[New-Poetry] Re: Sounding my barbaric AWP

Wed Feb 6 16:22:33 EST 2008

Jason, I've talked people's ears off before on ultra-talk, right on  
this very listserv, so before I deepen my sinning, I might suggest  
that you take a look at either the recent TriQuarterly issue on UT  
(#128), or else (I say, blushingly) my own quite readable essay on  
the topic, available free (free!) right here, at Ed Byrne's wonderful  
online mag, *Valparaiso Poetry Review*:

http://www.valpo.edu/english/vpr/grahamultra.html

Beyond that, I'm always happy to talk further. . . .

========================================
David Graham
grahamd at ripon.edu

Home Page:
http://web.mac.com/drjazz/iWeb/Site/About%20Me.html

Poetry Library:
http://web.mac.com/drjazz/iWeb/Site/DGPoLibrary.html
==========================================

On Feb 6, 2008, at 3:07 PM, Jason Quackenbush wrote:

> I've sometimes wondered if some of my poems could be called ultra- 
> talk poems. then again, i also sometimes wonder whether i should  
> really be medicating my attention deficit disorder. Since i don't  
> go to AWP, would you mind expanding a bit on what was discussed  
> during that pane for my benefitl?
> Thnks for the rundown,
> Jason Quackenbush
>
> On Feb 6, 2008, at 8:43 AM, David Graham wrote:
>
>> I don't blog, so you all must suffer.
>>
>> Notes on last weekend's Association of Writers & Writing Programs  
>> (AWP) conference in midtown Manhattan.   Skip the following if  
>> you're allergic to gossip and academic gatherings.
>>
>> The omnipresent buzz was, of course, about the sheer size of this  
>> year's conference.  7,500 attendees, they say, and it seemed like  
>> an under-estimate, especially if you were standing in line for  
>> coffee or an elevator.  Two main hotels for all the events, so  
>> there was much shuttling back and forth.  The book fair, which in  
>> times past was a fairly reliable place to meet all your old pals  
>> just by hanging around for an hour, was too vast and scattered for  
>> this:  there were three huge ballrooms full of books, on three  
>> separate floors.
>>
>> What an amazing feast for the literary book lover, even so.  Every  
>> little press and university press or journal you've ever heard of,  
>> it seemed, and hundreds you never have.  It takes nerves of steel  
>> not to walk out with a heavy bag of new titles.  I do not have  
>> nerves of steel.
>>
>> Another aspect of the conference's size was that they ran double  
>> featured readings in the evening, for the first time in my  
>> experience.  (I missed the last two years.)  For example, you had  
>> to choose one evening between hearing Rae Armantraut & Mark  
>> Strand, or else Susan Cheever & Sue Miller.   They also were  
>> militant about checking people's registration badges:  no more  
>> sneaking in for a free taste.
>>
>> I've never seen as much star power at any previous AWPs.  I mean,  
>> just on the poetry side of the aisle, the list of laureates alone  
>> was impressive:  Billy Collins, Mark Strand, Charles Simic, and  
>> Robert Pinsky were all on hand, along with quite a few other big  
>> splashes in the poetry pond:  John Ashbery, Sharon Olds, Yusef  
>> Komunyakaa, Robert Bly, James Tate, Russell Edson, Gerald Stern,  
>> Alicia Ostriker, Marvin Bell, Sonia Sanchez, Patricia Smith,  
>> Richard Howard, Stanley Plumly, Louis Simpson, Mark Doty, Martin  
>> Espada, Jorie Graham, Li-Young Lee, Edward Hirsch, C.D. Wright,  
>> Edward Fields, Thomas Lux, Stephen Dunn, Joyce Carol Oates (well,  
>> she writes some poetry), C. K. Williams, and Quincy Troupe, just  
>> to list a few.
>>
>> No-shows (both with broken bones, interestingly) included Louise  
>> Gluck and Albert Goldbarth.  My guess is that Goldbarth tried to  
>> lift a pile of his own books, and it snapped his old bones.
>>
>> I only saw a few of those listed above, as usual at such  
>> conferences.  I spent much of my time schmoozing with friends,  
>> trolling the book fair, and in this case checking out the Museum  
>> of Modern Art, only a block away from the droning of panelists.   
>> Excellent show of Lucian Freud etchings, by the way.
>>
>> Interesting to be at a literary event where someone like Collins  
>> was *not* the featured attraction.  He just ambled around from  
