Conceptualisms: The Anthology of Prose, Poetry, Visual, Found, e- and Hybrid Writing As Contemporary Art

A wide-ranging anthology of experimental writing--prose, poetry, and hybrid--from its most significant practitioners and innovators A variety of names have been used to describe fiction, poetry, and hybrid writing that explore new forms and challenges mainstream traditions. Those phrases include experimental, conceptual, avant-garde, hybrid, surfiction, fusion, radical, slip-stream, avant-pop, postmodern, self-conscious, innovative, L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E writing, alternative, and anti- or new literature. Conceptualisms: The Anthology of Prose, Poetry, Visual, Found, E- & Hybrid Writing as Contemporary Art is the first major anthology of writing that offers readers an overview of this other tradition as it lives in the early decades of the 21st century. Featuring over 100 pieces from more than 90 authors, this anthology offers a plethora of aesthetics and approaches to a wide variety subjects. Editor Steve Tomasula has gathered poems, prose, and hybrid pieces that all challenge our understanding of what literature means. Intended as a collection of the most exciting and bold literary work being made today, Tomasula has put a spotlight on the many possibilities available to writers and readers wishing for a glimpse of literature's future. Readers will recognize authors who have shaped contemporary writing, as among them Lydia Davis, Charles Bernstein, Jonathan Safran Foer, Shelley Jackson, Nathaniel Mackey, David Foster Wallace, and Claudia Rankine. Even seasoned readers will find authors, and responses to the canon, not yet encountered. Conceptualisms is a book of ideas for writers, teachers and scholars, as well as readers who wonder how many ways literature can live. The text features headnotes to chapters on themes such as sound writing, electronic literature, found text, and other forms, offering accessible introductions for readers new to this work. An online companion presents statements about the work and biographies of the authors in addition to audio, video, and electronic writing that can't be presented in print. Visit www.conceptualisms.info to read more. Contents Introduction 1. Writing Language Writing: A Preface (of Sorts) R. Henry Nigl | The Shout Artist (online) Kass Fleisher | The Speed of Zoom Scott Helmes | Non-Additive Postulations; The Division of the Soul Ben Marcus | from Notable American Women Bob Perelman | China; Confession Cole Swensen | Thought Experiment; Should Something Happen to the Heart; How Photography Has Changed the Human Face; Chaïm Soutine: Reeling Trees Harry Mathews | Translation and the OuLiPo: The Case of the Persevering Maltese Bhanu Kapil | from The Vertical Interrogation of Strangers Lyn Hejinian | from My Life Leslie Scalapino | Delay Series John Ashbery | Business Personals Noah Eli Gordon | from Novel Pictorial Noise Blake Butler | from Scorch Atlas Carla Harryman | from Adorno’s Noise 2. The Double Helix of Contemporary Writing & Contemporary Thought Charles Bernstein | The Lie of Art; Thank You for Saying You’re Welcome Michael Martone | Jaques Derrida Writes Postcards to Himself from a Diner in Winesburg, Indiana Lydia Davis | Story Joe Amato | from Under Virga William H. Gass | A Little Song of Suffering on Behalf of Prose Claudia Rankine | from Citizen Jonathan Safran Foer | Finitude: From the Permanent Collection Caroline Bergvall | Say: "Parsley" (online) David Foster Wallace | Reduced Brian Evenson | Altmann’s Tongue (online); House Rules Deb Olin Unferth | Brevity Lucy Corin | Some Machines Jenny Boully | from The Book of Beginnings and Endings Lidia Yuknavitch | The Chronology of Water Rachel Blau Duplessis | Draft 95: Erg Percival Everett | Confluence George Saunders | The Wavemaker Falters Robert Coover | The Return of the Dark Children Joshua Marie Wilkinson | from Meadow Slasher Steven Ross Smith | The Reader 3. Writing Technologies/Digital Wor(l)ds Jason Huff | from AutoSummarize Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries | Dakota (online); Nippon (online) Nam Le with Matt