Hey everyone!
Check out Gerry's new book, The Cezanne/Pissarro Poems, coming out September 13th from World Parade Books! Go to worldparadebooks.com for ordering info. If you get there and the site isn't up, don't get discouraged, it will be up soon . . .just try again the next day.
Book Info:
Price: $12.95
ISBN: 978-1-60461-251-6
Don't miss out on another great Locklin Book!
~KPL *R)v Press*
Saturday, September 08, 2007
Thursday, July 12, 2007
The Toad Poems (the play)
Read a review of the Toad Poems (the play) here:
http://www.backstage.com/bso/search/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003601588
KPL
http://www.backstage.com/bso/search/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003601588
KPL
Friday, May 04, 2007
Driving Desire Underground (Burning Shore Reviews, April 2007): A review of New Orleans, Chicago, and Points Elsewhere
Gerald Locklin, for those younger readers who are not familiar with him, is probably one of America's most important living poets. Locklin has published over 125 books of poetry and prose, of which, just to get a flavour of his writing, Go West Young Toad and Candy Bars are recommended. This year Locklin retires from his job as a professor at California State University, Long Beach, where he has resided and worked for almost four decades. But as far as writing goes, it is a slightly different story. With over 3000 poems in publication, and a mountain of prose, there is no sign of this prolific writer stopping just yet.
And we have proof to that because "The Toad," as Locklin likes to nickname himself, is back with a brand new collection of poetry in a book titled New Orleans, Chicago, and Points Elsewhere, a compilation of works written during some fairly recent trips around the USA. And in age when many young poets are glued to their computer screens surfing the matrix of the internet, it is quite refreshing to see something that has come from being - on the road - which, for a change, is not hung up on ideas of greatness. Indeed, many of those who have read Locklin's work say that it is like being in conversation with the man himself, who talks to you as a human being and not a man with a pretentious sense of fulfilment, nor a growling bitterness that can often be found, for example, in Bukowski's work (this is not a comparison of quality between the two writers, just my opinion of the difference of style, that's all). As he describes himself within Go West Young Toad, he is more of the diplomat. But do not be fooled into thinking Locklin is a pushover. He has had his face rubbed in life. He has had a fair share of women and he has done time with alcohol, which at one point almost killed him. Locklin has, and still lives his own life.
This is the first two paragraphs of the review. For the full review please visit www.burningshorepress.com.
And we have proof to that because "The Toad," as Locklin likes to nickname himself, is back with a brand new collection of poetry in a book titled New Orleans, Chicago, and Points Elsewhere, a compilation of works written during some fairly recent trips around the USA. And in age when many young poets are glued to their computer screens surfing the matrix of the internet, it is quite refreshing to see something that has come from being - on the road - which, for a change, is not hung up on ideas of greatness. Indeed, many of those who have read Locklin's work say that it is like being in conversation with the man himself, who talks to you as a human being and not a man with a pretentious sense of fulfilment, nor a growling bitterness that can often be found, for example, in Bukowski's work (this is not a comparison of quality between the two writers, just my opinion of the difference of style, that's all). As he describes himself within Go West Young Toad, he is more of the diplomat. But do not be fooled into thinking Locklin is a pushover. He has had his face rubbed in life. He has had a fair share of women and he has done time with alcohol, which at one point almost killed him. Locklin has, and still lives his own life.
This is the first two paragraphs of the review. For the full review please visit www.burningshorepress.com.
Monday, February 12, 2007
A Review of Gerald Locklin's open thy effing ears (please) by K.M. Dersley
Recently a slew of marvellous free writing has arrived from authors that I admire quite a bit. These happen to be people whom I also count as friends. For a lot of mags and webzines this would make it dubious to unacceptable for me to review them. Here on the ragged EDGE though, with nothing to gain or lose, I speak as I find.
In order of arrival: Defying the Odds (Selected Poems) by David Tipton, Spiders and Madmen by Doug Draime, and open thy effing ears (please) by Gerald Locklin. (Locklin's is a back-to-back shared chapbook from Zerx Press of Albuquerque, New Mexico. Reading upside down and the other way round is Mark Weber's long story short.)
Money may be slow to come through anyone's scribblings and internet forays these days, but as Whitman might have remarked, the pay is sure one way or the other. I've sent out things of mine gratis and posted them online all over, and here I am receiving these without paying a penny. All are collections that, assuming the poets were unknown to me and I'd chanced on them at a bookstall and thumbed through, they would have had to be bought.
