Following is a broad swathe of books & zines that were picked up by Ahadada Books at Montreal’s Expozine. A few reviews will follow once I have the opportunity to read through these finds. Where possible, I have supplied a link to the publisher or ordering information; please, if you know of a better link — let me know! Click on the thumbnail to get a more detailed scan of the cover image.
Matrix 68, editors Fiorentino & Allan; Erin Moure, Paul A Tosh, Suzanne Dery, Corey Frost, Stephen Heighton, Bill Bisset, Billy Mavreas
Monster Island! 2, editor Billy Mavreas; Harold Chackowicz, Salgood Sam, Marc Bell, Leila Majeri, Carolos Santos, Francis Hitchings, Jake Brown, Young Adonis, Jesse Bochner, Andy Brown, Marc Ngui, Shawn Jefferies, Sara Tonin, Francis Hithings, Egerton Sykes, Zachary Silberberg, Patrick R. Burger, Joe Ollman, John Mavreas, Owen Plummer, Meaghan Garner, Helene Brosseau
Bywords Quarterly Journal, Vol. 2, Issue 3, various editors, i.e. Amanda Earle, Charles Earle, Steve Artelle; Kim Stouffer, Barbara Phillips, Adele Graf, Margaret Malloch Zielinski, Ronnie R. Brown, Marianne Bluger, John Cloutier
Stationaery, Issue 2, editors Daniel Spitzberg and Ilya Zaychik; Anca Szilagyi, Uzodenma Okehi, Aliya Pabani, Nathaniel G. Moore, Patrick Eamonn, Matthew Hollet, Paul Kremsky, Melissa Reiter, Daniel Cambil
We’re recently back from Montreal and, despite the dipping mercury and a light dusting of snow, we’re warmed by the afterglow of Expozine. It was an amazing event, proving that Montreal is a fertile ground for the mini, micro, and small presses, cartoonists, and zinesters. We picked up a lot of small mags, books, and ephemera! We’ll make a note of things received and recommended over in Notes & Queries, when we have a chance to scan some images and leaf through the reams. It’s going to be a fun week!
Until then, enjoy the short clips of the event that we’ve put up. Of course, more pictures, reviews, and scans coming shortly!
David Howard is a major New Zealand poet. He sent us his Collected Poems 1980–2000 (Steele Roberts Ltd.) to be considered for the Dark Poetry Project. Here are two fine poems from that collection:
Charm
I’ll ride your smile
into the night. Here,
take the nails
from my index fingers
for security: I’ll come
back. Carefully
adjust your kiss
until it slips
under this collar
bone. Open
my body: pick
the rib that carries
the curve of your breast–
set
that bone between
an oak and an elm
as a cradle
for our child.
Inter Alia
1.
Winded, this tree
fell: you said
‘resting’
and reached
through its rings to
me, breathing
lightly.
2.
You reached
through the hole in the apple
where the worm turned
to me.
3.
Now the wind shakes us until we
slip off the edge of our dream.
Fugitives, we cower
under the wing of the screech-owl
who nested in the fallen tree,
who chewed on the knowledgeable worm.
Nancy D. Tolson is an assistant professor at Illinois State University where she teaches both Black and Children’s Literature. Her publications include essays in Children’s Literature Association Quarterly, African American review, and theafricanamerican.com. Her creative writing can be found in Journal of the Association for Research on Mothering and Tales of Africa (1999). She and her husband are currently being raised by their three children Kenneth, Kinnethia and Kindyl.
These excellent poems draw on both children’s story telling and the African-American experience.
Momma’s Boys
They moved the body
What?
They moved the body yesterday
Where were you suppose to be?
At the house waiting for Momma.
Why weren’t you there?
She never came. So I went looking for her.
Why did you go there?
That’s where she was, wasn’t it?
What did you see?
They were digging her up.
Who was?
The white people on the hill, George, Abe, and Truman.
Where did they put her?
In the trunk and drove off. She was mad.
Did you follow them?
Yeah.
Where’d they go?
Behind the gate!
Then what?
They tried to bury her again.
Where?
Behind the gate in front of the house.
Where?
In front of the house, behind their gate.
The front?
Yep, I saw them.
What did you do?
Nothing.
Nothing? Why didn’t you do something?
Momma took care of them.
How?
Thunder struck them.
All three?
All three.
What did you do?
I rolled them in the hole they dug for her.
Where’s Momma now?
In the car.
In the trunk?
No, she drove me here.
Night Visitor
I smelled Daddy last night in my room.
That old cologne he wore filled my nose.
Jimmy smelled him this morning when he got up.
He woke me up with his smell.
He sat and rocked in his rocking chair in the corner.
He said I reminded him of Momma.
He laughed, missing those front teeth.
He said that I even snored like her.
I asked why didn’t he just look at Momma
Since she was dead too
He said cause Momma wasn’t there.
