derek beaulieu at housepre@cadvision.com<= /DIV> ------=_NextPart_000_0009_01BE7D2A.0E6D5FE0-- ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Jan 1980 23:43:59 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Daniel Zimmerman Organization: Bard-O Subject: Re: April is the cruelest month for poetry .... MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Charles Bernstein wrote: > > David Antin sent me this reply to "Against National Poetry Month as Such". He > said it would be OK to pass it on to the list. --Charles Bernstein > *** > > from DAVID ANTIN: > > Hi Charles -- I'm with you all the way. Antipoetry month in the midst of > which, taking a cue from Geraut de Borneilh, I propose a TROBAR CLUS week > in which no one shall be allowed to commit a transparency. For that week > all poetic efforts must have the opacity of wood or steel and equal weight. > Truly CONCRETE POETRY cast in concrete or cast in iron with texts only on > the underside, so that they must be lifted to be read. I am myself > planning a poetry piece in cast glass (really), but fortunately placed > underwater to diminish visibility. Perhaps I can claim a dispensation for > its submergence. In any case it will be at the bottom of a pond if my grant > comes through. Hard to find if not to finally see. So you can see (sic) > I'm with you all the way. I also suggest POEM BARRERS laid across public > roads, so they can IMPEDE traffic. POETIC PITS in sidewalks and walkways. > POETIC LADDERS from which all but the top and bottom rung are removed. > POETIC ELEVATORS from which all power must be CUT OFF so that they can > only be moved by hand. WHISPER PERFORMANCES permitting only poetry > performances conducted in whispers only in large auditoriums, where the > first fifteen rows of seats must remain empty. Other suggestions are > welcomed. > > Best > > David Brilliant, David! I'd like to weigh in for [where does *that* expression come from?] LIPSYNCH POETRY for extemporaneous & antiquated (de-canonized, like St. Christopher) verse; MONOMETRICAL VERSE, in which all syllables receive either only stron or weak stress; IDEOGRAMMATICAL POETRY in which all glyphs ioncorporating faces resolutely (& atypically) turn their backs to each other; & BACKMASKICAL BARDOLATRY, which reads poets' publication credits (and reviews of their works) backwards. ;~) Dan Zimmerman ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 2 Apr 1999 22:06:28 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: david bromige Subject: added to antin Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I'd like to suggest that all taperecorders used for poetry readings in the month of April be doctored so that upon being rewound and played back even at full volume nothing can be heard except a faint diabolical cackling (I believe this was done at least once in a trial run at UCSD). In an alternative move, let's have the tapes be classified as blank but when the machine is switched on & the Poet begins to read, the tape emits a prerecorded, uninterruptible wall of words full volume for at least one hour, during which all efforts to switch off or unplug the machine will prove futile. That should put a stop to any threatened eruption of poetry during this damnable month. david. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 01:21:30 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Linda Russo Subject: Re: class MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I had the same reaction as David Zauhar on this one: juliana's questions address culture as much as they address class. Cultural studies has always insisted that culture is not the province of a particular class (privileged) but that culture was a "whole way of life" -- that culture was 'mass' -- was everywhere. (and class seems as pervasive.) While this allowed for some needed theorizing and intervention that revealed (and encouraged) a certain amount of autonomy ('subversion') on the side of those who were denied (high) culture (and so were denied 'class', were the underclass) -- it left aside altogether the tricky questions of the production of 'mass culture' -- who produces it? who consumes it? and for what explicity purposes? The same can be asked of class. And the answers in some instances will be identical. juliana: > Once we start to act like [class] is >something that can be called out in the language of clear category (that >academic means middle or whatever), we do class the disservice of >assuming it is an easy marker. The irony being that most modes of communication rely on our acting this way, and the disservice is done in the service of 'fixing' one's class -- remediating. (for an interesting if not endlessly irritating essay on this see "Freshman Composition as Middle Class Enterprise" by Lynn Z. Bloom) what juliana points out is that class can't be talked about until its cornered. So here's a corner: it strikes me that class is maintained as an economic category only to the extent that its inseparable from its visible, material embodiment: commodities. If posessions are markers of class, what does that make words? where does that leave writers? Innovative writers show us consistently that words are also material things, are not merely referential (i.e. materialized when contrasted to the conventional-and-so-transparent use of syntax, word and subject choice, spelling, pronunication, which are also [middle] class markers ) -- and yet innovative writing alone fails as 'subversive', fails to attack from the margin (of race gender class etc.) because it is, finally, just made of words. It's the people, the movements, the little magazines and presses that gather around and embody those words that make some sort of intervention. Class afterall is a heinous fiction that They/we maintain, that They/we build into our material circumstances (our institutions) but its a fatal fiction -- people die everyday for lack of the fictionality that is found there. I can't say I see class (as a problem, as a point of cleavage and meanness) going away anytime soon but i'm glad too people are talking about it, and perhaps maintaining the option that class (race gender etc.) is okay. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 00:50:01 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Loss Pequen~o Glazier" Subject: Relation of Web/hypertext ed. to book sales Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" We are engaged in a project creating a hypertext edition of a book and have run into resistance from the publisher. If anyone knows of a citation that supports the argument that a web version of a book increases sales of the book itself, or any similarly useful info for arguing this point, any suggestions would be most welcome! Thanks ... ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 02:18:13 -0800 Reply-To: snakayas@cts.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Sawako Nakayasu Subject: speaking of joy MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I teach high school art and math...and found that the math class (math not being my favorite subject) went much better when I tossed some art (which I love) into it. One day we did algebra problems exquisite corpse-style. So: anyone have or know of any poems about or using or related to math? ...about teaching: I've concluded that the best things I ever learned in high school was how to find *joy* in a subject. thanks, Sawako ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 2 Apr 1999 16:03:19 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Kris Dykstra Subject: Translation MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit You mention an interest in translation--I'm new to the list & am working on a first but large translation project (Spanish to English)--I'd be interested in hearing general +/- specific ideas about this topic, unless it was done to death last month. Example: I read an article that characterized Dickinson's poetry as a "compensation" for failed letter-writing, i.e. a compensation for the lost ideal of exact correspondence. Given that translation also seems to presuppose a loss of some sort of exact correspondence, is translation itself a compensatory mode? When is it useful to talk about intralingual translation as well as interlingual translation? & so forth. & if anyone can confirm that "murcielago" is commonly used in Cuba to refer to someone who stays out all night partying, I'd be interested in that too-- Kris --On Friday, April 02, 1999, 6:25 PM +0000 "Jamie Ferguson" wrote: > I think Chris is right to post a letter about his role as moderator of > the List, even if I think he should be less worried about how members > will react to the power that comes with that role. > > In response to his post, I want to suggest a couple of topics that might > be addressed by those who have taken a serious interest in this forum. > > - What sort of post does the medium tend to encourage? Are there common > pitfalls that might be specified and so more easily avoided? > > - Ought we to be more conscious of the modes of writing/thought > presented on the List, and would it make sense to address these matters > in terms of specific posts? (This would mean sometimes commenting not on > the content of a post so much as the kind of thinking it represents.) > > - What sorts of post tend to be valuable for us as readers? What sorts > less so? > > > I personally would answer these questions by saying that there does seem > to be something in the medium that encourages unconsidered > contributions. I would argue against the writing of unsupported > statements: "I find this book unconvincing." When I came onto the List, > I had the idea that I might begin an exchange on something that > interests me particularly at the moment: literary translation. I would > expect me posts to be deleted by those who take no interest in the > matter (or who think I'm a dolt), but what I would expect from those who > do take an interest and don't think I'm a dolt is TIME. I stopped > writing because, with a few exceptions, I felt that I was putting in a > lot more than I was getting back. Whether a response was enthusiastic or > critical, I often had the impression that while I had spent a half an > hour or more on composing something that seemed to me worth reading, the > responses were dashed off in a couple of minutes. This may, I know, be > entirely due to my not having, if fact, succeeded in composing something > interesting, even for those engaged with the topic. But I suspect that I > did manage to interest a few people - and did in fact elicit one very > interesting response from Pierre Joris. > Nobody would read a journal whose contributors were known to spend no > more than five or ten minutes on their pieces; while the potential > immediacy of EXCHANGE in this kind of format is clearly a bonus. My > estimation would be that those of us writing to the List should move > closer to the concentration implied by the former format, and try to > work against the seemingly perpetual thrill of the immediate in and of > itself. > > One further point, as to content: if there were more posts on the > negative effects of football on the American psyche, I would > unsubscribe. This is not to say anything about the intellectual quality > of the discussion that took place around this topic, but only to say > that I, for one, am looking for something else here. > Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 2 Apr 1999 18:11:19 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: anastasios kozaitis Subject: Re: class and gender In-Reply-To: <3703B4E3.A38974E9@lava.