purification in the heart, there is another heart, clean as the sea. But the sea isn't clean. the mirror doubles as a bee's nest the irony, or whatever Finally we got to hear what George Albon's been writing lately. But first he read a bit from Osip Mandelstam: continent lifting itself on paws out of the sea. George read from _Rehabilitation_: what is hound? terratoma, brain-compass what is map? slice sphere involving compromise pirates in the green space making [...] wrestlers fall, fall, fall with each thud a portion of the metaphysic escapes the first day of more day Chris Daniels, Darin DeStefano, Eric Selland (I think), my sister, my cousin, my nephew were among those spotted in the audience, and after the reading my relatives and I went to a cafe and then to Mission Street to have burritos and visit the new head shop on 24th St. (man they want a lot of money for those lava lamps) On Sunday at the 3300 Club there was a reading for John High's new book _The Sasha Poems_ featuring John and Harry Polkinhorn. Four people signed up for the open mic which was intended to follow (actually five, but one got cold feet or something and didn't answer when called), but it was decided to have two of us warm up instead. Jack and Adelle Foley went first, reprising the work (reassembled from Ginsburg lines about death) that got them on the front page of the _Examiner_. Then I read a couple short poems, one from the new _Antenym_ and the other from my notebook (turns out it's still in need of some punctuation). John was ready by then, and read several of the Sasha Poems, begun both as a way of dealing with despair and a way of communicating with his young daughter. Some lines I particularly liked were: she healed herself and even the dead one found it pleasing the chanting, like smoke, lifting from the Siberian snow the moon so blue, chilled there are those who listen to this music, and those who color its sound all these abandoned shoes, walking about the windmills to the south a winged butterfly moving toward the predawn face what happened to the father that he is distracted by the voice of God? There was a short break that allowed the assembled to mingle and order more drinks. (The assembled being, among others, Thoreau Lovell, Michelle Murphy, Andrew Joron, Don Hilla, Jandy Nelson, Jonathan Hayes, Joseph Aukee, Laurie Amat, Norman Fischer, and Anne (Andrew, was that Anne Lamott or another Anne?). I happened to mention to John that I had just turned 30, and Jandy said I must be having my Saturn return (right she was!) Back to the reading. Harry Polkinhorn, up from San Diego, read from three works, "Stein", _Mount Soledad_, and _Throat Shadows_, which contained lines such as the following: an ambiguous power over the falconry of desire egregious positing of [sorry, didn't get the word here] looks-at-you your body exploded in its own manner of speaking sucking the circular brilliance of the upper world into my own eyes a present person does not mirror an absent one Jonathan Hayes and one other open-mic reader later, we were deep into the lasagna some wonderful person had made (was it proprietor Nancy Keane, as I assume?) and conversation. Jandy and I took the astrology route (though I won't bore anyone else with the details, except to say that Jandy's a Sagittarius with Pisces rising). Cut to Monday night at Canessa Park, where series curator read with Ron Silliman. Good crowd for a Monday night, including Brian Lucas, Norman Fischer, Eric Selland and Naoko, Colleen Lookingbill, Steve Tills, Spencer Selby, Kevin Killian, Norma Cole, Lyn Hejinian, Kit Robinson, Leslie Scalapino, Paul Hoover, Maxine Chernoff and Steve Vincent. Avery read two translations of Salvatore Quasimodo that appear in _lyric&_ #5, and from his manuscripts _Differing Senses of Motion_ and _The City Speaks in Many Tongues_. the lizard in dormant awe my scar-filled bean trees running into each other at 70 miles per hour starry richness of night?! this rain is a sign of rain "things are in the saddle and ride mankind"--Ralph Waldo Emerson blinded by the not quite sunset source as silence cotton is king again Ron, introduced as still probably the most effective anthologizer (I'm paraphrasing) of "the Formerly Known as Language Poets", then read from _Ketjak II_, which he said he's been working on since 1988 or -9: memories of underdevelopment for each and every sentence, an equal and opposite sentence the odor from the cud of their great truck definition itself is a form of Manhattan the whale that ate Liberty Valance brushing dead leaves off of dry poets Antarctica has no legal time Vanpools of the night, unite! is seriousness boredom come of age? Then on the 15th at New College, Eileen Myles read to a packed house in the Cultural Center. Lyn Hejinian, Gloria Frym, Jean Day, Michael Price, Shauna Hannibal, Kevin Killian, Dodie Bellamy, Giovanni Singleton, Bob Gluck and Alison were in the house as Eileen rolled poems off her tongue in a thick New York accent: even the millennium is unspeakably long I'm beginning to trample you all with my big ass daily it's the openness of summer that disturbs me there may come a day when my dog will eat cat food the blood in the eyes of the cars under the spotlight--eep! he's like a big posing gondola we must offer ourselves up as food or eat someone not a poet, but a donut or a myth prose fills the window and becomes abstract now that we're through virtual reality, we can try virtue, that might work the word wiggly describes my desire I believe in you like a door that returns and a poem that Eileen was pleased to report she heard through the lesbian grapevine that Adrienne Rich had giggled at, which reads in its entirety (of course I'm omitting any line breaks that may exist in the original): Her tongue and her heart were throbbing in the holster of her pussy. Coming soon: my report on some more S.F. readings.... ********************************** sjcarll@slip.net Steve Carll http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/mags/antenym http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/ezines/antenym In seed- sense the sea stars you out, innermost, forever. --Paul Celan ********************************** ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 13:11:34 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Re: Rukeyser Reprints In-Reply-To: <7128E0C28AD@fas-english.rutgers.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Same address as Poetry City, to wit: Teachers & Writers Collaborative 5 Union Square West, 7th Floor New York NY 10003-3306 ph (212) 691 6590 fax (212) 675 0171 email (me) jdavis@panix.com or info@twc.org Don't forget to come this THURSDAY at 7 PM to hear Maureen Owen and Ed Berrigan Jordan On Tue, 22 Apr 1997, LYNES- KATHERINE wrote: > Jordan Davis wrote: > > > Pierre == Muriel Rukeyser's being celebrated here at Teachers & Writers on > > May 8 (reservations required, call now). > > > where is "here"? kl > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 13:09:54 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: horse apples In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 22 Apr 1997 17:43:50 -0400 from On Tue, 22 Apr 1997 17:43:50 -0400 Bobbie West said: >Henry Gould wrote: > >>(as my Uncle George used to sing: "What's the color of horse manure? >>Brown, Brown, Brown.") > >As we all know, the color of horse manure depends on whether it's fresh or >well-aged. Uncle George obviously prefers the well-aged variety, since fresh >horse apples are green, green, green. Actually, this became quite an issue between Uncle George & me. He claimed poetic license based on an obscure tradition from Taigetos, a wild region of northern Greece (horse country, for sure), where they practice something called aeiphatosmosastoupoulos, or "satire using horse manure imagery". I said he was just making fun of my institutionalization of hired learning. I'll be reading transcripts from our recorded dialogues from Fargo, MN at the poetry & public shusphere conference at Rutgers, in room 101 (across from the men's room). - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 13:22:36 -0400 Reply-To: Mark Prejsnar Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: A Tale of Two Cities (part one): Berkeley White Comments: To: "Aldon L. Nielsen" In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Aldon-- Report on the whiteness conference is fabulous..As someone who's interested in all these issues ( and consider 'em very germane to poetry), I found this helpful and fascinating. This kind of thing is a major service, at least to me. (..in a very different way I also value the I-was-there reports of Steve Carll, the Michael Musto of the SF poetry scene; useful for the deprived who unfortunately are not (there)....) from the isolate outback of the cotton and poetry plantation, Mark P. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 13:33:41 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: Poem for Rent In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 23 Apr 1997 09:50:26 -0400 from this is great. I'm gonna try to read this post at our little conclave tonight on the public role of poetry. - Henry of the Giordano Bruno Palaver Palace "God created prairie dogs. Then he let them do the rest." - Jack Spandrift "You know, old boy, there's a poem there somewhere." - Eric Blarnes "God exists in my own mind & he has a hell of a case of cabin fever." - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 13:44:17 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Fred Muratori Subject: Re: ReHoops Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >>And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a >>similar love of BASKETball? >> >>bill marsh > You bet. Stephen Dunn certainly is -- in fact I think he played semi-pro in Spain for a while in his youth. Other versifying NCAA fans -- and Syracuse fans at that!-- are Robert Lietz and yours truly. I think Garrett Hongo's a hoops fan, too, but I'm basing that on a poem of his so take it for what it's worth. It does seem, though, that if a poet dares admit to liking a sport, baseball is the safe one, probably because it's slow, and therefore "poetic." That whole gauzy (but yes, attractive) _Field of Dreams_ thing. An interesting sport to bring up in the company of poets is golf. I once mentioned that I played -- or was trying to -- and was immediately brought up short by another poet who gave me a lecture about how poetry and golf were incompatible, morally so, as I remember. This, however, came from someone who had never played the game, and who assumed that only rich stockbrokers indulged, ignorant of the fact that almost every summer weekday evening the links are crowded with hard workin' factory folk tearing up the fairways with their company leagues. Par to the people. *********************** Fred Muratori "The spaces between things keep (fmm1@cornell.edu) getting bigger & more Reference Services Division important." Olin * Kroch * Uris Libraries - John Ashbery Cornell University Ithaca, NY 14853 WWW: http://fmref.library.cornell.edu/spectra.html *********************** ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 13:39:43 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: individuality and capitalism In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 23 Apr 1997 09:11:48 -0400 from Once upon a time there was a village in the hills called Squattle Falls. People worked hard just to keep the mill open and the jail closed and the furnace running and the plow polished and the grill hot and the potatoes fried. Everybody knew everybody (and that includes Jodie & Bob over on Lilac Lane). Barnet S. Robinson of the distinguished sherriff & militia clan of Robinsons owned a lot of property (right up against Governor Limpet's estate) & he got richer & richer in a single-minded way. His kids were spoiled rotten except Leonard became one hell of a lawyer & Louise is now chairwoman of the D.A.R. for Junta County. Now the Robinson Tool Works is owned by a southeast Asian conglomerate, and everybody works hard just to make ends meet. Sprint Blodgett set up a website for Squattle Falls, can you believe it or not. You can find out more about us at http://bingo.individuals.org. Or just ask Professor Weber over there at State U. He's done a book that sure pulls it all together, yah. - Herbert J. Antintellectualatall (a real person!) ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 11:21:46 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: horse apples Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" when I was a child I spent summers in camps in the mountains of pennsylvania with a bunch of other urban kids. by analogy with snowballs, we used to have manure fights. This makes me something of an expert. The lady has it. The deal was to find a turd that had dried enough so that it could be molded into a proper sphere but fresh enough so that it would still cause offence. What a relief to tell the story. I have been afraid that this piece of folklore would die with me and the world be impovrished by its loss. At 05:43 PM 4/22/97 -0400, you wrote: >Henry Gould wrote: > >>(as my Uncle George used to sing: "What's the color of horse manure? >>Brown, Brown, Brown.") > >As we all know, the color of horse manure depends on whether it's fresh or >well-aged. Uncle George obviously prefers the well-aged variety, since fresh >horse apples are green, green, green. > >B.W. (a former surf lurker grazing on Henry's turf.) > > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 11:27:24 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Colin Browne Subject: Re: desublimation/eliade Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >>For more on Eliade see Norman Manera's essay "Felix Culpa" in his ON >>CLOWNS: THE DICTATOR AND THE ARTIST (NY: Grove Weidenfeld, 1992). CB ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 12:12:17 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: ReHoops Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Poetic sports? Most sports fall into three categories--skills of war, skills of hunting, forlorn hope that sportstogs will tear in interesting ways (the greeks combined these by having athletes compete naked). Then there's a remnant category--skills of labor. My favorite of these is the ox-pull, practiced at county fairs in New England (and beyond?). A pair of enormous oxen are hitched to a sledge laden with concrete blocks. The pair gets three tries at pulling each weight for, I think, ten feet. What's wonderful about this sport is that the oxen (unlike horses in the otherwise identical sport of horse-pulling) are truly as stolid as oxen--they exhibit absolutely no change in affect or mood. As if by contagion, their human entourage neither. Despite the fact that consistent losers are likely to wind up as hamburger (analogy with mesoamerican ballgame?). And also (antecedent--wonderful) that the vast bulk of the time is spent in loading the sledge further, leading in the teams of oxen, hitching, rehitching, unhitching, etc. If the poetic in sports is in proportion to the slowness of the game, this beats baseball by a mile. The audience, sometimes larger than at most poetry readings, tends to be on the laconic side--zen farmers who've sat once too often. Did you know that if you sit absolutely still for long enough your brain, responding to gravity, begins to puddle? That's what I love about ox-pulls. At 01:44 PM 4/23/97 -0400, you wrote: >>>And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a >>>similar love of BASKETball? >>> >>>bill marsh >> >You bet. Stephen Dunn certainly is -- in fact I think he played semi-pro in >Spain for a while in his youth. Other versifying NCAA fans -- and Syracuse >fans at that!-- are Robert Lietz and yours truly. I think Garrett Hongo's >a hoops fan, too, but I'm basing that on a poem of his so take it for what >it's worth. > >It does seem, though, that if a poet dares admit to liking a sport, >baseball is the safe one, probably because it's slow, and therefore >"poetic." That whole gauzy (but yes, attractive) _Field of Dreams_ thing. >An interesting sport to bring up in the company of poets is golf. I once >mentioned that I played -- or was trying to -- and was immediately brought >up short by another poet who gave me a lecture about how poetry and golf >were incompatible, morally so, as I remember. This, however, came from >someone who had never played the game, and who assumed that only rich >stockbrokers indulged, ignorant of the fact that almost every summer >weekday evening the links are crowded with hard workin' factory folk >tearing up the fairways with their company leagues. Par to the people. > >*********************** >Fred Muratori "The spaces between things keep > >(fmm1@cornell.edu) getting bigger & more > >Reference Services Division important." >Olin * Kroch * Uris Libraries - John Ashbery >Cornell University >Ithaca, NY 14853 >WWW: http://fmref.library.cornell.edu/spectra.html >*********************** > > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 15:21:55 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Re: "As a matter of fact, i do, Cubby" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Dave Zauhar wrote: > > >> > >> And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a > >> love of BASKETball? > >> > > > >Well, not in this household, but back on the WC, San Diego way, Quincy > >Troupe, son of a basketball player, player near-pro himself til is knee > >quit on him, has had basketball themes run through his work all along. > > Is this true? (not the stuff about the themes, etc). I know that Quincy > Troupe's father, Quincy Trouppe, played in the Negro leagues from 1930 > until their demise (for the KC Monarchs, Homestead Greys, the Chicago > American Giants, and others), and then briefly in the majors. This wouldn't > leave much time to play basketball seriously. But then again, in those days > you didn't get rich playing baseball, esp. in the Negro Leagues, so I can > see where he would have had to barnstorm at hoops too, to make a living. > > Dave Zauhar Oops, Dave, my mistake -- yes, of course, Quincy's father was a baseball player, not a basketball player -- guess I's just an ole european & get my 'merikan games mixed up from time to time -- Pierre -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 15:26:41 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Re: ReHoops MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Fred Muratori wrote: > An interesting sport to bring up in the company of poets is golf. I once > mentioned that I played -- or was trying to -- and was immediately brought > up short by another poet who gave me a lecture about how poetry and golf > were incompatible, morally so, as I remember. Fred -- trhere is of course Toby Olson, lovely poet & novelist & golfer who has a splendid book of the latter variety that deals with golf. -- Pierre -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 14:21:08 CST6CDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hank Lazer Organization: The University of Alabama Subject: Re: ReHoops A major hoops fan (alas, for Syracuse too): John Taggart. As for Fred Muratori's unearthing that charged topic, golf, I'll go on record as a fanatic. And yes, Fred, the poetry & golf connection does produce odd responses. I do know of a number of fellow golf-addicts on this list, but I will not name names.... Hank Lazer ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 14:21:41 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christina Fairbank Chirot Subject: Re: Looking for Mr. Goodba--no, Joe Napora Comments: To: Christopher Alexander In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Joe Napora's Bullhead IS in Spencer Selby's list. You can get BULLHEAD from Joe for five dollars at: 2205 Moore Street Ashland, Kentucky 41101 --dave baptiste chirot On Tue, 22 Apr 1997, Christopher Alexander wrote: > Alright, Joe Napora, come on out, I give up. > I've been looking through the archive for any > mention of *BullHead* & how to get it but I > > just can't seem to find it, even on the mag list > (Thank you, Spencer Selby) posted last October, > nor can I find your address for that matter. We > > all know you're in here somewhere, so "don't you > think it would be best for all concerned if we > just took care of this matter quietly right now?" > > > Chris > .. > Christopher Alexander, etc. > nominative press collective > 160S 1300E #16 > Salt Lake City UT 84102 > calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu > > n/formation issue 1.1 now online: > http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 15:35:57 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Henry Gould Subject: more of yr favorite arthur here's the whole poem of which a line was drawn in San Francisco by O. Mandelstam, trans by McKanes, with improvements (in his mind at least) by H. Gould: Birth of the Smile When a child starts to smile, with a crease of bitterness and sweetness, honestly, the ends of his grin go off into the anarchy of the ocean. He feels invincibly good, the corners of his lips play in glory, already the rainbow stitch is sewn for the endless understanding of reality. At the flux and flow of the mouth's snail the mainland rose out of the water on its paws, and one world-shouldering moment is revealed to the slender tune of praise and surprise. 1937. Translation of course is a poor substitute. This too was written in Voronezh in the year of the Terror. Mandelstam's music of phanopeia/ melopeia/logopeia - his bridge of pathos/joy - is utterly invincible & is the apex of the M(illenium). He is maybe close to Yeats - the same "eagle mind" but without that sort of cat-like feral coldness Yeats sometimes displays. One of his few pleasures in exile was listening to the radio. He wrote this poem after hearing Marian Anderson (she was on tour in Moscow). I am buried in the lion's den and into this fortress I sink lower, lower and lower, listening to the yeasty cloudburst of sounds stronger than the lion, more powerful than the Pentateuch. How closely your voice calls to me: mankind before the commandments, like the strings of ocean pearls and the slender baskets of Tahitian girls. The strong deep notes of your chastising song are like an advancing continent. The savage sweet faces of spoiled daughters are not worth the matriarch's little finger. My time is still limitless, and I abetted the rapture of the universe the way a quiet organ's playing accompanies a woman's voice. [trans. by McKanes with slight improvements] think of Marian Anderson singing at the Lincoln Memorial in the 30s over the heads of the D.A.R. & Mandlestam is listening to her, over there in Voronezh. & it's the 30s and it's now. - T.S. Eliot after a double on the rocks with lime ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 16:25:00 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: 50 poem collar Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" You know, the stock market has a fifty point collar that holds up trading almost every day these days the idea being to allow things to cool off, but when the lock comes off (the button?) trading tends to go on at the same pace as before! Which is not to draw any analogies between this list and the stock market, at least none between any of the things people say about either ... speculating pinky, Jordan who reminds you to come hear Maureen Owen author of "Poem to Piss Everyone Off" tomorrow (NY!) ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 00:53:09 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Subtext readings for May, June, July Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Time now to relax & let our memories drift back to 1997, thirtieth anniversary of the summer of love. Well, for some perhaps, but for others, 1997 was the year in which the Subtext@Speakeasy presented the following readings: May 15 Belle Randall & Drew Gardner June 19 Leslie Scalapino (Scalapino will also conduct a workshop on the 20-21. The workshop is $40. July 17 John Olson & Christine Stewart All readings begin at 7:30 pm on the 3rd Thursday of the month at the Speakeasy Cafe, 2304 2nd Avenue in Seattle's increasingly fashionable Belltown district. Suggested donation is $5. This quadrant of the perennially ongoing series was curated by Bryant Mason. (He's also responsible for the following couple of months, but that information is currently available on a need to know basis only.) Also, writers from the Subtext collective uber-committee will be featured readers at the Red Sky reading Sunday may 4th, at 7:30 pm on 14th Ave between Pike & Pine Streets in Seattle. Did I remember to make it clear that this all takes place in Seattle, in the capitol of the United States? Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 08:44:53 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: robert drake Subject: announce POTEPOETZINE / POTEPOETTEXT Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" peter ganick asked me to forward this--lbd >Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 07:06:28 -0400 >From: Peter Ganick >Reply-To: potes@erols.com >Organization: Potes & Poets Press, Inc. >Subject: announce POTEPOETZINE / POTEPOETTEXT > >> POTEPOETZINE, a new experimental e-zine >> is accepting e-mail addresses >> for free subscriptions >> to its irregularly, but frequently, >> appearing series of issues.... >> >> it will include the finest >> experimental poetry >> from all over the united states.... >> >> also, a section of hartford area >> electronic artists will display >> examples of electronic art.... >> >> no submissions will be accepted >> with subscription orders >> however issue ONE will contain >> information about submitting to >> issue TWO and POTEPOETTEXT, >> a series of electronic texts >> situated in the on-going discourse >> in cultural theory worldwide.... >> >> send e-mail only >> (no telephone, fax, or post office) >> to: potes@erols.com.... >> >> POTEPOETZINE....POTEPOETTEXT.... >> new experimental poetry >> and discourse.... > > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 15:25:58 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: William Burmeister Prod Subject: Re: ReHoops In-Reply-To: Fred Muratori "Re: ReHoops" (Apr 23, 1:44pm) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Fred Muratori writes: >baseball is the safe one, probably because it's slow, and therefore >"poetic." That whole gauzy (but yes, attractive) _Field of Dreams_ thing. It's in the pitching too. There's poetry in the pitching, or at least I think so from my few years on the mound. Spicer said poets think that they are the pitcher when in fact they are the catcher. I think it can go either way; one can't do without the other. Gerald Early (I think that's right) has a couple of nice prose articles in the APR on baseball and poetry from last year (summer I think). Bill B. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 15:16:00 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" Subject: Re: ReHoops Comments: To: Fred Muratori MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN You can add Jack Collom and Michael Friedman to that list. As for me, I had the distinction of playing on the worst H.S. team in South Bend Indiana - the Marian Knights - in the early 70's. We went 1-12 before I quit. God, did we suck! Jack opines that the Bulls are so eminently watchable not just b/c of their preternatural court prowess but b/c they are easily the most eccentric collection of players in the league. (Is anyone else beginning to find Jordan's impersonable perfection cloying? My favorite was Magic Johnson - with the possible exception of Cousy and the Big O, the smartest player ever to step onto the court). And why is it that baseball (which moves too slowly for me) inspires such good writing and basketball doesn't? I can only think of two good books on hoops - Halberstam's _Breaks of the Game_ which unfortunately was written by Halberstam ("He was Bill. He was Bill Walton.") and John McPhee's marvelous book on Bill Bradley at Princeton, _A Sense of Where You Are_? Golf is a truly sublime sport, as anyone who's ever sunk a difficult putt or knocked the dimples off a tee shot knows. I know Paul Naylor is a player, but I've never met any other poet who professed to like the game. I'd play more - but then I couldn't buy books! Patrick Pritchett ---------- From: Fred Muratori To: POETICS Subject: Re: ReHoops Date: Wednesday, April 23, 1997 2:09PM >>And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a >>similar love of BASKETball? >> >>bill marsh > You bet. Stephen Dunn certainly is -- in fact I think he played semi-pro in Spain for a while in his youth. Other versifying NCAA fans -- and Syracuse fans at that!-- are Robert Lietz and yours truly. I think Garrett Hongo's a hoops fan, too, but I'm basing that on a poem of his so take it for what it's worth. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 16:08:04 EST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Keith Tuma Subject: Re: ReHoops In-Reply-To: Message of Wed, 23 Apr 1997 14:21:08 CST6CDT from re Hoops there's the opening to _What_ now obsolete 'cause of the WNBA and procrustean Walter Benn Michaels once told me that he knew the west coast langpo boys best from basketball rather than poesy and despite bad knees barry watten volunteered for a game in orono that never took place and tim bahti once told me a funny story about stanley fish yelling at a grad student "hey yr not ever to play without me again" or something of the sort as i guess sf had been forced to the sidelines or wasn't getting his shots and alan shapiro played as an undergrad at brandeis and sees the court pretty well and rumor has it once turned down a chance to pick up a game in nc with mike j. figuring he'd be the only one ever offered that possibility who could say THAT and i recommend all you bards send yr books to phil jackson so he can pass them out to players on the road and you can say that rodman and kukoc didn't read my book as they hung out in hotels and made $250,000 a night dribble dribble ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 14:11:41 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: there's a man on the fairway taking names MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hank Lazer wrote: > As for Fred Muratori's unearthing that charged topic, golf, I'll go > on record as a fanatic. And yes, Fred, the poetry & golf connection > does produce odd responses. I do know of a number of fellow > golf-addicts on this list, but I will not name names.... Now what sort of fun is it if you won't name names? But I like what Mencken had to say on the subject: "If I had my way, any man guilty of golf would be ineligible for any office of trust in the United States." Rachel L. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 17:10:27 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: ReHoops In-Reply-To: <4063A5B7FEB@as.ua.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Last summer I went to a soccer game (Vancouver 3, Seattle 2) with Bromige, and we had , because of his son, a thermos of gin and a thermos of vermouth and some plastic cups. Bromige told me that in England this was quite customary. I believed him, George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 16:07:15 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Bouchard Subject: Re: ReHoops Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII > An interesting sport to bring up in the company of poets is golf. I once > mentioned that I played -- or was trying to -- and was immediately brought > up short by another poet who gave me a lecture about how poetry and golf > were incompatible, morally so, as I remember. Fred -- trhere is of course Toby Olson, lovely poet & novelist & golfer who has a splendid book of the latter variety that deals with golf. -- Pierre In fact, golf is used as an agent of good (against evil) in Seaview. A fine novel; morally compatible for even the best golfers. daniel_bouchard@hmco.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 16:40:50 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: & now, a comic [morbid] interlude . . . a friend sent me this: From John Dvorak's May 6 _Inside Track_ column in PC Magazine. << It Was Bound to Happen Dept.: Leif Technologies (513-932-1108) is showing an unusual new tombstone add-on called View.logy (about $5000 to $7000). It's a computerized system with an LCD screen and a couple of buttons that allows people to read your biography, access family tree information, and view whatever else can fit into 250 pages of memory at your final resting place. The double-walled stainless-steel unit is designed to last forever or until Armageddon, whichever comes first. Right now this system displays text and pictures on a gravestone or cremation urn, but I'm sure more applications will arive. >> One wonders about -- a few technicalities. Like: postmortem editing? (add-ons of descendents? -- provisions for inclusion / exclusion of begats...); hypertext links? sound/video files? "live" connections to websites in perpetuity? -- and a new botique niche for RIP-VID scriptwriters & directors & producers -- & the special eclat of having (say) Wim Wenders or David Lynch "do" your r.i.p.-vid. -- (those are a few, for starters) . . . "r.i.p., hombre" d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 08:59:31 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: ReHoops Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Up till now, I've resisted the urge to post a poem, but since I'm reading tonight in Ellsworth (Maine), and since this one comes so close to the description below, I've succumbed. It's from around 1980, & based on the Blue Hill Fair, annual Labor Day Weekend event. September Cast-concrete weights, five to the ton. The front-end loader stacks them on the sledge-- it is the month of the ox-pull. It looks like a contest for bellies-- men swollen with children, with bills, swollen with biscuits and Bud. Oxen wait and wait. They have no place to go, no reason to go there, shriveled scars for balls. All afternoon the weights are added to the sledge; the oxen strain, lurch forward past the stands, the Ford-dump gears down and hauls it smoothly back. Hoofprints and treadmarks in the dirt, oxshit and oil. In the stands, ice-cream and polite applause. They wait all year for this, and then all afternoon. There's something here I can't make out. No thin man owns an ox. Sylvester Pollet >Poetic sports? Most sports fall into three categories--skills of war, skills >of hunting, forlorn hope that sportstogs will tear in interesting ways (the >greeks combined these by having athletes compete naked). Then there's a >remnant category--skills of labor. My favorite of these is the ox-pull, >practiced at county fairs in New England (and beyond?). A pair of enormous >oxen are hitched to a sledge laden with concrete blocks. The pair gets three >tries at pulling each weight for, I think, ten feet. >What's wonderful about this sport is that the oxen (unlike horses in the >otherwise identical sport of horse-pulling) are truly as stolid as >oxen--they exhibit absolutely no change in affect or mood. As if by >contagion, their human entourage neither. Despite the fact that consistent >losers are likely to wind up as hamburger (analogy with mesoamerican >ballgame?). And also (antecedent--wonderful) that the vast bulk of the time >is spent in loading the sledge further, leading in the teams of oxen, >hitching, rehitching, unhitching, etc. >If the poetic in sports is in proportion to the slowness of the game, this >beats baseball by a mile. The audience, sometimes larger than at most poetry >readings, tends to be on the laconic side--zen farmers who've sat once too >often. >Did you know that if you sit absolutely still for long enough your brain, >responding to gravity, begins to puddle? That's what I love about ox-pulls. > >At 01:44 PM 4/23/97 -0400, you wrote: >>>>And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a >>>>similar love of BASKETball? >>>> >>>>bill marsh >>> >>You bet. Stephen Dunn certainly is -- in fact I think he played semi-pro in >>Spain for a while in his youth. Other versifying NCAA fans -- and Syracuse >>fans at that!-- are Robert Lietz and yours truly. I think Garrett Hongo's >>a hoops fan, too, but I'm basing that on a poem of his so take it for what >>it's worth. >> >>It does seem, though, that if a poet dares admit to liking a sport, >>baseball is the safe one, probably because it's slow, and therefore >>"poetic." That whole gauzy (but yes, attractive) _Field of Dreams_ thing. >>An interesting sport to bring up in the company of poets is golf. I once >>mentioned that I played -- or was trying to -- and was immediately brought >>up short by another poet who gave me a lecture about how poetry and golf >>were incompatible, morally so, as I remember. This, however, came from >>someone who had never played the game, and who assumed that only rich >>stockbrokers indulged, ignorant of the fact that almost every summer >>weekday evening the links are crowded with hard workin' factory folk >>tearing up the fairways with their company leagues. Par to the people. >> >>*********************** >>Fred Muratori "The spaces between things keep >> >>(fmm1@cornell.edu) getting bigger & more >> >>Reference Services Division important." >>Olin * Kroch * Uris Libraries - John Ashbery >>Cornell University >>Ithaca, NY 14853 >>WWW: http://fmref.library.cornell.edu/spectra.html >>*********************** >> >> ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 17:04:31 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: horse apples In-Reply-To: <199704231821.LAA19510@norway.it.earthlink.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Our Okanagan horse bun fights were something like that. Not the soputh Okanagan is desert country, so horse buns would get crispy dry on the outside while they were still green on the inside. Perfect for picking up without disgust and throwing against the other kid's shirt (on the days when we wd wear shirts), because they would burst and spread. Other good things for throwing were tree-ripened peaches and clumps of really high-growing couch grass, whixch you wd swirl and hurl. They wd hit dirt first. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 16:36:01 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Shaunanne Tangney Subject: Re: ReHoops In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Wed, 23 Apr 1997, Fred Muratori wrote: > > It does seem, though, that if a poet dares admit to liking a sport, > baseball is the safe one, probably because it's slow, and therefore > "poetic." That whole gauzy (but yes, attractive) _Field of Dreams_ thing. oh, for me it's all about basketball. perhaps because i went to my 1sy bball game when i was 27 days old (my dad's a coach) and thus it has been a part of my life forever. but it's not so sentimental, really. basketball is an art/form. impossible things happen on a basketball court. and they happen because they are confined to that court. just like in poetry, impossible things happen--because they are confined to the poem. there are rules, forms, a space in which to play, to perform--and when all of those things are maintained: the impossible happens. is made to happen. no human body should be able to do what chamberlin's or west's or abdul-jabbar's or bird's or jordan's did/does and language isn't supposed to do what it does in a poem, what the poet makes it do. i suppose you could make this analogy of (m)any sport(s)--but there is something about basketball--something about the form and formalism of it. baseball has its infinitude; football and ice hockey their recklessness; but basketball (and tennis, too, i think) are about form and formalism, making impossible things happen w/in that form. . . --shaunanne ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 16:40:04 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Small Press Traffic Subject: Ronald Johnson reading in SF In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Hi, this is Dodie. The staff at SPT just found out that Ronald Johnson will be reading from ARK in the New College Theater (777 Valencia Street) on Thursday, May 1, 7:30 p.m. His reading is sponsored by the Poetics Program at New College. _____________________________________________ Small Press Traffic Literary Arts Center 766 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415/437-3454 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 17:08:28 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: ReHoops In-Reply-To: <335E2A33.5B6F@cnsunix.albany.