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The BMO Winterset Award submission deadline

Title: The BMO Winterset Award submission deadline

Location: Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada
Description: The BMO Winterset Award was established to honour the memory of Sandra Fraser Gwyn, award-winning social historian who died in Toronto on May 26, 2000. An ardent advocate and promoter of Newfoundland and Labrador culture, she was granted an honorary degree from Memorial University, made a member of the Newfoundland and Labrador Arts Council’s Hall of Honour, and an Officer of the Order of Canada.

The BMO Winterset Award is designed to encourage and promote excellence in all genres of writing. Published literary works, written either by a native-born Newfoundlander and Labradorian, or by a current resident of the province, are eligible. One prize of $10,000, and two prizes of $2,500 are awarded annually.

Learn more here.

Date: December 31, 2012

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Canadian Women in the Literary Arts (CWILA) critic-in-residence application deadline

Title: Canadian Women in the Literary Arts (CWILA) critic-in-residence application deadline

Location: Canada
Description: CWILA seeks to support a female Canadian writer (poet, novelist, storyteller, scholar) as its resident critic for a calendar year. The aim of the residency is to foster vital criticism that promotes public awareness of women’s literary and critical presence in Canadian letters. The residency is virtual, so the writer will be free to work from home.

Learn more here.

Date: November 1, 2012

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Clayton Eshleman reads at the University of Michigan

Title: Clayton Eshleman reads at the University of Michigan

Location: Ann Arbor, Michigan, US
Description: Poet and translator Clayton Eshleman reads as part of the Michigan Writers Reading program presented by the Department of English, University of Michigan. At this reading, Eshleman will read from his recent translation of Solar Throat Slashed by Aimé Césaire.

Learn more here.

Date: October 18, 2012

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Karen Solie reads at the Florida Writers’ Festival

Title: Karen Solie reads at the Florida Writers’ Festival

Location: Gainesville, Florida, US
Description: The Florida Writers’ Festival is presented by MFA@FLA, one of the oldest writing programs, begun in 1948 by Andrew Lytle, who later edited the Sewanee Review. Learn more about MFA@FLA here.

This year’s Florida Writers’ Festival features readings and craft talks by Lauren Groff, Mary Gaitskill, Ben Lerner, Karen Solie, and Kevin Wilson.

Learn more here.

Date: October 13, 2012

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Florida Writers’ Festival

Title: Florida Writers’ Festival

Location: Gainesville, Florida, US
Description: The Florida Writers’ Festival is presented by MFA@FLA, one of the oldest writing programs, begun in 1948 by Andrew Lytle, who later edited the Sewanee Review. Learn more about MFA@FLA here.

This year’s Florida Writers’ Festival features readings and craft talks by Lauren Groff, Mary Gaitskill, Ben Lerner, Karen Solie, and Kevin Wilson.

Learn more here.

Start Date: October 11, 2012
End Date: October 13, 2012

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Poetry & Conversation at Enoch Pratt Free Library

Title: Poetry & Conversation at Enoch Pratt Free Library

Location: Baltimore, Maryland, US
Description: The Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore, Maryland offers Poetry & Conversation evenings as part of its ongoing presentation of classes, events, exhibits and meetings. On this occasion, Linda Pastan and Myra Sklarew read from and talk about their work.

Learn more here.

Date: November 14, 2012

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Priscila Uppal, Carmine Starnino read at launch of The Best Canadian Poetry In English

Title: Priscila Uppal, Carmine Starnino read at launch of The Best Canadian Poetry In English

Location: New York, New York, US
Description: A celebration of the Best Canadian Poetry In English anthology’s five-year anniversary features readings by contributing poets including Priscila Uppal and Carmine Starnino. The event is hosted by series editor Molly Peacock and co-sponsored with Tightrope Books.

All New York University Creative Writing Program Fall 2012 Reading Series events are free and open to the public, and held in the program’s Greenwich Village home, the Lillian Vernon Creative Writers House, unless otherwise noted.

Learn more here.

Date: October 26, 2012

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from Chapter E

Christian Bök

copyright ©Christian Bök, 2001



 

Enfettered, these sentences repress free speech. The
text deletes selected letters. We see the revered exegete
reject metred verse: the sestet, the tercet – even les
scènes élevées en grec. He rebels. He sets new precedents.
He lets cleverness exceed decent levels. He eschews the
esteemed genres, the expected themes – even les belles
lettres en vers. He prefers the perverse French esthetes:
Verne, Péret, Genet, Perec – hence, he pens fervent
screeds, then enters the street, where he sells these let-
terpress newsletters, three cents per sheet. He engen-
ders perfect newness wherever we need fresh terms.

Relentless, the rebel peddles these theses, even when
vexed peers deem the new precepts ‘mere dreck.’ The
plebes resent newer verse; nevertheless, the rebel per-
severes, never deterred, never dejected, heedless, even
when hecklers heckle the vehement speeches. We feel
perplexed whenever we see these excerpted sentences.
We sneer when we detect the clever scheme – the emer-
gent repetend: the letter E. We jeer; we jest. We express
resentment. We detest these depthless pretenses – these
present-tense verbs, expressed pell-mell. We prefer
genteel speech, where sense redeems senselessness.

Notes on the Poem

By limiting himself to one vowel per section in his acclaimed poetry work Eunoia, Christian Bök does with words what a talented gardener can do, wielding the appropriate methods, to create a bonsai tree or shrub. Does applying linguistic or horticultural constraints create beautiful poems and plants?

The bonsai tradition involves growing and continual pruning so that all parts of the plant — flowers, leaves, and stems — remain in proportion as the gardener produces a miniature version of a tree or shrub. Bonsai plants are intended for viewing and admiring, and for the grower to have his or her skills and ingenuity pleasantly challenged.

Christian Bök clearly challenged himself when he embarked on Eunoia, as he describes here in "A Few Thoughts on Beautiful Thinking." Not only did he limit himself to words with one vowel per section, but he made himself comply with other rules with respect to the poem's content, including alluding to the art of writing, describing "a culinary banquet, a prurient debauch, a pastoral tableau, and a nautical voyage" in each section, and more. The excerpt shown here illustrates that he managed to touch on those subjects.

Bök acknowledges that some might not be impressed by these poetic feats:

"He lets cleverness exceed decent levels."

Does he? Well, Bök self-effacingly guesses at some reactions:

"We sneer when we detect the clever scheme - "

Whether or not you think bonsai is an acceptable way to treat and present a plant, it does let the viewer see a tree from some very different perspectives. Do the constraints Bök applies in Eunoia do the same thing with respect to seeing the power and flexibility of language?