Newly Published Issue of Pinstripe Fedora

Issue #3 of online poetry journal, Pinstripe Fedora, edited by Michael Crake, contains Masticatorial, 1 of 8 memorandums from my longer work, Autographography. I recently read Masticatorial at the Zinc Bar Poetry Series (founded by Joe Eliot and hosted by Douglas Rothschild). I haven't made much of an effort to read out loud since leaving my graduate program, but I was pleased with the response, especially to Masticatorial. 

 

Juliana Spahr's "2."

My last few morning commutes have been occupied by reading WORK #2 (See the entry several prior to this for general information on WORK#2). The item I've returned to most often has been the 2.5 page contribution entitled "2." by Juliana Spahr. When I read "This Connection of Everyone With Lungs," one of her full length manuscripts, I was challenged by her lyricism, how despite focusing so much of her critical work on the writings of L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E poets and other mostly anti-lyric writers, her own writing often embraces a forthright and unashamed lyricism. But I think it might be more appropriate to say that she is re-embracing lyricism, and not the lyricism I've been accustomed to through my readings as an undergrad (i.e. high-modernism, the song of his self and her self). Juliana's lyricism seems to be more of a song of selves, both intensely personal, accompanied by idiosyncratic experiences, and yet sincerely aimed at connecting with readers, revealing itself to be an empathetic text.  

What I found in my recent reading of "2." suggests the continuing evolution of her relationship with a certain brand of lyricism. If I were to describe the piece, I'd have to call it openly biographical, factual and stocked with facts, an eerily cut and dry tone, the kind of confession that comes from remembering. And yet, were this description told to me, I'd suspect something very different than what is on the page. I would imagine the delivery somehow embellished and dramatized or obscured, as is often the case with anything biographical.

Beneath the title, it begins "1969, 17.8 percent./ 1979, 14.1 percent./ And a story about the invention of rubber soles./ And sometimes when people came by the station she would/     curse at them and tell them that my father was a son of a/     bitch." Further down it reads "Each evening the computer was programmed./ Eventually a lawsuit was filed./ Every useful thing, for example, iron, paper, etc., may be looked/        at from the two points of view of quality and quantity./ Forty jobs per 100 people in 1969." 

The personal continually and inevitably runs into the public. The statistics aren't simply dry material, they are delivered dryly, without immediate association with any meaning. We read dates and ratios as they bookend literal facts of lives. Each incident is shrouded by glib deliveries, many of the lines seeming more like simple responses to questions rather than sentences woven together to explain a situation.

The result is more jarring than most "I"-less attempts to meddle with language. I finish the poem thinking about people. 

Autotypists of the past

Unbeknownst to many, the Autotypist was an actual contraption of the past. It is often referred to as the first 'word processor.'  The following photographs are of women and their Autotypist. 

Mashinka Firunts on Movietelling

Mashinka Firunts recently posted some insightful praise for the still somewhat recent shadoWord movietelling events I took part in. Being my wife, and loving all things related to me the most, the article is largely comprised of her account of my performance, and is preceded by several excellent observations and analogies pertaining to the visual spectacle and the evolving spectator into and throughout the 20th century. 

Dillon Westbrook Listens to Kenny G

Following Kenneth Goldsmith's reading at Mills College, Dillon Westbrook posted the following entry: [partial excerpt]: "If I'm only managing information when I "write" and don't know it, and you're [Goldsmith] managing information when you "write" and do know it, what difference is there in the literature we produce? It's probably the case that a google search could find every word I used in this post printed in newspapers printed today, but that knowledge isn't part of my writing practice. Could the difference between what I do and what Kenneth does really consist only in that notion being in ,or not being in, either of our heads? If so, I think Kenny G alone has resurrected the importance of intentionality from the jaws of modernism (I really hope that sentence actually exists, verbatim, somewhere in today's papers)."

And now I'm stuck on the same question(s). Could it simply be a matter of why he manages information vs. why we manage information? In this case, is that the point, to convey the virtual and real-time overlap of modern communication/ meaning? Though it could be considered part of the same question, a second factor could be what or which information he chooses to manage, vs. the general indiscretion of a public, our misapprehension where clear decisions are concerned. 

