The best description I can give
Would be that if you looked at new spring snow
Which has a fine grain size
About an hour after dawn or an hour before sunset
You'd see the same spectrum of light
That an alien astronomer in another galaxy would see
Looking at the Milky Way [more inside]
posted by thirteenkiller
on Jan 13, 2012 -
10 comments
R.M. Berry on Samuel Beckett's peculiar writing style: "It's as though the narrator's words were almost thoughtless, accidental, written by someone paying no attention to what he or she says." Beckett is best known for his play
Waiting For Godot, in which "nothing happens, twice", but he was also an accomplished writer of prose, ranging from the relatively simple
Three Novels to the extremely minimal
Imagination Dead Imagine. Some of Beckett's more challenging short plays are available on YouTube:
Play (
pt. 2),
Not I (the famous "mouth" play), and
Come and Go, one of the shortest plays in the English language (ranging between 121 and 127 words, depending on translation).
Once he interviewed John Lennon and found out who the eggman really was. Beckett's final creative work was his poem
What Is the Word.
posted by Rory Marinich
on Jun 25, 2011 -
41 comments
Should you find yourself wandering around the city of Leiden, the Netherlands sometime, you may
notice some curious markings on the city's walls.
These
Muurgedichten ("Wall Poems") adorn many of the town's streets
(clickable map), and many English-language poets are represented:
one John Keats, for instance, inside a bookshop;
Dylan Thomas,
E. E. Cummings,
W.B. Yeats, some guy
called William Shakespeare, or this
ode to Charlie Parker by American
William Waring Cuney.
[more inside]
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane
on Apr 5, 2009 -
15 comments
The Gawain Project is an ongoing translation of the late 14th century anonymous poem
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (originally written in Middle English) into Modern English, for the amusement of Arthurians and anyone who likes a good story.
[via mefi projects]
posted by Effigy2000
on Feb 13, 2009 -
18 comments
It began when Mr. Klinsky threw in his two cents, a vague request that a poem he had written for and about his family be lodged in a wall somewhere, Ms. Sherry said, “put in a bottle and hidden away as if it were a time capsule.”
Sometimes when you make a simple suggestion about the remodeling of your $8.5 million 5th Ave. apartment, the designer goes a little
overboard. In an awesome way. Don't miss the
slideshow.
posted by Who_Am_I
on Jun 12, 2008 -
81 comments
Anglo-Finnish artist
Sanna Annukka's vibrant, flat design work (especially her
Icons series) got me curious about her, well, iconography.
She mentioned
The Kalevala previously, the Finnish national epic poem (
in Finnish here), a tale of creation and heroism that arguably spurred the Finns to independence from the Russians.
Like so much else epic and awesome, it spawned a '70s prog band, with
three albums.
posted by klangklangston
on Feb 25, 2008 -
23 comments
Being But Men. Every year around this time, this interstitial runs and I am reminded of the genius of Dylan Thomas and how much fun it must be to make interstitials for TNT.
[more inside]
posted by The Bellman
on Dec 10, 2007 -
8 comments
Too Hot To Hear.
Fifty years ago today, a San Francisco Municipal Court judge ruled that Allen Ginsberg's Beat-era poem "Howl" was not obscene. Yet today, a New York public broadcasting station decided not to air the poem, fearing that the Federal Communications Commission will find it indecent and crush the network with crippling fines. More on Allen Ginsberg
here.
Via.
posted by amyms
on Oct 5, 2007 -
69 comments
The time for more public poetry is at hand with the soon-to-arrive National Poetry Month. Perhaps you favor love poems?
Poets and Writers listed the 25 best (among those online:
#1,
2,
4,
6,
7,
9,
13,
15,
19). Or perhaps ballads with a beat?
This was once considered the best example, but this
offensive poem is even more famous. Of course,
nonsense is
good, as is
alliteration. Eager to take your own turn? Try some
complex forms.
Double sestina, anyone?
posted by blahblahblah
on Mar 27, 2005 -
21 comments
The notorious
Laura (Riding) Jackson, mistress and muse to Robert Graves, among others, is back with a new
poem in the New Republic last week. There's a new biography and a new anthology coming out too, but the best things to read are her tirades to the New York Review of Books in response to critiques of her work by
Paul Auster and
Harry Matthews.
posted by oldleada
on Feb 17, 2005 -
17 comments
Elimination Dance A quicktime movie based on Michael
Ondaatje's
poem. "The rules of the dance are simple: if the caller announces a circumstance that has occurred in the lifetime of you or your partner, you must leave the dance floor at once."
posted by dhruva
on Dec 15, 2004 -
29 comments
From all over the media has recently attacked us
'bout the hangover cure made from extract of cactus
Taken hours before drinking, may ward off the curse...
...but only Charles Osgood has
reported in verse.
posted by britain
on Jun 30, 2004 -
4 comments