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" In an anthology of fiction about sports that I once edited, there was one story about golf, by David Helwig of Kingston, a poet and fistion writer. But that's the only one I remember seeing, and IU dont remember any golf poetry. Wait, didnt that novelist whose name starts with U. write fiction abt golf? George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 08:02:54 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jeff Hansen Organization: The Blake School Subject: what this list is (intended) to be about MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit I have enjoyed being on this list for the past year and a half. The discussions are often lively, and I receive a lot of information on publications, conferences, etc. that I would otherwise not know about. But I do feel that we should all heed Charles Bernstein's latest revision of what the list is about. Note that this is not intended to be a list for anyone with a vague interest in poetry. It is intended for people committed to working through and on innovation. On top of that, "poetics" by its very definition involves intellectual theorizing. Therefore, it seems to me that criticizing people for being "high falutin'" or too intellectual on this list is contrary to what the owner of it intends. While I don't want to be a police officer, I do think we should all take note that this list is private and that it is intended for certain purposes. If our interests diverge from those intended by this list, maybe we should try to hook up to a different one. A number of people have told me, backchannel, that they no longer post for fear of being pounced on by others who have not even carefully read the original post. Why are we here? ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 21:12:10 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dave Zauhar Subject: Re: poetry and golf (was ReHoops) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >A major hoops fan (alas, for Syracuse too): John Taggart. > >As for Fred Muratori's unearthing that charged topic, golf, I'll go >on record as a fanatic. And yes, Fred, the poetry & golf connection >does produce odd responses. I do know of a number of fellow >golf-addicts on this list, but I will not name names.... > >Hank Lazar The strangest amalgamation of poetry and golf I can think of are those stories of Ted Berrigan, presumably, and oddly, a fan of the sport. At least one memoir I've read mentions him reading books on the history of the PGA tour, and he was known to compare the writing of poetry to Arnold Palmer charging on the back nine on the last day of an important tournament. Dave Zauhar, currently working in Arnold Palmer's birthplace of Latrobe, PA, while dreaming of writing the definitive Berrigan biography ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 20:47:38 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: orient v. occident interesting that the word "europe" is parsed (via some or other root) to mean "west" just as the word "asia" (in like wise) has roots in "east" -- which brings me to David Bromage's occidental complaint, namely & to wit: <<< Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 14:00:32 -0500 From: David Bromige Subject: marianne moore's poems PPS The 50-posts-per-day limit is unfair to Westerners, esp to BC, Oregon, Washington state & California residents. Unless we're insomniacs, the dice of the day's debate are loaded against us. Would like to see some proportional representation system worked out to redress this imbalance. >>> proportional, as in, numerically representative of a ratio of subscribers? (or of just those who post? -- swimmers rather than swimmers + lubbers)? -- as if one were to take a census & figure out how many are in eastern U.S. time zone & how many in western U.S. [the two assumed poles of the above idea] and then ration it out somehow? . . . and where does that leave our friends down in Oz? -- or (say) Stephen Paul Miller (now in Krakow, Poland) or . . . so, in theory, there could be issues . . . David B. posted the above-quoted note early in the day on Monday [from California], but I didn't get it till today [Wednesday] -- it was being compiled in Wednesday's digest [being a hold-over form a day well past its 50-limit], till I switched from digest to nodigest mode . . . David I. [aka moi], on the other hand, attempted to make a post at 4:45 p.m. today (here in the mystic east), and got this response from LaMama Computer: >>> L-Soft list server at University at Buffalo (1.8c) 04/23/97 04:45pm >>> The distribution of your message dated Wed, 23 Apr 1997 16:40:50 -0400 with subject "& now, a comic [morbid] interlude . . ." has been postponed because the daily message limit for the POETICS list (50) has been exceeded. No action is required from you; your message will be reprocessed automatically once the list owner releases the list. / / / / / I'm thinking of this & trying to reckon (or sourt out) against whom the dice of the day are/were loaded; but I can't quite reach clear conclusions. Today, the 50-limit was reached quite early -- and true enough, it was 3 hours earlier in California than in New York; on the other hand, you westerners get a clean slate & a clear road directly after the New York Midnight -- which is 9:00 p.m. for you'all, so you've got clear sailin' at that end of the day, while we -- to participate in any early-list reparte, must needs burn the proverbial midnight oil . . . DB also allows: <<< You c o u l d place a ceiling upon the number of postings by an (excuse the term) individual per day. db >>> yes, but some folks have these neat little rejoinders & suchlike, while others have these fantastic, billowing essayish items -- and how, praytell, is that to be well-sorted by a mere number-of-posts factor? . . . in short, I don't really have a position on this. Another listserv that I participate in has a number-of-posts limit set at 10 / day -- and that's something that, there, folks are rarely aware of (once or twoice, I've met up with it meself, but this indicates my prolixity in that corral . . .) -- yes, there could be some such limit; one thing it would perhaps encourage would be longer (or even more "thought out" posts) -- but do we necessarily want either of those forces at the steering wheel ? ? nuff (as they say) sed, d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 19:05:35 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: articulated skeletons Comments: To: Rebecca Reynolds In-Reply-To: <199704231453.KAA28782@erebus.rutgers.edu> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII lurk flit flitter-- flitting always shy of fitting . . . if I a-r-t-i-culate myself enter the "social contract" become bone is my skin individuality? flesh is appetite my fondness for . . . shall I be lost if you find me? (without doubt) ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 19:07:21 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: "the divine analogy which is the unity of the human race"? In-Reply-To: <199704222011.NAA03771@norway.it.earthlink.net> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Tue, 22 Apr 1997, Mark Weiss wrote: In a dogless context we run off with the cat. precious. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 16:52:02 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: ReHoops In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >>And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a >>similar love of BASKETball? >> >>bill marsh > Well, I did have 2 free tickets for g ames 3 and 4 of last year's NBA final, except that I had to sit with a bunch of Bulls' family and friends at the Dome. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 22:50:15 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jen Sondheim Subject: Re: Video tomorow night (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Although not strictly poetry, but poetics, I have a video show tomorrow night, Thursday, at 7:00, at the Knitting Factory here in NYC, 74 Leonard Street. I'm running out of Jennifer, btw, or vice versa, at this point; on Cybermind and Fop-l, I've been writing about the phenomenology of this ms/ recognition of problematic identity. Alan ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Doctress N's Expose of Jen's Lies When Doctress N stayed with me a few weeks ago (having come for the launch party of the Being on Line book), I screened the Jennifer tape for her. Later, in the middle of arguing, she said she knew now that I wore pant- ies. I said, no, I didn't wear panties; I wore them for the tape and noth- ing else. (Since she had seen me naked, she should have realized that.) Where is this going? For one thing, I'm screening the tape tomorrow night. For another, her reply was that she was an artist, and she never lied in her art. The assumption, of course, is that wearing panties on tape and not in real life constituted a lie, a dishonest art, an art of subterfuge perhaps - which itself was constituted by the fact that the material on the tape, its content, appeared somewhat _as if_ I was Jennifer, to re- suscitate Jeremy Bentham's or Vaihinger's conceit. A fetish requires maintenance, labor, economics, of a different order and temporality than artwork, which passes literally from hand to hand. When I think: Jennifer pushes me borderline, I _do_: Alan pushes Jennifer border- line. There's no hardness, no uncanny gaze, in the text. But the primitive conceit of the _truth_ of art (i.e. "her art is honest," "she true to herself," "she's a fake," "her art's fake," and so forth) hangs like a phallus over its irreality. (For if art is a discourse, it is centrifugal, rim-objects at the subject's horizon generating internally, ec-centric. Truth _swarms._) Forge a head. __________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 16:51:49 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Small Press Traffic Subject: the next 2 Fridays at SPT Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Small Press Traffic Presents Friday, April 25, 7:30 p.m. Talk Series: Kristin Prevallet on Helen Adam New College Theater 777 Valencia Street $5 Small Press Traffic's _Talk Series_ continues with this special event featuring poet Kristin Prevallet, who will discuss her research on the life and work of Helen Adam, one of the brightest lights of the San Francisco Renaissance. Scottish-born Helen Adam (1909-1992) was a mystic balladeer, who wrote and thought in the language of Dunbar and Ingoldsby while maintaining intimate friendships with Robert Duncan, Jack Spicer, Madeline Gleason, James Broughton, and countless others in the poetry-mad world of the Bay Area of the 1950s and 60s. A gifted storyteller, collagist and photographer, she is best remembered for her tragicomic operetta _San Francisco's Burning!_ Kristin Prevallet's _Perturbation, My Sister: A study of Max Ernst's Hundred Headless Woman,_ is forthcoming this spring from First Intensity Press. She is an editor of _apex of the M,_ and is working on a video based on _The Rime of the Ancient Mariner._ For the past three years she has been cataloguing the archive of Helen Adam at the Poetry/Rare Books Collection at SUNY Buffalo. At this event, Prevallet will give a slide presentation of Adam's life and times, and will introduce the restored version of _Daydream of Darkness,_ the film made by Helen Adam and the painter William McNeill in 1962-3. _Daydream of Darkness,_ a poetic film fantasia, was shown only once, at Robin Blaser's Peacock Gallery on the eve of JFK's assassination, and then abandoned. In the course of her research, Prevallet discovered the film, its celluloid near rotting, and has arranged its restoration for this grand re-premiere! Please note: Prevallet will be reading from her own poetry at a separate event this same weekend, at Canessa Park, 708 Montgomery Street, Sunday, April 27th, at 3:00 p.m. Do not confuse the 2 events-our event is the one and only Helen Adam presentation! --------------------------------- Friday, May 2, 7:30 p.m. Joanne Kyger Dale Smith New College Cultural Center 766 Valencia Street $5 What an event! Joanne Kyger, an active presence in the Bay Area poetry scene for forty years, has lived the life I've always dreamed of. She's the author of 14 books of poetry: she's seen it all, she's done it all, and she grows younger instead of older-my ideal! The friend of Olson, Spicer, Wieners, Berrigan, and so many more, Kyger has crafted a poetry of excitement and spiritual revelation which influences the younger generation of today. The range and energy of her writing seems to re-distribute the molecules of the air we breathe, and the social space we inhabit. Her most recent book is _Some Sketches from the Life of Helena Petrovna Blavatsky_ (Boulder: Rodent Press, 1996). This summer she will be teaching at the Naropa Institute. Dale Smith returns to San Francisco from Austin, Texas, where he has recently completed a thesis on Philip Whalen's poetry for his MA from New College. Smith's writing is always surprising, ranging from elegaic to formally combustible, but always with a romantic Western undercurrent. "Wanting/ to live furious, the living/ as distinct a thing as things/ themselves." His work is forthcoming in _GAS_ and _Jejune_ and has appeared in _Mirage, Exquisite Corpse,_ and _Wired_. With Michael Price he edits the magazine _Mike and Dale's Younger Poets_. "Other than that, I get high, read, and hang out with Hoa." _____________________________________________ Small Press Traffic Literary Arts Center 766 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415/437-3454 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 21:03:15 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: ReHoops Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >>>And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a >>>similar love of BASKETball? >>> >>>bill marsh >> Bill probably knows this already, but our mutual teacher at Arizona, Jon Anderson, is a fanatic, particularly of Arizona Wildcats basketball and the Boston Red Sox. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 07:21:00 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Boughn Subject: Robert Duncan MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I've been working on ways to get the Peruvian governemnt involved in negotiating the release of the Duncan papers being held hostage in the poetry compound at Buffalo. Anybody got any ideas? Mike mboughn@chass.utoronto.ca ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 04:51:53 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: Granby, Mon Amour MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit George Bowering wrote: > Words delight me, and so do sentences (and so do those little > gestures Rachel makes, but that is another question). Mister Bowering is confused again. What he remembers as "gestures" were, of course, my desperate attempts to hail a cab after that disastrous night in Granby, Quebec in 1973 (about which the less said the better). George had a lampshade on his head at the time and was alternately singing "O Canada" and reciting from the collected works of Charles Bukowski (one of his favorites), so I guess he must be forgiven for his lack of depth perception. Rachel L. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 08:13:38 -0400 Reply-To: Mark Prejsnar Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: Poem for Rent In-Reply-To: <85256482.005BAD32.00@krypton.hmco.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII The Lorber information was indeed delightful. As with the "BurmaSlave" campaign, this is much-needed creative linking between social action, political debate and poetry. Daniel B., thanx for the updates about Boston/Cambridge. It should also be kept in mind that housing struggles are central to just about all of us, and things weren't better for most people even before the recent ultra-right attacks on rent-control. Under the old system, relatively few people of modest means could get rent-control in Brookline, Cambridge, and Boston; the system only applied to a small percentage of the rented housing stock. I lived in the 1980s in Somerville, a working class part of greater Boston where rent control had been successfully trashed in the seventies..Rents were rising so fast that Somerville natives were being driven out, dozens of families per week. I sometimes felt impatient with housing activists in the area, who concentrated for years on the impending attacks on rent-control, when the housing situation was dire for the majority of area working-class people, who couldn't get into the small number of controlled units. (In Cambridge and Brookline, though not Boston, there was virtually no link to need; so pertinacity and connections got some people rent control who didn't need it that much, while many who did hadn't a prayer--It bothered me how little the local left understood or cared about the limits of defending what was already in some ways a corrupt and inadequate system....) Mark Prejsnar Atlanta ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 07:37:10 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Kathleen Crown Subject: Poetry and the Public Sphere In-Reply-To: Automatic digest processor "POETICS Digest - 22 Apr 1997 to 23 Apr 1997" (Apr 24, 12:11am) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Hey folks, We are gearing up for the Rutgers conference on contemporary poetry, "Poetry and the Public Sphere," which kicks off this afternoon at 3 p.m. with talks by Cary Nelson, Maria Damon, and Harriet Davidson. Thanks to a dedicated group of crazed graduate students, wacky professors, and mightily talented and energetic New Brunswick community poets, the conference will be huge, exciting, and explosive. The full program and travel information is posted on our website: http://english.rutgers.edu/poetry.html. Everyone is welcome! No need to pre-register. Tonight, readings by Amiri Baraka, Tracie Morris, Reg E. Gaines, Aileen Reyes, and Carl Hancock Rux. After a brief intermission, we will hold a tribute reading to Allen Ginsberg. For those of you who cannot make it to the conference, Galinsky and Go! Poetry will be here taping events for a later broadcast and archive on his website (more information to follow). Thanks to everyone who helped make this event HAPPEN. KC -- ********************************************************** Kathleen Crown Rutgers English and Women's Studies Conference Co-Coordinator, "Poetry and the Public Sphere" P.O. Box 5054 New Brunswick, NJ 08903-5054 H: 908/572-1128 W: 908/932-8537 Dept. Fax: 908/932-1150 kcrown@rci.rutgers.edu *********************************************************** ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 07:48:24 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" Subject: Re: A Tale of Two Cities (part two): On the Wings of Atalanta (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 20:15:13 -0700 (PDT) From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" To: simon@CVAX.IPFW.INDIANA.EDU Subject: Re: A Tale of Two Cities (part two): On the Wings of Atalanta meanwhile -- after a brief sojourn in Los Angeles about which I speak no further, it was on to Atlanta and the College Language Association -- The College Language Association recently celebrated its 60th anniversary, this was its 57th conference, and, as mentioned in a previous post, the number of white academics in attendance does not seem to have increased by much in six decades -- not that white attendance is a measure of anything other than a continuing lack of interest on the part of persons employed at Historically White Universities and Colleges -- On the other hand -- there were far more students on hand than usual, though they hadn't meant to be on hand for a conference. As it happens, the conference was scheduled for the same weekend as the 17th annual Black College Spring Break Freaknik, always held on the beaches of Atlanta. Thursday night as the advance wave of students started checking into the hotel there was a certain amount of consternation as they discovered that the place was full of the very English and Foreign Language professors they were trying to escape -- I won't try to summarize lots of panels, but will tell you of some characteristic moments -- The first session I attended proved to be one of the most interesting of the weekend -- Titled "Migration and the African Diaspora in European Literature," it featured primarily medievalists -- Catherine Johnson of Georgia Southern U gave a good survey of "Medieval Europe's Struggle to Re-Define Self after Contact with the Black Moor," Reginald Bass talked about the image of blacks in medieval German literature, and Mario Chandler, who impressed me very much, read a paper on fictional representations of Juan Latino, bringing us into one Renaissance (the Spanish) at a conference where the word "renaissance" was more often preceded by the word "Harlem." At the banquet later in the conference, young Mario Chandler was awarded one of the CLA's small travel grants for research in Spain. After some good papers on Wallace Thurman and Jessie Fauset, including one by Dolan Hubbard, who is working on a book about Thurman, it was on to the Langston Hughes Society's luncheon with guest speaker Arnold Rampersad. Rampersad did manage to quote Hughes once or twice, but the subject of his talk was Jackie Robinson, which was about as close to poetry as things got that first day. Rampersad, for all you poet/baseball fans out there, is working with Mrs. Robinson on the authorized biography, out soon. As a former Howard University lecturer, I was particularly pleased by the panel examining the legacy of Arthur P. Davis. Most interesting to me was post-panel discussion of Davis's initial hostility to the Black Arts poets and his later thaw with regards to a few of those writers (_not_ the poets I might have expected him to warn up to later at all). Angelyn Mitchell of Georgetown, whose anthology of African-American literary criticism is a good teaching tool despite its somewhat narrow selection, spoke of Davis's work as an anthologist. That night there was a screening of W.E.B. DuBois in Four Voices, with the producer/director Louis Massiah there to talk about the film with those of us who were still awake after all the receptions at Spellman and the day's arguments. next morning I was up early for one of the few poetry panels, a session on Robert Hayden, though I have to say the papers didn't seem to move the scholarship very far from where it already was. BUT, Angela Chamblee, after much difficulty with the AV equipment, put Hayden's Harriet Tubman poetry back together with Jacob Lawrence's Tubman series of paintings, and that was great fun. Bernard Bell chaired a session on Charles Johnson and Ishmael Reed that featured James Coleman and two of his grad. students, both of whom did an admirable job with their topics. I went with great expectations to a panel on the theme of passing in the works of Charles Chesnutt and Nella Larsen, only to find that two of the panelists had passed up the opportunity to appear -- Left alone with her session chair was the remarkably collected and adaptable Tracyann Williams of CUNY, who, to judge from her talk on Larsen, will make a very good professor of literature when she gets that diss. done -- Went then to a general panel on "Narratives of Migration, Liberation and War," where Mary Helen Washington presented some of her work on the 50s, work that might have been a great addition to the Orono conference last Summer even though it was not about poetry. Washington is planning more 50s stuff for the American Studies conference in D.C. in the Fall -- a revelation to me in her presentation was the news (new to me, probably old to most of you) that the 1959 Negro Writers Conference [the first ever], sponsored by the American Society of African Culture had been funded by the CIA -- The focus of Washington's talk was novelist Frank London Brown and his realist novel _Trumbull Park_, which I had not known of before but will now look up. That night featured the conference banquet and awards. Octavia Butler was the featured speaker, and gave an autobiographical address to such questions as "why write" and "why write that stuff?" AND for all you Science Fiction listophiles, there is a call for papers out for a special issue of Callaloo on Octavia Butler -- the person to contact if you want to give the subject a try is: Paulette Richards Department of English Loyola University 6363 St. Charles Ave. New Orleans, LA 70118 barbara6@aol.com fax # (504) 865-2295 Next morning I had the great good luck to be the first speaker on the first panel of the last day -- talked about C.L.R. James -- was joined by an interesting grad. student named Mursalata Muhammad who talked about black American artists in Europe. The last panel I got to brought things full circle in an odd way to the departure from Berkeley -- the subject of the panel was the Middle Passage -- Sophia Canatave of Tufts talked about literary aesthetics and the history of Middle Passage, Sheila Smith McKoy (Vanderbilt) spoke of a Kofi Awoonor novel I had somehow not heard of yet titled _Comes the Voyage Last_ (anybody out there read that yet? Awoonor is a poet.) and Iyunolu Osagie, of Penn State, gave a paper titled "Conceptualizing Blackness in Middle Passage Migrations." This last created quite a ruckus. Part of her paper was a sort of wondering out loud about what it might be like to define blackness in relation to itself instead of in relation to whiteness. In the resulting dialogue with the audience there was much talk of Fanon, and of African/African-American relationships,,,, and then somebody wondered whether white academics ever talk about the dependence of the concept of whiteness on the concept of blackness. I knew a cue when I heard one, and briefly (far more briefly than I did here) described the Berkeley conference on whiteness and the fire storm it caused in the media. (The media, by the way, left us pretty much alone in Atlanta -- They had all the freaknikers to get on camera after all.) Oddest moment of the entire conference came when one young person in the audience opined that black Americans have never been credited for making white people possible -- and then the look on his face when he realized what he'd just said -- folk seen at the conference included Joanne Gabbin, the aforementioned Bernard Bell, Trudier Harris (WHO is starting up a society for the study of African-American poetry that should be of interest to all on this list -- there'll be an organizing meeting at the American Literature Association in B'more next month -- will supply info address on request), Jacqueline Jones of nearby (to me) Santa Clara University, Hugh Gloster (who is gettin' old), Beverly Guy-Sheftall, R. Baxter Miller, Robert O'Meally, Gay Wilentz and other notables of the prose world -- which is why Trudier's society is so needed -- again, very little talk of poetry at this conference -- there's a lot of important work to be done, but students won't know it's waiting to be done if we never teach any of the relevant materials -- if we don't get those books back in print -- and so on, you know the drill -- so, having been made to feel my age by large numbers of exceedingly polite freaknikers who quickly spotted me as somebody well past forty and thought they should all tell me that English is their absolutely favorite subject (and I will choose for the moment to believe every one of them), I flew back to San Jose only to find 7,000 fans of TAFKAP (the artist formerly known as Prince) snaked around my building waiting for the concert I hadn't known was about to happen - and next morning learned that TAFKAP had encored with a scorching guitar duo performed with Carlos Santana -- but I did have a good book to read at least -- love to all, and to all a good night -- sure wish I was going to that Rutgers wing ding to see all my buddies from the list, though ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 10:56:57 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christina Fairbank Chirot Subject: Re: ReHoops In-Reply-To: <199704231912.MAA06791@norway.it.earthlink.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII A really good fair has both an ox pull and a demolition derby. As Jerry Lee Lewis says, "Think about it". A pro scout sent to visit the farm where then pitching prospects Gaylord and Jim Perry grew up tried acting "country", feeding sugar to a mule. The mule bit his hand near off. Paul Metcalf in Patagoni writes of stock car races and the Incas--and incarnation--inca car nation-- Thats' why we still have hits songs about Mercury. (Thank you Alan Jackson.) As they say--Ox Pulls go way back. If not much forward. To emphasize the point--there's the demolition derby. On Wed, 23 Apr 1997, Mark Weiss wrote: > Poetic sports? Most sports fall into three categories--skills of war, skills > of hunting, forlorn hope that sportstogs will tear in interesting ways (the > greeks combined these by having athletes compete naked). Then there's a > remnant category--skills of labor. My favorite of these is the ox-pull, > practiced at county fairs in New England (and beyond?). A pair of enormous > oxen are hitched to a sledge laden with concrete blocks. The pair gets three > tries at pulling each weight for, I think, ten feet. > What's wonderful about this sport is that the oxen (unlike horses in the > otherwise identical sport of horse-pulling) are truly as stolid as > oxen--they exhibit absolutely no change in affect or mood. As if by > contagion, their human entourage neither. Despite the fact that consistent > losers are likely to wind up as hamburger (analogy with mesoamerican > ballgame?). And also (antecedent--wonderful) that the vast bulk of the time > is spent in loading the sledge further, leading in the teams of oxen, > hitching, rehitching, unhitching, etc. > If the poetic in sports is in proportion to the slowness of the game, this > beats baseball by a mile. The audience, sometimes larger than at most poetry > readings, tends to be on the laconic side--zen farmers who've sat once too > often. > Did you know that if you sit absolutely still for long enough your brain, > responding to gravity, begins to puddle? That's what I love about ox-pulls. > > At 01:44 PM 4/23/97 -0400, you wrote: > >>>And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a > >>>similar love of BASKETball? > >>> > >>>bill marsh > >> > >You bet. Stephen Dunn certainly is -- in fact I think he played semi-pro in > >Spain for a while in his youth. Other versifying NCAA fans -- and Syracuse > >fans at that!-- are Robert Lietz and yours truly. I think Garrett Hongo's > >a hoops fan, too, but I'm basing that on a poem of his so take it for what > >it's worth. > > > >It does seem, though, that if a poet dares admit to liking a sport, > >baseball is the safe one, probably because it's slow, and therefore > >"poetic." That whole gauzy (but yes, attractive) _Field of Dreams_ thing. > >An interesting sport to bring up in the company of poets is golf. I once > >mentioned that I played -- or was trying to -- and was immediately brought > >up short by another poet who gave me a lecture about how poetry and golf > >were incompatible, morally so, as I remember. This, however, came from > >someone who had never played the game, and who assumed that only rich > >stockbrokers indulged, ignorant of the fact that almost every summer > >weekday evening the links are crowded with hard workin' factory folk > >tearing up the fairways with their company leagues. Par to the people. > > > >*********************** > >Fred Muratori "The spaces between things keep > > > >(fmm1@cornell.edu) getting bigger & more > > > >Reference Services Division important." > >Olin * Kroch * Uris Libraries - John Ashbery > >Cornell University > >Ithaca, NY 14853 > >WWW: http://fmref.library.cornell.edu/spectra.html > >*********************** > > > > > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 08:25:21 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: ReHoops In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Actually, as a poet who's a baseball fan(atic), this belongs with Henry's multitudinous and well-cataloged horse-manure.....Most poets (like most **real people**) who know the game loathe that movie, precisely because of the putrid Norman Rockwell absurdity of it (I grew up knowing the sainted Norman myself, in Stockbridge, and posed for him as a kid--I know from bad Americana already). Mark Prejsnar Atlanta On Wed, 23 Apr 1997, Fred Muratori wrote: > > It does seem, though, that if a poet dares admit to liking a sport, > baseball is the safe one, probably because it's slow, and therefore > "poetic." That whole gauzy (but yes, attractive) _Field of Dreams_ thing. > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 00:51:24 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: JDHollo@AOL.COM Subject: further to sandhyabashing Hi, folks--& David Israel & his Sanskritist friend George Thompson, in particular: a note from Anne Waldman in response to G.T.s latest post on the matter-- "Of course the so-called Beats, particularly Diane di Prima, Allen Ginsberg, and Jack Kerouac were quite familiar with & reading Eliade, but I have not come across particular use of the term 'sandhyabasha' in the context I was applying it in the Scripture (Kerouac) preface. This certainly does not preclude awareness of the principle, & it surfaces 'in spirit' in the long-awaited _Some of the Dharma_ (Kerouac) coming out this fall from Penguin USA. I see this text as illuminating the profound and interesting link of a postmodern poetics with Buddhist philosophical/psychological ideas and practices. There's so much more to say on this subject! In haste, Anne Waldman." End of transmission. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 15:01:26 -0700 Reply-To: Joe Safdie Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Safdie Subject: Re: Re Hoops, Lurking and The Divine Analogy In-Reply-To: <199704231912.MAA06791@norway.it.earthlink.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Wed, 23 Apr 1997, Mark Weiss wrote: > Did you know that if you sit absolutely still for long enough your brain, > responding to gravity, begins to puddle? Hasn't Mark found the real alternative, here, to lurking? I humbly submit PUDDLING to the multitude! Just puddling along, not really diving in; puddling through the posts. I dunno, sounds good to me. About sports, and recent messages concerning same: would anyone be interested in collaborating on what may not be a RENGA but would definitely be some sort of post-individual piece on the NBA playoffs? "I" "myself" (sorry, Mark Wallace _et al_, an ingrained habit) try to compose some improvisational thing or other on the occasion of the World Series every year; this would of course be quicker, the associations more "instanter" as Olson had it, but might be fun. And finally, if I may be permitted a short excursus on the thread last week that (briefly) bore my name in the subject line, along with that Canadian fella . . . my lone, rather small, contribution to the individual/social conversation was quickly metamorphosed into a defense of some romantic heroic/artistic individualism which I didn't recognize as ever having said (although I have nothing against individuals, some of my best friends . . .) I was concerned, rather, with what I perceived as the stated likelihood of the artist's work -- by which I mean yours, mine or anyone else's on this list -- being subsumed by the institution he or she was a part of: not quite the same thing. I wish I had Olson's _Selected_ at hand, because I'm now going to butcher something he wrote (Michael B., are you still around?), something like "I deplore the current substitution of the social for the cosmos, the totality" -- that gets closer to what, in this context, I believe. Me and Giordano Bruno. And maybe even Henry the Bold, whose remarks on Joyce and the "real world" a few days back are still ringing. Not a Boeing Supersonic fan, though currently puddling in Seattle, Joe Safdie ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 13:52:47 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: horse apples Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" If horse-shit fights were an organized sport poets would be banned from the amateurs. At 11:21 AM 4/23/97 -0700, you wrote: >when I was a child I spent summers in camps in the mountains of pennsylvania >with a bunch of other urban kids. by analogy with snowballs, we used to have >manure fights. This makes me something of an expert. The lady has it. >The deal was to find a turd that had dried enough so that it could be molded >into a proper sphere but fresh enough so that it would still cause offence. > >What a relief to tell the story. I have been afraid that this piece of >folklore would die with me and the world be impovrished by its loss. > >At 05:43 PM 4/22/97 -0400, you wrote: >>Henry Gould wrote: >> >>>(as my Uncle George used to sing: "What's the color of horse manure? >>>Brown, Brown, Brown.") >> >>As we all know, the color of horse manure depends on whether it's fresh or >>well-aged. Uncle George obviously prefers the well-aged variety, since fresh >>horse apples are green, green, green. >> >>B.W. (a former surf lurker grazing on Henry's turf.) >> >> > > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 23 Apr 1997 14:12:53 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joel Felix Subject: Re: ReHoops Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 01:44 PM 4/23/97 -0400, you wrote: >>>And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a >>>similar love of BASKETball? Myself I find basketball to be my great love these years, tho maybe i'm a victim of the generational decline of baseball myth. Is it true that baseball is less poetic than it was once, as they report on the tv? Any of you all ever read Tom Clark's *Fan Poems*, from '76? May I hazard my opinion that it was a truly awful book? A couple monthes ago I set out to re-write it, using the same title, and now instead find myself writing paeans to Chris Webber. Still stuck in '92 with the Fab Five, I guess, t-ing for one last time out. Joel Felix ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 12:53:23 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: Poetics Geography Comments: cc: bernstei@bway.net Poetas, If you're curious who's where, here's how to find out. (Sorry, this won't tell you east coast / west coast; but it will, methinks, identify all internationally-recognized sovereign states.) Of what do I speak? To unravel this mystery, you need but read the next chapter (as they say in the old Chinese novels). yours, d.i. [what follows is rubric'd w/ some backchannelism, but the basic methodology is outlined in short order] >>> Charles Bernstein 04/24/97 12:24pm >>> This is very interesting and I will include it for sure. I didn't know you could do that. Indeed, I would welcome you to repost this info now to the whole list. At 09:33 PM 4/23/97 -0400, you wrote: >Charles -- > >thanks for posting that update of the Poetics welcome msg. -- > >I've a small note regarding section # 6, which section reads: > ><<< >6. Who's Subscribed >To see who is subscribed to Poetics, send an e-mail message to >listserv@listserv.acsu.buffalo.edu; leave the "Subject" line of the e-mail >message blank. In the body of your e-mail message type: > > review poetics > > or > > review POETICS by name > >(which will give you the list alphabetically by name) > >You will be sent within a reasonable amount of time (by return e-mail) a >rather long list containing the names and e-mail addresses of Poetics >subscribers. This list is alphabetized by server not name. >>> > > >here's another neat listserv command along kindred lines: > >review POETICS by country > >will give you the same roster, but itemized (& organized) under a >separate subheading for each country (nation) -- it's rather neat to thus >get some particulars of the global sweep -- > >and there can be some interesting results from perusing such a list; for >instance, by doing so, I discovered that old Stephen Paul Miller (whom I >knew through frirends-of-friends) is currently in Krakow, Poland. > >Naturally, you might not wish to be exhaustive in the info provided in a >welcome msg., but -- in short -- I thought you might care to consider this >possible addition to those currently noted. > >Thanks, as always, for the good thing afoot, >d.i. > > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 14:26:30 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM Subject: Heather Fuller @ Bridge Street Sunday April 27th @ 8 PM a reading/talk by Heather Fuller on the occasion of the publication of the Edge Book _perhaps this is a rescue fantasy_ Bridge Street Books 2814 Pennsylvania Ave NW Washington, DC ph 202 965 5200 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 11:27:51 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: william marsh Subject: Re: ReHoops Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >It does seem, though, that if a poet dares admit to liking a sport, >baseball is the safe one, probably because it's slow, and therefore >"poetic." i agree / the oft-mentioned "zen" aspect of baseball makes for easy (often false) parallels but would anyone be interested in collaborating on a list of basketbal-to-poetry analogies? i.e., i'll begin with: dribble = cadence, syncopation cross-over dribble = line break slam dunk = haiku etc. bill marsh ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 11:35:02 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: & now, a comic [morbid] interlude . . . Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" and cemeteries would serve espresso. At 04:40 PM 4/23/97 -0400, you wrote: >a friend sent me this: > >>From John Dvorak's May 6 _Inside Track_ column in PC Magazine. > ><< It Was Bound to Happen Dept.: Leif Technologies (513-932-1108) is >showing an unusual new tombstone add-on called View.logy (about >$5000 to $7000). It's a computerized system with an LCD screen and a >couple of buttons that allows people to read your biography, access >family tree information, and view whatever else can fit into 250 pages of >memory at your final resting place. The double-walled stainless-steel unit >is designed to last forever or until Armageddon, whichever comes first. >Right now this system displays text and pictures on a gravestone or >cremation urn, but I'm sure more applications will arive. >> > >One wonders about -- a few technicalities. Like: postmortem editing? >(add-ons of descendents? -- provisions for inclusion / exclusion of >begats...); hypertext links? sound/video files? "live" connections to >websites in perpetuity? -- and a new botique niche for RIP-VID >scriptwriters & directors & producers -- & the special eclat of having >(say) Wim Wenders or David Lynch "do" your r.i.p.-vid. -- (those are a >few, for starters) . . . > >"r.i.p., hombre" >d.i. > > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 11:37:38 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: ReHoops Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" As one of those bellies, bravo! You've found the tragic core of the ox-pull! At 08:59 AM 4/24/97 -0400, you wrote: >Up till now, I've resisted the urge to post a poem, but since I'm reading >tonight in Ellsworth (Maine), and since this one comes so close to the >description below, I've succumbed. It's from around 1980, & based on the >Blue Hill Fair, annual Labor Day Weekend event. > > September > >Cast-concrete weights, five to the ton. >The front-end loader stacks them on the sledge-- >it is the month of the ox-pull. > >It looks like a contest for bellies-- >men swollen with children, with bills, >swollen with biscuits and Bud. > >Oxen wait and wait. >They have no place to go, no reason to go there, >shriveled scars for balls. > >All afternoon the weights are added to the sledge; >the oxen strain, lurch forward past the stands, >the Ford-dump gears down and hauls it smoothly back. > >Hoofprints and treadmarks in the dirt, >oxshit and oil. > >In the stands, ice-cream and polite applause. >They wait all year for this, and then all afternoon. >There's something here I can't make out. >No thin man owns an ox. > > Sylvester Pollet > >>Poetic sports? Most sports fall into three categories--skills of war, skills >>of hunting, forlorn hope that sportstogs will tear in interesting ways (the >>greeks combined these by having athletes compete naked). Then there's a >>remnant category--skills of labor. My favorite of these is the ox-pull, >>practiced at county fairs in New England (and beyond?). A pair of enormous >>oxen are hitched to a sledge laden with concrete blocks. The pair gets three >>tries at pulling each weight for, I think, ten feet. >>What's wonderful about this sport is that the oxen (unlike horses in the >>otherwise identical sport of horse-pulling) are truly as stolid as >>oxen--they exhibit absolutely no change in affect or mood. As if by >>contagion, their human entourage neither. Despite the fact that consistent >>losers are likely to wind up as hamburger (analogy with mesoamerican >>ballgame?). And also (antecedent--wonderful) that the vast bulk of the time >>is spent in loading the sledge further, leading in the teams of oxen, >>hitching, rehitching, unhitching, etc. >>If the poetic in sports is in proportion to the slowness of the game, this >>beats baseball by a mile. The audience, sometimes larger than at most poetry >>readings, tends to be on the laconic side--zen farmers who've sat once too >>often. >>Did you know that if you sit absolutely still for long enough your brain, >>responding to gravity, begins to puddle? That's what I love about ox-pulls. >> >>At 01:44 PM 4/23/97 -0400, you wrote: >>>>>And given Spicer's love of baseball, any poets (here or there) with a >>>>>similar love of BASKETball? >>>>> >>>>>bill marsh >>>> >>>You bet. Stephen Dunn certainly is -- in fact I think he played semi-pro in >>>Spain for a while in his youth. Other versifying NCAA fans -- and Syracuse >>>fans at that!-- are Robert Lietz and yours truly. I think Garrett Hongo's >>>a hoops fan, too, but I'm basing that on a poem of his so take it for what >>>it's worth. >>> >>>It does seem, though, that if a poet dares admit to liking a sport, >>>baseball is the safe one, probably because it's slow, and therefore >>>"poetic." That whole gauzy (but yes, attractive) _Field of Dreams_ thing. >>>An interesting sport to bring up in the company of poets is golf. I once >>>mentioned that I played -- or was trying to -- and was immediately brought >>>up short by another poet who gave me a lecture about how poetry and golf >>>were incompatible, morally so, as I remember. This, however, came from >>>someone who had never played the game, and who assumed that only rich >>>stockbrokers indulged, ignorant of the fact that almost every summer >>>weekday evening the links are crowded with hard workin' factory folk >>>tearing up the fairways with their company leagues. Par to the people. >>> >>>*********************** >>>Fred Muratori "The spaces between things keep >>> >>>(fmm1@cornell.edu) getting bigger & more >>> >>>Reference Services Division important." >>>Olin * Kroch * Uris Libraries - John Ashbery >>>Cornell University >>>Ithaca, NY 14853 >>>WWW: http://fmref.library.cornell.edu/spectra.html >>>*********************** >>> >>> > > ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 13:35:31 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: jinxed by the collar Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" That'll teach me not to absolutize. The Owen / Berrigan reading at Poetry City (NY) is not _tomorrow_ as the message you received today would have it. It's tonight, 4/24, Thursday, 7 pm. He was Bill. He was Bill Walton. Signed, Jordan ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 14:27:54 CST6CDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hank Lazer Organization: The University of Alabama Subject: Re: there's a man on the fairway taking names Dave Z -- thanks. glad to hear of Berrigan's golf interest. And I do have a couple of golf poems in _Doublespace_ (Segue, 1992) OK, Rachel, a few names (off and on the list): Ray Federman (a seriously addicted and reputedly fine golfer, has played in tournaments all over the US); Michael Palmer (reported to be quite a good golfer); the already named Paul Naylor; Alan Golding (sorry, Alan, Rachel coaxed it out of me.... though Alan is, properly, much more of a soccer player...); Judy Grahn; Tom Mandel; Charlie Altieri (I stop now, since I'm beginning to name critics...). And Rachel, just think of the clothes--plaid pants, tasseled shoes, strange gloves, weird tan lines, etc.... And the discussions of blades vs. cavity backed irons; persimmon vs. metal woods.... Hank Lazer ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 15:44:01 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: armand schwerner Subject: DRAGON BOND RITE Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dragon Bond Rite, a cross-cultural mask dance drama, commissioned by Japan Society in New York City, will have its world premiere at Japan Society, 333 E.47, NYC 10017, on June 4,5 and 6 at 8PM. The mask dance drama is conceived and composed by Jin-Hi Kim, written by Armand Schwerner, artistic direction by Richard Emmert, lighting design by Jennifer Tipton, set design by Hyun Joo Kim, and features a company of fifteen performers from five different traditions, fourteen from Asia, all highly skilled representatives of their traditionalist categories-- as follows: Japan: Akira Matsui, noh mask dancer Shonosuke Okura, otsuzumi drum Sadamu Omura, noh singer Richard Emmert, noh singer (in English) Korea: Kwon Soon Kang, kagok/p'ansori singer Jong Ho Lee, kang ryung mask dancer Jin Hi Kim, komungo zither Jong Sil Choi, changgo drummer Tuva (Mongolia): Kongar-ool Ondar, throat singer Bali (Indonesia): I Ketut Rina, topeng/barong mask dancer I Wayan Sira, dalang singer I Gede Putu Winartha, kundang drummer Kerala, India: Margi Madhu, kudiyattam dancer Unikrishnan Nambiar, mizhavu drummer Tickets are $25.00. Dragon Bond Rite will be in final rehearsals at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis,MN,from May 25 through Sunday May 31; on Sunday May 31, there will be a dress rehearsal at 2PM, open to the public, before the company moves to NYC. On the 9th of June, DBR will be presented in the Eisenhower Hall at Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. Ticket reservation requests may be sent to the Japan Society, or may be charged to 212/752-3015 Monday through Friday, 10AM-5PM, or charged by FAX to 212/715-1262. DBR has received support from the Rockefeller Foundation Multi-Arts Production Fund, Lila Acheson Wallace/Japan Society Fund, Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust, Asian Cultural Council, the NEA, N.Y.State Council on the Arts, Saison Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Center and Walker Art Center. Transportation is assisted in part by Northwest Airlines. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 14:54:52 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dale Smith Subject: Re: what this list is (intended) to be about Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" It's interesting how conversational and experiencial language is acceptable in certain threads, like Hoops. But to ask some one to explain their conceptual terms through similar experiencial language is frowned upon in other threads. When I used the word, 'highfalutin'' in my post to Mark, I was commenting upon his use of language, as well as my own. Critical, yes. But also self implicating, because I chose to address terms like 'individual' and 'social' which are, ultimately, open conceptually. Intellectual theorizing, debate, and response are different, for me, from conceptual declaration, as in, "there is no individual." In the end, these sorts of exchanges seem fun, lively, and engaging, if not, somehow clarifying. But if the posts seem unfair or damaging, perhaps those "with a vague interest in poetry" should be addressed publicly and taken to task. Otherwise, how will "innovation" take place? Thought, it seems, should be provoked and proved. And what better place for this kind of exchange than here, on this list. By the way, could someone forward me Bernstein's revision. Dale >I have enjoyed being on this list for the past year and a half. The >discussions are often lively, and I receive a lot of information on >publications, conferences, etc. that I would otherwise not know about. >But I do feel that we should all heed Charles Bernstein's latest >revision of what the list is about. Note that this is not intended to >be a list for anyone with a vague interest in poetry. It is intended >for people committed to working through and on innovation. On top of >that, "poetics" by its very definition involves intellectual >theorizing. Therefore, it seems to me that criticizing people for >being "high falutin'" or too intellectual on this list is contrary to >what the owner of it intends. While I don't want to be a police >officer, I do think we should all take note that this list is private >and that it is intended for certain purposes. If our interests diverge >from those intended by this list, maybe we should try to hook up to a >different one. > >A number of people have told me, backchannel, that they no longer post >for fear of being pounced on by others who have not even carefully read >the original post. Why are we here? ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 16:44:33 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Stephen Vincent Subject: Re: ReHoops/ analog Hoop Analogs - OK I'll pick it up and try: palming = rhetorical moment fast break = open field steps (traveling) = rejection, give it up tip off = romantic opener jump shot = romantic, cosmic aspiration/love half court shot = cosmic bathos (if it goes in) defensive elbow = keeping the opposition (unacceptable lingo) out fake = irony pump fake = testing the waters foul = line/lingual abuse. Interesting if you are attracted to damage (if foul is severe, outrageous) screen = one word opens another line double screen = words making other words work in poems favor. dunk = dramatic last line that might relieve the pressure of heavy duty opposition, i.e., knotted language etc. A 7 ft center (fill in name) and a 5 ft 7" guard (fill in name) = Oxymoron. No doubt to challenged, revised, or amplifed. Back to the bench. Cheers, Stephen Vincent ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 16:58:45 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Thomas Bell Subject: Imaginary derivations and real delurking Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 12:53 AM 4/24/97 -0800, Herb Levy wrote: Subtext@Speakeasy Speakeasy: n 1. [so named because the orders are given quietly], a place where alcoholic drinks are sold illegally, 2. a list with no moderator. v. 1. to respond glibly to posts, 2. to seduce inter- netically, and 3. toss out stale pickup lines in a speakeasy. tom bell ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 18:12:48 -0400 Reply-To: BobGrumman@nut-n-but.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Bob Grumman Subject: Hoops, Golf, Etc. MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I love Bill Marsh's request for basketball/poetry parallels but, puhleeze, a slam-dunk is no haiku. Maybe the give-and go, successfully executed, is. Or you have to go to baseball for a haiku parallel. Haiku are all serenity. Now that I'm into this thread, I have to give into to my taxonomania yet again and bother you with my division of sports into TARGETEERICAL SPORTS and CREATIVE SPORTS (tentative terminology). In targeteerical sports, the participant tries to hit a target many times through the repetitive use of one more or less unvarying, highly specialized physical act: as in the worst case, golf, which is the same swing at the same unmoving stupid ball, varying only the club (for the most part); and in bowling; baseball, except for fielding; pool; darts; croquet; tiddly-winks . . . In creative sports one one has to react spontaneously, on the move, to what the opposition does: e.g., at its best, tennis, which I always thought the most popular sport among poets, though it has its targeteerical serving component (which with souped-up racquets and playing surfaces has in my view become too large an element of the modern game), and of course it finally has the one swing, too, but it's a swing that has to go high or low, left or right, at a moving ball; basketball; soccer; ice hockey, and so forth. But I AM prejudiced because I'm probably the worst golfer in the world. Anyway, basketball and tennis are my favorite sports. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 18:29:09 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: William Burmeister Prod Subject: Re: what this list is (intended) to be about In-Reply-To: Jeff Hansen "what this list is (intended) to be about" (Apr 24, 8:02am) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii >But I do feel that we should all heed Charles Bernstein's latest >revision of what the list is about. Note that this is not intended to >be a list for anyone with a vague interest in poetry. It is intended >for people committed to working through and on innovation. On top of >that, "poetics" by its very definition involves intellectual >theorizing. Therefore, it seems to me that criticizing people for >being "high falutin'" or too intellectual on this list is contrary to >what the owner of it intends. While I don't want to be a police >officer, I do think we should all take note that this list is private >and that it is intended for certain purposes. If our interests diverge >from those intended by this list, maybe we should try to hook up to a >different one. I wasn't aware that there was a recent revision to the list mission statement. It seems that it has remained unchanged since at least 3-4-97 according to the welcome message. The recent changes appear to have more to do with keeping "the scale of the list small and the volume manageable." The scale being the default on the listserve program, it is more a matter of being able to keep up with the sheer volume of posts each day, and not a matter of censoring out a list member's self-censoring, as it were, in an otherwise engaging and list-worthy thread on individuality vs The State. Bill B. ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 15:30:13 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "John Norton (415-506-2834)" Subject: Memorial Service for Allen Ginsberg in San Francisco MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" On Sunday April 20, San Francisco's Temple Emanu-el was the site for a memorial service for Allen Ginsberg. Before the service began, the performance group City of Poets donned white costumes with patches of shread= ed cloth and assembled in the courtyard to read from "Kaddish for Naomi Ginsber= g" and "Howl." The cacophony of voices with their erratic movement throughout t= he crowd echoed like the wailing of banshees. I estimate close to two thousand people filled the sanctuary of this wonderf= ul building with its symmetrical vaulted arches spanned by a great dome. Ferlinghetti, Gary Snyder, Diane di Prima, Mark Lilenthal, Anne Waldman, Robert Hass, Michael McClure, Joane Kyger, and Andrew Schilling spoke of the= ir friendship with AG and how generous he was. The SF literary communities out= in force. To close, the Rabbi led all in reciting Kaddish. A great afterno= on. Seen in the crowd: Carl Rakosi, Floyd Salas, Jack & Adelle Foley, Neeli Cherkovski, Jack Mueller, Gloria Frym, Jerry Kamstra, George Scrivani, Kevin= Killian and Bob Gluck (looking for seats), Hilton Obenzinger, Dennis Hopper,= Whitman McGowan, Margery Snyder, Joyce Jenkins. April 21's SF Chronicle and Examiner both wrote up the service. You can fin= d these reports at http://www.sfgate.com. The following came to me as I walked back home. LISTEN UP - for Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997) Buddha is teaching patience don't hurry it will happen you were struck ten times today still you want more mind the people walking dogs and children look at that couple how they talk with their hands y las dos chicanas que linda! Listen up Buddha says change is coming spring then summer ripening and harvest for your next lifetime you will be born a Jew John Norton ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 16:46:16 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: R I Caddel Subject: British Poetry Seminar in Brno Comments: To: poetics MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII The Department of English and American Studies, Masaryk University, Brno and The Centre for Comparative Cultural Studies, Palack University, Olomouc with the support of the British Council in the Czech Republic will be holding a seminar entitled "Different British Voices - Poetry, Locality, Plurality" on September 12-14, 1997 in Brno, the Czech Republic The seminar will examine aspects of locality and difference in the writing and performance of poetry in British contexts and beyond. Leading the seminar will be four widely differing British poets: Richard Caddel, Maggie O'Sullivan, Lee Harwood and Tony Baker. Like many other poets currently active in Britain, each of them has established a reputation for using performence and voice to stress the importance of locality and to question notions of "centrality" in British poetry and culture. The poets will perform their own work and lead a series of seminar discussions. They will be joined at the seminar by the renowned Czech poet Miroslav Holub as well as by other Czech poets and translators and, we hope, by poets and translators from other countries and regions. The seminar will be of interest and relevance to poets, teachers and translators. The cost of the Seminar, including two nights accomodation and meals, will be in the region of 80 pounds. For further information, or to express interest, please contact: Don Sparling Department of English and American Studies Masaryk University Arna Novaka 1 660 88 Brno Czech Republic Tel: (421-5) 41121 153 Fax: (421-5) 41121 406 e-mail: sparling@phil.muni.cz ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 09:36:27 MDT Reply-To: calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christopher Alexander Organization: U of U Marriott Library Staff Net Subject: Re: Robert Duncan MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Mike Boughn wrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrtttttt: > I've been working on ways to get the Peruvian governemnt involved in > negotiating the release of the Duncan papers being held hostage in the > poetry compound at Buffalo. Diplomatic solutions are a waste of time. Now the moment is come for action. We can only win who have nothing to lose. Viva la revolucion! "wait, no...my Spanish isn't too good here, um...sir, excuse me, senior...por favor...can you tell me which is the bus to nueva...nueva yorca?" Have you tried begging? Or wine & chocolates for the faculty? (If either of these ideas works I expect to be cut in on the take). Chris .. Christopher Alexander, etc. nominative press collective 160S 1300E #16 Salt Lake City UT 84102 calexand@alexandria.lib.utah.edu n/formation issue 1.1 now online: http://choengmon.lib.utah.edu/~calexand/nonce ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 10:09:31 -1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Gabrielle Welford Subject: MRTA Statements (fwd) Comments: To: hawaii , arnolde@hawaii.edu, bakerd@hawaii.edu, bft@hawaii.edu, bkige@hawaii.edu, budgetcrisis-l , caron@hawaii.edu, cfrankli@hawaii.edu, cward@hawaii.edu, Dhira DiBiase , Norma LaRene Despain , susan crane , egg-l@hawaii.edu, ethelw@hawaii.edu, fand@hawaii.edu, foltz@hawaii.edu, fujikane@hawaii.edu, grow-l , haram@hawaii.edu, heberle@hawaii.edu, hershinow@aol.com, hilgers@hawaii.edu, jcarroll@hawaii.edu, jkellogg@hawaii.edu, jmarsell@hawaii.edu, joanp@hawaii.edu, jyin@hawaii.edu, lelyons@hawaii.edu, mahe@hawaii.edu, miriam@hawaii.edu, mot-l@hawaii.edu, natec , nealson@hawaii.edu, nettell@hawaii.edu, nicholso@hawaii.edu, nmower@hawaii.edu, omealy@hawaii.edu, rhsu@hawaii.edu, rodneym@hawaii.edu, rshapard@hawaii.edu, rwilson@hawaii.edu, schab@hawaii.edu, sibley@hawaii.edu, simson@hawaii.edu, snkn@hawaii.edu, Susan Schultz , story-l@hawaii.edu, tcarroll@hawaii.edu, ulu-l@hawaii.edu, vjs@uhheph.phys.hawaii.edu, vwayne@hawaii.edu, whitlock@hawaii.edu, wom-l Comments: cc: poetics MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: QUOTED-PRINTABLE ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 18:55:21 -1000 From: Peter Urban >INTRO >~~~~~ >This week's GS INFO is focused on covering the storming of the Japanese >embassy in Lima, Peru, and the subsequent killing of all 14 MRTA members >inside. While it is still too early to grasp the full ramifications of >the embassy occupation and massacre, the information provided here may >help to fill in some of the gaps left by the coverage of the mainstream >press. Another GS INFO with more information on happenings in Guelph and >activities being planned over the summer will be sent out in the next >couple of days.=20 > > >"A DEFEAT FOR THE MRTA?" AN INTERVIEW >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >Interview With Norma Velazco, European Spokeswoman For The Tupac >Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA) > >Q: Media reports claim that the MRTA guerrillas were caught >completely by surprise during the storming of the Japanese >ambassador's residence. Was the attack by 150 elite soldiers in >fact a surprise? > > No. The storming of the residence did not come as a surprise >to us, nor to the MRTA commando in the residency. We always knew >and said that President Fujimori, right from the beginning, was >pushing for a military solution. That was proven time and again >during the occupation of the residency. Even before the occupation >action began, martial law was imposed on Lima and the harbor area >of Callao. Many campesinos were arrested without charge and >accused of being members of the MRTA. > > Then in March there was the discovery of the tunnel, which >the military had dug from a neighboring house. That made >Fujimori's intentions clear to all the world. No, we had no >illusions. All the time Fujimori spoke of a peaceful ending and >the media reported how a solution was almost at hand. But we did >have some bit of hope that the international public opinion in >many countries would increase pressure on the Peruvian government >and force them to give in. I mean in countries where, unlike in >Peru, people can go out into the streets and demonstrate for their >demands. But in this, we were disappointed. > >Q: How do you explain the fact that during the storming of the >residency, all 14 guerrillas were killed - including two teenage >girls - whereas on the other side, only 2 soldiers and 1 hostage >died? > > The goal of the MRTA commando was not to murder the embassy >prisoners. They were determined to have their demands fulfilled >while providing the maximum protection for the lives of their >prisoners. There was a struggle between the members of the >commando and the soldiers. But most of the members of the MRTA >commando were only killed after the residency had been taken, they >were most likely tortured as well. Their dead bodies have not yet >been shown to the public. > >Q: Following the storming of the ambassador's residence, was there >any resistance on the part of the Peruvian people? > > Due to the total militarization of Lima, no such resistance >is possible. But over the next few days, there will be actions >carried out all across Peru. The MRTA is prepared for this. > >Q: Was the storming of the residence a defeat for the Tupac Amaru? > > Sure, this is a serious defeat for the MRTA; neither the >movement nor the Peruvian people have gained anything from this. >But it is not over yet. We lost the battle, but the struggle >continues. > >Q: A few hours after the storming of the Japanese ambassador's >residence, Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori celebrated in an >exclusive restaurant in the San Isidro diplomatic district his >most recent victory over "terrorism". It seems that Fujimori has >emerged from this crisis stronger than when it began. > > If one were to believe Fujimori, this action could never have >taken place to begin with, since he had declared that the MRTA was >dead years ago. He will do that now again, but he will be >disappointed. Fujimori can celebrate his victory for the moment. >But the problems of the Peruvian people have by no means been >solved by his action: A vast segment of the population still >suffer from poverty, hunger, and a lack of proper medical care, >and these problems are increasing. The end of the crisis at the >ambassador's residence showed that Fujimori exclusively relies on >military means; he always has and he always will. > > The MRTA commando always stressed that it desired a peaceful >solution, and many people in Peru demonstrated on the streets for >that same reason. The basis for a peaceful solution would have >been changes in the inhumane conditions which the political >prisoners in Peru endure. But one thing is clear: There is no >basis for dialogue with the Fujimori regime. > >Q: The stated goal of the residency occupation was to win improved >conditions for the political prisoners of the MRTA in Peru's >jails. What will this new situation mean for the prisoners? > > Until now, no improvements in conditions have been proposed >by the regime. So we must think of new and better ways to win the >release of our comrades. But the important thing now is for the >international community not to close their eyes and forget the >political prisoners and the inhumane treatment they receive. > >(Interview by Peter Nowak, published in Junge Welt, April 24, 1997; >Translated by Arm The Spirit) > > >MRTA COMMUNIQUE #16 >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >Movimiento Revolucionario Tupac Amaru (MRTA) Communique #16 > >On April 22, 1997, at 3:00 p.m., military and police units stormed >the embassy, thereby murdering all the members of our commando and >one other person, according to reports so far. The National >Directorate of the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA) would >like to report the following to the international community: > >1. A new crime has been committed against the best sons and >daughters of the people, a crime carried out by the terrorist >regime of Alberto Fujimori, with the compliance of the governments >of Japan and North America. > >2. During the one-sided battle, the members of Edgar Sanchez >Commando displayed the morale of Tupac Amaristas, the decision for >victory or death, to stand for the liberation of our people and >against neo-liberalism, which has only brought our people sorrow >and oppression. > >3. With the murder of Comandante Nestor Cerpa and the members of >the Edgar Sanchez Commando, the genocidal Fujimori regime seeks to >convince our people and the international community, once again, >that the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement has reached its end. > >4. We, Tupac Amaristas, lower our flags in honor of our murdered >brothers and sisters, strengthened in our resolve to continue the >fight for a peaceful society with social justice. > >5. We say to our people and to our militants all across the >country, the members of the Edgar Sanchez Commando did not die, >they have reached the level of heroes, they will be with us during >all of our mobilizations and actions. > >The workers' commander from the people of Tupac Amaru, in all of >his human qualities, was a slap in the face of the genocidal >generals, and they could not endure this. > >COMANDANTE NESTOR CERPA CARTOLINI... PRESENTE! =20 >You Are In Our Memories! > >COMANDO EDGAR SANCHEZ...PRESENTE!=20 >You Are In Our Memories! > >The People Of Tupac Amaru Will Continue To Fight Against=20 >The Neo-Liberal Model And Against State Terrorism! >The People Will Not Surrender! >Neither Surrender Nor Defeat ... The Struggle Continues! > >National Directorate of the MRTA >April 22, 1997 > > >CRITIQUE OF MRTA TACTICS >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >The massacre of the Lima's Japanese residence >By Juan Ponce (member of Poder Obrero Peru) > >On Tuesday 22 April bat 3:17 p.m., Roberto Fujimori, Peruvian president, >ordered the assault on the residence of the Japanese ambassador in Lima. >In approximately 35 minutes the 140-man military-police team where able to >rescue all except one of the 72 ho stages. In the action all the 14 MRTA >guerrilla fighters, two soldiers and one judge which was a hostage were >killed.=20 > >Three days before the action the Minister of Interior, General Juan Carlos >Briones, and the police commander, Lt. General Antonio Ketin Vidal, >resigned. The latest was the person in charge of the capture of the great >leader of the PCP-Sendero Luminoso, Dr. Abimael Guzman, which conducted to >the beginning of the downfall of the guerrillas more than four years ago. >Ketin Vidal was apparently against an armed solution. For him the path to >be follow have to be a political one.=20 > >The operation was a technical and military success. It was very well >prepared by foreign "anti-terrorist" specialist. The Israeli army, which >had the most sophisticated and "third generation" electronic devises >trained a special commando for more than fou r months. According to "La >Republica" (Lima , 23 April) the troops entered like moles from three >tunnels. An AP cable said that they "poured through the compound^=D2s fron= t >gate and blasted open the mansion's front door.=20 > >Others attacked from the rear, and a third unit climbed to the rooftop and >shepherded hostages down to the ground." The attack was made in a clear >day and the MRTA commando was completely took by surprise. Nestor Cerpa, >the commander in chief, was playing football with some hostages, when it >happened. Despite that they where heavily armed, they where incapable of >confronting with so advance technologies and training.=20 > >Until the moment the official version is claiming that only one hostage >was killed. Fujimori said 25 other captives were injured in the gunfire >and explosions that rocked the compound. The Peruvian chancellor, Tudela, >and few other hostages received some bullets and are hospitalised. Their >are no more information about that and it could not be annulled the >possibility that in some more hours more wounded people would not survive.= =20 > >Fujimori employed a pure military solution to finish the 127 days >guerrilla occupation of the Japanese diplomatic house. It begun on 17 >December 1996 when more than 500 VIP where celebrating the anniversary of >the Japanese emperor in the house of the amba ssador.=20 > >The MRTA action differed from other guerrilla operations. They didn't kill >any hostages. In the first day of the occupation they liberated all the >200 women (including Fujimori's mother and sister) trying to show that >they are a Macho Latino gentlemen. Some days later they also liberated all >the US hostages and all the diplomats from Europe, Canada and Asia. They >only kept 72 hostages which included high Peruvian figures, two tens of >Japanese businessmen and diplomats, and the ambassadors of Japan and >Bolivia. In a gesture of "pacifist" will the MRTA freed on the 26 January, >general Jose Rivas, a top police repressive figure, because he was very >ill.=20 > >The MRTA tried to demonstrate to the ruling class and imperialism that >they where not "savage" terrorists, and that they wanted to open a road to >a pacific solution which would contemplate the re-integration of the >Castroite MRTA into the system as it hap pen with its brother >organisations in Colom bia and Central America.=20 > >The MRTA didn't appeal to the working class to make mass demonstrations.= =20 >Despite the fact that they said that they want a change in the political >economic programme, they didn't strength that point. All the debate was >around the situation of the MRTA's 400-500 prisoners. They even didn't >want to a sk for the liberation of the other 5,000 prisoners which belong >to other forces, mainly to the rival guerrilla organisation, the PCP-SL.= =20 >The MRTA was founded in 1982 under the influence of the Sandinista's >revolution.=20 > >At that time in Peru the PCP-SL was already two years in "popular war". >The strategy of both organisations where very different. The PCP-SL had a >Mao-Stalinist one which con sisted in surrounding the cities from the co >untryside and establishing fierce four-class dictatorships in their >liberated zones. > >For the Maoists the rest of the political parties where the same thing and >they kill tens of left-wingers and trade-unionists. They where in favour >of the physical destru ction of all the workers and peasants organ >isations and unions which they would not be able to control. The MRTA >wanted to appear as a force which was willing to have alliances with the >United Left, a mass popular front, and the APRA, the bourgeois nationalist >party which won the 1985 elections, and sections of the army, the church >and the ruling class. The y used uniforms and had better weapons and >military sophistication than the Maoists who where mainly poor peasant and >shanty-towns activists.=20 > >Their most spectacular action was when in 1990, few days before Fujimori >became president, they liberated all their prisoners from a new jail of >maximum sec urity in Lima. In 1990 Fujimori decided to crush the militants >unions and the guerrilla. His anti-terrorist measures served to destroy >all working class resistance. The guerrillas become isolated. After the >April 92 self-coup in which Fujimori dissolved the parliament, the PCP-SL >launched a premature adventure w hich tried to produce the capture of >Lima. They over-estimate their forces and their main leader was captured. >One year later Guzman decided to radically change his strategy and called >all his comrades to abandon the "people's war" and to enter in a "p eace >agreement" process with the regime. > >This lead to the demoralisation and division of this former powerful >guerrilla movement. At the same time the MRTAs nearly destroyed. In 1995 >Fujimori was re-elected with the majority of the votes. The guerrilla was >extremely weak, and the workers movement and the left where heavily >disorganised. Some months before the MRTA assault on the Japanese >diplomatic house, the situation in Peru was slowly change. Fujimori >started to make concessions when he tried to privatise all the petroleum >company and when he tried to cancel some weeks of the holiday period of >every worker. Some sections of t he bourgeoisie, which supported all his >repressive measures, where beginning to ask for a more open society, to >moderate the extreme power of the repressive forces, and to make some >economic changes from an extreme neo-liberal programme. > >The MRTA occupation of the Japanese residence divided the ruling class >into two main camps. The neo-liberals wanted a military solution which >could allow more privatisation and measures against the organised workers >movement. The moderate opposition wanted a peaceful solution which would >weak Fuji mori, could incorporate the guerrillas into the system and could >allow the development of an internal market. Peru has one of the worst >human rights conditions. The political prisoners are judge by faceless >military courts and could be sentenced to survive until their deaths in, >what Fujimori call, "living tombs". They could not have access to the >media, could o nly see the sun in weeks and to receive only one half an >hour visit per month. The bourgeois opposition accepted that rule because >for them the "terrorists" are sub-humans. However, they started to realise >that so much harsh conditions would affect the future of any stable >society. > >In his latest declarations, Fujimori said that the MRTA dropped its >original demands in favour of the liberation of all their more than 400 >political prisoners to only 20. In Easter a solution was very close to be >achieve. Japan was pressing for a deal in which the MRTA commando will be >able to travel to Cuba and would receive in exchange some money, the >freedom of some minor prisoners (including the partner of Nestor Cerpa, >the MRTA commander in chief of the occupation) and to improve the >situation of the rest of the MRTA prisoners with the aim tto prepare a >peace process like in Guatemaa. > >The latest move indicates that Fujimori decided to implement a hawk >decision. Some days before a recent opinion poll showed that Fujimori's >level of popularity where in its lowest rate ever since he became >president of Peru on 28 July 1990. After having for many years a rate of >support of around 60 to 75% in the opinion polls he had some days ago only >37%. In the last months many Peruvians moved to express more >dissatisfaction than support for his administration. The man that >organised a self-coup d'etat in April 92 and forced the change of the >constitution to be re-elected in 1995, want to break the laws another time >and to be re-elect in the year 2000 for another five years more. However, >he was behind the Lima^=D2s major in some last opinion polls.=20 > >Fujimori wanted to recover his popularity showing that he is a strong man,= a=20 >way of operating that he imitates from Thatcher. There is another reason w= hy=20 >he ordered an invasion of the residence. In the last months there was a=20 >growing discontent in the population against his most loyal collaborators= =20 >and he was being undermined inside the army. A TV station and two prominen= t=20 >high politicians (an ex-Minister of the former APRA government and the=20 >national leader of the United Left) where attacked by para-military in the= =20 >recent weeks. =20 > >Several denunciations on corruption where being made against high >repressive figures including Vladimiro Montesinos, the man in charge of >the all-powerful National Intelligence System and the real "Rasputin" >behind Fujimori. Four out of five Peruvians demanded that Montesinos have >to explain the reasons of his fortune. Former general Sinesio Jarama, >declared that the Peruvian army was unhappy of the situation and that it >could produce a new situation of military coup or Fujimori's self-coup.=20 > During the five months hostage crisis Fujimori had two foreign pressures.