Great Gatsby, OMG!

I have been listening to a recording of The Great Gatsby. ever hear of the book??? well yeah, it is a warhorse. I 1st read it in high school, 9th grade. and I liked it, I think. that it is as ubiquitous a cultural item as, say, Vivaldi's Four Seasons should not take away from the pleasure of the book. Fitzgerald had a magnificent ease with his writing. edit that, his best writing was honey smooth. I dutifully read Tender is the Night and it was pretty much of a botch. too much effort following thought out strictures rather than allowing the story to find itself. the plot of Gatsby is meticulous to the point of being burdensome. it is wonderful to see the intricate play of elements but that ends up seeming like gimcrack. the interwoven relationships work, but they derive from that basic novelistic falsity that does not draw me in much. I am taken with how Scott's satiric edge merges with his fascination. he belongs to the world of which he writes yet also stands aside. the tension of those 2 viewpoints holds the story together. I saw the movies after having read Gatsby at least a couple of times, and the look of the movie (I mean the version with Robert Redford) informs how I imagine the characters and look of the book. Redford's crisp woodenness seems perfect for Gatsby, and just seeing all that white flannel and those airy mansions evokes a milieu and an era. Scott's description of the social interactions between people is Proustian in its presence. certainly Scott was not attempting the depth charge that Proust committed to, but the prickling light bouncing off the social surfaces in Gatsby are pretty vivid. the scene in which Tom Buchanan dismally honks about the need for racial purity, and the women prattle about his great intellect, is clustered unknowing fatuousness. and there's the library of uncut books, and that ridiculous drunken car crash at the first Gatsby party that Nick attends. oh, and I love the litany of attendees to Gatsby's party, with the goofy names and desperate invocation of importance as in the society page of the newspaper. about which I wonder, whither goest? as newspapers conk out, will there be a venue for those pictures of Dr and Mrs Whosis at the charity ball? I mean, would a website serve so lusciously? a brave new world is nigh. anyway, Scott's short stories, which Gatsby extends from, are flush with a humoured embrace of present giddy particulars. Tender represents the artist's attempt to create weight. the result is something that cannot bear its own weight. I think of Truman Capote's Answered Prayers, which is his attempt to find value in the tacky social network he teased himself into. Capote had Proust and probably Fitzgerald clanking in his head as he tattled about his friends and acquaintances. he missed the boat entirely. everyone had the clef to his roman, probably because he had gossiped it all right along. and these elite are not so fascinating, of themselves, as he believes. Lee Radziwill? Babe Paley? Fitzgerald was not just fascinated by the milieu of America's rich explosion. Gatsby ends, almost jarringly, with a reminder that the main players in the drama were Midwesterners. the implication of the American turbine may not be drawn out enough but it is a node of interest and relevancy in the book. I do not entirely trust Fitzgerald or, in fact, many of the most interesting 20th Century American novelists. Hemingway interests me almost not at all, but Wolfe and Dos Passos have their moments, and I really like immersing in Faulkner, but there is something that I do not trust about them, all of them. it is something about these United States that scars or misshapens the work. dare I say that the pure products of America go crazy? there is something to that, tho I recognize that a curveball exists in the word pure.

watched Pineapple Express last night. I now have 2 Apatow/Rogen movies under the belt. it had its moments, and some limitations. Seth Rogen is a likeable presence, everyman lug and wise ass. in this movie he is a process server, which is only relevant for the first few minutes, during which he serves subpoenas and smokes dope. this is Rogen at his most comfortable, and he is funny to watch. the plot shifts to his girlfriend, who is still in high school. which is played for laughs but we are still supposed to take the relationship seriously. it is just awkward, and is largely left behind for the rest of the film. the plot begins in earnest when Rogen goes to buy more pot. his source is James Franco, total stoner. I know Franco only from Spiderman, where he has to be overwrought, but goodlooking. he and Rogen are great together, even to the uncomfortable point of you thinking you knew these guys in college. after Rogen leaves he witnesses a murder by a drug lord. in his distress Rogen leaves a joint at the scene, which the drug lord easily identifies (it is the rare weed pineapple express), so Rogen and Franco go on the run. here things get stupid, and a little tone deaf. there is a Tarrentino mix of murder and mirth that does not settle well with stoner contentment. the humour is slapstick but, well, I must bring up the Three Stooges. the slapstick of the Stooges was stylized in a way that detached the mayhem from gross consequence. in this movie, the violence looks painful, and characters die. so the humour gets quashed. our stoner heroes are joined by another stoner, who is hilarious. the cast is solid, tho Ed begley and Nora dunn are wasted as the girlfriend's parents. when they appeared, it seemed like the movie might be perched on absurdity, but they ended up just fulminating. ApaRogen movies seem improvisational. I imagine that the story is whipped up over a weekend, the script over the following week, then they take a week or so to film, and it is all fun and games. that is how it seems. it works because the cast is solid but I think this sort of production eventually wears thin. I find that I do not want to see another trailer for a Will Ferrell movies, because they are blurring together, and I suspect that Rogen and Apatow may be doing the same thing.

Jack Kimball writes well of the current temperature of the poetry world and its subsistence blogs, here. the zest seems to have passed, drained elsewhere. as in Facebook, Twitter, I don't know. the Poetics list, and others, too, were lively, in their day. lo 10 years ago or so, I came on board this internet, greeted by a network of forces that I had been abstracted from. there was contact with other poets, that is, and it grew my own work immeasurably. I was vitalized by the Poetics list then, and Subpoetics, and some few other lists. they were places of energy. the old neighbourhoods have changed and right now, it feels like nothing has replaced what there was. I guess there's a whiff of nostalgia here. I do not think that blogs have lost their utility, as singular fronts and as community nodes. my own usage has skidded some recently. I always consider this blog a Poetry blog, even tho my posts are often 'off topic'. I associate everything that I write here with poetics, and if you have a moment (make that a few moments), I could explain. not right now, tho. my reading has not been poetry overmuch of late, tho I have just brought down John Milton from the shelf (Paradise Lost, perhaps), having read a Cromwell bio. and I am reading Carl Sauer's 17th Century North America, and been listening to Olson lectures, namely the Vancouver reading (remember when poetry could be exciting???). if we really are a community, then we need to kick out the jams. we are drifting, right now.

saw two more movies over the weekend, Signs and Contact. both of which we own, and have seen before. Signs simply hits me. its atmosphere is claustrophobic and scary. visually it is gratifying. it is not a flashy exercise, it just feels well filmed. Mel Gibson is pretty well tainted at this point, it is hard to forget all the weirdness attached to him now. I am, that is to say, leery of him, even films that appeared before he weirded out. despite this prejudice in which I find myself, he comes across well. the cast is really good. a pall hangs over Gibson and family. Gibson's wife died before the action of the movie. the older child is a morose boy, the younger a quirky girl. and there is Gibson's brother, played by Joachim Phoenix. the relationship of these 4 is funny, human, and convincing. so I have named many of the positives in the film. Gibson's denial of God because his wife died, and his ultimate renovation, is too pat. art is interesting when it doesn't explain. the movie is basically Childhood's End meets Dawn of the Dead meets War of the World's. the freshness of the humour, the compelling atmosphere, and the realness of the relationship of the 4 of them, as family members and as actors, is what distinguishes this movie. I have seen it 3 times and still enter it wide eyed. Contact has a similar underlying wistfulness as Signs. Jodie Foster is ambitious researcher who lost her father at a young age. like in Twister, as it happens. that loss informs her actions thru out. the SETI project is a big I don't know for me. collateral discoveries and advancements aside, I wonder if it is getting very far. it is in the movie but... well anyway, Jodie has a 2001 moment, which is upbeat in that odd heroic way of Carl Sagan. Tom Skerritt and James Woods are nefarious in a pat way, but that doesn't matter. the focus is on Foster's trip, if I can please use that word. which brings me to Foster herself. she is a good actor, very intelligent yet lively, but even when she is giddy, there is a coolness about her. we're not used to smart actors, I mean really smart ones. Hollywood is full of knuckleheads so it must be hard for her. anyway, Foster brings forth that preternatural faith in science that Sagan brought.

the reading fare at the supermarket has presented what I believe is an inordinate amount of material concerning Jennifer Aniston. I have nothing against her, and admit to having watched Friends for a time. sure, she had the one hit on tv, and smartly did not hustle another one (so far as I know). she did a few modest movies that look to be extensions of Rachel, tho I have not seen them. and there you are, tho I should not forget Leprechaun. the drama with Brad and Angelina, woohoo! plenty acridity there. and I thought she had already broke from John Mayer (loved him with the Bluesbreakers) when I learn that Jen dumped him just now because Mayer claimed he was unavailable to her but was publicly tweeting (probably to Eric Clapton and Peter Green). so look, here's an FAQ (my 1st!) to give you some sense of the real Jennifer Aniston.

1. Does Jennifer have the power of flight? of course she does. sadly, she just doesn't have the time to indulge this passion of hers. she is a sight to behold as she flaps her arms and glides thru the tepid Southern California sky.
2. so what's up with that expensive hairstylist that she used for the Academy Awards? yes, a lot of money was paid so that Jen and her stylist could work together to make her hair the most beautiful on the planet (Earth) on that magical night. her stylist removes each hair from the follicle, cleans, dries, and perms it separately, and reattaches. such expertise and care does not come cheaply.


