<html><head></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><p class="MsoNormal"><div></div><div>___</div><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Questions for Alice Notley from Yale Poetics Seminar to be held
Friday April 19, from 3 PM-5PM</p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">1).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</span>In looking through <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">Culture of One</i>,
a reader can trace a number of threads pulled from various cultures and belief
systems.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>For instance, not only
are there allusions and gestures drawn from the Western Canon and
Judeo-Christian beliefs, but also references to Hinduism and Tibetan
Buddhism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Could you say something
about your relationship to these Eastern belief systems?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>What role do they play in your thinking
about Culture of One?</p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">2) Given that there is a sort of loose conception
of narrative (one continually reshaped by an investment in lyric and song,
would you say something about the compositional process of writing <i>Culture of
One</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>For example, was there a
structure in place before you began?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</span>Were you continually ordering and reordering poems? Were the opening
poems (before Marie actually appears) written first? Last?</p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">3) How do you see your thoughts about epic—and
specifically a feminine epic—having evolved over the years?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Is Culture of One a collection that
addresses that mode? Is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">Culture of One</i>
consciously a response to Eliot’s “The Wasteland”? What wre other models you borrowed from?</p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle"><o:p> </o:p>4) Do you have a sense of audience in mind when
you write?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>Given the depth of some
of the allusions, do you imagine and audience that will get all these?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>What is your thinking about a reader’s
responsibility to a text?</p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle"><o:p> </o:p>5) What do you see as the cultural role of poetry
and the poet, specifically in our contemporary moment?</p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle"><o:p> </o:p>6) What do you see as the tone of the
collection?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>How were you trying to
establish this? Particularly there was discussion about the final poem and
whether you yourself see this as a kind hopeful and redemptive moment, or
whether it suggests that Marie is exiled to herself (rather than
liberated).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes"> </span>This isn’t a question
intending for to elicit and explanation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">
</span>Instead, it is directed towards your sense of what constitutes a culture
of one and if you wanted to write towards that or bring its possibilities into
question.</p>
<!--EndFragment--></p>
<!--EndFragment--></body></html>