Tag Archives: spring 2003

Given

Arielle Greenberg Verse Press ($12) by Michael R. Allen In Given, Arielle Greenberg makes dazzling explorations into the secrets embedded in language. Greenberg deals with words as strange objects that offer obscure meanings which might explain life, but she is no simple "experimental" writer—rather, she remembers that what poetry does best is produce complex meaning […]

Blind Huber

Nick Flynn Graywolf Press ($14) by Mike Chasar A mysterious and entrancing sequence of short lyrics that journeys through the violent, erotic and even gothic world of the honeybee, Nick Flynn's pocket-sized volume Blind Huber feels appropriately like a combination of prayer book and field guide. There is no shortage of book-length sequences in American […]

As Ever: Selected Poems

Joanne Kyger Penguin Poets ($20) by Gary Gach This gathering, an overdue celebration, presents an awesome range of poems with a stunning developmental narrative baseline, from Joanne Kyger's discovery of her "voice" on through 40-some years of evolution into one of the leading literary voices of her generation. Naturally, wide recognition's been delayed merely due […]

Complete Fiction

Serge Fauchereau Translated by Ron Padgett and John Ashbery Black Square Editions ($14) by Karl Krause "Art is artificial, nature is natural." —Piet Mondrian "Do we look enough at what we'll never see twice? Space is imaginary. Only time exists, and time has no edges." —Serge Fauchereau An anthology of an author's entire work can […]

Alphabets Upside-down: the voice of Bei Dao

Blue House translated from the Chinese by Ted Huters and Feng-ying Ming Zephyr ($13.95) At the Sky's Edge, Poems 1991-1996 translated from the Chinese by David Hinton and Yanbing Chen New Directions ($15.95) Unlock translated from the Chinese by Eliot Weinberger and Iona Man-Cheong New Directions ($13.95) by Lucas Klein One has to be patient […]

Tales of a Jargonaut: an interview with Jonathan Williams

by Jeffery Beam Jonathan Williams is perhaps best known as the genius behind The Jargon Society, which has published poetry, experimental fiction, photography, and visionary folk art (including the surprise bestseller, White Trash Cooking); among the press's distinguished offerings are works by Charles Olson, Paul Metcalf, Lorine Niedecker, Lou Harrison, Mina Loy, Joel Oppenheimer, James […]

20 QUESTIONS FOR JORDAN ELLENBERG

by Stephen Burt A foul-mouthed misanthropic poet from a obscure corner of Europe inspires, in turn, a struggling college in the American West; a superstar professor who decides to stop speaking; and the lucky-in-love misfit student who must watch the professor (in case he starts speaking again). Thus runs the plot for Jordan Ellenberg's The […]