Updates Archive: October 2005

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October 30, 2005 4:25 AM Topher Tune alias Chris Church dedicates this moving poem (about "nothing" (link), "in particular"(link) (link)) to me. Moved.

October 29, 2005 1:45 PM Ralf Andtbacka, Ida Börjel, Agneta Enckell, Helena Eriksson and Marina Ciglar, Jörgen Gassilewski, Anna Hallberg, Johannes Heldén and Fredrik Nyberg, Karin Huber, Jonimatti Joutsijärvi, Leevi Lehto, J. O. Mallander, Teemu Manninen, Peter Mickwitz, Reetta Niemelä, Ulf Karl Olov Nilsson, Jyrki Pellinen, Lars Mikael Raattamaa, Cia Rinne, Oscar Rossi, Aki Salmela, Miia Toivio, Juhana Vähänen, Heidi von Wright. This is a - probably partial - list of Swedish, Finland-Swedish, and Finnish poets to perform in Bar Dubrovnik, Eerikinkatu 11, Helsinki, November 22, 7 PM to 1 AM. Responsible for organizing this Kohina event are literary magazines OEI (Sweden) and Tuli&Savu (Finland) together with Galleria Huuto, and it also connects to a text-art exhibition at the Galleria by Jörgen Gassilewski, Anna Hallberg, and Cia Rinne. I wonder if it's the largerst gathering of Swedish and Finnish poets to appear at the same stage during one evening ever - and whether it's gonna be covered here.

October 29, 2005 10:03 AM Charles posts a link to a German dissertation (in English) on his work: Ursula Göricke: Poetry as Epistemological Inquiry: Reading Bernstein Reading Cavell Reading Wittgenstein. My instinct is it may interest some of my 22 subscribers at blogilista.fi.

October 29, 2005 7:43 AM Kari Klemelä's Suomentajan huomioita may be the one active Finnish blog on translation now. These days Kari often refers to Tomaz Salamun (Tomas Salamun), a fine Slovenian poet whose volume in Finnish he's working on. The Tuli&Savu board had this discussion with Tomaz back in August 2003.

October 28, 2005 8:55 AM Quite many poets of the world have not learned to use Technorati tags yet.

October 28, 2005 6:02 AM Can I say this? I think we Finns are priviledged to have Rauno Räsänen as a blogizen (bastardly from citizen, of course). Witness, most recently, this long entry ("Part One") on the dialectics of metaphysics / communality versus individuality / scepticism in the history of thinking and art. Why couldn't I? Well, Rauno writes in response to some poetics posts by Teemu Manninen, and to my recent piece on Kenneth Goldsmith. It's a lot out of nothing, to say the least... I may have reasons to re-join the discussion; suffice it to say here that I'm not thinking of myself as a supporter of individualism / scepsis in any of the meanings given to them by Rauno so far. - The same by Woogle (you may have to wait a bit). (Via Sven Laakso and Karri Kokko.)

October 27, 2005 15:35 PM With me in a panel discussion about sivistys at the Helsinki Book Fair today, Hamdam Zakirov (Finnish spelling?), of Uzhbekistan Ferghana School of Poetry, a movement "influenced by the traditional Russian poetry and the classics of Persia, China, and Intia, together with the 20th century Western Modernism" (Jukka Mallinen). Hamdam now lives and writes in Kouvola, Finland, and is learning Finnish at an astonishing pace. His useful site forms an important part of what is (should be viewed as) contemporary Finnish literature (both geographically and in terms of the language and its conditions).

October 27, 2005 12:32 AM The Russian Connection.

October 27, 2005 8:41 AM Two new Finnish poetry bloggers: Henri Alavus (a pseudonyme), and Mikael Brygger.

October 27, 2005 8:02 AM Microsoft Mary Reads Google. Anonymous: "Horny Cunt" (mp3, 412 KB, 1:45, in nine movements); Anonymous: "Isotissi" (mp3, 0,99 MB, 4:20, with a small chorus).

October 26, 2005 15:19 PM New revealing image(s), click here.

October 26, 2005 1058:50 AM Tomorrow, Oct. 27, I'll be at the Helsinki Book Fair - taking part in a panel discussion on "sivistys" (education? culture? (Bildung)), and in presentation of Suom.huom., a book of essays on translation. See My Calendar.

