<html><head></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><img id="27e2483a-4e71-4c81-b69d-266aa1c93ab5" height="234" width="176" apple-width="yes" apple-height="yes" src="cid:1B185753-226C-4203-AD50-6D619FA0BC16@gateway.2wire.net"><img id="13c4b145-f778-484a-a129-632165125fe2" height="265" width="174" apple-width="yes" apple-height="yes" src="cid:A91F1359-E62F-45EA-A073-55A8675D2D31@gateway.2wire.net"><div><br></div><div>Dear Friends,</div><div><br></div><div>Last Friday the WGCP met for our first discussion of the work of poet/philosopher John Koethe--specifically his recent book ROTC Kills and his book of essays Poetry at One Remove. From that conversation--generative, thoughtful, provocative as it was about the intersections and delineations between philosophy and poetry--I derived a series of questions. These should give people a sense of our conversation that day. I have sent these to Koethe and they will help give us a foundation for our next session, which Koethe himself will attend. That will occur on <b><u>December 7th from 3PM-5PM</u> in room B04 in the basement of the Whitney Humanities Center.</b> All are welcome to attend, even people who have never visited the WGCP before.</div><div><br></div><div>Also, here is a brief vide of Koethe reading his work:</div><div><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bGIMOUDUaE">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bGIMOUDUaE</a></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>And finally, our own Jennifer Gross has put together a landmark exhibition of the work of Richard Artschwager at the Whitney Museum of Art in NYC. Jennifer will be giving a talk at the Whitney Museum tomorrow night (Thursday) at 7.30 with poet/art critic/former WGCP visitor John Yau. This is a must see event and the information can be obtained here: <a href="http://whitney.org/Events/GalleryTalkJohnYau">http://whitney.org/Events/GalleryTalkJohnYau</a></div><div><br></div><div>In the meantime, be well on this far side of a hurricane and an election season.</div><div><br></div><div>Richard Deming--Coordinator</div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>++++++++++++++++++++++++</div><div><br></div><div>
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<!--StartFragment--><p class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:normal">Questions from Yale
Poetics Seminar.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Meeting to occur
12/7/12, 3 PM-5PM in the Whitney Humanities Center<o:p></o:p></b></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol"><span style="mso-list:Ignore">·<span style="font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Are you a comic poet with a sense of tragedy, or
are you a tragic poet with a sense of humor?</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol"><span style="mso-list:Ignore">·<span style="font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Your work often makes use of popular culture as
a set of meaningful references.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Do
you worry about the ways that such things (particularly technological things)
are often limited to their moment?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</span>In that way, what do you think of a poem’s relationship to a larger
context of time and even ideals of permanence or universality? Given that your
books have been progressively dealing with aging and mortality, this seems like
a particularly relevant question.</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol"><span style="mso-list:Ignore">·<span style="font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->On what might be a complementary or a
contrasting note (in regards to the preceding question), we might come from a
different direction: <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">ROTC Kills</i> has
poems clearly in discussion with philosophers who may not be household
names.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>What do you feel is the
role of allusion in a poem and how much responsibility do you feel a reader
needs to take on?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>What do you feel
your responsibility is to the reader, as well?</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol"><span style="mso-list:Ignore">·<span style="font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->What do you feel is the uses as well as
limitations of abstraction in poems (Wallace Stevens notwithstanding)? Do you
see yourself as an abstract poet (or at least a writer of abstract poems)?</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol"><span style="mso-list:Ignore">·<span style="font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How does language and discourse (ranging from
the technical to the discursive) create a challenge for poetry? What is the
function of a sentence within a poem (this question gets at the discursive
tendencies of your work and looking at what you see as the formal effect of
long sentences as the sense of measure rather than the line).</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol"><span style="mso-list:Ignore">·<span style="font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->You have written about a number of poets whom
you admire from prior generations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</span>Who would you see as your influences?<span style="mso-spacerun:
yes"> </span>What way do they influence you?<span style="mso-spacerun:
yes"> </span>How do you work with and against these influences?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>What do you see as the poet’s response
and relationship to larger “traditions” of poetry?</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol"><span style="mso-list:Ignore">·<span style="font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Who do you see as your most influential
contemporaries?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Do you feel part
of a generation or a company of writers?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</span>Do you think of yourself as a second-generation New York School poet?</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol"><span style="mso-list:Ignore">·<span style="font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->You consistently use capital letters along the
left-hand margin? Does this intentionally serve to create a tension between the
ongoing horizntal pull of the long sentences that you use.</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol"><span style="mso-list:Ignore">·<span style="font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->What is the role of narrative in poetry?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Are you a lyric or a narrative poet?
While there really may not be a such thing as a pure genre, what motivates you
first or even primarily?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>The music
or the story?</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol"><span style="mso-list:Ignore">·<span style="font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How has your sense of poetry (yours, and
generally) changed over the years?</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-indent:-.25in;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family:Symbol;mso-fareast-font-family:Symbol;mso-bidi-font-family:
Symbol"><span style="mso-list:Ignore">·<span style="font:7.0pt "Times New Roman"">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Although you have written extensively about the
differences between poetry and philosophy, how do the study and practice of
these disciplines intertwine for you?</p>
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