These writers have something to say, there's no shit with them about poetry being some sort of state of being (though in effect it is, and with these scribblers more than most). The fact is, they have strong subjects, subjects that they had to write about in masterly free verse that takes a particular compulsive and convulsive shape which belongs to that particular scribe.
Tipton's book, a handsome paperback (from Sow's Ear) of more than 200 pages, provides a fistful of his work from as early as 1960 up to roughly ten years ago. There's that sensitivity which comes over alongside a tone that at times is almost gruff. We find in these verses hundred of vignettes of the life he has lived and observed in Peru, Venice or Paris or during National Service in Malaya. There are equally exotic glimpses into the fraught existence in Essex or Bradford of the incorrigible lecher and formidable literary artist. Not only that, there are decades-old warnings and insights into the mindsets of the Muslim fanatics of Bradford which get timelier every news bulletin. A gem casket.
It's always great to get out the set of Tipton's books.
It was a treat to get Doug Draime's latest chapbook, Spiders and Madmen, to go with 2004's Unoccupied Zone. Bob Lenney leapt at Draime's work when I featured Doug as guest poet. He leapt on those lines as shafts down the same honeycomb mine that was exploited before by Kerouac, Wantling, Winans, etc. Draime met Bukowski a couple of times and lived near him for a while. He has an amusing poem in here ('More Details'), a sort of refusal to write ye olde Buk tribute so much in demand which, in itself, though skirting round the subject of Buk, is about as much Hank, or rather the source that he came from, as Buk himself. Chapbook published by Scintillating Publications.
It's always great to get out the set of Draime's books.
The Locklin chapbook carries on his poetic meditations and notes from Zerx on jazz and the jazzers. It's dedicated to staff at California State University Long Beach where he has worked for 42 years, and he very gracefully quotes Keats: 'I always made an awkward bow.' Yes, it's mainly music riffs here, and though you (I) may not know many of the names he invokes, his enthusiasm and the bright descriptiveness of his writing mean that it doesn't matter. There is an amusing account ('Send in the Idiot') of buying a Barbra Streisand disc in order to write down the lyrics of a Sondheim number so he can sing it at a poetry reading later. As he practises the song at home the cats crowd round him (at first I wondered if he meant the cats with tails or the cats with berets). A collection that brings a feeling almost of the actual physical presence of the writer.
It's always great to get out the set of Locklin's books.
January 22, 2007
Copyright 2007 by K.M.Dersley
http://www.raggededge.btinternet.co.uk/
In order of arrival: Defying the Odds (Selected Poems) by David Tipton, Spiders and Madmen by Doug Draime, and open thy effing ears (please) by Gerald Locklin. (Locklin's is a back-to-back shared chapbook from Zerx Press of Albuquerque, New Mexico. Reading upside down and the other way round is Mark Weber's long story short.)
Money may be slow to come through anyone's scribblings and internet forays these days, but as Whitman might have remarked, the pay is sure one way or the other. I've sent out things of mine gratis and posted them online all over, and here I am receiving these without paying a penny. All are collections that, assuming the poets were unknown to me and I'd chanced on them at a bookstall and thumbed through, they would have had to be bought.
These writers have something to say, there's no shit with them about poetry being some sort of state of being (though in effect it is, and with these scribblers more than most). The fact is, they have strong subjects, subjects that they had to write about in masterly free verse that takes a particular compulsive and convulsive shape which belongs to that particular scribe.
Tipton's book, a handsome paperback (from Sow's Ear) of more than 200 pages, provides a fistful of his work from as early as 1960 up to roughly ten years ago. There's that sensitivity which comes over alongside a tone that at times is almost gruff. We find in these verses hundred of vignettes of the life he has lived and observed in Peru, Venice or Paris or during National Service in Malaya. There are equally exotic glimpses into the fraught existence in Essex or Bradford of the incorrigible lecher and formidable literary artist. Not only that, there are decades-old warnings and insights into the mindsets of the Muslim fanatics of Bradford which get timelier every news bulletin. A gem casket.
It's always great to get out the set of Tipton's books.
It was a treat to get Doug Draime's latest chapbook, Spiders and Madmen, to go with 2004's Unoccupied Zone. Bob Lenney leapt at Draime's work when I featured Doug as guest poet. He leapt on those lines as shafts down the same honeycomb mine that was exploited before by Kerouac, Wantling, Winans, etc. Draime met Bukowski a couple of times and lived near him for a while. He has an amusing poem in here ('More Details'), a sort of refusal to write ye olde Buk tribute so much in demand which, in itself, though skirting round the subject of Buk, is about as much Hank, or rather the source that he came from, as Buk himself. Chapbook published by Scintillating Publications.
