First Reviews Are (Coming) In for Punks

Punks has been out roughly two and a half weeks, but it has begun to receive some very good, thoughtful reviews. They include 

• a fine review, the very first official one, on the Poetry Foundation's Harriet site by David Woo; 
• a starred review in Publishers Weekly; 
• a selection as one of Entropy's (soon to be RIP) Best Poetry Books of the last two years;
• one of Hyperallergic's Favorite Poetry Books of 2021 picks, reviewed by Albert Mobilio;
• and a wonderful initial review by the incomparable Samuel R. Delany on Facebook.

If you had asked me back in January or June what I thought might be the response, I'd probably have said I'd be happy if it sold through the first printing. This isn't false modesty but my earnest acknowledgement of the (years') long and arduous process it took for this book to make it into print. As it also turns out, however, it is Small Press Distributor's BEST SELLER for the month of November! Many thanks to all of the publications, reviewers and readers so far!

Please consider purchasing a copy ($20), from The Song Cave (it ships internationally too) or other retailers, and do recommend it to others if you think they might be interested and ask your local bookstores and libraries to order copies if you can! 

Thanks so much!

Punks' Official Debut

It's official! Punks, my new book of poems is officially in the world! You can order a copy directly from my publisher The Song Cave, via Small Press Distributors, and from bookstores (such as Barnes & Noble to Powells.com, etc., as well as the behemoth) around the country!

This collection, which includes a selection of collaborative poems with the late poet Cynthia Gray, experienced many false starts over the years on the way to publication, but once I connected with The Song Cave editors, talented poets in their own right Alan Felsenthal and Ben Estes, Punks was on the road to publication!

Please consider ordering a copy or at least urging your local bookstores--very important to support them--and your local libraries to order copies if you can. If copies are in bookstores people will see them and consider buying them and if libraries purchase them far more people have the opportunity to read them!

Many thanks to everyone who helped me and this book along the way, and enjoy! 

Abdulrazak Gurnah Wins Nobel Prize in Literature

Abdulrazak Gurnah on Gravel Heart
(via YouTube.com)

I haven't blogged much this year, for a variety of reasons, but I did want to post a brief item about this year's Nobel Laureate in Literature, Abdulrazak Gurnah. A native of Zanzibar (now a constituent part of Tanzania) who emigrated to the UK in his teens, Gurnah (1948-) is a fiction writer, critic and emeritus professor of English and Postcolonial Literatures at the University of Kent. The Swedish Academy praised Gurnah for his "for his uncompromising and compassionate penetration of the effects of colonialism and the fates of the refugee in the gulf between cultures and continents," which is an excellent and concisely encompassing description of Gurnah's short fiction and ten novels, which include his debut, Memory of Departure (1987), the highly acclaimed Paradise (1994), By the Sea, which was listed for the Booker Prize and the Los Angeles Book Prize), Desertion (2005), and his most recent, Afterlives (2020). 

In being named Nobel Laureate last week Gurnah becomes the first Black Nobelist in Literature of the 21st century, the Black literature prize winner first since Toni Morrison in 1993, and only the sixth African writer over all to receive the Literature Prize. He also is the first ever native of what is now Tanzania to receive a Nobel Prize. Congratulations, Abdulrazak Gurnah!

As some J's Theater readers may recall, in the lead-up to each year's Nobel Prize in Literature I used to post my thoughts, speculations, critiques, etc., but after the award to Bob Dylan back in 2016 and the scandals that led to the temporary cessation of the award a few years later, I thought to myself, why bother? Clearly the Academy, which was and perhaps still riven by internal issues, remains Eurocentric in its outlook, has made some dodgy selections in recent years (cf. the last two laureates (2019 and 2020)), is determined to go its own route, whatever the damage the public's feelings about its legitimacy and judgment. 

The Gurnah choice seems like a very good decision on the merits and in light of the recent flubs, and while there are numerous other figures, not least Ngugi wa Thiong'o, whom I might have selected first, I believe Gurnah is an important and vital writer and critic--one of the greatest of his generation--and gilds the Nobel Prize with his receipt of this international honor.

