Yesterday Jerome Rothenberg published a selection of new works by Nicole Peyrafitte on his poems and poetics blog (& thus also on the Jacket2 version of the blog, here). The opening header & pix here below: Nicole Peyrafitte: Poems and Poetics from “Bi-Valve” JEROME ROTHENBERG [Nicole Peyrafitte’s move from the French Pyrenees to the United States came in 1987, and from California to New York in the 1990s. She … Read more Poems & Poetics from “Bi-Valve”
In the valley d’Oueil, high up in the Pyrenees right now (will post a series of photos form the walks soon) with most of the time still spent proofing the Maghreb anthology. Here is an extract from the fourth Diwan: Resistance and Road to Independence: Jean el Mouhoub Amrouche (Ighil Ali, 1906–Paris, 1962) ADORATION OF THE PALM TREES At night the palm trees shed heavy tears. Their shadows bend over the … Read more Jean el Mouhoub Amrouche
So here I was, barely set up in my Pyrenean retreat, the lousy Euro-weather just beginning to switch to summer warmth, when, whamm! here come the 750+ page proofs for Poems for the Millennium, Volume 4: The University of California Book of North African Literature. They’ll keep me busy until I return to NYC (I’ll holiday there, then…) The great news in all this is, of course, that the anthology is … Read more A Wonderful Way of Having My Holidays Spoiled!
Interesting piece on how to become a translator on Arabic Literature (in English) blog today. Obviously I don’t agree with all of what is being said & proposed, but much if not most is sound advice indeed. Opening paras below, the rest of the post can be read here: 20* Questions: How Do I Become a Literary Translator? Posted on July 23, 2012 by mlynxqualey | 1 Comment Young writer — and prospective literary translator … Read more How to Become a Literary Translator
Sad to hear of the death of Alexander Cockburn, one of our sharpest, most belligerent, most progressive left-wing polemicists. You can read his collaborator & friend Jeffrey St. Clair’s obit here in Counterpunch. I started reading him in England in the early eighties when I was writing occasional pieces for the New Statesman, & his work set an example that I was never able to emulate. In The Progressive, Matthew Rothschild expresses … Read more Alexander Cockburn (1941-2012)
Started the day thinking on an old friend, the German writer Jörg Fauser, who was hit & killed by a car 25 years ago today — when at the tailend of his 43rd Birthday party he crawled through a fence & onto a highway. Am packing & getting ready to catch a flight to Europe, so no time for detailed reflections — just to say that Jörg, though on the surface readable … Read more Jörg Fauser — a Quarter Century Already
Photos Copyright © John Sharpe Many thanks to all — & there were many, way too many for me to answer each one — who sent birthday greetings. I finished my quatorze juillet / bastille day celebration at The Stone, New York’s best avant-garde/impro jazz venue, listening to the Blood Trio — Sabir Mateen (woodwinds) Whit Dickey (drums) Michael Bisio (bass) — playing a breath-taking set, amazing clarity of sound & tone, brilliant inventiveness — … Read more Ending the Day with the Blood Trio
Lol Coxhill in a skip. Art event copyright Simon Thackray. Photo: Tony Bartholomew. cris cheek just alerted us to a superb homage to Lol Coxhill by his friend & collaborator David Toop. Below 2 paragraphs from that homage; you can read the full piece here. Lol could be an extraordinarily generous person. There were those he believed to be “duff”, dismissed with pithy anecdote and an underplayed chuckle, and … Read more Toop on Coxhill
More good reading for the summer: been reading around Jason Weiss’ latest tome: Always in Trouble: An oral history of ESP-DISK, the most outrageous Record Label in America published earlier this year by Wesleyan University Press. It truly is a sweet dippin’ & diggin’ book, depending on your mood — Albert Ayler or Roswell Budd, Evan Parker or William Parker, Gato Barbieri or Amiri Baraka. A fascinating look ‘behind … Read more ESP-DISK: Always in Trouble
Talking over Skype with friend Allen Fisher in Hereford, I learned the sad news of Lol Coxhill’s passing. Lol & his music were among the great delights over my years in London during the seventies & early eighties. Below, the opening paras of the Guardian’s obit. You can read the rest here. Lol Coxhill at the London Jazz Festival in 2006. Photograph: Howard Denner/Getty The saxophonist Lol Coxhill, who has died aged … Read more Lol Coxhill (1932-2012)