>> session to session and around the book fair like a Regular  
>> Person.  I shook his hand and we had a tiny pleasant chat after  
>> the Ultra-Talk panel.  And his reading was not one of the big  
>> nightly features, either.
>>
>> Highlights:  seeing Russell Edson about three decades after the  
>> last reading of his I caught, and finding him much the same,  
>> happily.  A bit stooped and halting, but creatively the same.  The  
>> session was a tribute to Edson, with his reading preceded by  
>> tributes from Robert Bly, Charles Simic, and James Tate.  Strange  
>> to see that collection of geezers on stage and realize that Tate,  
>> at age 65, was the youngster.  Edson is 73, Simic turns 70 this  
>> year, and Bly's 82.  I'd not seen Tate in a number of years, and  
>> his health seems very precarious.  Walks with a cane now.  Very  
>> sad to see.
>>
>> Tate had his own big tribute, with a reading of new work (for  
>> which he sat down) followed by a Q & A, at which he essentially  
>> deflected all questions.
>>
>> Another highlight for me was a panel on religion & poetry,  
>> featuring talks by Marianne Boruch, Robert Thomas, Greg Rappleye,  
>> Laura Kasischke, and Roy Jacobstein, all excellent, on time, and  
>> well prepared--not always the case at AWP.  I had to leave during  
>> the Q & A, but I'm told some born-agains provided some heated  
>> questioning afterward to the panelists, some of whom had announced  
>> themselves as atheists.
>>
>> Heard Alice Friman read for the first time, and if you ever get a  
>> chance, go see her.
>>
>> My favorite session was no doubt the Ultra-Talk panel, with David  
>> Kirby, Barbara Hamby, Mark Halliday, and Rodney Jones.  One of the  
>> liveliest in terms of questions and discussion, too.
>>
>> My greatest disappointment was not hearing what Goldbarth might  
>> have had to say about Marianne Moore, in a tribute to MM that his  
>> fractured bones prevented him from attending.  Moore is another  
>> Ultra-Talk precursor, it seems to me, as Goldbarth is one of our  
>> best current talkers, ultra- or otherwise.  It was a very  
>> interesting session, even so, with particularly strong remarks, I  
>> thought, from Jeanne Marie Beaumont.
>>
>> Among my too-numerous book purchases was Jason Bredle's *Standing  
>> in Line for the Beast* (New Issues Press, 2007), which I read on  
>> the plane home.  If you like Ultra-Talkers, he's a very worthy new  
>> voice.  And New Issues impressed me greatly with its list, I must  
>> say.
>>
>> I also highly recommend Alice Friman's *Book of the Rotten  
>> Daughter*, from BkMk Press (2006) and Carol Potter's *Otherwise  
>> Obedient*, just out from Red Hen Press, another highly impressive  
>> small press.
>>
>> Red Hen's also just published an anthology that is in some ways  
>> unique.  It's called *Letters to the World*, and consists of poems  
>> by subscribers to the Wom-Po Listserv.  It's a long and  
>> fascinatingly complex story, told in the book itself, but in a  
>> nutshell--the anthology is a collaborative venture arising from  
>> the Wom-Po membership, which went from being a notion to a blog to  
>> an online anthology to a book entirely without a "leader", all  
>> with volunteer labor and an endless stream of on-list talk about  
>> methods, goals, standards, procedures, etc.  An all-email book,  
>> start to finish, with input from (if I remember rightly) five  
>> continents.  It's truly amazing that the book ever appeared, and  
>> it's a beauty.   In my possibly biased opinion--I wound up as the  
>> sole male contributor.
>>
>> For those who like to track such things, since there was no  
>> editorial selector of works (anyone who wished could contribute  
>> one poem), it's among the most eclectic anthologies out there,  
>> aesthetically.
>>
>> AWP is really the blind man's elephant these days, so I'd love to  
>> hear others' reports.
>>
>>
>> ========================================
>> David Graham
>> grahamd at ripon.edu
>>
>> Home Page:
>> http://web.mac.com/drjazz/iWeb/Site/About%20Me.html
>>
>> Poetry Library:
>> http://web.mac.com/drjazz/iWeb/Site/DGPoLibrary.html
>> ==========================================
>>
>>
>>
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