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I am reading a book that I think would be important to all those who are interested in this thread: _Inequality Reexamined_ by Amartya Sen. "Sen argues that the dictum 'all people are created equal' serves largely to deflect attention from the fact that we differ in age, gender, talents, and physical abilities as well as in material advantages and social background. He argues for concentraing on hight and more basic values: individual capabilities and freedom to achieve objectives. By concentrating on equity and efficiency of social arrangements in promoting freedoms and capabilities of individuals, Sen adds an important dimension to arguments about such vital issues as gender inequalities, welfare policies, affirmative action, and publich provision of health care and education.' Sen, _Inequality Reexamined_, Harvard UP, 1992 >Just went to a talk the other day on Carolyn Chute and class. And then >all the talk post-pagemothers on class. It is worrying me. The reason we >as a society have trouble talking about class is that it is endlessly >complicated. It is hard to quantify, much less smell or generalize about >preferences of roughness or smoothness. Once we start to act like it is >something that can be called out in the language of clear category (that >academic means middle or whatever), we do class the disservice of >assuming it is an easy marker. Even though our society, falsely, treats >race or gender as something absolute, it has never treated class that >way. Yet that class is the language that white people at times use to >assert their marginalization makes me nervous about it all the time. > >Yet I also think it is crucial to talk about all the time (who knows it >might lead to the class revolution). So I am grateful for the >discussion. > >I guess my question is how do we talk about class while paying attention >to how many people pass in both directions all the time? How do we talk >about class and make room for the way some people move up and down it >all the time? Is class growing up background? Or is it net income at >current year? And what are the income levels? Or is it purely cultural? >Is there a lower class culture of dirty shirts and beer drinking that >the Chute talk seemed to suggest? An upper class culture that owns >artyness? How does rural and urban play into this? What about marriage >and wives with no income? Does education disqualify one from being lower >class? Does one's academic job disqualify one from being lower class >anymore? What if you are an adjunct? Does one's Yale undergrad degree on >scholarship disqualify? Or if one grows up upper class yet goes to the >local community college, does that change? > >Like those students who can't understand My Life, I really can't imagine >that their background income is that different from Hejinian's--her >father was an academic administrator (a decent but not the best paying >job), her mother a housewife. The New College, where she worked until >recently, is known for its substandard salaries. She doesn't have an >advanced degree. What is making her the symbol for middle (?) classness >to these students? Is it because she doesn't in My Life put her self >forward as a marginalized subject? > >I mean these questions not as critique but just as questions. I am glad >this discussion has been happening. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 12:05:57 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: James Sherry Subject: Cultural Classes and Economic Classes In-Reply-To: <199904030508.AAA03983@mail2.panix.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII There seems to be some confusion between the two types of classes in the messages as I read them in the past two days. Having a nice house and time to get a manicure is a cultural bias and many working class women and men in pink and white collar jobs like to be clean and neat, but are in no way upper or ruling class. We as poets and academics and poet/academics have a cultural class bias, but having books, etc is not an upper class characteristic. There are many cultural classes and they are fungible and are usually subject to an ideological stance that is annoying to other cultural classes. There are also many mixed cultural classes, ie, people with dirty hands and books or clean floors and only electronics or dirty floors and electronics. Among economic classes there are far fewer. Here ruling class is appropriate to consider, but even within the ruling class there is pecking order such as between Bill Gates and Bill Clinton. Being able to make decisions for others is one of the prime motivators and characteristics of ruling class ideology. Being able to plan the course of the lives of many is also a motivator for ruling class or aspiring ruling class. There are many cultural classes on this list, but only one or two economic classes on this list, although some of us work more directly for ruling class institutions, such as the teachers and corporate types. Those who do not work for those kinds of institutions may still be of the same economic class, but have different cultural biases. I don't think anyone on this list is a member of the ruling class. Although some have made some money or inherited enough to qualify, none of us to my knowledge is working to direct the lives of thousands or making decisions to control the course of many lives. We as artists have chosen a path to control that is weak and indirect. That is we can't really determine the effects of our work. But we still believe in the effect poetry can have. We believe that poetry and other arts have an effect on the lives of many indirectly by contributing to the way people talk and think about themselves. What would we like to contribute to that? How do we think we can best go about it? If we can't exactly predict how our work will effect others, what are the techniques of indirection that are most useful/effective in getting to the kind of presentation we'd like to make while giving us the best chance of gettting the kind of result we want. Do we want to promote a metaphorical message or be exponents of it? I think most of the people reading this list approach the message part metaphorically rather than representing it directly as perscription. The metaphors are riskier than many can imagine. Allen Ginsberg was one who found out the dangers of metaphor after his metaphor had had its sad effects. In closing I apologize for going so slowly, but read much that confused me in the mails about class and thought this out as I wrote. In that way I don't support the planned out approach to what should be on the list. It's up to Chris, with input from all of us who are willing to contribute, to come up with a functional definition of appropriateness. James Sherry ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 13:14:01 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: KENT JOHNSON Organization: Highland Community College Subject: Five Myths of NATO's war MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT The following is taken from Z Net http://www.lbbs.org/ZNETTOPnoanimation.html. While a clearer acknowledgment of the long-standing repression suffered by the Kosovar Albanians would have added much to the balance of this "Myth Sheet," the points made are certainly thought-provoking and prompt urgent questions about NATO's actions and the motivations behind them. Kent ---------------------------------------------- The US/NATO War in Yugoslavia: Five Myths Myth #1. U.S./NATO had to attack "the Serbs" because the Yugoslav government and President Slobodan Milosevic refused to negotiate on Kosovo, a region of Yugoslavia where ethnic Albanians are the majority. Reality: U.S./NATO bombs are falling on all Yugoslavs: Serbians, Montenegrins, Albanians, Hungarians, Romanis and other peoples who make up the multiethnic Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. There were no "negotiations." U.S. officials like Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, went out of their way to make this point when "peace talks" were held in France in February. Instead, there was an ultimatum presented by the U.S. government to the Yugoslav government that had three points: 1) Kosovo must be granted autonomy; 2) NATO must be allowed to station 30,000 ground troops in Yugoslavia to ensure this autonomy; and 3) A NATO-conducted referendum for Kosovo's independence from Yugoslavia would take place within three years. The Yugoslav government agreed to the first condition, and rejected the second and third, saying they were a gross violation of their sovereignty and the independence of their country. Myth #2. Yugoslavia is the aggressor in this conflict and Milosevic is a "new Hitler." Reality: No Yugoslav soldiers, planes or ships are attacking another country. The conflict in Kosovo is an internal issue. A developing country of 10 million people, Yugoslavia is being attacked by 19 countries, including the biggest military powers in the world, which have a combined population of more than half a billion people. Milosevic has been demonized much like Saddam Hussein is. As a State Department official said, "the demonization of Milosevic is necessary to maintain the air attacks." (S.F. Chronicle, Mar. 30, 1999) Myth #3. Clinton, Albright and the Pentagon generals were moved to action by their concerns about "ethnic cleansing" and human suffering. Reality: The U.S., Germany and other NATO powers played a key role in breaking up Yugoslavia in 1991-92, arming and supporting secessionist movements. For 45 years after World War II, the many nationalities that made up Yugoslavia lived together in peace. In the civil wars, which followed the break-up of Yugoslavia, there was much bloodshed and human rights violations on all sides. The biggest single act of "ethnic cleansing" was the forced removal of 600,000 Serbs from the Krajina region of Croatia (a former Yugoslav republic) by the U.S.-trained and armed Croatian military in 1995. More than 55,000 of these Serbs, who were resettled in Kosovo, are among the hundreds of thousands of people made refugees by NATO bombing and the conflict in Kosovo. (Julia Taft, Asst. Secretary of State on C-SPAN, 3-29-99) The U.S. "concern" about removal of people from their homeland is very selective. This is not surprising: Virtually the entire continent of North America was "ethnically cleansed" of Native people to make way for the U.S. and Canada, two of the NATO powers. U.S. policy has supported, with arms and money, the removal of Kurdish people in Turkey, Palestinians, East Timorese, Guatemalan indigenous people -- and the list goes on. Myth #4. The U.S./NATO goal is to protect the rights of the predominantly Muslim Albanians in Kosovo. Reality: U.S. officials pretend to care about the rights of Muslim people in Yugoslavia, while their policy of sanctions and war kills 300 Iraqis every day -- half children under 5 years old. Most Iraqis are Muslims. The Pentagon is not a humanitarian relief agency and the corporate-owned politicians don't really care about any people -- Albanians, Serbs, Kurds, Iraqis, or the poor and working people of this country. This war is killing people of all nationalities in Yugoslavia, and poisoning their land with radioactive depleted uranium (DU) weapons. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, U.S. veterans and their families are suffering from Gulf War Syndrome as a result of depleted uranium poisoning. The Clinton administration and the Pentagon talk about "supporting our troops" before they go into battle, but then deny medical benefits to veterans who suffer from the after-effects of Agent Orange from Vietnam or DU from Iraq. This war will cost many billions of dollars, money stolen from housing, health care, education and other social programs. Each cruise missile costs $1 million. The only ones who will benefit from this war will be the military-industrial complex and big business. The real U.S./NATO goal is to break Yugoslavia into ever-smaller pieces and bomb its people into submission. The Balkans is a strategic region, a crossroads between Western Europe and the oil-rich Middle East and Caspian Basin. The U.S. has established, in only 5 years, military domination of the former Yugoslav republics of Croatia, Bosnia and Macedonia, as well as Hungary and Albania. The only hold-out has been what is today the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. This is the real reason why Yugoslavia has become the target in the Balkans, just as it is the real reason that Iraq has become the target in the Persian/Arabian Gulf region. Myth #5. U.S. news reports are balanced and impartial, giving us the true story. Reality: What we see today is a gross distortion of the facts. The media is dominated by big business interests, and functions as a Pentagon propaganda machine. For political purposes, the suffering of only one group, the refugees leaving Kosovo, is shown, while the other Yugoslav victims of the NATO bombing are virtually ignored. The New York Times, CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, The Chronicle Examiner, and others have given a very slanted view of events in Yugoslavia, to justify the massive bombing. General Electric, one of the country's largest military contractors which supplies engines for NATO jet fighters, owns NBC and co-owns MS/NBC. Volunteers and donation are needed! Contact us to receive a copy of the 1998 IAC book NATO in the Balkans International Action Center 39 W. 14th St., #206 New York, NY 10011 (212) 633-6646 fax: (212) 633-2889 http://www.iacenter.org email: iacenter@iacenter.org ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 11:58:37 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Elizabeth Treadwell Subject: Outlet reviews Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Hi all, I've got my reviewers set, so quickly!, for Outlet 4/5. Thanks to all. Elizabeth Outlet Magazine -&- Double Lucy Books P.O. Box 9013, Berkeley, California 94709 U.S.A. http://users.lanminds.com/~dblelucy ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 13:51:55 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: emgarrison Subject: No I Comments: To: "ictus@listbot.com" Comments: cc: wr-eye-tings , "webart@onelist.com" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit P E A C E Two consanants Three vowels No I ----- Beth ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 19:59:31 EST Reply-To: Pompeiij@aol.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Jessica Pompeii Subject: no one liners MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Jesus did good stand up. He was good on his feet. OK? I am taking over my body. OK? Freeze. Don't move. I am a black-hole nothing comes in and nothing goes out. Crushing victim, baby, no, silicon breasts. Slack jawed hyena, rapes the desert silence, howling for her mate. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 2 Apr 1999 16:27:20 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Maria Damon Subject: Re: The Joy of Poetry In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" At 3:05 PM -0500 4/2/99, Mairead Byrne wrote: >Dear Maria, >Like you, my interest is in poetry and cultural studies. I agree with most >of what you say in your recent post. Except maybe our spirits are >different. You seem charging and charged, determined and probably >effective too. I have begun to feel that academic life in America is >structured to inhibit political action or involvement, even at a local >level. It is my experience here (5 years and two towns) that colleges and >universities are cut off from their local matrix, intellectually though >not economically. When I look back, I remember students with a >lot of political attitude, but no actual political involvement with their >immediate environment: the town or city in which they were living. >For myself, I was and am connected to "my" town through my children, who >go to school here, or daycare. Yet I am not active in the PTA or on the >board of the Drop-In Center, nor am I active anywhere else, except as a >reader in the various libraries. I am a graduate student and college >lecturer: this combination (which is the most common for all graduate >students in the cultural studies field, though some may be called T.A.s >rather than lecturers) is fairly gruelling and inexorable over a >considerable number of years. Throw in another engagement with poetry: >writing it, and you screw things up a bit. Throw in a family, and the >pitch is a notch higher still. But even the grad school/T.A. tandem seems >destructive. My experience of grad school was one of an extremely >structured, controlled, pointless, and time-wasting classes which I was >obliged to both take and teach. Even now, when I have greater freedom, >the continual scraping necessary to get by on the time and money available >seriously inhibits political involvement -- or *any* sort of serious >activity, including writing and thinking. My question is (after all >that): am I completely paranoid in thinking that the academic system here >is actually set up to prevent people thinking, to inhibit engagement with >anything outside the academy, and to keep students/graduate students in a >state of "near-death" until they actually *are* near death and >pensionable? This paragraph is a bit rough but I hope you will get the >general idea. >All the best, >Mairead unfortunatley i think you are right. grad students are depoliticitized in a number of ways; in the less prestigious and wealthy institutions, it's by being so nickeled and dimed to death both economically and with regard to time (at U of MN the grad students are run ragged by the necessity of always having to find jobs, and are told by a cynical administration that this --"lots of teaching experience" --will look good on their cvs!!!); at the more privileged institutions its because it is suggested that by reading raymond williams they are automatically doing right by the under- or working-class many of them have never had firsthand encounters with. there are exceptions though; some faculty i studied w/ at stanford were actively involved in stuff like voter registration in under-represented neighborhoods, and combined it with their intellectual work by writing about it. i did my most interesting work (teaching in a GED program) *before* i went to grad school, but was able to *theorize* and write about that work in grad school. since becoming a prof, i've had less and less incentive toward a certain kind of involvement outside the academy and have become more and more "literary" as well, though plenty of opportunities are available for volunteer or organizing work. right now i'm considering how to make some of my classes, like "Poetry as Cultural Critique," have an element of "community work" built in to the syllabus, though this is complex and involves lots of bureaucratic red tape. so mostly i'm "reduced" to activism through writing about subjects that don't usually get covered in academic journals. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 21:50:23 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Poetics List Administration Subject: email charges / Lowther MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit had to reformat this. Chris ---- From: "Lowther,John" Date: 4/3/99, 4:29 PM -0500 > PHONE CHARGES FOR THE NET? > > CNN reported that in the next two weeks, Congress is going to vote > on allowing telephone companies to charge for Internet access. that means, every time we make a long distance e-mail we will receive a > long distance charge. This will get costly. > > Please visit to the following web site AND complain. Complain to > your Congressman. Don't allow this to pass. > > CONTACT: http://www.house.gov/writerep/ > > Pass this on to your friends. It is urgent! I hope all of you will > pass this on to all your friends and family. All of us have an interest in this bill. > PLEASE FORWARD ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 18:33:57 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Mervyn Taylor Comments: To: british-poets@mailbase.ac.uk, poetryetc@listbot.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" For those of you in SoCal, two events, the first a broadcast, the second a reading, followed by bio and quotes and a sample poem. Mervyn Taylor may be the best poet you discover this year. 1. >On Monday, April 5th @ 10pm, we introduce Mr. Mervyn >Taylor sharing poetry from his newly released book. >Mr. Taylor, visiting from New York, is promoting his book >while sharing his poetry. > >If you`re in the environs, tune~in to 90.7-FM (Los >Angeles) or 98.7-FM (Santa Barbara) at 10pm for some >poetry and music. > >Blessings w/ Peace! > >Angalifu >Producer, Host >KUUMBA - Creativity Through Music & Poetry >KPFK - Los Angeles, 90.7-FM > 2. On Wednesday, April 7th at 4:30 at UC-San Diego, in the Visual Arts Performance Space, a FREE reading by Mervyn Taylor. Mervyn Taylor divides his time between New York and his native Trinidad. Formerly a treasury worker in Trinidad, he currently teaches high school English in the New York City public school system and creative writing at The New School for Social Research. His poems have been published in numerous magazines and several anthologies, among them Giant Talk (Random House) and Rock Against the Wind (William Morrow). He is a graduate of Howard University and holds an MFA in poetry from Columbia University. Junction Press published his first book, _An Island of His Own_, and now, still warm from the press, his second, _The Goat_. "Using imagery that is subtle yet richly evocative, Mervyn Taylor creates whole lives in just a few short lines. Piquant details and a detached, acutely perceptive voice draw the reader into atmospheres swollen with feeling. These are poems that open up new worlds in which readers may live." Publishers Weekly "[In his poems] I have