= =20 > >The USA was pushing him into a more intransigent solution to avoid other= =20 >groups in the world to follow the example of the MRTA. Japan was pushing f= or=20 >moderate and pacific concessions. At the end the son of Japanese decided t= o=20 >accept the recommendations of the real bosses of Peru: the USA. The=20 >operation was realised in a diplomatic territory which by international la= ws=20 >is part of Japanese sovereignty. In Tokyo, Japan's prime minister called i= t=20 >a ''splendid rescue,'' but also said it was ''regrettable'' that Peru had= =20 >not forewarned his government.=20 > >When the hostage crisis started Poder Obrero Peru published a very well=20 >known international statement in which we criticised the guerrilla operati= on=20 >while we said that we will critically defend them against the repression a= nd=20 >that we are unconditionally in favour of the liberation of all the politic= al=20 >prisoners. > >The failure of the occupation show how wrong are the guerrillerist methods= =2E=20 >They are made outside the workers movement and at the end only want to pus= h=20 >the system into reforms. The two guerrilla groups in Peru attacked workers= =20 >organisations and workers democracy, had an strategy in favour of a popula= r=20 >front and a "democratic" regime with and behind the "progressive"=20 >bourgeoisie, and help the reaction to isolate and defeat toilers mass=20 >struggles. > >It is not possible to defeat the US-trained army with very well armed >elite. Only a mass uprising could do that. We work in that perspective. At >the present low level of class struggles in Peru we are in favour of >organising the workers and poor people from the shanty towns and the >countryside for fighting around their more minimum demands and to advance >in them through direct action.=20 > >We fight for eight-hour work, for a minimum living wage, for the >elimination of all anti-terrorist laws, for stopping and reversing the >privatisation, for the cancellation of the foreign debt and for the >reorganisation of the union and popular organisations. We need to unite >all the sectors in conflict into an struggle committee which would >organise mass actions. In the recent months different workers sectors went >into mass action (construction, oil, etc.) and we need to avoid the >isolation of that struggles. > >Our strategy is for a mass insurrection led by workers and peasants >councils and militias which should establish a socialist republic as part >of a voluntary Latin American federation. Our small forces are in >discussions with other militants trying to crea te a nucleus for a >revolutionary workers pa rty which could be the vanguard that struggle. >Unfortunately most of the Peruvian left are in favour of popular front >strategies. They want to create common governments with wings of the >bourgeoisie. They disagree on the different electoral or armed methods to >presurise them. > > >MRTA COMMUNIQUE #15 >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >Movimiento Revolucionario Tupac Amaru (MRTA) Communique #15 > >The International Represenation of the MRTA reports the following >to the international and national public: > > Militants from other Latin American revolutionary movements >will join the MRTA if Fujimori does not free the political >prisoners. > > Several revolutionary groups that we will not specify for >security reasons have expressed their intention of joining the >political-military struggle of the MRTA in the Peruvian jungle if >Fujimori's government does not agree to free the political >prisoners imprisoned in Peruvian jail-tombs. > > The inhumane conditions of these prisoners as well as the >sympathies for the MRTA that have been awakened in revolutionary >groups throughout Latin America have caused the formation of a >movement called "The International Combat Block" that includes >members of several nationalities and will co-ordinate >revolutionary strategies from "the Rio Grande to Patagonia". > > Paradoxically, the intransigent position of dictator Alberto >Fujimori is creating a movement of groups joining the MRTA that >will increase the MRTA's political and military strength and will >increase its coordination with other revolutionary groups on the >rest of the continent and throughout the world. > > The MRTA has expressed its willingness to continue >struggling for peace with social justice, the only peace that >lasts, but if this peaceful path is closed one more time, we have >decided to continue the struggle by other means, and we are >greatful for the international solidarity of all of the people in >the world that have seen in our struggle the revalidation of >their own struggles, the hope of building a better world, without >hunger, without unemployment, without neoliberalism. > >Neither surrendering, nor conquered... The struggle continues! > >International Represenation of the MRTA April 1997 > >------- >Honor To The Martyrs Of The Edgar Sanchez Commando! >Tupac Amaru Lives! The Struggle Continues! >MRTA Solidarity Page - http://burn.ucsd.edu/~ats/mrta.htm > > >END >~~~ > > > > > > > _________________________________________________ FOUR WINDS STUDENT MOVEMENT www.fwsm.org =20 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 16:38:44 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Matthias Regan Subject: Re: ReHoops Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" so much I'd like to say about sports over wine and poorly cooked pasta (my fault) two other members of the list & I argued for hours in Chicago (if you didn't know, the best "sports city" in the US, with only Boston and perhaps Pittsburgh not far behind) about whether there was any difference between sports (in general) and the arts (in general), specifically basketball and theater and cam to no clear conclusions watching a game, a good novel the ordered & relatively slow pace of baseball must be part of the poetic appeal--a couple people have said so so far--but to my mind the appeal is much more in the patriotism baseball is made a symbol of, the history of it, the fact that it is usually played outside in a stadium around dusk those things to my mind make it poetic but a certain kind of poetry is evoked another kind by basketball I think the aesthetic I'm associating with baseball is closely linked, through small-town & borough business-sponsored softball games, to the oxen pull (SP, if you read this thanks for the poem how was your reading?) described below: (((by the by, is watching oxen pull concrete slabs really a sport? or a staged spectacle? and whats the difference?))) >>What's wonderful about this sport is that the oxen (unlike horses in the >>otherwise identical sport of horse-pulling) are truly as stolid as >>oxen--they exhibit absolutely no change in affect or mood. So true! I'm really serious when I remember the first sort of sad eternal mystical feeling that got me started writing (juvenile) poetry found its greatest material presence in NH state and county fairs >> that the vast bulk of the time >>is spent in loading the sledge further, leading in the teams of oxen, >>hitching, rehitching, unhitching, etc. I always liked this aspect of it as well. Because it was both part of the spectacle and not at once. I always had the sensation, very enjoyable, at those fairs of seeing "behind the scenes" while looking directly at them; an aspect of "carnival" (the adjective) little discussed and related, a priori or not I'm not sure, to shabiness... In other news the Bulls open their post-season-season tonight against the Bullets I haven't heard if Dennis will be back tonight, or Toni the thing about MJ is he's really an intellectual player now; I swear he gets the same hang time with his fade away jumps as he used to with his glides and drives Bill Wennington said yesterday in the paper that MJ has invented some little move no one's ever seen before in every game he's been in for the last five years and MJ has played every game of every season since he returned Matthias, late in the day Matthias Regan Northwestern University Department of Chemistry Phone: 847/467-2132 ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 18:36:07 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Golumbia Subject: URGENT: MLA VOTE (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Marc Bousquet wrote: From owner-jamesf-l@WVNVM.WVNET.EDU Fri Apr 25 18:12 EDT 1997 Message-Id: <199704252212.SAA25182@orion.sas.upenn.edu> Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 18:12:22 -0400 Reply-To: mbousque@email.gc.cuny.edu Sender: JAMESF From: Marc Bousquet Subject: URGENT: MLA VOTE Comments: To: h-amstdy , gsc-sc@listproc.bgsu.edu, esa-l , AmGroup-L To: JAMESF-L@WVNVM.WVNET.EDU Content-Type: text Content-Length: 2726 PLEASE FORWARD TO LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE DEPARTMENTS AND LISTS Please get a stamp and read carefully. In the next few days, MLA members will be asked to vote on several propositions. Some, like the resolution committing the organization to a more activist stance on the employment crisis, are likely to pass by a large majority. Others are more controversial and need to be thought about more carefully. Chief in this second group are the CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS (1-4 on the ballot). These all transfer power to the 14-member Executive Council, taking it from from the 270-member Delegate Assembly (which includes graduate students, new scholars, and delegates for Composition, Continuing Ed, Creative Writing, Disabled, Ethnic Studies, Gays and Lesbians, Independent Scholars, and Women in the Profession). The concerns fueling these amendments are often legitimate. But the crippling of the single most diverse and democratic governance body in any scholarly society is not the answer. The MLA Graduate Student Caucus urges MLA members to vote NO or ABSTAIN to CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS 1-4. There are 12,000 graduate student members of MLA. The GSC-MLA Steering Committee 1997: Vicky Smallman McMaster U, Canada Leo Parascondola CUNY Graduate School Mary Refling Columbia University Matthew Kirschenbaum U Virginia Will Murphy Indiana University Shelley Reid Austin College Anthony Xaco Navarrete UC San Diego Kate Burns UC San Diego christian a. gregory U Florida dave lashmet U Florida christine macdonald U Colorado Greg Rubinson U Rochester Kirsten M. Christensen U Texas, Austin Ray Watkins U Texas, Austin Andy Fleck Claremont Graduate School Jodi Schorb UC Davis Joe Aimone UC Davis Kate Stavisky U West Virginia Barbara White U Pittsburgh Alan Rea Bowling Green SU Yoshie Furuhashie Ohio State University Marc Bousquet CUNY Graduate School Granville Ganter CUNY Graduate School Eric Marshall CUNY Graduate School -- dgolumbi@sas.upenn.edu David Golumbia ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 22:40:45 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: robert drake Subject: Re: Looking for Mr. Goodba--no, Joe Napora Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" delayed response, but joe's BULLHEAD mag is now online: http://ram.ramlink.net/~napora/bullhead.htm (thanx to karl young via his Light & Dust site fr the alert...) luigi ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 26 Apr 1997 00:26:35 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Poetics List Subject: Library Company job opening (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII sorry if I sent the other one more than once or twix having thrubbles here- jk ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 17:40:49 -0700 (MST) From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" To: Poetics List Subject: Library Company job opening (fwd) please forward this to someone who might need/want it. ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 09:43:26 -0400 From: Ruth Hughes To: C18-L@LISTS.PSU.EDU Subject: Library Company job opening I am posting this in the hope that someone on the list is or has a grad student in need of a job. This is a great place to work if you are interested in the 18th century. Library Assistant Position at the Library Company of Philadelphia. The Library Company of Philadelphia, a rare book research library specializing in early American history, seeks a paraprofessional library assistant. Duties include reference assistance to patrons, paging books from stacks, card catalog maintenance, cataloging reference books, and miscellaneous clerical duties in support of professional catalogers and reference staff. A bachelors degree and computer literacy are required; an interest in American history or literature, library experience, or course work in library science are desirable. Starting salary, low 20s. Applicants should be prepared to start work by August. Send a resume with names of three references to Phil Lapsansky, Chief of Reference, Library Company of Philadelphia. 1314 Locust St., Philadelphia, PA 19107. The Library Company is an equal opportunity employer. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 26 Apr 1997 00:25:43 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Poetics List Subject: CFP: Whiteness and Cultural Identity (5/10; SAMLA) (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 15:43:07 -0700 (MST) From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" To: Poetics List Subject: CFP: Whiteness and Cultural Identity (5/10; SAMLA) (fwd) ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Tue, 22 Apr 1997 16:34:29 -0400 (EDT) From: Tim Engles To: cfp@english.upenn.edu Subject: CFP: Whiteness and Cultural Identity (5/10; SAMLA) Call for Papers -- 1997 SAMLA Conference, Nov. 13-15, Atlanta, GA Special Session: Whiteness and Identity Numerous articles, conferences, and books have recently addressed from various perspectives the topic of "whiteness." Areas of interest within whiteness studies include such questions as whether or not there is a "white culture"; whether or not "whites" should or do identify themselves as such; and how the lives of racialized minorities are influenced by the dominant order's favoring of supposedly white skin, by the pervasive presence of unspoken "white" values, mores, and presumptions. How do authors portray the influence of such forces on the self-conceptions formed by "people of color" and/or "whites"? Abstracts are invited that address how authors (either marked as "white" and/or in other ways) portray the influence of unspoken whiteness on constructions of identity. Please send abstracts by May 10 to: Tim Engles University of Georgia Department of English 254 Park Hall Athens, GA 30602 (e-mail submissions accepted as well) =============================================== From the Literary Calls for Papers Mailing List CFP@english.upenn.edu Full Information at http://www.english.upenn.edu/CFP/ or write Jack Lynch: jlynch@english.upenn.edu =============================================== ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 06:58:38 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: Re: there's a man on the fairway taking names MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Hank Lazer wrote: > OK, Rachel, a few names (off and on the list): Ray Federman (a > seriously addicted and reputedly fine golfer, has played in > tournaments all over the US); Michael Palmer (reported to be quite a > good golfer); the already named Paul Naylor; Alan Golding (sorry, > Alan, Rachel coaxed it out of me.... though Alan is, properly, much > more of a soccer player...); Judy Grahn; Tom Mandel; Charlie Altieri > (I stop now, since I'm beginning to name critics...). And Rachel, > just think of the clothes--plaid pants, tasseled shoes, strange > gloves, weird tan lines, etc.... And the discussions of blades vs. > cavity backed irons; persimmon vs. metal woods.... Hank, thank you for that wonderful list. Judy Grahn?! Judy, we hardly knew ye. But now that you mention it, I think I do remember her showing up for a reading run-through (long ago) in golf shoes and a little cap. Silly me, I just thought it was her Valerie Solanas chic. Rachel ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 17:02:56 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: ReHoops Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Although I like sports, and I enjoy watching the Bulls, I just want to point out that Michael Jordan's salary for one year could easily support the publication of 6,000 titles of poetry. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 22:13:03 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: CharSSmith@AOL.COM Subject: Fwd: Networking Artists & Poets Exhibition I'm passing this along for anyone interested: --------------------- Forwarded message: From: gbook5@POBOX.UPENN.EDU (Greg Bear) Sender: BOOK_ARTS-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU (The Book Arts: binding, typography, collecting) Reply-to: BOOK_ARTS-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU (The Book Arts: binding, typography, collecting) To: BOOK_ARTS-L@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU Date: 97-04-24 14:28:43 EDT The University of Pennsylvania Library's Department of Special Collections presents "Networking Artists & Poets: Assemblings from the Ruth & Marvin Sackner Archive of Concrete & Visual Poetry." This exhibition is currently on view from 17 April-27 June 1997 in the Rosenwald Gallery, located on the sixth floor of the Van Pelt-Dietrich Library. The Rosenwald Gallery is open to the public Monday through Friday from 9 AM-5 PM; a picture ID is required for admittance to the library. Van Pelt-Dietrich Library is located at 3420 Walnut Street (but its entrance is from Locust Walk, at the statue of the broken button), Philadelphia PA 19104-6206. Parking is available at 36th & Walnut Street. Craig Saper, Exhibition Curator, states that, "in the second half of the 20th century, artists, writers, and printers started many alternative distribution networks for their experimental art and literature. They circumvented the gallery system with direct mailings and other innovative ways to reach their audiences and collaborators." Assemblings are an outgrowth of this desire. "Networking Artists & Poets" represents one of the largest exhbitions to date featuring this unique material. Assemblings featured in this exhibition include works by prominent mail artists, Dada and Fluxus artists, concrete and visual poets, and more. The Library has produced a 34-page full-color exhibition catalogue for this exhibition, currently available for $10.00 per copy (check only; we cannot accept credit cards.) To order a catalogue, or if you want more information about the exhibit, contact me by phone, mail, or e-mail (numbers, etc., are listed below). A few copies of the illustrated catalogue based on Penn's 1993 exhibition also drawn from the Sackner Archive, "Human Documents: Tom Phillips's Art of the Page," also remain available from the same address. (They also cost $10.00.) Thanks, Greg Bear __________________________________________ Greg Bear Exhibit/Graphic Designer Department of Special Collections University of Pennsylvania Library 215.898.7088 215.573.9079 fax __________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 18:46:58 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: ReHoops In-Reply-To: <01II1SGJNUCM8ZFAVG@iix.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" One reason why the Bulls are so much fun to watch is that they are so old. The old teams were pretty successful and interesting to watch. this year. The Jazz are old. The Sonics are pretty old. The Suns are old. The &*%$#@! Knicks are old. Also, the Bulls are so international. They have an Australian, a Canadian, a Croat (or is he a Serbian--I cant remember or tell the difference), a Martian and a bunch of USAmericans. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 18:55:43 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: Granby, Mon Amour In-Reply-To: <335F4959.2618@concentric.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > George had a lampshade on his head at the time and was >alternately singing "O Canada" and reciting from the collected works of >Charles Bukowski (one of his favorites), so I guess he must be forgiven >for his lack of depth perception. > >Rachel L. Okay, I will admit to the lampshade. And maybe I did sing the national anthem once, maybe twice. But that wasnt Bukowski I was reading. It was my old rap sheet before I reformed and learned poetry. All I used to do before Rachel saved me , was drink beer, go to the track, pee my pants, and get into fistfights and lose them. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 22:52:26 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Wendy Battin Subject: chastened by CB'sreposting of the welcom message In-Reply-To: <9704240412.AA32388@oak.cc.conncoll.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII New Release 1997 Winner of the Snyder Memorial Prize from Ashland Little Apocalypse poems by Wendy Battin ISBN #0-912592-40-0 $10.00 pbk. Amid the incoherence of things, between the coarse lines of dissolution; after our last photogenic war, the "fever-vivid" language of Wendy Battin's Little Apocalypse threads between lucidity and lyricism, surface and depth to the very fovea of the song. An exquisite collection. --CD Wright Available from The Ashland Poetry Press Ashland University, Ashland, Ohio 44805 phone 413-289-5110 fax 413-289-5333 ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 22:57:59 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Zimmerman Subject: Re: ReHoops MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit william marsh wrote: > > >It does seem, though, that if a poet dares admit to liking a sport, > >baseball is the safe one, probably because it's slow, and therefore > >"poetic." > > i agree / the oft-mentioned "zen" aspect of baseball makes for easy (often > false) parallels > > but would anyone be interested in collaborating on a list of > basketbal-to-poetry analogies? i.e., i'll begin with: > > dribble = cadence, syncopation > cross-over dribble = line break > slam dunk = haiku > > etc. > > bill marsh foul shot = allusion jumper = line break enjambed to a new stanza rebound = (Hebraic) iteration Dan Zimmerman ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 00:52:50 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Louis Cabri Subject: selections from In-Reply-To: <1.5.4.16.19970417145243.440f54fa@mercury.chem.nwu.edu> from "Matthias Regan" at Apr 17, 97 09:52:43 am MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit David Bromige, hi--I was referring, way back, only to the intro that Robert Pack wrote for his selection of poets in the 1962 edition of New Poets from England and America, not to the individual poets therein. And to the implicit argument of Pack's intro. It is an argument that supports the following in my view. The poet Ginsberg enters the social arena of Time policed by the journalist, only on condition that poet substitutes for poem, agency conflates with agent--i.e. on condition that the poem itself disappears, and that agency is contained in one individual, Ginsberg, whose reception is governed by the journalist. Thus the journalist can say, Ginsberg's popular because of his media-tuned personality, that's all. Ginsberg anticipates this reception in his poetry at times, formally--in other words, he anticipates the conflation of agency with agent by assuming it, sometimes to be critical of it, sometimes to use it to go somewhere else, sometimes to ride on it. I do read the '62 antho backwards. Thanks for the reminder that the first edition came out in '58. / I like this version of the Moore poem for its ending: POETRY I too, dislike it: there are things that are important beyond all this fiddle. The bat, upside down; the elephant pushing, a tireless wolf under a tree, the base-ball fan, the statistician- "business documents and schoolbooks"- these phenomena are pleasing, but when they have been fashioned into that which is unknowable, we are not entertained. It may be said of all of us that we do not admire what we cannot understand; enigmas are not poetry. (from A Survey of Modernism, eds. Riding/Graves, 1928) / And here for no direct reason at all, in a slippery language befitting the email context, the first sentence from an essay, "Topping," by Clint Burnham, in the latest BOO magazine: "Today our cultural and political world is characterised by two contradictory attitudes or ideologies: global diversity and absolutist monism." --Louis ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 24 Apr 1997 22:19:03 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Elizabeth Mathews Losh Subject: Re: Poem for Rent In-Reply-To: <85256482.005BAD32.00@krypton.hmco.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Paleeze! It's certainly a good idea to bother state senators whenever possible with one's poems, but there are certainly greater social justice issues than rent control and whatever ideas you may have about being persecuted by your landlord. What about the failure of our government to build more affordable housing for low and moderate income tenants and the general gutting of HUD happening this year? I can't speak for New York or Massachusetts, but here in California rent control (without vacancy decontrol) helps upper middle class tenants over and above everyone else. In fact, just about every major demographic study of both Santa Monica and Berkeley shows rent control (without vacancy decontrol) DECREASED the number of low and moderate income tenants as the housing market shrank. Ethnic diversity took a dive too. Now I'm talking about rent control not rent stabilization. They ARE different. Anyway, the poetics list isn't the place for me to take issue with Daniel Bouchard or to note the fact that I generally agree with him on poetry and politics. Anyone who wants to backchannel and have me crunch the numbers for them I'd be happy to. Anyone who wants a unit with hardwood floors and a liberal-lefty poet landlord on premises in Santa Monica, forget it. It's rent controlled so we never have vacancies. On Wed, 23 Apr 1997, Daniel Bouchard wrote: > Good for Brendan Lorber! > & May what happened in Massachusetts, not come to pass in New York. > > Since rent control was banned in Massachusetts, former rent control tenants > (aka "protected status") have faced rent increases anywhere from 50-300%. > What have cities done to help all the people who are now vulnerable to > "market rates?" Nuttin. Except, in Cambridge at least, the city has set up > a board to "assist" people in moving out of their apartments and, since all > the rents in the city have skyrocketed, effectively move out of the city. > Left on their own, city government does this kind of thing, and then they > praise themselves for it in the press. > > There are alternatives though (for anyone in NY, or anywhere else facing > this situation). > > Last week, after months of campaigning, tenant organizing, lobbying, etc., > a group called the Eviction Free Zone saw through city council orders in > Cambridge that 1) transferred over 1 and 1/2 million dollars into the > Affordable Housing Fund (from the "free cash" coffer) and 2) designed a > transfer tax on residential sales in Cambridge--with the first $300,000 > exempted that will provide a substantial revenue for replenishing > affordable housing funds. This is going to the State House in a week or > so, where Governor Weld has already stated that he will veto ANY taxation > bill that does not have a local referendum attached to it. So in the > drafting of the bill, the EFZ insisted that such a referendum be attached. > We are very confident of being able to see that it passes in the fall. > Next on the agenda is securing a 20 million dollar bond for the immediate > purchase of apartment buildings on the market to be made permanently > affordable housing. > > It's incredible the arguments that were made against all of our efforts. I > am growing confident that the real estate interest is second in power in > this country only to the military/defense interest. One argument: "if we > put through this transfer tax it will hinder young and struggling families > from buying homes in Cambridge." A glance at the Sunday house > advertisements indicate the median price range for a house in this city to > be well beyond the means of any "young and struggling families." In fact, I > have come across more than enough families who have lived in Cambridge all > their lives and who cannot afford it anymore. Their children will have to > settle elsewhere. > > Anyway, it's been a long road, and it's certainly far from over. Hours of > meetings and talk complicated by time given for both Creole and Hispanic > translators, etc. But it can be done, and good luck to anyone facing this > dismal prospect. Back channel me if you want more info. on the work we've > done here. > > daniel_bouchard@hmco.com > > > Brenda, > > How can I get a copy of Lorber's poem? > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 01:05:53 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Marina deBellagente laPalma Subject: writing (or thinking, for that matter) more than one thing at a time Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Actually, it's THINKING THE SAME THING WITH MORE THAN ONE MIND I'm working on some poems under title "Somas" Ideas coming out of long embracing of theme and recent readings such as: David Abrams' The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception & Language in a More than Human World; Morris Berman's Coming to Our Senses: Spirit and Body in the Hidden History of the West The Gift: Imagination and the Erotic Life of Property by Lewis Hyde. I talk about these things in the frequently modified prose texts on my web site, but they are also being processed at another level in "poet" mind. Here is a recent one. (the stanzas are meant to appear on the page in two columns, with slightly different typefaces and alternately aligned -- one flush right, next one left and so on ... sort of "interlaced", formatting impossible via e-mail.) title: Bicameral Breakdown (a nod to Julian Jaynes) Language, as Beckett supposedly said (or was it Ionesco?) is something gone wrong with the silence. Is it possible some of those pages you lost or discarded were precisely the ones that might have supplied the meaning, the missing phrase? Could they be alive somewhere and growing, like the children whose faces adorn or deface milk cartons? Idiot and idiom derive from the same Greek root, meaning private one's own, Gramsci noted. Writing: an act so simple it isn't worth mentioning. An action so brutal it can separate, temporarily, left from right, body from mind. Chained to the cyclic tortures of sleep, the fallible body is bottleneck, switchboard, ground. Being in the present observes Anne Klein is always interesting. Sometimes you flare up, demanding fairness, attention, sanity. Sometimes you lose your temper, becoming unfair, inattentive, insane. This release is a mild stimulant, about as harmless (or harmful) as coffee, depending on your metabolism. Revolts, Pasolini suggests are fed by a secret anxiety for order. Is the whole thing merely a swirl of indifference, you ask yourself, an ocean of chaos where we shore up islands of light? The passions are numberless, you vow to extinguish them all. But not yet. Marina laPalma ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 01:06:01 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Marina deBellagente laPalma Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" This is a recent exchange I had with a friend who is very involved in working with Amnesty International. I see this as a free speech issue and wonder how other on the poetics list see it. I received the following: Date: Mon, 21 Apr 1997 From: Veronique Fourment To: lapalma@mail.well.com Subject: FW: Help block Neo-Nazi group Hi Marina, Hope you can use this , pass it on ... A bientot, "We understand that Nazi groups are trying to create (again) a usenet group where they want to keep in contact with each other regarding their activities. I believe it is not necessary to dwell further on these activities. The group is rec.music.white-power To create such a group, they have to win a referendum that is always organised when a new usenet group is created. All persons with an email address, and only those, can vote in this referendum. It is important to vote only once, otherwise the vote is cancelled. To prevent the creation of this group, you have to: 1. Send this message to people you know 2. Send an email to the following address: music-vote@sub-rosa.com with as contents (not 'subject') ONLY the following line: I vote NO on rec.music.white-power Since the vote is automatic, it is IMPORTANT to send the exact line as it is given above, without adding anything, not even a name. And please send it only once or it becomes invalid ! I replied: Dear Veronique -- Of course the first reaction of any decent human being is "Neo-nazi groups? Let's STOP THEM now!" But I wonder whether the specific blocking of such a net communications group by a referendum isn't a repression of free speech? How can we hope to change their minds and hearts by not letting them speak to one another? Since it is their actions we must block, mybe it's better to have neo-nazis typing their ugly and pathetic ideas (and their addresses etc.) because then we/others know where they are; can WATCH them, as KlanWatch does with the KKK. And can repond to them. If we agree that the democratic antidote to free speech one disagrees with is more free speech, then (assuming that usenet groups interchanges, like most electronic communications media, are permeable) reasonable people could in fact monitor, publicize and comment upon neo-nazi exchanges. Otherwise I fear we simply risk setting precedents for the "blocking" of groups that want to talk about, say, gay rights or trans-gender issues, organize anti-nuclear sit-ins or share information on obtaining marijuana for medical uses, or whatever someone else might see as wrong or evil. Is the use-net considered a "private" medium, a club where we have the right to exclude material we object to. The first time someone in a neo-nazi usenet group advocates any act that is illegal or violent, it can be brought to the attention of potential victims, appropriate civil authorities or whatever, whereas if they do it in a secret meeting in their houses how will we know? Anyway, these are my thoughts tonight. What do you think? I will certainly let people know this thing potentially exists and is something to keep an eye on. Love, Marina ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 08:38:08 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Mandel Subject: Sighted -- poets dunk golf balls Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Golf is a great game, and I'm a fanatic. If you play it well (I don't) it verges on a sport. Hank Lazar and I have repeatedly discussed playing a round together -- Hank is a *serious* fanatic. As to roundball, I assume you all know that Kit Robinson, one of the really great poets of our time in my opinion, is also a pretty good basketball player. He was the center on the Computerland corporate team for most of the years that he (and Ron Silliman, and Alan Bernheimer, and Bill Luoma, and others of the bay area poetry community) worked there. Kit is captured driving the basket in one of Warren Sonbert's later films (apologies, but I can't remember which right now). What about ping pong? How can we not mention ping pong, another great language game. Joan Retallack is an *excellent* ping pong player; she has a table in her garage. I can beat her though; I am a reeeally good ping pong player! I take on all comers. What about it? Tom Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com ******************************************************** Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com 4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 ******************************************************** Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 09:37:28 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Re: ReHoops In-Reply-To: <9704231525.ZM28736@plhp517.comm.mot.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I'm finally breaking down...and adding to the baseball(golf/hoops) thread, a citation for my all-time favorite irresponsible book in the universe (in certain moods, my all-time favorite book, period)--Mikhail Horowitz's Big League Poets, from City Lights: the ultimate collision of baseball and poetry. The outrageous text, I could quote from; but it has to be seen in conjunction with Horowitz's remarkable photomontage caricatures of everyone from Homer to Baraka as ballplayers. (Just one line; one of Pound's achievements was "to be the game's first designated hitler"--) For the (surprising) number of folks on the list who sound as fond of baseball as I am, this is really required. Mark P. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 09:40:47 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Gwyn McVay Subject: Re: DRAGON BOND RITE In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Serious question: is that THE Kongar-ool Ondar, the same one who's in Huun-Huur-Tu? Serious but dumber question: is he the same man who made a recording with San Fran bluesman David Pena and taught him to sing khoomei? bests Gwyn McVay suddenly not the only Tuvan music fan she knows ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 14:30:20 +0200 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michel Delville Subject: Poetry and Soccer Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable One more addition to the list -- the title poem of Don Paterson's best-selling collection, *Nil Nil*, is, unsurprisingly, about soccer. Paterson is reported to be quite a good soccer player as well as a (semi?)professional jazz musician. =20 ------------------- Michel Delville English Department University of Li=E8ge 3, Place Cockerill 4000 LIEGE (BELGIUM) =20 Fax: ++ 32(0)4 366 57 21 e-mail: mdelville@ulg.ac.be ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 26 Apr 1997 00:47:56 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Poetics List Subject: NOTICE FROM YOUR INFORMATION BROKERS MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII You will notice that no one received any mail on friday as the list exceeded its daily limit of 50 messages and I was not available to "free poetics" (which is the listserv command I send to release the held messages). I apologize for having other things to do, like the current Zukfofsky conference: yowie it has been great! The combination of Mark Scroggins, Ira Nadel and Paul Zukofsky on one stage was too much for me. I loved it! They were all great and it was the first real congenial conversation I've ever witnessed in Buffalo. Joseph Conte gave one of the best and most useful papers I've seen here while the "Man from Maine" Burt Hatlen (who surely stands 7 feet tall) exercised his readerly prowess while dangling us over the precipice of A-13. I'm also moving out of my apartment into the street where I hope to get to know what it is like to be online and have no place to live. I hope to be at the public library again sometime soon. Y'all in the mean time might think about adding a little to your posts, perhaps not sending a post to every post you see (but rather taking it in a little before responding). It's not volume of posts but quantity that causes this problem. besides, if you've got nothing to do, what's to keep you from writing in the same message?? just an idea, a suggestion, if this sounds too much like hitler for ya, well, you can stuffa baloney sandwish through the lines--i'm really hungry-- love and kisses, your friendly poetics janitor ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 23:24:45 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: ReHoops Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Sport is in the eye of the beholder. Basketball has always struck me as balletic. Spectacle without the swans. For those of us old enough baseball has little to do with patriotism except for the relative democracy of the sandlot, and not much to do with norman rockwell or suburban anything. It was the dust of an empty-lot game or timing the action for between the cars in a side street stickball match. You didn't need much--no court, no hoop, just a ball, a few shared gloves, and any kind of bat-substitute. And no adult intervention. At 04:38 PM 4/25/97 -0500, you wrote: >so much I'd like to say about sports over wine and poorly cooked pasta >(my fault) two other members of the list & I argued for hours in Chicago (if >you didn't know, the best "sports city" in the US, with only Boston and >perhaps Pittsburgh not far behind) about whether there was any difference >between sports (in general) and the arts (in general), specifically >basketball and theater and cam to no clear conclusions watching a >game, a good novel > the ordered & relatively slow pace of baseball must be part of the >poetic appeal--a couple people have said so so far--but to my mind the >appeal is much more in the patriotism baseball is made a symbol of, the >history of it, the fact that it is usually played outside in a stadium >around dusk those things to my mind make it poetic but a certain kind >of poetry is evoked another kind by basketball I think the aesthetic >I'm associating with baseball is closely linked, through small-town & >borough business-sponsored softball games, to the oxen pull (SP, if you read >this thanks for the poem how was your reading?) described below: > > (((by the by, is watching oxen pull concrete slabs really a sport? or a >staged spectacle? and whats the difference?))) > >>>What's wonderful about this sport is that the oxen (unlike horses in the >>>otherwise identical sport of horse-pulling) are truly as stolid as >>>oxen--they exhibit absolutely no change in affect or mood. > > So true! I'm really serious when I remember the first sort of sad >eternal mystical feeling that got me started writing (juvenile) poetry found >its greatest material presence in NH state and county fairs > > >>> that the vast bulk of the time >>>is spent in loading the sledge further, leading in the teams of oxen, >>>hitching, rehitching, unhitching, etc. > > I always liked this aspect of it as well. Because it was both part of >the spectacle and not at once. I always had the sensation, very enjoyable, >at those fairs of seeing "behind the scenes" while looking directly at them; >an aspect of "carnival" (the adjective) little discussed and related, a >priori or not I'm not sure, to shabiness... > > > In other news the Bulls open their post-season-season tonight against >the Bullets I haven't heard if Dennis will be back tonight, or Toni > > the thing about MJ is he's really an intellectual player now; I swear >he gets the same hang time with his fade away jumps as he used to with his >glides and drives Bill Wennington said yesterday in the paper that MJ has >invented some little move no one's ever seen before in every game he's been >in for the last five years and MJ has played every game of every season >since he returned > > Matthias, late in the day > >Matthias Regan >Northwestern University >Department of Chemistry >Phone: 847/467-2132 > > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 23:35:46 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: Poem for Rent Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" You're right: you can't speak for New York or Massachussets. At 10:19 PM 4/24/97 -0700, you wrote: >Paleeze! It's certainly a good idea to bother state senators whenever >possible with one's poems, but there are certainly greater social justice >issues than rent control and whatever ideas you may have about being >persecuted by your landlord. What about the failure of our government to >build more affordable housing for low and moderate income tenants and the >general gutting of HUD happening this year? > >I can't speak for New York or Massachusetts, but here in California rent >control (without vacancy decontrol) helps upper middle class tenants over >and above everyone else. In fact, just about every major demographic >study of both Santa Monica and Berkeley shows rent control (without >vacancy decontrol) DECREASED the number of low and moderate income >tenants as the housing market shrank. Ethnic diversity took a dive too. >Now I'm talking about rent control not rent stabilization. They >ARE different. > >Anyway, the poetics list isn't the place for me to take issue with Daniel >Bouchard or to note the fact that I generally agree with him on poetry >and politics. Anyone who wants to backchannel and have me crunch the >numbers for them I'd be happy to. > >Anyone who wants a unit with hardwood floors and a liberal-lefty poet >landlord on premises in Santa Monica, forget it. It's rent controlled so we >never have vacancies. > > > On Wed, 23 Apr 1997, Daniel Bouchard wrote: > >> Good for Brendan Lorber! >> & May what happened in Massachusetts, not come to pass in New York. >> >> Since rent control was banned in Massachusetts, former rent control tenants >> (aka "protected status") have faced rent increases anywhere from 50-300%. >> What have cities done to help all the people who are now vulnerable to >> "market rates?" Nuttin. Except, in Cambridge at least, the city has set up >> a board to "assist" people in moving out of their apartments and, since all >> the rents in the city have skyrocketed, effectively move out of the city. >> Left on their own, city government does this kind of thing, and then they >> praise themselves for it in the press. >> >> There are alternatives though (for anyone in NY, or anywhere else facing >> this situation). >> >> Last week, after months of campaigning, tenant organizing, lobbying, etc., >> a group called the Eviction Free Zone saw through city council orders in >> Cambridge that 1) transferred over 1 and 1/2 million dollars into the >> Affordable Housing Fund (from the "free cash" coffer) and 2) designed a >> transfer tax on residential sales in Cambridge--with the first $300,000 >> exempted that will provide a substantial revenue for replenishing >> affordable housing funds. This is going to the State House in a week or >> so, where Governor Weld has already stated that he will veto ANY taxation >> bill that does not have a local referendum attached to it. So in the >> drafting of the bill, the EFZ insisted that such a referendum be attached. >> We are very confident of being able to see that it passes in the fall. >> Next on the agenda is securing a 20 million dollar bond for the immediate >> purchase of apartment buildings on the market to be made permanently >> affordable housing. >> >> It's incredible the arguments that were made against all of our efforts. I >> am growing confident that the real estate interest is second in power in >> this country only to the military/defense interest. One argument: "if we >> put through this transfer tax it will hinder young and struggling families >> from buying homes in Cambridge." A glance at the Sunday house >> advertisements indicate the median price range for a house in this city to >> be well beyond the means of any "young and struggling families." In fact, I >> have come across more than enough families who have lived in Cambridge all >> their lives and who cannot afford it anymore. Their children will have to >> settle elsewhere. >> >> Anyway, it's been a long road, and it's certainly far from over. Hours of >> meetings and talk complicated by time given for both Creole and Hispanic >> translators, etc. But it can be done, and good luck to anyone facing this >> dismal prospect. Back channel me if you want more info. on the work we've >> done here. >> >> daniel_bouchard@hmco.com >> >> >> Brenda, >> >> How can I get a copy of Lorber's poem? >> > > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 26 Apr 1997 10:32:59 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Christina Fairbank Chirot Subject: Re: Baseball & Poetry In-Reply-To: <199704260624.XAA14141@iceland.it.earthlink.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII By far one of the best books by a poet on/with/for baseball is Willie's Throw, by Paul Metcalf. You can read it at Karl Young's Light and Dust Poets at http://www.thing.net/~grist/homekarl.htm Metcalf includes the box score of the game he's working with--box scores being in themselves a form of poetry. I have often thought an interesting method of "literary criticism" could be developed by applying Bill James' Sabremetrics to writers. (See James' superb Historical Baseball Abstract as example--) A good deal can still be learned from a favorite book of Virginia Woolf's (and mine--i reread it each Spring Training in preparation forthe season. TIME BEGINS ON OPENING DAY as they say)--You Know Me, Al by Ring Lardner. Lardner knew how to telegraph voices. "Shut up he explained." Also recommended: The Glory of their Times (interviews with ballplayers from the first two decades of this century) and Baseball When the Grass Was Green. Paul Metcalf's first book, Will West, is about an American Indian pitcher . . . Here's to Joachim Andujar and Mickey Rivers--two great baseball poets --dave baptiste chirot ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 26 Apr 1997 09:58:19 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" Subject: Fwd: FYI: Zora Neale Plays Discovered (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII This just in from D.C. by way of New Orleans! ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Fri, 25 Apr 1997 19:00:23 -0400 (EDT) From: KALAMU@aol.com To: charliebraxton&johnnierobinson , colinchanner , "derricki.m.gilbert" , kevinpowell , kwamesenunevilledawes , michaelwarr , "valeriej.boyd" , asantesalaam , MtumeS@aol.com, nzm01@gnofn.org, tallawa@mcs.com, StephensNN@aol.com, LARGAITHER@aol.com, JJWARD@msuvx1.memphis.edu, EMiller698@aol.com, Lasana@aol.com, eallen@afroam.umass.edu, anielsen@email.sjsu.edu, SusanMcH@aol.com, dixon@westonia.com, xman@umich.edu, pcs@mobbs.com, Salim4X@aol.com, AsimJ@washpost.com, GabbinJV@jmu.edu, guild@charlie.cns.iit.edu, e-alexander2@uchicago.edu, toiderri@pitt.edu, harding@ucsu.colorado.edu, tahst22+@pitt.edu, RLPENNY@vms.cis.pitt.edu, A#MOORE@ccmail.ceco.com, hbeavers@dept.english.upenn.edu, sparkle@minerva.cis.yale.edu, mdest6@pitt.edu, dpparker@mailbox.syr.edu, areid@dca.net, muse@ihug.co.nz, chastitypratt@news.oregonian.com, TRZE23A@prodigy.com, tsalaam@tiger.lsuiss.ocs.lsu.edu, ts16@hotmail.com Subject: Fwd: FYI: Zora Neale Plays Discovered this is kalamu, just received this from another list i'm on. give thanx. FYI&C (For Your Information & Celebration)!!! -------------- --------------------- Forwarded message: From: MsThang2@aol.com Sender: degriotspace-request@infobro.com Resent-from: degriotspace@infobro.com To: degriotspace@infobro.com Date: 97-04-25 17:35:36 EDT 4/25/97 >From Thursday's Washington Post..... Audrey'97 ************************************************* >>Hurston Plays Discovered Find at Library of Congress May Shed New Light on Black the Writer By William Triplett Special to The Washington Post Thursday, April 24 1997; Page B02 The Washington Post The Library of Congress staffers were just looking for a little lunch-time entertainment, but they came up with a slice of literary history: 10 carbon copies, largely forgotten, of play manuscripts by the late African American writer and folklorist Zora Neale Hurston. Alice Birney, a literary specialist in the Manuscript Division, coordinates the library's Performing Arts Forum, . whose members meet monthly over lunch to hold informal readings of dramatic texts that are in the public domain. After a recent meeting, Birney said, a forum member suggested doing something by Hurston. A subsequent check into copyright records turned up the 10 scripts, all of which had been submitted for copyright between 1925 and 1944 as unpublished plays. Four of the scripts -- "Woofing," "Poker," "Forty Yards" and "Lawing and Jawing" -- are short sketches in dialogue form. The remaining six -- "Cold Keener," "De Turkey and de Law," "Meet the Mamma," "Polk County," "Spunk" and "Mule-Bone" -- are full-length works. Only the last two appear to have been published, but not until 1991 and after adaptation to another medium. Victoria Sanders, a literary agent who represents the Hurston estate, said yesterday that the heirs have known about the scripts in the library's collection "since the early '90s, when a copyright search was done." Indeed, a 1989 bibliography of Hurston's works included all the above titles. It did not, however, indicate whether copies of the works still existed. Several Hurston scholars contacted yesterday were intrigued by the discovery. "There isn't that much of [Hurston's] work that survives," said Patricia Willis, curator of Yale University's Collection of American Literature. "That's what makes this discovery so exciting." "This is very significant," said Joellen Elbashire, curator of Howard University's Moorland-Spingarn Research Center, which is considered, along with Yale, to be among the most extensive repositories of Hurston manuscripts. Yet Yale and Howard combined have copies of only three of the 10 titles found in the library. According to Lois Hurston Gaston, a Hurston heir, it's uncertain whether there are copies of the other works in other archives. The library's seven "might be the only copies," she said. Moreover, as Robert E. Hemenway, chancellor of the University of Kansas and author of a Hurston biography, said, "All 10 are going to be of interest to scholars" because Hurston was known for using a given title for more than one work. For example, "she wrote a number of things called `Polk County,' " Hemenway said. The script in the library's collection "may or may not be" the same as any of the other identically titled works. Hurston, who grew up in Florida and studied at Howard University before moving to New York, was known primarily for her novels, in particular "Their Eyes Were Watching God," published in 1937. But she had a diverse career that included stints as teacher, journalist, librarian and anthropologist as well as dramatist. She became a key figure in the Harlem Renaissance and, in the words of Kathy A. Perkins in her book "Black Female Playwrights," was eventually "the most prolific and widely published female black writer of her era." Still, Hurston was unable to support herself through her writing, which at times provoked attacks from black intellectuals. "She was criticized for perpetuating stereotypes in her work," said Kristy Anderson, an independent filmmaker who is making a biography of Hurston, who died in poverty and relative obscurity in 1960 at the age of 69. (C) Copyright 1997 The Washington Post Company<< ************************************************* ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 26 Apr 1997 13:02:50 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: p i n g p o n g MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On Fri, 25 Apr 1997, Tom Mandel wrote: > What about ping pong? How can we not mention ping pong, another > great language game. Joan Retallack is an *excellent* ping pong > player; she has a table in her garage. I can beat her though; I am a > reeeally good ping pong player! I take on all comers. What about it? this reminds that Meher Baba was quite fond of ping-pong, and is said to have played very well. (He also favored a game called "7 tiles" --more a local Maharashtra sport, I think). It's hard to mention ping-pong w/o recalling ping-pong diplomacy. I'd be happy to go a round w/ you sometime, Tom, though I can't claim to be an expert. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 26 Apr 1997 13:22:13 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: DRAGON BOND RITE MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT On Fri, 25 Apr 1997, Gwyn McVay > Serious question: is that THE Kongar-ool Ondar, the same one who's > in Huun-Huur-Tu? Serious but dumber question: is he the same man who > made a recording with San Fran bluesman David Pena and taught him to > sing khoomei? > > bests > Gwyn McVay > suddenly not the only Tuvan music fan she knows I much enjoyed Huun-Huur-Tu's concert up at Symphony Space (NYC) a couple-three years ago (had a nice cassette of theirs, too, but don't know what became of it; this was before I had a CD player) . . . Tuvan music is wonderful -- but it's ESPECIALLY wonderful live. (Perhaps that's true of most lovely musics.) Another entry in Armand Schwerner's international lineup also seemed of some note: > Margi Madhu, kudiyattam dancer that's, if I'm not mistaken, a dance-form from Orissa (north Indian state on the east coast, next to Bengal) -- I saw one kudiyattam dancer years ago in Berkeley & was much impressed w/ the lyricism of the form -- indeed remarkable. The Dragon Bond Rite composer, Jin-Hi Kim, was featured on the cover of an issue (which naturally we called the "Jin-Hi Kim issue") of EAR Magazine, circa 1990. She plays a remarkable Korean instrument w/ long strings -- probably similar to the old Chinese chin -- which I think is the same instrument about which Chuang-Tze had that lovely tale (circa 3rd century BC), abt. two friends. One played the chin, another listened. The listener and player were in such perfect accord, that when the former died, the latter broke the strings of his chin -- for there was remained no one able to hear the music as it should be heard. . . . I wonder of A. Schwermer might be willing to say a word or two about what he's written for this new music/theatre work (playing, as noted in post of yesterday, in NYC in early June) -- and if (for instance) it has any spoken words, or what? . . . d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 26 Apr 1997 10:38:40 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: william marsh Subject: Re: ReHoops Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 06:46 PM 4/24/97 -0700, you wrote: >One reason why the Bulls are so much fun to watch is that they are so old. >The old teams were pretty successful and interesting to watch. this year. >The Jazz are old. The Sonics are pretty old. The Suns are old. The &*%$#@! >Knicks are old. > Jordan is 34, i believe, and aren't the other "seasoned veterans" about the same, or even younger? / sometimes disconcerting how age is factored so differently in sports / i'm one year younger than Sir Air, and yet have the understanding i'd be classified as a "young writer", n'est-ce-pas? (don't the folks at Yale let anyone 40 and under submit to the Younger Poet's prize?) / also heard Kareem has turned 50 -- is that true? [uh oh - are we allowed to give personal ages on this list?] >Also, the Bulls are so international. They have an Australian, a Canadian, >a Croat (or is he a Serbian--I cant remember or tell the difference), a >Martian and a bunch of USAmericans. > Kukoc is Croatian, yes / and don't forget the two Ari-zonies, Kerr and Buchler (sp?) bill marsh ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 26 Apr 1997 13:49:43 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: ReHoops / Yale Youngsters MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Bill Marsh muses on time's passage -- > Jordan is 34, i believe, and aren't the other "seasoned veterans" > about the same, or even younger? / sometimes disconcerting how age > is factored so differently in sports / i'm one year younger than Sir > Air, and yet have the understanding i'd be classified as a "young > writer", n'est-ce-pas? (don't the folks at Yale let anyone 40 and > under submit to the Younger Poet's prize?) / also heard Kareem has > turned 50 -- is that true? Yes the folks at Yale do so let. They let me submit for several years running -- I sent 'em my MS *Orison* twice, and I think I sent 'em my MS *A Bowl of China* twice (last time being in February 1996). At that point I thought it was my final submission. But this year, I realized that, since I was still just 40, I could give it one last shot. But somehow or other, I inadvertantly let the deadline slip by w/o getting the MS in the mail (& the $25 entry fee check with it). So I've been spared from fame & glory after all (oddly). The Yale Younger Poets competition has but two entry requirements: one must (i) be 40 years or younger, and (ii) have never yet published a po-book. Guess I was drawn to the Yale game mainly bec. W.S.Merwin and John Ashbery -- two of my serious faves -- had both published first volumes under that august (if not to say septemberal) rubric. (Now it's added to my annals of non-history.) best, d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 01:57:06 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jennifer Sondheim Subject: Foundations of European Metaphysics MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Ground Cassell's Compact Latin Dictionary earth, soil == humus, solum, terra [humid soil terrapin, sole solar rockets terraplaning, terraforming soiled humus] on the ground == humi [Rumi] place, position == locus [locale, location, luscious looking] reason, basis == causa, ratio [Grund, Grundwerk, Panties, Rations] on the ground that == quod [because of, "quid"] Collins Latin-English English-Latin Dictionary bottom == solum [earth, soil, above, above-ground] earth == terra, humus [humdrum terrain, humorous Ground-breaking] cause == ratio, causa [above, above-Grund, above-Grundwerk, Panty-liner] sediment == faex [false sentiments, groundless presuppositions] on the ground == humi [almost, "as if dead," whirled worlds Grundless] gain ground == proficiere [proficient in Metaphysics, Foundations] rumour == increbrescere ["increbulous," said Jennifer] lose ground == cedere [acceded dispersions of metaphysical foundations military == inclinare [which are inclined to reified instantiations, vt == instituere [institutions, not _as if,_ but vi (ship) == sidere [sail-less, rudderless, on the high seas] ----------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 11:34:44 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Chris Stroffolino Subject: Re: TUBERCULOSIS (and individuals) There comes a time in the life of ( ) when "one" must risk sounding STUPID or at least UNTHEORETICAL.... And, concerning the questions raised by the phrase "there are no individuals", one may, I think, respond that to say THERE SHOULD BE NO INDIVIDUALS (or at least they should be consigned to something that doesn't have the status of poetry) is not the same as saying THERE ARE NO INDIVIDUALS..... and so what about this GAP? We can retheorize alot, The esso of individualism can become the EXXON of "false consciousness subject position" etc. but what about "EVERY MAN FOR HIMSELF" or James Brown "I GOT MINE DON'T WORRY ABOUT HIM"..... Oh, we're SO MUCH BETTER THAN THAT....la di da.... we could cry, in unison (as in inversion of that scene in "life of brian" concerning said individual) But lets say one may find that he has many of the symptoms of TUBERCULOSIS, and let's say that one has no HEALTH CARE and can not afford healthcare.... Well, if there are no INDIVIDUALS, this shouldn't be a problem, right? Because "ask not for whom the TUBERCULOSIS tolls, it tolls for thee" and "I can almost smell your tb sheets" and we can all check into the FUND FOR POETRY'S HEALTH CLINIC that allows one to be properly diagnosed and then given the cure. How far does "community" go? So, how does one GET OVER TB without having to check into a hospital? Does one simply die? Oh, of course, these questions have nothing to do with poetics.... Write this 100 times on the board.... ------------Chris S. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 10:03:30 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dan Raphael Dlugonski Subject: Or-Wa-Id Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" For those of you in the hinterlands of the above named states, to let you know i (dan raphael) will be reading this week: 4/29 in LaGrande at Eastern Oregon State College, 7:30 4/30 in Kennewick at the Starbucks, 7:30 5/1 in Moscow at BookPeople, (7:30?) and 5/2 in Walla Walla at The Temple, 7 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 13:13:02 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Field of Roses Subject: Re: TUBERCULOSIS (and individuals) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >But lets say one may find that he has many of the symptoms >of TUBERCULOSIS, and let's say that one has no HEALTH CARE and can not afford >healthcare.... >Well, if there are no INDIVIDUALS, this shouldn't be a problem, right? 'But let's say one'... The treatment for TB is usually a triple drug therapy for 1-2 years, (usually provided free by a local public health clinic, as it is in their interest to stop the spread of this contagious disease within a population.) If one suspects they may have TB, it is paramount that they be immediately diagnosed and treated. Hospitalization is usually for one week and is ONLY for those whose diagnosis is still unclear and who may be contagious. Linda Charyk Rosenfeld ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 15:57:10 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: TUBERCULOSIS (and individuals) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT > >But lets say one may find that he has many of the symptoms > >of TUBERCULOSIS, > 'But let's say one'... > > The treatment for TB is usually a triple drug therapy for 1-2 years, > Linda Charyk Rosenfeld not sure that either the original leapin' hypothetical, nor the helpful medical clarification, have altogether illuminated my understanding of the theory and practice of non-individuality. For the record (but not the CD, shy goto ex-dreams?), I'll say this: imho, individuality was not recently invented, nor will it be soon stamped out. It is an essential trait of "the soul in illusion" -- and well-founded rumor has it that "a spark of individuality" survives even nirvana & the subsequent nirvakalpa samadhi. Vide (for instance) Meher Baba, *God Speaks* (Dodd, Mead & Co., 1955), *passim*, for many useful (& I dare say clarifying) details of this overall (or, forsooth, oversoul) ur-narrative. best, d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 17:15:42 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: William Burmeister Prod Subject: Re: Fwd: FYI: Zora Neale Plays Discovered (fwd) In-Reply-To: "Aldon L. Nielsen" "Fwd: FYI: Zora Neale Plays Discovered (fwd)" (Apr 26, 9:58am) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii This is indeed exciting! Being from her neck of the woods (Brooksville, a small town some 70 miles west from Eatonville where she grew up, and where she collected much of her folklore), I follow her work with a keen interest. She has helped preserve the idiom of a people who, though they lived in abject poverty, celebrated life richly in their language and customs. I hope that these plays and their lively language are all published together soon. Bill B. RE: >>Hurston Plays Discovered Find at Library of Congress May Shed New Light on Black the Writer By William Triplett Special to The Washington Post Thursday, April 24 1997; Page B02 The Washington Post The Library of Congress staffers were just looking for a little lunch-time entertainment, but they came up with a slice of literary history: 10 carbon copies, largely forgotten, of play manuscripts by the late African American writer and folklorist Zora Neale Hurston. Alice Birney, a literary specialist in the Manuscript Division, coordinates the library's Performing Arts Forum, . whose members meet monthly over lunch to hold informal readings of dramatic texts that are in the public domain. After a recent meeting, Birney said, a forum member suggested doing something by Hurston. A subsequent check into copyright records turned up the 10 scripts, all of which had been submitted for copyright between 1925 and 1944 as unpublished plays. Four of the scripts -- "Woofing," "Poker," "Forty Yards" and "Lawing and Jawing" -- are short sketches in dialogue form. The remaining six -- "Cold Keener," "De Turkey and de Law," "Meet the Mamma," "Polk County," "Spunk" and "Mule-Bone" -- are full-length works. Only the last two appear to have been published, but not until 1991 and after adaptation to another medium. Victoria Sanders, a literary agent who represents the Hurston estate, said yesterday that the heirs have known about the scripts in the library's collection "since the early '90s, when a copyright search was done." Indeed, a 1989 bibliography of Hurston's works included all the above titles. It did not, however, indicate whether copies of the works still existed. Several Hurston scholars contacted yesterday were intrigued by the discovery. "There isn't that much of [Hurston's] work that survives," said Patricia Willis, curator of Yale University's Collection of American Literature. "That's what makes this discovery so exciting." "This is very significant," said Joellen Elbashire, curator of Howard University's Moorland-Spingarn Research Center, which is considered, along with Yale, to be among the most extensive repositories of Hurston manuscripts. Yet Yale and Howard combined have copies of only three of the 10 titles found in the library. According to Lois Hurston Gaston, a Hurston heir, it's uncertain whether there are copies of the other works in other archives. The library's seven "might be the only copies," she said. Moreover, as Robert E. Hemenway, chancellor of the University of Kansas and author of a Hurston biography, said, "All 10 are going to be of interest to scholars" because Hurston was known for using a given title for more than one work. For example, "she wrote a number of things called `Polk County,' " Hemenway said. The script in the library's collection "may or may not be" the same as any of the other identically titled works. Hurston, who grew up in Florida and studied at Howard University before moving to New York, was known primarily for her novels, in particular "Their Eyes Were Watching God," published in 1937. But she had a diverse career that included stints as teacher, journalist, librarian and anthropologist as well as dramatist. She became a key figure in the Harlem Renaissance and, in the words of Kathy A. Perkins in her book "Black Female Playwrights," was eventually "the most prolific and widely published female black writer of her era." Still, Hurston was unable to support herself through her writing, which at times provoked attacks from black intellectuals. "She was criticized for perpetuating stereotypes in her work," said Kristy Anderson, an independent filmmaker who is making a biography of Hurston, who died in poverty and relative obscurity in 1960 at the age of 69. (C) Copyright 1997 The Washington Post Company<< ************************************************* ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 18:43:18 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: New York City Poetry Calendar Comments: cc: Dajuin Yao MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT >Date: Fri, 11 Apr 1997 10:24:02 -0400 >From: Charles Bernstein >Subject: New York City Poetry Calendar > > The New York City Poetry Calendar is now on-line: > > http://www.nynow.com/poetry/ good news, this! Used to be, one (yrs truly) from the provinces would surface in NYC and head for St. Marks Books, in hopes of getting a copy of the legendary Po Calendar. Now - from the comfort of my southern hovel! fantastico Had been thinking of a jaunt to le grande apple mid-May, and was just wondering how to find out abt. poetical doings. Now I know. thanks -- > PUBLISHER > Martin J. Paddio > EDITOR > Molly McQuade the searrch feature (including, by venue or by poet) looks good. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 16:24:15 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dan Raphael Dlugonski Subject: Re: B Ball Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" -In grad school at bowling green we had a couple visiou bball games tween the poets and prose writers. why are prose writers almost always bigger &bulkier than poets (charles olson aside). and william matthews used to have a very sweet jump shot. i've written a couple bball poems myself, particualry one called "big guys dance" that happened when my son was taking an archery class in a city parks roller skating rink that was under the gym, which opened about midway thru the archery class-- the thunder and echoes pf the ball bodies and feet in the cavernous underrground wpa skating rink was transportive. > >On the other hand -- there were far more students on hand than usual, > ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 19:24:13 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: TUBERCULOSIS (and individuals) In-Reply-To: Message of Sun, 27 Apr 1997 11:34:44 -0400 from Mark of DC & Jeff of Mpls ('there are no individuals" or - perhaps significant difference - "in writing there are no individuals") and Henry of Providence ("individuality is the divine analogy sacred must not be tampered with you benighted totalitarians") are paradoxically only half-right & thus wrong; this is the essence of idealization/abstraction/mis/communication. Jeffrey Timmons asked is there a common ground; perhaps it might be found among other places in Aristotle's Poetics, the ur-text of "poetics": where tragedy is described as the ultimate form of poetry because it joins action and reflect ion, indissolubly, in an image of suffering which evokes identification (pity & fear) as well as evaluation (reflection). The meaning of humanity is action/reflection; there is no individual in the abstract; the idea of individuality is a social construct; we know of great historical "individuals" simply because of their mastery of the social, the communal; and yet what is action without character, what is the social without the bond of individuals (love, kinship); individual-social mirror one another in life and in writing; life is double, action is double, writing is double, analysis is double, halves are part of one, halves are individual parts of one whole; etc. And we are each 2-sided creatures (left,right) (front,back), & one & unrepeatable. (or if repeatable, the repetition of a singularity). We are rational animals, fumbling & then understanding; fumbling in our understanding & correcting incorrectly in our actions. TB will be dealt with by people who are secure enough in their individuality to help out in the community. (Though how did they get so secure? Was it love or was it Daddyo paying for college? Both, double, double, O world, let go the superflux) - Eric Blarnes, Earl of Oxford, author of Shakespeare ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 19:49:38 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: B Ball MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Dan Raphael Dlugonski asks: >-In grad school at bowling green we had a couple visiou[s] bball > games tween the poets and prose writers. why are prose writers almost > always bigger &bulkier than poets (charles olson aside). David Raphael Israel replies: think pros vs. amateurs. The wasted-away lover (amateur - from L. amat; - a venture for sake of love). Not to mention the pros & the cons. Con-artists are not nec. skinny; prose-artists not always fat. twixt the twain they lixed the platter clean tween the pos & pros they played it mean I cannot quite unravel such a riddle -- nor was I there in kelly bowling green d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 21:34:58 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jennifer Sondheim Subject: from Oswald O. MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII (From Oswald O.) I'm sitting here in tshirt and pants, worrying about a future in death And hackers screwing up my system and my arms and legs leprosy and lies So there's nowhere to go but into machines and I've lost the will to live Which is why I say in the middle of the night thank god for the rain And the flowers are dying in roadside Amerika and no one's around to collect And rainbows are yearning while cities are burning and children are dead from neglect The war's hardly over, girls lie down in clover, scream and they never get up It's time for the magic, the reaper wrecks havoc, it's time for the gallows and cup I'm sitting here in combat and drinking long gone brew of blood and wine And you might think it's fine and that we're walking the party line But the sides are smashed with needles and vials and vile's the weather today So thank God for the pounding on windows and roof thank God for the nighttime rain And she offers me water, she offers me wine, she offers her body as well Cause she knows I've returned, whole villages burned, I've been through the weather of hell The war's just begin, there's blood on the sun, there's blood on the harvest moon And I'm throwing the cards, hanged men and hanged girls, they're sowing another rune And you might think I'm dressed in armor, leaning down from the pulpit for cards But I've wounded myself, I've lost my way, in the woods where the runes send off sparks And flames reach for the skies, they cover her thighs, the runes scream, they're burning bright She buries herself in my burning flesh, thank God for the storm and the rain Pattie Hearst walks again with the strong Weathermen, Black Panthers are loading their guns Em-Sixteens are ready, our bodies are steady, we're off to the hills at a run Lord Jesus will keep us, Death will not reap us, revenge is the truth of the day And nighttime will hide us, the ghetto abide us, we're waiting to kill and to pray And you'll find me here in bluejeans and tshirt, roaring down the wires at you, You'll see me in the flaming sky, holy embrace with Janis and Jimmie and The Owl Pure windows opened up flaming skulls where we'll take the boat to Nam's pure booty hell And celebrate our love beyond your cracked dull thought, and thank God for the thunder and rain And the flowers are dying in roadside Amerika and no one's around to collect And rainbows are yearning while cities are burning and children are dead from neglect The war's hardly over, girls lie down in clover, scream and they never get up It's time for the magic, the reaper wrecks havoc, it's time for the gallows and cup ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 22:17:28 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Zimmerman Subject: Re: TUBERCULOSIS (and individuals) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Field of Roses wrote: > > >But lets say one may find that he has many of the symptoms > > >of TUBERCULOSIS, and let's say that one has no HEALTH CARE and can not afford > >healthcare.... > >Well, if there are no INDIVIDUALS, this shouldn't be a problem, right? > > 'But let's say one'... > > The treatment for TB is usually a triple drug therapy for 1-2 years, > (usually provided free by a local public health clinic, as it is in their > interest to stop the spread of this contagious disease within a > population.) If one suspects they may have TB, it is paramount that they be > immediately diagnosed and treated. Hospitalization is usually for one week > and is ONLY for those whose diagnosis is still unclear and who may be > contagious. > > Linda Charyk Rosenfeld Linda: Thank you for the useful information, but it doesn't really seem to address the issue Chris Stroffolino (also usefully) raises [though it flashes a gleam of hope that in some yet hard-to-envision future one might not feel the need to raise such issues]. "The law is no respecter of persons," and no more (or much less) of individuals: i.e., as you note, the free treatment afforded to TB patients derives not from concern for the individual sufferer, but in reaction to the threat to the collective "society" (which includes, of course, the "individuals" who offer such therapeutic largesse)--a fact which seems to emphasize rather than obviate the urgency of Chris' point. Dan Zimmerman ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 21:59:04 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: chastened by CB'sreposting of the welcom message In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" hey congrats wendy!! At 10:52 PM -0400 4/24/97, Wendy Battin wrote: >New Release > > >1997 Winner of the Snyder Memorial Prize from Ashland > >Little Apocalypse > >poems by Wendy Battin > >ISBN #0-912592-40-0 >$10.00 pbk. > >Amid the incoherence of things, between the coarse lines of dissolution; >after our last photogenic war, the "fever-vivid" language of Wendy >Battin's Little Apocalypse threads between lucidity and lyricism, surface >and depth to the very fovea of the song. An exquisite collection. >--CD Wright > > >Available from The Ashland Poetry Press >Ashland University, Ashland, Ohio 44805 phone 413-289-5110 >fax 413-289-5333 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 23:54:24 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Field of Roses Subject: Re: TUBERCULOSIS (and individuals) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Linda: > Thank you for the useful information, but it doesn't really seem >to address the issue Chris Stroffolino (also usefully) raises [though it >flashes a gleam of hope that in some yet hard-to-envision future one >might not feel the need to raise such issues]. "The law is no respecter >of persons," and no more (or much less) of individuals: i.e., as you >note, the free treatment afforded to TB patients derives not from concern >for the individual sufferer, but in reaction to the threat to the >collective "society" (which includes, of course, the "individuals" who >offer such therapeutic largesse)--a fact which seems to emphasize rather >than obviate the urgency of Chris' point. >Dan Zimmerman Dan Perhaps I misread Chris' 'urgency' as I thought I heard a distress signal above the question of individuality. Call it priorities. (Mine.) Information is what I brought to the discussion. Simply that. Without the common good, most of us wouldn't be here to intellectualize about the individual and contagious disease. Linda Charyk Rosenfeld ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 23:59:10 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jennifer Sondheim Subject: Re: TUBERCULOSIS (and individuals) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I also thought I heard that distress signal, and wrote him off-line. A very close friend of mine, ex-wife, was in his situation here in New York. TB is spreading in the city, as far as I know. Alan ____________________________________________________________________ URL: http://jefferson.village.virginia.edu/~spoons/internet_txt.html MIRROR: http://www.anu.edu.au/english/internet_txt/ TEL 718-857-3671 IMAGES: http://www.cs.unca.edu/~davidson/pix/ Editor, BEING ON LINE CUSEEME 166.84.250.149 ADDRESS: 432 Dean St., Brooklyn, NY, 11217 ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 23:32:30 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steve Carll Subject: April is the Readingest Month II Comments: To: poetics@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu, maz881@aol.com, CHRIS1929W@aol.com, Levyaa@is.nyu.edu, kunos@lanminds.com, sab5@psu.edu, mwinter@blue.weeg.uiowa.edu, fittermn@is.nyu.edu, wmfuller@ix.netcom.com, lease@HUSC.HARVARD.EDU, daviesk@is4.NYU.EDU, Daniel_Bouchard@hmco.com, drothschild@penguin.com, jdavis@panix.com, jms@acmenet.net, maj6916@u.cc.utah.edu, AERIALEDGE@AOL.COM, jarnot@pipeline.com, lgoodman@acsu.buffalo.edu, lppl@aol.com, jaukee@slip.net, aburns@fnbank.com, acornford@igc.org, jday@uclink.berkeley.edu, peter_gizzi@macmail.ucsc.edu, olmsted@crl.com, andrew_joron@sfbg.com, peacock99@aol.com, tlovell@sfsu.com, murphym@earthlink.com, john_r._noto@sfbg.com, 102573.414@compuserve.