October 26, 2005 8:51 AM The Tuli&Savu board spews out great new Finnish poetry: Juhana Vähänen (the two "Poetics" pieces); Teemu Manninen (the entrys of Oct 25, 26); and Miia Toivio (the Flarf poem at the end of the posting).

October 26, 2005 6:12 AM Markku Paasonen: Let the Motherfucker Burn (a Google Poem).

October 25, 2005 5:50 PM For those of you in Toronto tonight, note the launch of O Spam, Poams: Selected Daily Treated Spam by Rob Read, at 7:30 at Yammy the Cat, 1108 Yonge Street at Roxborough. For more info, visit www.dailytreatedspam.com.

October 25, 2005 2:15 PM Ron Silliman writes about The Other Tradition by John Ashbery (& a follow-up post today), prompting me to publish (as an example (or a contra one?) of the "parisimony principle") this draft translation into Finnish of Ashbery's "...by an Eartquake". I made the draft very quickly - in less than an hour, I think - for a reading I organized around the theme of Pacific Tsunami in early January. - For an alternative (or same?) view on quakes, you may want to navigate to the Pakistan Earthquake blog.

October 25, 2005 12:36 AM Iveel Othel: Edasanas (mp3, 2,46 MB, 10:47). (This incantation was reverse-engineered by Marko Niemi, the Poetry Engineer.)

October 25, 2005 9:12 AM To tsuransurate youru name into Japanesedo asu ueruru, you mai uishito to go here. Gureechingusu, Reebi Refuto. Via Phile Center.

October 25, 2005 7:22 AM In our continuing series "It's all been said before", Teemu Manninen today backs into this quote from T. S. Eliot on "expression" versus "medium". For Tom himself on "what you already know", check another quote at the Prufrock page; and to listen to his own R-sound-ripe reading of The Waste Land, go here.

October 24, 2005 6:32 PM Geof Huth is learning Finnish.

October 24, 2005 5:36 PM "Computer supported poetry writing using translation engines and whatever can be found on the internet" at exquisite poetry by Leena.

October 24, 2005 4:41 PM A Follow-Up On Haavikko. 1) A recording of a classic interview by Hannu Taanila with the poet in 1975 (ra, 58:32) is available at www.yle.fi (or click here). 2) Basics on the poet in English: kirjasto.sci, virtual.finland.fi. 3) Decided put online the "First Poem" from my unpublished new translation into English of Talvipalatsi (The Winter Palace, 1959). This was prepared for a seminar back in 2003, in Helsinki, where Marjorie Perloff gave a talk on the work, comparing it to the poetry of Rimbaud (unfortunately there's no recording of the event, and Marjorie just had notes...). I publish my version without consulting the Maestro about permissions and such - may do that later...; 4) Here's an excellent Dutch site with a host of translations of the same poem - to Dutch, English, French, Spanish, Slovakian, Czech.

October 24, 2005 8:16 AM ">Subject: Septic_Tanks_-_What_You_Should_
Recognize" by Rob Read also features a great blurb about his Daily Treated SpamTM project. Click here to learn more.

October 23, 2005 7:12 AM "Runo on se, mitä ei voi sanoa toisin. Sen asiaa ei ole olemassa ennen kuin se on sanottu. (...) Tuntuu kuin varsinkin loppusoinnullisen runon mahdollisuudet, kielessämme verraten vähäiset, olisi aikoinaan viljelty melkein tyhjiin, eikä se maaperä tunnu vielä toipuneen, uusiutuneen. Toisaalta olen kyllä alkanut mieltyä tekstiin, joka perustuu hilpeään riimittelyyn siinä määrin, että elää pelkästään sen varassa, sen kummempia 'sanomatta'." Haavikko as Lönnrot, 1984 (with my emphasis), from a fascinating project and book, Paavo Haavikko (ed.): Suomen kansan uusia runoja (New Poems by Finnish People), INFO 1984. I'm teaching it at my poetry classes in Kriittinen korkeakoulu.

