West Chester
 

I'll be leaving early on Tuesday, June 7, for the West Chester Poetry Conference, and will be back in Canada on Sunday afternoon, June 12. Hope all goes well here on TDE during my absence.

Have a marvellous time, Cathy! Can we have a full report, with photos—please!!??

Cally

Cally,

Thanks for the warm wishes. Actually, I'll be carrying neither my computer nor my camera. Unfortunately, I have developed a horrendous case of tendonitis in my right hand and arm (I saw the doctor today, finally, after 10 days with no relief). Even a purse and a carry-on bag will be a challenge. However, I'm sure others will be taking lots of pictures, at least I hope so!

Have a grand time, Cathy and everyone. See you next year.

Found a computer in Sykes Hall and a nice young man logged me in.

What a great start to the conference last evening! Couldn't believe it only took me one hour to get from Montreal to Philadelphia. I met Julie Kane and Susan McLean at the airport. Also lots of other new poet friends.

We took the shuttle to West Chester and arrived just in time to drop our bags in our dorm rooms and walk down to the Faunbrook B&B for the welcoming reception.

What a lovely venue! What great wine and food! Most of all, what wonderful poets everywhere! Met Kim Bridgford, David Landrum and Alicia Stallings, and many others. Was glad to see so many very young poets here :); had a lovely conversation with Rhina.

Registration will begin here soon, so I'll log off. Am a bit nervous about my reading this afternoon, but the atmosphere is so warm and friendly, I guess I really needn't be worried.

Other events on today's schedule "Poetry as the Global Art" with Rhina as Chair and Bill Coyle and Micheal O'Siadhail on the panel. Then there's "The Formal Poetry Press: Niche or Ghetto" panel with Anna Evans chairing and Deborah Ager, Gerry Cambridge, Allison Joseph and David Yezzi on the panel.

Then the First Books panel with Len Krisak chairing, and readings by Andrew Sofer, Brett Foster, Michael Cantor reading from M A Griffiths' work, and myself. Then this evening the keynote reading by Robert Pinsky.

Cheers,
Cathy

Oh, wow. What a great day, Cathy! It's wonderful to get news flashes from you in this way! I can't believe you're nervous about reading your work - are you kidding??!! Your poems will take the room by the ears of its mind! (I read your book over the last few days - dazzling range!).

Have a great day - hope your hands are holding out, and give Michael Cantor a kiss from me, and if you get a chance, give us a brief insight into Pinsky's speech.

Cally

We want photographic proof!

Almost like being there in the midst of the formalist fest Thanks Cathy for the report. Here's wishing you a great audience for your poems and lots of purchasers.

Day 1 (yesterday) was fantastic. I learned so much from the Hip-Hop panel. Wasn't really planning to attend, but was so glad I did. Attended Rhina's panel on poetry as a global art and it inspired me to return to translation, which I've practically abandoned this past year. Then a wonderful panel on the small presses, and heard insights on publishing, editing, submissions, etc. from Anna Evans, Gerry Cambridge, David Yezzi and others. Lots of questions and a discussion on print vs digital publication. The First Books panel went well. Michael Cantor read several of Maz's poems, and also had two recordings of Ann Drysdale reading two of Maz's poems as well. I got through OK but as I was reciting from memory, I accidentally forgot one stanza of my villanelle, but nobody except me (I think) noticed. There was some extra time so Len Krisak asked us all to read another poem, so I recited my winning Nemerov sonnet, "Coming to Terms".

I finally got to meet our wonderful Alex Pepple!!! He arrived earlier than he was supposed to in order to attend the First Books panel.

I met some Sphereans: Greg Dowling, Bill Carpenter, Lisa Barnett, Jennifer Reeser, R.S. (Sam) Gwynn. Jennifer introduced me to Timothy Steele. The banquet was wonderful. I was wondering why they had given me a reserved seat at table 3 with former director, Michael Peich, but soon found out -- it was because I had received the Keane Spencer scholarship and Kim Bridgford asked me to stand up and take a bow! I was also seated next to a young poet who had won the first annual Spencer prize, Richie Hofmann, who has a poem in the latest New Criterion.

Then, the Pinsky reading. The auditorium was packed. He spoke brilliantly and often with great humor, about the physicality of poetry, giving examples from his own and others' work. He spoke about the Favorite Poems project, and ended with a reading of many of his poems, including the wonderful "The Shirt".

A reception for Mr. Pinsky followed, downtown, but my hand was in agony by that time, so I didn't attend. Perhaps Michael did, or others, and they can report on that.

Today I begin my master class with Alicia Stallings. Only ten in the class. Also, a panel in ten minutes from now, "Poets' Landscapes and Sense of Place, a Robert Pinsky town hall meeting with Dana Gioia interviewing, a panel on artistic collaboration, an art exhibit and faculty readings this evening featuring Kim Addonizio, Dick Davis, Alison Joseph, David Mason, Molly Peacock and Timothy Steele.

I'm in heaven.

Cheers,
Cathy

Yep, that sounds like heaven, all right.

