L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E  P=O=E=T=R=Y

Aims are best grasped by what the movement opposed: {6}

Some Examples

With its playful tone and gentle mockery of social address, the poem is exactly about its subject, synaesthesia, which it aptly demonstrates later with the sky looks blue which feels like stilettoes / Sophia's plant is green, just like an 'E'.

Chronic Meanings by Bob Perelman has a looser associative thread of meaning, but all lines are opening words of everyday sentences: {12}

Why so pleasing? Because the lines themselves make us want to know more. And because they obliquely follow on from each other. What is Symbiosis of home and prison but staying put or confined in some way? 'Doing time' is serving a prison sentence, and 'superfluous' points out that time indeed stands still when we have nothing unusual to do: Then, having become superfluous, time. And then. And so on: the many teasing connections in the poem hardly need pointing out.

That sense of fun is apparent in Thinking I Think I Think by Charles Bernstein: {13}

Bernstein goes further by muddling phrases: Like sl(h)ips g(p)assing in the night. By adding riddling remarks: Search & displace, curse & disgrace. And thoughtful nonsense: The man the man declined to be. But it's fun, entertaining, not to be taken too seriously.

Though not deeply personal, poems have their own voices and takes on situations. Here is David Bromige sending up Rilke's Herbsttag. {14}

Language poets are not always adverse to using old forms, which they pull gentle fun of while still getting something out of. An example is Douglas Barbour's breath ghazals {15}

And common to many is an exactness in the speaking voice: they sound as a good radio script. Kit Robinson's line 56: {16}

For all their playful, throw-away appearance, considerable knowledge and literary skill is needed for these poems. The fragments have to be entertaining, and they have to 'sit right' in the lines.

The playful, the ludic, the 'just suppose' is an important element in art, and we'd be dull creatures not to respond. Naturally, being members of the avant garde, its exponents could lead critics a merry dance into the thickets of radical theory, {17} in which they may or may not have believed. L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E poetry is a clever art, sophisticated and fitfully entertaining. Perhaps it's not poetry as was, and undoubtedly it shirks larger responsibilities, but it anticipated our consumerist world of news snippets, ad men and political sound bites, becoming less radical when reality caught up with art.

A few of the better-known figures in the movement:

Bruce Andrews {18}
Rae Armantrout {19}
Steve Benson {20}
Charles Bernstein {21}
David Bromige {22}
Clark Coolidge {23}
Alan Davies {24}
Ray DiPalma {25}
Robert Grenier {26}
Carla Harryman {27}
Lyn Hejinian {28}
Susan Howe {29}
Steve MacCaffery {30}
Michael Palmer {31}
Bob Perelman {32}
Kit Robinson {33}
James Sherry {34}
Ron Silliman {35}
Barrett Watten {36}
Hannah Weiner {37}