discovered Taylor’s remarkable ministorytelling talent, his cool, aphoristic phrasing, his tonally discreet prose lyricism, and his quiet, ironic world view. A poet of technical expertise, thematic understatement, language subtlety, and human warmth and compassion." Andrew Salkey, World Literature Today "Mervyn is a wary technician, even a cunning one. He works in taut meters that want to cohere the pressures of the casual. Mervyn Taylor is an honest poet, and that is high and sufficient praise indeed." Derek Walcott The End of Their Days I. The Father After he died it was as if the flooring had been taken away and we walked for the longest while on sand, water lapping at our feet. Standing tip-toe the mother would run her hand along the back of the shelves and find a few pennies or none, and rain blew in on us in the kitchen as she turned a pot dark as the weather, and the ghost of a goat butted the ghost of the man and Fitzy his helper paraded with a switch, small cascadoo ghosts leaping in the kitchen. Then the Indian came and laid linoleum throughout the house so we walked on that and he put a rail on the back steps so the mother wouldn’t fall. Then she hurt her foot on a Morris chair and the wound grew into a lifesore that sent up a warm smell that lit up the house, and one Christmastime she dyed her hair and the chemicals left her eyes sealed tight and the windows curtainless, her head blacking the pillow, the bed unmade, the house undone. II. The Mother After the boys migrated she held out as long as she could, but there was no one to send to the shop for Phensic, and the wound would shrink to a pinhead then blossom again. And her best friend held her hand as she asked for the men in her life: the one who looked so much like her they could pass for twins, who gave her her first son, and the one who gave her her second and built them this house growing silenter by the days. Then the one who’d been watching all along, who knew her lonely story and came to people her place with strangers. “Into thy hands,” her friend intoned. She repeated it, and the breadfruit tree dropped a ripe one on the roof that night, the room growing as hot as La Brea noon. Her eyes looked at the ceiling to see what repairs had to be done and her ankles twitched as they propped her up to look over the wall for anyone who at last was coming. III. The Boy He thinks he heard his father calling as the goats pull the old man up and down the road, he sees his father’s hand exploring the diseased gut of a ram, worms curling from the hole onto an open palm. The same hand polished brass buttons, lifted the silver whistle that blew to send the trains lurching forward. He begins to follow the old man’s path down the uprooted track. He begins to occupy the one-room depot, a relic himself. He is deeded more than the house and goat pen. More than once the corporal stops him as he combs Arouca, looking for Telemaque, the old man’s one and only friend. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 10:13:47 PST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Krebs Subject: class & kosovo MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain There is so little need to be concerned with fabric. This cannot be undone - class, differences, borderlands. It is genetic, this behavior among human beings to territorialize and to single out and dehumanize those individuals opposed to the expansion of one's stature or territory. We can talk about it. We can abstract it. We can even try to fight it. But look closely at the animal part of us. Understand why our eyes are set forward-facing in our skulls. Understand why we have incisors. Why we are so skilled in the fine art of building and perfecting weapons. We are vicious and we are hungry and we are civilized. All three. Take off your clothes and count the hairs sprouting over your body. The solution? Better yourself and oppose those who oppose your attempts at bettering yourself. How to do this and what this means, both are in your head. Write it down, maybe. Nihilism is freedom... www.angelfire.com/nj/totalitarianmuseic _______________________________________________________ Get your free, private email at http://mail.excite.com/ ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 21:54:06 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Poetics List Administration Subject: Poets on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown / Greenway MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit was asked to forward this to the list; queries should go to the addresses specified below. Chris ----- From: "Gerard Greenway" Date: 4/2/99, 4:59 PM +0100 Dear Poetics@Buffalo The editors of the below collection have asked if it would be possible to distribiute the call for papers to the Buffalo list. Could you let me know if you can do this for us. Thank for your time Gerard Greenway managing editor -- Angelaki _______________ Call for Papers _______________ A N G E L A K I journal of the theoretical humanities Special Issue 5.1 (for publication march/april 2000) POETS ON THE VERGE OF A NERVOUS BREAKDOWN ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Edited by Anthony Mellors & Robert Smith The deconstruction of nostalgia for transcendent identity is crucial to international poetry working out from modernism. If, for example, the work of Andrea Zanzotto, Allen Fisher, and Susan Howe centres on locations saturated with national myths (the Veneto, London, New England), this is not in order to romanticize the poet's identity with the place or to envision universal truths from a local microcosm. Rather, each of these poets takes the immediate environment as a place crossed by divergent histories, perceptions, and ecologies which are traced as partial evidence, inviting readers both to attend to the difficulties of the text and to pursue their own lines of inquiry. Even in the case of Zanzotto's psychoanalysis of pastoral identity, no subject-position is evoked which remains unquestionable. However, although this kind of poetry has a wide and dedicated audience, it is far removed from what most readers and literary critics today regard as the appropriate form of contemporary verse. Late modernism is post-modern in the sense that Lyotard makes of the term: a critical reworking of the procedures of modernism. But postmodernism has acquired another meaning, which has gained general currency: the outright rejection of modernism as being idealist, elitist, reactionary, inaccessible, and irrelevant. If postmodernism means the breakdown of distinctions between high and low forms of culture, late modernism's formal difficulty puts it squarely in the high culture camp. Post-modernist poetry, on the other hand, turns away from avant-garde experimentation. Instead, it reestablishes the lyric voice, either through ironic parables of the self or as the expression of multicultural identities. It endorses the local, the particular, even the provincial, as the representation of vital if marginalized communities, and it does so without the modernists' desire to sublate the regional into a unified humanist locus. Value is placed on the lucidity and directness with which the poet communicates, allowing readers to identify with representations of their own community or to empathize with others. Poetry is a means - one among many - by which local identities protect themselves from the homogenizing power of the culture industry. In this light, poetry which suspends identification looks as if it has never managed to break free from the Coleridgean belief in a clerisy of readers only able to grapple with the dialectics of the text because highly attuned to the history and theory of poetic forms. In a world where marginalized voices are fighting for recognition, late modernism stands accused of evading its democratic responsibilities. Far from inspiring readers to engage with questions of identity and difference, these barely legible texts could be said to encourage resignation and indifference in anyone except those who are well educated and already disposed towards the 'difficult matter' of modern art. In contrast, postmodern poetry claims humanist inclusivity without the rhetoric of aesthetic unity. It aspires to what Simon Armitage and Robert Crawford call in their recent Penguin anthology 'the democratic voice'. This new poetic democracy is not without its theoretical and institutional problems. Postmodernism argues for the irreducibility of experience, its essential difference from community to community. Yet in this context it requires that all experience be rendered in an identifiable form. In Britain, for example, poetic legitimacy is associated with a deeply ingrained suspicion of 'foreign' influences, so that even where regionalism is valued it tends to be invoked as a populist defence against European experimentalism and American excess. And it is not always clear whether a poet's work is given as regional or radically marginal because it engages with the linguistic and political pressures of non-centralized identity, or simply because the poet has a tenuous association with a marginal site. In _Devolving English Literature_, Robert Crawford wants to affirm the virtues of 'provincial' writing against what he sees as a dominant and exclusive metropolitan culture; yet his preferred exponents of regional identity tend to be poets who, although having Welsh, Irish, or Scottish family origins, are granted cultural legitimacy by conforming to the only poetic 'voice' acceptable to metropolitan publishing houses such as Faber: an ironic lyric style relatively untroubled by the translatability of language or personal experience and endorsing aptness of metaphor as the fundamental mark of poetic value. Crawford's provincial/metropolitan opposition is itself bogus in that it elides the problem of complicity: the notion of the provincial is an invention of the metropolitan bourgeoisie, and its use calls into question Crawford's ability to analyze the politics of poetry beyond a centralist point of view. The position here is both metropolitan and imperialist in that 'provincials' become the subjects of sentimental regard as long as they communicate in the accepted terms; otherwise, they are ignored or denounced. The marginal is invited into the mainstream or preserved as marginal value by the mainstream only when it gives up its attachment to difference. For late modernists, on the other hand, difference cannot be translated, only approximated. The poem is a construction which makes the reader aware that every translation is an appropriation. It could be argued, however, that the implied reader of this poetry is just as 'metropolitan' as Crawford's democrat. But, while the two positions are not as clear cut as our description suggests, they do represent fundamentally opposed views of poetry's function in modern society. For what we are calling late modernism, poetry can only become a radical force by resisting consumer culture and its appeal to the 'short attention span' of its audience; for postmodernism, poetry can only prevent itself from being marginalized or completely ignored by competing with more marketable forms of cultural