Back To School Special: Professor Bob Holman’s “Exploding Text: Poetry in Performance”

Poetry

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Poetry

Back To School Special:
Professor Bob Holman’s “Exploding Text: Poetry in Performance”

Dateline: 9/12/98

You cannot institutionalize the anti-institution! So. . . Let's teach a course in that! Pssst -- wanna see a perfpo readlist? Take a looksee, as our intrepid PoGuide takes up residence as Visiting Professor of Writing at Bard College this semester.

Professor Bob Holman’s “Exploding Text: Poetry in Performance”

Lit 2122 Fall 98
Tuesdays 1:20-3:20 Olin 101

READING LIST:

Algarin/Holman, eds., Aloud! Voices from the Nuyorican Poets Café* [Henry Holt: 1994].
Berrigan, Ted, On the Level Everyday* (talks) [Talisman: 1997].
Blum/Holman/Pellington, The United States of Poetry (2 VHS tapes) [KQED: 1996].
Lu Chi's Wen Fu, The Art of Writing* (trans. Hamill) [Milkweed: 1997].
Pessoa, Fernando, Fernando Pessoa & Co. (trans. Zenith) [Grove: 1998].
Sundiata, Sekou, The Blue Oneness of Dreams (CD) [Mouth Almighty/Mercury Records: 1997].

RECOMMENDED:

Auden/Pearson, ed., Viking Portable Poets of the English Language [Viking: 1975].
Baraka, Amiri, Transbluesency [Marsilio: 1995].
Beefheart, Captain, Trout Mask Replica (CD) [Warner Reprise: 1970].
Blum/Holman/Pellington, The United States of Poetry (anthology) [Abrams: 1996], (CD) [Mouth Almighty/Mercury Records: 1996].
Boland, Eavan, Object Lessons: The Life of the Woman and the Poet in Our Time [Norton: 1995].
Motherwell, Robert, The Dada Painters and Poets [Wittenborn: 1967.]
Rothenberg/Joris, eds., Poems for the Millennium, Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 [California: 1997, 1998].
Trachtenberg, ed., Verses That Hurt [St. Martin’s: 1997].

CLASSES:

9/8 “Is that a real poem or did you just make it up yourself?” What’s a poem? Who’s a poet?
9/15 Fernando Pessoa & Co. Heteronyms alive!
9/22 Wen Fu: The Art of Writing: The Chinese written character as a medium for poetry. What is the difference between writing and fishing?
9/29 Poets Theatre: Plays by poets performed by poets. Who is Ubu? The difference between a reading, a performance, a play. Pessoa paper due.
10/7 Manifesto: Charles Olson’s “Projective Verse” and Frank O’Hara’s “Personism: A Manifesto.”
10/14 VidPo: Epithalamium for a marriage of opposites, poetry and television. The United States of Poetry. The MTV-ization of poetry.
10/21 Reading week: flipped from week before.
10/28 Mid-term: Performance/text Manifesto due. Description of Final Project due.
11/3 Sound Text: There were 400 Homers! Page as score. Schwitters. Rap is poetry.
11/10 Performance: Roots in Dada and Surrealism and Futurism.
11/17 Slam and Decima and Improv: Jali, troubadours, jibaro, hoboes and contemporary sofa surfers.
11/24 Ted Berrigan and the New York School: Poems are just the words. And everything after that, everything comes after that. . . . As Frank O’Hara once said, “I’m assuming everything is all right and difficult.”
12/1 The Nuyorican Poets Cafe: The oral tradition is the hidden book.
12/8 CyberPoetics: The Web ain’t nuttin' but a poem.
12/15 Finals: Performance and text.

What to expect, what’s required:

Keep a notebook by your bed. Use it. Bring it to class on 10/28 and 12/15. I would love to see them on other dates, but this is not required.

You are required to write two papers. One, of three pages or more, will be about Fernando Pessoa. It’s due 9/29. The second, of five pages or more, will be a Manifesto for a new school of poetry, complete with poets and poems. It’s due 10/28.

You are required to create a Final Project. Performance, play (write &/or direct &/or act in), a reading, a film or video, a recording, a Web site.

Additional work: Write imitations of each week’s poets. Write poems in/of class. And, of course, write your own poems/plays/perfs, record them on audio/video tape and film, send 'em up on the Net, etc.

We will create a group piece based on the writings of Pessoa -- you are required to participate. We will slam at least once against Sarah Lawrence -- you are required to participate.

I will be reading:

Thursday, September 10, The Knitting Factory, with David Thomas, 8 p.m.
Wednesday, September 16, Bryant Park, with Sarah Skaggs and Dancers (“Twister Mixer”)

Please keep the class informed about readings/concerts/perfs of note.

--Bob Holman