mercredi 2 octobre 2013

A.D. Winans: Interview conducted with me during my trip to Mexico to attend the Oaxaca, Mexico International Arts Festival


In 2007 I was one of two U.S. Poets honored at the Oaxaca, Mexico International Arts Festival 
Below is an interview conducted at that time.
Interviewer:  Daniel Eduardo De La Fuente Altamirano, a Mexico freelance journalist.
A.D. Winans
 
 
 1-How would you describe the literary environment in the US?
 
First off, I’m not a poetry scholar or an academic poet.  The response you will receive is a blue-collar, workingman’s perspective of the poetry scene and how it relates to my life.
 
If by this question you are referring to the publishing environment in the U.S., it has been on the decline since corporations first began purchasing major publishing houses in the eighties.  The major publishing houses no longer accept unsolicited manuscripts.  You need to have an agent in order to get in the front door.  This is a “Catch-22” situation.  The publisher demands you have an agent, and the agent demands publishing credits, and a track history before representing you.
 
The University presses are dominated by academic writers and a few poets and writers who have managed to obtain name recognition.
 
The only real alternative left is being published by a small press.  There are literally thousands of small press magazines seeking and publishing the work of alternative poets and writers, but 99% of them lack any distribution and are limited to small press runs.  The small presses who publish books are hampered by lack of funds for proper promotion and distribution.  
 
This has led to “Print on Demand” (POD) services, which refers to the digital printing and binding of a book in a relatively short time frame.  It is cost-effective to produce books one or two at a time, rather than the more costly process of a larger print run.
 
In reality, however, POD publishing services aren’t publishers in the traditional sense of the word but are really just a printing-publishing service offered to writers. They charge a fee for publication and will publish most anyone willing to pay the fee.  They do not routinely provide editing services or proofreading, although many will provide this service at an additional fee.   In practice, this service closely resembles vanity publishers and is equated as such by critics and reviewers. 
 
It has been estimated that 40% of POD sales are to the authors themselves, who purchase them for family and friends. There are many drawbacks: Booksellers don’t like dealing with POD services; POD services are not cheap; books are unlikely to be reviewed; The book will not be publicized, and terms and conditions have been known to be changed without warning.  In short, to a new poet or writer, the publishing prospects other than the small press world are indeed bleak.
 
If you are referring to the poets and authors writing within this environment, a lot has changed since my generation. There are any number of young writers today who are not overly concerned with being published by a big publishing house. This is true for some writers I know in San Francisco who are content with desktop publishing and having their books published in a print run of 100 or 200 copies.  They are satisfied with a local reputation, although I’m sure they would not turn down an offer from a large publishing house.  
 
I don’t feel qualified to speak for the entire U.S.  I was born in San Francisco, California, and have lived here practically my entire life; therefore, I feel qualified to speak about my own literary environment. 
 
San Francisco has always been a Mecca for creativity, be it poetry, prose, or the art world.  Many young people continue to be enthralled with the Beat poets and writers, but before the Beat Generation, there existed what was known as the “ San Francisco Renaissance,” a designation for a range of poetic activity centered throughout the city. 
 
The poet Kenneth Rexroth is considered the founding father of the renaissance.  Rexroth was a prominent second-generation modernist poet who corresponded with the likes of Ezra Pound and William Carlos Williams.  He held regular readings in his apartment located in the Fillmore District.   The poets and writers attending the meetings represented a wide range of styles, from the ballads of Helen Adams to the bawdy themes of poet and filmmaker James Broughton. 
 
In the fifties, the Beat Generation sprang-up with the core of the movement centered in New York’s Greenwich Village and San Francisco’s North Beach.
 
Allen Ginsberg came to San Francisco around this time and soon found his way to Rexroth’s pad, as did Philip Whalen and other Beat poets.  Later Rexroth arranged a reading at the Six Gallery where Ginsberg read his now famous HOWL poem.  Gary Snyder, Philip Whalen. Michael Mc Clure, and Philip      Lamanita (surreal poet) were also on the bill.
 
Literary historians cite jazz as a major influence on the work of the Beats, and this is certainly true in the case of writers and poets like Jack Kerouac and Bob Kaufman. The truth is reading poetry to music was nothing new.  In the early 1900s, Carl Sandburg played the guitar while reading poetry and Rexroth read to jazz with Langston Hughes, in Chicago, Illinois, before the term “Beat” existed.  And Kenneth Patchen, whom I have only heard on tape, was perhaps the greatest jazz poet of them all.
 
The Beats openly challenged and defied the established order of the day.  They were among the first to fictionalize their lives to readers worldwide, who thrived on their real-life experiences.  By the late fifties, they had cemented their role in the new American Counterculture. The most important thing Kerouac, Ginsberg, and Cassady did was to make rebellious youths in the U.S. and abroad aware there were others out there who felt the same way they felt.
 
The single most important event that served to gain the Beats notoriety was when the U.S. Customs seized A shipment of Ginsberg’s HOWL, declaring it obscene.  Customs later dropped the charge and allowed the book into the U.S., but an overzealous San Francisco Police Department arrested Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Shig Muro (the then manager of City Lights) and charged them with selling obscene literature.  Judge Clayton Horn later ruled that if a book has “The slightest redeeming social importance, it is protected under the First and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. and California Constructions and therefore can not be declared obscene.”  This legal precedent allowed Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer to be published by Grove Press.
 
The Beat movement in San Francisco continued through the early part of the sixties.  Ferlinghetti, Corso, Ginsberg, Di Prima, Joanne Kyger, Bob Kaufman, Jack Spicer, Richard Brautigan, Philip Whalen, and others were at the forefront of the movement.
 
There is some dispute over who termed the word “Beat.”  Some people claim it was Bob Kaufman.  Ferlinghetti, Mc Clure, and others Beats have said they are uncomfortable with the term but are quite content with the fame it has brought them. The word itself is hardly new.  As Robert Briggs has pointed out, “In 1860, a Beat was a loafer, moocher, or dead beat. By 1930 it was the rhythm with which someone beat a rap, or beat someone’s time for a girl, and by the late 40s the term dead beat referred to those who drained whatever scene they happened into.”
 