October 22, 2005 7:06 AM "Shadowtime is not a work about Benjamin's mind; it is - to the best of Bernstein and Ferneyhough's abilities - Benjamin's mind." In Jacket 28, a toughtful overview of the opera and the book, by Colin Browne. And note the upcoming BBC 3 Broadcast on Sat., Nov. 12, 18:30 GMT. Charles' Shadowtime page is here.

October 21, 2005 2:24 PM After all my amateurish sound-crap, meet Charlie Morrow, of Charlie Morrow Productions - a conceptualist and maple syrup maker, and a apparently a big name in newest in surround sound technology with his "3d sound cube" that "can allow you to experience the extreme, like being run through by motorcycle or swung around by a super roller coaster". In this small world of ours, I was introduced to Charlie by a mutual friend, Charles Bernstein, and not only because of his close connection to Finland (he actually exhibited the 3D cube in Porvoo last Summer), but also in view of his many contributions to sound art and poetry. Together with Jerome Rothenberg, he is the founder of The New Wilderness Foundation, Inc., with the mission of "New/Old Explorations of Sound and Oral Poetry", and has been collaborating with, among others, Steve "Wukkers Friend" McCaffery. Rothenberg, of course is the editor of the Ethnopoetics secion at Ubu, (see/hear "soundings"). Some binaural samples of Charlie's, including the motorcycle, are available here, and I strongly advice you not to miss them....

October 21, 2005 10:32 AM To wrap up (?) my week in readings, here's (mp3, 0,58 MB, 1:00) Microsoft Sam on "Nocturne", by Eino Leino.

October 21, 2005 8:03 AM... A sestina by Timo Salo; a poem by ill...

October 20, 2005 00:01 PM A Day in Google Poems. I always like to see the youngsters like my cadget; here's the_sweet. Timo Salo has some fine (Finnish) passwords. And also see Martin's (see below) piece in the Anthology.

October 20, 2005 8:00 PM, it's after eigth, and my first poem-as-spam from Rob Read reads: "wird Nachfolger / der die das / Pro-Helvetica wegen / nach acht / abgeben muss" (my emphasis).

October 20, 2005 5:59 PM On Blogistanian Expansion. Re my earlier note, Martin Larsen is now confirming that his blog can again be read in China, and besides, "det samme gælder ALLE GOOGLES BLOGSPOT-SIDER". As Martin puts it, "Det hjælper at tale til folk! Det hjælper at engagere sig!" Somehow, it feels fitting to note here that, according to the Technorati Weblog, about one new weblog is now created each second...

October 20, 2005 12:00 AM & this is my first attack at my "Sanasade" (Word Rain) (mp3, 6,3 MB, 10:47) from Ampauksia (it's in Finnish, apparently... though a command of that language won't help you much, either...)

October 20, 2005 9:54 AM This one sure is a classic. "The Kummunist Manifesto or Wot We Wukkers Want" (mp3, 5:54; text). & more readings by Steve McCaffery at PennSound.

October 20, 2005 7:57 AM Now I'm looking forward to getting spammed (subscribed to this project by Rob Read, a Canadian poet).

October 19, 2005 9:44 PM PAX is Post-Modern Academic Carelia Society (siis Postmoderni Akateeminen Karjala-seura) that does not attempt at a revival of the infamous 1930's rightist movement but instead opts for a "non-exclusive ethnic identity" and an "open Carelianism". Now they even have a group blog that concentrates on "reactions". Interesting. Via Eufemia.

October 19, 2005 16:33 PM To know what's hot poetically in these parts of world just now, navigate to this entry at dbqp by Geof Huth (of Schenectady, New York, US) which might be the best in-depth guide to visual poetry (vispo among friends) online today. Geof has three announcements to make: 1) on Audiatur, a recent festival of new poetry in Bergen, Norway, organized, among others, by Paal Bjelke Andersen (whose blog, Omsengate, is always worth following), 2) on Poet's Corner, a great Italian-based website for poetry (great not only or primarily because of these poems and translations of mine there) by Anny Ballardini - and 3) on nokturno.org, "the Finnish Ubu Web". To wrap up the world tour, I learned about Geof's entry via Mark Young, of Australia, who also has interesting (translated) stuff at Nokturno. - & while at dbqp, make sure to colsult Geof's instructive Essential Vocabulary of vispo, now in its version 3.0.

