What makes for a good reading?

A thoughtful blog post at the Guardian on the good, the bad and the ugly in poetry reading, with lots of links to various poets reading their work. One of the links is to this recording of Wallace Stevens reading "The Idea of Order at Key West." Very different from my oral interpretation of the piece:

FOREVER YOUNG

Patricia & Terence Young, live at the UBC bookstore, Feb. 12 2009.

HARD TIMES

You can tell it’s hard times for the arts

By how many buskers are out hustling

Quarters on street corners. You can tell

By their bewildered looks, the exceeding

Refinement of their style and their swell

Manners that they are unaccustomed

To such crude environs and to the rude

Rebuffs of passers by with no intention

Of being detained. Pity the poor buggers,

Forced by the twin threats of starvation

And creditors, from their studios, stages

And pits out into the dinful, bustling

Market. They are such sensitive creatures—

Can’t you see how your lack of appreciation

For the nuances of their interpretations

Plunges them into sullen depression?

Can’t you see how brutal it is for them

To be grateful for the handful of change

You toss in their box as you stroll by?

Readings

I'm off to see the forever youthful duo of Patricia and Terence Young read tonight at the Robson Square bookstore. I'll see about bootlegging it, just for you.

And if you're in Vancouver, don't forget about my reading tomorrow night.

Palmu on the Couriers

Brian Palmu has reviewed Peter Richardson's recent book Sympathy for the Couriers in a very unorthodox manner: he goes thru the book poem by poem, giving us a paragraph or two on each. Lately, I'm so much more interested in talking about individual poems than collections; I guess this is one way to do both. Peter's poems deserve the attention and don't get it nearly enough, in my biased opinion. He got his start as a published poet late in the game, but he's miles ahead of most of his contemporaries, never mind mine. And related to the Birney quote I posted in my last entry, he spent a career as an Air Canada ramp hand. Maybe working for a living is good for poetry...

Get a Job

My advice to young Canadian writers is ... to take a temporary part-time job. It could even be in a university, especially in a Creative Writing course, so long as it is temporary or part-time. But better perhaps to fish salmon in the season and work on novels out of it it, as one ex-student of mine is doing; or run a rooming house and write plays for the CBC, which is how a young woman I know is managing both to live and to write what she wants; or take a nine-to-five banking job with no homework, as Raymond Souster has done.

--Earle Birney, "The Writer and His Education"

More on Academic Freedom

Stanley Fish weighs in on the Denis Rancourt situation. It would be helpful to get some kind of official statement from U of O at this point, because what is not at all clear is if they're trying to fire him because of giving all his students A+'s (or saying that he would do so) or because he's a thorn in their side. It's looking like they're going after him for the grading in the same way that the prosecutors here in BC are going after the Mormons for polygamy when what they really want them for is child abuse. In neither case does this seem like a smart move. If Rancourt has, as Fish says, repeatedly overstepped the boundaries of acceptable professional conduct, surely he needs to be disciplined for those things. A friend of mine in high school got expelled after being caught smoking off grounds. He wasn't expelled for being caught smoking, but for all the other things he'd done. He'd been warned that one more infraction would lead to expulsion. Has Rancourt received warnings, or have his bosses just expressed their frustrations to him and told him to behave? Is the grading an actual infraction? A prof got fired at UPEI a few years ago for offering a B- to students in exchange for them not showing up. His course (on the history of Christianity; perhaps this was a concrete lesson in the selling of indulgences...) was over-enrolled and there wasn't enough space for everyone to sit. Fair enough, but dealt with in an unethical way. What Rancourt has done doesn't seem at all the same. He wants the students there. He wants them to get more from their educational experience. He's going about his business in an oddball way, but jesus, universities are full of people who spout weird shit as if it were wisdom and ramble on ad nauseum about things only tangentially related--at best--to the curriculum. If you want to get rid of all the tenured profs who are nuts, you'll have to do a lot of firing and hiring.

This is kind of funny

That is, if you find dogs chewing off their own tails and gulls pecking out the eyeballs of live fish funny.

