From the category archives:

Art

Hamlet and his (Public) Problems

Thumbnail image for Hamlet and his (Public) Problems May 28, 2010

Hamlet self-consciously reveals his inner thoughts to an audience he does/n’t know is there. Perhaps this soliloquy is a proto-modern lyric?

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Poem Thing

Thumbnail image for Poem Thing April 26, 2010
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Incantations: Michael S. Harper, A Love Supreme

Thumbnail image for Incantations: Michael S. Harper, A Love Supreme April 13, 2010

NOTE: In lieu of Grossman today, I’m posting a short essay I wrote on Michael S. Harper’s poem “Dear John, Dear Coltrane” for one of my classes back at Hunter’s MFA program. Listen to the following as you read: A Love Supreme It is almost impossible to read Michael S. Harper and not feel as though [...]

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Dorothea Lasky’s POETRY IS NOT A PROJECT or Cutting More Lines in the Cosmic Divide

Thumbnail image for Dorothea Lasky’s POETRY IS NOT A PROJECT or Cutting More Lines in the Cosmic Divide April 13, 2010

Dorothea Lasky’s POETRY IS NOT A PROJECT made huge waves when debuted at this years AWP. The newest book on UDP‘s Dossier imprint, Lasky lays out, in 19 quick pages, a theory of poetry that reaches back through High Romanticism into a more hermetic time. Illustrated beautiful throughout by Sarah Glidden, Lasky’s theory pushes against [...]

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Closing a Poem (Blogging through Grossman, Part 6)

Thumbnail image for Closing a Poem (Blogging through Grossman, Part 6) April 6, 2010

How do you know when you’re “done” a poem? I’m not speaking about revision, but rather, the act of writing, particularly lyrical free verse. Donna Masini once described it to me (or a class I was in—can’t remember which), as a settling in the body: a literal sense in the poet’s body that there is [...]

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Looking at Ballad Form, and the Nature of Voice

Thumbnail image for Looking at Ballad Form, and the Nature of Voice March 31, 2010

We are in traditional ballad country the second Auden writes “As I Walked Out One Evening” (see “The Streets of Laredo”). He is not mocking the structure or form of the ballad (except perhaps the way a lover would tease his beloved); he is reveling in the cliche. He trusts his own ability to have fun with cliché (something Ashbery also trusts).

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Reciting your own poems from memory is for supernerds, or the worst project of my life

Thumbnail image for Reciting your own poems from memory is for supernerds, or the worst project of my life March 30, 2010

Concerning all the recent discussions about memory, recitation, etc, I thought I would try it in my own way. I should disclose that I never recite my own poems from memory at readings. I think it is corny, weird, it makes me uncomfortable, and frankly, to spend that much time memorizing your own work is kind of sick.

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Do Movie Critics Matter?

Thumbnail image for Do Movie Critics Matter? March 25, 2010

Journalistic standards have changed so drastically that, when I took the podium at the film circle’s dinner and quoted Pauline Kael’s 1974 alarm, “Criticism is all that stands between the public and advertising,” the gala’s audience responded with an audible hush—not applause.

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THE THEORY OF EVERYTHING, ABRIDGED

Thumbnail image for THE THEORY OF EVERYTHING, ABRIDGED March 24, 2010

Ben Luzzatto’s THE THEORY OF EVERYTHING, ABRIDGED (UDP, 2010) is one of those rare artifacts that transfers its own actual magic—and it is real magic—until the possessed begins to lift a bit toward the sky.

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Immortality (Blogging through Grossman, Part 4)

Thumbnail image for Immortality (Blogging through Grossman, Part 4) March 23, 2010

(Apologies for not posting on Grossman last week as promised.) I’ve decided to change my strategy for blogging through Grossman. Not only is it almost impossible to try and successfully capture the first part of the book in any systematic way (the conversation shifts too rapidly and it’s almost maddening to trace any idea), but [...]

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