Be it as may, today the Beats have by and large died off,  with only Ferlinghetti, Mc Clure, Di Prima, Kyger, and David Meltzer still residing in the San Francisco Bay Area, but their Influence remains, their spirit carried by post-Beat poets, who are too numerous to mention.
 
 2-Is today's American literature characterized by any determining trend?
 
I don’t follow or subscribe to trends. American Literature since the beginning of thee 21st Century is exceptionally diverse, with rapidly growing multicultural influences.  The biggest and fastest-growing minority group is the Latino population, which is now more than 40 million strong.  The Asian population, although stabilized, also makes up a sizable number of the overall population.   New voices continue to emerge within the Native American, African American, Asian American, and Hispanic American communities.  “Bilingual” is a popular theme among American authors, reflecting both the alienation and the strong cultural identify that come with being a non-native English speaker living in the U.S.   Gender issues remain popular in 21st Century American Literature, and Gay and Lesbian authors continue to publish and make their concerns known within their particular communities.
 
American writers as a group continue to respond to the important issues of the country and the world at large, while creating unique worlds within their own communities.  America’s diverse literary voices reflect the unique characteristics of its land, its people, and culture.  The same holds true for Latino writers in their native land.
 
3-Horace Engdahl, Nobel Prize Secretary, said on the eve of declaring Le Clézio winner of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Literature, that the US were too insular and ignorant a country to compete against Europe for the world's main literary prize. “Europe is still the center of the literary world,” he said, "not the United States. The U.S. is too isolated, too insular. They don’t translate enough and don’t really participate in the big dialogue of literature. That ignorance is restraining.” What is your opinion about this statement?
 
I think his statement is both arrogant and misguided.   There is just as much junk literature cluttering the shelves of Europe as there is here in the U.S.   Perhaps Engdahl forgets that William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, John Steinbeck, Saul Bellow, and other recognized writers were also awarded a Nobel Literature Prize, the very prize Mr. Engdahl holds in such high esteem.Faulkner said, “I believe that man will not merely endure, he will prevail.  He is immortal, not because he alone among creatures, has an inexhaustible voice, but because he has a soul, a spirit, capable of compassion and sacrifice and endurance.  The poet’s, the writer’s duty, is to write about these things.  It is a privilege to help man endure by lifting his head, by reminding him of courage and honor and hope and pride and compassion and pity.   The poet’s voice need not merely be the record of man; it can be one of the props to help him endure and prevail.” 
 
Could a European writer have said this any better?   But more importantly, poetry is not, and should not be, about competing.  Poetry comes from the heart and soul of the poet, and poets should not be in competition with each other, let alone nations competing with each other.
 
Mr. Engdahl says the U.S. is “too insular and too ignorant a country.”  He fails to realize poetry does not originate from the core of any one country, but from the poet himself, regardless of what country he resides in.  Most poets outside the Academy are by their very nature outsiders, some even outlaws.  
 
He is perhaps right that not enough translations are being done in the U.S., but this is slowly changing.  PEN (of which I am a member) encourages and rewards translations, and its writers have actively participated in the “dialogue of literature.”  However, I would respectfully point out that no translator can fully catch the full beauty of a poem written in the native tongue of the poet.   As for the “big dialogue of literature,” I leave this up to the Academics.
 
4- You were close to the Beat Tradition. What is the legacy of its authors? How valid are Ginsberg, Kerouac or Burroughs' writings in 2008? Have they been studied enough?
 
Kerouac will always be the Godfather of the Beat Generation and Ginsberg (a self-marketing genius) will be remembered, if for nothing more than his poem, HOWL.  
 
For my money Ginsberg’s Kaddish is the best poem he wrote. I’ll discuss Burroughs later, as you have a question directly addressed to him.  However, I feel it’s important to point out there were many Beat writers who were as good if not better than Ginsberg, but who never received the proper recognition.  An example is Bob Kaufman, one of the original voices to come out of the Beat Generation.  Kaufman is rightfully considered as one of the most influential black poets of his era, though his poetry transcends race identification.  Like many of the Beats he started out in New York and later migrated to San Francisco’s North Beach. 
 
He was an amazing poet who early in his life served in the Merchant Marines and traveled the world over. Like Kerouac, he was heavy into the jazz scene.  In later years, he became the victim of drugs and forced shock treatments at New York’s Bellevue Hospital. He took a vow of silence in 1963 after watching President Kennedy assassinated on TV, and kept his vow until the end of the Vietnam War.   And yet he had the poems of the masters memorized.  You would be sitting next to him in North Beach and all of a sudden he would start reciting lines from T.S. Eliot, William Blake, and Lorca, this despite his diminished capacity.
 
Today, literary critics and academics alike recognize the Beats as legitimate poets, writers, and artists, but the legitimacy did not come without a cost.  In later life, Ginsberg sold out to the establishment, and as a result his work suffered.  He applied for and received not one or two, but three NEA fellowship grants, and years before his death sold his archives to Stanford University for one million dollars.  William Burroughs made commercials and had a small roll in a popular movie.  Today, Ferlinghetti’s City Lights Bookstore can’t be distinguished from other commercial bookstores, and he is second only to Ginsberg in marketing himself, receiving thousands of dollars for readings.  
 
It’s unfortunate that Beat historians and translators have by and large limited their study of the Beats to Ginsberg, Ferlinghetti, Corso, Di Prima, Mc Clure, and Burroughs, while largely ignoring other Beat poets who left their mark on the Beat Generation. This extends to non-Beat poets who were an influence on the Beats; Kenneth Patchen and Kenneth Rexroth are an example of two excellent poets and writers who seem to have fallen out of favor with the literary elite.
 
5- You were close, among other writers, to Burroughs. To what extent is his work enriching and influencing other authors?
 
