Charles Bernstein
[wpvideo rBNDeSaL] Charles Bernstein reading at Openned 14/05/08.
[wpvideo rBNDeSaL] Charles Bernstein reading at Openned 14/05/08.
'Q. You think poetry’s on the upswing? A. Well, in some ways it is, indisputably. When I was poet laureate, one effect of occupying that office is that you get interviewed quite a bit, and the two most frequently asked questions were, one, how to do you account for the upswing in poetry, the rebirth of interest in it all across America, and the second question was, how come no one reads poetry anymore? Q. So, there’s opposite sides of the same coin. A. Well, I think the answer lies … There is a way, in a kind of paradoxical way, to answer both questions, which is to say that, yes, the audience for poetry is increasing, the number of reading venues and prizes and magazines and all poetic mechanisms are increasing, but—and this is not completely the case—but that the audience for poetry seems to be composed largely of people who want to write poetry. George Carlin, who’s one of my favorite word guys, he says, the thing about poetry is there’s a lot more people writing it then there are reading it. Yeah, well, I think there’s a great deal of truth to that, and I think there are certain poets out there who are breaking this kind of vicious circle, if you will, by bringing it into the audience of poetry non-practitioners, that is to say, people who have no vested interest. It’s like, if you have 600 people at the opera, probably 20 of them are fellow opera singers, but if you have 600 people at a poetry reading, it’s closer to 500 that are poets.' Link via Silliman's Blog
[wpvideo onTLhNuY] Maggie O'Sullivan reading at Openned 14/05/08.
'What does a Google Books Library Project book look like? When you click on a search result for a book from the Library Project, you'll see basic bibliographic information about the book, and in many cases, a few snippets – a few sentences showing your search term in context. If the book is out of copyright, you’ll be able to view and download the entire book. In all cases, you'll see links directing you to online bookstores where you can buy the book and libraries where you can borrow it.' Link
[wpvideo mB2Kmw7G] Sean Bonney reading from his book Baudelaire in English in an abandoned Church inside a grave yard somewhere in Stoke Newington sometime early 2008. The weather turned to hail.
La Monte Young (translation: developing 2nd world city) All we hear is, radio Dada Some modern art, give me a G, give me a G Rhyme 'em to Death Before watching you should also go here. Is it book or bock?
[wpvideo vP9NDRBq] A fragment of Portmanteaux being read at Openned See documentation of Portmanteaux. Previously the piece was performed at the Wigmore Hall (April 5th 2008) and was presented with this program note: "Monuments, in their grandeur and imposing splendour, are manifestly present, while simultaneously marking an absence: they refer to a time since passed. The piece which now erupts into Wigmore Hall stands as a monument to a collaborative process which began months ago in an alley café off Brick Lane. Bound into its form is the staining dirt of the journey, telescoped into this moment and sung through the body of the French soprano Emilie Brégeon. Drawing on Emilie's nationality and the concept of translation, two poems were written which play on the ambiguities between the French and English languages, and broadly situate themselves within the two sites of Wigmore Hall and Brick Lane. The poems, translated into two sets of musical material, are presented simultaneously: at every given point the voice is singing one of the poems while a setting of the other is rendered by one or more of the instrumental lines. There are several words in the poem whose meaning changes depending on whether they are contextualised within a French or English Lexicon. These words, or portmanteaux, are written in bold in poem 1 and form points of transition to or from poem 2, which contains these words as well as the text presented here. At some of these transition words the voice and instruments swap roles, and so neither poem is sung in its entirety. Thus, like the monument, the text in performance is both present and absent: the form of the piece points away from itself to something that is irretrievably lost." Poem 1. Stalkers eight pedicel prick manila into street Regardez les briques brillantes, hawkers assassin Fly nail _ ash _ calcite moons _ autoclave cloy Malevolent cloister plus le temps et l'espace: deafen Shed oyster shatter cobble to bakery barracks Miasma tongues faulty torque embrace sky halls Un probleme de la vie quotidienne: throttle loss Gaze vaunted gather lit. Fisheye lens. Red red alabaster/// There are words for your love aleatoric Circadian spinnerets: cavalcade of centers, aleurone Fait gasp pain. Jitter fleuron sepia stymied lead septic death, Skeptic light rusted post-blonde so basal sweet My date coagulated, rivers infect yeast into mean Braced in every brick this thought. (____________________________________) Everything Quotidian: Everything is Night: A haunted Rue Poem 2. (for your company my silent monument I do pay) At The Foundry performance (14th/5th/08) Emilie was not able to make it so the piece was radically reworked and re-conceived for the Foundry. Wigmore Hall Performers: Composer: Edward Nesbit Poet: Steve Willey Voice: Soprano Emilie Brégeon Clarinet 1: James Burke Clarinet 2: Cristina Strike Viola: Drew Balch Vibraphone: Gregory Felton Foundry Performers: Composer: Edward Nesbit Poet: Steve Willey Voice: Steve Willey Viola: Drew Balch Clarinet 1: Hannah Laurence Clarinet 2:Tagore Gonzalez Vibraphone: Gregory Felton