Big, Huge, Giant Congrats on receiving the Keane Spencer scholarship. I'm so happy for you!

Let's see if I can link to a bit more West Chester news this morning:

West Chester University Poetry Conference broadens its scope

Many thanks, Maryann.

The computer lab upstairs at Sykes is great for live blogging. Cathy, have they air conditioned the dorms? We melted there fifteen years ago and stayed at the Holiday Inn forever after.

Press Release


Today at the West Chester Poetry Conference

2011 FIRST BOOK SALON DES REFUSÉS!

http://blogs.princeton.edu/wri152-3/...erbe-thumb.jpg

Titles and authors on this year’s panel include

Le Dejeuner sur l’Aigrir des Raisin by Edward Cash

Lyric in White, No. 1 by James “Toots” McNeill

and

Here Comes the Sun by Claude Moon

This year's moderator: Emily Sola

In the grassy lot across the street at 3:00 pm, Thursday, June 9.
(BYOB)
__

Buried lede: Refusés congratulate all on site!

Yes, Tim, I'm using the Sykes computers. Actually, the dorms are relatively new buildings. I'm in an air-conditioned suite on the 7th floor with my own room and bath with a common sitting room with one other student. Very nice and cool, because outside it's hot and humid. On my way now to my master class with Alicia Stallings. Will report back tomorrow.

Cheers,
Cathy

Cathy,

Thanks so much for such a thorough report.

Excellent send-up, Rick! You're not the first to be gratuitously snubbed. For what it's worth, I went to bat for you, and as far as I'm concerned, they blew it by not including Huncke. And they can't plead ignorance. Not this time.

It isn't as if, this time around, I'd say that any of the books included didn't deserve inclusion. It's more that the conference, to capture what it is supposed to capture, needs to open the hell up. Badly. I cannot think of a volume of the scope and ambition of Huncke that has come across the First Books Panel since I've been paying attention. While I applaud Bridgford's efforts to "diversify" with regard to style and demographics, surely some of the process has to be not blowing off rising writers doing excellent work who come from outside rather narrow constituencies. I tried to tell Bridgford about Huncke, to no avail. If she misses another one this big, it'll be Very Bad.

Good to hear the goings-on, Cathy. I’m looking forward to reading more. Thanks for sharing it all.

Quincy and Rick, would you explain, to someone who doesn’t get the joke, what the scoop is with Rick’s book and West Chester. I think I get Rick’s allusion to the Paris Salon and the snubbing of artists there. And I do know that Huncke is distinguished work and easily deserves to be on a first books panel at such a place at West Chester. Are you saying that it was left out because of insider politics? Really, I’m asking this naively, as one who never gets how this stuff works. I want to understand it better. Thanks.

That's what I'm saying, at least, Andrew. Rick was not on the initial invite list (though I know Seven Towers informed the WCU Poetry Center of the book's existence). I made an appeal to a list of WC faculty and panel and seminar leaders, as well as to Kim Bridgford herself, arguing for the inclusion of Huncke. (Sure, I was excluded when Across the Grid of Streets came out, but look, someone had to make the appeal.) In fairness, the bulk of those I contacted responded graciously... and said (I assume accurately) that they had no role in the First Books Panel selection could do nothing. But Bridgford never so much as acknowledged receipt, and Rick was not invited. Some of us apparently don't merit a response (though my immediate boss at the Raintown is running the Women's Timeline and a panel, though I co-curate the regular reading series that gave Kim Bridgford a paying New York reading last fall, etc.).

It was hurtful when it was my turn, but it's hard to be objective about one's own work. In Rick's case, it is a genuinely exceptional book, and that lot just can't be bothered. And I'm saying this as nicely as I can.

Thanks, Quincy. Getting snubbed sucks, no doubt about it. And there is always plenty of it to go around. I've found that the rub of it is often the fact that there is no way of really knowing what in the world is going on behind the scenes. When someone doesn't respond, in other words, sometimes it's a snub sometimes it's not, and the person left hanging has no way to find out which it is. In po-biz it's especially tough because what we do gets so little acknowledgment anyway, even though it is really and truly hard work. So I sympathize with your and Rick's frustration/irritation about the whole thing.

Journalasmus
 

On-line journalasmus notification:
In Maryann's link at the top of this thread (paragraph three, word 20), there is a new transitive verb formed from a noun : "helming", that minds the boggle.

Who knew? "Helming". Sounds like something from "Star Wars" or the Nibelungenlied. I'll be "helming" now everywhere I go all day: "helming" the hot and cold water supply in my West Chester dorm room, "helming" the elevator buttons, "helming" my 1K compliant pencil and 2K+10 compliant computer, helming my toothbrush. If that on-line writer can "helm", wotthehelm, so can I.

Quincy, you said:

Sometimes one doesn't have to say things in order for the words to be hurtful to those for whom the silence is intended.

I apologize to Rick for (perhaps) having taken his rightful place on the panel (or perhaps it was Maz, or perhaps it was Andrew Sofer, or perhaps it was Brett Foster).

Cathy

Please see my Eratosphere Blog for news about West Chester conference events.



Cathy