A Facade of Coherence

Thanks to Owen for sending me the link to this piece about the academic road less travelled: no letter grades. Maybe Alan Rock should take a look at this before he tries to shitcan the quixotic professor Denis Rancourt, who I posted about t'other day.

Dinosaurs

Thanks to Carmine for posting this awesome video by Leigh Kotsilidis, accompanying music by Mathias Kom and The Burning Hell.

I stayed at Leigh's place in October when I was in Montreal for the Jailbreaks launch. All the sets for the video, which she made herself, were in her hallway. So awesome to see the finished video.

Reading report

What a turnout for the Best Canadian Poetry launch last night. I'm glad I got there early because it was standing room only. The venue, Cafe Montmartre, is long and narrow and gets narrower as it gets longer, as the bar and kitchen are at the back. It's not a bad spot for a crowd of 20-25, but wasn't ideally suited for the 70 or so who turned up last night. They also weren't prepared logistically. I tried to order food and was told they weren't taking any more food orders. Alas.

Each poet read his or her poem from the book, along with 2 or 3 others. One highlight of the night was Amanda Lamarche, who had some of the best between-poem banter I've heard. She could be a stand-up comedian, I swear. The humour was a nice counterpoint to the pathos of the poems she read. Another was Matt Rader, who gave the best reading I've heard him do, of his outstanding poem "The Great Leap Forward," which he launched into with no preamble other than a quick witty joke about Amanda's reading. Matt's poem is one of the best in the anthology. He then read a poem by David O'Meara and sat down. Short and sweet. His reading and Amanda's made for a nice study in contrasts, how totally different approaches can both yield attention-grabbing performances. I also dug Yvonne Blomer's "The Roll Call to the Ark," a poem in two voices, which she read with her husband. There were some laughs in a couple of the poems read by Leanne Averbach, who reads very well. I wouldn't say they were terrific poems, but they were entertaining at least.

Leanne Averbach's band played after, but I had to go. Pretty hungry by this point and I can't stay out late these days: Kaleb shows no mercy in the morning. I would have recorded the reading, but I was near the back and all that would've come thru would have been kitchen sounds, unfortunately.

Best Canadian Poetry

Off tonight to the launch of The Best Canadian Poetry in English. I'll see if I can bootleg a tape of it. Here's the scoop:

Please join us in celebrating the launch of Tightrope Books’ new anthology series, The Best Canadian Poetry In English. This year’s collection of poetry, edited by Stephanie Bolster, is the first in an annual series showcasing poems published in Canadian literary journals. The evening’s festivities will include readings by contributors, and a performance of music and spoken word by Leanne Averbach & Indigo.

Saturday February 7th, 2009
7:00 pm (readings start at 7:30)
Montmartre Café
4362 Main Street
Vancouver
Free Admission

About the anthology:

From a long list of one hundred poems drawn from Canadian literary journals magazines, this year’s guest editor, award winning poet Stephanie Bolster, has chosen fifty of the best Canadian poems published in 2007. With this anthology readers, baffled by proliferating poems and poets, can for the first time tap into the remarkable and vibrant Canadian poetry scene. Readers are invited to explore the currents and cross-currents of poetry in a distinguished volume distilled by a round robin of esteemed editorial taste.

http://www.tightropebooks.com/anthology.html

Readings by:

Yvonne Blomer
Amanda Lamarche
Matt Rader
Keith Maillard
Joy Russell
Leanne Averbach
Maleea Acker
Anna Swanson

Leanne Averbach & Indigo:

FEVER with Leanne Averbach & Indigo is a sultry fusion of the spoken words of Vancouver/New York poet Leanne Averbach and the original blues/jazz accompaniment of Astrid Sars' band trio INDIGO.

http://www.leanneaverbach.com/index.html

CITRIC BITCH’S THINKING IS SHIT

Citric bitch thinks: “Litcrit is sick—I’ll fix it!”

Sic ‘im, citric bitch, sic ‘im!

Citric bitch is yipping.

Citric bitch isn’t biting.

Citric bitch is griping.

Citric bitch will instill civil chill.

Citric bitch will flip the switch.

Citric bitch will bring light.

Citric bitch picks fights with hicks.

Citric bitch will diss big dicks.