3. was Jennifer shining shoes at train stations when she met Brad? yes.
4. what is the longest that she has stood outside the Branjolina residence, staring grimly? 17 days. it ruined the gown she was wearing.

watched 40 Year Old Virgin yestreen. and it is indeed what the title indicates. this may be my 1st and only Judd Apatow movie. he seems to be the John Hughes of this generation. at least so I infer, judging by the murmur that I hear. and is Seth Rogen the new Molly Ringwald? the movie opens with a very familiar set up, with Steve Carel as 40YOV, and all these risible details of said character acted out as the opening credits roll. Get Smart began the same way. Carel is quite likeable, being nerdy yet with a modest loopy aggression that sparks the humour. he and Colbert bear similarities, tho obviously they took different routes away from The Daily Show. the idea is that Carel's putative friends help him to get, as they say, laid. it is the sort of plot that so many teen comedies of the 80s wore down, tho it is cast with older tho no less puerile characters. the ensemble is good, with Paul Rudd, Seth Rogen, and I do not know the other guy's name tho he looks familiar. the situations are stupid but the throwaway lines are great. yes, it is so much like a John Hughes movie, before he really crapped out. there's an improvisational feel to all the actors, which makes one wish that the press of narrative could have been detoured more. it ends with Carel singing Aquarius and everyone dancing Hair-style, which went off really well. I think I could bear watching 2 more Apatow movies, then I know they'd just bear on me as the limited entertainments they aimed to be.

I have pretty much failed Twitter, and am not overly sad about that, because it is just one more thing, but still, it is a gooey mass of (self) interest, if you will. for instance, Christopher Walken tosses off flakes of moments that are quite... something something... evidence at this link... the deal is, poetry could be found or made in this context. that I have accomplished little of either is not the point.

saw As You Like It by roughly the same troupe as was involved with the home school coop. the person in charge of the production today was the initial force, and director, behind the previous productions (most of which I wrote about here in Tributary Land). I think we can say that creative differences caused her to leave the aegis of the coop behind. and so...

the venue was the grange building in Groton, MA. grange!!! not a great place for a play, but that difficulty is something of a funky plus. the audience has a different involvement when performances are other than slick.

the largish room on the 1st floor was the dressing room. upstairs was a similarly-sized room, with a small stage at the end. the stage size certainly proved a logistical problem.

probably more than half of the cast had formerly been involved with the homeschool coop. Rosalind was played by the girl who played Juliet a couple of years ago. she did a great job in that. for this production she was music director and composer and was a dance coordinator. she wants to be a classicist (Latin and Greek), and is a member of a sword dancing team. zowie! she handled Ganymede's dazzling wit delightfully. her Romeo from the previous production played Orlando. he has a slapsticky presence (he is almost as tall as Erin) and likes to ham it up, but he is strong in dramatic roles, as well.

I do not want to critique the acting too much because I am impressed by all the actors. they all get their lines capably, and some few, like the above, put dimension in the lines.

there was quite a bit of music in the production, all played live. I was struck that a girl of 4 or 5 was given 2 solos. I would not have asked it of her but she did a good job with those quirky melodies and rhythms (I do not believe that the songs were composed by the Rosalind actress, probably adapted).

there was a stairway from the dressing room to the side of the stage. one can both come on stage or enter the hall. near the end of the play a girl came thru the door into the hall and marched in front of the stage and sat down in the front row. it seemed at first that she had just used the bathroom but did come up the other staircase, as we were told to do. the adult she sat next to tried to hold her in the seat but she got up and moved. then she stood at the front of the stage. then she went on stage. by this time it was clear that she was autistic. and as it happens, a member of the cast, tho not of this specific production (two full productions are run). I do not remember which character it was took the girl (9 years old) by the hand and kept her out of the way. nobody panicked or got upset, which is nice. perhaps the girl should've been dressed in her costume even tho she was not in the day's production. when the characters danced and sang together, the girl joined in.

autism and Alzheimer's are 2 shocking human revelations. engaged in the idea of normalcy, we see people who are tuned to some key that we cannot hear. and how difficult it is for us to accept that difference. we lodge in the difficulties that we see, very real difficulties. we labour with these differences. we stand stunned in front of these differences. we expect people to understand the world in the way we understand it. I think that we can take from Shakespeare the idea that we do not know what other people's role is, nor even our own, on this stage.

my reading of Shakespeare is not exhaustive, perhaps half of the plays. it is a lovely thing to see productions, e'en such amateur ones as this. his work has life, still. this life may muchly owe to his rep, the cultural ok that he has. imagine the Mermaid Tavern, and Shakespeare, Marlowe and Jonson, plus whoever else (no scholarship talking here), talking brilliant whatnot. they were not gods. and remember the Monty Python skit in which Whistler and Wilde exchange bon mots, which devolves to mere vitriol. maybe the brilliance of Shakespeare is the same as is evinced in Lost, or whatever other hot tv show that I have not seen. Shakespeare seems supercharged now but there were cheap seats then as now. I cannnot answer any of that, but these plays are mighty instigations, for sure.

love this little story about Clayton Eshleman that Jack Kimball found. Jack demurs on the suggestion that Eshleman may be the next John Keats with this perfect encapsulation: "Yes, if Keats had worked out more on the poetry-is-applied-dabbling-raised-to-revelation side of things." I like Eshleman for Sulfur, which delivered an exhaustive amount of work (I have more than 40 issues of the journal), as well as his own weird historical modernism. Jack has posted several times perceptivesly on Eshleman readings, if you would like to peek in the pantaloons.

reading at Furtherance by J H Prynne (The Figures). I say reading at because I have not read thru, which I do not usually do anyway with poetry books. it is a collection of 4 tiny publications (the whole is slightly more than 100pp). well, I just want to say that it is quite lovely. Prynne tickled my interest because of an Olsonian connection, I think (hazily) that Olson bespoke Prynne. what ev, Allen: what of the POETRY? ok, given the critical standards of the day, I might asseverate that Prynne totally rocks, using ESPECIALLY emphatic italics there. there is something post-Olson about Prynne, where the methodological study of Olson has been transformed into a capable and common usage. by which I mean Olson's self-conscious quest has been transformed into a general tool. reading these poems, I think of the 3rd Maximus volume, where Olson returns to a more straightforward narrative and even a lyrical integer. there is a LANGUAGEy sort of intuition in Prynne, but free of the self-referential inscape of academic promulgation. I mean, isn't there a touch of conscious academic outreach in the LANGUAGE parlance? as I entered the LANGUAGE realm, in discovery mode, I was dismayed by the clanking vocabulary of the critical matter. I got the loopy satire of, say, Bruce Andrews, and appreciated the cogency of Silliman and Susan Howe, and I trusted, having some 1st hand experience (hoka hey! I am Facebooked among former Franconians (Franconia College, just to be clear), tho Grenier is not as yet among that number), Grenier's wired interest. but beyond some few, I discerned in LANGcrit a rattled academic barf of big words meant to look big, and fit the academy's need. which I did not see in Olson, tho he talked over my head so often. Prynne pragmatically takes a LANGUAGE sort of involvement, and an intellectual embrace, and presses that verbal activity into a diurnal sort of squeeze of process and margin. please nod if you catch my drift. I am also confronted with how English in the UK sounds different from that of the American states, as furthermore does the poetry of Canada sound in slightly different, slightly unfamiliar, tones. vive la difference, fer sure, tho I might struggle with unfamiliarity.

Carl Annarummo published my recent chapbook, but beyond that evidence of percipience, he makes really nifty books. look at what he has produced. I recommend all of his work.
unrelated, but another wonder worker, Donna Kuhn and ferlies of visual and word.

taking a moment to feed my blog, on a springy, daylight saved day in southern New England... I downloaded a word processor called Jarte (and you can too). it is a simple word processor without a lot of extras. writers do not necessarily need all those extras as offered by Word and OpenOffice, both of which I regularly use. it occurred to me that I get the same jolt from getting a new word processor as I do a new pen or notebook. just as a new pen or notebook seems to open possibilities, likewise different word processors. just the difference of the interface, I guess. changing where I write has always seemed to come thru in the writing. watched portions of 3 movies yesterday, while doing other things.

1. that movie by the Farrelly Brothers about Siamese twins, starring Matt Damon and Greg Kinnear. clearly a South Parkian willingness to risk bad taste. Damon and Kinnear are connected at the waist, they share a liver. while their condition is occasionally awkward it is never disabling. it helps that they can switch sides at times, which is not explained and is barely pointed to. it is a surprisingly goodhearted movie. playing somewhat against type, Kinnear is the confident one and Damon is tremulous.
2. that smoking industry movie starring Aaron Eckert. his character is a lot like his role in Dark Knight. his character is a crisply accomplished and efficient lawyer defending the tobacco industry. he is pretty charismatic.
3. Troy. seeing the trailer at the theatre had me, specifically the shot from above of the 1000 face-launched ships headed towards Troy. I have seen it several times and enjoy it, tho it has its weaknesses. the gods have been excluded from the story, which is okay. Zeus and the gang would distract from the human story. the movie opens with a nice evocation of a battlefield, with Agamemnon's army about to face that of Thessaly. it is hard to conceive of the hand to hand clash of such armies. the battle of Cannae, Hannibal's greatest victory over Rome, saw an army of at least 50,000 Romans destroyed. some of those were made slaves but most were slaughtered slaughtered slaughtered. having a visual rendering of something like that, I mean a representation of two large armies meeting, is fascinating to me. whoever played Agamemnon was perfect. he is beefy and blustering and pompous as I imagine Agamemnon to have been. Brad Pitt as Achilles is good despite an overarching Brad Pittiness. you cannot forget that it is Pitt there, the guy married to the goddess Angelina (and not to that pale hamadryad Jennifer). Pitt is convincing vis-à-vis the physical prowess. early on he goes up against a steroid giant, whom he efficiently dispatches with a Michael Jordan sort of leaping feint. when Achilles and the Myrmidons hit the Normandy shore, Achilles is blurry ferocity. this ferocity brings to mind John Cleese's Lancelot in Holy Grail. the movie presents a lot of great shots of Troy and the battleground, a lot of presence. Eric Bana as Hector is terrific. he clearly hath not th'advantages of Achilles but proceeds nobly natheless. Orlando Bloom, despite all the great swordplay in Pirates and Rings, is stuck being a washout as Paris. it is a thankless role. there are plenty of changes in what we know of the Troy story, some of which seem gratuitous. Patroclus is the nephew of Achilles, brash due to youth rather than hubris, and Achilles can focus his attention on Briseis. the movie fizzles out after Hector dies, mainly because that love story is tired.

