Literarisches Events (in and around Lawrence KS)

  • PATRICIA LOCKWOOD. Lawrence. Thursday, September 11, 7:00 p.m., Spooner Hall, KU Campus.
  • PATRICIA LOCKWOOD. Lawrence. Friday, September 19, 7:00 p.m. Lawrence Public Library. Sponsored by Raven Bookstore.
  • DENNIS ETZEL, JR. & RACHEL CROSS. Lawrence. Thursday, September 25, 7:00 p.m., Raven Bookstore, 6 E. 7th St.
  • TONY TRIGILIO. Lawrence. Thursday, Oct. 2, 4:00 p.m., English Room, Kansas Union, KU Campus. FREE.
  • CALEB PUCKETT & JUSTIN RUNGE. Lawrence. Thursday, October 16, 7:00 p.m., Raven Bookstore, 6 E. 7th St.
  • BEN LERNER. Kansas City, MO. Thursday, October 23, 7:00 p.m., Epperson Auditorium, Vanderslice Hall on the KCAI campus, 4415 Warwick Blvd.
  • KRISTIN LOCKRIDGE & ROBERT DAY. Lawrence. Thursday, December 4, 7:00 p.m., Raven Bookstore, 6 E. 7th St.

Saturday, October 4, 2008

New NO

I just got the new copy of NO: A Journal of the Arts. Like the previous issues, it's very swish - high production values and quality writing. It seems like NO started by publishing a few famous poets alongside "emerging" ones (and some who were a little of both). Then they started publishing more famous people, but also including much more visually adventurous poetry than in previous issues(poetry including pictures, even stitching; poetry demanding different typefaces; or a "landscape" page orientation).

This issue is pretty much composed of really famous poets (mostly over 60). And, while there's some dandy reproductions of visual art works, there's not as much of a visual sensibility to the poems (certainly not much use of the graphic possibilities possessed by a well-funded journal).

This is not to say that it's boring - it's not, by any means. There's a lot of really exciting, interesting writing by those really famous poets. But I do hope they continue to make room for some less-well-known, off-the-wall stuff - especially from poets who include pictures or push the spatial and graphic potential of the art nowadays.