More writeups about Gurnah's Nobel honor:

Guardian UK: Abdulrazak Gurnah wins the 2021 Nobel Prize in Literature

NY Times: Abdulrazak Gurnah is awarded the Nobel Prize in literature

All Africa: Tanzania: Nobel Prize Winner Abdulrazak Gurnah: An Introduction to the Man and his Writing

PBS: Watch Abdulrazak Gurnah wins Nobel Prize in literature

The Standard: Gurnah's win of the Nobel Prize raises hope for African writers

Publishers Weekly: Abdulrazak wins 2021 Nobel Prize in Literature

Cape Talk/MSN: Novelist Abdulrazak Gurnah opens up about his books and 2021 Nobel Prize win

Brittle Paper: 10 novels by Abdulrazak Gurnah

The Complete Review's writeup on Abdulrazak Gurnah's Nobel Prize

Translation: Jesús Cos Causse (on Poets.org's Poem-a-Day)

Today, thanks to poet, translator and critic Rosa Alcalá, who curated the poems appearing on The Academy of American Poets' September "Poem-a-Day" roster, you can read my translation of the late and truly great Afro-Cuban poet Jesús Cos Causse's poem "Mirando Fotos," or "Looking at Photos." 

I will say as little as possible here, beyond thanking Rosa, as well as Kristin Dykstra, Herbert Rogers and Prof. Jerome Branche, who were invaluable in helping me get in touch with Cos Causse's son Camilo, who provided permission to run the translation, and to MR Daniel, who sent me the poem many years ago (2007), and which I posted on this blog.

It took me 14 years but finally, here is the translation, with short notes about the poem itself and about Cos Causse, as well as me reading it in both English and Spanish (forgive me, Spanish speakers).  

You can find all of this at the link above or here.

Enjoy!

Moviegoing (Pandemic) - April (Final)

And now, one year and one month later, I have wound down my pandemic-spurred moviewatching (I of course will continue to watch films and TV shows avidly), to conclude with the following films I shoehorned in during a very busy April. It was almost a blur, but I did remember to write down the following films and shows. Please do share your thoughts about any of these films or entries, throughout the entire past year, in the comments!

April's films:

Señorita* (a trans gem from the Philippines, by Isabel Sandoval)

Yellow Fever* 

Caught

Monkey Business*

Horse Feathers*

Relic (1, 2, 3, 4)*

Charles and Lucie* (a Nelly Kaplan film, my first introduction to her work)

A Very Curious Girl* (Kaplan's feminist masterpiece)

Papa, the Lil' Boats*

Watermelon Man* (I'd seen this a few times in the past) 

How to Take a Bath

Lovers & Lollipops

The Homecoming* (rewatched this)

Outside the Wire* (Damson Idris & Anthony Mackie + SF = worth it)

Monsoon* (Henry Golding's & Parker Sawyers's characters in love - well done)

Lime

Copa 181 (It needed a bit more depth, but interesting nevertheless)

Dr. Strangelove*

Guilt 

Moviegoing (Pandemic) - March (One Year)

So one year has passed--one year of the pandemic (which actually arrived in the US in December 2019 or perhaps January 2020, to be a bit more factual--since I began recording the films I watched during the dog days of Covid-19's devastating rampage, which is not over, let me state in no uncertain terms, though we now have more effective vaccines and greater knowledge about how it spreads, infects, and so on. As I noted in March of last year, I began watching films (I always watch TV shows) because I was struggling to read for pleasure or get through anything not work-related and thus required; my anxiety was off the charts but I found I could sit through films. I have catalogued thus far many of the ones I watched, though I'm sure I missed quite a few few, but reviewing the list, it really represents quite a range in terms of style and approach, with a strong emphasis, as I noted last year, on features and shorts, and far less on documentaries. (My cinematic mind is akin to my literary one, it seems, with a preference for poetry and fiction over nonfiction.)

Here is my list for March of this year:

One Night in Miami* (imagine Dr. King, Muhammad Ali, Malcolm X, and Sam Cooke all convened for one night in Miami -- enough said)

You Only Live Once* (the 1937 version, not the more recent one)

A New Leaf (this movie, directed by Elaine May, is so odd and awful it's actually quite interesting)

The Palm Beach Story* (Claudette Colbert, Joel McCrea, classic Hollywood divorce shenanigans)

Song of Freedom* (beautiful Paul Robeson film)

Rock 'n Roll High School* (an old fave)

Boneshaker* (a short, by Nuotoma Bodomo)

The Pleasure of Love* (Oh, Nelly Kaplan....!)

