Kudos to RD Raindog Armstrong for giving rebirth to LUMMOX magazine as a mammoth annual issue (now onsale). It throws a wide net in terms of poets and writers--and includes people from places other than Southern California.
Here are some quotations from the interview/essay portion of the issue:
"...I know there are plenty of people who will disagree with me on this, but I feel the battle between academic poetry and performance poetry, which seemed so important ten years ago, is largely over. Sure, there are still disagreements over what constitutes good poetry (or even what constitutes poetry at all), but the divisions are not entirely as clear. There is much more of a spectrum these days. I hear poets with MFAs doing stuff that would have been considered pure performance, and I hear poets with no formal education writing poems as finely crafted as anything out rhere. Maybe it's not all liked, or even appreciated, but it is all accepted as poetry."--from interview with G. Murray Thomas of NEXT magazine and NEWS CLIPS AND EGO TRIPS.
"Far and away the worst most flagrant element is the rampant and utterly rapacious careerist ambition practiced by increasing numbers of poets and would-be poets, a kind of relentless, compulsive self-promotion, which it it weren't so damaging would be almost comically ludicrous....unabashed status seeking...continual seeking and cultivating reading opportunities...intense conferences in restaurants talking only "shop"-which these days means comparing strategies to get published; which poetry "prize" to pursue; taking every available workshop and of course sucking up to celebrity poets. These "name" folks are cultivated to 'get ahead'; attending no readings except your own and those of certified eminences and the ne plus ultra of this utter betrayal of the traditional poet's stance: contriving to secure a co-featured reading with the big-shot poet."
"It's hard to bust someone for undertaking an advance course of study so as to earn a living teaching about what [he or] she loves. But "let's put it where it is": the MFA is a "union card". And real poetry does not come from the Academy. It comes from the confrontation of the nakedness of the poet's soul with 'being-in-the-world'.--excerpts from Steve Goldman's essay "The Coming of the YUPOETS".
Showing posts with label R.D. Raindog Armstrong. Show all posts
Showing posts with label R.D. Raindog Armstrong. Show all posts
Thursday, November 1, 2012
Saturday, October 13, 2012
NEWS CLIPS AND EGO TRIPS poetry panel--Part 8
Only two more portions to go after this one.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvsOkAD3CNE&feature=plcp
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvsOkAD3CNE&feature=plcp
Tuesday, September 25, 2012
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
Monday, June 4, 2012
The art of full disclosure when writing poetry book reviews.
First, I'll start with a full disclosure of my own: I once had a book published by Lummox Press and was included in an anthology of its Little Red Books series.
G. Murray Thomas, who reviews books for Poetix.net (alongside Eric Morago), knows the proprietor of Lummox and has toured with him in recent months.
But Murray routinely reviews poetry volumes published by Lummox and even more routinely fails to offer any kind of full disclosure. This modus operandi has also occurred with books from Write Bloody. There, the ethical conundrum gets a bit stickier because Derrick Brown's Long Beach-based small press recently offered up the NEWS CLIPS AND EGO TRIPS anthology, based on the NEXT....poetry magazine edited by....G. Murray Thomas.
Once again, I'm aware that a certain segment of the SoCal poetry community views itself as small enough where friends write reviews of each other's books and few people don't care to see this as any kind of an issue.
And I'll give Murray the benefit of the doubt and guess he does his best to be objective when writing reviews of Lummox and Write Bloody offerings.
But, if the poetry community in SoCal wants to trumpet its idealness more convincingly, then it should avoid too many occurrences of even the appearance of conflict of interest.
UPDATE 6/5/12: Heard from Murray privately (sent him comminique via Facebook); essentially, his response is that "most people" know he knows people from local presses and that he's not interested in full disclosure. Case closed.
G. Murray Thomas, who reviews books for Poetix.net (alongside Eric Morago), knows the proprietor of Lummox and has toured with him in recent months.
But Murray routinely reviews poetry volumes published by Lummox and even more routinely fails to offer any kind of full disclosure. This modus operandi has also occurred with books from Write Bloody. There, the ethical conundrum gets a bit stickier because Derrick Brown's Long Beach-based small press recently offered up the NEWS CLIPS AND EGO TRIPS anthology, based on the NEXT....poetry magazine edited by....G. Murray Thomas.
Once again, I'm aware that a certain segment of the SoCal poetry community views itself as small enough where friends write reviews of each other's books and few people don't care to see this as any kind of an issue.
And I'll give Murray the benefit of the doubt and guess he does his best to be objective when writing reviews of Lummox and Write Bloody offerings.
But, if the poetry community in SoCal wants to trumpet its idealness more convincingly, then it should avoid too many occurrences of even the appearance of conflict of interest.
UPDATE 6/5/12: Heard from Murray privately (sent him comminique via Facebook); essentially, his response is that "most people" know he knows people from local presses and that he's not interested in full disclosure. Case closed.
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Santa Monica CA poet Lynne Bronstein needs your help.
Forwarded to me by R.D. Raindog Armstrong yesterday:
This, from fellow poet Luis Campos...
howdy folks:
tough times we're living in... an old friend is in
trouble: Lynne Bronstein; she's being evicted...
needs a little help from her friends. Don't know
Lynne? Beautiful person, fine poet; writes for the
Santa Monica newspaper... has been living at her
small place in S.M. at least since I met her back
in '70... community activist, cares for people; could
end up living on the streets.
enough said... please send her whatever you can afford.
She'll cry first, thank you later.
Lynne Bronstein
215 Bay St.
Santa Monica, CA
90405
This, from fellow poet Luis Campos...
howdy folks:
tough times we're living in... an old friend is in
trouble: Lynne Bronstein; she's being evicted...
needs a little help from her friends. Don't know
Lynne? Beautiful person, fine poet; writes for the
Santa Monica newspaper... has been living at her
small place in S.M. at least since I met her back
in '70... community activist, cares for people; could
end up living on the streets.
enough said... please send her whatever you can afford.
She'll cry first, thank you later.
Lynne Bronstein
215 Bay St.
Santa Monica, CA
90405
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