Silliman's Blog

The closing of Olsson's means the last independent bookstore in the downtown DC area is gone, following Chapters losing its lease a while back. The whole area (including as "chinatown" that now sports a california tortilla and a fudrucker's outlet) has had every bit of real life squeezed from it. I could go on, but it's just too depressing.

# posted by

mgushuedc : June 23, 2008

Ron, I don't know how you process this information in, ostensibly, one swipe. I love Susan Howe!

# posted by

LM Rivera : June 23, 2008

Ron, thanks for linking to my literaria biographia in terms of the online portion of the Lutheran Surrealist movement.

In terms of your School of Quietude vs. Post-Avant, and now -- The Third Way (??), why don't you draw up a questionnaire of some sort -- a kind of personality typology for poets so that we can see where we fall into on your scale of things.

It could have a hundred questions, and you could get scored if you take the test.

Sort of like that American accent questionnaire you re-posted here a few summers back.

IT would be fun and there'd be tons of smoke and lightning, and possibly even a little illumination from same.

Just an idea.

Here's the kind of questions I think could be asked:

1. Your wildest dream is to have a poem accepted at Massachusetts Review.

2. You don't want anybody to accept your poems. You don't even want to be read. You just like writing, and you like to write in such a way that no one else can figure out what you're doing because you're SOOOO abnormal, you crazy thing, you.

3. You have a huge trust fund, but you are still a communist on principle.

4. You think that states and counties should be dismantled and redesigned according to "poetic" territories. One major territory for you is that of Camden, NJ which you want to rename Whitmania and of which you want to be mayor.

I'm not very good at this, but I wanted to offer a sample of what I'm thinking. Then you'd have to figure out a scoring rubric, and then you'd need a bit of description to match. I think you'll need at least ten possible categories for the poet to fall into, and then perhaps some suggestions for each category, and you'd have yourself an absolute squall of distaste on your hands, and a lot of fun for those of us who enjoy this kind of conceptual frenzy of denial among the poets, each of whom is of course a type, and yet, each of whom believes they are completely individual.

You could even have a Lutheran Surrealist camp, and maybe we'd get one or two converts in this fashion!

Here's the two questions for Lutheran Surrealists:

1. You attend a Lutheran church on at least a monthly basis, and you consider yourself a Lutheran.

2. You admire the surrealist movement, but would like to retrofit it with Lutheran principles and mores.

# posted by

Kirby Olson : June 23, 2008

It distresses me that Cody's in Berkeley has closed; I don't suppose I'll ever have difficulty find good literature to read, but there is something that a store like Cody's provided that made you feel that reading wasn't something you did in isolation. I know book store economics all too well, and I will not having them to visit when I come to the Bay Area.

Thank you for the link.

# posted by

Ted Burke : June 23, 2008

True story: When Fred & Pat Cody drove up from Mexico City to the Bay Area to start their bookstore (its first location was at Grove & Rose where Fat Apple's is now), they drove with George & Mary Oppen.

# posted by

Ron : June 23, 2008

you 'did it' again, Ron

in this 3 a.m. reading
about another "drive"

Carl Rakosi writes of George Oppen (The Last Days):

"The morning his wife Mary and I drove him to Oakland to enter him into the Home for Jewish Parents, he was very {...}."

this from/out of "Carl Rakosi: Man and Poet"

# posted by

Ed Baker : June 24, 2008

Snail Mi Lorn
Slain Mi Lorn
What Rial or Ritual
Limns No?

Marlin Loins
Mansion the Rill

Amnion Lanolin
Rims the Marlin Lions
and Ails Nil Morns

Liar Limns No
Nail Slim Snail Mil
No Morals Molars' Nil
In Nil In
Oral Limns

Slam Roil Inn
Salon Nil Rim

Romans Ill In
Mason Rill In
Moans Rill In
Mans Ill Iron
Mans Rill Ion
Mans Nil Roil
Roam Ill Inns
Roam Ills Inn

La Rim Inn Sol

The Rhyme in Soul
Ron Silliman tis..

[thanks ron]

# posted by

phaneronoemikon : June 24, 2008

a silly little thing

your link here to
john burger
is meant to be peter burger

john berger
is great however
"hold all thngs dear"

you're a gas

# posted by

jh : June 24, 2008

Ron, thanks for pasting Keith's picture up there at the top and for linking to the tribute. He and Heloise will much appreciate that. And my blog got "the Silliman bump." Not quite like the Colbert bump. But a nice bump.
Bobby

# posted by

Bobby Byrd : June 24, 2008

JH,

always interesting to see where the mind turns when it goes onto automatic pilot,

Ron

# posted by

Ron : June 24, 2008

Thanks for posting pictures of the flooding here, Ron. The Main Library is closed for now as well as several other buildings. The Library should open sooner than many buildings, including the Art Museum, unfortunately.

We survived and I managed to check out some poetry books before getting out of the Library/Work on Friday 13th.

# posted by

Amish Trivedi : June 24, 2008

I wonder what Gloucester poet John Ronan makes of the pact of 17 in the high school coven. That would be a poem worthy of Olson in terms of its intricacy. Saw on the news last night that the mayor thinks the principal made it all up. Principal isn't available for comment. Coven or no Gloucester's not far from Salem. The mayor (a woman) said that the problem in Gloucester is there's nothing to do and everybody's broke. You're getting neat footage of Gloucester, but I suspect the story is made-up. , or partially man-handled to create hysteria. We need an investigative poet!

# posted by

Kirby Olson : June 24, 2008

I have a signed copy of
Keith Wilson's 1969
Homestead
which was published by Kayak
and contains prints
by Robert McChesney.

I know I wrote a brief review
of one of his books.

I believe it was through my
connection with
Doug Flaherty and his
Road Apple Review
when I was teaching at UW-Oshkosh
that I was introduced to him.

# posted by

brian salchert : June 24, 2008

Dear Ron,

I hope that you are well. Thanks for mentioning my discussion of Peter Burger over at the Poetry Foundation's Harriet blog. For those who are interested, I'd like to mention that the piece to which you linked was the third of a four-part series. The first part, in paricular, contains an even more detailed discussion of Burger. It can be found at http://poetryfoundation.org/harriet/2008/06/avantgarde_and_modern_part_one.html.

Thanks a lot and take good care.

peace and poetry,

Reginald

# posted by

Reginald Shepherd : June 25, 2008

Silliman's Blog

Monday, June 23, 2008

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