It's always great to get out the set of Draime's books.
The Locklin chapbook carries on his poetic meditations and notes from Zerx on jazz and the jazzers. It's dedicated to staff at California State University Long Beach where he has worked for 42 years, and he very gracefully quotes Keats: 'I always made an awkward bow.' Yes, it's mainly music riffs here, and though you (I) may not know many of the names he invokes, his enthusiasm and the bright descriptiveness of his writing mean that it doesn't matter. There is an amusing account ('Send in the Idiot') of buying a Barbra Streisand disc in order to write down the lyrics of a Sondheim number so he can sing it at a poetry reading later. As he practises the song at home the cats crowd round him (at first I wondered if he meant the cats with tails or the cats with berets). A collection that brings a feeling almost of the actual physical presence of the writer.
It's always great to get out the set of Locklin's books.
January 22, 2007
Copyright 2007 by K.M.Dersley
http://www.raggededge.btinternet.co.uk/
Sunday, January 21, 2007
A kinda/sorta review of Gerald Locklin's New Orleans, Chicago, And Points Elsewhere by John Yamrus
I’ve known Gerald Locklin for 30 years now. Back then I was managing a clothing store in Reading, Pennsylvania and publishing a cheap literary quarterly that leaned toward poetry because that’s what I wanted and that’s what I did. Distribution for the magazine was small…the number of subscriptions was even smaller. But every couple of months I’d get a stack of poems sent to me by Locklin, who by that time was already a big name in the underground press. And, gentleman that he is, he wouldn’t just submit his poems, he would also write these long, wonderfully chatty and informative letters about anything and nothing…about the water dripping in his sink and about the literary lions he’d occasionally meet up with. Anything. Nothing. Things that meant a lot to someone publishing an under-appreciated and hardly read little magazine. I can’t tell you how much I looked forward to those letters and those poems. The poems were fresh and vibrant and funny and alive. The letters, equally so.
Now, all these years later, he’s still turning out some of the most consistently good poetry you’ll ever hope to find. It’s astonishing to me to think that he’s published somewhere around 130 books. Not only that, but California State University in its Locklin collection has catalogued more than 3,000 of his published poems! That’s just the ones they’ve found! My guess is the real number is significantly higher.
His newest book of poetry is called NEW ORLEANS, CHICAGO, AND POINTS ELSEWHERE. The poems in this 94 page volume are arranged roughly around the cities in which the action in the poems takes place. For my money, Locklin always seemed to be at his best when writing about either great art or great jazz (he’s a knowledgeable connoisseur of both) and the central section of this book is titled CHICAGO AND THE ART INSTITUTE. In it, he writes some pretty slick stuff about his visits to the Institute. I’ll quote one of my favorites in its entirety:
monet was one prolific motherfucker
all those haystacks,
all those lilies,
all those seascapes,
all those twilights on the thames…
as opposed to poor seurat,
known for one painting
(and a musical)
and caillebotte,
mainly for two,
(so far no musical).
but if you’re only going to be known
for a couple of great works,
you might as well make them
big ones.
and hope they end up centerpieces –
logos –
of a great collection.
Such a relaxed style. The man doesn’t even bother with capitals. It’s like he’s just talking to you…one on one…conversationally…friend to friend. Work like this - in fact, Locklin’s entire career as a writer - has contributed greatly to the humanization and demystification of modern poetry.
Aw, heck, I can’t resist quoting another poem from the book:
as time goes by
i speak to strangers
all the time now,
out of the blue,
impetuously,
hesitating only momentarily,
unable to stop myself,
on planes,
at the ymca pool,
in bookstores,
crossing campus.
i ask about the food they’re eating,
the wine or beer they’ve selected,
their destination, the weather,
the book they’re reading,
life in general.
to the woman who is on the flight
back from grading
advanced placement essays
in Daytona beach,
i say, of the power and the glory,
“that’s a great book.”
“unh-hunh,” she says,
and goes back to her reading.
well, how was i supposed to compete
with a great book like that?
No big deal here…no attempts to write the Great American Poem. This is just Locklin going through his day, showing us what life is all about. He’s been doing it for 40 years.
If you’ve never read a book of poems by Gerald Locklin…NEW ORLEANS, CHICAGO, AND POINTS ELSEWHERE is as good a place as any to start.