 Actually I only met Burroughs twice.  The first time was at a New York Book Fair and the last time at City Lights Bookstore, for a total conversational time of probably no more than fifteen minutes.   There is no denying he was an important voice that went beyond the “Beat” image. 
 
 His was a literary voice that influenced many young people, both at home and abroad.  He is considered by many to be one of the most important literary figures of the twentieth century.  Jack Kerouac called him, “the greatest satirical writer since Jonathan Swift,” and Norman Mailer went so far as to say he was quite possibly the “only American Writer possessed by genius.” 
 
He was a Harvard-educated man and the grandson of the inventor of the Burroughs adding machine, whose family was listed in the Saint Louis Social Register, who gave it all up to write drug-induced literature that bridged generations and made him immensely popular both at home and abroad.
 
 After graduating from Harvard, Burroughs moved to New York and became part of the underground drug scene.  It was in New York that he met and became friends with Kerouac and Ginsberg, who were both students at Columbia University.  Ginsberg and Kerouac convinced Burroughs to write about his own personal experiences in life, which resulted in his first book, Junky. In his early literary career he wrote straight narrative prose, having burst forth on the scene at a time when conventional methods of writing were becoming boring.  It’s said his intention was to create a “literature of risk,” in which the writer was an outlaw in the midst of society and the accepted writers of the day.
 
 His greatest contribution to literature came with the publication of later books such as Naked Lunch, which was banned in many places due to its sexual content and biting political satire.  The book revealed a new writing style, with Burroughs presenting numerous characters and personalities within the course of the book, shifting from one to the next without any warning.  He spliced in what he called “routines,” small skits of humorous anecdotes.  Rather than the standard practice of progressing from beginning to the end as the book evolves, the chapters were presented in random order.  He ignored the standard rules of the day, and manipulated the language to suit his purposes.
 
 The most radical change in his writing took place in 1959, when he began to employ what is known as “cutups,” the process of cutting up pages and rearranging them to form new combinations of word and image.  A page, for example, might be cut into quarters, and then the top right would be paired with the bottom left, and the top left with the bottom right.  The composite text is then read or typed to form the new text.
 
  There is little doubt Burroughs played an important role in the evolution of modern writing as well as other artistic mediums.    His style broke through previous literary standards and barriers and made it possible for other writers to openly experiment with different writing styles.
  
6- Speaking about your personal work, what moves you to write? Who do you consider as your main influences and why?
 
 My most immediate influences were writers and not poets.  Writers like Ernest Hemingway, Steinbeck, Camus, and F. Scott Fitzgerald.  My early poetry influences were William Carlos Williams, Carl Sandburg, T.S. Eliot, and Ezra Pound.  It was not until I returned from the military (Panama) in 1958 that I discovered the Beats.  Early Beat influences were Ferlinghetti’s Coney Island off the Mind, followed by the work of Ginsberg, Corso, Jack Spicer, Richard Brautigan, Bob Kaufman, Jack Micheline, and the non-beat poet, Charles Bukokwski.
 
 But I have never said I was a poet.  I would be hard pressed to tell you what a poet is.  If I’m a poet, I’m a blue-collar workingman’s poet.  I find poetry wherever I go.  I have no national sense of poetry.  I write because I have to.  I write to appease the demons inside my head, voices that demand to be released, but there are times too when I write for the pure pleasure of it. 
 
 It seems like today everyone calls himself a poet.  The Internet is flooded with some of the worst poems imaginable.  You can’t simply call yourself a poet and be one.
  
I believe there are a large number of poets out there who write poetry because they want to be called a poet.  They want recognition and crave awards and court favors, when in reality the real poet struggles to just survive and make a living.  I will never write to become part of the literary mafia or the cliques that exist in San Francisco and beyond. 
  
A good percentage of my poems are about the dispossessed:  hookers, drug addicts, alcoholics, the homeless, and the like.   But I’m also a political poet, having opposed the Vietnam War and the unlawful invasion of Iraq by the criminal Bush administration.  When I saw that young naked and crying girl running down the village road in Vietnam, after it was napalm bombed, well that was something I had to write about.  I witness the police brutality of cops beating a man on the street, that’s another poem in waiting.  I write what I feel, but also what I see.  I leave the leaves and trees to poets like Li Po.   So you can say social injustice and tragedies move me to write, but then so does a sweating Black musician blowing his horn in a jazz club, or the women I have loved in my life.  It’s all writing material.  It’s why I never took a writing workshop.  They don’t teach subject matter like this in the classroom. 
 
 I’m not sure when I discovered the potential influence of the written word, or when I first realized its revolutionary power.  Politically speaking, I was inspired by Folk musicians like Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger, and later on by Bob Dylan.  But I don’t confine myself to any one writing style.  My short chapbook, 13 Jazz Poems is lyrical in nature, and my book Crazy John Poems is written in a narrative style, laced with humor.  I like to keep experimenting with language.  I don’t want to be labeled under any one particular category.
 
At a recent reading during an invitation to participate at a literary festival in Oaxaca, Mexico, one of the students raised his hand and said he didn’t understand poetry.  That’s one of the problems I have with poetry. Too many poets write for other poets.  They don’t write in a language the common man and woman understands.  They don’t write about what goes on in the daily lives of the average American. The Language Poets search for the perfect line, but there is no gut feeling in those lines. 
  
You can arrange lines in a near perfect order, and play around with metaphors and similes, but what does it mean to the average person in the street?  That’s not the kind of poetry I write.   I’m not interested in the clever use of words that lie lifeless on the page.  I do not write to impress other poets or the Academic world.
  
7- What are your favorite topics, your main literary interests?
 
 My main topic is the human condition.  I address this by the laying down of words on paper as I see, feel, and live them.  So the human condition is my main interest.  I’m pretty much a recluse when it comes to the San Francisco Literary Scene.  I don’t go to coffee houses, or carry a notebook to write down my every thought. I don’t go to weekly meetings at Spec’s Bar in North Beach, where a small group of poets meet and talk the night away.  I’d rather have a beer at Gino and Carlo’s bar and talk life with a secretary or a longshoreman. 
 
