Wednesday, April 13, 2005
Formatting help
I have a poem I want to post that has lines that are indented--i.e. one line will end and I want the next to begin just below the end of the previous line. I don't see any obvious way to do this through the Blogger interface, and I don't know enough about HTML to figure out how to do it manually. Any suggestions?
(Honestly, this problem has frustrated me ever since I started blogging; I've just never bothered to figure out a solution.)
(Honestly, this problem has frustrated me ever since I started blogging; I've just never bothered to figure out a solution.)
Thursday, April 7, 2005
Bellows
Now that Saul Bellow has died, an unseemly battle has broken out between Chicago and New York to claim him. The Chicago Tribune's Wednesday cover story declares him "Chicago's Novelist." Today the New York Times has a clever riposte: "New York was Saul Bellow's Second City."
Chicago would seem to have an edge in this one; he grew up in Chicago and worked, lived, and taught there for much of his career. On quality of coverage, though, the Times has the Trib beat hands down; the Times's appreciations sound a bit more like real criticism, comparing Bellow to other 20th-century authors and even using words like "postmodernism"--which, of course, as a Great Writer, Bellow was said to loathe. (The Trib's synonym for postmodernism seems to be "cynicism.")
The Trib, in contrast, is hamstrung, as it usually is in its arts coverage, by having no idea what audience it's talking to--Chicago or the world? the city or the suburbs? the intellectual or the "man on the street"? We're treated to a list of Chicago writers who praise Bellow as Mr. Chicago; to a comparison of Bellow to "Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry James, Ernest Hemingway, and William Faulkner" (whose only resemblance to Bellow seems to be that two of them also won Nobel Prizes); to the insight that "he was the antithesis of everything blase"; and to a catalog of Bellow's thoughts on Chicago that make him sound like the thinking man's Mike Royko. The important thing, in the end, is that Bellow "out-and-out loved Chicago."
That kind of crass civic boosterism makes it easier for the Times's writers to conceal their own provincialism (I mean, come on--Bellow loved New York's "complicated women" and "the onion rolls from Zabar's"?) behind a veneer of sophistication, even drafting Ian McEwan to explain why Brits love Bellow.
I am starting to wonder about Michiko Kakutani, though. I gave her a free pass last time, and I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that she would wax eloquent about a hero of realism who rejected "mainstream" literature, "aestheticism" and "postmodern pyrotechnics" (McEwan even claims that Bellow "freed" the novel from the iron grip of modernism--take that, Virginia Woolf!). But what's with describing Melville as a "brawny, red-blooded American"? Robin says: "I think the word I would use would be 'anemic.'"
Chicago would seem to have an edge in this one; he grew up in Chicago and worked, lived, and taught there for much of his career. On quality of coverage, though, the Times has the Trib beat hands down; the Times's appreciations sound a bit more like real criticism, comparing Bellow to other 20th-century authors and even using words like "postmodernism"--which, of course, as a Great Writer, Bellow was said to loathe. (The Trib's synonym for postmodernism seems to be "cynicism.")
The Trib, in contrast, is hamstrung, as it usually is in its arts coverage, by having no idea what audience it's talking to--Chicago or the world? the city or the suburbs? the intellectual or the "man on the street"? We're treated to a list of Chicago writers who praise Bellow as Mr. Chicago; to a comparison of Bellow to "Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry James, Ernest Hemingway, and William Faulkner" (whose only resemblance to Bellow seems to be that two of them also won Nobel Prizes); to the insight that "he was the antithesis of everything blase"; and to a catalog of Bellow's thoughts on Chicago that make him sound like the thinking man's Mike Royko. The important thing, in the end, is that Bellow "out-and-out loved Chicago."
That kind of crass civic boosterism makes it easier for the Times's writers to conceal their own provincialism (I mean, come on--Bellow loved New York's "complicated women" and "the onion rolls from Zabar's"?) behind a veneer of sophistication, even drafting Ian McEwan to explain why Brits love Bellow.
I am starting to wonder about Michiko Kakutani, though. I gave her a free pass last time, and I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that she would wax eloquent about a hero of realism who rejected "mainstream" literature, "aestheticism" and "postmodern pyrotechnics" (McEwan even claims that Bellow "freed" the novel from the iron grip of modernism--take that, Virginia Woolf!). But what's with describing Melville as a "brawny, red-blooded American"? Robin says: "I think the word I would use would be 'anemic.'"
Saturday, April 2, 2005
Hey Mr. DJ
You can hear me reading "Whatever You Want Is What You Want" tomorrow night on the inaugural edition of Matthew Shindell and James Meetze's poetry radio show on KSDT in San Diego. Tune in between 4-6 p.m. (PT) at http://scw.ucsd.edu/.