production. While the former continues to be reviled by the mainstream publishing houses and literary organs as too rarefied to be of popular interest, the latter is itself beginning to fall foul of market pressures. The current hoo-haa over Oxford University Press's axing of its poetry list shows that the mainstream is somewhat more marginal than its proponents have imagined. Even so, poetry is flourishing as never before through public readings, small publishers and magazines, and via the Internet. Although these networks might be said merely to affirm poetry's marginalized status in an era of global markets, they nevertheless lay claim to the cultural value of independent means of production. (A modern irony being that small-press material has frequently out- sold 'major' publications.) And, if these networks originate from local or marginal groupings, they are anything but narrow in their reach. They have inaugurated a new internationalism in poetry which goes some way to confound the old coteries and critical demarcations. The use of new technology has revitalized traditional media by lowering production costs and has created alternative forms of distribution. Australia, for example, has become a new poetic centre. Through magazines such as John Kinsella's _Salt_, James Taylor's _Boxkite_, and (on the Internet) John Tranter's _Jacket_, it has increased international recognition for Australian writing while creating strong links with poets in France, Britain and the United States. The aim of this issue of _Angelaki_ is to collect a wide range of critical essays addressing the current state of international poetry. We invite contributions addressing the general questions raised above, and we hope to encourage debate about the history and ideology of modern poetic forms and institutions. Far from being taken as read (which is unlikely considering the partisan nature of the subject), the remarks made here should be seen as the springboard for argument and clearer definition. The issue will also include new poetry. * * * Submission Information ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ _Angelaki_ is a peer-reviewed journal. ABSTRACTS of 1000 words by APRIL 30 1999. Abstracts to be sent to the below material address, or e-mailed to: greenway@angelaki.demon.co.uk If e-mailing, please ensure that you put 'Angelaki 5.1' in the subject line. FINAL MATERIAL (full essays) for peer review by JUNE 30, 1999. Essays must be sent in duplicate (double-spaced, paginated) to: Dr Anthony Mellors 59 Orchard Drive Durham DH1 1LA UNITED KINGDOM * * * About ANGELAKI ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ _Angelaki: journal of the theoretical humanities_ is a print journal published three times a year by Carfax Publishing Limited. The journal publishes two theme issues and one general issue per volume. ISSN: 0969-725X. _Angelaki_ was selected Best New Journal in the 1996 Council of Editors of Learned Journals Awards. For further details of the journal and contents listings please visit: http://www.carfax.co.uk/ang-ad.htm "Since its inception in 1993, the journal _Angelaki_ has established itself as a leading forum of theoretical reflection, providing a practical refutation of all those who would celebrate 'the end of theory.' Whether it is focused on thematic issues of the most varied nature, introducing thinkers to English-language readers, or treating a variety of problems in open issues, _Angelaki_ challenges the complacency of the self-evident. Required reading for the next millennium." Samuel Weber Please distribute this call Gerard Greenway managing editor A N G E L A K I journal of the theoretical humanities Carfax Publishing Limited http://www.carfax.co.uk/ang-ad.htm 44 Abbey Road E greenway@angelaki.demon.co.uk Oxford OX2 0AE F +44 (0)1865 791372 United Kingdom T +44 (0)1865 793891 ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 17:55:17 PST Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "m a t t..." Subject: Re: No I Comments: To: webart@onelist.com, wr-eye-tings@sfu.ca Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain [emgarrison@uswest.net designed] >P E A C E > >Two consanants > >Three vowels > >No I >----- > > >Beth > beautifully put beth. here's something: k[no]wledge ig[no]rance name:[matt...] email:[runawayslinky@hotmail.com] url:[http://emo.abysmal.net/~circle] statement:[leaves will fall and so shall we] Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 22:06:42 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Poetics List Administration Subject: A Reply to Kent Johnson MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Kent - As you know, I withheld your message of friday until today; it having been addressed to me by name, I felt it my due at least to have the chance to read it before sending it on. Now that I have read it, I can say that - if not gladly - I'm willing to respond to your questions this once, despite the fact that where they lead may be, whatever your assurances, "another round of angry accusation." On this count, I leave it to other members of the list to judge for themselves how the rhetorical tactics you deploy in such phrases as "B92ed from the List" etcetera balance with those assurances. Your basic questions, I take it, are these: 1. Does the enactment of the List's "ideological character" mandate, in addition to your daily surveillance of posts, the denial of subscription rights to certain poets? 2. IF it is true that there have been poets "ideologically" excluded from List membership, isn't it actually the case... that you ARE, in practice, preventing posts that might "provoke consideration or sustained argumentation" from coming to the List's attention? My reply is simply this, that the *specific* ideological cast that you and your friends have wished to give this issue is a gross distortion, and tiresome; and that the supposed intellectual or poetical differences that have comprised this debate are neither. Instead, we - by which I mean the owners of this list and its subscribers - have been met time and again with an empty rhetoric of "free speech" so twisted as to support the grossest domination; coupled with sustained inappropriate behavior toward list administrators and fellow subscribers, as the case may be. I reserve, as do all listserv moderators, the right to remove from the list and to deny further subscription privileges to any subscriber who will not abide by the rules of the list as set out in the Welcome Message; and this includes "problem" subscribers that were removed or resigned their subscriptioins before I took on the task of list moderation. I use the words "subscription privileges" pointedly - as a little [electronic] bird just reminded me, list membership is a privilege, never a right. The obligation to remove such subscribers from the list is one I take very, very seriously; so much so that I want to address the specific formulation of the two questions I've quoted above, in order to be absolutely clear. In the first, you ask me if it is true that the fact of moderation on this list mandates "the denial of subscription rights to certain poets." To this I would have to reply that the task of list management has to do with subscribers, and not "poets" as such; and that the implication that anyone has been removed from this list for reasons other than their behavior on this list is certainly false. In the second question, you attempt to demonstrate a flaw in the logic of my earlier claims, to the effect that my actions here *are* preventing discourse on this list. In answer to this, please refer to my preceding characterization of the "contributions" to which you evidently refer. Those who wish to know more may consult the Poetics List archive, located on the web at . So in fact, Kent, as you suggest in your post, your questions are informed by faulty assumptions. I would go so far as to say that even the assumption that these are questions - of the kind that want answering - would be faulty. What you seem to want, rather than answers, is to make further accusation; and the tenor of your questions bears this out. What I want is to preserve this list, so shaken by the actions of a small group of subscribers, some of whom evidently employed precisely the sort of tactics you employ in this post, if perhaps less subtly; and whose abuses of this list and its members directly precipitated my appearance as moderator. Now this issue has been given enough time on-list; we have wasted enough bandwidth. To think that 600 people would want to be subjected to "another round of angry accusation," however cooly made, is too much; not to mention my own time, which is precious to me. Chris % Christopher W. Alexander % poetics list moderator ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 19:48:44 -0800 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Re: Five Myths of NATO's war In-Reply-To: <48C5214C33@student.highland.cc.il.us> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Surely the source of this is somewhere in the bowels of the Milosevic propaganda machine? Among the distractions here: we don't villify Hitler because he crossed borders--that's far too commonplace a behavior--but because he practiced genocide. While the expulsions of whole populations may not be technically gennocidal, it's a pretty close relation. He who does this, repeatedly, demonizes himself. That others have done so is rather beside the point. US interest: If in fact we control the rest of the Balkan Penninsula, what difference does the enmity of the Serbs make to us? Are we concerned that they will ally themselves with a superpower like Angola? How can the Serbs either help or hinder us? The US has reasons for being there, not all of them altruistic, but this aint one of them. Capitalist plot to control the news: curiously, a lot of news outlets are adamantly opposed to the bombing, a lot of others are doubtful, and these among those most identifiable with Big Business. Likewise resistance in Congress. One can disagree about the action and its efficacy, but not, I think, on these grounds. At 01:14 PM 4/3/99 -0500, you wrote: >The following is taken from Z Net > >http://www.lbbs.org/ZNETTOPnoanimation.html. > >While a clearer acknowledgment of the long-standing repression >suffered by the Kosovar Albanians would have added much to the >balance of this "Myth Sheet," the points made are certainly >thought-provoking and prompt urgent questions about NATO's actions >and the motivations behind them. > >Kent >---------------------------------------------- > >The US/NATO War in Yugoslavia: Five Myths > >Myth #1. U.S./NATO had to attack "the Serbs" because the Yugoslav >government and President Slobodan Milosevic refused to negotiate on >Kosovo, a region of Yugoslavia where ethnic Albanians are the >majority. > >Reality: U.S./NATO bombs are falling on all Yugoslavs: Serbians, >Montenegrins, Albanians, Hungarians, Romanis and other peoples who >make up the multiethnic Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. There were no >"negotiations." U.S. officials like Secretary of State Madeleine >Albright, went out of their way to make this point when "peace talks" >were held in