Copyright John Yamrus
December 31, 2006
Now, all these years later, he’s still turning out some of the most consistently good poetry you’ll ever hope to find. It’s astonishing to me to think that he’s published somewhere around 130 books. Not only that, but California State University in its Locklin collection has catalogued more than 3,000 of his published poems! That’s just the ones they’ve found! My guess is the real number is significantly higher.
His newest book of poetry is called NEW ORLEANS, CHICAGO, AND POINTS ELSEWHERE. The poems in this 94 page volume are arranged roughly around the cities in which the action in the poems takes place. For my money, Locklin always seemed to be at his best when writing about either great art or great jazz (he’s a knowledgeable connoisseur of both) and the central section of this book is titled CHICAGO AND THE ART INSTITUTE. In it, he writes some pretty slick stuff about his visits to the Institute. I’ll quote one of my favorites in its entirety:
monet was one prolific motherfucker
all those haystacks,
all those lilies,
all those seascapes,
all those twilights on the thames…
as opposed to poor seurat,
known for one painting
(and a musical)
and caillebotte,
mainly for two,
(so far no musical).
but if you’re only going to be known
for a couple of great works,
you might as well make them
big ones.
and hope they end up centerpieces –
logos –
of a great collection.
Such a relaxed style. The man doesn’t even bother with capitals. It’s like he’s just talking to you…one on one…conversationally…friend to friend. Work like this - in fact, Locklin’s entire career as a writer - has contributed greatly to the humanization and demystification of modern poetry.
Aw, heck, I can’t resist quoting another poem from the book:
as time goes by
i speak to strangers
all the time now,
out of the blue,
impetuously,
hesitating only momentarily,
unable to stop myself,
on planes,
at the ymca pool,
in bookstores,
crossing campus.
i ask about the food they’re eating,
the wine or beer they’ve selected,
their destination, the weather,
the book they’re reading,
life in general.
to the woman who is on the flight
back from grading
advanced placement essays
in Daytona beach,
i say, of the power and the glory,
“that’s a great book.”
“unh-hunh,” she says,
and goes back to her reading.
well, how was i supposed to compete
with a great book like that?
No big deal here…no attempts to write the Great American Poem. This is just Locklin going through his day, showing us what life is all about. He’s been doing it for 40 years.
If you’ve never read a book of poems by Gerald Locklin…NEW ORLEANS, CHICAGO, AND POINTS ELSEWHERE is as good a place as any to start.
Copyright John Yamrus
December 31, 2006
Sunday, January 07, 2007
Toad's Very First Blog
Why I Insist that Everything I Write is Fiction
Because I do not have direct access to the past, not a single moment of it, and no technology is so far able to capture the totality of it—and that is only speaking of externals—what of the totality of the continuing present of the consciousness, and that the past only exists to the extent that it is included in the manifest content of the consciousness, or as latent in the unconscious.
Because that’s why we call the past the past. Because we’ve lost it.
Because it ain’t the present, which waits for no man. We can reflect in the present but not upon it.
Because calling something “true” or “autobiographical” doesn’t make it any better anyway.
Because life is swifter than the pen. And truth is not transparent. And reality cannot be fully represented by any art—it can only be suggested. That is the art of art, the craft of the craftsman. Cf: Lessing’s Laocoon.
Because life cannot be represented in its fullness on a page or canvas or even a movie screen. Maybe someday technology will make such representation possible, though it is hard to imagine. But that would be the end of art and the triumph of technology. And, one might add, the end of freedom, of privacy as well.
Because, to think of it, we may not be far from it.
Because memory is fallible.
Because all these statements are just re-statements of each other.
Because I employ personae such as Toad and Jimmy Abbey precisely to deflate the assumption of autobiography.
Because a lot of what I write is just plain made-up.
Because a lot of what I write is intended to be comic, and comedy deals in exaggeration and understatement.
Because, having studied and taught the entire history of literature in the English language, I do not limit my conception of poetry to the romantic and “confessional” schools, or my conception of fiction to the “realistic.”
Because I write dramatic monologues and feel free to represent the spectrum of points of view on any issue in my work, not just “my own”: (which I am seldom sure of anyway).
Because the same is true of my fictional narrators and characters.
Because Fiction is different from Lying.
Because our times are already being spoken of by theorists as the Post-Human Era.
Because our defense mechanisms seem to demand that we rewrite and defuse reality or descend into hell.
Because I have listened to the opposing testimonies in divorce court. Not of liars, but of those convinced they were telling the “truth.”
