Toward a poetry and poetics of the Americas (29)
Alison Knowles and Jim Tenney, from 'The House of Dust' (1967)
[In our hemispheric anthology of the Americas (from origins to present), Javier Taboada and I are including this pioneer work of computer-generated poetry for a section of “extensions” beyond our normative ideas of poetry that begins with pre-Columbian hieroglyphics and moves on from there to the here-and-now. Our work-in-progress will be published by the University of California Press in the next year or two. (J.R.)]
A house of dust
on open ground
lit by natural light
inhabited by friends and enemies
A house of paper
among high mountains
using natural light
inhabited by fishermen and families
A house of plastic
by an abandoned lake
using all available lighting
inhabited by various birds and fishes
A house of glass
in michigan
using electricity
inhabited by people who eat a great deal
A house of tin
on an island
using candles
inhabited by people who sleep almost all the time
A house of stone
on the sea
using all available lighting
inhabited by lovers
A HOUSE OF WOOD
IN A DESERTED FACTORY
USING CANDLES
INHABITED BY NEGROS WEARING ALL COLORS
A HOUSE OF ROOTS
BY THE SEA
USING CANDLES
INHABITED BY FRIENDS
A HOUSE OF SAND
IN A COLD, WINDY CLIMATE
USING NATURAL LIGHT
INHABITED BY FRIENDS AND ENEMIES
A HOUSE OF STRAW
IN HEAVY JUNGLE UNDERGROWTH
USING ALL AVAILABLE LIGHTING
INHABITED BY AMERICAN INDIANS
A HOUSE OF WEEDS
BY THE SEA
USING ELECTRICITY
INHABITED BY PEOPLE WHO SLEEP ALMOST ALL THE TIME
A HOUSE OF GLASS
ON OPEN GROUND
USING ELECTRICITY
INHABITED BY PEOPLE WHO ENJOY EATING TOGETHER
A HOUSE OF ROOTS
AMONG HIGH MOUNTAINS
USING NATURAL LIGHT
INHABITED BY FRIENDS
etc.
COMMENTARY
“The House of Dust was a poetry project created by Alison Knowles and James Tenney and the Siemens 4004 computer in 1967 using fortran language. An early example of a computer-generated poem, creating stanzas by working through iterations of lines with changing words from a finite vocabulary list. An early example of computerized poetry that plays on the unlimited possibilities of the random juxtapositions of words. To create this work, Knowles produced four word lists that were then translated into a computer language and organised into quatrains according to a random matrix. Each of the four lists contains terms that describe the attributes of a house: its materials, location, lighting, and inhabitants. The computer program imposed a non-rational ordering of subjects and ideas, generating unexpectedly humorous phrasing and imagery.
“Printed on perforated tractor-feed paper common to dot matrix printers of the time, Knowles printed out numerous pages of these phrases in the form of a long scroll. She then created a book of sorts by tearing off a block of approximately twenty pages at a time, folding it in the manner of an accordion, and placing it in a plastic pouch. Hundreds of variations of houses are possible, as every version of the poem begins and ends with a different set of quatrains. Knowles’s collaboration with the computer highlights the underlying arbitrariness of language, demonstrating how words acquire different meanings through structural relationships and shifting contexts.” [From catalogue to exhibition at James Gallery, New York, September 2016]
Poems and poetics