The Astonishment Tapes

Talks on Poetry and Autobiography with Robin Blaser and Friends
Erscheinungsjahr 2015
ISBN: 978-0-8173-5809-9
Verlag: University of Alabama Press

Buch, Englisch, 344 Seiten, Paperback, Format (B × H): 152 mm x 226 mm, Gewicht: 544 g

Reihe: Modern and Contemporary Poetics

The Astonishment Tapes is the edited transcript of revealing autobio­graphical audiotapes recorded by the groundbreaking poet Robin Blaser, a founding member of the Berkeley contingent of the San Francisco Renaissance in New American Poetry.

Robin Blaser moved from his native Idaho to attend the University of California, Berkeley, in 1944. While there, he developed as a poet, ex­plored his homosexuality, engaged in a lively arts community, and met fellow travellers and poets Robert Duncan and Jack Spicer. The three men became the founding members of the Berkeley core of what is now known as the San Francisco Renaissance in New American Poetry.

In the company of a small group of friends and writers in 1974, Blaser was asked to narrate his personal story and to comment on the Berke­ley poetry scene. In twenty autobiographical audiotapes, Blaser talks about his childhood in Idaho, his time in Berkeley, and his participation in the making of a new kind of poetry. The Astonishment Tapes is the ex­pertly edited transcript of these recordings by Miriam Nichols, Blaser’s editor and biographer.

In The Astonishment Tapes Blaser comments extensively on the poetic principles that he, Duncan, and Spicer worked through, as well as the differences and dissonances between the three of them. Nichols has edited the transcripts only minimally, allowing readers to make their own interpretations of Blaser’s intentions.

Sometimes gossipy, sometimes profound, Blaser offers his version on the inside story of one of the most significant moments in mid-twenti­eth century American poetry. The Astonishment Tapes is of considerable value and interest, not only to readers of Blaser, Duncan, and Spicer, but also to scholars of the early postmodern and twentieth-century American poetry.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Blaser, Robin

Nichols, Miriam

Über Autor(innen)

Robin Blaser was a pathbreaking poet and, along with Jack Spicer and Robert Duncan, a founding member of the San Francisco Renaissance in poetry. His work has been recognized with Canada’s most distinguished literary awards—a Griffin Award for lifetime achievement and the Griffin Poetry Prize for his collected poems. He was also made a member of the Order of Canada for his contribution to the arts.

Miriam Nichols is the editor of The Holy Forest: Collected Poems of Robin Blaser and The Fire: Col­lected Essays of Robin Blaser.