Poetic Machines 04 November 21, 2007: Manifestoes generally call for advanced mandates in the arts—so of course, I am going to read the manifesto of the New Athenians with some interest, thinking that I am going to encounter an avant-garde demand for a, heretofore unimagined, revolution in poetry, but I must admit, with some disappointment, that the poetic agenda of the New [...] by Christian Bök

Wednesday Shout Out November 21, 2007: Jean Valentine’s Door in the Mountain: New and Collected Poems 1965-2003 received the National Book Award in 2004. Eight previous collections have been just as well received and widely recognized for the intensity of their spirit—a Jean Valentine poem faces the broken world without fear and not without hope. So it is with much enthusiasm that [...] by Rigoberto González

The Canon within the Canon November 20, 2007: W.H. Auden’s Christianity is the subject of a fascinating article by Edward Mendelson in the current issue of the New York Review of Books. “In apparently secular poems, he kept hidden what was often their religious starting-point.” That Auden kept his religious awakening under wraps at first, so as not to call down the wrath of his [...] by Ange Mlinko

A New Athenian Poem November 20, 2007: Individualism is a mature and calm feeling, which disposes each member of the community to sever himself from the mass of his fellows and to draw apart with his family and his friends, so that after he has thus formed a little circle of his own, he willingly leaves society at large to itself. Selfishness originates in blind instinct; [...] by Major Jackson

In Praise of Callaloo November 20, 2007: The distinguished man on the right is Charles Henry Rowell, one of the deans of American letters. Do not let the John Lennon glasses fool you; he's an old-style, southern aristocrat with a passionate love for African-American visual and literary art. This is evidenced by his 30 year tenure as the founding editor of Callaloo, "the premier [...] by Major Jackson

Similes and the Moving Van of Metaphor November 20, 2007: Here amongst the other New Athenians, "metaphores" (metaphors) is often seen emblazoned on a van. In modern Greek, it means "movers," and comes with burly men used to hoisting large pieces of furniture and boxes marked, in vain, "prosoche" (fragile) and "ano meros" ("this side up"). More than once I have almost been run down by the Moving Van [...] by A.E. Stallings

The New Athenians: A Manifesto in Search of a Generation of New Poets & Poems November 19, 2007: What follows below was received in my Inbox this morning. The anonymous senders threatened to pelt my four year old son with potatoes if I did not post their manifesto. I love my son, so here goes: (more...) by Major Jackson

are you getting enough SLOIP? November 19, 2007: Yesterday I learned-- from Wesley Kort's Space and Place in Modern Fiction-- the architectural term SLOIP, an acronym that stands for Space Left Over In Planning, i.e. the odd-shaped bits of lawn, sidewalk, or lot, or analogous interior space, you get when you put one shape (the building or buildings whose outline you created) on top of another [...] by Stephen Burt

Stigmata Errata Etcetera November 18, 2007: In his introduction to this book by Bill Knott, which includes 16 collages (apart from the one gracing the cover) by poet/artist Star Black, Mark Doty writes: “Knott builds out of fragments; he erases himself. How appropriate that these poems should be accompanied by a suite of collages, in which bits and pieces both make a new whole and [...] by Rigoberto González

In Praise of Print Journals November 18, 2007: [Note: I wrote this a couple of days ago, but didn't actually manage to post it...] Well, I guess the Anti-Muses have had it out for me since Snark & Blurb, so I am down with either a monster of a cold or, maybe, actually the flu, and so have spent the day in bed with aspirin and tissues and thermometer close at hand. Luckily, though, yesterday [...] by A.E. Stallings