David Horton's WORK

David Horton has just put out WORK no. 2, as advertised on his blog. It includes WORK by K. Silem Mohammad, Jorge Boehringer, CA Conrad, and Juliana Spahr. Mr. Horton functions as an artist, scholar and critic, with interests as diverse as the mediums in which he creates. No time spent investigating something he's put together would be time wasted. I am already familiar with previous work put out by nearly everyone in this publication, and in my estimation, everything between the covers of this edition of WORK should be more fresh and relevant (to now and later) than Sunday's New York Times.

Copies of WORK no. 2 are available through him directly, as well as through several bookstores nationwide. For more information, see his blog directly. 

Kenny G Moor

I first began to realize the potential of boredom (as technique) during my initial visits with William Moor. The name Kenneth Goldsmith didn't stick with me at the time, but I certainly remember William telling me about his having (re)typed the entirety of an edition of the New York Times. Shortly after, William began to (re)type most of the (then) recent Harry Potter book into an amazon review of the book's listing. 

I just read something by Goldsmith to the effect of... If it doesn't exit on the internet, it doesn't exist. Which immediately brought to mind how much of William's work was nowhere, but on the internet: his amazon reviews, his endless email inquiries [what culminated as his thesis, which I believe he planned to submit as a forwarded email].

And yet, if you search for William Moor, you'll find his Amazon reviews, but you won't find, for lack of a better phrase, a poetic context. Whereas, Goldsmith's primary search results are overwhelmingly crowded by links to information, interviews, and 'works' hosted by academic and artistic institutions. Also, Goldsmiths works, a(bound) in books, recordings and video. Kenneth Goldsmith's work is Kenneth Goldsmith working. He seems to advocate to his readers/ listeners a desire to diminish, if not eradicate, the intellectual self, but his own practice undermines this impulse by (reluctantly or not) giving way to the cult of personality, which, in this case, strongly relies on his associations with academies and institutions. 

And yet, there is no inherent hypocrisy, in that he relinquishes the rights to his own name, his own personality, advocating a practice which he seems to earnestly act upon. 

 

William exists (on the interweb) as a phenomenon of manufactured normal thoughts on ordinary things. Goldsmith exists (on the interweb and elsewhere) as a practicioner of practicing the re-manufacturing of language. 

William is generally self-sabotaging as an artist, almost ensuring a certain level of anonymity in regard to his internet writings. There is, of course, no reason to NOT suspect Goldsmith of closet anonymity. Aside from his not-so-anonymous role as DJ Kenny G on WFMU, he may very well be functioning under a variety of pseudonyms, if not nameless (ala wikipedia, chatrooms, products reviews). Identity theft can be practiced among his students in the haven of his classroom, so perhaps he's found a similar haven for himself somewhere along the out rim(s) of the internet. 

I've only just begun to investigate the work and persona of Kenneth Goldsmith. I understand that tonight, across the country, he is reading at my former home, Mills College, in Oakland, CA. And two former colleagues of mine, Lara Durback and Greer Gainer, have collaborated with him on a 'broadside suite,' something I look forward to seeing. 

ALSO, he dresses very well.

 

The Bucky Monkey

The boys that brought you Cricket Online Review have been hard at work. In the post today, I received several copies of The Bucky Monkey, issue A, as well as Bher, a chapbook by Chad Lietz. The Bucky Monkey, guest edited by Daniel Drew, puts some of the more difficult work(s) of Polis, Chad Lietz, Lizzie Brock, Wm. Moor, J.D. Mitchell-Lumsden, and myself along side each other, creating an all together difficult selection. Sometimes difficult to look at, sometimes difficult to read. 

Always vigilant David Horton has devoted a few lines to discussing my Bucky Monkey contribution, as well as to Chad Lietz' Bher. 

Movietelling on the Internet: a query

Goooaaalll!!! (part 1) by Mathew Timmons and Stan Apps is something like Movietelling Flarf. At first I was disappointed by what seemed to be a tone of sarcasm, delivered as commercials segue into a soccer match (channel surfing). I was bracing myself for a line-up of punchlines. The humor is certainly there, but the repetition and re-working of lines, the constant reapplication of 'products' being misrepresented, finally gets to me. I'm sucked in. It's also the first instance I've seen of multiple speakers providing the narrative and character voices, which is further complicated by something I read about Stan Apps contribution being played as a recording while Mathew Timmons performed live at their performance at Betalevel for Da Benshi Code in Los Angeles. (Though I think this had more to do with Stan Apps being out of town). 

