<html><head></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; ">Dear All,<div><br></div><div>the notes for the recent session with CK Williams are forthcoming. In the meantime, I wanted to say that the copies of david Lehman's New and Selected Poems are now available in Room 116 of the Whitney Humanities Center (on that shelf nearest the window). These are hot off the press! Lehman will be joining us for a discussion of his work on Friday Dec 6th. This is a make session from last spring when the blizzard forced us to cancel his visit. I'll say more about Lehman with my next email. But do grab a copy--they tend to go quickly, as you all know. These books are free and available to anyone who thinks it likely that they'll make the session on 12/6. </div><div><br></div><div> To whet your appetite, go here for a q and a with Lehman about this new book: <a href="http://www.npr.org/2013/11/02/242348033/i-feel-a-bit-like-a-spy-a-q-a-with-poet-david-lehman">http://www.npr.org/2013/11/02/242348033/i-feel-a-bit-like-a-spy-a-q-a-with-poet-david-lehman</a></div><div><br></div><div>And let me paste here the text of the starred Publishers Weekly review of the new collection:</div><div><br></div><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>Lehman (When a Woman Loves a Man) enjoys an unquestionable prominence in
American poetry, as much for his energetic editorial and critical work
(he edits the Best American Poetry series) as for his own much-praised
verse. This seventh volume <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>and first selected places the poems
themselves at center stage: they steer an entertaining, zigzag path
between nonchalant Jewish-American autobiography and whimsical
experiment. Lehman shows a genius for comic one-liners, for the humor at
the <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>root of pathos and the pathos inside tragedy: “my favorite word is
‘you.’ I love ‘you’ ”; “You either live too long or die too young—/
Nothing else is real, not even your childhood.” Especially in 50 pages
of brand-new poems, Lehman mixes personal <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>reminiscences with literary
history, with results that defy realism but capture a certain
extroverted tone: “Rabbi Kafka escaped to Mexico. Details are sketchy.”
Earlier books show his way with game-like forms: daily poems, sestinas,
and villanelles. (A <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>handful of “early and uncollected” poems conclude
the volume.) Skeptics may complain that Lehman’s verse is often too
conversational and too low-pressure; admirers will connect it instead to
the comic side of the New York School, to Ashbery and <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>Koch. Attuned to
the life of his own generation, and to the mechanics of memory, Lehman
remains a nonpareil creator of quotable remarks, often about how we
write or about how we read: “The idea was to have a voice of your own…
The result was <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>that everybody sounded alike.” (Nov.) </div><div><br></div><div>**</div><div>I also wanted to pass along a call for papers presented by two of our members-at-large: Liansu Meng and Jennifer Feeley. I'll paste that below.</div><div><br></div><div>Cheers,</div><div>Richard Deming, Coordinator</div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>+++</div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><div><span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0); ">Please see below for a call for papers for a seminar that will be held at<br>the annual American Comparative Literature Association (ACLA) conference,<br>at New York University from <a href="x-apple-data-detectors://1" x-apple-data-detectors="true" x-apple-data-detectors-type="calendar-event" x-apple-data-detectors-result="1">March 20-23</a>, 2014. The submission deadline is Nov 15.</span></div><div><br></div><div style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; "><span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0); ">Is the World Flat? Globalization, Translation and World Poetry<br><br>Seminar Organizer(s):<br><br>Liansu Meng (University of Connecticut), Jennifer Feeley (University of<br>Iowa)<br><br>Less than ten years ago, in his internationally best-selling book, Thomas<br>Friedman announced that “the world is flat”, proclaiming that the world<br>has become a level playing field for all parties in the globalized market.<br>This seminar uses translation as a lens to examine local and global flows<br>of “world poetry” in this so-called increasingly “flat” world. Has the<br>world of poetic translation become flat? Are terms such as “periphery” and<br>“center” still valid in this new ecology of global capitalism? How has the<br>dynamics of translation shifted? What are the mechanisms of canon-making<br>in world poetry now? How does the poetic canon change if we shift our<br>discussion of poetry from so-called peripheral languages and cultures<br>while bracketing the center?<br>We aim to foreground the dynamism of poetics of the periphery, calling<br>into question the essentialist tendency to define them against Eurocentric<br>construct as we formulate ways for the periphery to function as a critical<br>paradigm. We invite papers that explore topics such as:<br><br>• Globalization and world poetry<br>• Globalization of translation<br>• Anthologies of poetry in translation<br>• Gender and translation<br>• Translation and appropriation of poetic forms<br>• Orientalism and translation<br>• Shifting roles of the translator<br><br>Seminar keywords: translation, world poetry, globalization, capitalism,<br>gender, peripheral, center, poetic canon<br><br><br>Our seminar description is also available at<br><br><a href="http://acla.org/acla2014/is-the-world-flat-globalization-translation-and-wo" x-apple-data-detectors="true" x-apple-data-detectors-type="link" x-apple-data-detectors-result="1">http://acla.org/acla2014/is-the-world-flat-globalization-translation-and-wo</a><br>rld-poetry/<br><br>To submit your paper proposal, please follow the link:<br><br><a href="http://acla.org/acla2014/propose-a-paper/" x-apple-data-detectors="true" x-apple-data-detectors-type="link" x-apple-data-detectors-result="2">http://acla.org/acla2014/propose-a-paper/</a><br><br>Please feel free to email Liansu Meng at <a href="mailto:liansu.meng@uconn.edu" x-apple-data-detectors="true" x-apple-data-detectors-type="link" x-apple-data-detectors-result="3">liansu.meng@uconn.edu</a> or Jennifer Feeley at <a href="mailto:jennifer-feeley@uiowa.edu">jennifer-feeley@uiowa.edu</a> if you have any questions.</span></div></div></body></html>