Very joyful and also promising looking trailer of a documentary by Stephen Silha and Eric Slade about poet, experimental filmmaker, and gay rights activist Richard Broughton (1913-1999).
Broughton, ‘Crazy old men are essential to society because young men need role models.’ (He forgot to mention old women and young women. But I apart from that, nice).
Oh yes and, ‘Follow your own weird’.
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Why is it that some names continue to be susceptible to misspelling? And I mean not only by journalists or so, but by people who are familiar with the names they’re misspelling. Is it ‘name dislexia’?
What to think of the often misspelled John Ashbery (Ashberry by many, for example in a recent poetics listserv mail, and in the table of contents of Veronica Forrest-Thomson’s Poetic Artifice, ok, so that was probably just a typo).
Then there is Charles Olsen
Frederic Jameson
Illiad
What else? I dunno. Maybe literary scholars have a blind spot where it is most obvious, like the purloined letter, or an aleatory point in the eye of the storm
And usually the only order we can come up with is the stubborn repetition of the same actions, performed in the same way in the same place and on the same time; only the forces from outside are able to change us, but we adapt ourselves to the change and begin again with the repetition of our new actions. – from Quiet Chaos, S. Veronesi (someone’s Facebook update)
..well dunno actually. But he could’ve – the first Levis were made in 1853. But if he didn’t wear them he’s certainly trying his best to sell them in an ad in which he reads his poem ‘America’. Exploitation of the ‘poet of democracy’? Or a teaming up of two American icons? Dunno either. But beautiful short film (via Slate):
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America
Centre of equal daughters, equal sons,
All, all alike endear’d, grown, ungrown, young or old,
Strong, ample, fair, enduring, capable, rich,
Perennial with the Earth, with Freedom, Law and Love,
A grand, sane, towering, seated Mother,
Chair’d in the adamant of Time.
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This is great – a sound poem by David-Baptiste Chirot played over the score of the visual poem.
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Enough irony for today – thanks to Paul Zukofsky’s invective a few days ago I am now the happy ‘owner’ of ‘A’, and so, should you wish, can you be. Unsurprisingly, someone read Zukofsky’s open letter as somewhat of a dare and made all 400+ pages of it available as a free download.
‘The self is an imaginary construct, made of parts of one like the other so to be recognized as one by an other, thus made contingent. Mimicry/mimesis being the means by which the subject makes the imaged self. Contingency/multiplicity is therefore the one true nature of universality’ (Notes on Conceptualisms). ‘Dance as thought equals, ‘also play, of course, frees the body from social mimicry, gravity and conformity.’ (Badiou). ‘I think where I am not therefore I am where I do not think.’ (Lacan). Where I is not, lamella is. Pre-subjective substance, ’something extra-flat, which moves like the amoeba…’ (Lacan) The dancer does not dance. Lamella dances through the dancer. The dancer without organs. The dancer amoeba. The dancer dances amoeba. The bones are emptied of I, the I becomes gelatin, ground-up bone. Sweet death / ‘drive, he sd, for / christ’s sake look / out where yr going.’
cruel angel bite
angel bites heaven
muscle palpitations toward
palpitations toward folded
connect forgetting arch
forget arc onto
lumps rejoins open
re- open concession
joinders centreless field
race field swells
centreless ceases borderless
beginnings boundless allow
cease area bubbles
again bubbles regain
Oh please, nothing new about this:
‘LSD is a potentially very valuable substance for human health and happiness.’ and
‘If you handle LSD with care, it isn’t any more dangerous than other therapies’
Statements from an academic and a psychiatrist both conducting separate research on the benefits of LSD. Haven’t we known this since its ‘discovery’ by Hoffmann in 1938? Yes. Yes, we have.
The Guardian reports on new research and also relates accounts of people, for example a university teacher taking LSD once or twice a year (instead of being an alcoholic).
For Paul Auster readers: there is a nice interview on Dutch radio. It’s the second of three hours, which you can download here (at bottom of page).
Everything I needed for my suicide was in my backpack, but I dropped in at a supermarket to buy various things just in case. Candles, batteries for the radio, stomach medicine, eau de cologne, shaving things.
