WEBVTT

00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.510 align:middle line:90%


00:00:00.510 --> 00:00:03.480 align:middle line:84%
I just want to second that
David Dunn is a genius.

00:00:03.480 --> 00:00:04.860 align:middle line:90%
So don't miss hearing him.

00:00:04.860 --> 00:00:05.975 align:middle line:90%
He's amazing.

00:00:05.975 --> 00:00:08.100 align:middle line:84%
But we're also going to
hear from an amazing person

00:00:08.100 --> 00:00:10.830 align:middle line:90%
tonight, Juliana Spahr.

00:00:10.830 --> 00:00:13.350 align:middle line:84%
It is hard to see
Juliana's work objectively

00:00:13.350 --> 00:00:15.720 align:middle line:84%
when I know some of the
biography when I came up

00:00:15.720 --> 00:00:17.850 align:middle line:84%
through the same
graduate poetics program

00:00:17.850 --> 00:00:20.460 align:middle line:84%
that she did and shared
some of the same mentors

00:00:20.460 --> 00:00:24.240 align:middle line:84%
and when so many of her concerns
speak so closely to mine.

00:00:24.240 --> 00:00:26.580 align:middle line:84%
And yet, as I began to
teach Juliana's work

00:00:26.580 --> 00:00:28.980 align:middle line:84%
in my ecopoetics
classes and my students

00:00:28.980 --> 00:00:32.159 align:middle line:84%
discuss the nature of this
"we" she is proposing,

00:00:32.159 --> 00:00:34.470 align:middle line:84%
and who exactly
these "yous" are,

00:00:34.470 --> 00:00:37.080 align:middle line:84%
and exactly how many of
them are in that bed there,

00:00:37.080 --> 00:00:39.630 align:middle line:84%
whether or not we feel
comfortable with that address.

00:00:39.630 --> 00:00:41.490 align:middle line:84%
And the thing about
a Juliana Spahr book

00:00:41.490 --> 00:00:43.800 align:middle line:84%
is that whether
you like it or not,

00:00:43.800 --> 00:00:46.590 align:middle line:84%
you inevitably become
her "you" after reading

00:00:46.590 --> 00:00:48.240 align:middle line:90%
beyond a certain point.

00:00:48.240 --> 00:00:50.040 align:middle line:84%
I sense the work taking
on a dimension that

00:00:50.040 --> 00:00:54.000 align:middle line:84%
is completely beyond my
imagination of Juliana Spahr,

00:00:54.000 --> 00:00:56.310 align:middle line:84%
pretty much beyond
Juliana herself.

00:00:56.310 --> 00:00:59.510 align:middle line:84%
And this, I must say, is
the mark of great writing.

00:00:59.510 --> 00:01:01.260 align:middle line:84%
I think that more than
just about any poet

00:01:01.260 --> 00:01:05.160 align:middle line:84%
of my generation, through her
work with the journal Chain,

00:01:05.160 --> 00:01:08.070 align:middle line:84%
her celebrated poetry
collections, her prose

00:01:08.070 --> 00:01:13.080 align:middle line:84%
work, her work as a scholar,
co-editing important

00:01:13.080 --> 00:01:17.310 align:middle line:84%
groundbreaking
anthologies in pedagogy

00:01:17.310 --> 00:01:19.700 align:middle line:84%
and questions of
gender and poetics.

00:01:19.700 --> 00:01:21.450 align:middle line:84%
I think that more than
just about any poet

00:01:21.450 --> 00:01:23.550 align:middle line:84%
of my generation, Juliana
has brought poetry

00:01:23.550 --> 00:01:26.760 align:middle line:84%
down into the everyday of
deciding how to live, and act,

00:01:26.760 --> 00:01:28.560 align:middle line:84%
and think, and what
exactly does it

00:01:28.560 --> 00:01:30.600 align:middle line:84%
mean to be alive
and find yourself

00:01:30.600 --> 00:01:34.620 align:middle line:84%
in all sorts of compromising yet
exciting positions in what we

00:01:34.620 --> 00:01:36.660 align:middle line:90%
call this 21st century.

00:01:36.660 --> 00:01:39.780 align:middle line:84%
It may or may not be significant
that as early as 2004,

00:01:39.780 --> 00:01:43.380 align:middle line:84%
Juliana still did not
identify as a poet.

00:01:43.380 --> 00:01:45.450 align:middle line:84%
Juliana's work helps us
think through questions

00:01:45.450 --> 00:01:47.700 align:middle line:84%
about who does the
dishes and who takes out

00:01:47.700 --> 00:01:51.360 align:middle line:84%
the garbage, about how to learn
and respond without doing harm,

00:01:51.360 --> 00:01:54.810 align:middle line:84%
to what one is learning about
or who one is responding to,

00:01:54.810 --> 00:01:57.360 align:middle line:84%
about how to write through
the daily news feed,

00:01:57.360 --> 00:02:00.060 align:middle line:84%
about where to be happy
and what to teach,

00:02:00.060 --> 00:02:03.090 align:middle line:84%
about what and where to write
in the face of incredible class

00:02:03.090 --> 00:02:06.030 align:middle line:84%
divisions, about the
schizophrenia of one's

00:02:06.030 --> 00:02:08.729 align:middle line:84%
desires in a capitalist
culture, about,

00:02:08.729 --> 00:02:10.830 align:middle line:84%
well, what do you really
think about loving

00:02:10.830 --> 00:02:13.410 align:middle line:90%
a species to extinction?