 My main interest today is exploring how to take my poems and arrange them side-by-side with photographs I have taken over the course of my life, since I am also an amateur photographer.  I’m interested in art films and art galleries.   I am interested in people and politics.
 
 8- How would you describe your own path, your personal poetry?
 
I have walked many paths in my life. I have tried to walk the walk, as well as talk the talk.  I’ve been a poet, a writer, a supporter of the arts, as well as having worked in Education, at the Office of Civil Rights, investigating discrimination against minorities, women, and the disabled.   I’ll soon be 73, and I’m still learning and nowhere near to seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.
 
As for my personal poetry, even though I like to consider myself a “People’s Poet,” I refuse to be pigeonholed. I have experimented in other forms and styles from lyrical to haiku and humor.  In baseball terms, I see myself as a fastball and curve ball pitcher, who sometimes crosses the batter up with a knuckle ball or a change-up.  I like to keep them guessing.
 
9- What is the present situation of American authors vis-à-vis Latin America and the rest of the world?
 
I am not sure how to respond to this question.  I think American writers and Latin American writers have much in common, as both share a common ground in responding to the important issues of their country and the world at large.  American writers, Latin American writers, and writers across the globe have diverse literary voices reflecting the unique characteristics of their land, people and culture.  There is much we can learn from each other.
 
As for my own familiarity with Latin American Poets and Writers, I am limited by the fact I am not bilingual.  Like most American poets, I discovered Lorca, early on.  There is no doubt he is one of the truly great Spanish writers of the 20th Century.  In his short life, he produced a great body of work.  His tragic death at the hands of Franco’s fascist henchmen is also what drew my attention to him. 
 
Octavio Paz left behind a beautiful web of words of things seen and unseen.  He was a true master of mixing in elements of surrealism with the grit and bone of natural objects. I recall his saying, “Wouldn’t it be better to turn life into poetry rather than to make poetry from life?” 
 
I discovered Jorge Luis Borges rather late in life, which I regret, because I understand he is considered to be the foremost contemporary Latin American writer, and only now am I acquainting myself with Carlos Fuentes, a marvelous writer, dealing with the themes of Mexican identify and history.
 
And who cannot identify with Cesar Vallejo, if for no other reason than his identifying himself with the sufferings of the underprivileged.
 
Here at home, while working with the San Francisco Arts Commission (1975-80), I became familiar with Isabel Allende, who was at the time was living in California.  During this time I also became friends with Victor Cruz and Alenjdro Murguia, two fine bilingual poets and writers.
 
As I said earlier, I think American and Latino writers share a common ground in that they both write about important issues of their respective counties, and both reflect diverse literary voices of the unique characteristics of their land, people, and culture.   We both have the opportunity to enrich our lives through the eyes and words of the other.
 
10- Finally, your country faces a very severe economic crisis. What can a poet say when his country stands at such a difficult juncture? 
 
This is not an easy question to answer.  It’s up to each individual poet and writer to determine his response to these difficult times we find ourselves in.  In my opinion a poet must say what needs to be said, without any thought or consideration as to the consequences. 
 
We have war criminals in the Bush Administration who condoned and set policy allowing the torture of prisoners.  Our Constitution has been whittled away, little by little, and the average person on the street doesn’t seem overly concerned.  The Bush Administration used FEAR as its weapon and the people were all too willing to give away ordinary freedoms for the promise of a false security.
 
 Poets need to speak out against these and other abuses of power.  They need to join workers on the front lines; those brave enough to take their beliefs to the streets; protesting against the injustices perpetuated against the working class.  Poets need to do more than just write a poem and read it to an audience and take satisfaction in the applause.  They need to become active participants in the community they live in.
  
There is no easy solution to the economic crisis we find ourselves in. The banks and Wall Street are largely responsible for putting us in the position we find ourselves in, with their greed for the almighty buck.  The poet and average citizen does not have a real opportunity to put an end to this greed other than to hold the politicians accountable and vote them out of office. 
  
If the U.S. sinks into a depression like the one we experienced in the thirties, it may actually be good for the country.  We have become a commodity-obsessed nation.  We live beyond our means.  We put everything on credit.  We pass a homeless person on the street, and we don’t look him in the eye, let alone drop a coin in his cup.  The Government isn’t the answer; it is only a player in the game.  We need to examine our very heart and soul. 
 

 

vernissage exposition daniel lehman, galerie didier devillez


samedi 21 septembre 2013

Carolyn Cassady, 90 years old, passed away yesterday September 20th

http://brianhassett.com/

Carolyn Cassady tribute 1923 – 2013


September 20th, 2013 · Kerouac and The Beats, Real-life Adventure Tales


Another giant has fallen — another angel taken flight.

Carolyn Cassady has just left us to join Neal and Jack on that great road trip in the sky.
Her son John, the light of her life, was there by her side till the end.

After a year’s refusal of entry into the U.K., just 3 months ago he was able to return to England to be with her.

She was her regular rockin self up through Sunday, woke up with a tummy ache Monday morning, had an infected appendix, and checked out by Friday.

I hope I’m so lucky.  She was 90 years old and still drank her white wine and smoked her More menthol ciggies every day.

That is to say — she was living the life she chose, on her own terms, in her own house, until the very end.

Besides Neal, it’s my considered opinion she was also the love of Jack Kerouac’s life — and in life they pledged to be together in the next one.

So there’s that.



Carolyn was spiritual, an intuitive channel, naturally smart, well educated, well read, independent, strong, creative, curious as all get-out, had an ethical sense of right and wrong, and was a helluva gifted portrait painter.  She grew up in a library of a house, with a biochemist father and English teacher mother, and intellectual discourse and reading were the orders of the day.

She got her BA as one of the first students at the revolutionary Bennington College in Vermont, then earned her MA in Theater and Fine Arts at the University of Denver, where she was living when she met Neal.