Steve Tills comments on my reaction to Elizabeth Willis' intro to Lisa Robertson, below. I should say that when I make bold statements, I imply, and you should infer, a question mark. as in, in this instance, is Willis' intro as disturbing as I think it is? that would require you (Dear Reader) to go to iTunes and download the podcast. I have read Willis' poetry, and like it, but I wonder why poetry should be transmuted into an academic quandary of code. poetry itself is a code, but the key is, poetry's code is immediacy. words in poetry are leaping life. Emerson was right enough that every word was, initially, a poem, an exalted expression of the world's experience. trapping poetry in a dialectic of segregated meaning is distressing. I wish others would listen to Willis and tell me how far off the mark I may be. as I said earlier, what she says is not meaningless. her words just seemed to have a push away, as if poetry were an Arcanum. it may be. when pressed, I have told people that I wrote poetry, which often seems to amount to admitting that I do weird, if not quite criminal, things. that is a sad encroachment. Robert Grenier did not speak in an involved haze, in the classes I took with him, but in the realm of personal (his) experience. school should not change that. but maybe I am prickly on this point, and unfair to Elizabeth Willis. does poetry need to be an isolation? maybe so, that is largely my experience. I gravitated to writing poetry because the field was open. I did not know what poetry was, so I could make up the necessities. the necessities flowed in and out. writing is a directive, and impetus toward confirmation. sorry if I compelled sleepiness with that sentence. one writes as an act of discovery. that would imply a personal language. the stutter of writers like Olson or Creeley, or Dickinson--look at her work--is instructive, a revelation in speech. speech is active. poetry is an active moment in language. it will not be rightly described by stalled words. I acknowledge my ignorance and my resistance in these matters, because poetry is not, after all, not easy or easily quantifiable.

In Podcasting News...

1. listening to a podcast called Jordan Jesse Go, which is 2 guys talking, mostly. they are funny, often unexpectedly so. in the most recent episode they mention a teacher they had at UC Santa Clara, or whatever it is exactly called. said teacher was Kasey Mohammad, whom they describe as strange but interesting. hey, I almost know Kasey, beyond rep, from being on the Flarf list... in a similar vein, Stephen King mentions Creeley and Olson in his novels. the world of poetry is so small...


2. in another podcast, from iTunes U, actually, is a reading given by Lisa Robertson. I have not read much of her work so that is fine. thing is, Elizabeth Willis gave an atrocious intro. the atrocity of which I speak concerns the stodgy academic talkspeak she employus. it is not gibberish that she speaks, but a stultifying overlay. is poetry indeed such a code of segregation? the4 lecture by Harold Bloom that I have mentioned here was a pleasure to me because he revealed his pleasure in the works of poetry. Willis' intro had the makings of a bad lecture, a congestion of words around but somehow not in a subject. let's not do that sort of thing, k?

I herewith advert 2 pieces that I myself wrote:

1. Some Songs. I wrote this oh 8-9 years ago, a translation (if you do not notice) of the 1st 3 Duino Elegies. I took a Project Gutenberg translation of Rilke's work and just changed a lot of words. what I like here is how something of the original (twice translated) remains. I posted it some time ago on my crappy website, the one with all the pop ups, but here I clean it up a tad and you avoid the pop ups.
2. On Education. this is another college paper, written within that stricture. even so, I think it is fresh enough in looking at how my work evolved. a great impetus in a writer, in the arts, in many endeavours, is the urge to do it. added to that, tho, is the urge to understand how to do it, and why. we make much of our bi-cameral brains but it is all one brain after all. anyway, I hope this paper is not seen as mere indulgence. to me, it seems bright-eyed.

reading Nota Bene Eiswein, but I shan't review it at this time (might as well read it before review it, tho I do not wish to set unattainable goals). I am, however, inspired to write a few general words about Eileen Tabios' work. a byproduct of reading her work, for me anyway, is that I want to write. I always want to write but I mean try something different. Eileen's hallmark is adventure, in the sense of setting a challenge for herself, and enjoying the ride (mixed metaphors are the best metaphors). I think of Virginia Woolf, who, at least in the handful of her novels that I have read, seems to have given herself experiments to perform. the relentless wave action of The Waves, the focused quest of To the Lighthouse, the shifting POV of Mrs Dalloway. she sets herself challenges beyond the creation of a story, technical challenges. with Eileen, one sees different methodologies applied with each work. she attaches context to local effort, or the local context is understood as informative of the whole, the whole being Her Work. Nota Bene largely eschews the prose that she often writes in, instead she uses hay(na)ku and similar short lines forms. what she does not eschew with this book is notes and such, which she supplies with every book of hers that I have seen. I love notes and afterwords and all that stuff. Black Sparrow Books were always good for extra matter, which I enjoy. Eileen frequently uses other works of art, as well as historical or personal narratives, as seeds to riff from or with. in the case of NBE, there is an extensive use of the work of Christian Hawkey, whose work I am unfamiliar with. one thing that interests me with Charles Olson: his poetry, his prose, his lectures and interviews, all of it has the same voice. I mean the bold rush and stutter, assertions and questions. Eileen's work, including many blogs and even her place and placement in the Poetry Republic (as writer, editor, instigator), is an embrace of the many in one. all my life I heard one makes many. this is inspirational. it is simply fun to discover what is next with Eileen. when I say fun, I mean including books that embrace her father's death, or the painful nexus of her heritage, as well as the immersion into criticism of her work she allowed with The Blind Chatelaine's Keys (which see). these few words for now...

1. Nota Bene Eiswein by Eileen Tabios is in hand, product of Ahadada Books. I have not read it yet but it boasts cover art (collage) by Eileen Herself. the work is not in prose, unlike much of her work, but instead owes form to hay(na)ku and other means of counting, short lines. it is always worth reading the work of someone who pays me royalties (check is in hand).


2. Anny Ballardini sent a note to Wryting, and presumably elsewhere, adverting her new book, Ghost Dance in 33 Movements, available from Mark Young's excellent publishing adventure Otoliths. Anny's work receives of many tributaries, without formailized attachment. she also presents a wonderful generosity. her blog, par exemple, points to many works not her own. both Anny and Mark do good work. our challenge, should we accept it, is to support their support. this is part of what we can call community, if u willin.

for those who might be interested, I added numerous texts to my writing portfolio site, yclept Allen Bramhall Writing Portfolio. included in this array is the catalogue for the art show that I did 2 years ago, “Conversations and reactions”. the catalogue is part of my thesis project. I still need to scan in the images. that is a project, and beyond that, many of the pictures exceed, size-wise, the capabilities of my scanner. I wrote the catalogue descriptively, but it would be better with the images. selah, until such time as I can do better. I am hopeful that links, of which there are many, work, and apologize now for whatever glitch I have yet to fix. I will keep nurturing this thing. if you have any involvement with what I write, please let me know.

this is just to say that Meritage Press, in the person (grandeur) of Eileen Tabios, is once again shuffling *** Royalties *** in my direction for Days Poem. royalties mean that there still remain those whose money resides where their mouth is. well, I here declare that I shall take my share of the green grab and add it to the national trickle down, possibly breakfast at Starbucks. it is the least I can do (only Congress can do less). Eileen takes the idea of poetry seriously enough as to treat the publication thereof as if it were something of value. this rare envisionment is in itself of value. I leave it to the Reader to figure out why.

two things in the recent mail:

1. A book:

   by Eileen Tabios, a wee little book. it is a Teeny Tiny chapbook, produced by Amanda Laughtland, whose other chaps can be seen here. this is an anti-brick, consisting of a single sheet of paper folded into 6 pages, plus covers. the story is a short poetic sortie, with holes open for the reader to fill. it is yet another adventure from the institution that is Eileen Tabios. or do I mean instigation. “Nearby, needless to say, breathed the 1950 Petrus.” I believe I have tasted the 70 vintage of Petrus, which is named for a famous disciple. fwiw.