October 19, 2005 11:26 AM I'm playing with Acoustic Labs Multitrack Recorder (bought online for $19,90) to redeem a promise given a year ago in my Ampauksia ympäripyörivästä raketista (Savukeidas 2004) to put online readings of two poems in that book. This (mp3, 1,94 MB, 3:24) is my first try on "Elegia" (Elegy).

October 19, 2005 8:59 AM Karl Rove gives Bitty the shivers, making her produce this Google Poem on the subject.

October 18, 2005 9:15 PM Jukka-Pekka Kervinen has invented a great poetic washmachine (posts Oct. 13 to 17, so far).

October 18, 2005 8:20 AM Two superb readings of The Last Acts of St. Fuck You, by Ben Porter: by the author, and by Kenneth Goldsmith. & you may also want to check out Porter's Found Poems (from 1968) at Ubu Web.

October 17, 2005 1:05 PM Listen to Microsoft Mike read "Of the Help Her Art", my "first Google poem" from Fall 2002.

October 17, 2005 8:15 It's so sad. After Matti Wuori (1945-2005), one intellectual less in Finland.

October 16, 2005 16:00 lindharma: lindharma said...

October 16, 2005 12:55 AM Well, it's almost like looking into a mirror - and they even asked about it: Intellectual (83%), Artistic (90%), Narcissism (83%), Adventurousness (90%), Work ethic (83%), Anti-authority (83%), Sexuality (83%) - while Orderliness (16%), Religious (10%), Dependency (16%), and Change averse (10%). Myself, according to the Advanced Global Personality Test, via Rauno Räsänen and Timo Salo.

October 16, 2005 10:00 AM "Dark Swallows Will Return" is Omegar Martínez' translation of his recent "Volverán las oscuras golondrinas".

October 16, 2005 7:00 AM One more on blogalisation. Yesterday, the number of countries this site has had visitors from since April 25, 2005, topped 100. Those with more than 1 percent share of all visits are Finland (10,881,37.95%), United States (7,840,27.34%), Germany (2,684,9.36%), Canada (1,308,4.56%), United Kingdom (924,3.22%), Austria (577,2.01%), Sweden (507,1.77%), Australia (442,1.54%), and Spain (383,1.34%), while there's only one visit from each of Bangladesh, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Algeria, Slovakia, Nepal, Paraguay, Armenia, Benin, Qatar, and Lao People's Democratic Republic. Of visits from a referring address, 73.75% (18,607) come from websites, 26.16% (6,601) from the search engines, the top search terms (of a total of 2638) being "poem", "google", "poems", "leevi", "lehto", "poetry", "generator", "runo", "want", "the", "die", "pearl", "about", "finnish", "sex", "get", "harbor", "keats", and "isotissi" (Finnish for "big-breasted", and responsible for bringing 72 innocent surfers in contact with my collage poem "Ananke: A Pantoum" so far). Technorati now gives 68 sites linking here. Not counted in these are these two favorites of mine: hydepark.hevre.co.il and bookmark.eyou.com, nor the old-media related www.krone.at, bild.t-online.de (image only), and vilaweb.com. At Finnish Blogilista, I now have 20 subscribers. - And talking about the global presence, Dumbfoundry is a great poetry blog where the blogroll is organized by timezones.

October 15, 2005 12:40 PM A note on my correspondence with Google, re certain restrictions applied to the searches coming from the Google Poem Generator.

October 14, 2005 3:55 PM With "Volverán las oscuras golondrinas", by Omegar Martínez from Mexico City, the Generator goes Spanish.

October 14, 2005 1:30 PM It's Nothing! Reflexions on the work of Kenneth Goldsmith, with an emphasis on The Weather (2005).

October 12, 2005 8:10 PM Two more upcoming poetry events in my calendar: a big Swedish-Finnish "marathon" in Helsinki (Nov. 22), and a joint Finnish-Russian reading in St Petersburg (Dec. 15). Read more.

October 11, 2005 10:15 AM The Inverted Order Jukka-Pekka Kervinen is the most popular Finnish poet in the world just now, as shown by this new revealing image.

October 10, 2005 6:50 AM Phil Ulrich: Dishwasher: A Sestina, and Hugo Andre: Eleições Autárquicas, introducing Portuguese in the Anthology.

