Jerome Rothenberg

Poems and poetics

Anne Blonstein

Seven notarikon poems with a note on the process and an essay on the poet by Charles Lock

The following, reprinted from two previous postings on Poems and Poetics, is intended to serve as an early announcement of a symposium on the work of Anne Blonstein (1958–2011) to be held in Buffalo April 17–19, 2020 under the auspices of the SUNY Buffalo Poetry Collection and the Switzerland-based Anne Blonstein Association.

[The following, reprinted from two previous postings on Poems and Poetics, is intended to serve as an early announcement of a symposium on the work of Anne Blonstein (1958–2011) to be held in Buffalo April 17–19, 2020 under the auspices of the SUNY Buffalo Poetry Collection and the Switzerland-based Anne Blonstein Association.

Peter Valente

Introduction and translation of Nerval's essay 'Le Diable Rouge'

[With the help of Henri Delaage (a well-known figure in the nineteenth century among the “initiated” in Paris) and some illustrators (including the famous Nadar, who was a designer before becoming a photographer), Gerard de Nerval composed the journal Le Diable Rouge, which was meant to be a “Cabalistic Almanac for 1850.” Le Diable Rouge inaugurated Nerval’s “Republican” period, the one that would see him, in 1850, publishing in Le National, the great daily organ of the Left.

Hiromi Itō and Jeffrey Angles

'Birthing the World,' from the Kojiki

A portion of 'Izanami and Izanagi Creating the Japanese Islands' by Kobayashi Eitaku, mid-1880s, ink and color on silk, 49 5/8 x 21 1/2" (126 x 54.6 cm), Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

[The Kojiki (Record of Ancient Matters) is the oldest chronicle ever produced in Japan, compiled in the years 711–12 CE by the court noble Ō no Yasumaro at the request of the Empress Genmei, who reigned 707 to 715 CE. It begins with the creation of the world, describing the actions of the gods and goddesses as they create the earth and society, then it connects these myths to the earliest history of the Japanese nation. Among the most important of these stories is the tale of Izanami and Izanagi, the first gods to descend to earth.

India Radfar

Five opening poems, with foreword, from a booklength poem called 'Far'

FOREWORD

 

Charlie Morrow

'A Voice in the Wilderness: Seance vs. Vision Music' (1975)

[The following is a classic statement on voice and breath by Charlie Morrow, who for many years has been my collaborator and close companion (at times my mentor) in the elaboration of performative works that touch on both music and verbal language. The occasion for posting it here is the appearance of a retrospective gathering of Morrow’s written work, The Book of Numbers and Spells, set for publication this year by Sean McCann and Recital in Los Angeles.