2. A teaching certificate:

   I am now licensed to teach. while I seek employ, let me ruminate, perhaps even divagate, on education. just before I entered 2nd grade we moved across town, and I had a different school to attend. this school, for some reason, was experimental, unlike the other elementary schools in town. in the other ones, students stayed in the same classroom all day, whereas in mine we shifted to different classrooms for different classes. the school blended grades somewhat. I was among a handful of students who took French lessons in 3rd grade. the school secretary would round up those of us who took this class and brought us to the weirdo who taught it. weirdo, I came to discover, is synonymous with French teacher. I mean no disrespect, just observing. I learned to conjugate a few verbs in the 4 years of French that I took in elementary school, and I had to sing a lot of baffling French songs. a feature of my elementary school (Franklin School, named after a famous president of the US, or at least so I understood for perhaps too long) was a lot of singing. several teachers that I had could be expected to haul out their guitar, and we had many school wide conventions in the auditorium during which the teachers led a hootenanny. too real! the repertoire was folk music, the Pete Seeger canon, I would say, with a fair taste of international music. it amuses me to think of an auditorium of children singing about marching to Pretoria. come the revolution, brothers and sisters… three teachers from the school actually quit teaching to become folk singers. we gathered in front of the television once to watch them singing somewhere. honest!

   my senior year at high school I was offered the opportunity of an experimental program. I mean, the entire senior class was so offered. I took it mostly because my friend did, I think. the program was called Education Without Walls, shortened to, heaven help us, EWOW (ee-wow). the teachers were allowed to offer courses that really interested them, and students too could teach courses. I took my first creative writing course, and my stellar pass/fail evaluation is posted on this very blog, a few weeks back. it was a great experience for me.

   et puis--which means look, this proves that I learned something in French class--I went to Franconia College, which was along the lines of Black Mountain or Antioch, I imagine, tho no one ever said so. located in the woolly realm of north central New Hampshire, a federally recognized poverty zone, it was under-financed but had a good heart. I did a lot of writing there. my 1st semester, I was supposed to write 20 pages of material (poetry, in my case) for the semester. I wrote 40 pages before the class had convened the 1st time. this course was taught by a fiction writer who did not feel qualified to critique poetry, tho I found his advice useful and sound. during my 2nd semester a search went for a poetry professor. several candidates read at the school. Robert Grenier was the winner. he left Tufts (where my father went to school), and Kenneth Irby took his place there. Grenier, as I have said a-many times, has had great effect on my course and direction. I recall that all the candidates for the poetry position made much of Olson and Creeley. I think my education did a pretty decent job of not stifling my interest. I remember learning about Heinrich Schliemann in elementary school, and whaling, and dinosaurs, all very exciting. and I am still interested in French, and folk music. education is opportunity. I can legitimately say that I am a lifelong learner. I owe this to the fortuitous facts of my education.

ah, the Super Bowl®. I watched but had other things going so did not pay full attention. it was a good game. certes, that interception at the end of the half was one of those ecstatic, improbable moments that are so beguiling. I do not know why the Steelers were allowed to add 15 blockers on the run back of the interception, nor why the Cards thought waving at Hamilton would help, but so it goes. I write, tho, because of Bruce Springsteen. I have made several failed attempts to record my impressions of Springsteen’s ridiculous performance, but the results have been unsatisfying. why did his performance bother me so?

I am not a fan of Springsteen’s music, but I am not against it either. not to my taste, but I recognize its appeal. I fumed a little at work about what I experienced of his performance, and someone said that he liked hearing those old songs again. och, I do not mean this to be about my musical taste.

the ‘show’ began with Bruce and Clarence posed in profile together. then the lights came up and, inscrutably, Bruce tossed the guitar he was holding to someone. that was disturbing. it appears that the guitar was only a prop. tossing the guitar seemed like a ceremonial detachment. curious, with an unpleasant vibration. Bruce then takes a mike and announces that the greatest rock band in the world will now take over for the next 12 minutes. and suddenly it is Wayne Newton onstage exerting himself to get a rise out of the audience. he smirks, dashes about the stage, exhorts. is irony evident? it does not matter. whether the desperation is joking or serious, it still smells. I forget which song he does 1st, but he goes thru a gamut of shticks. he drops to his knees à la James Brown. he kneels, arching his back dramatically, I guess à la Bruce Springsteen. he runs over to Clarence to mug à la every 80s hair band. oh yeah, sliding across the stage towards the camera, ugh.

the 12 minute high that Bruce offered was full of his tiresome shouty vocals, fake sincerity, over production, and sad lack of promise. it was all a straightforward attempt to move units of his latest release. yes, the agents of dystopia in charge of the show established that Bruce pretend that the claque was the world. just like last year with Tom Petty, and years before, no doubt, the formatted audience waved lit cigarette lighters, just like in the real world. silly.

despite the fakery, Tom Petty’s performance last year came across as sincere. Bruce was awkwardly content to swim the bullshit. and at a time of jitters, one would think this person who has been willing to speak would have said something to the nervous world at large. an acknowledgement that times are tough now, a note of hope about the new administration, something/anything related to the country and world now<. no, it is about those units that need to be moved.

2 of the songs, and they are both legitimately familiar ones, are songs of the frozen past: “Glory Days” and “Born to Run”. so much of Bruce's energy just bubbled in this mire of weary documentation. the anachronism is obvious. his performance was canny bullshit. once again, poetry is dead.

here is a link to my graduate thesis "Personal Myth in Art", which I have been meaning to put online for some time. it can also be accessed by way of the Bramhall Writing Portfolio link to the right. some years ago, I had the opportunity to write the advertising newsletter for the store where I worked. this newsletter was a significant part of the store's image. it was meant to inform and entertain as well as to advert and entice. I was happy, thrilled really, by the challenge, but at the time, I almost no longer knew how to write appropriately for this venue. my poetry then was written without much punctuation except commas. in addition, the extensive journal writing I was doing then did not really obey sentences. instead, I used dashes rather than periods, and certainly nothing so complex as semi-colons, because I was pouring forth, not developing a structured piece. dashes could be full stops or they could lead on, which is what I wanted from the writing. to write declarative sentences meant that I had to relearn prose writing. I consciously studied good and bad writing, reread Strunk and White, as I do regularly, and paid a lot of attention. to write a college paper meant a similar study, tho less on sentence mechanics and more on developing ideas. one notes in my poetry (prose tho it may be) that I accept dissonance, disjunction, and other deformities of what we define as good English. poetry is, after all, an effort to break thru the received structures of our daily speak to a realm of verbal immediacy. anyway, I commend what I have written to your gentle eyes.

I read a piece that Gerald Burns presented to the Charles Olson Society (from the minutes thereof: 8/95), to wit: “Maximus Betrayed”. he pretty well excoriates George Butterick, for poor scholarship, poor proofreading, etc. Burns’ criticism unleashes some emotions for me. I went thru hero worship with Olson, whose example meant so much to me. and Butterick, who did so much to bring O to the public, earned 2ndary hero status. but I have grown out of slavish respect. I recognize that Olson had his weaknesses and errors.

O was goofy. he envisioned a community of scholars, best of the best, and tried to entice the historian Carl Sauer, among others, to join. Sauer was too practical for such visions and demurred. Olson was wack, and that is both precious and something to be wary of.

one should remember that Olson was a scholar, but his aims were poetic. those who followed him were of the same vision. presenting a definitive text cannot proceed by such impetus, however.

so O had his acolytes, and Butterick was one of them. Butterick’s dedication was admirable, but was he a rigourous scholar? Burns argues effectively that Butterick was not. Burns has a prickly surety not unlike Dahlberg’s, and I can see that his rigour is well-earned. Butterick, on the other hand, and not surprisingly, is an enthusiast.

the idea of a definitive text presents a set of accepted terms and procedures, like that the last change that a writer makes is the definitive one. we know that both Whitman and Wordsworth reworked their work as time went on, and perhaps not for the better. a public sense could be said to have intruded on their artistic decisions. those changes are definitive, but one might prefer the earlier expressions over the redactions. Butterick’s decisions were not always rigourous.

my emotion here rides on wanting to agree with Butterick, but I see Burns’ point. and please, do we need this singular ownership? Dickinson is sadly trapped by that walled garden in Cambridge, and you can think of myriad other artists monopolized by the whosis with the rights.

papers of mine are housed and available at Ohio State University. yes, that is a weird thing to consider, imagining the future and who might be interested.

when I worked on typewriter, I would retype successive drafts, often for the most minor of changes. I developed the habit of numbering and dating the drafts, but that rigour only put the lie to consistency. there was all that work that preceded the decision to date everything, and there were the times when I neglected to follow my rules.

the computer complicates the situation. every time I hit ctrl-s, a draft is created and another is annihilated. I could go to the trouble of saving each ‘finished’ draft but I don’t, for obvious reasons. those annihilated texts still exist, in some quantum way.

it is difficult to get my mind around definitive. when I make changes, even of sloppy typos, I have the feeling that I make a new poem not change the old one. there is this sense of fluidity in the process. I occasionally make odd errors, like writing which when I clearly meant with. I could and sometimes do stay with the oddity but usually make the correction as quickly as I repair hte.

I read of the debate concerning the last lines of Keats’ Grecian Urn. the wording is fine but exactly what the punctuation should be creates a significant change in meaning. as readers, we create meaning, as much thru our misapprehensions as our care. the possibilities that arise thru this muddle of punctuation resolves in the idea of a poem’s manyness. poetry is not statement.

a definitive text is an effort to agree. in Ulysses, Leopold Bloom is credited with the unlikely chest measurement of 29”. a so called definitive edition of Ulysses came out in the 90s that was supposed to fix all the many errors that entered the text via confused compositor and such. according to Guy Davenport, as many errors as were corrected in that edition were added. we as human beings will err.

an ownership has taken place with Olson, as it has with others. this ownership becomes a slavish reliance. text disappears into mythos. Butterick was obviously energized by Olson. you can see it in his own odd and eccentric Collected Poems. I was so pleased to come upon Butterick’s collected, because it showed him defining space that was his own, not just working Olson’s farm. Butterick’s collected seems incomplete, and not just because he died young. one sees points of interest for him, but it feels as if he never developed the comprehensive vision of his own work that he had with Olson’s. that is, he gave more time to his work with Olson than he did with his own work.

when one looks at the works that Butterick edited one is aware of Butterick expressing himself. one sees an area being protected. I understand that urge, but readers must do their best to ignore such defenses.

the Authors are in eternity, fair enough. editors are still here on earth. I do not want to lionize anymore, not Olson, not Butterick. I just want to continue digging around in the rubble.

to the right the canny reader will see links to my Resume, my C.V., and my Writing Portfolio. the Portfolio, so far, features some user guides that I wrote, and some academic papers. I shall continue adding to these offerings.

