This feature celebrates the life and work of Marjorie Perloff at almost exactly the moment she receives the honor of induction into the American Philosophical Society, headquartered in Philadelphia, which happens to be — some blocks west of that venerable institution — home base for Jacket2. APS election is something like what in L.A., Perloff's own home, is called “a lifetime achievement award.” So it seemed time for us to bring together not just friends but also critical admirers at various distances to write brief retrospective reviews of her work over the years.
Clockwise from top left: Jim Ferguson, Colin Herd, Marvo Men, Lila Matsumoto, feature editor Sandra Alland, Nuala Watt, Alison Smith, and ShellSuit Massacre.
“It’s difficult to say exactly what’s going on in Scottish poetry right now,” writes Sandra Alland. “But it’s definitely something exciting.” Alland convenes nine poets in Scotland, most of whom live in Glasgow or Edinburgh, to suggest a “recent surge” in work being done in flourishing hybrid forms and experimentation in this increasingly independent region.
The fourth installment of Pam Brown’s feature “Fifty-one Contemporary Poets from Australia” (ordered, “[i]n the interest of objectivity,” by “a recently invented ‘downunder’ method — the reverse alphabet”) includes work from Jane Gibian, Claire Gaskin, Angela Gardner, Liam Ferney, Michael Farrell, Kate Fagan, Chris Edwards, Laurie Duggan, Anna Couani, and Stuart Cooke, along with artwork by Angela Gardner and Chris Edwards.
