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| Charles Olson (left) strikes a pensive pose. |
We'll wrap up our foundations classes with a few short essays specifically addressing poetic practice. First we have an era-defining manifesto by Charles Olson, "Projective Verse," in which he lays out his ideas concerning the composition of modern poetry, including "composition by field" and the relationship between the breath and the poetic line. As a complement to Olson's essay, we'll also take a look at a few poems that exemplify his ideas, written by Olson himself and two of his Black Mountain school peers, Robert Creeley and Paul Blackburn.
- Maximus, to Himself [MP3]
- The Songs of Maximus: Song 1 [MP3 (starts around 3:00 and follows with Song 2)]
- The Songs of Maximus: Song 2 [MP3 (Song 1 and 2 at the beginning)]
Robert Creeley
- I Know a Man [MP3]
- A Wicker Basket [MP3]
- The Rain [MP3]
- For Love [MP3]
- The Language [MP3]
Paul Blackburn
- 7th Game : 1960 Series [MP3]
- Brooklyn Narcissus [MP3]
- Ritual VIII
- Ritual X : the Evening Pair of Ales
Next, I'd like you to read two brief essays by Charles Bernstein. First, we have "Hearing Voices," which lays out some of the key ideas to his notion of "close listening," in a more concise and up-to-date way than his classic introduction to the volume of the same name where those concepts were first codified a generation ago: [PDF].
Finally, here's "The Difficult Poem," which offers strategies for navigating challenging poetry while buoying the reader with its irreverent perspective: [PDF]
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