Ridiculously Good Writers
One of the nice things about having friends who are writers who don't live in the same town as you do is that you tend to get stuff when they visit. Hooray! Like books, I mean, and also dinner sometimes. Jon Paul gave us his book Asthmatica, mainly because he has a man-crush on Paul. I've been reading it to relieve myself of the tension of The True History of the Kelly Gang, which is getting really sad, what with Ned Kelly's mom losing her teeth and itinerant husbands left right and centre. Wow, is Asthmatica ever good! I remember being really jealous when I saw that JPF had written crossword puzzle poems and published them in Matrix. That's totally cheating, Tino. My crossword poems weren't any good and weren't funny at all and my thesis advisor at the time advised me to stop writing them, and he was probably right, but it still hurt that someone else had the same idea as I did and did it better and was in a position to say "Screw you, academics, I'm publishing them myself!" So the crossword poems are in Asthmatica along with a healthy dollop of other really good stuff. I'm so jealous. I wish I could be less serious and more fun just like Tino Dancer, only without being called the Elton John of Canadian Letters.
Speaking of writers stealing each other's ideas-- er I mean being mutually responsive and reflexive or something like that-- below are two examples of "Framing the Narrative," one by me, the other by Chris Ewart.
Chris wrote a story responding to derek beaulieu's concrete poem and had Paul Kennett and Sandy Lam assist him in reading it on thursday night at the NoD launch. I perfromed mine at his Calgary launch at Pages about a month or so ago. derek's been getting people to do his dirty work for him with the poems from his latest book Fractal Ecomonies (sic) since the poems are basically impossible to read conventionally and he knows it.
He also managed to corral angela and Fiddy, who, you'll notice from the photos, are also plagiarizing each other. They both did an interpretive dance. Ok, just kidding, we all know Fiddy would never do that. He read a couple of his own poems, showing some self-promotion smarts there, while angela DID in fact dance. In homage to "derek's unhealthy obsession with rubbing," she treated us to some frottage. Like a katydid. angeladid.
In keeping with the theme of stealing ideas, Kevin McPherson read some poems earlier in the evening-- found language from comic books, but only the POWS FRAPS BANGS and POKS. He vowed never to read them again, since he'd learned that Mark Hopkins had the same idea, but really, he should perform them MORE, not less, thereby staking his claim.
The night was so full of readers I can't even name them all, because I didn't take any notes. It's this new thing I'm trying for blog reviews-- I call it "irresponsibility." Actually, it was more that I was a little nervous, since I was performing with angela from WSfL and we'd only had an hour or two to practice that afternoon. I ~think~ it went really well... angela is a very skilled performer, and had rehearsed with other people at length, so any pauses/mistakes/missed cues were entirely on my side of the a hoosh. Anyway, in addition to the four stars of the evening (beaulieu, Christie, Fiorentino and rawlings), I think the most interesting and fun performance was from James Dangerous, who read a story and then sang a translation of a fictional poet's fictional poem in a fictional language, and there were singing bowls, gongs and an impressive tremolo. Nicely done, Dangerous!
The evening at The Carpenter's Union Hall wrapped up with The Russian Artist Factory playing some songs, and there was some ridiculously good dancing. Then there was pizza. I found that I am a ridiculously good photographer, especially with a head rush from intensive a hooshing and a ha-ing, as evidenced below. Too bad my camera's batteries ran out! Also-- see how derek is trying to take over JPF's staus as the Elton John of Canadian letters? He can't even play the piano! C'mon!
We miss you already, angela and Jon Paul!
Speaking of writers stealing each other's ideas-- er I mean being mutually responsive and reflexive or something like that-- below are two examples of "Framing the Narrative," one by me, the other by Chris Ewart.
Chris wrote a story responding to derek beaulieu's concrete poem and had Paul Kennett and Sandy Lam assist him in reading it on thursday night at the NoD launch. I perfromed mine at his Calgary launch at Pages about a month or so ago. derek's been getting people to do his dirty work for him with the poems from his latest book Fractal Ecomonies (sic) since the poems are basically impossible to read conventionally and he knows it. 
He also managed to corral angela and Fiddy, who, you'll notice from the photos, are also plagiarizing each other. They both did an interpretive dance. Ok, just kidding, we all know Fiddy would never do that. He read a couple of his own poems, showing some self-promotion smarts there, while angela DID in fact dance. In homage to "derek's unhealthy obsession with rubbing," she treated us to some frottage. Like a katydid. angeladid.
In keeping with the theme of stealing ideas, Kevin McPherson read some poems earlier in the evening-- found language from comic books, but only the POWS FRAPS BANGS and POKS. He vowed never to read them again, since he'd learned that Mark Hopkins had the same idea, but really, he should perform them MORE, not less, thereby staking his claim.The night was so full of readers I can't even name them all, because I didn't take any notes. It's this new thing I'm trying for blog reviews-- I call it "irresponsibility." Actually, it was more that I was a little nervous, since I was performing with angela from WSfL and we'd only had an hour or two to practice that afternoon. I ~think~ it went really well... angela is a very skilled performer, and had rehearsed with other people at length, so any pauses/mistakes/missed cues were entirely on my side of the a hoosh. Anyway, in addition to the four stars of the evening (beaulieu, Christie, Fiorentino and rawlings), I think the most interesting and fun performance was from James Dangerous, who read a story and then sang a translation of a fictional poet's fictional poem in a fictional language, and there were singing bowls, gongs and an impressive tremolo. Nicely done, Dangerous!
The evening at The Carpenter's Union Hall wrapped up with The Russian Artist Factory playing some songs, and there was some ridiculously good dancing. Then there was pizza. I found that I am a ridiculously good photographer, especially with a head rush from intensive a hooshing and a ha-ing, as evidenced below. Too bad my camera's batteries ran out! Also-- see how derek is trying to take over JPF's staus as the Elton John of Canadian letters? He can't even play the piano! C'mon!
We miss you already, angela and Jon Paul!
posted by Jill at 1:59 PM
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