Huynh, Kylie Boltin, and Matt Smith | The Boat (online) John Cayley with Douglas Cape and Giles Perring | What We Will (online) The High Muck a Muck Collective Including Fred Wah, Jin Zhang, Nicola Harwood, Thomas Loh, and Bessie Wapp | High Muck a Muck (online) Charles Bernstein | The Yellow Pages (online) Stephanie Strickland and Ian Hatcher | Liberty Ring! (online) Lance Olsen with Tim Gutherie | The Nature of the Creative Process (online); 10:01 (online) Illya Szilak and Cyril Tsiboulski | Queerskins (online) J.R. Carpenter | The Gathering Cloud (online) David Jhave Johnston | Henry (online); Ouadane (online) Alan Bigelow | Silence; Last Words; My Life in Three Parts (online) Mez Breeze | V[R]erses: An XR Story Series (online) Scott Rettberg and Roderick Coover | Hearts and Minds: The Interrogations Project (online) Nick Thurston | from Of the Subcontract, Or Principles of Poetic Right 4. Architecture of the Page/Writing as Visual Form/Visual Form as Writing Lesley Dill | Blue Poem Girl Lee Siegel | from Love in a Dead Language, “The Kama Sutra Classic Comic” Johanna Drucker | from Narratology Lily Hoang | from Changing Tom Phillips | from A Humument Graham Rawle | from Woman’s World Susan Howe and Susan Bee | from Bed Hangings Rimma Gerlovina and Valeriy Gerlovin | Be-lie-ve & Absolute-Relative Douglas Kearney | Runaway Tongue 5. Clouds, Collage & the Aesthetics of Ripping & Mixing Miels Plenge with Charles Bernstein | The Answer (online) Davis Schneiderman | Drone-Space Modulator (online) Mark Z. Danielewski | from House of Leaves Frank Rogaczewski | So What Else Is New?; The Fate of Humanity in Verse Craig Dworkin | from Parse Amaranth Borsuk and Brad Bouse | from Between Page and Screen David Clark | 88 Constellations for Wittgenstein (to be played with the left hand) (online) 6. Reworking the Past & the Future & the Present Charles Bernstein | Before Time; Amberianum Richard McGuire | Here Fred Wah | Akokli (Goat) Creek; Havoc Nation; Hamill’s Last Stand; Chain; The Poem Called Syntax; (sentenced) Harryette Mullen | Bilingual Instructions; Black Nikes; Coals to Newcastle, Panama Hats from Ecuador; Denigration; Sleeping with the Dictionary Anna Joy Springer with Rachel Carns and Jane O'Neil | The Forest of Mandatory Innocence; The Forest of Peril That’s Real; The Forest of Good Bad Intentions; The Not Fake Parallel Forest; No Escape Hatch in the Forest (online) Michael Mejia | Coyote Takes Us Home Carole Maso | Deer Patrik Ourednik | from Europeana: A Brief History of the Twentieth Century Stacey Levine | And You Are? Salvador Plascencia | from The People of Paper Kate Bernheimer | A Star Wars Tale Rikki Ducornet | The Wild Child Hank Lazer | Dream; Torah; INTER(IR)RUPTIONS 5 Debra Di Blasi | “Winter” from Selling the Farm: Descants from a Recollected Past Lynne Tillman | Future Prosthetic@? 7. Sound Writing Steve McCaffery | The White Pages Nathaniel Mackey | Song of the Andoumboulou: 18, 19 & 20 (online) David Antin | stepping into the river (online) Ian Hatcher | All Hands Meeting (online) R.M. Berry | from FRANK David Melnick | from Men in Aida 8. DNA, Found Scores, Machine Writing & Other Post-Literature Literature David Buuck | Black Box Theater: United 93 Vanessa Place | from Tragodía Nick Montfort | from ppg256 Shelley Jackson | from SKIN Jhave | Spreeder: For EPC20 4am-5am Sept 11th 2014 (Part 1) (online) Eduardo Kac | Biopoetry Christian Bök | The Xenotext Experiment Credits "Anyone who looks beyond the bestseller lists can see that the literary landscape outside its commercial walls is just as varied as that of visual art, just as wild, just as conceptual: novels in the form of dioramas, narratives read through virtual-reality glasses, or told as a series of tweets, stories told as recipes, poems in skywriting, genetic code, pixels, skin-as well as print and sound. The 100+ prose works and poems that make up Conceptualisms all have the strangeness authors have always given ordinary speech in order to transform it into literature. In fact, this strangeness, or unfamiliarity, may be the very core of what makes writing literature, and pushed to its boundaries, what makes literature conceptual. Experimental, conceptual, avant-garde, hybrid, surfiction, fusion, radical, slip-stream, avant-pop, postmodern, self-conscious, innovative, L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E writing, alternative, anti- or new literature ... Across the years, a variety of names have been used to describe fiction, poetry and hybrid writing that, like conceptual visual art, foregrounds its ideas, explores new forms, challenges mainstream writing traditions, strives for ways to speak to the present. Along with whatever else they do, they ask, Why isn't this also literature?