Dr John M Bennett, curator of the Avant Writing Collection at Ohio State informs me that my archival papers are now catalogued. go to library.osu.edu/ and search "Allen Bramhall Collection" as title. you can click on full record and also click on the link to the finding aid. begin writing theses on my work now. seriously, this is something to twist my brain around. I have never done archival research but it fascinates me. I also learned today, via Dan Bouchard's local readings email list, that the Boston Athenaeum has acquired a goodly portion of John Wieners' published work... I'm looking at that now: does that mean they acquired his BOOKS??? well yes, it does, including mimeos and that sort of whatnot. cool.

Traffique de Thanksgiving

just back from another dimension (got a new hat!!!)

oh, okay, here is one of Robert Grenier’s comments on my class work. I know it is pretty unreadable but I think the gist is that I am awesome, you should buy my books, and generally you should bow to me. you can forgo the bowing if you would simply buy this book.

It Started Here…

 

The following is from the one creative writing class I took in high school, when I was 17. I began writing the year before. I am glad that Mrs H noted my predilection for rewriting. I am sure I did not do a lot of that rare thing, but any time a young writer makes such effort, it is worth noting. I also found one of the comments that Robert Grenier made for a poetry class I took at legendary Franconia College, a study of American poetry. I cannot put my hand on the one in which he notes that I spent my time either writing or playing ping pong. living in Franconia meant that Littleton, NH represented Big City Lights. click the image to read the report.

 

a few thoughts in an unfocused post:

1st) Anny Ballardini and Obododimma Oha (denizens of the Wryting-L list) have collected poetic responses to the recent election in USA at the site Anny oversees, Poet's Corner. the specific link is here, but check out all the work collected at the site, including a poem by Ezra Pound's daughter. I was invited to contribute to the project (Anny is one of the really supportive poetry folk out there--stay out of NYC, Anny!!!), but had nothing fitting, and I did not write to fit. work by Your Servant can be found on the site, however, including a couple of poems for the Autumn anthology

2nd) I know I should be more adept with my links. some are out of date, others could be added. Ron Silliman's excellent harvesting of links, which lose some usefulness with the less than evocative captions that he supplies, shows a terrific span of attention. in the same vein, but more so, of course, is Wood's Lot, which left my link list some while back because of my inability to do justice to (id est: read) it all just made me sad. a stunning range of material.

I have added links to more of my work (work I neglected to link to earlier), to the right there, yonder, which you might feel inspired to tap. you can even buy what excellent Carl Annarummo created of my wordage: Walden Book, a sort of preamble to Days Poem, which you already cherish as 1000 pages of awesome. Walden Book is the early buzz of the same obsessions, not to give any stories away. the internet, cor, it fills up with your work.

Important Advice

I was looking at a recent book by a butler, about manners and how to get along. Sensible advice but I quibble with his description of how to open a bottle of sparkling wine. He was doing fine until he ripped the cork free with a loud pop. Big Drama, but lives are at stake. For SAFETY'S SAKE, read on:

1. Remove the wire cage from the bottle, always keeping a finger or thumb on top of the cork. Corks can pop without your help, and with devastating force. Could be a bad thing.


2. Hold cork in one hand, bottle in the other. Keep the bottle horizontal. The reason? The pressure is upward from the surface of the wine. Holding the bottle vertically can inspire a rapid exodus of the contents of the bottle towards unprepared regions. You can wrap the bottle in towel or napkin, for a better grip and added safety, but you will look a bit poncy. Also, wear a Kevlar suit.


3. Twist the cork slowly. I have heard it advised that one should twist the bottle. In my experience, it is easier to twist the cork. Do whatever you think is right. Just because I have professional experience does not mean you should listen.


4. Ease the cork out. The trapped gas will help.


5. As the cork reaches the point of extrication, maintain a firm grip on the cork and let the gas slowly hiss out as you raise the bottle to a vertical and remove the cork entirely. Oh darn, did not spill a drop.


6. Pour wine into glasses, not the ones modeled after Marie Antoinette's breast--oh those French!--but tall flutes. Flutes are made with a rougher surface. Bubbles emanate from those rough points. Oo, the bubbles tickle your nose!


7. Hail the New Year, lads and lasses.

you ought to take time to read this blog, by the former Stephen Ellis now ycelpt Bob Button and likely to take on other aliases. page down a bit for a lovely Youtube performance by Leo Koetke (on the Tonight Show!!!), but do not ignore the words.

my informant sent this link to Charles Olson reading "The Librarian". additionally I am informed that today is Frank Moore's birthday, born 1923. yesterday was Olson's 99th annivérsaire. there are several other videos of Big Fire Source on Youtube. I realize that that sort of moniker is weighty and wearing but I am sure Duncan meant it straight up. I am now beyond slavishness towards my teachers but I am still much invigorated by Olson's work.

saw Batman the Dark Knight. it exceeded expectations. it is based more in a human reality than these comic book movies usually manage. Heath ledger was certainly riveting. of course, that is how it works, the crazy, intense one is the centre of attention. as has been noted, Satan is far more interesting in Paradise Lost than Adam or Eve. that given, Ledger still made every moment crackle. Cesar Romero played the role campy, pretty much as Bob Kane envisioned the character. Jack Nicholson was Jack, creepy yet fun. Ledger’s Joker was disturbing. late in the movie he deliver unto Batman an examination of Batman’s moral dilemma that was splendidly biting and well-aimed. Joker himself is hors de combat of that problem. he’s a terrorist without the moral clause. the sense of the city being terrorized, in the current political sense, was strong and compelling. Aaron Eckart as the white knight DA was good. he’s startlingly goodlooking in a brisk public servant way, and entered the role of Two-Face smoothly, I thought. no need to go entirely Willem DaFoe. Michael Caine as Alfred was good, cockney Alfred, and Morgan Freeman as Lucius Fox, worked well as well. do not go cheap on the little roles in these things. Batman as Dark Knight is wearisome. he’s got issues just like the criminals, but is far less evolved. Christian Bale as Wayne has life to him, but no Batman has succeeded in being more than a costume. which is the point, I suppose, of the character. the movie was well-contained, did not allude outside itself to other entries in the franchise, and its themes held thru out. I haven’t seen the latest James Bond movies, but I think they tried to just start over, treat them more like separate movies. there was that obvious sense in Iron Man that this began the series. it worked nonetheless, but one fears the attenuation that likely will occur. one need only look at the Pirates flicks following Black Pearl, and the 2nd Matrix was so awful that I could not watch the 3rd, tho that is supposed to be better and resolve the 3.

Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull, check. 1st one is still the best. this one has the same self-conscious manipulation as The Last Crusade, the urgency to touch all the franchise keynotes and let the plot take care of its own. the result is even more muddled than Last Crusade. I even found it visually cluttered. it looked remarkably cheesy, which is surprising given that as a film technician Spielberg aint no slouch. the movie starts with some malarkey about Russians invading Area 51 to steal, oh, you know, the Crystal Skull, or some hint to its whereabouts. the movie simply accepted that certain forces must push the plot, and dealt something to suffice. Indy is accompanied by a Brit who, it turns out, is a double agent. and a triple agent, except no one likely believed that reconciliation. but Indy gets away, and survives a nuclear bomb test by hiding in a refrigerator. I believe everything I see. there’s a brief 50s blackball theme, then Indy meets Shia LaBoeuf, who arrives looking like Brando in The Wild Ones. decent rapport exists between Ford and LaBoeuf, albeit a contrived tension, plotwise. on a vague hint, they fly to Peru, in search of that crystal skull. the Russians remain in the story, poor man’s Nazi. I did not mench Cate Blanchett being the nutsoid in charge of the Russians. she’s Stalin’s head of psychic research, or some such. which sounds more like a Hitler thing but anyway.she’s a dully campy dominatrix. is she a good actress??? her Galadriel was probably not her fault, the director forced her to look like such a bemused drag. I cannot remember what else I have seen of her. the plot was muddled beyond repair. the crystal skull attracted metal, but only when convenient to the plot. the action set pieces were lacklustre and did not seem to worry about plausibility. one accepts that Mythbusters might bust certain imaginative elements in a movie, but not that Jamie and Adam would not even bother to probe the possibilities. that is how it seemed with this movie. the movie was enjoyable enough, since I like Ford, and Spielberg’s failures are still largely competent. the crystal skull belongs, we learn, to ETs, so we end up with Richard Dreyfus’ friends with a somewhat more malign aspect. I do not know the budget of this flick but it looked cheapo. I wonder about Lucas, who has twiddled away his most interesting projects for the sake of merchandise and 2nd rate productions. I imagine that the plan was to slip River Phoenix into the Indy franchise, back in that day, and death kinda precluded that. LaBoeuf might be the next chance to move on, because Ford’s not good for many more punch outs. the movie ended smarmily, so maybe we should just tuck the baby in and say goodnight.