Day 1: I’ve given up eating. All I need is a tiny shelter, built using the existing trees…What will I do if someone finds me before I die? Day 17: In the evening I could hear the sound of insects: I’m not alone. The only sound coming from the radio is like the buzzing of the mosquito there are three candles left…
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Wow. Haunting. That is from the documentary ‘The sound of insects’ Peter Liechti, based on the novel miira ni narumade by Shimada Masahiko, based on the true story of a mummified body found in a remote forest.
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The time is nearing for another Poetry Hearings, one of Berlin’s more worthwhile annual poetry events. The announcement below is from the festival’s own site:
Poetry Hearings: Berlin Festival of Poetry in English returns Friday and Saturday, November 20-21, 2009.
We are excited to announce a change in location for Poetry Hearings, this year taking place at the historic Kaffee Burger in Mitte. This unique venue dates back to the 1930s, and was a meeting place for artists during the DDR times.
What hasn’t changed in the Poetry Hearings’ commitment to bringing a diverse range of artists for the Berlin audience. Mainstream, experimental, and performance poetry from the UK, US, Ireland, Australia, and Wales will take the stage on these two chilly fall nights to electrify, provoke, and share their words.
We have a wonderful lineup in store this year, featuring: Matthew Sweeny, Donna Stonecipher, Alistair Noon, Tim Turnbull, Ivy Alvarez, Tom Chivers, Andrew Shields, Mary Noonan, Hannah Silva, and Maurice Scully.
Hosting PH2009 will be Michael Haeflinger. Keep checking back here for updated information and if you would like to be added to the civilian email / non-myspace mailing list, please email mikehaef@gmail.com.
Over at Harriet John O’Connor writes a nice piece in which he comments about comments (of teachers on students’ writing). He says he always tries to be encouraging and positive. Colin Ward adds in a comment (on the comment on comments) that it is more important to be truthful than kind, to not trade in candour for encouragement. I think if it was a choice between one or the other I would more often than not prefer candour over encouragement (but not always, depends on the situation). In any case, I completely agree that there is little point that only being positive about anything is (again usually) not going to help someone very much further. But. Just wondering why we can’t simply have a bit of both (in variable doses, depending on the circumstance).
I am all for forthright and harsh criticism (not that I’m any good at it), as long as it is not resentful, as long as, ultimately, it is coming from a place of affirmation. There is way too much resentment in the poetry community (well, thinking mainly of online comment boxes now. Also, of course there is resentment in any sub-culture really, but no less so in poetry circles). So affirmative criticism, not in the meaning of only always positive. But, yes, in the sense of exploring potential instead of putting down whatever is supposedly lacking in a piece of writing.
My god, what is going on with Mr. Paul Zukofsky. I think I have literally never read anything so full of resentment, bitterness, anger, biting sarcasm, cynicism, unnecessary insult.
He wants money for every word anyone quotes from Louis (and Celia) Zukofsky’s poetry. But even if you grant him that he owns the copyright and therefore should be paid for citations, why would someone want to prevent people from studying Zukofsky’s work? Why so aggressive, and even threatening (and not even to a specific person who might actually have been an ass, but to anyone in general who is (thinking of) doing scholarly work on Zukofsky).
In general, as a matter of principle, and for your own well-being, I urge you to not work on Louis Zukofsky, and prefer that you do not. Working on LZ will be far more trouble than it is worth. You will be far more appreciated working on some author whose copyright holder(s) will actually cherish you, and/or your work. I do not, and no one should work under those conditions.
[...]
I can perhaps understand your misguided interest in literature, music, art, etc. I would be suspicious of your interest in Louis Zukofsky, but might eventually accept it. I can applaud your desire to obtain a job, any job, although why in your chosen so-called profession is quite beyond me; but one line you may not cross i.e. never never ever tell me that your work is to be valued by me because it promotes my father. Doing that will earn my life-long permanent enmity. Your self-interest(s) I may understand, perhaps even agree with; but beyond that, in the words of e.e.cummings quoting Olaf: “there is some s I will not eat”.
Notes on Conceptualisms schematizes three kinds of Conceptual writing:
1. Pure appropriation
2. Hybrid/impure
3. Baroque
‘The primary focus moves from production to post-production. This may involve a shift from the material of production to the mode of production, or the production of a mode.’
