[ebooks] Performance Projections: Film and the Body in Action by Stephen Barber at Arts-Photography

Review

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful. A little disappointing or possibly outdatedBy ArthurI cant figure out how Bernstein and other editors make certain essay selections to become the spoken word guru scholars/editors. Marjorie Perloffs essay is brilliant; nevertheless. Maybe the editors taste is past it or no longer relavent to a younger crowd; for the most part. I recommend Voicing American Poetry: Sound and Performance from the 1920s to the Present for secondary material on this phenomenon. She takes a fresh look that seems more relevant. For those who want to "listen" to indispensable spoken word by a master of the genre Hedwig Gorski; tune into Send in the Clown: Live Radio Broadcasts of Performance Poet Hedwig Gorski. A woman; yes; and that may be why old-schoolers are out of touch with what is really going on. This book by so-called performance poet Gorski Poetique: Speak-Songbook for CD Send in the Clown (Micro Books; Volume 1) does have a quote from the trans-generation Perloff on the back: "Delightful." So between Gorski and Perloff; there may be hope for the old-schoolers yet.6 of 7 people found the following review helpful. Publishers summary of contentsBy A Customer*From the publisher:Close Listening and the Performed Word brings together seventeen essays; especially written for this volume; on the poetry reading; the sounds of poetry; and the visual performance of poetry. While the performance of poetry is as old as poetry itself; critical attention to modern and postmodern poetry performance has been negligible. This collection opens many new avenues for the critical discussion of the sound and performance of poetry; with special attention to innovative work. More important; the essays collected here offer wide-ranging elucidations of how twentieth-century poetry has been practiced as a performance art. The contributors cover topics that range from the performance styles of individual poets and types of poetry to the relation of sound to meaning; from historical and social approaches to poetry readings and to new imaginations of prosody. Such approaches are intended to encourage new forms of "close listenings"--not only to the printed text of poems; but also to tapes; performances; and other expressions of the sounded word. With readings and "spoken word" events gaining an increasing audience for poetry; Close Listening provides an indispensable critical groundwork for understanding the importance of language in--and as--performance.Contents: Charles Bernstein; IntroductionSounds MeasuresSusan Stewart; Letter on SoundNick Piombino; The Aural Ellipsis and the Nature of Listening in Contemporary PoetryBruce Andrews; Praxis: A Political Economy of Noise and InformalismMarjorie Perloff; After Free-Verse: The New Non-Linear PoetriesSusan Howe; Either/EtherPerforming WordsJohanna Drucker; Visual Performance of the Poetic Text Steve McCaffery; Voice in ExtremisDennis Tedlock; Toward a Poetics of Polyphony and TranslatabilityBob Perelman; Speech Effects: The Talk as GenrePeter Quartermain; Sound ReadingClose Hearings / Historical SettingsJed Rasula; Understanding the Sound of Not UnderstandingPeter Middleton; The Contemporary Poetry ReadingLorenzo Thomas; Neon Griot: The Functional Role of Poetry Readings in the Black Arts MovementMaria Damon; Was that "Different;" "Dissident" or "Dissonant"? Poetry (n) the Public Speak: Slams; Open Readings and Dissident TraditionsSusan Schultz; Local Vocals: Hawaiis Pidgin Literature; Performance; and PostcolonialityAfterwordRon Silliman; Who Speaks: Ventriloquism and the Self in the Poetry Reading3 of 3 people found the following review helpful. Listen to this bookBy Paul A. BakerWhat do poetry slams have in common with traditional poetry readings?More than one may think.Close Listening; edited by Charles Bernstein; offers 17 perspectives on how contemporary poetry has been practiced as a performance art. Nearly ten years after its initial publication; this book remains fresh and stimulating.Much literary criticism has neglected the auditory and performance aspects of the poem; Bernstein writes. But a poems sound and its meaning are aspects of each other; neither prior; neither independent.This collection of essays argues against the assumption that a poems text is primary; while a poets performance of the poem is secondary; and fundamentally inconsequential to the "poem itself." Bernstein observes that; in a poetry performance; explicit value is placed almost exclusively on the acoustic production of a single unaccompanied speaking voice.Contributors include Bruce Andrews; Marjorie Perloff; Ron Silliman; Susan Howe; and others; some performers in their own right.