The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry Edited by Alan Kaufman and S.A. Griffin
1999
Weight: 2.4 lbs
Method of Disposal: Left in a Lending Library
I purchased this way back when Waldenbooks was a store, and I worked there. I was young and the rebellion of the poetry spoke to me. Re-reading it as an adult, I had quite different impressions of so many of the authors. The editors did a great job getting writing from all sorts or people and compiling it in the way they did. The authors they chose are well-respected and well-known.
Here are some of my thoughts:
1. There are a lot of male authors that are beside themselves with fascination for women who work in sex work and for what it means for them to be sex workers. These woman are called all sorts of names but rarely are they considered to be women or people outside of their work.
2. Some people think if you insert sex the shock value will turn something magically into art. I like sex, and I like writing. I like kinkiness, honesty, and all the intense details. I am not taken by sex for shock's sake.
3. Sometimes women seemed to try to write with this same energy and misconception.
4. It is important to remember the time something was written in and that sometimes that can change the whole value of a poem.
5. Reading anything in the midst of a pandemic changes your outlook on what you are reading.
6. I most enjoyed reading Penny Arcade, Maggie Estep, David L. Ulin's tiny poem, "Mendal's Law." I liked Abbie Hoffman's "School Project for the 80s."
7. There are some seriously strange thoughts men have about their moms, their lovers, their sexual partners, their muses. I did not see a lot about friends. I saw that all of those blurred together in their writing and, truly, women became objectified. They generally showed up on the page as a mirror, to say something about the men who were writing the poems.
1999
Weight: 2.4 lbs
Method of Disposal: Left in a Lending Library
I purchased this way back when Waldenbooks was a store, and I worked there. I was young and the rebellion of the poetry spoke to me. Re-reading it as an adult, I had quite different impressions of so many of the authors. The editors did a great job getting writing from all sorts or people and compiling it in the way they did. The authors they chose are well-respected and well-known.
Here are some of my thoughts:
1. There are a lot of male authors that are beside themselves with fascination for women who work in sex work and for what it means for them to be sex workers. These woman are called all sorts of names but rarely are they considered to be women or people outside of their work.
2. Some people think if you insert sex the shock value will turn something magically into art. I like sex, and I like writing. I like kinkiness, honesty, and all the intense details. I am not taken by sex for shock's sake.
3. Sometimes women seemed to try to write with this same energy and misconception.
4. It is important to remember the time something was written in and that sometimes that can change the whole value of a poem.
5. Reading anything in the midst of a pandemic changes your outlook on what you are reading.
6. I most enjoyed reading Penny Arcade, Maggie Estep, David L. Ulin's tiny poem, "Mendal's Law." I liked Abbie Hoffman's "School Project for the 80s."
7. There are some seriously strange thoughts men have about their moms, their lovers, their sexual partners, their muses. I did not see a lot about friends. I saw that all of those blurred together in their writing and, truly, women became objectified. They generally showed up on the page as a mirror, to say something about the men who were writing the poems.