(Citric bitch digs chicks.)

Citric bitch will bin shrill critics.

Citric bitch will kill phillipics.

Citric bitch will still illicit shit-stirrings.

Citric bitch will dish shit-kickings.

Citric bitch will kick pricks.

Citric bitch will pick nits.

Citric bitch sips gin fizz with bigwigs.

Citric bitch slips in -isms.

Citric bitch is dripping gism.

Citric bitch is willing.

Citric bitch is shilling.

Citric bitch grips bills in fists.

Citric bitch is crisping fins.

Silly citric bitch, litcrit isn’t ill, it’s illin’.

Drink piss, dimwit citric bitch,

Kiss this critic’s nightstick!

EDIT: A NOTE ON THE TEXT

THEORY OF MIND

I can see you. You can see

Me. I can see you

Can see me. You can see

I can see you. I can see

You can see me

Seeing you. I can see me

In you. I can see you

In me. I can see you

Seeing you in me, seeing

Me in you. You can see

Me seeing me in you,

Seeing you in me. You and me,

We can see me and you.

I can see you can see. You. Me.

Newsflash: University Hostile to Independent Thought and Radical Action

A friend of mine posted this story on Facebook today. I'm totally with this guy. I know grades poisoned my university experience. And not because I got bad ones. Because I got straight A's and had to keep those grades up to keep my scholarships and I had to keep my scholarships to keep out of debt, which I had to keep out of to keep from becoming indentured indefinitely to an economic agenda I'm none too fond of. Rock. Hard Place. So I chose courses strategically, picking the occasional bird course to lighten the load, rather than taking something that might interest and challenge me more and writing papers I knew would succeed rather than pushing into riskier topics and approaches.

Most profs and administrators are so conditioned by the grading system that they don't even think about this sort of thing. When I was choosing courses for my fourth year at university (a year I was only enrolled in for a piece of paper, not for education per se), I signed up for a couple of 2nd year courses in my major. Even tho the department's guidelines said I could take these courses because I'd fulfilled all the specific requirements for an English degree, I was called in to see the department chair. He advised me not to take those courses because they'd be too easy for me. I told him that was part of why I was taking them. He looked at me like I had two heads. I guess that kind of pragmatism doesn't come naturally to an academic. He had no concept that without grades, those kinds of decisions wouldn't be made.

I hope Denis Rancourt prevails. He sounds like a damn good teacher who, unlike so many profs, has actually given a lot of thought to pedagogy. Which you can see for yourself in this interview.

Charles Bruce

Just encountered this lovely reading of Charles Bruce's "Back Road Farm," by someone named David Kosub. Glad to see another Bruce Poem featured at Arc. The more of this that happens, the more likely his exceptionally fine poems will stay alive. I'm still waiting anxiously for the new selected Bruce that's supposed to be published by Signal Editions. The last book of Bruce poems was 1985. Almost a quarter century now. High time for the new one.

Here's me reading Bruce's "Nova Scotia Fish Hut":



UPDATE: Carmine Starnino has posted about the Kosub essay and provided a link to this virtual chapbook of Bruce's poems. Sounds like the Bruce book I'm looking forward to will be out in a couple of years, 40 years after his death.

CNQ 75

The latest number of CNQ arrived in my box today. This is a special issue edited by Carmine Starnino, featuring soothsaying essays on various cultural topics by different writers. Haven't had a chance to dig into it yet. Looking forward to doing so soon.

In my section of the mag, there's some very good stuff, including

• Jason Guriel on Nick Thran, JD Black and Christopher Patton's debut collections
• Nick Thran on Jason Guriel and David McGimpsey's mass media-inspired collections
• Alessandro Porco on a couple of slippery poets, Kevin Connolly and Walid Bitar
• Jim Pollock on the black and white magics of Jeffery Donaldson
• Steven W. Beattie on the Giller list
• Lyle Neff on David W. McFadden's selected
• Martin Wallace on WJ Keith's cultural conservatism
• Yours Truly on first collections by Suzanne Buffam and Pino Coluccio

The last on that list is a bit of a long story. I first wrote the review for The Antigonish Review in 2005. Several issues went by and no review. Then I saw they published a review of a book published in 2006 and asked if I could withdraw the review. I'm the first to admit I'm not the most organized of reviews editors, but that was just a bit too much. So it was homeless for a while till I gave it to Dan Wells. He was going to post it on the CNQ website, but then Carmine wanted it for the issue he was editing, so voila. Never too late for an in-depth review of good books.