As I’ve mentioned before, Carolyn was the first of the (still unnamed generation of) Beats to move to San Francisco, and she was the reason Neal went there, which is why Jack went there, and so tumbled the dominoes of history.

I used to phone her at her cottage home in the forest around Windsor Castle every few months just to chat, and a little over a year ago she told me she didn’t expect to be here next year.

Since none of her three kids could get over there at that point, and I was sort of freed up for the first time with my mom just passing, I went and lived with her for 3 months, and boy did we have a good time!

When we first started hanging out in the early ’90s, we were having so much fun, it made me realize I could be doing this with my own mom, who was about the same age.  And for the next 15 years my mom and I took our adventure even further and were even better friends than we had been before — and it was thanks to Carolyn opening those doors wide so I could see how much possibility there was.

Carolyn was born a week after my mom in April, and died a week after her in September. I always wanted to get the two of them together but could never pull it off. Talk about fabulous roman candles exploding across the stars — those two together woulda lit up the night sky till dawn!

And she wasn’t just a surrogate mother to me, but was the den mother to the entire Beat Generation, the only one in that whole crazy krewe who maintained a home with kids and a garden — and a Kerouac bivouac under the backyard tree. And she remained a mother figure until the end to hundreds of fans who would email her, and she’d write every one back, always offering her advice and years of wisdom to any problem anyone else had.
She maintained a routine for at least the last decade of her life, where she would do emails in the morning, read from a stack of books beside her bed all afternoon, and at 5:00 it was okay to have a glass of wine and watch the local and then Beeb national news, then quiz shows or nature documentaries in the evenings.

She had shelves full of Beat movies that I went through and had us systematically watch every damn one, and we would hit pause and I could ask her any question and we’d go off on tangents and get another glass of wine and maybe watch another five minutes then something else would come up and it would take us about ten hours to get through one movie!

And she’d always say to whoever was talking in a documentary, “That isn’t how it was!” and be correcting the history as it’s being presented. And the best time was when she was yelling at the screen, “That’s completely wrong! You don’t know what you’re talking about!” and it was her being interviewed!   :-)

She is survived by her beloved son John Allen Cassady — named for Kerouac, Ginsberg and Neal — but she called him Johnny. As well as by her daughter Jami “Jack liked me best” Cassady-Ratto, and her first-born Cathy Sylvia, as well as her grandchildren Jamie, Becky and Bill, and her great-grandchildren Jon, Ellie, David, Bradley, Elizabeth and . . . Cody. ;-)

Carolyn rocked, but she also held down the Beat so others could solo.

Carolyn Cassady      1923 – 2013       R.I.P.

 
Brian Hassett


vendredi 20 septembre 2013

Galerie Ecritures: Signature

RAPPEL 

Après la première exposition des planches des tomes 1 et 2, exposition de planches originales du troisième et dernier tome de la série Braise de Bouton et Fortier

 

Exposition du 20 septembre au 13 novembre 2013

Vernissage et signature le 21 septembre à partir de 10 h

 à la Galerie ECRITURES 

  1, rue Pierre Petit  03100  MONTLUCON

 

Avec le concours de la Librairie

Le Talon d'Achille, 8 Place Notre Dame

Souvenons-nous... Prune et son grand frère Janus avaient été enlevés par Braise, chat facétieux et retors, pour être livrés en pâture à l'appétit féroce d'une reine sans pitié. Perdus dans un parc d'attraction qui, la nuit, prend des airs de cauchemar, les enfants parviendront-ils à échapper aux créatures étranges qui les pourchassent ? Et si la solution à leurs problèmes se trouvait dissimulée dans le passé de celle qui a juré leur perte ?


Avec ce conte en trois parties qui connaît ici son épilogue, Bouton et Fortier ont opté pour une originalité parfois outrancière. Le soin apporté par les auteurs à la réalisation est à souligner. Textes savoureux et couleurs audacieuses accompagnent un trait qui ne ressemble à aucun autre pour pimenter un récit aux multiples rebondissements... mais sans que la cohérence de l'ensemble ne soit remise en cause. Le final à la morale subtile ponctue par un retour au calme une intrigue dont l'issue sera longtemps restée incertaine.


Entre rires et larmes, espoirs et désillusions, Braise rassemble dans un joyeux désordre personnages attachants et destins hors du commun. Avec un petit air de jamais vu qui fait du bien !

 

AD Winans: I am San Francisco


 

 New this Year by A D Winans, "San Francisco Poems" See on Amazon
 

I Am San Francisco

I have witnessed the waterfront decay
the ships disappear
the piers given over to tourists
and sunbathing sea lions


Gone the Haight Theater
in the old Haight Ashbury
where as a kid I paid a dime to see
two movies a serial and a newsreel

Gone the old Embassy Theater
on Market Street where

they spun the Wheel of Fortune
playing Ten-O-Win
with a busty female usherette  shouting

“In the Balcony, 1-2-3-4 Silver Dollars”
her breasts bouncing in unison
with each coin  that hit the tray

the old Fox and Paramount Theaters
now ghostly memories
the old Market Street porno house
boarded down

Mc Farland’s Fudge Shop
and Merrill’s Drug Store gone


Gone the old Hoffbrau house

on Market Street
Breen’s on Third Street
with the worlds best Martini

Gone I Magnum’s Department Store
and the old City of Paris
where as a child I thrilled
at the sight of the giant Christmas tree
and who can forget The Emporium
its indoor ice-skating rink

and a Santa Claus workshop
the roof top garden where
rides included a Ferris wheel
a small roller coaster
and a train for children to ride


Gone the North Beach Beat hangouts:
“The Place The Co-existence Bagel Shop
and the old Coffee Gallery where
Janice Joplin sang as an unknown

gone the old Barbary Coast where
as a teenager I tried to sneak into a bar

to catch a glimpse of a  naked female dancer
long before Carol Doda

and topless and bottomless bars

Lenny Bruce and the old Purple Onion
fading memories like
Play Land at the beach
and the old burlesque house
in the Mission
gone the way of trolley car tokens
Fleer’s Double Bubble Gum
and the Sutro baths