1. Gertrude Stein. http://epc.buffalo.edu/authors/stein/.
2. Louis Zukofsky. http://epc.buffalo.edu/authors/zukofsky/
3. Of Time and Charles Bernstein’s Lines: A Poetics of Fashion Statements. Susan M. Schultz. Jul. 2001. http://jacketmagazine.com/14/schultz-bernstein.html. Extended Jacket (issue 14) article.
4. Ron Silliman. http://wings.buffalo.edu/epc/authors/silliman/ Author haomepage at EPC.
5. Bob Perelman. http://www.poets.org/. Listings on The Academy of American Poets.
6. L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E P=O=E=T=R=Y. 1999. http://www.poetrypreviews.com/poets/language.html. Short Poetry Previews article with links to books in print.
7. "Contemporary Poetry, Alternate Routes" an introduction to language poetry. Jerome McGann. 1988. http://www.writing.upenn.edu/%7Eafilreis/88v/mcgann.html. Extract from McGann, Jerome J., Social values and poetic acts : a historical judgment of literary work (Harvard Univ. Press, 1988).
8. Language Poetry and the Lyric Subject: Ron Silliman's Albany, Susan Howe's Buffalo. Marjorie Perloff. 1998. http://wings.buffalo.edu/epc/authors/perloff/langpo.html. Language poetry in context: essay with good bibliography.
9. After Free Verse: The New Non-Linear Poetries. Marjorie Perloff. 1998. http://wings.buffalo.edu/epc/authors/perloff/free.html.
10. Textual Politics and the Language Poets (excerpts). George Hartley (1989) Aug. 2004. http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/88/hartley.html. Emphasizes the political aspects of the movement.
11. Bernadette Mayer. Synesthetes at the Writers House. http://writing.upenn.edu/wh/about/mayer.html target="_blank".
12. Chronic Meanings. Bob Perelman. http://www.writing.upenn.edu/%7Eafilreis/88v/chronic-meanings.html. Poem from the book Virtual Reality.
13. Thinking I Think I Think. Charles Bernstein. http://www.fencemag.com/v1n2/work/charlesbernstein.html. Fence Magazine.
14. From Fall (Rilke into Californian) David Bromige. 1994. http://www.theeastvillage.com/tc/bromige/p3.htm. The East Village Poetry Web: Volume 4.
15. Breath Ghazal 17. Douglas Barbour. 1994. http://www.theeastvillage.com/tc/barbour/p3.htm. One of ghazals in The East Village Poetry Web: Volume 4.
16. Line 56. Kit Robinson. 2002. http://www.writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/robinson/robinson_line_56.html NNA.
17. Vernon Shetley, After the Death of Poetry: Poet and Audience in Contemporary America (Durham: Duke University Press, 1993), 139.
18. Bruce Andrews’s Venus: Paying Lip Service to Écriture Féminine. Barbara Cole. May 2003. http://www.jacketmagazine.com/22/and-cole.html.
19. Rae Armantrout. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rae_Armantrout Brief Wikipedia article with links.
20. Steve Benson. http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~wh/visitors/bensonbio.html. Bio from Kelly Writers House.
21. Charles Bernstein. http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/703. Academy of American Poets bio and links.
22. David Bromige. http://www.theeastvillage.com/tc/bromige/a.htm. Nine poems at The East Village Poetry Web.
23. Clark Coolidge. http://www.poetrypreviews.com/poets/poet-coolidge.html. Poetry Previews article and links to book.
24. Poetry in a Time of Crisis. Juliana Spahr. 2002. http://people.mills.edu/jspahr/poetrycrisis.htm NNA. Article on the poetry of Alan Davies.
25. Ray DiPalma. http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~wh/samples/dipalma.html NNA. Brief listings on Kelly Writers House.
26. Robert Grenier. http://wings.buffalo.edu/epc/authors/grenier/. Grenier author page at EPC.
27. Carla Hayyman. http://www.fact-index.com/c/ca/carla_harryman.html. Fact Center bio and listings.
28. Lyn Hejinian. http://www.literaryhistory.com/20thC/Hejinian.htm NNA. Listings at Literary History.
29. Susan Howe. http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/g_l/howe/howe.htm. Modern American Poetry page.
30. The Art Of Noise: Peter Finch Sounds Off. Claire Powell. http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/peter.finch/noise.htm NNA. Article on Peter Finch and contemporary music, mentioning Steve MacCaffery.
31. Michael Palmer. http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/98. Academy of American Poets bio and links.
32. An interview with Bob Perelman. Toh Hsien Min. Mar. 2002. http://jacketmagazine.com/16/perelman-toh.html. Jacket 16 interview.
33. Kit Robinson. http://www.writing.upenn.edu/epc/authors/robinson/ NNA. EPC bio and links.
34. In the Cold Earth and Beneath the Bluish Sky. James Sherry. October 2003. http://www.thebrooklynrail.org/poetry/oct03/jamessherry.html NNA. Long poem in the Brooklyn Rail.
35. Ron Silliman's Blog. http://ronsilliman.blogspot.com/. Much information on poetics and contemporary scene.
Barret Watten homepage at Wayne State University.
36. The Miraculous Objects of Hannah Weiner. Alan Clinton. Jun. 2002. http://nasty.cx/archives/000925.php NNA. Extended article in Nasty magazine.
37. Language Poetry, the legacy of "new poetries," and the contemporary avant garde. Al Fireis. Fall 2004. http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/88v/chap900a.html. Extensive references for course 88.
38. Small Press Traffic. http://www.sptraffic.org. Events, publications and personalities in the San Francisco poetry scene.
39. Modern and Contemporary American Poetry. http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/88/home.html. EPC's excellent listing.
40. SPD Online. http://www.spdbooks.org/. Represents over 500 small press publishers.