Since there isn't much ambient sound on the recording, I'm guessing they made this performance privately, primarily intending, I assume, to post it online. Currently, there are no youTube listings for "Movietelling." For "Neo-Benshi," there are two excerpts of David Larsen's  performance "Paris of Troy." For "Benshi," there are some postings in Spanish which I don't believe have any relevance here, as well as one old news broadcast explaining the function of 'katsubenshi," and the performances of Stan Apps and Mathew Timmons. 

That's it. I find this surprising considering how many folks I know of who've performed in this medium, and how many times a video recorder was present. 

There are a variety of Movietelling performances I've heard or read about that I would very much like to see, but may never have the chance unless someone were to post them online. 

Walter Lew's shadoWord productions, who I continue to perform with, is planning an online release, of one kind or another, this summer. At the very least, I know it will involve the digital publication of many of our scripts, as well as vidcaps and photographs from the performances. 

(EDIT): As I was making the links for this post, I stumbled upon Da Benshi Code's website, where one can find no less than 8 video recordings of live Movietelling.

Movietelling: for a more practical avant-garde

The practice of Movietelling seems so fresh and unexplored. It's so rare to come upon a medium that is both relatively untapped, as well as somewhat resistant to being a novelty. For anyone not yet privy to the term Movietelling, let me begin by saying that it's a term coined by Walter K. Lew, in reference to the revived and renovated practice of the traditional Pyonsa (Korea), Benshi (Japan), Benzi (Taiwan), Lector (Poland), Gavrilov Transltor (former USSR), and other historically and culturally specific live narrators of film. It would be difficult, if not impossible, to sum up the specific function of each of these in a single description, but if we focus on the practices that are most commonly derived from today, the task becomes more reasonable. To that end, Pyonsa and Benshi, among the performances I have been associated with, seen, or read about tend to be the most common. Toward the beginning of the second decade of the 20th Century, silent foreign films were making their way to the countries of Asia (coming mainly from Europe and the United States). As the countries of Korea and Japan already possessed a rich history of stage performance (puppetry, mimes, theater and more), film might have been perceived as a similar art. And like many of the other stage performances, a narrator became a part of the film watching experience. In many cases, long before film narration, a narrator was responsible for far more than general narration; he or she may express the dialogue of each character, adopting a wide range of voices, as well as sound effects and singing. Another important note is the visual presence of the narrator: generally off to one side, as if their range of sight were to fill the gap between performance and audience. Among our current Western traditions, instances of narration are often intentionally hidden from view: a retrospective voice in a film, an announcer at a sports event, or one might even include the dubbing of a pop-singer's performance.

The Pyonsa and Benshi, as with the narrators of many other Asian genres of that period, were always exposed, though in some instances (following several decades of the practice(s)), the narrator presented (amplified) from behind the audience. The narrator often became inseparable from the film watching experience, often to the point of gaining celebrity on par (if not greater than) that of the actors. People often went to see a certain film as a result of it being narrated by a certain Pyonsa or Benshi. This tradition continued even after actors were given voices, but eventually the practice became increasingly esoteric (perhaps as a result of the technologically influenced spectacular scale of later films) and was relegated to the event listings of preservation societies and museums.

I've provided a significantly abridged version of one very small facet of the history of live film narration, and merely for the purpose of briefly contextualizing the contemporary practice of Movietelling. The broadest definition of Movietelling I could give is any instance where a human contingent mediates between an audience and an image. I say this very literally, as I understand that taken relatively it may encompass more than half the pastimes and art forms of the later part of the 20th Century. The following is a quote from my contribution to the Wikipedia "Benshi" page: "While some have adopted the term "Neo-Benshi," other performers have chosen to adopt the title "Movieteller" as an alternative to "Benshi," as they believe it emphasizes both the multicultural past and future(s) of the form, while also inviting further experimentation with the medium, such as a live narration of one's own films, the implementation of instruments as narrative devices, or any instance where a human contingent mediates between an audience and an image."

I think that Movietelling is an ideal form for emphasizing the collaborative process, reinventing the recognizable image, and contributing to a more practical avant-garde, in that it draws together an attentive group, creates new specifications from more general sources, and provides an entertaining, educating unexpected experience. It seems an appropriate medium for those interested in seeking out and/or creating new spaces wherein the distance between artifact, artists and audience is less daunting, and therefore more conducive for building community, which is itself a social art.

I've put all this down because I intend to refer to this practice often, and I hope it will assist in providing some initial context.