Third and Howard Street
the old skid row given a face lift
the new skid row between
Sixth and Seventh Streets

home to drug dealers and alcoholics
an open festering wound
the city fathers ignore


Martini’s now an old people’s drink
Whiskey Sours just a memory
the Waterfront dives that served
Seamen and Long Shore men replaced

by new movie complexes and parking lots

The Mission once home of the Irish
has gone Latino
North Beach is moving
from Italian to Asian


The Greeks long ago moved to Burlingame
and no one knows what happened
to the American Indian
and the bar they frequented
on Valencia  Street
and yet the city remains a magical
living breathing theater
of eccentric characters
that go back to Emperor Norton


You can still get a reasonably priced drink
at the 3300 Club in the Mission
or if you can afford it
go to the Top of the Mark
for a $13 hot chocolate drink with
a shot of Stolly Vodka and Southern Comfort
and enjoy one of the most beautiful views

in the world
or on a hot summer afternoon enjoy
an ice cream at Mitchell’s on San Jose Avenue

where my father took the family
for an after dinner treat


You can still sun yourself
at Washington Square Park
watch young lovers lying on the grass
old men feeding pigeons

or walk the streets of Noe Valley
once a blue-collar neighborhood
now a Yuppie paradise
see young mothers with kids in stroller’s
eye women joggers
admire a dog sitting outside
Martha’s Coffee Shop
faithfully waiting with pleading eyes

for table scraps from its owner
I'm a Giants baseball fan
and a lifetime 49ers football addict
my heart still bleeds over the loss
of Seal’s Stadium and the old time
San Francisco Seals

I am the possessor
of framed achievement awards
and a baseball trophy from Panama where

I played a decent outfield

I am the only word-slinger
in a working class family
I am a ghost lost
in poetry books struggling to find
the right words to a hit song
like my idol Hank Williams

I am at war with my shadow
who shamelessly stalks me
I survived my apartment fire
to reestablish family ties
long buried in quicksand


my niece my nephew my grand nephews
and grad niece share my blood
a mixture of white and Mexican roots

my father’s ghost walks my dreams
stares out the window of my soul
like he stared out  the living room window
the year before his death.
my mother sitting at the dinner table
serving meat loaf and mashed potatoes
the air heavy as an anchor dragging
the ocean floor

I am San Francisco.

mardi 10 septembre 2013

Mino DC: nocturne samedi 14 septembre à la déchethèque du grand moiré!

samedi 14 septembre pour les journées du patrimoine

 à la déchethèque de Mino D.C

 


à partir de 21h

habillage sonore DJ Bosstoo


sur des éclairages magicfluos de Mino D.C


à 22h

projection en extérieur de"mino's décheteck" de Jérôme Marichy,

et de "mino est génial" de Sylvain Bossard,

...

pensez à réserver au 05 49 69 74 84

et amenez votre lampe de poche et une petite laine pour la soirée!

 

vendredi 6 septembre 2013

José Altimiras: LE TAXIDERMISTE

http://www.interzoneeditions.net/letaxidermiste.htm

LE TAXIDERMISTE – Vendredi 23 Août 2013
Un piètre dessinateur de province
© José Altimiras
José Altimiras et Isabelle Aubert-Baudron, Airvault, juillet 2012
 
J’ai rencontré François Darnaudet, le co-auteur avec Daurel du TAXIDERMISTE, au cours d’une manifestation pacifiste contre la guerre quelque part dans le monde, puisque rares aujourd’hui sont les nations qui évoluent sans que trop de bombes n’explosent.
   
            Je suis venu grossir le flot des doux dingues de la province française ; je suis enclin à penser que les capitales soucieuses de promouvoir leur prestige aristo-culturel et la civilisation avec un grand « C » comme à Capitale, ville de tête, ne supportent guère les individus colportant une douce démence, qui plus est, dans une B.D. dont un des moteurs du scénario est la conservation permanente de jeunes femmes se ressemblant ceci pour qu’elles connaissent une jeunesse éternelle et qu’elles entretiennent le souvenir d’une première femme dont l’apparence corporelle a disparu. Le procédé technique pour ce faire mis en avant par Darnaudet-Daurel est la taxidermie. Une idée de doux dingue de province. Je ne connais pas Daurel.
 
            Darnaudet, le prof de maths (il y en a un dans l’histoire), que je n’ai pas vu depuis la dernière pluie, est toujours un doux dingue de province et deviendra le papi du polar noir de province comme je deviendrai le piètre papi de la B.D. de province ; je me fais un plaisir à répéter le « p » pour qu’on ne prenne pas ma plume pour du pipo.

            Dans le TAXIDERMISTE, il est question de volatiles, la visite du musée des sciences naturelles de Perpignan la nuit, à l’insu du gardien est à but pédagogique : comment conserver les animaux à plumes et à poils. Et à but scénaristique : commettre un vol, en l’occurrence une statue post-primitive, pour justifier des personnages qui justifieront une fin de récit en commettant un vraisemblable acte criminel.

            Cela se termine souvent par un crime, c’est la loi du genre. N’oublions pas que nous sommes dans le cadre d’un genre. Un polar, c’est un genre, la B.D. aussi. J’ai aussi accentué le trait, pour donner le caractère des provinces méridionales. Dans le TAXIDERMISTE, nous sommes dans le genre méridional, toujours à la recherche de l’ombre, car nous sommes écrasés par le soleil. Les bons moments sont ceux où l’on sirote un verre à la terrasse d’un café sous les platanes et qu’un vent léger vient rafraîchir votre front. Parfois, on se fait la conversation et la nuit s’égrène à pas feutrés. Suivez le chat.

            Suivez le chat, qui quoique maltraité, retombe sur ses pattes et trouve une place pour se reposer. Les chats, comme bon nombre d’animaux, ne dorment que d’un œil, car ici en Catalogne, il fait trop chaud pour dormir des deux.