The real reason to listen, though, is that Matthew and James will be starting off with a tribute to Robert Creeley, including recordings of Creeley reading and elegies contributed by other poets.
The real reason to listen, though, is that Matthew and James will be starting off with a tribute to Robert Creeley, including recordings of Creeley reading and elegies contributed by other poets.
Friday, April 1, 2005
A list of our own? (II)
As both Pam Lu and Roger Pao have (very gently) reminded me, I've sort of dropped the ball on the whole Asian American poetics list thing. Besides general busyness, I can offer two pleas: format anxiety and technical ignorance.
There's been some debate, both here and on Roger's blog, about whether a listserv is the best way to generate the kind of discussion and community I'm interested in. One commenter chez Roger ("Nick," who I'm assuming is Nick Carbo), suggested that the era of listservs is over and "blogs are where it's at." I'm sympathetic to that, obviously. But I still wonder if a listserv might be good at reaching the broad community of Asian American writers and readers I'm hoping to engage--a community that would not only include younger poets but critics and scholars who have an interest in the field (and who, in my experience, are relatively clueless about the world of blogs).
The group blog and the discussion board have also been suggested as models. I'm nominally a part of several group blogs, and I think they can be fantastic for a few people who are pursuing a group project; I'm less convinced that they are great forums for discussion amongst a fairly large, diffuse group. I've never really been happy with any of the few discussion boards I've stumbled across; they seem to encourage anonymity and sniping more often than community, but perhaps I'm wrong. If people have models in either of these realms that they think would be promising, I'm all ears.
I think listservs, old-fashioned as they are, can work well for groups of moderate size that already have some sense of community--a sense of shared interests and relations that keeps discussion civil and focused. Not necessarily "among friends," but perhaps among colleagues. My fantasy is that there exists such a group around Asian American poetry and a listserv would just need to activate it. I will confess, though, that I have no idea if this is true. My friend Dorothy Wang and I often lament that we seem to be the only people around in academia who care about Asian American poetry; I'd hope that the list would prove us wrong.
I don't see why we couldn't try several things at once; a group blog, a discussion board, and a listserv aren't mutually exclusive and might even reinforce each other.
Finally, to technical issues. My only experience in creating lists is on academic networks; nearly all of them still use antiquated LISTSERV software, offering limited features. I have been looking into the idea of hosting the list through the University of Toronto's system, but they do not even seem to offer archiving, much less any kind of web interface. I've been on several Yahoo groups, and I see Google groups as well; can anyone tell me if these seem like better ways to manage a list, or if there are other options that I should consider?
There's been some debate, both here and on Roger's blog, about whether a listserv is the best way to generate the kind of discussion and community I'm interested in. One commenter chez Roger ("Nick," who I'm assuming is Nick Carbo), suggested that the era of listservs is over and "blogs are where it's at." I'm sympathetic to that, obviously. But I still wonder if a listserv might be good at reaching the broad community of Asian American writers and readers I'm hoping to engage--a community that would not only include younger poets but critics and scholars who have an interest in the field (and who, in my experience, are relatively clueless about the world of blogs).
The group blog and the discussion board have also been suggested as models. I'm nominally a part of several group blogs, and I think they can be fantastic for a few people who are pursuing a group project; I'm less convinced that they are great forums for discussion amongst a fairly large, diffuse group. I've never really been happy with any of the few discussion boards I've stumbled across; they seem to encourage anonymity and sniping more often than community, but perhaps I'm wrong. If people have models in either of these realms that they think would be promising, I'm all ears.
I think listservs, old-fashioned as they are, can work well for groups of moderate size that already have some sense of community--a sense of shared interests and relations that keeps discussion civil and focused. Not necessarily "among friends," but perhaps among colleagues. My fantasy is that there exists such a group around Asian American poetry and a listserv would just need to activate it. I will confess, though, that I have no idea if this is true. My friend Dorothy Wang and I often lament that we seem to be the only people around in academia who care about Asian American poetry; I'd hope that the list would prove us wrong.
I don't see why we couldn't try several things at once; a group blog, a discussion board, and a listserv aren't mutually exclusive and might even reinforce each other.