Other People (Molly Shannon is the main reason to watch this)

The Lady Eve* (Barbara Stanwyck & Henry Fonda one of her iconic roles)

Sullivan's Travels* (Veronica Lake in one of her iconic roles)

The Legend of Nigger Charley* (Fred Williamson stars as an escaped, self-empowered enslaved man, pursued by a bounty hunter)

Sergeant Rutledge* (Woody Strode in a career-defining performance as a soldier accused of raping a White woman)

Posse* (an old fave)

Kevin Jerome Everson films* - We Demand, Fastest Man in the State, Black Bus Stop

Owusu films* - Drexciya, Reluctantly Queer, Pelourinho: They Don't Really Care about Us

Plastic Bag* (Rahmin Bahrami's short about a...a plastic bag)

Putney Swope* (a successful racial satire of the kind we rarely see today)

Queen of Diamonds (Nina Menkes film, did little for me)

Permanent Vacation* (an early Jim Jarmusch film that gives a glimpse at what was to come in his work, as well as the New York of its era (1980))

The Reflecting Skin* (a vampire movie with a twist - eerie & refreshing)

The Inland Sea* (visually striking film about one of Japan's interior seas)

Insignificance* (Nicolas Roeg's unusual film that somehow works)

Love The One You're With* (the 2021 Black gay Sampson McCormick film about a couple's dying relationship)

Red Carpet, Hashtags & Heartbreak (a Black gay dramedy)

[Wyatt Cenac's commentary on Criterion Channel] 

Moviegoing (Pandemic) - February

I posted a bit on my Blogaversary (Blogiversary?), not too long ago, so I will keep this entry brief. Every day of almost every week day this month was packed with one thing or another, I have been Zooming nonstop yet sitting still (go figure), chairing, conducting remote readings, and so forth. I also have a new book (poetry!) in the works for later this year (wish me luck!).

Here's February's list:

Lupin* (series - I could watch Omar Sy in anything but this was an immense treat)

Plutão (short)

Urano* (Brazilian short by Daniel Nolasco)

The Breeding* (Extremely disturbing, on many levels)

The One You Never Forget* (tender queer short)

Gay Agenda films on HereTV: Bill & Robert, Diary Room, Floss

My Culture (Mario Bobino film, not super memorable)

Pretend It's a City (Scorsese & Leibowitz - it got a bit tiresome after a while, though I'm a fan of his and hers)

The Tall Target* (a historical thriller, starring Dick Powell & Adolphe Menjou & directed by Anthony Mann about a thwarted attempt to assassinate Abe Lincoln)

Ghost Dog, The Way of the Samurai* (an old favorite)

Thomasine & Bushrod* (Gordon Parks' take on the western, starring Vonetta McGee and Max Julien, star of The Mack)

A Season in France* (my introduction to Mahamet- Saleh Haroun & one I highly recommend)

Abouma* (another Mahamet-Saleh Haroun success)

Cotton Comes to Harlem* (Chester Himes' detective novel vividly realized, starring Godfrey Cambridge & yummy Calvin Lockhart & Raymond St. Jacques, directed by Ossie Davis)

Take a Giant Step* (Philip Leacock's 1959 film about a Black teen coming of age in a racist environment, the film stars Ruby Dee, Beah Richards, Estelle Helmsley and budding singing star Johnny Nash ("I Can See Clearly Now"))

Daratt* (translating to Dry Season, this is one of this Mahamet-Saleh Haroun's masterpieces)

A Screaming Man* (another haunting & remarkable film from Mahamet-Saleh Haroun, Chad's gift to the world of filmmaking)

Pressure* (Horace Ové's powerful portrait of 1970s Black London/Britain)

Celebration* (YSL documentary - very good)

The Brother from Another Planet* (an old fave)

Black Lightning* (series, new season - love love love) 

16th Blogiversary

The Translation Project's Black
History Month tweet, from February 21, 2021,
 highlighting my essay "Translating Poetry,
Translating Blackness"

Happy Black History Month and Happy Almost-End-of-February 2021. We are almost a year into the Covid-19 pandemic, and it has been over a year since I posted on this blog. It sometimes amazes me that more than a decade and a half has passed since I first began blogging, back in 2005, during what was a decidedly different time in the online world. Social media platforms as we know them barely existed; blogging was still a somewhat new and exciting activity, though the bloggers who inspired me had been blogging for several years; and people read and commented on blogs, including this one. I have over 2,000 non-spam comments attesting to that. 