            Combien d’indices ai-je inclus pour que le lecteur colle les pieds au goudron et que, si comme moi, il ne comprend pas grand-chose à l’histoire qui se déroule devant ses yeux, il sache au moins que c’est au Sud de l’Europe que ça se passe, dans le cas présent à Perpinya. De l’ultra local à l’universel : une idée qui me meut.

            Pourrait-elle mouvoir ou émouvoir d’autres personnes ?

            Il se peut qu’Isabelle Aubert-Baudron fût sensible aux ombres lourdes et aux personnages engourdis par eux-mêmes et par la chaleur. Elle, quelque part dans la campagne française entre l’Océan Atlantique et le Nord Ouest de la Loire, à Thouars exactement, une grande bourgade au passé ancien, maisons et immeubles à colombages, chapelles et cathédrale romanes, marché couvert et en plein air sur la place publique, profusion de légumes charcutailles et fruits de l’océan ; un pays agricole et maritime, les paysans vont à la chasse tuer le volatile, les fermes sont « grandes », il faut donner un toit au troupeau. Probablement peu de doux dingues dans ces régions où il faut beaucoup travailler pour vivre : « mon p’tit gars ». Probablement qu’Isabelle est un peu dingue, rare exception, et qu’avec ses petits moyens elle décida, un jour où il fallait mettre un peu plus d’eau dans son moulin, preuve qu’elle n’est pas trop dingue, d’éditer une histoire de dingues : le TAXIDERMISTE que vous avez entre les doigts.

            Comme le polar, et au même titre, la première version fut en français, avec la coopération du réseau « Interzone », Ken Gage et Isabelle, une deuxième version vit le jour en anglais.

            Une version en hollandais verra le jour prochainement avec une fois de plus la coopération fidèle de Peter Van de Leur, plus familiarisé avec l’anglais que le français, avec lequel il se débrouille pas mal pourtant. Par conséquent, avis aux amateurs !

            Quelques mots complémentaires avant de mettre un point sur ce petit chapitre. Peut-être aurais-je la plume moins souple si d’aventure quelques dingues de Loudun, petite bourgade non loin de Thouars, n’avaient mis en place un festival du livre baptisé « En ces lieux des livres ». Lequel m’incita à traîner en ces lieux mes pinceaux, à lever ma tête pour contempler les arbres, les toits des maisons la nuit et rencontrer Isabelle que je ne connaissais que par téléphone, lettres et souvenirs interposés.

            Festival qui finalement aux premiers jours de sa vie produit quelque pitance au piètre dessinateur de province que je suis. 
   
            Point trop n’en faut pour entretenir la flamme et peut-être même la flemme, cette fameuse flemme méridionale, mère de tous les arts. Nous avons été habitués par trop à travailler, comme les canuts qui allaient culs-nus. 
   
            ALTIMIRAS
En français:
 

José ALTIMIRAS & François DARNAUDET:
"Le Taxidermiste"
ISBN : 978-2-9531513-1-2
Format: 21x 29,7 cm
46 pages
Prix: 22 €

En anglais:

José ALTIMIRAS & François DARNAUDET:
"The Taxidermist"
Traduit du français par Isabelle AUBERT-BAUDRON & Ken GAGE
ISBN : 978-2-9531513-2-9
Format: 21x 29,7 cm
46 pages - Prix: 22 €
 
Commandes à http://www.interzoneeditions.net/letaxidermiste.htm 
interzone.editions@interpc.fr

 

galerie didier devillez, focus septembre 2013


Quelques nouvelles de l'éclat

Bonjour

 

 

Les deux "nouveautés" de septembre sont en librairie à partir de jeudi. Occasion de retrouver Paolo Virno, après Opportunisme, cynisme et peur (1991) ou Grammaire de la multitude (2002). Et ainsi de suite. La régression à l'infini et comment l'interrompre, s'attache à un "détail" (la "régression à l'infini") qui en dit long sur notre difficulté à faire face au monde tel qu'il est. Et dès lors, comment l'interrompre? Comme toujours chez Virno, on part d'un point et… on va le plus loin possible dans l'analyse.

Puis la première traduction en français d'un livre de Rita di Leo, "L'expérience profane. Du capitalisme au socialisme et vice-versa", sur l'expérience soviétique qu'il est grand temps d'analyser pour la comprendre et non plus pour la combattre ou pour la glorifier. Le livre donne une analyse implacable de la "guerre de soixante-quatorze ans" (1917-1991) qui a marqué le XXe siècle. Il est préfacé par Mario Tronti, avec qui Rita di Leo a fondé, dans les années 1960, la revue Classe operaia en Italie (voir Nous opéraïstes, de Tronti, paru au début de l'année).

Paraît également en version numérique "expérimentale" seulement et en bilingue anglais-français un Abecedarium "destiné aux architectes, aux designers et aux créateurs en général", établi par Céline Poisson, professeur à l'école de Design de l'Uqam (Montréal) à partir des dix mille définitions de concepts de Charles S. Pierce pour le Century Dictionary. Un outil ludique et indispensable (comme tout ce qui est ludique).
 
Quelques réimpressions, également, attendues depuis un petit moment: Alfred Korzybski, Giordano Bruno, Yona Friedman, Pic de la Mirandole
 
Vous trouverez tous les détails sur ces parutions sur la page http://www.lyber-eclat.net/nouveautes.html

Sur cette même page vous trouverez aussi le rappel des titres du premier semestre, encore disponibles dans les "meilleures librairies"…Bonne rentrée à vous tous

Merci de votre fidélitéMichel Valensi
Editions de l'éclat

La Nouvelle République: Jérôme Pintoux et " son vieux pote Dylan "

 
 

mercredi 4 septembre 2013

Jérome Pintoux: 7 à Poitiers : Il revisite Dylan

http://www.7apoitiers.fr/uploads/archives/af9f746e2b9705341a51ceffc6befcb5fabf7c5f.pdf

Anthony Rousseau: Journées Européennes du Patrimoine 2013 - Danse macabre à l'Hospice Comtesse - Lille

 

Découvrez au Musée de l'Hospice Comtesse, l'œuvre "Danse macabre" d'Anthony Rousseau (samedi 14 et dimanche 15 septembre de 10h à 18h) dans le cadre des journées Européennes du Patrimoine 2013…

Rencontre avec l'artiste le dimanche 15 septembre de 10h00 à 18h00.