A few years back I sent out a call for an anthology of “Dark” poems–meaning poems written in the spirit of Melville in Pierre, or Lautreamont. The project died from a dearth of good material. We did, however, hear from some very interesting writers, and we hope to work off our karmic debt by printing some of their work on this blog site.
First up is S.K. Kelen, an Australian poet of some accomplishment. The following poem is from Atomic Ballet, published by Hale & Iremonger’s Contemporary Australian Poets series.
Koki Market
Koki market on the beach
next to the village on stilts
over the water. Where you can
buy fruit and vegetables at native prices.
Red stains of betel nut spat
everywhere on the ground. Pedlars sit
behind their goods all laid out
on small grass mats. Gossiping
and arguing in Pidjin and Motu.
Fifty Papuan soldiers march by
to the joy and pride of a group of
laughing girls. Naked children
play while a red-brown man with no legs,
held up by crutches, looks sadly over a
universe of waves to heaven. A youth with
Afro hair and a shirt with a picture of Che
screams revolution at the seagulls
but the sounds of living drown him.
I buy a coconut from a woman
whose tattooed head’s a thousand years old.
Smells of cooking and tobacco and
rotting fruit pervade the air.
Pure sky touches the horizon of
the jade desert.
Old women wade
into the sea, cast their
fishing lines. Out on the reef
the wing of a Japanese transport plane
stands like a broken soldier.
As I was reading the Winter volume of R.H. Blyth’s classic 4 volume study of Haiku, a colleague of mine, the genial Chiaki Kaise noticed what I was doing and mentioned that he had been a student of Blyth’s as a young man. I asked him to write a brief memoir about Blyth and just today he gave me the sketch below. Kaise sensei, I might add, has one of the clearest and most precise pronunciations of English I have encountered in Japan. After you read this you will understand why.
R. H. Blyth as an English Teacher
Before I began to learn English at the University of Tokyo, I had known the name of Reginald H. Blyth, because I used to listen to his voice on old-fashioned 78 records when I was still a highschool student. These gramaphone records for students of English were first put on sale in 1951. I immediately bought them to practice my English. Professor Blyth’s pronunciation was extremely clear, beginning with short sentences and short stories which I imitated over and over again from beginning to end. The basis of my English, especially my pronunciation of English, is due mainly to his excellent recordings. In this way, I began to take much interest in learning English. At that time, Professor Blyth was a tutor of the Japanese Crown Prince (now the Emporer), and that is why he was asked by the record company to read English model pronunciation.
Then it was in 1956 when I was in the third year at the University of Tokyo that I personally met Professor Blyth in class. His way of speaking English was as clear as ever and his talking very instructive. He taught us mainly English poems, often citing similar examples from Japanese haiku poets. Also he suggested reading Ralph Waldo Emerson in class and we read a few pages of Emerson’s writings at every meeting. Professor Blyth was himself a poet and a philosopher. Our class had only 15 students and we were all enthused by his lecture every time. This is a long time ago, but I still remember his talks and his teachings, and his influence on me.
In conversation Kaise sensei mentioned that Blyth was considered a bit eccentric in his mannerisms by his students. He usually rode a bicycle to class, and often he would sit for minutes at a time in silent meditation before he began each lesson. I thank Professor Kaisei for sharing his memories with us. It would be interesting to try to find the set of recordings that he mentions and to hear Blyth’s voice.
Ahadada Books will be at Expozine this upcoming Sunday. It’s Montreal’s best (and only) small press, comic and zine fair.
bq.. **When**: Sunday, November 28, 11 - 6 p.m.
**Where**: Station C, 1450 St. Catherine St. E. at the corner of Plessis (near Beaudry Station). See the map below.
**Cost**: Free to the public!
p. As Melora Koepke writes in [”The Hour”:http://www.hour.ca/books/books.aspx?iIDArticle=425]:
bq.. Expozine is a kind of church-bazaar-like marketplace where Montreal’s small press, comix and zine avatars set out their wares for everyone to see, in the basement of one of the city’s most imposing religious structures.
“Last year’s event was overwhelming beyond compare and exactly what we were hoping for, so this time, we’re three times bigger!” continues Mavreas. “It really is the cultural event of the season. People can see all the madness: It’s one-stop shopping. French and English, poetry and comix. In one glimpse, you can get a huge overview of the Montreal cultural scene.”
It’s a lot of fun to peruse table after table of stuff: Carefully bound small-press volumes, zany zines, soft-core comix, gold-gilt posters, voodoo dolls, buttons, stickers and all manner of strange things to put in your pocket. This year, the long list of exhibitors includes everyone from small-press bastions to fresh faces.
p. We’ll have copies of all our books currently in print as well as our current catalog. The Ahadada Street Team will be there as well, snapping photos and taking video. We’ll post the results upon our return from Montreal.
For more information, and to see a list of small presses that will be featured at Expozine, check out their [”website”:http://www.expozine.ca/].