Finally, to technical issues. My only experience in creating lists is on academic networks; nearly all of them still use antiquated LISTSERV software, offering limited features. I have been looking into the idea of hosting the list through the University of Toronto's system, but they do not even seem to offer archiving, much less any kind of web interface. I've been on several Yahoo groups, and I see Google groups as well; can anyone tell me if these seem like better ways to manage a list, or if there are other options that I should consider?
for Robert Creeley (1926-2005)
Conversation Poem (unathorized)
Robert Creeley—Chicago, December 29, 1999
Hey, let me
tell you
this: he
as the ultimate
good person, as
the art of lying,
by the throat and
throttle it.
The sawyer of
the mind seated
in the rocking chair,
so the neighbors might
see. Variously
culminating literature
of tacit
horror: the willing
suspension of
culpability.
Taking the XXX Cantos
to war: just read
this and add
water, for which no
academies exist.
Sit with a book
and sound it, quote
get it right unquote.
You couldn’t
break it. It’s not
a product, much as
music is, the
activity of forgetting
the apparatus.
Meaning begins to,
as the ascent
beckons: the materials,
the house I was born.
To, to get to,
much, much too
particular: I rock
on the porch. There
isn’t room. A
mirror of someone
seeing themselves, where
lyric begins: Look Ma,
I’m dancing! At
85, what the
hell? When the whole shift
is so simple: Socrates
asking what you mean.
If you haven’t been
hit by a club, how
can you know? Translating
into standard English: why
one must be the
subject of a sentence.
Works on paper,
painters, especially
what’s seen.
It’s a vocab-
ulary, a place,
place of seeing the
world, a different
pattern, a friend of
a few years.
Apart from other physical
human persons: like
cluttering, like chickens.
The salt pond,
so heavily
salted you can walk
on it. I never
realized how I smell.
A kind of civilization
vs. barbarism, this
adversarial relation, the
possibility of class,
again back to that
time in the 40s: then there were those
that were not. Why this
person of that place, the
phony energy? I felt
a great and social
father, mine dead when
I was 4, 8 miles from
Concord—Jude the
Obscure, an eye
for a college.
In this country
I heard a woman
talking about, about
government, a super-
market, a sense of
completion and production.
What else are they
going to do?
I wanted a poetry
like the soapbox derby:
go to your own
dictionary. All American
poetry is homemade.
What’s, what’s, what’s
to happen? The Cantos
had sold a modest
number of copies.
She writes poetry
for every occasion.
She has a
situation. The nearest
thing would be
a dilemma.
I began by reading
the door, the measure
of four. Quoting
some other poet
gets you started.
This poem originally appeared in Mirage #4/Period(ical) #99.
Robert Creeley—Chicago, December 29, 1999
Hey, let me
tell you
this: he
as the ultimate
good person, as
the art of lying,
by the throat and
throttle it.
The sawyer of
the mind seated
in the rocking chair,
so the neighbors might
see. Variously
culminating literature
of tacit
horror: the willing
suspension of
culpability.
Taking the XXX Cantos
to war: just read
this and add
water, for which no
academies exist.
Sit with a book
and sound it, quote
get it right unquote.
You couldn’t
break it. It’s not
a product, much as
music is, the
activity of forgetting
the apparatus.
Meaning begins to,
as the ascent
beckons: the materials,
the house I was born.
To, to get to,
much, much too
particular: I rock
on the porch. There
isn’t room. A
mirror of someone
seeing themselves, where
lyric begins: Look Ma,
I’m dancing! At
85, what the
hell? When the whole shift
is so simple: Socrates
asking what you mean.
If you haven’t been
hit by a club, how
can you know? Translating
into standard English: why
one must be the
subject of a sentence.
Works on paper,
painters, especially
what’s seen.
It’s a vocab-
ulary, a place,
place of seeing the
world, a different
pattern, a friend of
a few years.
Apart from other physical
human persons: like
cluttering, like chickens.
The salt pond,
so heavily
salted you can walk
on it. I never
realized how I smell.
A kind of civilization
vs. barbarism, this
adversarial relation, the
possibility of class,
again back to that
time in the 40s: then there were those
that were not. Why this
person of that place, the
phony energy? I felt
a great and social
father, mine dead when
I was 4, 8 miles from
Concord—Jude the
Obscure, an eye
for a college.
In this country
I heard a woman
talking about, about
government, a super-
market, a sense of
completion and production.
What else are they
going to do?
I wanted a poetry
like the soapbox derby:
go to your own
dictionary. All American
poetry is homemade.
What’s, what’s, what’s
to happen? The Cantos
had sold a modest
number of copies.
She writes poetry
for every occasion.
She has a
situation. The nearest
thing would be
a dilemma.
I began by reading
the door, the measure
of four. Quoting
some other poet
gets you started.
This poem originally appeared in Mirage #4/Period(ical) #99.
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