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" The sequel to the brain-busting crunch month of poetry in San Francisco. Our story resumes on Saturday, April 19th at New College as Small Press Traffic presents Elizabeth Willis and Steve McCaffery. Dodie Bellamy introduces Elizabeth, who reads poems such as "A/O", "Human Abstract" (Willis', not Blake's), "Piet a Terre", "Catalog Resin A" (for Richard Dodd), and "Without Pity" to a crowd which included Lyn Hejinian, Avery E.D. Burns, Leslie Scalapino, Douglas Powell, Sam, Rodrigo Toscano, Ron Silliman, Peter Gizzi (of course), Norma Cole, Steve Dickison and Tina Rotenberg, Cydney Chadwick, Mary Margaret Sloan, Paul Hoover and Maxine Chernoff, Jean Day, Mary Burger, Elizabeth Robinson, Renee Gladman and Stephanie Baker. Some great Liz lines I caught were: flower is becoming a graph idea three: only one violet H: the heart of a flower flower in the heart of the flower the spirit fell, and you knew it because you were earthly this is my reference to the amity of sand whoever called light discreet? if I err, I am, and my error moves me desire is a form of fastening the love of fertile ground can be a kind of phobia everything appears to shine, given enough darkness trees have the only real land legs to fashion oneself wholly on dogs Steve McCaffery then held the floor spellbound for awhile, reading from "Serbia Mon Amour", "Critique of Cynical Poesis", "Broad Topics", "What As Poetic", and _Teachable Texts_. Here are some lines of his: there are stars above a piece of soap someone just happens to have dropped into a movie the sutra through its murmur is bound to offend a duel is not a social contract the route of writing not the round of language I is another; we are not alone property droppity plops my mouth is earth's scholar the disambiguated geese just opening mnemonics to a type of shore fiat latex the ontology of the neuter shows promise so it seemed better to shoot poems than to write democracies jouissance _is_ my inner-city asthma wondering why clouds seem so up-to-date in case of an exit, please use the nearest emergency There was a party not far away given by the incoming editors of _Five Fingers Review_ to say goodbye to the outgoing editors, so we cabbed over and stood out back in the mist, and I heard lots of stories about eating out in Iowa which I believe I'll spare you all. The following Tuesday at Intersection was the reading for _Five Fingers Review_ #16. There was a great spread on tables in the back (I started eating peanuts and just never stopped...) and Thoreau Lovell (one of the aforementioned outgoing editors) started us off by reading from cue cards, "Russian style". He was followed by a first set: Mary Margaret Sloan, Peter Weltner, Norma Cole (playing herself and Cole Swenson), Adam Cornford, Chris Daniels, Gabrielle Glancy, John High, Fanny Howe, and Kim Jensen. Some of the lines from the first set were (various authors): that we will break the alphabet in two drowning tangent immediate archaic take sides into pieces I knew I was being inconsistent, but I was beside myself into his gaze intelligence slipped old lizard blood combusts the buffalo with golden horns settles on the nenuphar a pylon of the bridge of tedium stretching from me to the Other field upon field of uncharted disaster I was like a cataract against the darkness of the sky blessed is the transparent sky today stood as cold as a mirror it's bad poetry night at the arbitrarium After a break to let the readers and audience (John Noto, Joseph Aukee, Giovanni Singleton, Pat Reed, Don Hilla, Katya Olmstead and Sasha (John High's loved ones), Jean and Ann, John High introduced the second set of the night (using first names as opposed to Thoreau's introduction of the first half using last names in what John dubbed "the combination of contradictions"): Thoreau Lovell, Scott McCleod, Michelle Murphy, Andrew Joron, Jandy Nelson, incoming 5FR editor Jaime Robles, and Barbara Roether. Lines from the second half included gems like: he thinks hard because reality is haunted, deep out into the snow there are actual spies in this world into the dream and out again whose arms are wide enough to keep the horizon from falling? my tongue becomes a fuse thought begins with the interruption of a rhythm all the flowers in the city switched colors years of rain fell back up into the sky a petrified joint reminiscent of stem and branch maybe we can find a nice animal who can help us do you remember where I came from and have you returned to tell me? Friday Kristin Prevallet gave a lecture and slide show on Scottish/New York/San Francisco Renaissance poet Helen Adam, followed by a screening of a recently restored print of Adam's long-lost film _Daydream of Darkness_ (more on Kristin later). Saturday the 26th at New Langton Arts, Jean Day and Barrett Watten gave a spectacular reading. Jean read first, reading from _The Literal World_ , "Vernaculars of the Present: Seven Secular Sermons", and "Narratives From the Crib", a series written from the perspective of her 2-and-a-half-year-old: where the world resists--pathos westering from ruin to ruin when the composer sees in everything the condition of flowers, the two can seem the same we live in an optative virtuosity the ships, how well they sail--_in the ocean_ if you saw words in the clouds instead of numbers, you would become unesoteric how many nights with an axe "interpolating" the forest trees? among the sublime and lonely jets, I legislate the milk of heaven is said to make the sun rise. MC Kit Robinson went without pause into his intro to Barrett Watten, who proceeded to turn his recently published _Frame_ into _Zone_, written since his move to Michigan to teach at Wayne State. His reading was relentlessly thought-provoking, and I couldn't write down a lot of lines because so many were followed by equally mind-bending lines (but here's some I did get): dreams are our life, which we'll never be able to penetrate everyone looks, while no one can be found even clouds of the same sky are the same time is a sensible by-product of motion between two poles then we made a language out of action, but static interfered with our speech the sky excludes landscape altogether just as the dream fails to impose self-correction, we can only approve of ourselves to abandon painting, look directly at the sun In the New Langton bleachers sat Norma Cole, Laura Moriarty, Norman Fischer, Lyn Hejinian, Mary Burger, Pamela Lu, Rodrigo Toscano, Rob Hale, Leslie Scalapino, Hung Tu, Kevin Killian, Steve Vincent, Larry Ochs, Etel Adnan, Nick Robinson, George Lakoff, and Melissa. The very next day, Sunday the 27th at Canessa Park, Michael Boughn (of Toronto), Brian Lucas (of San Francisco) and Kristin Prevallet (of Buffalo; told ya we'd get back to her) gave varied and captivating performances in front of a pretty full house that included a lot of people I don't know, but some I do, like Kevin Killian, Elizabeth Willis and Peter Gizzi, Norma Cole, Spencer Selby, Steve Dickison and Tina Rotenberg, Charlie Palau, Duncan McNaughton and Rob Hale. Michael Boughn started, reading from _Dislocations in Crystal_ and a ms. currently entitled _Enormous Bodies of Water_. Here's a few tidbits: add a fourth receptor and it seems all heaven breaks loose so maybe Einstein's got his answer now--it just keeps heading out as if flesh were metaphor's last stand liberates white fins to the sun angels of evaporation is it democracy--that weird exhalation of Detroit? next time around, it's wind over metonymics day's relentless stretch toward Zaire and Christmas Brian Lucas, editor of _Angle_, read from a manuscript called _Divine Ward_: trace a seal onto vespering glade ever is thought of as approaching always a valley present; a thought is a grove here traces that, delayed, mean us how's breathing? did it tell you as much as you'd hoped? and Kristin finished up with a reading which drew from _Perturbation, My Sister_ and _Lead, Glass, and Poppy_: shadows were collecting the evidence they became like the window that abandons the house and joins the view newcomers are sprayed with a lavender seal Afterwards there was a party at Jean Day's house featuring this awesome chili Jean made out of the Green's Cookbook and some lively conversation about Pearlman's book on langpo, that other LP, the so-called "New York lifestyle poets" (you know who you are), the Neo-formalists, following your bliss--narcissistic or not?, and the metaphorical underpinnings of mathematics. ********************************** sjcarll@slip.net Steve Carll http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/mags/antenym http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/ezines/antenym In seed- sense the sea stars you out, innermost, forever. --Paul Celan ********************************** ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 15:15:20 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: ReHoops In-Reply-To: <199704260624.XAA14141@iceland.it.earthlink.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Remember the good old ABA? Great team names such as The Spirit of St. Louis? Well, back then, George Stanley and I invented the World League of Basketball, and had teams such as The Great Wall of China The Berlin Airlift The Alexandria Quintet The Treaty of Utrecht The Spanish Armada The Mexico City Blues The Peking Ducks The Johannesburg Riesling The Warsaw Pact The Black Hole of Calcutta George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 15:17:16 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: p i n g p o n g In-Reply-To: <199704261702.NAA20455@wizard.wizard.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Ping Pong, or as it is called among us really good players, table tennis, is very important to the earlier Sidel novels (Such as _Blue Eyes_) of Jerome Charyn, my main man. George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 06:18:37 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Loden Subject: home of the brave MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit George Bowering wrote: > All I used to do before > Rachel saved me , was drink beer, go to the track, pee my pants, and get > into fistfights and lose them. Saving George...it's not for the faint at heart, you know. It's not for sissies. But as Lincoln said at Gettysburg, we are here dedicated to the great task remaining before us. The last full measure of devotion, etc. Rachel L. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 16:57:52 +0300 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Fredrik Hertzberg Subject: Peter Winch 1926-1997 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Just heard that Peter Winch, wittgensteinian philosopher at Urbana-Champaign, author of The Idea of Social Science (& etc) died this morning. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 10:11:42 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Louis Cabri Subject: Cabinet Gallery London In-Reply-To: <199704281357.QAA20188@ra.abo.fi> from "Fredrik Hertzberg" at Apr 28, 97 04:57:52 pm MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I'm wondering if anyone has the address for the Cabinet Gallery in London, England. Would much appreciate it backchanneled (email too if it's available). Thanks! - Louis ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 10:29:18 -0400 Reply-To: Peter Jaeger Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Peter Jaeger Subject: fi press (fwd) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: QUOTED-PRINTABLE Some of you will find this press very exciting, not only for editor damian lopez's attention to the book as unique object, but also for the wide range of writers and forms that he publishes. Peter =20 ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Tue, 01 Apr 1997 15:14:05 -0500 From: Prose & Contexts Subject: march publications, website update fingerprinting inkoperated announces: =09=09=09* march publications & expanded website * march publications fi is happy to announce the long awaited release of Christian B=F6k's _Crystallography: A Report on Lucid Writing_. this creative essay on poetics as crystals is related to B=F6k's acclaimed 1994 book of poetry, _Crystallography_. this 36 page chapbook is a lucid essay exploring poetics through the metaphor of crystallization. the term essay though is misleading--this is a creative work, not an academic exercise. printed on frosted mylar with a full colour cover & a 2X magnifying lens laid in a pocket inside the back cover in an edition of 70 numbered & signed copies, this hand sewn chapbook is available for only C$5.00* fi is also pleased to re-release Alana Wilcox's first chapbook, _Analogue_. the first edition, published only a month ago, managed to stay in print for a mere matter of days, prompting this reprint (an unusual occurrence at fi). this second edition of 50 sewn copies will not be in print long, & is available for only C$2.50* *subscribers receive 20% off this price--see the website for details website facelift over the last few weeks the fi website has undergone another make-over. the new site not only includes a new interface but also expanded content. the "in print" section now includes samples from many of the publications. also, there are now clearer & more extensive submission guidelines. speaking of which, since fi is back in high gear, submissions are being actively sought. so check out the "submit" page & send in some work. coming soon there are a number of projects on the go, including work by Stephen Cain, jwcurry, MAC Farrant, and a long awaited kid's book by David UU. with some luck, these new publications will be ready by the Toronto Small Press Fair, to be held Saturday 3 May, 11am-6pm, at Club 360, 326 Queen Street West, Toronto. fi will be there along with many of Toronto's most interesting mags & presses. damian lopes __________________________________________________ fingerprinting inkoperated damian lopes Box 657 Station P Toronto Canada M5S 2Y4 http://www.interlog.com/~dal for pgp key, email: pgp-key a micro-publisher of innovative writing exploring form/at ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 10:03:02 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Matthias Regan Subject: Tribal Suicide Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Someone posted this on the "Bad Subjects" list over the weekend. I send it on not only to telegraph a message but because on my screen (set at courier 12 point) the line breaks are interesting: >From today's Daily Telegraph: International News Electronic Telegraph= =20 Saturday 26 April 1997 =20 Tribe threatens mass suicide By John Hiscock in Los Angeles=20 A TRIBE of 5,000 is threatening to commit mass suicide by leaping from a cliff unless Occidental Petroleum abandons plans to drill for oil in what the tribesmen claim is their territory. The semi-nomadic U'wa tribe of Colombia is sending its chief, Roberto Cobaria, to the United States next week to publicise the=20 threat and meet environmental and rights groups.= Legend has it that a group of U'wa tribe members committed mass suicide in the 17th century in protest against Spanish colonialism. The tribe's threat has become a public relations nightmare for Occidental, which says it has been deluged with letters, faxes and e-mail from around the world urging it to abandon its drilling plans for the 400,000-acre site. Dozens of demonstrators protested at Occidental's annual meeting yesterday at its offices in Santa Monica, California, where the issue was on the agenda. "We are supporting the U'wa in their demands that Occidental promise to respect their cultural integrity and not to drill for oil on their ancestral land," said one of the demonstrators, Lucy Braham, of Action Resource Centre of Los Angeles which, along with Amazon Watch, is hosting Chief Cobaria's visit.= "We need to hold US corporations accountable for their actions." Occidental Petroleum, which has so far invested =A38 million in the site, has the support of the Colombian government and= is looking to government leaders to settle the issue. Three Colombian cabinet ministers are to travel to the= U'wa reservation east of the Andes Mountains next month in= the hope of reaching an agreeement and Occidental has said it is awaiting some signs of an accord before proceeding. _____________________________________________________________ Brian J. Gross ** bgross@worldweb.net ** Washington, D.C. =20 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 10:10:00 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" Subject: Re: p i n g p o n g Comments: To: George Bowering MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN Ah Jerome Charyn, who wrote the marvelous _The Seventh Babe_ a very good baseball book even for someone who's not crazed about the game. Patrick Pritchett ---------- From: George Bowering To: POETICS Subject: Re: p i n g p o n g Date: Monday, April 28, 1997 2:44AM Ping Pong, or as it is called among us really good players, table tennis, is very important to the earlier Sidel novels (Such as _Blue Eyes_) of Jerome Charyn, my main man. George Bowering. , ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 12:25:28 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Peter Jaeger Subject: new fi release - april 97 (fwd) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII more from fingerprinting inkoperated ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Sat, 19 Apr 1997 13:59:17 -0400 From: Prose & Contexts Subject: new fi release - april 97 fingerprinting inkoperated announces: Diana Ross in Wax by MAC Farrant Diana Ross in Wax is a classic example of Farrant's "suburban surrealism." in this story she tackles a cultural icon, Diana Ross, who in Farrant's world is a 35 inch midget... need i say more? well if so, check out the opening of the story on the website in the "in print" section. Diana Ross in Wax is a 16 page handsewn chapbook with a silver thread band sealed with gold wax, published in an edition of 65 copies, available for only C$3.75. as always, subscribers to fi receive a 20% discount on regular prices--see the website for more information on how to subscribe. for those in the Toronto area, don't forget the Small Press Fair is being held Saturday 3 May at Club 360 (located at 326 Queen West). __________________________________________________ fingerprinting inkoperated damian lopes Box 657 Station P Toronto Canada M5S 2Y4 http://www.interlog.com/~dal for pgp key, email: pgp-key a micropress specializing in innovative writing exploring form/at ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 12:27:15 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Bernstein Subject: Rational Meaning is now out Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I've just gotten a copy of Rational Meaning. I realize it is quite expensive, but perhaps something to get from the library, or to get your library to order. This is University of Virginia Press's catalog copy: Rational Meaning A New Foundation for the Definition of Words and Supplementary Essays Laura (Riding) Jackson and Schuyler B. Jackson Edited by William Harmon Introduction by Charles Bernstein "The publication of Rational Meaning: A New Foundation for the Definition of Words brings to completion one of the most aesthetically and philosophically singular projects of twentieth-century American poetry. No North American or European poet of this century has created a body of work that reflects more deeply on the inherent conflicts between truth telling and the inevitable artifice of poetry than Laura (Riding) Jackson." --Charles Bernstein, from the introduction Existing only in manuscript since the 1940s but enjoying an underground reputation among friends and advocates, this primary document by one of the most original and influential of American poets and thinkers is now being published as Rational Meaning, Laura (Riding) Jackson's testament of the necessity of living for truth. Begun as a dictionary and thesaurus in the1930s, the work developed into a fundamental reevaluation of language itself. Riding, in close collaboration with her husband, Schuyler B. Jackson, continued this monumental project over the succeeding decades, completing it after his death in 1968.The work, which she regarded as a "Magna Carta of the human mind," has heretofore been seen by only a handful of people. Yet the recent resurgence of interest in Laura Riding (1901-1991) is nourishing the growth of scholarship and study, in whichthis culmination of a life's work will play its part as her true significance becomes more widely understood. At the age of forty, having already produced a substantial and challenging body of poetry, stories, and criticism, Laura (Riding) Jackson renounced poetry and began to concentrate on the discovery of the principles that embed truth and meaning in words. She believed that, if words and meaning could be irrevocably fused, people would become "morally articulate" and thus could never lie. This inquiry, which reaches out to include literature, philosophy, linguistics, and lexicography, would become central to the latter half of her long life and would finally result in Rational Meaning. Included in this edition are essays that Riding wanted published as supplements to Rational Meaning. At the core of this work, which aims to restore the truth of language by arguing that meaning inheres in words, stands the idea that a total renovation of the knowledge of language is needed, not to develop mere verbal sophistication and respectability but fundamentally to reinvigorate the intellectual processes of consciousness. The book reveals the disastrous extent to which language has been "unlearned" and shows how it may be learned again. Rational Meaning will be essential reading, not only for students of literature but for radical-minded linguists and lexicographers unhappy with the orthodoxies current in their disciplines. Among Laura (Riding) Jackson's other publications are First Awakenings: The Early Poems of Laura (Riding) Jackson and The Word "Woman" and Other Related Writings. Schuyler B. Jackson's writings have been published in several magazines, including The New Republic and Time. William Harmon, James Gordon Hanes Professor of English at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has published five volumes of poetry and edited several anthologies, including The Oxford Book of American Light Verse and The Top 500 Poems University of Virginia Press 640 pages 6 1/8 x 9 1/4 cloth ISBN 0-8139-1682-8 $50.00 S ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 11:44:56 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Safdie Subject: Re: TUBERCULOSIS (and individuals) In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Now, this was only message 1,617 of 1,667 messages on my screen -- a good 150 of which arrived over the weekend when I couldn't get to this computer in my office -- so I can't promise that in the interval this thread will have disappeared or metamorphized. But suffering from the West Coast disadvantage that David Bromige mentioned last week, I do want to jump in mention a few things about its long half-life. David Israel (and perhaps Anne Waldman if she ever gets on) might know more about this, but: doesn't the concept of the "Superior Man" in the _I Ching_ come AFTER the more abstruse, knotty, entangled hexagrams that hold no truck with individuals at all; isn't it, in fact, an invention of Confucius' commentary? That would seem to argue, at least historically, for the individual -- or concept of same -- rising out of the community, in much the same way (it seems to me) that Renaissance artists only started signing their works after the long medieval period in which there was, effectively, no "individual" art but humans were seen as part of, not separate from -- (a huge generalization, I know). American law offers yet a third example, a pernicious one -- in reconstructionist America, corporations were handed the same rights under the 14th amendment as "persons," thus greasing the wheels for the concentration of capital we've seen since -- one of the prime snots of American history, Roscoe Conkling, was largely responsible for that. These are the things that come to my mind when I think about this question: that is, sometimes it's beneficial and a matter of the health of a particular community not to insist, aggressively, on an individual identity, and yet sometimes that's the only check to corporate and/or communal mischief. But I'd still like to know what the PURPOSE -- the FUNCTION -- of Mark Wallace's dictum is. That is, what does it DO for you, Mark, to believe that "there are no individuals"? Besides being the latest trendy doctrine of cultural studies, I mean, or besides saying "It's not me, it's the language that did it" -- (again, a simplification). Perhaps the real answer is Aldon's (and others) humor and wit, identifying people as "congeries of social forces" and then moving on to the next thread . . . but still, the discourse continues, eh? Joe On Sun, 27 Apr 1997, Field of Roses wrote: > >Linda: > > Thank you for the useful information, but it doesn't really seem > >to address the issue Chris Stroffolino (also usefully) raises [though it > >flashes a gleam of hope that in some yet hard-to-envision future one > >might not feel the need to raise such issues]. "The law is no respecter > >of persons," and no more (or much less) of individuals: i.e., as you > >note, the free treatment afforded to TB patients derives not from concern > >for the individual sufferer, but in reaction to the threat to the > >collective "society" (which includes, of course, the "individuals" who > >offer such therapeutic largesse)--a fact which seems to emphasize rather > >than obviate the urgency of Chris' point. > >Dan Zimmerman > > Dan > > Perhaps I misread Chris' 'urgency' as I thought I heard a distress signal > above the question of individuality. Call it priorities. (Mine.) > Information is what I brought to the discussion. Simply that. Without the > common good, most of us wouldn't be here to intellectualize about the > individual and contagious disease. > > Linda Charyk Rosenfeld > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 15:51:24 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry Subject: Re: TUBERCULOSIS (and individuals) In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 28 Apr 1997 11:44:56 -0700 from On Mon, 28 Apr 1997 11:44:56 -0700 Joe Safdie said: > >These are the things that come to my mind when I think about this >question: that is, sometimes it's beneficial and a matter of the >health of a particular community not to insist, aggressively, on an >individual identity, and yet sometimes that's the only check to corporate >and/or communal mischief. sort of like when Odysseus told the Cyclops his name was "No Man"? - HG [a Jambalaya of Social Disfunctions] p.s. that was in 2386 B.C., in the Mediterranean, about 4 p.m., right? on April 28th? Over near those rocks? Odysseus was the captain who did not go down with his ship. "Oh, diss us, you sissies" - Jack Spandrift Jack's new CD, "Sailin' through the Red River Valley", is available from Honk Your Titanic Prods., Bingo, Wyo. Don't even try to order it. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 17:06:19 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: UiPsSnToAwIoRuSt MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII UPSTAIRS 31 poems by Jordan Davis Cover by Anna Malmude Barque Press, Cambridge Keston Sutherland, prop. Including: "The Muppets Regroup in Prague" "Chippewa Mishegas" "Cosmic Smacker" "Flub Grid" and many, many more! ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 16:27:17 +1000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Maria Damon (Maria Damon)" Subject: job announcement Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" X-From_: owner-cafs-f2@tc.umn.edu Mon Apr 28 15:44 CDT 1997 Mime-Version: 1.0 Approved-By: Center for Advanced Feminist Studies Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 15:44:13 -0500 Reply-To: Center for Advanced Feminist Studies Sender: Affiliated Faculty - CAFS From: Center for Advanced Feminist Studies Subject: job announcement Comments: To: cafs-stu@tc.umn.edu To: Multiple recipients of list CAFS-F2 ****Interdisciplinary Studies: California State University, Los Angeles**** seeks a tenure-track assistant/associate professor for the Liberal Studies Program. Candidates must have a Ph.D. in hand in Interdisciplinary Studies, or in a field that clearly emphasizes interdisciplinary research, and a demonstrated ability for successful teaching of interdisciplinary undergraduate university courses. Research/creative work and teaching should also emphasize interdisciplinary scholarship and pedagogy and demonstrate potential for contributions toward program development. Standard teaching load is three courses per 10-week quarter, three quarters per year. In addition, the applicant will be expected to serve on committees, work with students in the Women s Studies minor, serve as advisor for LBS majors, and be available for flexible scheduling. Release-time is negotiable depending on amount of advisement and program coordinator duties. Submit letter, evidence of scholarly work, curriculum vitae, transcript from institution awarding the Ph.D., and three recent letters of reference to: Search Committee Chair, Liberal Studies Program, California State University, Los Angeles, 5151 State University Drive, Los Angeles, CA 90032-8110. Position open until filled. Review of applications to begin on May 1, 1997. An equal opportunity/affirmative action/disabled/title ix employer, CSULA is committed to creating a community in which a diverse population can live and work in an atmosphere of tolerance, civility and respect for the rights and sensibilities of each individual, without regard to economic status, ethnic background, political views, sexual orientation, or other personal characteristics or beliefs. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 10:56:45 GMT+12 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Wystan Curnow Organization: Univ of Auckland Subject: Re: TUBERCULOSIS (and individuals) In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT In R.Sillman's 'For L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E' (The New Sentence, p57) there is this sentence: '--Individuals do not exist--'. Wystan Curnow ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 20:25:54 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" Subject: Re: individuables In-Reply-To: <16AAACD30AB@engnov1.auckland.ac.nz> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII have kept out of this for the most part -- but most of the heat generated around this subject has been a matter of shifting terms -- it's pretty clear to me that Mark and some of the people responding to him simply do not mean the same thing by the word "individual" -- I don't think there's any doubt that discernable entities roughly bounded by their own skin exist and move about -- but it's not just a "trendy" thing to worry that "cogito ergo sum" has at least one or two remaining presuppostions to be looked at -- Ron also writes on pg. 57 "Don't imitate yourself." Which actually sits a bit oddly next to "Individuals don't exist," as I imagine he recognized in the writing. Not existing is what individuals do best, no? There is a grammatical action that can't be evaded here -- ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 20:32:35 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: alterity Comments: To: "Aldon L. Nielsen" In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII would someone explain this term? i take it that it seeks to get out of the dilemma of using "otherness"? jeffrey timmons ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 17:00:33 GMT+12 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Wystan Curnow Organization: Univ of Auckland Subject: Re: alterity In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Yes, think its the condition entered into as a result of having been strenuously othered ('Other me, baby/All night long', et cetera) or altered to suit (Alterity Tailors, workmanship guaranteed) sometimes confused with altarity, the condition of having been signified, transcendentally. Or hailed, ideologically while doubled up with laughter. Generally, however, alternity is preferable to ' otherness' ( which while murky is also comparatively diurnal ), for apart from being more syllabic it is surely a condition of greater consequence and dignity. Hope this helpless. Wystan ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 23:06:13 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: words Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I'm currently temping at a big accounting firm. My job entails examining a database of old accounting reference books (most five to ten years out of date), which are in Word 1.1, looking for table and shading codes. Eight hours a day: I will never say I'm bored again. But tracing back to a previous thread, something interesting did emerge from this boredom: I stumbled upon this word list of hedging products, some of which sound quite beautiful. For those who don't follow economic arcana, hedging products are financial instruments designed to reduce exposure to risk, mostly in stock, futures, and other sorts of exchanges. Here goes: Accreting swap Amortizing interest rate caps Annuity swap Asset based swaps Average rate options Basis rate swap BEROs BIG index swap Boston option Break forwards Butterfly swaps Callable cross currency swaps Callable/puttable swaps Cancellable forwards Caps Caption Ceilings CIRCUS Collars Commodity swaps Compounds Coupon option swap CPI futures Currency option swap Currency swap Cylinder options Deferred cap Deferred interest rate setting Deferred swap Discount swap Double swaps ECU futures Either/or options Euro rate differential futures EXTRAs FALCONS Flexible forwards Floating rate basis swaps Floors Floortions Forward CIRCUS Forward rate agreements Forward swap FOXs Hindsight options Interest rate collars Long-dated forwards Lookback options LORAs MINI-MAX Mortgage swaps OPPOSSMS Options on futures Options on options Partial ceiling options Participating caps Participating forwards Puttable swaps Range forwards Reversible swaps Roller coaster swaps Saw-tooth swap Spread lock Staircase cap Stock index futures Super floater caps Swaptions Triple snap downs Tunnel Unhinge and extend Unwinds Windows Yield curve swaps Zero coupon swaps Zero premium options (c) 1989, American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. Trillions of dollars circulate through these instruments, mostly imaginary, unless you happen to live in Orange County. So not only are there no individuals, there's no money either. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 23:08:37 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: alterity Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Alterior motives? Hugh Steinberg > Yes, think its the condition entered into as a result of having been >strenuously othered ('Other me, baby/All night long', et cetera) or >altered to suit (Alterity Tailors, workmanship guaranteed) sometimes >confused with altarity, the condition of having been signified, >transcendentally. Or hailed, ideologically while doubled up with >laughter. Generally, however, alternity is preferable to ' >otherness' ( which while murky is also comparatively diurnal ), for >apart from being more syllabic it is surely a condition of >greater consequence and dignity. Hope this helpless. > > Wystan ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 01:47:58 -0400 Reply-To: Steven Marks Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Steven Marks Subject: Re: words In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII what a great list of terms! Who said accountants were boring? You know, the favorite "Boston option" of the old Celtics was their famous "break forward." Some day, I will make a list of all the ridiculous terms (none of which are beautiful) which I use in my business ghostwriting. PI/E, anybody? cheers, Steven People involvement/empowerment. They're not workers or employees; they're people. Being called a person instead of being labeled an employee must mean I'm unique, right? A real individual. The company wants ME to be involved and empowered. God bless them! Could I have a seat on the Board of Directors next? I'm sure they will be happy to make room for ME and maybe even YOU. __________________________________________________ Steven Marks http://members.aol.com/swmarks/welcome.html __________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 04:17:36 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Ken Edwards Subject: rempress readings Comments: To: British-poets at St Peter's Church on Castle Hill, Cambridge (adjacent to Kettle's Yard) 8pm 8 May Caroline Bergvall / cris cheek 15 May John Forbes / Andrew Duncan 22 May Ken Edwards / Wendy Mulford 29 May Drew Milne / Rob McKenzie Tickets 3.50 pounds (2.50 concessions) Season tickets 10 pounds (8 concessions) from rempress, 6 Grasmere Gardens, Cambridge CB4 3DR, UK ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 17:29:14 +0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rebecca Weldon Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I sent a message for nomail to listserve on the 24th. The message was not recognized because when I returned on the 29th I was treated to 70 messages. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 08:10:57 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: henry gould Subject: Re: individuables In-Reply-To: Message of Mon, 28 Apr 1997 20:25:54 -0700 from More 3rd thoughts on this subject. I take it Mark W & Jeff H were making a "writerly" statement which was meant in the context of writing [i.e. "indiv. do not exist"]. Have been reading a really excellent study of Aristotle by Michael Davis [_Poetics of Aristotle_], maybe can draw some connections. One of the zillion things Davis considers is that the _Poetics_ is a study of all human action - all action being poetic since it's both imitative & based on mental representations ("I will do the heroic thing here, I will do the necessary, the right, the wrong thing"..etc]. & "man" being the rational animal, it's always a combination of action/reflection; tragedy turns on its own interpretation of what went wrong (the reversal, the recognition scene), which is a display of this action/reflection... & always involves lying or fiction, as the better the imitation of real life, the more artificial... anyway, not to ramble too much more, this fiction-making which obscures/ displays the moment of truth brings up the issue of the author's intention, which connects with the question of individuality. In tragedy the author is more "effaced" than in epic, where the writer's hand is visible in the narration & choice of materials - it's a story as opposed to an enactment of "real life"... so what's the point here? Aristotle says a basic purpose of poetry is to cause wonder, to cause the listener to wonder & consider. Authorial intention is obscured behind the double action/reflection of the work (just as in real life - only in the poem or drama - there's a focus or general purpose) - behind the lying/truth of the work. This obscurity establishes a middle path, a mean, between conventional "truths" (fixed shibboleths or abstract verities) and complete chaos (the idea that since the poet is lying, there is NO access to the truth, no authorial intention, etc. - trendy these days). So that the audience "wonders" into a deeper exploration & sympathy for the fatalities that emerge from this doubleness. Again, what is ze point, Hank? As Aldon says, there are qualifiers to "cogito ergo sum". M & J's "there are no individuals" rang out like a "verity" provoking the double-dealing arguments that followed. I would still hold that if there's authorial intention, it's a pretty good assumption that there are individuals. Proust's meisterwerke destabilizes the concept of the simple "person" (people change so much they no longer recognize themselves) - & yet toward the end of the novel, in his defense of his enterprise, he claims - I think - that it's the SURFACE, false social faces of the person that are illusions - the "personalities" created by society - & that the writer really does justice by sinking deeper into the utterly unique experience of individual time - and only art that draws deep enough really contributes something original & "true". (But then, he had his own genre & his own individual axe to grind.) - Henry Gould ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 09:01:57 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: Re: words MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT from Hugh Steinberg's hedging roster: > Boston option Sure don't know what that is as such -- but the lexical formula reminds (of course) of that well-known temporal descriptive >a New York minute based on which, think I've seen a few other city-rooted expressions. Co-veterans of a suburban televideotic education of a certain era will likely recall >Texas tea A sense of self-irony (or parody) seems to adhere in such expressions -- and they have the important quality of paying tribute to particular locations. Some of us who've been to India are familiar with >India time but this gets a bit diffuse; the the city-based terms seem more interesting. Others out there (traditional -- or hot off the e-press?) cheers, d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 10:40:33 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Mandel Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Those who call it "table tennis" are destined to fall, scuffing up their table whites 'n all, should they visit DC to try such stuff 'pon me Tom ...who wrote: Date: Sun, 27 Apr 1997 15:17:16 -0700 From: George Bowering Subject: Re: p i n g p o n g Ping Pong, or as it is called among us really good players, table tennis, is very important to the earlier Sidel novels (Such as _Blue Eyes_) of Jerome Charyn, my main man. Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com ******************************************************** Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com 4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 ******************************************************** Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 10:48:02 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Mandel Subject: Zone Defense Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" In a dream, Calbert Cheaney came to me and said: "Guarding Michael, having a big game myself, giving up 55 to him, giving my all -- it just makes me realize there are no individuals. The only defense is a zone." Yet, although Joe Safdie writes: > Aldon's (and others) ... identifying > people as "congeries of social forces" on my (individual) computer screen the quoted phrase came out "quandaries of facial sources" -- I think my computer has been reading my notes on Levinas. Tom Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com ******************************************************** Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com 4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 ******************************************************** Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 08:09:20 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" Subject: Re: out for alterations In-Reply-To: <170BB8B74E2@engnov1.auckland.ac.nz> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII If the idea that there is no such thing as authorial intention is so trendy, I'm not clear about why I've never actually read that anywhere or heard anybody say it. My understanding of the argument, dating back to the old new critics, was that it was an argument about access to authorial intention, about the nature of intention, an argument against allowing a construction of an author's intention after the fact to be the limiting horizon for all interpretations of the work, etc -- That would even seem to be what E.D. Hirsch had in mind in his attacks on the attacks upon the "intentional fallacy." Likewise, I've never read anywhere that there is no access to truth -- but have read much about the unlikelihood of an unmediated access to a transcendent truth -- the arguments on this score always appeared to me to concern what a truth is -- that is, whether truth is a property of language, or whether it is something that pre-exists and persists apart from human language -- but maybe I just don't read enough to be in on the latest trends -- ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 08:16:58 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" Subject: Re: Zone Defense Comments: To: Tom Mandel In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970429104802.006fddbc@cais.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Last time I was in D.C. I made the mistake of playing ping tennis with Mr. Mandel, who promptly drove one of those Jack-in-the-box balls into my nose -- which explains that permanently befuddled look on my face that so many of you have commented upon -- as well as the odd sonorities of my highly individuated vocal apparatus -- Tom Mandel is no ping pong diplomat -- If you accept his challenge, prepare to meet your unmaker -- [no ironies where none intended] ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 11:24:56 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Gwyn McVay Subject: Re: Tom's pingpong rap Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit such babble. my game is Scrabble. I'll bet no one can sling tiles better than me for miles. Gwyn ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 11:22:28 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: hg Subject: Re: out for alterations In-Reply-To: Message of Tue, 29 Apr 1997 08:09:20 -0700 from they're probably not at all the latest trends - but I was referring to deconstruction and the Yale School, which as I understand it (I could be way wrong), holds that the text slips away from the author, cannot refer to external reality (no such thing), & is all part of a de-Saussurean saucer of non-identities. - HG ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 10:53:36 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dale Smith Subject: Re: individuables Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Yes, it is a curious word, individual. Since this is a poetics list, I took the word in the context of poetry. Henry Gould's post in which he discusses Artistotle's Poetics is very apropos because, in terms of writing, to invalidate the individual, however you take that term--philosophically or historically--brings up questions of authorial intent, etc. To deny intention, personal engagement, or the very impulses by which one writes seems strange to me. Maybe that's not what Mark meant at all. Maybe he thinks you can engage and listen to personal impulses, though not as an individual. But as what? The thing is, and this brings me back to the context of poetry, Mark writes--indeed, many write--from the perspective of the social. And poetry is, by all means, partly a social act. But I do want to place emphasis on the word 'partial.' Adorno traces poetry's roots to the occult practices of the ancients. The lyric itself seems a to be a kind of medium through which we connect the self to the emotional realities of others. The social is not concerned with emotional realities. Negative capability is, oddly, an extremely personal exegesis of that which exists outside of, but not dependent from, the personal. Since most experimental poetry experiments with social forms, I'm wondering if it's also possible for other experiments to take place under more traditional forms. I'm not advocating a new formalism by any means. I'm just interested in how something--self? individual? commuity?--invests language with the power of expression. The following is from Tom Clark's "Confessions." I hate to burden the list with so much, but Tom articulates something which is for me quite accurate. My question is how is the individual different from self? Or are these terms the same? **************** "Not knowing oneself, when all's said and done, is a little like breathing, a habit one can give up only for a minute or two before serious consequences start to set in. Given that fact, imagine how uncomfortable things might quickly get if one were able to actually see one's various unidentical selves strutting their ridiculous pretensions to coherence through the eyes of others. Some levels of complication were probably meant to be borne only by language, in whose surprising reflections and sudden transparencies things take on for moments at a time a clarity that's spellbinding-or perhaps more accurately spellbreaking, shattering the data-hypnotized, stressed-out, hurry-up stupor of a life in a technologically administered society. Within that society, to be oneself is almost too great a burden to bear; even, and maybe especially, in the chilling revelation of the lyric moment, the moment of negative capability when one's party to the projection of a kind of self-knowledge that's not individual but species-specific. As deep into the substratum of a collective life the undercurrent of our language seeps, the lyric never loses its power to follow, tapping the convergences of all those tributary streams, drawing off primary metaphors as trace elements from word roots. That underground current is the medium in which a submerged poetics can always be detected, rising back up to the surface like air bubbles behind a swimmer in water." >have kept out of this for the most part -- but most of the heat generated >around this subject has been a matter of shifting terms -- it's pretty >clear to me that Mark and some of the people responding to him simply do >not mean the same thing by the word "individual" -- I don't think there's >any doubt that discernable entities roughly bounded by their own skin >exist and move about -- but it's not just a "trendy" thing to worry that >"cogito ergo sum" has at least one or two remaining presuppostions to be >looked at -- > >Ron also writes on pg. 57 "Don't imitate yourself." Which actually sits a >bit oddly next to "Individuals don't exist," as I imagine he recognized in >the writing. Not existing is what individuals do best, no? There is a >grammatical action that can't be evaded here -- ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 12:16:09 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: from pong to scrabble MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT In bardic manner boasteth Gwyn McVay who claims a winning lexical touche sez: > such babble. > my game is Scrabble. > > I'll bet no one can sling tiles > better than me for miles. perhaps perchance belike you might be right but pudding's proving isn't in its fame I've not played scrabble since I was a slight & wispy youth but now in age I'm game some summer day beside the C&O where willow leaves are kelly as the Knight to meet your haughty challenge would I go thus proving an you boast for sooth aright d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 12:24:00 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jordan Davis Subject: Re: from pong to scrabble Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I know a woman who plays scrabble with an older woman for money -- not as in a wager but to pass the time and she always loses! because the older woman plays words 'from the Latin or Greek' but doesn't allow the woman I know to play those same words next game. J ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 09:51:10 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Herb Levy Subject: Re: DRAGON BOND RITE Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I returned home from a long weekend in SF (not always poetical, though I did get to see/hear/hang out (again in some instances) with some of the folks on this list: Hi all) to find the postcard from the Japan Society about this & another, more traditional, event in May. To the several comments & plugs, I'll add that the Indonesian perfomers are also very good & that Jin Hi Kim, who has spent a lot of the last ten-fifteen years collaborating with artists from diverse cultures (though this may be the most elaborate project she's ever undertaken) primarily plays komungo, IS technically a zither, though, unlike the chin, the instrument is fretted and strummed with a stick, rather than plucked with fingers. She's a very good improvisor and has composed numerous works for traditional European and Asian instruments, often playing in the same ensembles, most of which I've heard are quite good. Oh, & one of the musicians in Huun Huur Tu is defintely among the pictures of performers on the card, so I assume that Gwyn's right about it being the same khoomei singer, though, never having seen them perform, I don't who's who in the band. Bests Herb Levy herb@eskimo.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 17:46:00 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Karlien van den Beukel Subject: REPORT CCCP 7 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII The annual Cambridge Conference of Contemporary Poetry took place for the seventh time last weekend, in England. Although I have been a silent subscriber of the poetics list up till now, I would like to offer this reportage of CCCP, a rather Byzantine event, yet significant in its international scope. Other list subscribers who attended CCCP 7, such as Ira Lightman, Fiona Templeton, Ken Edwards, John Kinsella and cris cheek, will, I am sure, have different responses. Here are short immediate responses on each of the readings, papers and performances I attended, in chronological order. Jennifer Moxley Since Romana Huk's conference in New Hampshire, Jennifer Moxley's poetry has become known in Cambridge. Lucy Sheerman and I (co-founders of the small poetry press Rempress) published Moxley's pamphlet "Enlightenment Evidence (Part One)" in November 1996. Underneath the rhetoric of studied modesty lies, of course, a self-regarding subjectivity, yet the subtle discursive progression through which the terms & conditions of the social contract are negotiated, made for a fascinating reading. John Tranter is an influential Australian poet whose energetic interest in manifold poetic forms is both stimulating and enjoyable. However, his reading, interlaced with unnecessarily reductive explanations, only in part conveyed that inventiveness. Perhaps an anxiety that social commentary on the Australian locale would be misrecognised by the audience, weighed unduly. The final poem, Voodoo, on the uncanniness in banal objects, was a tour-de-force. Papers and discussions Steve Evans opened the session, with a strategically surprising paper. Rather than offering a theoretical paper, he chose to close-read Bernadette Mayer's poem 'The Way to Keep going in Antartica'. With the elucidation of philosophy, he followed, beautifully, the instructions in the poem: 'Look at very small things with your eyes & stay warm'. Karen Mac Cormack presented a lucid analysis of the misleading readings of the stratification of poetry communities in the States, and off-set this with an exposition of her own methodology. If I understood correctly, seriousness is in collaborataive praxis, not in retrospective polemicisation of micro-political positions. Jean Khalfa provided an excellent short introduction to the French poet Emmanuel Hocquard, who was to read later that evening. Tony Lopez, who chaired the discussion, noted the similarities between Hocquard's and Mac Cormack's working practice, and steered the discussion toward the notion of 'communities'. Evans expanded on his paper by discussing Mayers in relation to the New York School. Current methods of production, distribution and communiciation (including the internet) were discussed. Some thought this unnecessary. Moxley found it displacing discourse (away from "creativity"). Grace Lake responded with what could be understood as an ironic public display of "creativity". Unfamiliarity with each other's geo-political restrictions made an in-depth discussion difficult. Thus, we retired to the bar and continued talking in smaller groups. Poetry readings, again. Grace Lake is a Cambridge poet anthologised in Conductors of Chaos and Out of Everywhere. Before reading, she threw a green net (of the kind one covers strawberries with against sparrows) which she called "her internet" over the bust of Maynard Keynes in the corner. Her imaginative gestures, the spendthriftness of rhyme and imagery, do indeed make for a great economy in her poetry. In the middle section (particularly 'Swiss Kiss'), however, her reading turned into a perfunctionary litany of wrongs: the poet is suddenly trapped in her own history. She emerged again, with a sparkling finalale. Karen Mac Cormack I thought that I would have to be critically informed to appreciate the disciplined elegance of the ellipses, turns, shifts, in Mac Cormack's language poetry. Not so. One sequence in particular, drove language down to vortex, and still, through & over, she continued, finishing balanced on one point & at a slant. The Australian poet John Forbes (not known as a language poet cognoscentus) was heard to mutter an awed 'yes'. Admirable stuff, indeed. Emmanuel Hocquard is probably well-known in the States for his translations of American poetry, and Keith and Rosemary Waldrop's translations of his. I won't embarrass myself by presuming to comment on a poet I have not read, as I do not read the French so fluently, but whose reading, suffice to say, I enjoyed, not least due to Peter Riley's witty and resourceful on-the-scene translations. Performance Fiona Templeton Her peformance of 'Recognition' was extremely well-attended. The performance seemed a continuous struggle against narrative closure, as if refusing the fact of death itself, and yet having to come to terms (but what terms precisely?) with this particular death: the death of a friend with whom she had collaborated on performances. Remarkable use of modern recording material, video and television. She would repeat the seemingly spontaneous gestures of his recorded moving image on the shown video, turning his play into hers (or had it been hers all along?), responding to what seemed his direct questions to her, choosing videos to replay, in an almost private moment, and then turn to the song of defiance, all the while unsettling boundaries between artifice and the real. Finally, the television set, showing a still close-up of his head on the pillow, was heaved on to the edge of the table, and she covered the table with a white sheet: he seemed to be present, a very thin man with a huge head lying in a hospital bed. And clearly he was not-present. A very moving performance, to which my too literal description does not much justice: it could never. Poetry Allen Fisher is a major English poet, and apart from his poetry's intelligence and social grace, Fisher himself also possess these qualities. He is an interesting performer of his poetry, at times, as if he is thinking aloud, even ad libbing. He read a dialectical poem which was an exchange between "two theologians": Roger Penrose and Stephen Hawking. The Olsonian scale of his projects are, to me, daunting, not only qua exegesis, but also in their interdisciplinary scope. I take it from what I know (those 'small things'), and then go on. Tracy Ryan is a young Australian poet who, together with her partner John Kinsella, works indefatigably for the journal Salt. She is tenacious and careful with her material, and read clear subject-poetry on domesticity, ice, child-care. One of her poems has been chosen to be printed as a poster for 'poetry on the Underground': thousands of commuters on the London Tube will read it daily. Closing the conference with her strong reading, was also an acknowledgement of our responsibilities, to return to homework to be done. Take care now, and mind the gap. Karlien van den Beukel Gonville & Caius College Cambridge, England ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 10:02:03 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: George Bowering Subject: Re: home of the brave In-Reply-To: <3364A3AD.46ED@concentric.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Saving George...it's not for the faint at heart, you know. It's not for >sissies. But as Lincoln said at Gettysburg, we are here dedicated to >the great task remaining before us. The last full measure of devotion, >etc. > >Rachel L. That is exactly it, exactly why I will do anything for Rachel, and conversely, why I felt so betrayed by Maria, who turned her back when I showed where I was bleeding. Turned her back (here is the worst part) and continued reading a poem by David Bromige! George Bowering. , 2499 West 37th Ave., Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6M 1P4 fax: 1-604-266-9000 e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 10:11:38 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Jeffrey W. Timmons" Subject: Re: alterity In-Reply-To: <170BB8B74E2@engnov1.auckland.ac.nz> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Tue, 29 Apr 1997, Wystan Curnow wrote: Hope this helpless. yep. thanks. jeffrey timmons ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 13:39:49 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sylvester Pollet Subject: Re: words Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Well, around here there's something known as "The Deer Isle Smile," which is the one that begins appearing on the lower back of a guy whose jeans are riding low. sp >from Hugh Steinberg's hedging roster: > >> Boston option > >Sure don't know what that is as such -- but the lexical formula >reminds (of course) of that well-known temporal descriptive > >>a New York minute > >based on which, think I've seen a few other city-rooted expressions. > >Co-veterans of a suburban televideotic education of a certain era >will likely recall > >>Texas tea > >A sense of self-irony (or parody) seems to adhere in such expressions >-- and they have the important quality of paying tribute to >particular locations. Some of us who've been to India are familiar >with > >>India time > >but this gets a bit diffuse; the the city-based terms seem more >interesting. Others out there (traditional -- or hot off the e-press?) > >cheers, >d.i. > . > ..... > ............ > \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > > david raphael israel < > >> washington d.c. << > | davidi@wizard.net (home) > | disrael@skgf.com (office) > ========================= > | thy centuries follow each other > | perfecting a small wild flower > | (Tagore) > //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 14:15:20 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Alan Jennifer Sondheim Subject: in-Kant MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII - Incantation: Corrective Strategy: Hacker Drive: Core Dump: Gdb: The drive to write, the drive to correct, to turn these words into pure empathetic sound: such would cancel, chill, curtail, recuperate violation- fabric-the-medicine, make me hole again, the disappearance of the vacanta- tory eye/I. Into the night, right I, slewed from skewed violation-fabric: Dar dar dar. Arduous the night. Dar dar dar. Perturbatio. Dar dar dar dar. Ahesulim, Salimpalihilisu, SalimpalihAdda, MusallimMarduk, Addumusallim. .rad rad rad raD .oitabrutreP .rad rad raD .thgin eht suoudrA .rad rad raD .millasumuddA ,kudraMmillasuM ,addAhilapmilaS ,usilihilapmilaS ,milusehA .rad rad rad raD .oitabrutreP .rad rad raD .thgin eht suoudrA .rad rad raD .millasumuddA ,kudraMmillasuM ,addAhilapmilaS ,usilihilapmilaS ,milusehA .rad rad rad raD .oitabrutreP .rad rad raD .thgin eht suoudrA .rad rad raD .millasumuddA ,kudraMmillasuM ,addAhilapmilaS ,usilihilapmilaS ,milusehA .rad rad rad raD .oitabrutreP .rad rad raD .thgin eht suoudrA .rad rad raD .millasumuddA ,kudraMmillasuM ,addAhilapmilaS ,usilihilapmilaS ,milusehA .eid lliw I .yawyna eid lliw I ,eid lliw I ;yawyna eid lliw I ,eid lliw I .eid lliw I .yawyna eid lliw I ,eid lliw I ;yawyna eid lliw I ,eid lliw I .rad rad rad raD .oitabrutreP .rad rad raD .thgin eht suoudrA .rad rad raD .rad rad rad raD .oitabrutreP .rad rad raD .thgin eht suoudrA .rad rad raD -------------------------------------------------------------------------- GDB: gdb Incantation: GDB is free software and you are welcome to distribute copies of it under certain conditions; type "show copying" to see the conditions. There is absolutely no warranty for GDB; type "show warranty" for details. GDB 4.16 (sparc-sun-sunos4.1.4), Copyright 1996 Free Software Foundation, Inc... "/net/u/6/s/sondheim/Incantation:": not in executable format: File format not recognized (gdb) quit _________________________________________________________________________ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 13:21:07 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: home of the brave In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" i wish it recorded publically here that i have never, contrary to scurrilous rumor, read a poem by david bromige. after i the caper with those red suspenders, how could I? At 10:02 AM -0700 4/29/97, George Bowering wrote: >>Saving George...it's not for the faint at heart, you know. It's not for >>sissies. But as Lincoln said at Gettysburg, we are here dedicated to >>the great task remaining before us. The last full measure of devotion, >>etc. >> >>Rachel L. > >That is exactly it, exactly why I will do anything for Rachel, and >conversely, why I felt so betrayed by Maria, who turned her back when I >showed where I was bleeding. Turned her back (here is the worst part) and >continued reading a poem by David Bromige! > > > > > >George Bowering. > , >2499 West 37th Ave., >Vancouver, B.C., >Canada V6M 1P4 > >fax: 1-604-266-9000 >e-mail: bowering@sfu.ca ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 13:25:10 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: words In-Reply-To: <199704291301.JAA08592@wizard.wizard.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" evidently the term "boston marriage" was a phrase in the gay/lesbian underground argot ca. 1950s or so to refer to a living arrangement in which two women were nominally "roommates" and may have actually never been sexual partners but were for all intents and purposes, a (closeted) couple. maybe i've got some of the details wrong. At 9:01 AM -0500 4/29/97, David R. Israel wrote: >from Hugh Steinberg's hedging roster: > >> Boston option > >Sure don't know what that is as such -- but the lexical formula >reminds (of course) of that well-known temporal descriptive > >>a New York minute > >based on which, think I've seen a few other city-rooted expressions. > >Co-veterans of a suburban televideotic education of a certain era >will likely recall > >>Texas tea > >A sense of self-irony (or parody) seems to adhere in such expressions >-- and they have the important quality of paying tribute to >particular locations. Some of us who've been to India are familiar >with > >>India time > >but this gets a bit diffuse; the the city-based terms seem more >interesting. Others out there (traditional -- or hot off the e-press?) > >cheers, >d.i. > . > ..... > ............ > \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > > david raphael israel < > >> washington d.c. << > | davidi@wizard.net (home) > | disrael@skgf.com (office) > ========================= > | thy centuries follow each other > | perfecting a small wild flower > | (Tagore) > //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 13:27:26 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: Tom's pingpong rap In-Reply-To: <3365CC78.4695@osf1.gmu.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" but who but me is the ali of split-end-picking? At 11:24 AM +0100 4/29/97, Gwyn McVay wrote: >such babble. >my game is Scrabble. > >I'll bet no one can sling tiles >better than me for miles. > >Gwyn ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 13:31:36 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: REPORT PPS ? In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" does anyone want to start of a composite and accretional description/report of the rutgers POetry and the Public Sphere conference? i'll join in after someone else begins.-md ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 14:51:36 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: Re: words ah yes, here's one other, now remembered: >a Philadelphia lawyer (I knew this was percolating -- for some reason, Maria D.'s mention of "a Boston marriage" dislodged it) -- only trouble is, I can't give a very exact definition; it was prob. William Safire who did a riff on this. (The sense, I think, suggests sleaze -- for reasons not lost to memory.) I recall laboring out an explanation of "a New York minute" to someone who didn't understand the phrase. (Much like "explaining a joke.") Of course, location needn't be strictly physical or strictly geography. How about cyberspace? what, for example, would be: >a Poetics epoch? [i.e., lasts abt. 4 days ?] >a listserv season ? [i.e., lasts abt. 3 days?] then there's the gentle art of euphamism, such as: >an internet pleasantry . . . (?) [i.e., when, for some seemingly innocuous remark, one is royally flamed, skewered, and hung out to dry ?] ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 15:06:40 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Bernstein Subject: Internation Subscribers Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I just got this from the listserv and thought it might be of interest to those who haven't tried the " review poetics by country" option. You also get a list of who the people are in each county * Country Subscribers * ------- ----------- * Australia 10 * Belgium 1 * Canada 31 * Finland 1 * Great Britain 17 * Ireland 2 * Italy 1 * Japan 8 * Netherlands 1 * New Zealand 7 * Norway 1 * Poland 1 * Spain 2 * Sweden 1 * Switzerland 1 * Thailand 1 * USA 424 * * Total number of users subscribed to the list: 510 (non-"concealed" only) * Total number of countries represented: 17 (non-"concealed" only) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 15:52:32 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Gwyn McVay Subject: Re: words In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII As Jim Morrison mentioned, "You can pick your teeth with a New York joint." Gwyn ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 16:27:26 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: RaeA100900@AOL.COM Subject: Re: REPORT PPS ? Dear Maria and All, I would love to hear a report on PPS. Rae A. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 15:45:50 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jocelyn Emerson Subject: Re: words In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" i believe Boston marriage actually goes back to the 19th century, picked up again later in this century as a term of empowerment (i.e. "queer"). i would go with Rich's analysis on this one, that it's more complex than sexuality (genital per say) alone can indicate-- as us queers are usually only defined by the sex thang, and think of the term as another facet of the lesbian continuum (or was that the Q continuum???) but you've all read the essay... JE >evidently the term "boston marriage" was a phrase in the gay/lesbian >underground argot ca. 1950s or so to refer to a living arrangement in which >two women were nominally "roommates" and may have actually never been >sexual partners but were for all intents and purposes, a (closeted) couple. >maybe i've got some of the details wrong. > >At 9:01 AM -0500 4/29/97, David R. Israel wrote: >>from Hugh Steinberg's hedging roster: >> >>> Boston option >> >>Sure don't know what that is as such -- but the lexical formula >>reminds (of course) of that well-known temporal descriptive >> >>>a New York minute >> >>based on which, think I've seen a few other city-rooted expressions. >> >>Co-veterans of a suburban televideotic education of a certain era >>will likely recall >> >>>Texas tea >> >>A sense of self-irony (or parody) seems to adhere in such expressions >>-- and they have the important quality of paying tribute to >>particular locations. Some of us who've been to India are familiar >>with >> >>>India time >> >>but this gets a bit diffuse; the the city-based terms seem more >>interesting. Others out there (traditional -- or hot off the e-press?) >> >>cheers, >>d.i. >> . >> ..... >> ............ >> \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ >> > david raphael israel < >> >> washington d.c. << >> | davidi@wizard.net (home) >> | disrael@skgf.com (office) >> ========================= >> | thy centuries follow each other >> | perfecting a small wild flower >> | (Tagore) >> //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 18:27:44 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Hugh Steinberg Subject: Re: words Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" With a couple triple snap downs I'll toss the legendary California Stop into this discussion, which is what you do when you're driving and instead of actually stopping at a light or stop sign, merely slow down. I don't know if this a western US regional thing or if it's a little more widespread. Hugh Steinberg ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 29 Apr 1997 21:26:30 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Out here in Albania MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit For anyone in or around Albany, or in driving distance, here's the poetry menu for this weekend, beginning on Thursday, Mayday: MAY DAY A Celebration of Poetry in Performance May 1, 1997 (Thursday) Performing Arts Center University at Albany, Uptown Campus 4:00 p.m. - Recital Hall Informal Seminar by performance poets Bob Holman and Ed Sanders 5:00-7:30 p.m. - Futterer Lounge and Lobby Small Press Book Fair featuring displays by over a dozen independent presses and journals 6:00-7:30 p.m. - Outside the PAC (or Futterer Lounge in the event of bad weather) Poetry Open Mike hosted by Tom Nattell, featuring readings by students and community poets. All are welcome. Sign-up at 5:45 p.m. 8:00 p.m. - Main Theatre Poetry in Performance readings by Bob Holman and Ed Sanders & then, on FRIDAY & SATURDAY: Chris FUNKHOUSER Belle GIRONDA Pierre JORIS Alex REID WILL BE READING/PERFORMING @ 7pm Suny-Albany � Campus Center Assembly Hall� Friday May 2nd FREE & open to the public Joel CHABABE /Pierre JORIS/Xavier CHABOT/Benjamin CHADABE with the ELLEN SINOPOLI DANCE CIE. will give the premiere of Joel Chadabe's composition "With Pierre's Words." @ 8:00pm at the EGG Saturday MAY 3rd PAYING (circa $10+) -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 01:44:33 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Piombino/Simon Subject: Re: Books & Co. In-Reply-To: <33666786.213A@cnsunix.albany.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Books & Co., long one of Manhattan's best poetry/philosophy/critical writing bookstores, is slated to close May 31. The following message from Paul Auster is posted in the window:"For twenty years, Books & Co. has been a sanctuary for readers and writers, a spiritual home for everyone who still believes in the importance of words. New York has been blessed to have this store, and the thought that it may be forced to close has filled me with sorrow. I feel like someone who has just been told that one of his dearest friends is dying.Does money always have to have the last word? Can a squabble over a few pennies actually shut down a place that has meant so much to our city? Don't the people bent on destroying this landmark realize the damage they will be doing? Subtract Books & Co. from New York, and New York loses part of its soul."(signed) Paul Auster 4/21/97 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 08:24:26 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: John Kinsella Subject: CCCP7, children & the domestic! In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII From Tracy Ryan, who's semi-attached (or semi-detached) to this list by virtue of "domesticity": Just a plea for attention to the "bigger things" as well as the small; while I appreciate Karlien's amiable comments, I should point out that as final reader at the Cambridge Conference of Contemporary Poetry I read sixteen poems, two of which mentioned children (& not child care???) and none of which were "domestic", except insofar as one of them mentioned "writing at the kitchen table"--a poem which was a meditation on the way space behaves when the human body/ psyche is in isolation (a person whose house has suddenly become vacant continues to write in the one habitual spot). I am baffled by the description of my work as "clear subject poetry" on domesticity & child care. Perhaps this was some kind of slippage?--since I dedicated one poem to John Kinsella mentioning that he wasn't there because he was at home minding our child. Ironic that even when your "domestic" situation is supportive in a feminist sense, you get patriarchal [?] cliches in the public arena--& from another woman? There's a danger in assuming that because one can immediately apprehend some of the content of a poem it is "clear subject poetry" unaware of its own process or of the often opaque habits of language. And when it isn't opaque for me, it's wrapping itself around & into visual art, landscape, clay, leeches, bees, French translations, trompe l'oeil table-tops, solstices, and internal organs. These were the "subjects" of what I read. Were we at the same reading??? A final note: the Australian poet John Forbes may not qualify for that awesome title of "language poet cognoscentus" but he's very discriminating in his use of "Yes!" and we Australians are more used to him satirising than being satirised [however affectionately]. Perhaps as he sat and listened to the clear and the unclear he was thinking, as in his "Love Poem" ("about"! the Gulf War?) ...I watch the west do what the west does best & know, obscurely, as I go to bed all this is being staged for me. --------------------------------- Well, a first posting may as well be a long one. Tracy Ryan. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 04:48:56 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: rsillima@IX.NETCOM.COM Subject: Poetry & Public Sphere? Comments: To: poetics@UBVM.cc.buffalo.edu MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii I missed the Poetry & the Public Sphere conference in New Brunswick the other day. It interferred with the start of the mini-T-ball season and having been away from my family for the two previous weekends, couldn't imagine a third. But other than a couple of brief oral reports from Bob Perelman and Charles Alexander (which came at Eli Goldblatt's house just two blocks from the site of the so-called summit on volunteerism ((which got more play in the media than did the poetry & the public sphere))), I've heard nought of said conference. Can somebody do the same sort of detailed account that we have now had of the Cambridge Conference? Alterity, by the way, teaches at UC Berkeley. Ron Ron Silliman When this you see 262 Orchard Road Remember me Paoli, PA 19301-1116 (610) 251-2214 (610) 293-6099 (o) (610) 293-5506 (fax) rsillima@ix.netcom.com rsillima@tssc.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 05:02:39 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: rsillima@IX.NETCOM.COM Subject: Robert Erickson Comments: To: silence@bga.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii A word here to note the passing of composer of Robert Erickson (1917-97) after having been bed-ridden for the past 15 years. Erickson was one of those American originals who seemed drawn to the West Coast. One of the first music directors of KPFA in Berkeley and a founder of the music dept at UC San Diego. Charles Shere wrote an excellent bio/study of Erickson that came out a year or two ago (and I believe is still carried by Small Press Distribution in Berkeley) that also contains a CD of the music. There was an obit in yesterday's NY Times that was fairly decent, especially by the sometimes spotty standard of that publication. Ron Ron Silliman When this you see 262 Orchard Road Remember me Paoli, PA 19301-1116 (610) 251-2214 (610) 293-6099 (o) (610) 293-5506 (fax) rsillima@ix.netcom.com rsillima@tssc.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 06:59:43 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Israel Subject: Re: words from Hugh Steinberg: << . . .I'll toss the legendary California Stop into this discussion, which is what you do when you're driving and instead of actually stopping at a light or stop sign, merely slow down. I don't know if this a western US regional thing or if it's a little more widespread. >> as a term, I suspect it's certainly a western US regional thing -- it reminds me of one which I think I'm remembering (rather than making up): > a Berkeley crosswalk (? maybe that has altered in memory; -- anyway, I'd define a Berkeley crosswalk as anywhere a Berkeleyite feels like crossing the street) d.i. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 08:34:18 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Mandel Subject: REPORT CCCP 7 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" It sounds like this fest was fun -- but, do I infer correctly that Tom Raworth was not involved in the goings-on? Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com ******************************************************** Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com 4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 ******************************************************** Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 08:41:06 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Mandel Subject: tiles, miles, ali, and me Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Stories I have yet to relate to the list. Buying Miles a drink when I was 15 (he was wearing a gorgeous pigskin overcoat over a raglan-shouldered houndstooth suit -- he looked like the devil's reply to Charlie Chaplin) Meeting Ali in '95 His suit was covered with stars; he passed me a two-page tract in Arabic crushed in the form of his hands' lost control. Meeting Colin Powell in '96 We discussed old Volvos. He drives (daily) a '66 122S wagon, green. My date with Jessica Lang (she lived on the rue des Rosiers; she stood me up) ...I better stop while you're ahead. Subject: Re: Tom's pingpong rap >but who but me is the ali >better than me for miles. > Tom Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com ******************************************************** Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com 4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 ******************************************************** Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 09:02:39 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: jarnot@PIPELINE.COM Subject: poetry project symposium Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" for anyone who's going to be in New York this weekend, the Poetry Project is holding its yearly symposium: Thursday May 1st: 8pm: reading: Robert Creeley, John Godfrey, Cecilia Vicuna Friday May 2nd: 1pm: Robert Creeley: a talk 3:30 pm: the Secret Gossip of the Poetry Project Part I: memoirs of 30 years at the Poetry Project by several readers including David Henderson, Paul Schmidt, Carolee Schneeman, John Yau, Paul Violi, Barbara Henning, etc. 8 pm: Reading: Jim Carroll, Lou Reed & Anne Waldman Saturday May 3rd: 10:30 am discussion groups: Barbara Henning: Gender and Writing (with Bill Luoma, Eleni Sikelianos, Laird Hunt, Brenda Coultas, Bill Kushner, etc.) Ed Sanders: Activist Poetics: 1955 to 1997 and beyond John Yau: Art and Poetry 1:00 pm Panel discussion: Poetry's Critical Climate: with Erica Hunt, Lisa Jarnot, Gary Lenhart, Joel Lewis, and Cecilia Vicuna 4:00 pm The Secret Gossip of the Poetry Project Part II: with Charles Bernstein, Lee Ann Brown, Alan Davies, Richard Hell, Marjorie Welish, Nick Piombino, Maureen Owen, Anne Waldman, and Tracie Morris 8:00 pm Reading/Performance: Amina Baraka, Amiri Baraka, Todd Colby, Ed Sanders, Tracie Morris Sunday May 4th 2:00 pm The Secret Gossip of the Poetry Project Part III: with Fielding Dawson, Bernadette Mayer, Martha King, Phillip Lopate, Jackson MacLow, Charles North, Douglas Rothschild, Edwin Torres, David Shapiro, Sparrow, etc. The Poetry Project is located at 2nd Avenue and 10th Street on the lower east side. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 08:59:53 -0400 Reply-To: knorris@pstcc.cc.tn.us Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Keith Norris Subject: Re: words In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT We'uns don't slow down. Keith On Tue, 29 Apr 1997 18:27:44 -0600 Hugh Steinberg wrote: > With a couple triple snap downs I'll toss the legendary California Stop > into this discussion, which is what you do when you're driving and instead > of actually stopping at a light or stop sign, merely slow down. I don't > know if this a western US regional thing or if it's a little more > widespread. ---------------------- Keith Norris | knorris@pstcc.cc.tn.us English Dept. PSTCC Knoxville, TN 37933-0990 423.539.7140 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 10:08:41 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Bernstein Subject: NYC Reading Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/enriched; charset="us-ascii" ffff,0000,ffffBruce Andrewsffff,0000,ffff and Charles Bernstein reading at 0000,0000,ffffPosman Books 0000,8080,0000Sunday May 11th at 3pm 1 University Place New York NY (USA) (212-533-BOOK) on the occasion of the reprinting of ffff,0000,0000The L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E Book available by the middle of May from Southern Illinois University Press ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 10:20:45 -0400 Reply-To: Mark Prejsnar Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Prejsnar Subject: Friendly inquiry MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Personal to Tom Mandel: What is the Caucus Conversation?? Mark P. Atlanta ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 11:25:44 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jethro Cadbury Subject: colloquium there follows a plain text version of the prepatory bulletin on the sub voicive colloquium - this is published in Sub Voicive Poetry 1997 number 9 alongside a chunk of texts by Karen MacCormack - and is being mailed out in UK - it will be on the Mainstream web site too within days. Apologies for cross posting Lawrence Upton Preparatory Bulletin Sub Voicive Colloquium 1997 CONVENOR: Lawrence Upton COLLOQUIUM COMMITTTEE: Ken Edwards, Allen Fisher, Robert Hampson, Lawrence Upton Preparatory Bulletin: April 1997 DATE: The Sub Voicive Colloquium 1997 will take place during the autumn of 1997 at a date to be announced. It will be a Saturday event with a poetry reading on the Friday night before. PLACE: Centre for English Studies, Senate House, University of London. APPROACH: There is too much to cover in one colloquium, but we can cover a lot; it is as important to be sure we listen to each other as it is to try to get through too crowded an agenda. It is important that all at the conference work to provide real opportunities to really TALK. (The convenor is committed holding another colloquium in 1998 and perhaps annually thereafter if it seems useful to do so.) The day will be structured and sessions will be chaired. However, we are not necessarily looking for formal papers to be formally delivered. Rather we are looking for activities which will initiate discussion in the colloquium and proposals for possible further action; such activities may well include the presentation of formal papers AIMS: to address issues of importance which have emerged from discussions and activities of working poets in the British Isles: PROPOSED AREAS OF DISCUSSION: What constitutes or why bother to care about * progress * progressive * innovative * inventive Why trouble over paradigms at all The term "linguistically innovative", first used by Gilbert Adair, is now used very widely and quite loosely. Does it have any meaning now? Is it a useful term to be using? Does the term "experimental" have any role? Visual poetry / concrete poetry: Is it being unfairly marginalised these days? has it had its day or is its day still to come? or is all the energy going into 'performance writing' these days? The relationship of poetry to other areas, in particular "performance", to what extent is poetry now separable as a discrete activity To what extent do we mean different things when we speak of the following and how useful are these terms in defining differences: * Poetry * text * writing How does electronic text relate / fit in? CONFERENCE MATERIALS: Finances permitting, there will be background materials of some kind; understanding of what is needed will grow as ideas and proposals become full plans. It is intended that, where appropriate, papers / prepared documents will be published in their colloquium or post colloquium form after the colloquium. It is intended to audio record the proceedings; but the recordings will not be released without relevant permission being granted. CONTRIBUTIONS: There is no agenda with regard to who leads discussions EXCEPT that it is desirable for the final list to be SURPRISING in a constructive way and it shouldn't be an all-male thing or anything like.) Further proposals in the areas outlined above are requested. Please state topics / areas in as much detail as possible together with how you want to do it, how long you want to do it for. NB We may have to limit the amount of time you take. DEADLINE for receipt of proposals: to be announced - keep sending them in. PROPOSED DEADLINE for materials to be included in background materials: to be announced Materials to be reproduced are requested in hard copy and computer file. FINANCES: At this moment there is no money and everything is being done on various people's goodwill. We welcome donations in money and kind! Other forms of finance will be sought but you must be prepared to be working for nothing and travelling for nothing There will be a fee to attend the colloquium. This will be kept as low as possible. A combined (cheaper) ticket to the colloquium and poetry performance will be available Please use email wherever possible because it is not only fast but cheap. Please send s.a.e. / i.r.c. when using the mail. PROMOTING THE COLLOQUIUM: Please tell people and / or pass us the addresses of people who might be interested. CONTACTING US us: Mail: 32 Downside Road, Sutton, Surrey SM2 5HP Telephone 0181 251 2204 Email: cadbury@compuserve.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 10:46:00 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" Subject: Re: tiles, miles, ali, and me Comments: To: Tom Mandel MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN Tom Mandel appears to have ALL the good stories. But I could - if I wanted - tell you about the time I tooled around LA in a pickup truck with Sinead O'Connor riding shotgun. Then there was the time - less elevating to be sure - that I watched Rodney Dangerfield consume an Arby's beef sandwich. Samuel Johnson has nothing on that guy! ---------- From: Tom Mandel To: POETICS Subject: tiles, miles, ali, and me Date: Wednesday, April 30, 1997 7:55AM Stories I have yet to relate to the list. Buying Miles a drink when I was 15 (he was wearing a gorgeous pigskin overcoat over a raglan-shouldered houndstooth suit -- he looked like the devil's reply to Charlie Chaplin) Meeting Ali in '95 His suit was covered with stars; he passed me a two-page tract in Arabic crushed in the form of his hands' lost control. Meeting Colin Powell in '96 We discussed old Volvos. He drives (daily) a '66 122S wagon, green. My date with Jessica Lang (she lived on the rue des Rosiers; she stood me up) ...I better stop while you're ahead. Subject: Re: Tom's pingpong rap >but who but me is the ali >better than me for miles. > Tom Tom Mandel tmandel@screenporch.com ******************************************************** Screen Porch * http://screenporch.com 4031 University Dr. Suite 200 * vox: 703-934-2034 Fairfax, VA 22030-3409 * fax: 703-391-6881 ******************************************************** Join the Caucus Conversation ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 12:13:47 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "David R. Israel" Subject: "The center & circumference of silence" Comments: cc: BABA@JWS.SUNYERIE.EDU MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT It has come to my attn that there has appeared, as of this month, Vol. 1, No. 1 of a new (evidently academic) journal: International Journal of Hindu Studies They have a website: http://www.clas.ufl.edu/users/gthursby/ijhs/contents.htm but the articles themselves don't appaer on the site. However, they are putting abstracts of the articles on the site. The 1st abstract from the 1st issue seems of potential interest to Poetics denizens, ergo I reproduce that here: / / / / / The center and circumference of silence: Yoga, poststructuralism, and the rhetoric of paradox by George Kalamaras Some recent studies of Hindu yoga have tended to ignore the dialogical aspect of this philosophy and, thus, its compatibility with poststructuralist theory and poetics. This paper focuses on paradox as sacred experience, arguing that the reciprocal paradigm of yogic meditative philosophy is a dialogical system capable of accommodating paradox and recasting it as a generative condition. Yogic philosophy thus offers an epistemology compatible with that of radical poetics, one that can ultimately enrich poststructuralist poetics in ways truer to their radical intent. / / / / / [author of the above]: GEORGE KALAMARAS Associate Professor of English and Director of Creative Writing at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne I've not seen the Journal itself (nor read the essay described above). "paradox as sacred experience" -- a phrase to conjure with (as they say) -- d.i. . ..... ............ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////\\\\\ > david raphael israel < >> washington d.c. << | davidi@wizard.net (home) | disrael@skgf.com (office) ========================= | thy centuries follow each other | perfecting a small wild flower | (Tagore) //////////////////////////////////////////\\\\\///// ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 12:15:37 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jethro Cadbury Subject: Gin & UK On Wed, 23 Apr 1997 17:10:27 -0700 George Bowering wrote <> He is being spendthrift with the truth... There is a type of Englishman abroad... I once went over a smallish mountain made huge by enormous heat with an Englishman who would take rest breaks every hour or so - he would sit on a rock or stump or whatever and produce a depleting bottle of ouzo - this was in Greece - and a rod of plastic cups... as the way became more arduous it seemed to matter less and the way back became more of a guess - it was enjoyable and clearly survivable - but it was not normal Lawrence Upton ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 09:30:08 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Aldon L. Nielsen" Subject: Re: tiles, miles, ali, and me In-Reply-To: <01IIBBN7BDFA8ZHQAJ@iix.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII That's nothing to brag about -- I once met a man at a bus stop in Los Angeles who had never heard of Kevin Bacon! ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 12:04:40 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Grant Jenkins Subject: Re: alterity Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Jeffrey: For the best explanation of "Alterity" as relating to otherness, check out Emmanuel Levinas's _Totality and Infinity_. In this book, he uses alterity to distinguish his use of the Other from that of a dialectical relationship of self and other. Instead of otherness being that against which the subject defines itself, "Alterity" for Levinas signifies that the Other is not a construct of the cognition of the subject. Instead, the Other is beyond reason and even beyond Being and transcends any idea the subject can have of the Other. Hope that helps. I'm doing a project relating this idea of alterity to poetry. Back channel me if you want more info. Grant Jenkins ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 09:56:01 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Susan E. Dunn" Subject: Writing the Speculative Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Since I just got back on the poetics wagon I'm not sure if this has been announced already. If so, then I apologize for the redundancy. For those in the Bay Area, this Friday May 2 Hank Lazer will be reading at the Stanford Bookstore at 4:00pm and on Saturday May 3 the Stanford Humanities Center presents "Writing the Speculum: A Symposium on Poetry and Knowledge." The full schedule of panelists and paper titles is now available on the web page: http://shc.stanford.edu/shc/poetry.knowledge.html -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Susan E. Dunn, Ph.D. Associate Director "Make the world your salon" Stanford Humanities Center - Mina Loy Mariposa House Tel: 415-725-0896 546 Salvatierra Walk Fax: 415-723-1895 Stanford University email: sedunn@leland.stanford.edu Stanford, CA 94305-8630 www: http://shc.stanford.edu --------------------------------------------------------------------------- ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 13:25:35 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: AG's Re-censored Howl John Whiting ---------- Forwarded Message ---------- RE: [Fwd: HOWL gets censored] Listener Howls, Radio Host Bounced by Michael Stutz 3:02pm 29.Apr.97.PDT "Howl," an Allen Ginsberg opus that has drawn censors' attention ever since it was first publicly spoken four decades ago, has gotten a Cleveland talk-show host kicked off the air. Cleveland's WERE-AM pulled the plug on The Gilly Show after an eight-minute reading of the poem's opening stanzas early Monday morning. Phil Ferrante, the show's producer, said that the station's action came as a surprise, considering that the poem was read just before 2 a.m., well into what the FCC deems "Safe Harbor" for material that might be considered indecent. "We even talked about [the FCC Safe Harbor Policy] on the air, we talked about Ginsberg and free speech and told everyone all night that we'd be reading it on the air." Like most of the station's non-syndicated content, The Gilly Show was among WERE's 88 hours of brokered programming - radio talk for pay-to-play broadcast time. A few local bars and nightclubs sponsored the show to help it break even, and despite its status as a brokered program, it was rated the Number One show on the station by Arbitron during the last ratings period, Ferrante said. John Hill, WERE station and program manager, said that the show's host, who goes only by the name of Gilly, knew the rules. "Everyone who starts a brokered show goes through a one-hour indoctrination of what can and can't be done on the air," he said. "We have a very liberal list of rules and regulations that we ask [the brokered shows] to follow - you have to do this when dealing with amateurs." The topic of last Sunday's show had been the radio free-speech issues as well as a tribute to Ginsberg, who died earlier this month. There were plenty of listener-discretion warnings throughout the show, said Gilly, a four-year veteran of WERE. "'Howl' is taught in high schools, for God's sake - it's a done deal, you can read this at night [during Safe Harbor]." The partial reading generated compliments - "A girl called afterward and said, 'You are too cool. I'm very interested in what you read and would like to get a copy of it,'" Gilly said - and one complaint. "A guy flipping stations was driving around with his 13-year-old daughter, and called the station to say that he was 'offended' by the F-word," he said. And that is what brought an end to the show. "I didn't hear the program," said Hill, "but the only thing I know is that the language used was deemed inappropriate for the station." ENDS MIME-Version: 1.0 References: <199704301613.MAA17882@wizard.wizard.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit John Whiting forwarded the following to me; it shld inetrest the list, so I'm forwarding it in turn -- Pierre ---------- Forwarded Message ---------- RE: [Fwd: HOWL gets censored] Listener Howls, Radio Host Bounced by Michael Stutz 3:02pm 29.Apr.97.PDT "Howl," an Allen Ginsberg opus that has drawn censors' attention ever since it was first publicly spoken four decades ago, has gotten a Cleveland talk-show host kicked off the air. Cleveland's WERE-AM pulled the plug on The Gilly Show after an eight-minute reading of the poem's opening stanzas early Monday morning. Phil Ferrante, the show's producer, said that the station's action came as a surprise, considering that the poem was read just before 2 a.m., well into what the FCC deems "Safe Harbor" for material that might be considered indecent. "We even talked about [the FCC Safe Harbor Policy] on the air, we talked about Ginsberg and free speech and told everyone all night that we'd be reading it on the air." Like most of the station's non-syndicated content, The Gilly Show was among WERE's 88 hours of brokered programming - radio talk for pay-to-play broadcast time. A few local bars and nightclubs sponsored the show to help it break even, and despite its status as a brokered program, it was rated the Number One show on the station by Arbitron during the last ratings period, Ferrante said. John Hill, WERE station and program manager, said that the show's host, who goes only by the name of Gilly, knew the rules. "Everyone who starts a brokered show goes through a one-hour indoctrination of what can and can't be done on the air," he said. "We have a very liberal list of rules and regulations that we ask [the brokered shows] to follow - you have to do this when dealing with amateurs." The topic of last Sunday's show had been the radio free-speech issues as well as a tribute to Ginsberg, who died earlier this month. There were plenty of listener-discretion warnings throughout the show, said Gilly, a four-year veteran of WERE. "'Howl' is taught in high schools, for God's sake - it's a done deal, you can read this at night [during Safe Harbor]." The partial reading generated compliments - "A girl called afterward and said, 'You are too cool. I'm very interested in what you read and would like to get a copy of it,'" Gilly said - and one complaint. "A guy flipping stations was driving around with his 13-year-old daughter, and called the station to say that he was 'offended' by the F-word," he said. And that is what brought an end to the show. "I didn't hear the program," said Hill, "but the only thing I know is that the language used was deemed inappropriate for the station." ENDS -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 14:17:12 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Subject MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit My humble apologies for making the subject such a bloated object in my AG Howl censorship post -- overhasty cut&paste cleared the difference between head(er) & body Pierre -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 1 May 1997 14:15:28 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joel Lewis Subject: National Poetry Month (fwd) Comments: cc: 'till.next.year@mindspring.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" dear folks--found this on CAP-L list.... joel lewis >---------- Forwarded message ---------- >Date: Wed, 30 Apr 97 09:38:44 CST >From: Woods@act.org >To: cap-l@tc.umn.edu >Subject: National Poetry Month > > > A friend who's not a poet just passed this to me from MSN's website--I > can't resist passing it on, for what it's worth, on the last day of > April: > > --------------------------------------- > --------------------------------------- > > April is National Poetry Month in the United States, and I have to pause > at the thought of poets adopting a month that begins with a day for > fools. After the jokes are over, the poets begin to emerge from the > woodwork, frayed manuscripts in hand. > > The rest of the year, poets tend to be a shy, reclusive lot -- admitting > to their craft only in certain smoky bars or empty houses, at midnight, > in a closet. The democracy and accessibility of the World Wide Web is > changing that. With great surprise and gladness, I have surfed, or > stumbled, onto a proliferation of poetry. It flourishes. It is > everywhere. > > The Internet has filled some primal need of poets languishing in college > classrooms and day jobs. They flock to the Web, they write, and on the > Internet they can publish their work for a potentially large and varied > audience. That is the first magic. > > My guess is that in a way, the Web has rescued poetry publishing. As > print costs rise, the Internet provides a comparatively inexpensive venue > -- one that more easily supports long works, and four-color art to > accompany them. Electronic publishing also allows a more flexible > schedule, with updates ranging from quarterly to every day. > > Come One, Come All > > The Web has something for everyone. Yahoo's Poet List will link you to > sites on some of history's finest and best known -- from Sappho, Dante > Alighieri, and Yeats to Seamus Heaney, Maya Angelou, and Rita Dove. It's > a fine site to bookmark for those days when you really want to read > Alfred, Lord Tennyson, or you find yourself down to the wire on a Chaucer > report. > > For a more informal sampling, you can visit a wealth of individual poets' > pages and e-zines. Some of them are aggressively self-labeled as > alternative or underground. Many are described as cutting edge, which > sounds exciting, but I haven't quite figured out what it means. Others > seek to continue the more polished tradition of printed literary reviews. > An example is Switched-on Gutenberg, a "Global Poetry Journal" that is > published solely for the Web by the University of Washington. > > I even found an Electro Magnetic Poetry page, for people whose > refrigerator real estate is at a premium. > > Now that the forum exists, poets are budding and blossoming, scrawling > and pecking at keys to put their poems out in public. As I browse from > site to site, I begin to recognize some of the names, and I remember the > poets whose work I enjoyed. > > Established regional and international print reviews haven't been left > out of the loop. One of my favorites is Painted Bride Quarterly, which > posts the kind of poetry that can make me gasp. College and university > reviews weigh in with a commanding Web presence. Print publications with > online sites often include an e-mail address, and information on > subscribing or ordering back issues. > > Keep on Clicking > > Here is the second magic: Nearly every one of these Web sites includes a > list of more sites. You can read poetry all day. > > Again, Yahoo offers a great place to start, listing a variety of literary > Web sites. Those newly added are highlighted at the top for a few days > before being alphabetized. One jump, and I'm on a wild journey through > words. If I'm not thrilled by the poems on a site, I can click my trusty > Back button or move onward. > > Another Web destination with a dizzying assortment of links is Zuzu's > Petals (yes, named for the Zuzu you've known and loved in Frank Capra's > It's a Wonderful Life). Zuzu's Petals provides a clearinghouse of more > than 2,000 links to information on writers' resources, grants, literary > magazines and e-zines, and readings -- in addition to the online Zuzu's > Petals Quarterly. > > A World of Poetry > > Not only has the accessibility of the World Wide Web encouraged poets to > share their work, it has become the nurturing ground for an exciting > sense of community. On the Internet, it's a global community. I can > visit the Web site of the venerable Academy of American Poets, which > sponsors National Poetry Month, to find out about upcoming events. I can > check into the local poetry scene in Pittsburgh or London. I can browse > through an online workshop, e-mail feedback on the poems posted there, > explore writing exercises suggested by other poets, find out about > upcoming contests, submit poems for consideration, or simply relish > immersion in words. > > One of the most exciting discoveries I've made is the Poetry Webring, a > worldwide poetry circle. Webrings are a free Internet service "committed > to creating a new kind of Web community," and exist on a variety of > topics. Links on Webring pages point to a CGI script on a server, so > sites can be added or deleted without changing links on individual pages > or interrupting the ring. From any site on a Webring, you can jump to the > next site, skip the next site, or choose to preview the next five sites, > encouraging a journey of immense proportions and diversity. The idea is > that if you keep jumping long enough, you'll return to your starting > place. The Poetry Webring, however, encompasses more than 460 sites, so > it will take a while. > > The Internet and e-mail are affecting poetry in another way. Writing is > ultimately about communication. And the Web technologies allow poet > colleagues to communicate across previously difficult distances. A recent > issue of Poets and Writers, which includes Poetry News on its Web site, > ran an article about a Wyoming writing workshop consisting of poets, > fiction writers, and other wordsmiths who used e-mail to send each other > work and reply with feedback -- something that would have been at the > very least improbable had it required meeting in a central location for > six weeks. > > It's giddy. It's marvelous. And it's all just a few clicks away. The > excitement generated by National Poetry Month thrives all year long on > the World Wide Web. The poets may stick to their garrets, but they're > online now -- a benefit for us all. > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -- > Joannie Kervran is the author of A Steady Longing for Flight, which > received the 1995 Floating Bridge Press Chapbook Award and is available > through the publisher. Joannie has been writing poetry for about 14 > years, and her work has appeared in Point No Point, Rain City Review, and > Wings Magazine; her short fiction has been published in Farm Pulp. When > released from writing or coding HTML for the World Wide Web, Joannie > tends children and old roses. A sample of her poetry is below. > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- -- > > > Undressing > > Last night, reluctance slipped from my shoulders like a silk shawl, fell > in small anxieties I could step over easily into your reach. Now I > gather them around me, look for answers in the treacherous folds, look > for an image of you > > bent over the table as you try to shift the balance and flow of wood > until it will slide like water, stand like stone. Your hand follows the > grain. Rain slaps the windows and you throw another scrap into the stove. > Heat is an elixir. > > Across town the rooms grow dark. I reach for a part of you that's lost > in the mysteries of cherry and maple. Drafts creep in from ill-fitted > corners, tighten my skin. I try on names for your absence like someone > else's clothing. The silk is elusive. Night is another chance. > > > > ;Loved this article? Hated it? Think you could write a better > one? ;Send us your feedback! > > > > 8 1997 Microsoft Corporation > > > > ************************************ JOEL LEWIS penwaves@mindspring.com >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> SLEEP FASTER! WE NEED THE PILLOWS! --- Yiddish aphorism <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 14:21:34 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Ken Edwards Subject: REPORT CCCP 7 Thanks, Karlien, for that careful and attentive description of the Cambridge Conference of Contemporary Poetry. I was going to attempt one of my own, but my take on what went on is not so very different, so I'll abandon it. Except to add my tuppen'orth on the one session she missed out which I was at, the Saturday morning one: Pierre-Yves Soucy and Staffan Soderblum. The former a Belgian-based French-Canadian, the latter from Sweden, and both previously unknown to me. Soucy's poems were long, dense, abstract, knotted, and possessed of an uncanny momentum. This meant that Ian Patterson's skilful translations had to wait a while to be heard, but the alternative - to interrupt the sequences - would have been untenable. Soderblum, was lighter, his poems shorter, but with a resonance that followed hard behind them: language leaving its traces, animal footprints in the snow. He prefaced the reading with some words on the translation process. Rod Mengham read English translations, including one of his own, having no Swedish - this exercise amused Soderblum. Last night (Tuesday) Karen Mac Cormack gave another tour de force reading at SubVoicive, the Three Cups, London, this time duetting with Alan Halsey on a collaborative piece which kind of zinged. Hope to see it in print soon. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 14:11:43 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Dale Smith Subject: Re: alterity Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" jeffrey- I'm curious. What is "the dilemma of using 'otherness'" and why does it need to be gotten out of? Dale >would someone explain this term? i take it that it seeks to get out of >the dilemma of using "otherness"? > >jeffrey timmons ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 15:38:54 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: from Britlist MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Ric Caddel posted the following to the brit&rish list, but I thought it would interest a number of you here in the US. This is indeed an indespendable infotool for anyone who wants to know what's happening across the big A. My only query being that odd date "1977"-- I take it to be a typo -- Pierre The new ed. of the Association of Little Presses' CATALOGUE OF LITTLE PRESS BOOKS IN PRINT (No.14, 1977) is now out. It costs 3 pounds 75, and is available from ALP Co-ordinator Chris Jones, 111 Banbury Rd Oxford OX2 6JX. It's an invaluable resource: list of UK little presses, access point for work by numerous UK authors (including members of this list!), bookshops (many of which do mail order) and - of course - individual press adverts. As well as pointing out new things which I'd never have heard of, it reminded me of a lot of blasts from the past, things I want to dig out and re-read. And some really weird stuff too. New readers, start here - with caution... ___________________________________________________________ Richard Caddel Durham University Library, Stockton Rd., Durham DH1 3LY, UK E-mail: R.I.Caddel @ durham.ac.uk Phone: +44 (0)191 374 3044 Fax: +44 (0)191 374 7481 WWW: http://www.dur.ac.uk/~dul0ric "Words! Pens are too light. Take a chisel to write." - Basil Bunting ___________________________________________________________ ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 15:41:45 +0000 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Pierre Joris Subject: Re: "The center & circumference of silence" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit David R. Israel wrote: > > It has come to my attn that there has appeared, as of this month, > Vol. 1, No. 1 of a new (evidently academic) journal: > International Journal of Hindu Studies ...... > The 1st abstract from the 1st issue seems of potential interest to > Poetics denizens, ergo I reproduce that here: > > / / / / / > > The center and circumference of silence: Yoga, poststructuralism, and > the rhetoric of paradox > by George Kalamaras > > Some recent studies of Hindu yoga have tended to ignore the > dialogical aspect of this philosophy and, thus, its compatibility > with poststructuralist theory and poetics. This paper focuses on > paradox as sacred experience, arguing that the reciprocal paradigm > of yogic meditative philosophy is a dialogical system capable of > accommodating paradox and recasting it as a generative condition. > Yogic philosophy thus offers an epistemology compatible with that > of radical poetics, one that can ultimately enrich > poststructuralist poetics in ways truer to their radical intent. > > / / / / / > [author of the above]: > GEORGE KALAMARAS > Associate Professor of English and Director of Creative > Writing at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne > Kalamaras has an interesting essay on poetry & mysticism in the current (a recent?) issue of Ed Foster's TALISMAN. Worth reading & arguying with. -- Pierre -- ========================================= pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Everything that allows men to become rooted, through values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in _one_ language, is the principle of alienation which constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, [...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot ========================================== ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 16:15:26 EDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Henry Gould Subject: reading in RhodeIsland May Reading at Native Gallery Karen Donovan, Henry Gould, Stephen Sartarelli, Janet Sullivan Fri. May 9th, 9 pm Native Gallery, 387 Charles St, Providence. Call the gallery at 401- 521-3554 for directions, or email me (Henry_Gould@brown.edu) reading follows opening for May show - a solo exhibition, "Strange Journey : paintings by Entang Wiharso". Opening 5-8 pm. all events free. "Henry Gould is not just an internet squall" - Eric Blarnes ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 16:55:56 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Kellogg Subject: Re: from Britlist Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Pierre or anybody, what's the scope of this list, and how can I get on? Cheers, David At 03:38 PM 4/30/97 +0000, Pierre Joris wrote: >Ric Caddel posted the following to the brit&rish list, but I thought it >would interest a number of you here in the US. This is indeed an >indespendable infotool for anyone who wants to know what's happening >across the big A. My only query being that odd date "1977"-- I take it >to be a typo -- Pierre > >The new ed. of the Association of Little Presses' CATALOGUE OF LITTLE >PRESS BOOKS IN PRINT (No.14, 1977) is now out. It costs 3 pounds 75, and >is available from ALP Co-ordinator Chris Jones, 111 Banbury Rd Oxford >OX2 >6JX. > >It's an invaluable resource: list of UK little presses, access point for >work by numerous UK authors (including members of this list!), bookshops >(many of which do mail order) and - of course - individual press >adverts. >As well as pointing out new things which I'd never have heard of, it >reminded me of a lot of blasts from the past, things I want to dig out >and >re-read. And some really weird stuff too. New readers, start here - with >caution... > >___________________________________________________________ >Richard Caddel >Durham University Library, Stockton Rd., Durham DH1 3LY, UK >E-mail: R.I.Caddel @ durham.ac.uk >Phone: +44 (0)191 374 3044 Fax: +44 (0)191 374 7481 >WWW: >http://www.dur.ac.uk/~dul0ric > >"Words! Pens are too light. Take a chisel to write." > - Basil >Bunting >___________________________________________________________ > > >========================================= >pierre joris 6 madison place albany ny 12202 >tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu >http://www.albany.edu/~joris/ >--------------------------------------------------------------------------- >Everything that allows men to become rooted, through >values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in >_one_ language, is the principle of alienation which >constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is, >[...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality >and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose >it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot >========================================== > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ David Kellogg kellogg@acpub.duke.edu Box 90023, Duke University (919) 660-4357 Durham, NC 27708 FAX (919) 660-4381 http://www.duke.edu/~kellogg/ There is no mantle and it does not descend. --Thomas Kinsella ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 16:13:00 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Pritchett,Pat @Silverplume" Subject: Re: from Britlist Comments: To: Pierre Joris MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN Speaking of things - and people - across the sea: can anyone give me any info on a English poet named Anthony Barnett and his book _The Resting of the Bells_? Backchannel wld be fine. Thanks. Patrick Pritchett ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 30 Apr 1997 20:35:51 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Charles Bernstein Subject: LINEbreak in RealAudio Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/enriched; charset="us-ascii" We are beginning to put up all the LINEbreak poetry radio shows in Real Audio on the EPC. LINEbreak is a series of about 30 shows, produced by Martin Spinelli, which I host. The shows have both conversations and readings. As of now, we have RealAudio only for Lyn Hejinian, Loss Glazier & Ken Sherwood, Ted Pearson, and Carla Harryman. (The other shows on the site are in .mpeg and .wav formats, which take time to load before playing.) More will be put up week by week. (You can also get all the shows on cassette.) RealAudio (or Real) Players are available free. They let you listen to the show in real time in low fidelity. Information about this is on the site. http://writing.upenn.edu/epc/linebreak/programs/