October 9, 2005 8:30 AM It seems "Organic poetry" - referring to "the method of creating poems by pasting together sentence fragment[s] using results of a search engine or other automated program" - has survived as a Wikipedia stub (after being on the verge of deletion a few weeks ago when I last checked about it). It is one of some 400 poetry stubs, such as Acephalous line, Cavalier poet, Hexameter, Finnish poetry, Kakawin Bhāratayuddha, Katarina Frostenson, Lāčplēsis, No Thanks, Sound poetry, Spoon River Anthology, Symbolist poetry, Urdu poetry, and Valerie Eliot, has and external link here, and of course you can help Wikipedia by expanding it.

October 7, 2005 2:03 PM Sheila E. Murphy: Art

October 6, 2005 8:50 PM Friday to Sunday, 7 to 9 Oct., I'll be at Turku Book Fair (Poetry Society Nihil Interit's stand A 10). We launch the special high school issue of Tuli&Savu, and there's a special Kohina reading on Friday night - more of that in my Calendar.

October 6, 2005 8:35 PM Information (in Finnish) on my poetry class at Kriittinen korkeakoulu, Fall 2005.

October 5, 2005 8:39 PM One more thing: the decision on the yearly artist grants for literature (Arts Council of Finland) was published today. After some (not much) hesitation I put online this rare, revealing image of the event.

October 5, 2005 7:41 PM Renessanssi @ www.leevilehto.net, the critically acclaimed essay by Kuisma Korhonen on my Ääninen (1997) (originally in Runosta runoon (From Poem To Poem) ed. by Sakari Katajamäki and Johanna Pentikäinen, WSOY 2004) now available in English translation.

October 5, 2005 12:19 AM "...we can't process your request right now. A computer virus or spyware application is sending us automated requests, and it appears that your computer or network has been infected..." It seems Google has begun treating the Poem Generator as spam. While this is an honor and an inconvinience, the phenonemon already has its artistic reflection in this poem by Timo Salo.

October 5, 2005 9:45 AM Beside mentioning the Google Poem one in its yesterday's entry, The Generator Blog has hundreds of others. I chekced out Dislexicon: The English Language Extender, which I found quite useful - and will make an effort to use, for example, STEREOPOETRYISE, CELERPOETRYARY, and POETRYATOR (all of course from the root word POETRY) later somewhere (while AQUATICPOETRYSCOPE - "instrument for viewing or measuring water poetry" - may be something Charles is in process of construing here (but it is Finnish only)). Generator Blog's Gerard's poem is now in the Anthology.

October 4, 2005 2:59 PM In the Google Poem Anthology, Anita Konkka's new poem, "Lause on osuva ja armoton" (with an illustration). Also, added a new Links page, and note the new instructive blurbs at the enty page ;-).

October 4, 2005 6:11 AM Happy Birthday, Kirsi!

October 3, 2005 5:30 PM Parnasso going online, it seems.

October 3, 2005 11:45 AM Oops, my mistake in yesterday's posting. One should not add up but multiply: 25!/32! x 119!/107! x 65!/55! x 23!/15! which will give us something in the order of 10^57, instead of my earlier 10^25... Thanks, Saara!

October 3, 2005 10:33 AM Seems the Finnish Blogistan is discovering the Google Poem Generator. Wittness the recent postings by Anita Konkka (Sanat, Kirjailijan päiväkirja), and at myllerryksissä and -C-. And of course, Hanhensulka has great examples both at her Runon arki and Turms the Eternal blogs.

October 2, 2005 8:50 PM With "When Ctrl+Alt+Del Is Not Enough" ("Kun ctrl+alt+del ei riitä"), from today's Helsingin Sanomat, the number of headlines in the "When A Car Gets into An Accident" (Finnish, English) poem database rose to 242. Along with "beauty", "nothing" (three times!), "reason", "eximia", "less", "salary alone", "brush", "mass", and "being a film star", the "not enough" subclass of headlines now has thirteen members. My impression is the variations are getting more interesting with the swelling of the base, so I'm going to continue the collecting. Just now, the exact number of possible poem variations is 25!/32! + 119!/107! + 65!/55! + 23!/15! = 4545041937899616253900800. Gird up your index fingers!