16 years later, blogs and blogging do still exist, and the term "the blogs" is often bandied about on reality shows as a catch-all for any site, blog or not. This is the case despite that period perhaps ten years ago when some in the media trumpeted blogging's demise, and despite the proliferation of quasi-blog-like sites, like Tumblr and Instagram, the former of which has done away with words altogether, and both of which are now part of many peoples' daily consumption, even if blogs as they once existed--as they existed in 2005--seldom are. I won't rehearse my blogging history, which is available via a search of this prior blogiversary posts on blog (I started off blogging about poetry and the arts, etc.), but blogging here was, at least for that first year, and certainly for the next decade or so, a vital experience for pondering the sometimes imponderable, conveying some of my enthusiasms and interests, especially across the arts, posting translations, sharing photographs (from daily life, events I attended, my random walks through NYC, Chicago and elsewhere), and just having a scratchpad to play, in written form.

Things began to change demonstrably, I think, in 2014-2015 when I began chairing a department. My free time increasingly disappeared, which meant that that I had to rearrange my priorities, with some things suffering more than others, among them blogging. (A colleague queried whether I had In 2013, my second year at Rutgers-Newark (I was acting chair for part of that year) I blogged 140 times; by 2014 it had fallen to 59. I made an effort over the next few years to blog a bit more and got up to 78 and 71 blog posts, successively, in 2015 and 2016, but my entries plummeted in 2017. In 2018, I again made a strong push to blog, and nearly reached 100 posts, but most of them that year appeared during National Poetry Month, and by the end of the year, I was down to a 1-a-month trickle. Two years ago I only managed six posts, a miracle I sometimes think, in that I had one of my busiest and most draining years in academe, and I think I consciously tried to post something, though the results were, as the total underscores, paltry. 

This past year, the Covid-19 pandemic, which is still very much with us, didn't result in a flood of posts, but rather a feeling of PTSD-style wordlessness, at least in terms of blogging, that I am still trying to process. I had a few blog stubs I began, and I will try to finish some of them, even if they consist mostly of links and images, but I also feel like the silence--the absence of posts--is testimony to what has transpired over these last 17 months (since February of 2020). Most of the people who were blogging when I began or who started during the last 16 no longer do so, at least regularly, though Gukira bucks that trend, with entries that are always rich, subtle, lyrical, and distinctive, however brief. This month he continues his readings of Dionne Brand's remarkable 2018 collection The Blue Clerk. I keep thinking that I will again be able to find the time and focus to blog, but I also increasingly feel, as I pointed out in a blog several years back, reading itself appears  fallen by the wayside, and videos, whether on Youtube or IG's stories--which Facebook, tellingly, has adopted, even though it owns Instagram--or TikTok, accompanied by music and each with its own distinctive set of active participants, have become increasingly predominant, so perhaps even occasional posts, as loose and free as possible, might be the thing to aim for.

One of the many types of blog posts I tried to include over the years entailed reviews, of films, series videos, and books of course, and I feel proudest of some of those, which still hold up. One of my most read posts (4,100 views) is a short review of Christopher Honoré's 2010 feature film Homme au bain, starring the writer Dennis Cooper and the porn star François Sagat. Perhaps its stars drew more readers than most of my other posts, though I think it provided a helpful introduction to the film, the best I have seen by Honoré. I also have been able to write about more recent offerings like Terence Nance's 2018 Afrofuturist masterpiece series Random Acts of Flyness (one of the strangest and most original things I have ever seen on TV), Boots Riley's 2018 film Sorry to Bother You (I dream of more films like this!), and John Trengove's 2018 film Inxeba (Wound), which also spurred a series of typically, thoughtfully dazzling responses from Gukira (Ke'guro). One of my favorite films, which I haven't seen in years, is Tsai Ming-Liang's slow, astonishing Goodbye, Dragon Inn. I remember watching it and thinking, the viewership for a film like this is probably very small, but I most certainly am one of those cineastic people, yet in reviewing it, I tried to make it legible for a wider array of potential viewers. Perhaps if and when I find the opportunity I'll try a few more reviews this year, so keep an eye out.