-and keep the boundaries of literature flexible and unresolved. Now, for the first time, here is an anthology that offers an overview of this other tradition as it lives in the early decades of the 21st century. The first major anthology of this other tradition, Conceptualisms presents writing by over 90 authors, across three generations, representing a plethora of aesthetics and approaches to their subjects. Readers will recognize authors who have shaped the nature of contemporary writing, such Lydia Davis, Charles Bernstein, Nathaniel Mackey, David Foster Wallace, and Claudia Rankine. They'll also find authors, and responses to the canon, that they haven't yet encountered. Conceptualisms is a book of ideas for writers, teachers and scholars, as well as readers who wonder how many ways literature can live"-- Provided by publisher A wide-ranging anthology of experimental writingprose, poetry, and hybridfrom its most significant practitioners and innovators A variety of names have been used to describe fiction, poetry, and hybrid writing that explore new forms and challenges mainstream traditions. Those phrases include experimental, conceptual, avant-garde, hybrid, surfiction, fusion, radical, slip-stream, avant-pop, postmodern, self-conscious, innovative, L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E writing, alternative, and anti- or new literature. The Anthology of Prose, Poetry, Visual, Found, E- & Hybrid Writing as Contemporary Art is the first major anthology of writing that offers readers an overview of this other tradition as it lives in the early decades of the 21st century.Featuring over 100 pieces from more than 90 authors, this anthology offers a plethora of aesthetics and approaches to a wide variety subjects. Editor Steve Tomasula has gathered poems, prose, and hybrid pieces that all challenge our understanding of what literature means. Intended as a collection of the most exciting and bold literary work being made today, Tomasula has put a spotlight on the many possibilities available to writers and readers wishing for a glimpse of literatures future.Readers will recognize authors who have shaped contemporary writing, as among them Lydia Davis, Charles Bernstein, Jonathan Safran Foer, Shelley Jackson, Nathaniel Mackey, David Foster Wallace, and Claudia Rankine. Even seasoned readers will find authors, and responses to the canon, not yet encountered. Conceptualisms is a book of ideas for writers, teachers and scholars, as well as readers who wonder how many ways literature can live.The text features headnotes to chapters on themes such as sound writing, electronic literature, found text, and other forms, offering accessible introductions for readers new to this work. An online companion presents statements about the work and biographies of the authors in addition to audio, video, and electronic writing that cant be presented in print. Visit (http://www.conceptualisms.info) www.conceptualisms.info to read more. Writing Language Writing : A Preface (of Sorts) -- The Double Helix Of Contemporary Writing & Contemporary Thought -- Writing Technologies/digital Word(l)s -- Architecture Of The Page/writing As Visual Form/visual Form As Writing -- Clouds, Collage & The Aesthetics Of Ripping And Mixing -- Reworking The Past/and The Future/and The Present -- Sound Writing -- Dna, Found Scores, Machine Writing, And Other Post-literature Literature. Steve Tomasula, Editor. Includes Bibliographical References. Electronic Reproduction. Baltimore, Md Available Via World Wide Web.