But the highlight of my section, if I'm allowed to pick favourites, is Pollock's review essay of Donaldson's oeuvre to-date. James has emerged in the last couple of years as one of the few truly top-notch Canadian poetry critics. His criticism is very precise and meticulously argued, but never dryly dispassionate. An earlier part of this essay was published at Contemporary Poetry Review a while ago. The updated piece takes into account Donaldson's new book, the outstanding Palilalia, as well.

There are also four poems each from a couple of poet-critics who are no slouches themselves, Jason Guriel and Mark Callanan. After precociously strong debuts, they've both got new books coming out soon, I do believe, which I'm looking forward to seeing. An awful lot of good-looking poetry collections on the horizon.

An Event-ful day

Just learned that my poem "Ego Sum" will be published in a forthcoming issue of Event magazine. Very nice. I find Event one of the most interestingly eclectic poetry sections of Canadian mags. This is a poem I can't imagine too many other magazines printing because of its weirdness (39 lines of anaphoric falling rhyme). It was certainly the most oddball poem I sent them. And it's one that I'm particularly fond of, so I'm glad it's found a halfway house.

Lettres miniscules

Could this be the next frontier for Christian Bok?

Les Mis-érables

Ooooh, wasn't that a clever postmodern pun!

So, apparently the average artist in Canada is "almost poor." (Anyone else wondering how much it cost our esteemed institutions to come to this earth-shattering discovery?) That is, if you only consider the income they make from their artsy work and ignore the money they make from their fartsy work.

But "In 2005, 42 per cent of artists said they took part-time jobs, compared with 22 per cent for the overall labour force." Newsflash: the other 22% didn't "take" a part-time job; many of them probably had no choice and had to "take" several such jobs to pay for rent, food, transportation and such. These are the people we might know as actually poor. I hear their hearts are bleeding for the almost-poor artists.

Another thing: how many artists at or below the poverty line (set for a single person in a city of 500,000+) are actually single people in cities of 500,000? What kind of dough do their spouses make? (Full disclosure: my mother is a full-time artisan whose net income is well below the single-person-in-a-city line. She lives in the country in a province with fewer than 200,000 people. My father is a retired deputy minister. My mother used to be federal civil servant. She much prefers being a poor artisan.) Is a tenured professor who teaches a subject related to his or her artistic professor an artist or an academic? It would seem the latter, since the "aristocracy" is identified as being comprised of "producers/directors/choreographers." This skews the numbers something fierce, considering the number of writers who work for university English and/or CW departments.

Interesting to note that 42% of artists are self-employed. At least we know who's exploiting those poor fuckers.

My favourite part:

What makes the situation even more distressing is that artist earnings have been decreasing since 1990 – a decline likely to intensify over the next two years. While average earnings for the overall labour force rose by almost 10 per cent from 1990 to 2005, artists experienced a slide of 11 per cent – to $22,731 from $25,433 – at the same time as the cultural-sector work force tripled in size. Actors experienced the sharpest decline in average earnings among artists, dropping 34 per cent to about $18,000 in 2005.

It takes a really piss-poor grasp of maths--something for which artists are notorious--not to get this. I think it's safe to assume that the non-cultural workforce did not triple in the 15 years between 1990 and 2005. If it did, boy would the average wage take a hit! That the cultural workforce did triple, and that--recall--42 per cent of that workforce is self-employed, and that the wages dropped--all this might just signify, oh, I don't know .... that there are too many artists for the amount of money available!!! Y'know what, I bet it's those foreign artists, you know the ones, the "exiles" from Bosnia and Iran, coming here and taking our arts dollars. Those bastards.

Finally, what the survey doesn't even pretend to address, because it's not quantifiable: shitty artists don't deserve to earn a living by their art. Many do anyway, but that's another story.

(from CanCult)