-
Friday Notebook 12.02.11
Kenny G. reading at PresidentObama’s”A Celebration of American Poetry” at the WhiteHouse on May 11, 2011. “Do not attempt to adjustthe picture. We are controllingtransmission.“ I really don’t have notebook entries for this week because I’ve been working on a new class for University of Denver’s University College, a “special topics” course on the poetic image. It’s great fun, but like all online classes, especially new ones, the pre-planning is tough.Read More
-
News Flash: Potatoeheads at Harriet in Line for Promotion to Muttonheads
So let me get this straight. The Harrieterati want us to sneer at Bradley Cooper playing Lucifer but applaud the casting of con man Kenny Goldsmith as Julian Assange because Goldsmith routinely violates copyright laws at UbuWeb. Now, I’m sure Cooper will never match my favorite film Satan, David Warner; but I’m equally sure that Goldsmith bears as much resemblance to Assange as Dan Quayle did to John F.Read More
-
Thinking (as in the Just-Previous Post) of Kenny G.
Karl Shapiro | newyorktimes.com Lower the standard: that’s my motto. Somebody is always putting the food out of reach. We’re tired of falling off ladders. Who says a child can’t paint? A pro is somebody who does it for money. Lower the standards. Let’s all play poetry. Down with ideals, flags, convention buttons, morals, the scrambled eggs on the admiral’s hat. I’m talking sense. Lower the standards. Sabotage the stylistic approach. Let weeds grow in the subdivision. Putty up the incisions in the library façade, those names that frighten grade-school teachers, those names whose U’s are cut like V’s.Read More
-
Rich
The White House has embraced con-artist Kenny Goldsmith. He will lead a “poetry workshop for children” with Mrs. Obama. This should be rich. For years now Goldsmith has been insulting the intelligence of college students, readers of the Harriet blog and Poetry magazine (see here and here), as well as credulous members of what passes for the “avant-garde” in this country. According to his Wikipedia page, Goldsmith’s classes at University of Pennsylvania, Center for Programs in Contemporary Writing, involve “appropriation, theft, stealing, plundering and sampling.Read More
-
Char Contra Conceptual Writing*
René Char “The poet is that part of man rebellious to calculated projects.” —René Char, from his preface to Furor and Mystery (1948). _____________________________*Viz., con artists like Kenneth Goldsmith: “I will refer to the kind of writing in which I am involved as conceptual writing. In conceptual writing the idea or concept is the most important aspect of the work.Read More
-
Stupid Funny*
“Why are so many writers now exploring strategies of copying and appropriation? It’s simple: the computer encourages us to mimic its workings.” The above is from Kenneth Goldsmith’s introduction to Against Expression: An Anthology of Conceptual Writing (a free UbuWeb download). Goldsmith, of course, does not explain why writers have not created novels with internal combustion engines in imitation of the way cars work; or anthologies that flush their contents as you read them, in imitation of urinals. Oh … wait….Read More
-
Heartless Imperialism
In the middle of a fascinating essay on Artificial Intelligence and what the author calls the “cerebral imperialism” that drives it, I came across this: Intelligence co-developed with other processes embedded in the body and designed for evolutionary advancement–love, for example, and empathy. A non-loving and non-empathetic humanlike empathy is a terrifying thing. In fact, we already have non-loving, non-empathetic autonomous creations that function by using humanlike intelligence. They’re powerful and growing, and they operate along perfectly logical lines in order to ensure their own survival and well-being. Here are two of them: British Petroleum and Goldman Sachs.Read More
-
No I Did Not Attend AWP, But…
For a couple of quick glimpses of the intellectual train wreck known as the Kenny Goldsmith Express, see this and this. For something to calm your nerves after perusing the debris field, try this and this (both via Linh Dinh), as well as this from Patricia Smith. I think I may give up poetry and start making these for sale at farmers markets.Read More
-
A Diagnosis
I recently came across John Latta’s statement that at age 37 Lyn Hejinian wrote a book called My Life, which consisted of “thirty-seven sections, each thirty-seven sentences long.” And it hit me: the avant-garde (think OULIPO, think Goldsmith) is afflicted with and obsessive-compulsive disorder.Read More
-
A Whisper from the Exobrain
Remember your favorite mantra as a kid during car trips: “Are we there yet?” Dilbert creator Scott Adams thinks so. Technically, you’re already a cyborg. If you keep your cell phone with you most of the time, especially if the earpiece is in place, I think we can call that arrangement an exobrain. Don’t protest that your cellphone isn’t part of your body just because you can leave it in your other pants.Read More