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| Production | Mode | Material | Post |
| Pure appropriation | + | + | |
| Hybrid / impure | + | + | + |
| Baroque | + | + |
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1. So pure appropriation is on one end of the scale, beginning with a focus on ‘the mode of production, or the production of a mode’ and ending with a statement concerning the post-production (the (or a) sense in which the work is allegorical; points from the work’s underlying concept (whatever that may be), to an allegory that traverses the work). – Kenneth’s Goldsmith’s Day (called in NoC the Ur-text of Conceptual writing)
2. Hybrid / impure writing involves both some focus on the tension between the mode of production and the post-production, as well as working with the material itself. The balance between these three values can of course differ a lot from work to work. – Rob Fitterman’s This window makes me feel, would be a good example of Hybrid Conceptual writing. The poem is a series of paragraphs with (Googled) sentences that all start with the phrase of the book’s title: it uses and complicates a mode of production, sculpts the material, and also invites reflection on the post-production.
3. Baroque writing is on the other end of the scale from pure appropriation, where all focus on the mode of production is shifted to the material of (language) itself, but as with 1 and 2, finally to post-production. – Vanessa Place would be the most remarkable example of Baroque Conceptual writing, using Baroque to engage the excess of language.
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So. Part of me is a dull romanticist at heart, but I like the idea of using some kind of conceptual underpinning to frame a poem. That is why part of the reason that Day scared me to hell was that I find it completely relevant yet completely alien to my natural inclination (‘natural’ meaning what here?). What I like about the notion of hybrid writing is that it involves all three elements and that these elements can be faded in or out (more/less focus on mode of production / material of production).
I like the sound of Lyrical/Electric Conceptualism (as a subset or variation of Hybrid/impure: Lyrical to emphasize this mode’s quality of affect/sensation as a result of manipulating the material of the work). A work that can be formally rigorous, yet at the same time allows for the contingency of language/subject-position to seep through. Or rather does not try to hide / actively recognizes the fact that there always will be traces of impurity even in pure Conceptual writing (something Kenneth Goldsmith – the Purest Conceptual writer around – has brought up himself on several occasions (e.g. the many inevitable, un-editable mistakes in Day)). So in fact, this recognition (in a hybrid work) of contingent factors, is like a second level of appropriation, the detournement, the rerouting of quirks of language or the lyrical subject. In this sense Hybrid Conceptual writing is actually even more comprehensive – more of its elements are immanent to it, have been taken account of – than in Pure Conceptual writing because not only does it envelop the scale from Mode to Post-production, it also traverses the seams of the work itself by the manipulation of its material, language.
Alain Badiou writes, in a great sentence, (the 12th of his 15 Theses on Contemporary Art) that ‘Non-imperial art must be as rigorous as a mathematical demonstration, as surprising as an ambush in the night, and as elevated as a star.’ However, I think the Lyrical bit is not fully covered in this statement. It is true of course that affect, sensation and intensity are not prominent parts of Badiou’s philosophy, and he agitates against what he calls the Romantic-Formalism of the 20th Century. But when I say Lyricism here, I mean non-personal affect/sensation (and this Badiou also mentions, ‘Art is the process of a truth, and this truth is always the truth of the sensible or sensual, the sensible qua sensible. This means: the transformation of the sensible into an happening of the Idea.’). If art is to be (and I think it should be, or is), ‘the impersonal production of a truth that is addressed to everyone’, then I like the idea of it including affect, of it speaking to the senses, as well as being as ‘rigorous as a mathematical formula’. Lyrical Conceptualism is then writing that is as exact as a mathematical formula while simultaneously also openly and joyously (not just ‘hybridly’ or ‘impurely’, we need more joy) allowing a manipulation of language, the materiality, rhythm, metre, etc, prosody, force, etc etc, virtual potential of language.
So an example of Lyrical Conceptual writing would be to take a slice of language (like Day is), but then to double that movement and take a slice of that slice (like the reading through texts that John Cage did). Add to that a splash of jouissance, loveliness and gristle. And oempf, a lyrical conceptual, electric acid poem