Ahadadians Daniel Sendecki and Jesse Glass outside of the Kabukiza Theatre in Ginza, Tokyo on 9 August 2004. Behind us are posters that herald the opening of “Tôkaidô Yotsuya Kaidan“; guaranteed to give anyone the chills, the story is replete with murders, ghosts and sadistic cruelty — comparable to the transpacific meetings Jesse and I occasionally enjoy! Alas, tickets were hard to come by and Jesse and I were unable to attend the showing. Rather, we spent the day taking in the sights around Ginza, and enjoying a sushi lunch.
To provide a little more information regarding the Glass/Sendecki venture that is Ahadada books, I thought I’d reprint a snippet of an interview from the Muse Apprentice Guild which ran in the fall of 2003.
Do you have any close associations with younger writers whose development as a writer you are supporting and nurturing?
… my most recent connection with a younger poet has resulted in a publishing venture. Dan Sendecki, a Canadian, met me over the winter holidays a couple of years ago in Tokyo. From that meeting Ahadada Books was born. Not only is Dan a writer of talent, but he’s also a book designer, cover artist, publicist-the real deal. Coach House Press does our printing and our books are beautiful. Our latest offering is Marton Koppany’s Investigations & Other Sequences. We’ve also done on-line volumes of John Solt’s and Rick Peabody’s.
What is your connection with the small press?
Richard Kostelanetz convinced me of the importance of the small press early on. I began my own efforts in 1974 with a homely little mimeo magazine called Goethe’s Notes. The remarkable thing about it was that this tiny publication attracted so many accomplished writers. It was learning about contemporary literature truly by the seat of my pants, and having fun while doing it. I went on to establish Goethe’s Press and published a few nice chapbooks after that.
On a recent trip back to the U.S. I opened an old foot-locker I’d stacked away in a closet and found signed copies of books by William Matthews and Daniel Mark Epstein, as well as scads of little magazines in which I had published in the 1970’s. Aleph, edited by Mel Raff, was a fine one. And the elegant Gargoyle. I found back numbers of Guardino’s Gazette, edited by Len Guardino, a friend of Langston Hughes, and a former editor of Hughes’ Poetry World. Who has ever heard of him? He was a generous editor, though, a nice guy and his magazine is still a good read. I’m sure he’s publishing it in Heaven.
By the way, where did that name ahadada come from?
Many folks see a deep significance in it, but actually my son Yoichi used to call me that when he was just beginning to talk. I thought it was cute and used it for my Internet name. There’s no real connection with urinals or Hugo Ball or hobby horses, though Dan uses Duchamp’s urinal as our logo.
Daniel Sendecki and Jesse Glass outside of the Kabukiza Theatre in Ginza, Tokyo on 9 August 2004. Behind us are posters that herald the opening of “Tôkaidô Yotsuya Kaidan”; guaranteed to give anyone the chills, the story is replete with murders, ghosts and sadistic cruelty. Alas, tickets were hard to come by and Jesse and I were unable to attend the showing. Rather, we spent the day taking in the sights around Ginza, and enjoying a sushi lunch.
One of the earliest E-Maki, or art-scrolls in Japan depicts hoards of Gakki or hungry ghosts involved in various activities in order to appease their hunger, including eating corpses and ordure. The interesting thing about this scroll is that the “ghosts” are remarkably real looking–in fact, with their distended bellies and scant hair, they look for all the world like a group of outcast people with the symptoms of extreme malnutrition. Furthermore, these ghosts do not have the typical features of the Japanese, who are also depicted in the scroll going about their Heian-era business. My opinion is that far from being the fanciful pictures of supernatural beings, these hungry ghosts are actually outcasts who were forced to live in just the manner as they are shown in the scroll. What group of people with Caucasian features are historically known to have been living in Japan at that time? The Ainu.
This following passage from page 71 of Strickmann’s Chinese Magical Medicine seems particularly germane: [please read Japanese for Strickmann’s Chinese]
“…Like the Indian demonology, Chinese conceptions of the realm of the extra-human included a wide range of beings. Moreover, as in India, human outsiders were always at risk of undergoing instant demonization. The ‘foreigners’ who figure so picturesquely as ghouls and monsters in the Book of Mountains and Seas included not only the residents of politically distinct states but also the various non-Chinese people or aboriginals living in close proximity to Chinese towns and villages. Such underprivileged non-Chinese were assimilated to animals, if not to demons; the very names assigned to them in Chinese are written with classificatory elements setting them among the beasts….Even within the larger cultural area, dehumanization and demonization were (and still are) a frequent means of reinforcing identity and group solidarity….”
Of course, there could have been other groups living in Japan that we simply don’t know about; or perhaps the anonymous artist of the scroll had traveled to other countries to see the lives of starving outcast groups, still it’s interesting to think that perhaps this scroll is an early ethnographic record of those Ainu that attempted to live among the Japanese at about the same time as the Norman Conquest.
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