traffic to this space tripled because of searches on Emma Bee Bernstein, indicating the interest in her. Beth and I did our share, just wanting to know a little more. I did not intend to write a poem to her (see link below), but it was immediately identified as such by someone on the Wryting-L list. intent is a difficult thing in poetry. I (hope to) let feeling find the words, rather than, say, replicate the feeling in a structured response. if there is a School of Quietude, its sin is boosting emotional moments into crass simulacra. some things are too large in feeling, and too essential, death certainly, that we cannot play them like that. when Olson tells Blackburn that he did not know it was a subject, he lets boundaries find themselves. when I write ‘E’ in my poem, I really meant the letter, mostly. that was a safe distance, you might safe, tho I did invoke her name. i like the poem, because I see language passing thru me, mostly, rather than me at the steering wheel, sorry if metaphors are mixed.

quickly but respectfully reported

I guess that I appreciate Ron Silliman's death watch. my interest in the obits page has yet to reach the lurid point, but I do take note. and it is so stark to see a name, Emma Bee Bernstein, that I readily compute as 'someone', not that I have met Bernstein or Bee, tho I could have dined with them after their presentation at Tim Peterson's series, along with the rest of the audience. the picture on Ron's blog is a casual snap, a frame in the life movie. I know no more about her death, and do not even need details. I think of Charles Bernstein as an edifice, as a focal point for poetic divergences and such, I mean, oo, Bernstein = this or that. neither this nor that, however, hardly comprises the person who has lost his Emma. I have spoken as many words to Charles Bernstein as I have to Princess Diana yet the picture of her with the doleful end date caught me, and not just because I can insert Erin for Emma to bring it home. death don't have no mercy, certes. clasp hands, dear ones.

I guess you could check out the 139th installment of Antic View. Antic View has links to a lot of Jeff Harrison's work. Please peer upon it with your best eye. It is unique and delightful work, idiosyncratic yet inclusive. that Socratic Republic of Plato is a word-twisting place, suspicious of intent. we have this political economy of vocabulary (lumpy mouthful), in which the dedication of employment of words is respected. whereas the life of words, as living history of the joining space between people, is paved with too much intent. too many poets suck out loud, to put it bluntly. they suck the meme of intent, the sort of intent that can make Sarah Palin the map of Republican expanse. I think Jeff Harrison is a poet who arrives in a better light, less willful and more respectful. I believe strongly that his nation is aligned with the best vibrations. I will declare my own intentions towards a similar assonance. I read Antic View coldly, because I know that it is not titillating anyone, and that it adverts upon me, and well as on Jeff. I take our dilemma as poets seriously, and feel that Antic View charges the reader as well as ourselves. what do you need, dear Reader, to be incited???

I note Jeff Harrison's review of Walden Book (scroll down the page) at Galatea Resurrects. buy a copy and support Carl Annarummo's press and good work.

2 new installments to Antic View. Jeff Harrison admits to writing only about one poem a month, and I do not seem to be doing much more than that lately. yet we both feel productive. hm.

a couple of interesting social networking options. I've tried a few:

• Myspace, simply too ugly even to start with


• Twitter, could be useful but it did not stick with me. do we really need too much???


• Facebook, overwhelmed by structure, and people counting coup, but it seems useful, tho it also seems like a lot of work. come on, be my Facebook Friend!!!!!

I like these 2, however:

1. Goodreads, advert the books you are reading, write reviews. I like reading what other people are saying, and it is fun to write my own wisdomisms.


2. Wakoopa, reviews and usage data of computer applications. Wakoopa can tally what applications you use, how much, plus you can learn about what others are using. really useful!

{revised, 12/9/08}

saw 2 movies. 1st Khartoum, which I saw on Hulu. a spectacular historical drama from the 60s, and really, it was a spectacle, with grand vistas and all that. 19th century British interests in Khartoum are besieged by Islamic forces following a visionary called The Mahdi. the story begins with the British sending an army to quell the nascent uprising. the army goes Custer-like into a trap and all 10,000 are wiped out. the Mahdists are now well-supplied with guns. back in England there is this backroom talk with Gladstone and such, how to save face, rather than save Khartoum. all these proper English accents sound like Monty Python, deciding how to cut bait without looking like it. the machinations are appalling and confusing, but the gist is that Charles Gordon is chosen to go save face for the British Empire. Charlton Heston pays Gordon. I think the point is that Gordon, a Christian fanatic, will stay at Khartoum to the death, that being how Gordon rolls, meanwhile Britain can get the rest of its interests out of the area. something like that, I need another shot at the movie to get this clear. the point is that Heston is onstage now. he has his pompous, hammy mannerisms, but he is fun to watch. and those mannerisms are not as exaggerated as they could be, Cecil B. deMille isn't directing. Gordon is a little like Obi Wan in Bridge on the River Kwai. he is not quite over the edge like Obi Wan, that is, the point of his duty is clearer, but he is still buggy. his 2nd in command is Stewart, who is there to keep an eye on Gordon. he attempts to run a blockade on the Nile with British citizens at Khartoum while Gordon awaits the Mahdi. shades of Dien Bien Phu. the Mahdi is played by Laurence Olivier, merely exotic to my mind, Iago minus 7. the show always has to be Heston, I think. not in the sense of chewing scenery, tho he is good for that, it's just that he is so commanding in his stiff, somewhat noble, somewhat silly way. even when up against the like of Yul Brynner, who is one hell of a screen presence himself, Heston just keeps you looking at his ridiculous grandeur. Gordon and the Mahdi meet near the end for a parley. they realize that their fanaticism is similar. in the course of conversation, the Mahdi shows Gordon the heads of some of the blockade runners, and the hand of Stewart. ah, all is lost. so Gordon goes back to Khartoum, the Mahdists attack and c'est ça. the battle scenes were done with a certain grace. since no one in the fighting were important characters there was never that exult of action and heroism, just this thronging of energy. I was surprised how well done the movie was. and not dated. I almost watched Casino Royale, the 60s version. which, surprisingly, was directed by John Huston, and starred most of Hollywood's 60s elite, all to no avail, from the few minutes that I saw. it was too dated for me. it was a Bond spoof but the comedic timing was dreadful, color was garish, and Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass playing Burt Bachrach was congestive, not to my taste. there was a legitimate Shakespearian quality to Gordon, not that Heston was really up to that stature. knowing that Heston went from Hollywood icon to IRA loony (then Alzheimer's???) adds a dollop of substance to his expansiveness. I do not think I know who is a good actor anymore. the laden consciousness of 'great' actors really tires me. Heston's earnest hamminess works in this movie, I guess because the director kept the screen wide and commanding, so that the tussle of actorly ego could not overwhelm scenes. the historical story certainly carries a freshness.

also saw Get Smart. this surprised me by having good pacing without the antic imperative of many comedies (I am thinking of Steve Martin's Pink Panther). the actors had good rapport, tho 99 was played generically. could 99 have been played strongly? she was strictly support team in the tv series, sense to be placed against Max's nonsense. Steve Carel played the role earnestly, that is, played Smart as an earnest fellow, less pompous than the tv character. the plot was stupid but flowed well enough. regularly sown throwaway jokes served to keep the standard plot from weighing heavy.

I guess it is Christmas season. I cannot wait to see a Very Brady Christmas again, or that one with Mr Magoo, beloved by millions. I am right now listening to a Christmas jazz favourite, mellow guitar trio, oop, time for the bass solo. anyway, Thanksgiving was nice. we went to friends. getting last minute goods to bring on Wednesday, we were surprised that Whole Foods was quite quiet. wondering if this is an economic indicator. it is if subjective reports count. the after dinner music was John Fahey's Blind Joe Death. it was recorded 45 years ago! woot. yesterday we had errands to run. did not seem busy as we were oot and aboot. we were inspired to visit the mall, just to look around. the lots were filling in the outlying areas but not yet stuffed. I wanted to traipse thru the mall itself. a very long line waiting for cashiers at Sears. someone was stationed at the Sears entrance into the mall, with flyers for eyeglass bargains. saw that elsewhere: effort, that is, to sell. lots of sales, one place adverting 65% off. just down the road a Linen 'n Things closed, a Tweeter is in process, and Circuit City is gettin' ready. we did not really go into many stores. I wanted to see Apple both to see the new stuff there and to judge how this do-no-wrong is holding out. certes, it was crowded. 2 people at the door with leaflets about the 1-day black friday sale. the prices of which were not fancy at all. oh, in the window were large representations of Santa and Herbie (or is it Hermie?) from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. do they pay for that? anyway, lots of people. Beth and I ogled the iPod Touch. the phone aspect of the iPhone is of least interest to me, and combined with all the other features, the battery hardly keeps a charge. so give me a dedicated phone and a Touch. seriously, give them to me. an Apple employee answered our questions efficiently and sans commish. it is a good business model there, with lots of expertise floating around, no central cash register, and plenty to play with. innovation will get a company thru these times. companies with 'n in their names will fail. the only other store we looked into was Coach. several people milled around, and lots of sales people. it is a stalwart brand that will hang in there, I imagine. so that was all there was for Black Friday. short line to be scared by Santa, but maybe people were not bringing the kids on this mission of savings. I should mench seeing Stephen Colbert's Christmas Special. it was awful. I still like Colbert, and continue to be amazed at how well he plays the character and the irony above it. the marketed part of him, the synedoche of his image standing for a slew of disparate things, all tires me. his special was really cheesy. he was satirizing those homey specials of yore, Perry Como or Andy Williams wearing sweaters and pretending to have a family celebration. Colbert did nothing different, except that he undermined any sliver of sincerity. he had numerous singing guests who were all uncomfortable. the worst was Toby Keith. who was not so bad as a guest, but his song, with him wielding a gun to defend Christmas, simply did not work. it was an embarrassing effort, as was the show itself. wheel off the tricycle time, it would appear.