I'll wind down here, and say that I feel like I've accomplished something just by posting something on this blog today. (I also deleted a slew of spam comments, which also felt like an achievement!) I am still chairing and teaching (including a graduate novel workshop this semester) and supervising theses, all via Zoom (like everyone else), every day of every week feels even more busy than usual (each seems to be triple-booked at a minimum in terms of Zoom meetings, calls, etc.), and my stack of required reading grows and grows, but it feels invigorating even to have gotten this far in this post. It is here. It is done. & I am going to try to post more.

Moviegoing (Pandemic) - January

A new year has begun and we are already at the end of its first month, though not without drama. On January 6, 2021, supporters of DJT attempted to storm the Capitol and overturn a legitimate election in which Joe Biden and Kamala Harris soundly and roundly defeated DJT and Mike Pence. In addition to extensive damage, several dead cops, one dead coup participant, unfulfilled threats to kill the sitting Vice President (some of the coup participants erected a gallows outside the Capitol and others chanted "Hang Mike Pence") and extensive destruction to the buildings, as DJT watched on, failing to quell the violence, the House and Senate were able to certify Biden's victory and he is now President of the United States. Covid-19's strains are still raging, but there are vaccines, social distancing continues, we have adapted in ways large and small at home, at work and in the wider world, and while we're not out of the abyss, there seems to be path upward and forward. My January films included:

Hasaki Ya Suda*

Twaaga*

The French Lieutenant's Woman* (I read Fowles' novel before I saw the film years ago & both, I must say, are very good)

Ministry of Fear*

The Age of Swordfish

Easter in Sicily

The Pub

Snuck Off the Slave Ship*

Lo Cal Hero

Frantz Fanon: Black Skin, White Mask

Les Saignantes* (I want to see much more by this director)

Yeelen* (remarkable)

Phoenix

White Elephant

Zumbi Child*

Blackmail

Kill List

Sorry We Missed You

Draw Me Now

Intimate Stranger

Space Is the Place* (I love Sun Ra & this film)

Marianne & Julianne

Mon Oncle*

Date with Dizzy*

Moonbird*

Dadli*

Flores* (I watched it again, it's short & beautiful)

Money Movers

Rome, Open City* (a classic)

Persona* (I have watched this film maybe 10 times!)

Poetry In Motion*

The Grass Is Always Greener

What Women Want: Gay Romance

Living for the Weekend* (series)

The Boys of Rio

Stranger than Paradise* (an old fave) 

Happy New Year (2021)!

At the Oculus, WTC, NYC

May this year bring us all much better tidings than the relentless, Covid-19-ridden horrorshow of 2020! Health, prosperity, healing, hope, love & real change!

Happy New Year!

Feliz año nuevo

Feliz Ano Novo

Bonne année

Buon Anno e tanti auguri

Kull 'aam wa-antum bikhayr

Aliheli'sdi Itse Udetiyvasadisv

Na MwakaMweru wi Gikeno

Feliĉan novan jaron

聖誕快樂 新年快樂 [圣诞快乐 新年快乐]

Bliain úr faoi shéan is faoi mise duit

Nava Varsh Ki Haardik Shubh Kaamnaayen

Ein gesundes neues Jahr

Mwaka Mwena

Pudhu Varusha Vaazhthukkal

Afe nhyia pa

Ufaaveri aa ahareh

Er sala we pîroz be

سال نو

С наступающим Новым Годом

šťastný nový rok

Manigong Bagong Taon sa inyong lahat

Feliç Any Nou

Yeni yılınızı kutlar, sağlık ve başarılar dileriz

نايا سال مبارک هو

Emnandi Nonyaka Omtsha Ozele Iintsikelelo

Subha Aluth Awrudhak Vewa

Chronia polla

Szczesliwego Nowego Roku

Kia pai te Tau Hou e heke mai nei

Shinnen omedeto goziamasu (クリスマスと新年おめでとうございます)

IHozhi Naghai

a manuia le Tausaga Fou

Paglaun Ukiutchiaq

Naya Saal Mubarak Ho

(International greetings courtesy of Omniglot and Jennifer's Polyglot Links; please note a few of the phrases may also contain Christmas greetings)