00:02:13.410 --> 00:02:15.600 align:middle line:84%
But then she transforms
these questions

00:02:15.600 --> 00:02:20.220 align:middle line:84%
into a kind of song, a pattern,
a list, a shifting of scales

00:02:20.220 --> 00:02:23.730 align:middle line:84%
up through the local to
global connections and back.

00:02:23.730 --> 00:02:26.280 align:middle line:84%
There are the procedures,
the fascinating translation

00:02:26.280 --> 00:02:29.130 align:middle line:84%
machines, the
weaving that distills

00:02:29.130 --> 00:02:33.630 align:middle line:84%
rather than confuses individual
words as one reads and rereads.

00:02:33.630 --> 00:02:36.000 align:middle line:90%
I like that Juliana's work--

00:02:36.000 --> 00:02:38.520 align:middle line:84%
I like that, over
time, Juliana's work

00:02:38.520 --> 00:02:43.110 align:middle line:84%
deepens my sense of words
like sell, and bed, and lungs,

00:02:43.110 --> 00:02:47.550 align:middle line:84%
and space, and bird,
and attack helicopter.

00:02:47.550 --> 00:02:50.730 align:middle line:84%
Juliana says, reflecting on
her first approaches to poetry,

00:02:50.730 --> 00:02:53.220 align:middle line:84%
"I viewed poetry as an
extension of what was going on

00:02:53.220 --> 00:02:56.580 align:middle line:84%
in hardcore, both aimed
for the transformation

00:02:56.580 --> 00:02:58.320 align:middle line:90%
of the everyday."

00:02:58.320 --> 00:03:01.170 align:middle line:84%
She also says "I like poetry
because it helps me think.

00:03:01.170 --> 00:03:03.360 align:middle line:90%
It helps me resort data.

00:03:03.360 --> 00:03:08.460 align:middle line:84%
It lets me list things and think
about the shape of the list."

00:03:08.460 --> 00:03:12.000 align:middle line:84%
In 2004, for an interview,
Juliana mapped a trajectory

00:03:12.000 --> 00:03:14.490 align:middle line:84%
that begins with Pound,
modernism, Dead Kennedys,

00:03:14.490 --> 00:03:18.510 align:middle line:84%
post-punk, Sonic Youth,
onto Stein, Tender Buttons,

00:03:18.510 --> 00:03:20.940 align:middle line:84%
and through or around
the New American Poetry,

00:03:20.940 --> 00:03:24.510 align:middle line:84%
to language poetry, conceptual
art, fluxus, Harryette Mullen,

00:03:24.510 --> 00:03:27.780 align:middle line:84%
Cecilia Vicuña,
Theresa Hak Kyung Cha,

00:03:27.780 --> 00:03:31.050 align:middle line:84%
to various cultural poetry
debates, responsibility,

00:03:31.050 --> 00:03:35.520 align:middle line:84%
appropriation, pidgin, Hawaii's
poetry, onto global local,

00:03:35.520 --> 00:03:39.060 align:middle line:84%
and finally, a return to
clarity, larger structure.

00:03:39.060 --> 00:03:41.400 align:middle line:84%
Rethinking lyric is
not necessarily tied

00:03:41.400 --> 00:03:43.320 align:middle line:90%
to emotion or intimacy.

00:03:43.320 --> 00:03:47.730 align:middle line:84%
You can view this map on Chicago
postmodern poetry online.

00:03:47.730 --> 00:03:50.190 align:middle line:84%
I think the challenge in the
almost hard assed raising

00:03:50.190 --> 00:03:52.380 align:middle line:84%
of the bar Juliana
has done for all of us

00:03:52.380 --> 00:03:55.260 align:middle line:84%
writers and readers is to
have accomplished this return

00:03:55.260 --> 00:03:56.370 align:middle line:90%
to clarity.

00:03:56.370 --> 00:03:58.830 align:middle line:84%
I like that she includes
instructions and notes

00:03:58.830 --> 00:03:59.940 align:middle line:90%
with her poems.

00:03:59.940 --> 00:04:01.980 align:middle line:90%
Everything is very up front.

00:04:01.980 --> 00:04:03.780 align:middle line:90%
It's often a collaboration.

00:04:03.780 --> 00:04:05.820 align:middle line:84%
She's telling us,
think about this.

00:04:05.820 --> 00:04:07.780 align:middle line:90%
It may change your life.

00:04:07.780 --> 00:04:09.030 align:middle line:90%
Here's what I've tried.

00:04:09.030 --> 00:04:11.920 align:middle line:90%
Sing through it a bit with me.

00:04:11.920 --> 00:04:14.756 align:middle line:84%
Let's lay it all on the
line and see what happens.

00:04:14.756 --> 00:04:16.339 align:middle line:84%
Let's see, for
example, what the lyric

00:04:16.339 --> 00:04:19.220 align:middle line:84%
can do in the era of
thermobaric weapons.

00:04:19.220 --> 00:04:21.079 align:middle line:84%
Let's consider the
contradictions.

00:04:21.079 --> 00:04:22.580 align:middle line:90%
Let's not simplify.

00:04:22.580 --> 00:04:24.257 align:middle line:90%
Let's be very clear.

00:04:24.257 --> 00:04:26.840 align:middle line:84%
Tonight, it's very clear that
we were incredibly lucky to have

00:04:26.840 --> 00:04:28.200 align:middle line:90%
Juliana Spahr with us.

00:04:28.200 --> 00:04:30.950 align:middle line:90%
[APPLAUSE]

00:04:30.950 --> 00:04:37.000 align:middle line:90%