Language is the essence of humanity; poetry is the essence of language. The reemergence of the oral tradition in the digital age has given an edge to word art which this course follows to the culture heart. Exploding Text is a hands-on exploration of a full-bodied literature, providing a theoretical basis for spoken word poetics via deep reading and analysis of text with a launch into physical analogues via performance practice. There is a microphone in the room.
The fall semester, “Poetry Performance,” begins with the assumption that All Poetry Is Performance Poetry, that even when a poem is fixed on a page it still performs. To move a poem to other media is simply a multidimensional close reading. Each semester we study different, often difficult, contemporary poets: Alice Notley, d.a. levy, Nathaniel Mackey, Ed Sanders, Ted Berrigan, Ani DiFranco, Amiri Baraka. Required essays: Olson’s “Projective Verse” and O’Hara’s “Personism: A Manifesto.”
Hiphop, Dada, Futurism, New York School, Rock, Beat, Black Mountain, Slam and other traditions weave through the curriculum. We engage media other than print: video and audio recording, live music collaborations, poets theater, and the internet are all considered. Students will participate in class collaborations with painters and musicians, and create a performance in at least two media as a final project. We often have visitors -- we follow the griot trail.
In the spring, “Exploding Text: A Poets Theater Festival” moves towards full-tilt theatricalization of poetry texts, our own and others, not to be confined nor defined by any particular theater, exploding. Students develop the use of media other than the standard printed page for the transmission of poetry, including music, dance, film and video, painting and sculpture and the Net. You will find Jarry, Mayakovsky, Artaud, O’Hara on the reading list; then we also deal with poetry books and how to cross over, including Wanda Coleman, Harryette Mullen, Sapphire. Can we create a production of John Ashbery’s Girls on the Run? Visiting poets and performers will drop by class, and we will participate in the Peoples Poetry Gathering in New York. There will be a group performance at the end of the semester. The final project is a book.