France in February. Instead, there was an ultimatum >presented by the U.S. government to the Yugoslav government that had >three points: 1) Kosovo must be granted autonomy; 2) NATO must be >allowed to station 30,000 ground troops in Yugoslavia to ensure this >autonomy; and 3) A NATO-conducted referendum for Kosovo's independence >from Yugoslavia would take place within three years. The Yugoslav >government agreed to the first condition, and rejected the second and >third, saying they were a gross violation of their sovereignty and the >independence of their country. > > > >Myth #2. Yugoslavia is the aggressor in this conflict and Milosevic is >a "new Hitler." > >Reality: No Yugoslav soldiers, planes or ships are attacking another >country. The conflict in Kosovo is an internal issue. A developing >country of 10 million people, Yugoslavia is being attacked by 19 >countries, including the biggest military powers in the world, which >have a combined population of more than half a billion people. >Milosevic has been demonized much like Saddam Hussein is. As a State >Department official said, "the demonization of Milosevic is necessary >to maintain the air attacks." (S.F. Chronicle, Mar. 30, 1999) > > > >Myth #3. Clinton, Albright and the Pentagon generals were moved to >action by their concerns about "ethnic cleansing" and human suffering. > > >Reality: The U.S., Germany and other NATO powers played a key role in >breaking up Yugoslavia in 1991-92, arming and supporting secessionist >movements. For 45 years after World War II, the many nationalities >that made up Yugoslavia lived together in peace. In the civil wars, >which followed the break-up of Yugoslavia, there was much bloodshed >and human rights violations on all sides. The biggest single act of >"ethnic cleansing" was the forced removal of 600,000 Serbs from the >Krajina region of Croatia (a former Yugoslav republic) by the >U.S.-trained and armed Croatian military in 1995. More than 55,000 of >these Serbs, who were resettled in Kosovo, are among the hundreds of >thousands of people made refugees by NATO bombing and the conflict in >Kosovo. (Julia Taft, Asst. Secretary of State on C-SPAN, 3-29-99) The >U.S. "concern" about removal of people from their homeland is very >selective. This is not surprising: Virtually the entire continent of >North America was "ethnically cleansed" of Native people to make way >for the U.S. and Canada, two of the NATO powers. U.S. policy has >supported, with arms and money, the removal of Kurdish people in >Turkey, Palestinians, East Timorese, Guatemalan indigenous people -- >and the list goes on. > > > >Myth #4. The U.S./NATO goal is to protect the rights of the >predominantly Muslim Albanians in Kosovo. > >Reality: U.S. officials pretend to care about the rights of Muslim >people in Yugoslavia, while their policy of sanctions and war kills >300 Iraqis every day -- half children under 5 years old. Most Iraqis >are Muslims. > >The Pentagon is not a humanitarian relief agency and the >corporate-owned politicians don't really care about any people -- >Albanians, Serbs, Kurds, Iraqis, or the poor and working people of >this country. > >This war is killing people of all nationalities in Yugoslavia, and >poisoning their land with radioactive depleted uranium (DU) weapons. >Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, U.S. veterans and their families are >suffering from Gulf War Syndrome as a result of depleted uranium >poisoning. The Clinton administration and the Pentagon talk about >"supporting our troops" before they go into battle, but then deny >medical benefits to veterans who suffer from the after-effects of >Agent Orange from Vietnam or DU from Iraq. > >This war will cost many billions of dollars, money stolen from >housing, health care, education and other social programs. Each cruise >missile costs $1 million. The only ones who will benefit from this war >will be the military-industrial complex and big business. > >The real U.S./NATO goal is to break Yugoslavia into ever-smaller >pieces and bomb its people into submission. The Balkans is a strategic >region, a crossroads between Western Europe and the oil-rich Middle >East and Caspian Basin. The U.S. has established, in only 5 years, >military domination of the former Yugoslav republics of Croatia, >Bosnia and Macedonia, as well as Hungary and Albania. The only >hold-out has been what is today the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. >This is the real reason why Yugoslavia has become the target in the >Balkans, just as it is the real reason that Iraq has become the target >in the Persian/Arabian Gulf region. > > > >Myth #5. U.S. news reports are balanced and impartial, giving us the >true story. > >Reality: What we see today is a gross distortion of the facts. The >media is dominated by big business interests, and functions as a >Pentagon propaganda machine. For political purposes, the suffering of >only one group, the refugees leaving Kosovo, is shown, while the other >Yugoslav victims of the NATO bombing are virtually ignored. The New >York Times, CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, The Chronicle Examiner, and others >have given a very slanted view of events in Yugoslavia, to justify the >massive bombing. General Electric, one of the country's largest >military contractors which supplies engines for NATO jet fighters, >owns NBC and co-owns MS/NBC. > >Volunteers and donation are needed! > > Contact us to receive a copy > of the 1998 IAC book > NATO in the Balkans > > International Action Center > 39 W. 14th St., #206 > New York, NY 10011 > (212) 633-6646 > fax: (212) 633-2889 > http://www.iacenter.org > email: iacenter@iacenter.org > > ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 3 Apr 1999 23:08:43 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: derek beaulieu / house press Subject: Re: Relation of Web/hypertext ed. to book sales MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit well i know that coach house books has certainly had success from web publishing - check them out at www.chbooks.ccom hope that helps yrs derek -----Original Message----- From: Loss Pequen~o Glazier To: POETICS@LISTSERV.ACSU.BUFFALO.EDU Date: Saturday, April 03, 1999 7:20 PM Subject: Relation of Web/hypertext ed. to book sales >We are engaged in a project creating a hypertext edition of a book and have >run >into resistance from the publisher. If anyone knows of a citation that >supports >the argument that a web version of a book increases sales of the book itself, >or any similarly useful info for arguing this point, any suggestions would be >most welcome! Thanks ... > ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 05:14:20 +0000 Reply-To: baratier@megsinet.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Baratier Organization: Pavement Saw Press Subject: Re: added to antin MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; x-mac-creator=4D4F5353; x-mac-type=54455854; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: 8BIT Considering the topic of National Poetry month was brought up I have a piece which fits in. I know some of you have seen portions of this series and for those who haven't, I have become friendly with a prophecy telling machine named Estrella. She is gorgeous and everybody loves mystery. It has become an expensive habit. I will be moving the 10th of this month as a result, backchannel for address. This has ruined my life. Be well David Baratier -------- Estrella’s Prophecies #52 Buy so much poetry this month that you can fiscally understand poetry month. Jonathan Galassi needs the money and decent non-honkey panelists. Buy a lot of white lady with the rest of the money because you think good writers shoot dope. Use a clorox clean needle as that sex-poem poet is more than words. When they take you away to the poetry rehabilitation center you will be de-programmed and finally learn Borders cannot carry excellent poetry. Drop another coin in the slot and I will tell more. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 05:18:02 +0000 Reply-To: baratier@megsinet.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: David Baratier Organization: Pavement Saw Press Subject: reading MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; x-mac-type="54455854"; x-mac-creator="4D4F5353" Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Columbus Ohio: Annie Finch is reading at Larry's tomorrow (Monday) night. Please make a special effort to be there. She teaches Creative Writing at Miami U/Oxford Ohio and her book Eve from Story Line Press has gotten attention. Her other books include The Ghost of Meter: Culture and Prosody in American Free Verse (Michigan, 1993); A Formal Feeling Comes: Poems in Form by Contemporary Women (Story Line, 1994); and After New Formalism (Story Line, 1998). She is translating the poetry of Louise Labe and working on a multimedia CD-Rom of Eve. Annie is driving in from Cincinnati, leaving her wee ones and the universtiy for a venue that is not her normal scene. ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 4 Apr 1999 11:13:51 EDT Reply-To: TBeck131@aol.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Tom Beckett Subject: The Iron Law of Oligarchy MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit One of the things which sticks with me from the Introduction to Political Science class I attended in 1971 at Kent State University (one of those midlevel State institutions recently derided on this list) is sociologist Robert Michel's Iron Law of Oligarchy--the idea that power inevitably tends to concentrate in the hands of a few.The essence of democracy is the fight against that tendency. Every time this list excludes a participant or censors a message the body politic is scarred. My wish is that more people participate in the poetics exchanges and that the personal vitriol be held in check. Jessica P.'s recent post about ambitions running rampant seems very much to the point. I share her frustrations. Tom Beckett ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 4 Apr 1999 12:32:19 -0600 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: derek beaulieu / house press Subject: filling Station Magazine: "Gas Jockeys Unite!" Comments: To: Undisclosed.Recipients@mail3.cadvision.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="----=_NextPart_000_000D_01BE7E97.C7C39E00" This is a multi-part message in MIME format. ------=_NextPart_000_000D_01BE7E97.C7C39E00 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable filling Station Magazine is very excited to announce; "Gas Jockeys Unite!: Celebrating 5 years and 15 issues of filling = Station Magazine" April 17th 7:30 Carpenter's UNion Hall 310 10th St. NW Calgary, Alberta a musical and poetic celebration with readings by: Richard Harrison Jeff Derksen Suzette Mayr tom muir Rob Moffat of SAGE Theatre and musical performances by: Shecky Forme The Anne Loree Band Los Morenos this is a licenced event, $8.00 cover contact derek beaulieu (housepre@cadvision.com) or coutrney thompson = (cfthomps@cadvision.com) for more information. ------=_NextPart_000_000D_01BE7E97.C7C39E00 Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

