Gilgamesh, some musings about fonts

Just finished revising 40 pp of my first draft of Gilgamesh.  Boy, tablet I & II were really a mess.

I noticed something kind of funny, and maybe one of the 3 or 4 people who read this site would like to comment.    I didn’t have the original font (Garnet) installed on the computer I was working on, so the printout came in Arial.   For some reason, I found it immensely easier to cut and radically change the MS, I think, than if I was using the fancy font.   I’ve decided to use only ugly fonts from now on, at least when drafting.  I think having something look pretty on the page gave me the misplaced perception that a work was finished.  I’m even wondering if I should drop the whole pretty font entirely from submitting as well.  After all, what if someone dislikes the font.  It’s probably better to use something more common in any case, to be on the same footing as everyone else.

All this is probably a bit–I don’t know–ironic in the context:  Gilgamesh was originally written in cuneiform, with a wedge shape on wet clay which was then baked or dried.

New link: Car Rental Australia (seriously)

Car Rental Australia has a little information about
Australian literature and very good links.  Far and away the
best literary page on any car rental site I’ve seen.

Added new site: Kim Drone

Kim Drone posts her work and provides a forum for other poets.

Fun with Etymology

Did you know words for black and white come from the same root word?  bhel-, indo-european for the colors in fire and ash: cf. blanche, black, blanco (Italian, white), alba (through metasthesis).  I speculate also blank (from blanco?).  For more fun check out the Indo-European roots index here.

Wordsandpoetry.com Says:
January 25, 2009 at 3:32 pm   edit

NEW! PROOFREADING,CRITIQUE AND PUBLISHING SERVICES FOR WRITERS OF POETRY AND MANUSCRIPTS! INTRODUCING, “WORDSANDPOETRY.COM” poem and manuscript proofreading, critique, book publishing, poetry contest, message board, -also featuring web advertising for published authors/writers!

  –>Will add to pmpoetry.com tonight…

Added new site

Just added PoemHunter.com to the search sites.  It looks very useful.

Alexander’s poem: an explication

There is also explication posted on Daniel Klotz’s website.   At times, he seems to belabor the obvious:

Allusion abounds. Many of the images are poignant
because they call up greater significance in our minds.
“Picked the cotton,” for instance, is about much more
than just any person in any field picking any cotton.
It alludes to our national history and to racial disunity
that continues to permeate our culture.

Aside from that quibble, he presents a good read. It might be very worthwhile to include this in a secondary school poetry class.

Alexander’s poem critiqued

I’ve seen some ungenerous reviews of Alexander’s poem on the web.

Obama Inaugural Poet Elizabeth Alexander Gets D Minus in Poetry Composition

Adam Kirsch on Elizabeth Alexander’s Bureaucratic Verse at The New Republic.

and another on the London Times that I can’t seem to find the link for.

Elizabeth Alexander’s poem

The full text, with lineation is on the New York Times website.

I’ve been thinking a lot about Elizabeth Alexander’s poem, as I’m sure a lot of other poets have. It is a remarkable and rare moment that poetry gets any kind of public attention, at least in the US.

It was extremely accessible piece.  It left me wondering how close a poem could be to ordinary speech without ceasing to be a poem. 

I don’t think the inauguration would have been a good place to trot out poetic pyrotechnics, what Mary Leader once simply summed up as “fancy.” 

Another problem with presenting a poem before millions is nuance and ambiguity, hyperbole, any of which might make for an interesting poem, but leave an audience puzzled or offended. 

Is the Washington Mall the place to read any good poem?

No, really, I should get moving

OK, New Year’s resolution, update my blog and website more often.