Lanny Quarles has made available a book in pdf form: Nosering Cellphone. I commend your attention to it. I have also updated his blog url in my links. I also add another Quarles blog. earthshaking!

I have it on excellent authority, my own, that in this post by Ron Silliman he is channeling me or otherwise influenced by my patented frame of peregrinacious wandering. seriously, tho he follows threads, this post is much more ramble table than I expect from him. good job! and he manages to mention the Beau Brummels!!! the source of all knowledge, Wikipedia, informs me that the original Beau Brummel was the 1st to introduce the suit and tie for men, and he recommended polishing one's shoes with champagne. I am doing that right now.

interview/documentary with/re mIEKAL aND.

reading Brothers Karamazov and a book on the sacred by Mircea Eliade. which is neither here nor there except, what, to provide a reading background? well. the nature of that has changed with the internet, because I read quite a lot online, and in the online way, from here to here to here. book reading is a specific pleasure, but so is listening to stuff, like podcasts and their variety. anyway, I was thinking that I made zero mench of the election that just passed thru the United States with the speed of slow variance. a bit of that is discouragement, a bit numbness, a bit an unwillingness right now to be part of the machinery that has been running for so long. Obama won, I hear. I thought to get to the polls early but dawdled and it was after 5:00 when Erin (his 1st) and I went to the polls, Beth voted earlier. I expected a long wait but there was essentially none. zowee! I can remember a lengthy line for the last election, and we went mid morning, but my frail father was allowed to cut in, and I was allowed to balance out his vote directly. my father's grandfather voted for Lincoln, and that set the tone thru the lineage, up till my baby booming divergence (my mother, rest her soul, was more liberal) tho my father did vote Democrats once or twice, including Kennedy. whatev, I am not trying to bubble on that mound. the race was a race, ultra long and crap like that, then Sarah, and I had nothing but growling contempt. her, even her, is something historical, and it is sad that it WAS her. Beth, much more politically astute than me--I am so hamfisted in comparison--lived long in Alaska, and is familiar with Sarah. Palin brought nothing worthwhile to the table. think how cruel that is, with the practiced patterning-in at work. this bespoken entity, Sarah, claimed by the desperate Think Attacks who fostered this battle, steps into the fray unqualified and untrained. how did they stick her in front of Katie Couric or that other guy, without a few hints how to fake it. that's just ridiculous. snap at her for the preposterous wardrobe fix up but reckon: we do not fuss whether the Joe Bidens and other momentum drags wear the blue or the grey. but the women package is a key snag for our consideration. hair up, hair down, etc. how are we to get thru this??? I have no original observations to offer. I am fast past the historical wonder of this election, this missive broadcasts from Shit Creek. Obama is not as creepy as a Clinton but it looks like a Facebook lock down with his crew. I mean the business as usual stuff will go on, tho Obama is bright, eloquent, and worthy of respect. is poetry possible after election night holograms? blague.

this & that...

I frequently see a man down the street from us. I suppose he is in his 60s, I am not a good judge. looks healthy enough. he looks like he is waiting for a bus, but the stop is across the street, and he never gets on or off one that I have seen. he lives a few yards away from where he stands, in what I am guessing is a group home. just stands there and watches, for considerable stretches. I have taken him to be simply interested in the passing flow, but there is that in his face, and this is completely inference, a sense of worry. I think of my father, who would, at times, have no idea where he was. nothing in his surroundings was familiar, tho he recognized me, and Beth, if not to the degree of knowing exactly the relationship. this past summer I was at the library at closing time. there was a man there about whom the librarians were concerned. the man did not know where he lived. he sat in a chair while the police were called. he looked at me with the same look my father used to have, surrounded by an unfamiliar world. this condition does not cease to amaze me, that panging sense of loss. we rely on certain foundations that are not, we discover, so secure as we believe. Buddha gives a clue, not to put a shine on this.

* * * * *

I was thinking about what I read when I was young, in terms of my later (age 16) becoming a writer. I was not a voracious reader in that autodidact sense that comes up in bios. I read, but I also watched the 3 Stooges. I know that I read Robert Benchley early on, and was mystified by James Thurber's cartoons. both those writers were in my parents' collection. Winnie-the-Pooh might have been read to me but I doubt that I read it myself until I was an adult. I was fond of Landmark Books, which were history and biography books for elementary school readers. I read every sports bio available at the school library, including bios of such unknowns as Red Schoendiest. which brings to mind the time a cereal box offered a small figurine of an American president in every box. when I fished out the prize I was thoroughly disappointed. it was James Polk. I was hoping for a real president like George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, or Benjamin Franklin. anyway, I was fond of the adventures of Danny Dunn (Danny Dunn and the Anti-Gravity Paint, which detailed his adventures in a sort of space bathyscath that was painted with this miracle paint, anti-gravitying its way into endless space), and the Happy Hollisters. we had 2 HH books, and I assumed until I consulted Wikipedia today, that those 2 were the extent of their adventures. in sooth, there are some 20 HH books. The Hollisters were essentially proto-Brady Bunch, tho with no implication of anything so decadent as remarriage. just as the 3 sets of Bradys paired off in neat incestuous units, so too the 4 older Hollisters. the littlest, Sue, is right out. I really enjoyed the 2 stories that I read. one was set at some oceanside resort, one was in the desert. turns out that the same mill that made the Hollisters made the Hardy Boys and such like. at Barnes & Noble yesterday, the juvenile selection was pretty oppressive. lots of franchises like Hannah Montana, just reams of bleary looking product. I never hooked into that stuff when I was young. I read a few Hardy Boys, but no Tom Swift, none of Edgar Rice Burroughs various series. dunno why. I have since read some Tom Swift Jr adventures. they are hilarious. son of erstwhile genius Tom Swift Sr from a generation before. Jr is much smarter and more capable than his dad. he just flies around in his rocketship with his pals, solving crimes, comes home for a delicious meal cooked by his mom, during which he explains to dad his latest discovers and victories. fully loaded, that is.

* * * * *

I started reading Brothers Karamazov. not sure why but I have only read one Russian novel, War and Peace. which is great. it's the milieu and the Napoleonic history that I like. I read 200 pages of Anna Karenina and could not get interested. the inferred gloom of Dostoevsky put me off from him. well, I have gotten thru several Thomas Mann novels so I guess I have the right stuff. at least he has some humour. I have to applaud B&N for producing less expensive editions of public domain authors.

watched Independence Day again. I think about all I want from movies is expansive ridiculousness. I mean, surely no one involved with the movie thought to talk to their physics teacher. and that's okay. there are some grand visual moments, some snappy humour, and the dopey stuff does not get in the way, so all systems go. I cannot haul in the name of the president here, Bill something. the perfect prez, just a family guy but nay, a hero, too. I am sure Bill Clinton always carried a similar picture in his brain, of what the people want, tho that aint what Bill is. it is a movie of familiar faces, that is, actors you know, can even name, but also actors who fulfill their compartment. the Sec of Def, Mr Stones in the Passway, for instance, imbibes the classic space of not being heroic enough in times of stardom. Jeff Goldblum does his roughly likable stuttering hero. Randy Quaid, well, he went overboard with the bulging eyeballs. I mean, he had to wear an aviator's helmet, just so that we could be really, really clear that he was a kook. I forget the name of the 1st lady, who always has that indomitable wan smile, too bad she had to leave this mortal coil. Will Smith's girlfriend, I forget her name, was much more 1st ladyish, than the fainting featherweight. Will Smith is Will Smith, and on a smaller scale, Harry Connick is Harry Connick. I for one could tire of them, in large doses, but it was just the right amount in this movie. not so with Data, however. his overplaying of the eccentric scientist was a chore, score one for the alien that moidered him. and so on. Judd Hirsch gets his faith back, tra la. the movie ends as homage to Star Wars. humanity nearly wiped out but the locust aliens defeated, so all's right with the world. I think I have seen 2 other movies by Roland Emmerich, Stargate and The Day After. Stargate's pretty good, even the tv show is, tho the show is scaled way down. Al Gore, who invented the environmental movement, would love the thorough disaster in Day After. some drippy plot points get in the way of the spectacle, and once again it's a happy ending with the world about ruined. bigger is best, says Emmerich.