filling Station Magazine is very = excited to=20 announce;

"Gas Jockeys Unite!: = Celebrating 5 years=20 and 15 issues of filling Station Magazine"

April 17th 7:30

Carpenter's = UNion=20 Hall

310 10th St. NW

Calgary,=20 Alberta

a musical and poetic celebration = with=20 readings by:

Richard Harrison

Jeff Derksen

Suzette Mayr

tom muir

Rob Moffat of SAGE = Theatre

and musical performances by:

Shecky = Forme

The Anne Loree Band

Los Morenos

this is a licenced event, = $8.00 cover

contact derek = beaulieu (housepre@cadvision.com) or = coutrney=20 thompson (cfthomps@cadvision.com)=20 for more information.

------=_NextPart_000_000D_01BE7E97.C7C39E00-- ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 4 Apr 1999 15:13:24 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: James Sherry Subject: Hypertextual Versions Relation to Book Sales In-Reply-To: <199904040509.AAA14133@mail2.panix.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Loss, You should contact the folks at Eastgate systems who do some of the best hypertext publishing. They will have the statistics, I'm sure. James ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 4 Apr 1999 15:58:22 EDT Reply-To: Dougolly@aol.com Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Douglas Oliver Subject: Re: class MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I'm made constantly aware that Americans and Brits use the word "class" in different senses. Though even in Britain things have become more fluid, when you meet the real ruling classes -- as defined in those chauvinistic terms -- you are in absolutely no doubt, for it begins in their schools. Still, when James Sherry says that no one on this list can be called ruling class, I recognise the cogency of his remarks but then go blank a moment. I have lived most of my life without many possessions or too much money (Alice and I live in a tiny two-room apartment in Paris) but I'm clear that I am a member of the ruling class. That's because I refuse to consider the question of class in anything but world terms. I simply won't do it. First, let me allow for the really disadvantaged in the Triad countries: I can't speak for them. But, for myself, it's obvious that in comparison with billions of people in the Third World -- the huge majority in the world -- I am decidedly upper class. Also, in terms of being a member of a country and of coalitions which impose their politics and economics on the rest of the world by force if necessary I am a member of the ruling class. Until Western poetry really takes those facts on board it will not, in my view, have a deep view of class. This is not piety on my part (and anyway I'm sure James has thought of this a million times himself). It's just that I cannot bear to island this argument, making of it a convenient national territory where I can feel comfortable either with my standard of living or my poetry. Doug Oliver ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 4 Apr 1999 17:13:51 -0400 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: A H Bramhall Subject: Poetics In A Gaseous State MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit intention isn't process. just say stuff, don't say that you're saying stuff. (war is a picture of determination. bomb/ nothing in doubt.) every barrier has its day. lurking some where, I have been drifting, expecting what I would never expect. find it timely to find. --Allen Bramhall, just trying to make doubt safe for the entire world ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 4 Apr 1999 21:34:22 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Query Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I'd appreciate a backchannel of Rachel Levitsky's current snailmail--I owe her a book. Mark Weiss ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 11:04:29 +0100 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: John Cayley Subject: whatsoever we serve Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I've finally made an html version of a short essay (with some added paratextual paraphernalia) which was written for *Mute* (no. 11), 'Of Programmatology'... This is at: . Can I take this opportunity to recommend this magazine again to those of you who may not have seen it, but take an interest in art and digital culture. The latest issue is number 12, and it includes many fine articles on, for example regulation and the net and the 'new' avant-frontier of biotechnological engagements. *Mute* did surface in UK news agents for a time. Better stockists should have it. Information from: I have also put up a more specialist essay on transliteration at: . A version of this essay will also appear in "Gravitational Intrigue: an anthology of emergent hypermedia," the forthcoming (CD Rom/Web-based) vol 22 of *The Little Magazine*. Inquiries: . Both these essays probably need 4.0x browsers and screens that are at least 800x600. Apologies if you receive this message more than once. ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 09:23:26 -0400 Reply-To: levitsk@ibm.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Minnie Bruce Pratt MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Please join us for a Reading and a Book Party Celebrating Minnie Bruce Pratt at the release of her new book of poetry: Walking Back Up Depot Street from the University of Pittsburgh Press Location: International Action Center, 39 West 14th Street Suite 206 New York, NY 10011 Date: Saturday, April 10 Time: 7 p.m. For More Information: 212-633-6646 Books will be on sale *** Proceeds from sale of books will be donated to Millions for Mumia, the campaign to stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal Advanced praise for the book: "This ambitious work which brilliantly uses biography, historical documents, newspaper reportage, oral history, fragments from testimony and interviews, never lets the reader down, not as art or as evidence....here, writing her greatest poems, a 'heart of flesh' is earned by consciousness of the powerful interrelated and often buried forces that connect us and shape who we are." --Toi Derricotte, author of "Black Notebooks" and "Tender" ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 10:48:01 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Poetics List Subject: Re: email charges / Krick MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit This message came to the administrative account. Chris ----- From: jkrick@ComCAT.COM Date: 4/4/99 10:50 AM -0400 Dear Poetics List, I searched the House web site for specific information about this the bill John Lowther refers to and found: Don Young, an Alaskan representative has posted three letters on his web site, each titled "Internet Access Charges": http://www.house.gov/donyoung/issues.htm Rep Young's letters explain the issue of "reciprocal charges" between phone companies pretty clearly. Arizona representative Jim Kolbe has also introduced a bill that would prohibit per minute charges for Internet access. Maybe this one deserves our support. You can read a release about it at: http://www.house.gov/apps/list/press/az05_kolbe/pr_990330_internet.html John Krick ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 11:29:16 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Amato/Kass Fleisher Subject: Re: class In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" douglas oliver: a fine sentiment, given that the yearly avg. global income is (i believe) hovering around $2500 (u.s. equivalent, and sorry for putting it this way)... also, i take your point about british pedigree... still---and while my mind went blank a bit too after reading james s's post (hi james!)