Because, as Wallace Stevens said, “Things as they are/are changed upon the blue guitar.”
Because the green waves of external stimuli are altered by the blue categories of the consciousness.
Because fiction is accorded certain privileges and protections. Why toss them away?
Because a cop I knew had a sign posted prominently on the wall of his garage: “Admit Nothing.”
Because I have a good friend—a good writer--who won’t even speak to a cop during a traffic stop, but will insist in print, for all to read, that what he writes “really happened.”
Because, as Billie Holiday sings, “Ain’t nobody’s business but my own.”
Because the Cretan (from Crete, not to be confused with cretins) said, “All men are liars,” and “I am a man,” which set us off on an infinite logical regression.
Because it doesn’t matter either way: horizontally or longitudinally, up the paradigmatic axis or along the syntagmatic.
Because that’s why it’s called Imaginative Literature.
Yours truly,
(Or not),
Gerald Bloglin
P.S. Please do not expect any response to comments or queries. My books are strophe and antistrophe; thesis, antithesis, and synthesis/new thesis, new antithesis, new synthesis/newer thesis, etc.
P.P.S. Zeno was right. Well, half-right, maybe.
Copyright 2006 Gerald Locklin
No part of this blog may be used in any form without the written consent of the author.
Because I do not have direct access to the past, not a single moment of it, and no technology is so far able to capture the totality of it—and that is only speaking of externals—what of the totality of the continuing present of the consciousness, and that the past only exists to the extent that it is included in the manifest content of the consciousness, or as latent in the unconscious.
Because that’s why we call the past the past. Because we’ve lost it.
Because it ain’t the present, which waits for no man. We can reflect in the present but not upon it.
Because calling something “true” or “autobiographical” doesn’t make it any better anyway.
Because life is swifter than the pen. And truth is not transparent. And reality cannot be fully represented by any art—it can only be suggested. That is the art of art, the craft of the craftsman. Cf: Lessing’s Laocoon.
Because life cannot be represented in its fullness on a page or canvas or even a movie screen. Maybe someday technology will make such representation possible, though it is hard to imagine. But that would be the end of art and the triumph of technology. And, one might add, the end of freedom, of privacy as well.
Because, to think of it, we may not be far from it.
Because memory is fallible.
Because all these statements are just re-statements of each other.
Because I employ personae such as Toad and Jimmy Abbey precisely to deflate the assumption of autobiography.
Because a lot of what I write is just plain made-up.
Because a lot of what I write is intended to be comic, and comedy deals in exaggeration and understatement.
Because, having studied and taught the entire history of literature in the English language, I do not limit my conception of poetry to the romantic and “confessional” schools, or my conception of fiction to the “realistic.”
Because I write dramatic monologues and feel free to represent the spectrum of points of view on any issue in my work, not just “my own”: (which I am seldom sure of anyway).
Because the same is true of my fictional narrators and characters.
Because Fiction is different from Lying.
Because our times are already being spoken of by theorists as the Post-Human Era.
Because our defense mechanisms seem to demand that we rewrite and defuse reality or descend into hell.
Because I have listened to the opposing testimonies in divorce court. Not of liars, but of those convinced they were telling the “truth.”
Because, as Wallace Stevens said, “Things as they are/are changed upon the blue guitar.”
Because the green waves of external stimuli are altered by the blue categories of the consciousness.
Because fiction is accorded certain privileges and protections. Why toss them away?
Because a cop I knew had a sign posted prominently on the wall of his garage: “Admit Nothing.”
Because I have a good friend—a good writer--who won’t even speak to a cop during a traffic stop, but will insist in print, for all to read, that what he writes “really happened.”
Because, as Billie Holiday sings, “Ain’t nobody’s business but my own.”
Because the Cretan (from Crete, not to be confused with cretins) said, “All men are liars,” and “I am a man,” which set us off on an infinite logical regression.
Because it doesn’t matter either way: horizontally or longitudinally, up the paradigmatic axis or along the syntagmatic.
Because that’s why it’s called Imaginative Literature.
Yours truly,
(Or not),
Gerald Bloglin
P.S. Please do not expect any response to comments or queries. My books are strophe and antistrophe; thesis, antithesis, and synthesis/new thesis, new antithesis, new synthesis/newer thesis, etc.
P.P.S. Zeno was right. Well, half-right, maybe.
Copyright 2006 Gerald Locklin
No part of this blog may be used in any form without the written consent of the author.
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