Author Archives: genericpronoun

Anarchism and the Experiment: “Poetry is radically communal”

The concept of language as a part of the common is one shared, implicitly, by all the poets in my project, in some form or another, but it is articulated most clearly and explicitly in Duncan’s work. For example, in a late poetic series, Dante Études, he writes: Go, my songs, then in zealous liberality,Continue reading “Anarchism and the Experiment: “Poetry is radically communal””

Anarchism and the Experiment: How do we read the illegible?

To work against the relatively[i] conservative scholarship of Perloff, my project employs, perhaps contentiously, the work of Craig Dworkin, who often works closely with, and pays homage to, Perloff. To be sure, Perloff’s extensive bibliography has done its part to bring radically experimental poetry to the forefront of poetic study in the last twenty years.Continue reading “Anarchism and the Experiment: How do we read the illegible?”

Anarchism and the Experiment: Who is the author?

Because I have privileged authorship (and its destabilization) as the most important aspect of the experimental poetic text, I should here spend some time discussing what experimental authorship entails, and how its problematizing of traditional authorship is a politically-charged activism. As with any contemporary discussion of shifting perspectives of authorship, this discussion begins with theContinue reading “Anarchism and the Experiment: Who is the author?”

Anarchism and the Experiment: What is an experimental poem?

It is important at this juncture to define the parameters of the experimental poem for my work. I have opted for the term “experimental”[i] over the term “avant-garde”[ii] for a number of reasons, not the least of which is the military connotation of the latter. I also employ Graeber’s skepticism of vanguardism, which is, IContinue reading “Anarchism and the Experiment: What is an experimental poem?”

Appendix(n): A Note on “Terrorism”

I realise that in 2013 in North America, I write about terrorism in a vastly different political climate than the one in which Bey wrote in 1985. I am also acutely aware that my use of the term is not without political motivation or desire for controversy. Following the attacks of September 11th, 2001, theContinue reading “Appendix(n): A Note on “Terrorism””

What is Postanarchism?: Hakim Bey and “Poetic Terrorism”

In 1985, when Bey published The Temporary Autonomous Zone; Ontological Anarchy; Poetic Terrorism, he did so, at least in part, out of frustration with an anarchist-activist movement that had stalled, suffering from the aforementioned unidimensional and unidirectional approach that failed to account for a society in which we must understand power as diffuse and pervasive.Continue reading “What is Postanarchism?: Hakim Bey and “Poetic Terrorism””

What is Postanarchism?: Theorizing Anarchism

At this juncture, I should make a brief note about the explicitly political, activist nature of these theoretical texts, and of the political philosophy behind them. While I maintain that these texts are valuable to literary study (and invaluable to the creation of a postanarchist literary theory), I do not want these literary elements toContinue reading “What is Postanarchism?: Theorizing Anarchism”

What is Postanarchism?: Poststructuralism and Postmodernism

Aside from Hakim Bey, who coins the term in 1985 (and who I will discuss in more depth momentarily), arguably the most important writer on postanarchism is political philosopher Todd May, whose 1994 book, The Political Philosophy of Poststructural Anarchism, paved the way for later texts that sought the inherent anarchism of poststructural philosophy. May’sContinue reading “What is Postanarchism?: Poststructuralism and Postmodernism”

What is Postanarchism? A Brief Introduction

Despite recent interest in incorporating political philosophies into literary studies, one of the most interesting, and potentially most useful, contemporary political philosophies, postanarchism, has not, as of yet, been given adequate attention as a literary theory. Yet elements of postanarchism are not only readily available as literary theories, they also allow incorporation of political activismContinue reading “What is Postanarchism? A Brief Introduction”