---i'll have to depart ultimately from the upshot of what you're saying, douglas: there are class differentials here in the states that are monumentally unjust... and there are class differentials here in the states that are less so, if nonetheless unjust... and i feel compelled here to exhort those who find themselves in the u.s. to begin to find a way to talk about these differences, b/c it's simply too easy (yes---easy) *only* to point our fingers at other countries and allege the enormous injustices there (with our words or deeds) while the injustices here (class-based, and as i've posted here before, entirely wound around race and gender and so forth) go unchallenged... reminds me in fact of a character in dickens's _bleak house_--- well i'll skip the literary allusions... also, while i'm at: i may as well depart a bit from other posts, other excellent posts on this thread, in which the desire to complicate money issues as such strikes me at times as an aversion to discussing said issues... i.e., if there is room for structural-economic analysis, for rethinking distribution of wealth, there is room too for more earthbound analyses... yes, class is indeed tricky b/c it's fluid---but fluidity does not erase memory, and memory is one sign of difference and identity... so, i'm with kathy lou and others on this---i can usually detect in short order when i'm dealing with someone whose (e.g., u.s.) pedigree is owing to a real difference in economic class... having been OF the u.s. working classes, having lived IN poverty (by u.s. federal standards) for some years, and having found mself of late in comfortable if markedly unstable u.s. middle-class confines (one mark of which may be---and here i must be parenthetically public abut this---that kass (above) and i recently filed chapter 7) has perhaps provided me with this... ability?... for me, i find that it's also a matter of being 1st generation american (my mother a french citizen, merchant class *prior to* wwii), and second on my father's side (italian, poor)... again, i don't wish to be too much "myself" in all of this, but i find accounting for oneself (as douglas has, in fact) to be an important, even urgent part of the discussion... not confessions, no, not even disclosures---just a sense of where, as we used to say, one is coming from... alla that said, i *do* appreciate douglas's global provocation... best, joe ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 10:38:12 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: "Pritchett,Patrick @Silverplume" Subject: Re: Joan Retallack at DU MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain > Dante met Beatrice > (bitter memory discarded) > though his body remained on the earth > & wept in the rain > > > THE 1998-99 > LEO BLOCK LECTURE SERIES > PRESENTS > > JOAN RETALLACK > > poet, > associate of the Bard Institute > for Writing & Thinking, > professor at U. of Maryland > & > author of > MUSICAGE: Cage Muses on Words.Art.Music, > Afterrimages, Errata 5uite, > and How to Do Things with Words > > > April 16 > TALK 4PM > READING 7:30 > > South Renaissance Room, > Mary Reed Building, > University of Denver Campus. > > April 17 > WORKSHOP 2-4PM > > Dupont Room, > Mary Reed Building, > Uof Denver Campus > > Questions? call 303 837 0557 ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 13:13:19 -0400 Reply-To: levitsk@ibm.net Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Rachel Levitsky Subject: Re: wartime activities/class/book party MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit I had meant to post this one: Dear List, First I’d like to thank all the folks who have been posting on the war, Charles B., Kent J. Etc. and nod to Doug Oliver’s clear statement about class. Capital comes in many forms, for those of us who have the priviledge of chosing some forms and not other less palatable ones. Worthwhile to keep in mind the penniless noble. My computer is all but useless just now so getting email is an activity that takes a whole day so I’m late in getting the following information out, but alas: Minnie Bruce Pratt is the author of _S/He_, Rebellion, Crimes Against Nature (Lamont Selection, 1989). She has published a new collection called _Walking Up Depot Street_ though the Pitt Poetry Series. I urge you to read this book which carries the reader though a wildly dimensional landscape via an internal and external descent into the female, working class south. Please come to a Book Party for Minnie Bruce Pratt whick will take place at the International Action Center, 39 West 14th Street, between 5th and 6th Avenues, this Saturday evening, April 10 at 7:00 pm call 212-633-6646 for info proceeds from book sales will be donated to Millions for Mumia, the campaign to stop the execution of Mumia Abu Jamal From the poem “A&P”: “She rolled a tomato in her hand, pink rubber ball engineered to fit a machine. The motion recalled Florida, toward the Glades, Pahokee, Belle Glade, fields to the horizon, crawling with tomato plants, and the proportion all wrong between the rows: wide enough for a truck to drive through. A truckload of migrant workers, Cuban, Haitian, Jamaican, perhaps Creek, Seminole, turning rolling to a dark spot on the horizon, stopping somewhere, the next unpicked spot the same, on the row, assembly line.” ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 13:20:59 -0500 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Joe Amato/Kass Fleisher Subject: Re: The Iron Law of Oligarchy In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" tom beckett's recommendation to 'hold personal vitriole in check' (i paraphrase) draws me out of lurk (again!), esp. as tom asserts that "[e]very time this list excludes a participant or censors a message the body politic is scarred"... i'm in sympathy with the latter, but see it as an ideal, predicated in fact on the former... and to give the discussion here, online, a practical bent (and w/o wishing to dredge up the poetics controversy of months past), i'd like to ask, rhetorically, how many of you have spent any time on usenet?... b/c there's generally a profound difference twixt usenet groups and lists such as these (moderated or unmoderated)... one reason why i don't bother with usenet these days is b/c of the deplorably unchecked AND uncensored nature of what goes on there... i speak in *broad sweep* of course (alan sondheim can speak more directly to this issue), but if you think you'd really like to see an unchecked and uncensored discussion c. 1999, please do have a look at usenet... i'm using the word "uncensored" in an admittedly narrow sense to mean, not only does no one stop what is said from being said (b/c no one really can), but there is NO encouragement (let alone moderation) by anyone in a position of responsibility to the effect that some things might be better left unsaid (yes, i'll say it---hate speech falls into this category of course, esp. in a public forum where anybody can say anything and everything)... on those usenet groups that purport to deal with some of the more sensitive issues we deal with here (such as race, say) the discussion (if you can call it that) can be utterly revolting... so i think spending some time on usenet may make that much clearer the need---at times---for SOME form of moderation (aka "censorship"), whether "full" or "partial" or someone in charge (as it were) just plain urging us to cool down... but don't take my word for it... head over to igc:soc.cult.af.am */ (or wherever) and see for yourselves... i'm against censorship in general, but perhaps this is more a comment on the nature of our public domain... and after all: there is much, i venture, that we'd all of us agree should not be posted in a public establishment (and in fact and contra the 1st amendment, there are laws to prevent such stuff from being posted)... best, joe ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 12:28:38 -0700 Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Mark Weiss Subject: Query Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Anybody out there got a phone number for Lithocrafters? ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 12:32:07 PDT Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group Sender: UB Poetics discussion group From: Michael Krebs Subject: Re: Poetics In A Gaseous State MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Nice. I like to think intention is process. It is movement toward motion. And everyone can continue saying stuff. The world may not be safer with a world