"Danse macabre" est une installation audiovisuelle dont le thème est la danse macabre ou danse de la Mort. Ce choix a été guidé par différents facteurs : la volonté de réactualiser une forme ancienne de représentation symbolique de la Mort dans notre société et le souhait d'interroger les rapports entretenus entre le spectateur et ce thème.

Cette installation se présente sous la forme d'une table avec un plateau tournant sur lequel est posé un dodécagone composé de miroirs. Le spectateur tourne ce plateau pour activer diverses séquences audiovisuelles. Ce "mobilier" inspiré des jeux forains, met en place un système de monstration ludique, qui associe les techniques liées au proxinoscope considéré comme l'un des ancêtres du cinéma (pré-cinéma) et des technologies plus récentes liées à l'électronique et au numérique.

Création musicale et développement informatique  : Adrien Fontaine

Danse : Sarah Duthille et Anne Deroo

Ce projet est soutenu par la région Nord-Pas-de-Calais, Pictanovo, "Lille, ville d'Arts du Futur", la Ville de Tourcoing, l'association COMBO et le Fresnoy, studio national des arts contemporains.

LIZIERES : "Ceci et Cela" un film de Michel Pellaton en résidence à LIZIERES

"Ceci et Cela" 



film d’artiste réalisé par Michel Pellaton, 

dans le cadre de sa résidence à LIZIERES soutenue par la DRAC de Picardie, 5 au 23 août 2013

  

cliquez sur le lien pour voir la vidéo:  http://vimeo.com/73302614


~ La démarche artistique de Michel Pellaton ~

“J’écris sur le monde avec des images.

L’iconographie est au centre de ma démarche. A voir mes collages, tout est un choix réfléchi. La forme du jeu combinatoire des multiples parties rapportées rencontre la recherche de possibilités d’un monde qui n’est pas résigné. Pour se faire, la forme est considérée comme un moyen; c’est le contenu qui est privilégié. Je considère le collage comme une méthode permettant de saisir le monde dans le temps; les contenus proviennent autant d’images ou d’objets d’hier que d’aujourd’hui, d’ici que d’ailleurs. Ces choix opèrent ainsi une performativité qui permet, aux spectateurs, acteurs,  collectionneurs et moi-même, d’aller et de venir, d’entrer par un signe ici ou par une matière là, pour partager nos propres moyens avec ceux proposés dans l’œuvre.

Les collages sont souvent de petite taille pour mettre en évidence notre rapport de l’égo avec l’infini. Ce sont en quelque sorte des « cartes d’identités » fragmentaires, qui tentent de composer et synthétiser du sens dans le mouvement. Je désire qu’ils soient vivants, ludiques et encore plus. Colorés et esthétiques, ils sont faits de matériaux parfois pauvres mais mis en évidence avec précaution. ”


~ La résidence à LIZIERES : réalisation du projet « Ceci et Cela » ~

 
Michel Pellaton décide de profiter de sa résidence à LIZIERES, et des ressources logistiques, techniques et humaines mises à sa disposition, pour développer un projet vidéo, une première dans son parcours artistique.

Le point de départ de la vidéo est celui de la série des origamis monétaires, billets de banque pliés formant des micro-architectures replacées dans des situations urbaines contemporaines.

Michel Pellaton construit, à partir de ces billets de banque, « objets légers et imposants », des grattes-ciels en 3 dimensions, à l’image des constructions d’enfants faites de cubes. Il les place au centre d’un jardin zen, conçu à partir de sable de silice blanc ramené d’une carrière de l’Aisne. Ces tours sont détruites à la fin de la vidéo par une tempête de sable.

« J’ai pensé à une tempête de billets de banque en référence à un de mes derniers origamis : Grains de sable, qui reprenait  une formidable tempête de sable envahissant Doha en 2009. Catastrophe naturelle ou remise en cause de la valeur de l’argent ? »

Des images de Kaboul sont projetées en début et fin de la vidéo en arrière plan, en confrontation avec le calme du jardin zen.


 


Remerciements : Ramuntcho Matta, Pierre Lanneluc, Simona Lanzoni, Véronique Tessier, Valéry Faidherbe, Donald Abad, Dominique Brisson.

 
~ Biographie ~

Né en 1965 à Lausanne, Michel Pellaton a étudié à l’Ecole Régionale des Beaux-Arts de Besançon et à L’Ecole Supérieure des Beaux-Arts de Nîmes. Il vit actuellement à Rome. Ses œuvres sont exposées principalement en France, en Italie et en Suisse. 

Lors de séjours en Afrique de l’Ouest (Maroc, Mauritanie, Mali), en Asie (Inde, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Népal, Ouzbékistan) et dans les Caraïbes, il glane des objets usuels et des images qu’il incorpore dans ses collages, sa pratique de prédilection depuis plus de vingt ans.

De plus, il réalise des dessins pour des fondations humanitaires et organisations non gouvernementales.

Depuis 2000, il travaille sur l’iconographie des billets de banque, et collabore avec l’Université de Lausanne et la Banque Nationale Suisse.  


Pour LIZIERES

Pedro Serra, président de l'association des amis de LIZIERES 

Ramuntcho Matta, directeur du Centre de cultures et de ressources LIZIERES 


Les amis de LIZIERES 

association à but non lucratif créée le 18 septembre 2009 pour permettre au projet LIZIERES de voir le jour. 

11, allée du comte de Lostanges - 02400 EPAUX-BEZU / +33 (0)9 51 07 13 74 

pour plus de renseignements : www.lizieres.org / amis@lizieres.org