Erin decided that we needed, our triumvirate, to do something for Halloween. he carved a pumpkin, and, dare I say, his finger (which I frequently did when I used to carve wood). Beth got some brie to bake, and also, scandalously, a morceau of some honest to god truffle infused cheese, tres cher mais delicieux. truffles are amazing, period. Beth and I had a bottle of Guigal Cotes du Rhone BLANC at the ready. thought to read something appropriate to the night but there's nothing on the shelf currently of that ilk or flav. so I offered to go to the library, looking for one of Edward Rowe Snow's books. okay, you don't know who he is. he wrote 100 or more books about New England legends and history, ghosts, pirates, and such like. he'd appear periodically on local tv, and I recall seeing one of his presentations, perhaps with the Cub Scouts, which included at least a couple of scared the bejesus "true" ghost stories. so that was my quest. I biked up to the library. the town centre was unusually clogged with traffic, and of course troops of costumed children with their parental units were all about. sirens were sounding, and when I reached the library, I saw smoke. a block from the library, a former school, now a collection of condominiums, was burning. the smoke was thick enough to irritate the eye. I went to the library entrance, only to discover a sign saying CLOSED DUE TO AIR QUALITY. as I was heading back home, sigh, 2 groups of teens convened. one fellow, coming from the fire, said, I'm going to be on television, yo. that yo demanded irony, but I am afraid the speaker thereof did not get the memo. the gist of that was the local newscast on which the kid believed he would appear. it really was a substantial fire, tho I did not attempt to get closer. tv news copters, I like to call them choppers, flew overhead. with smoke thick in the air, and throngs of excited children in costumes roaming all over (I think there might have been a gathering at the library), it was a pretty surreal scene. a beautiful fading autumn day, cloudless and still bright. I cycled home and bethought me plan B. I ended up reading an account on a sea serpent sighting in Provincetown (at the end of Cape Cod), from a 19th century book on the town. the witness, one George Washington Ready, somehow has a Professor attached to his name. I got the impression that he was more like the town rummy. there's a full front drawing of Professor Ready, aghast. one must presume from the pov that the sea serpent drew the picture. no, there is no picture of the serpent, just stunned Professor R. by his account, this creature was seen offshore, it made its way ashore, crawled to a pond and disappeared into it. in its progress it scorched the ground and sliced trees through. as it sunk into the pond the water receded. it left a 20' wide hole that was later plumbed to 250 fathoms without striking bottom. confirming what I believed, a fathom is 6'. do the arithmetic: sounds like Lovecraft material. another glance at the picture of the professor and you will realize that he had good reason for the look of disquiet on his face. a note at the end indicates that Mr. Ready resides at the head of Pearl Street, where he is willing to discuss the sighting further. perhaps a drop of the pure would make the telling go even better. we cycled to the fire saturday afternoon. it is this castle-like brick edifice, 4 stories high and more than a century old. the roof was burned thru. the place was cordoned off. workers and police were about, as well as the curious. Beth remarked how sad to a passerby, an older woman. this woman lived in a condo there. she said a worker soldering a copper gutter saw a spark get away. tho he responded quickly the fire was quicker. it was a breezy day. she seemed calm but she had yet to see the damage. she said she and her husband had given their place in town to their son, and could stay there. there's a sign near the building, with an old picture of it, to indicate the town;s history. someone, probably before the fire, had painted an X over it.

I just wanted to make notice of these publications by Lanny (with whom I have no) Quarles. he, like Alan Sondheim, among others, seem to be online constantly, producing and posting an enormous and varied amount of work. Lanny writes dense thickets of words, philosophical, grotesque, and weirdly musical. in addition he produces visual and sound works. I have seen much of this work, as it has flown by on the Wryting-l list, and on his blog (the address of which I have incorrectly to the right: I shall rectify this). oh, and also in the occasional comment box. I commend this work to the curious, if any such exist.

I just read all the John Ashbery links that Ron Silliman recently collected. it has been several years since I last read much Ashbery. we'd gone down to visit Beth's aunt and mother on the Jersey shore. I brought Flow Chart with me. that, some writings by Lenin, and sitting thru the better portion of a James Bond movie marathon resulted in a series of poems, to wit: The Lenin Poems. which has little to do with my initial instigation here, thoughts on Ashbery. I think it might be said that Robert Grenier championed Ashbery in class. we wrassled with the texts something fierce. the main book that we read was Tennis Court Oath, a monumental book, tho at the time the disjunction and the coolness of the author voice really distressed me. Three Poems had just come out. I responded to that better, because it turns out that I always liked the possibility of prose tho I did not realize it then (a Richard Grossinger reading broke the realization home). Grenier invited several of us Franconian poet types to dinner with Ashbery when JA came to read. Ashbery arrived from NYC by bus. Franconia was definitely The Sticks. I wonder what he was paid. Franconia had a modest event when I was there, the headliners of which were David Bromberg and the Holy Modal Rounders. Bromberg, whose claim to fame was session work with Dylan, got $750 plus room and board. the very awesome Holy Modal Rounders, a 6 piece electric band at the time (they began as an acoustic duo), got $150. Grenier was active in getting poets to the distant realm of New Hampshire. Ashbery is probably shy but he was warm enough socially. I remember we went on a road trip looking for an antique store where years ago Ashbery had seen some interesting piece that he hoped to find again. now that seemed weird. I believe we located the store but the piece was no longer available. during dinner Ashbery asked if there were any poems we would like him to read. I said "Le Livre est Sur la Table", I hope that's the title, from Some Trees. he dismissed that poem as inconsequential, and did not later read it. I liked it for being jokey, or at least what I perceived as so. astrological talk arose and JA and I connected for both being Leos, as likewise Grenier. JA noted that Leos and Cancers get along, and that O'Hara was a Cancer. of course now we know that O'Hara was born 3 months prior to the June 26 birth date he has been assigned. anyhoo, I was honoured to be included in this select group. the reading itself was a let down. it was a large room, or small auditorium. the audience was sparse, and spread thru out the room. so it was a terrible venue for Ashbery. and he read without much inflection, as I recall. I know that he read "The Skaters" and a portion of A Nest of Ninnies, which I have to admit has influenced my writing enormously. I felt sorry for him, stuck with such a weak crowd. his poetry has a blur to it, like the stuff that shows up as New Yorker column filler. there are so many of these pieces that fear, it seems, declamation. picaresque moods and moments. I am amazed at his popularity, his work does not seem user friendly but I guess they give satisfying pictures without that dowdy weight of the poet's impinging biography.

Big Changes!!!

with the idea of increasing here at the Green Blog, I had some focus group work done. turns out poetry, writing, and yard sales are right out as blog topics. from now on , my name is Tombstone, I will be wearing a black eye patch, and this blog will be all over Apple computers. email me for the address to send MacBooks, iPods, iPhone, and any other merchandise. ad astra, etc.

 

 

 

I watched Iron Man last night. I'd seen favourable reviews, which I do not think it lived up to. Robert Downey did. the movie was definitely a turn for him. I used to read the comic but IM was well down the list of favourite characters. initially his suit looked more like a robot, was bulkier. then some space age metal was developed so that it looked like the usual lycra.

the movie begins with Tony Stark touring Afghanistan in an armoured car, checking out the playground for the weapons he sells. frankly, this was just about redux of the fun parts of Less Than Zero. Tony Stark, is just riffing charmingly. well, this is war time: the car gets attacked and Stark gets wounded. this brings on an awkward flashback, to set the table plotwise. the arms industry is in his blood. as is the Playboy lifestyle. the morning after his viciously unlikely one night stand with a reporter, Gymneth Paltrow arrives. I had forgotten that she was in the film and I had forgotten about Pepper Potts. I would not have cast her because she is cool and elegant, and Pepper is more like Della Street. but Paltrow plays it well. putting capable actors into these movies works every time. Jeff Bridges was stuck with Mr McNasty. I like him but there was nowhere to go with the role unless he went all Christopher Walken, which would have been nice. I mean let Walken do it, or Anjelina's father (I forget his name). so, wounded Stark is captured, and in fact kept alive by another prisoner who hooks Stark up to a car battery. not too unlikely, prisoners in a cave. the Afghani warlord wants Stark to build the nasty missile that Stark demo'd earlier. instead, they build a robot outfit. thus Iron Man. well, Stark gets out, and decides that the weapons industry is a poor place for his creative impulses.

back home, Stark demands a hamburger, but gets a McDonald's instead. at the news conference, he munches that and has the gathered press sit on the floor. which just rang so silly. Stark's insistence on leaving weapon making behind brings bad guy Bridges into the open. Stark develops his IM rig while Bridges sets up the dramatic finale. took a long time to get to the IM part. it's a franchise, I realize, but it is a long wait for the story to find its cheese. it is entertaining, because Downey is so comfortable playing above and below the role. R2D2 and C3PO appear in spirit with a robotic whatsis that does funny stuff and a poncy computer voice that advises Stark. the denouement is stupid, with Bridges in a Transformer-like robosuit. no effort involved here.

having the real world, Afghanistan, bump against this crap was a bad risk. what's stopping IM from selectively killing off all the bad elements there except his complicated relationship with Pepper. Samuel Jackson arrives after the credits to enlist IM against some heinous evil, you know, a guy in tights, chapter2. once that's cleared up, IM can save the Middle East.

now, is it a propos of me to write now a few words about the recent Apple press con? it is available from iTunes. I was curious what the buzzmaking machine does when it is doing. I do not own a Mac, nor have I used one much, but I am attracted. and I got an iPod without thought that other mp3 players exist. Steve Jobs is Mr Cool in black turtleneck. he's just selling the latest merchandise, you know. my god, what is so gorgeous about a track pad? Tony Stark creates a totally smoove robosuit, not just power but slick design. thus Apple. Apple renders as a slack superficiality with this ultimate design stuff. Jobs brought highranking Apple folks on stage, the core of his desmesne, haha. and the press is rapt. didn't they realize they were machined? well I do not have in me right now to paint it clearer, but I connect IM with Jobs up there selling the latest Apple confections. which I want, of course.

this post by Jack Kimball is a poignant look at an effed up climate. I started to riff on this but maybe I should just mouse out. I am aware that I am so, so, so here, thus unreliable.