A New Book & Launches

TIMELY IRREVERENCE



Vancouver Launch, Saturday 13 April 2013: 7:45PM
WESTERN FRONT
305 E. 8th Avenue



Toronto Launch, Saturday 20 April 2013: 5:30PM
SUPERMARKET
268 Augusta Avenue



Hope to see you there!

aka bpNichol: a speculative biography

Last week I finished aka bpNichol, a preliminary biography by Frank Davey. I can honestly say that it was probably one of the strangest texts I've ever read on the subject of another person's life, and so I am now only thinking of it as a "biography" - just like that, in quotes. This is not to say that it was not interesting to read, but it should probably not be read as a biography of Nichol. Throughout the book, Davey discusses a number of intriguing things - the invention of the author persona by an author, for example, or the concept of a "psychotherapy poetics." Even the minimal historical context Davey provides about the rise and fall of The Coach House Press phenomenon makes the book worth reading, and given the climate of our current poetry culture, there is some worthwhile discussion about the anxiety that may or may not be produced when an author tries to produce both "honest" and "original" work under the weight of the cultural milieu in which they live. But in order to discuss these things, I don't think it was necessary to use a biographical framework of bpNichol, especially given the fact that Davey speculates so much about so many things. That and why Davey has chosen to focus in particular on embarrassing material about Nichol's early childhood is what sends the whole narrative off into questionable territory. What makes it all untrustworthy is Davey's choice to use, for the most part, Nichol's notebooks written as an adult, a recent history of Therafields, & Nichol's own poetry as evidence (Davey quotes nearly 600 lines of the Martyrology throughout the text, not one of which was asked for permission to use, I understand) to support his speculations. In fact, Davey didn't appear to talk to anyone who knew the man, and only quoted written . So, a "biography" aka bpNichol will have to be, now and forevermore. I would go so far as to call aka bpNichol a "speculative biography," which is a term that perhaps Nichol would appreciate, but maybe only the version of Nichol that Davey has presented his reader.

The question that remains is how to deal with this weird book moving forward. A biography of bpNichol was way overdue, but now that aka bpNichol exists, will anyone be able to work past it and create a more accurate picture of Nnichol's life and contribution of Canadian poetry? Probably the correct response would be a biography of bpNichol composed by a community of those who know him.

The Future of Literature

All this kaffuffle with the Globe & Mail "letting go" or "reassigning" Martin Levin and Jack Kirchhoff from the Book Section, which will still (apparently) continue their "stellar" coverage of books and literature even though they are slashing the section and folding it in with their Focus section (after already reading globe articles about the shifting plane of literary publishing -- the death of the mid-list author for instance, or the changes in the landscape that have left House of Anansi Press (who are now using musicians to decide what is good literature) as the largest Canadian owned publishing firm in the country) has me thinking that the future of literature is likely not in books, but in Television or Film, and it will be published in Hollywood.

BookThugs & TroubadourSlaves

Come out on 31 January to see me and Michael Menegon jam music and poetry together into an evening of unpredictable entertainment. There is also a lot of chocolate available!

What: BookThugs & TroubadourSlaves (Jay MillAr & Michael Menegon in concert)
When: 31 January 2013, 7-11pm
Where: COCO, 365 Jane Street, just south of Annette.
Why: Why not? Chances are you might hear me read all of ESP, some fungal poems, a few select "cover tunes" and some poems from my forthcoming collection Timely Irreverence. And Michael will be playing all sorts of things too – original songs and accompaniment.
How: Where there is a will there is a way to get to COCO.

Back

I was gone for a while again. Not that I actually went anywhere. But it is now 2013 -- and i turned 42 -- isn't that strange? It seems like a good number, even, quiet, and sure of itself. I am in the midst of dealing with various things -- anxiety mostly. Who knows where this stuff comes from or why it sticks around the way it does, but it sure is annoying and why not become happy or even content with oneself? The world isn't so bad, even if it is going to pot. In fact, the world doesn't even care -- it's like the world can't be critical because it is so particulary indifferent, so you have criticize your self all by yourself. So I'm trying to lift myself up and over all that stifling self awareness this year. Should be fun.

Oddest Industry Ever

This week I wound up thinking a lot about why I do what I do from the point of view that we are defined by what we do to earn money -- the "why bother" factor crops up again and again when I do that. Fred Wah asked me about this in an interview this week, both with regard to writing and publishing, and I found myself staring off into space unable to formulate an answer despite knowing that I hold a pure and deep belief that what I write and what I publish IS important. People who live their lives doing "normal jobs" (I don't know why I call them by this name since my life feels pretty normal most of the time, but I suppose it serves a purpose here to label them as such) constantly use the term "courageous" when they find out the details of what I do as a writer and a publisher. I have met other people in the publishing industry (usually people who have made savvy choices and work for large corporate publishers) who tell me they are so glad that publishers like BookThug exist because the companies they work for would love to publish the kind of work we publish but when such projects cross an editor's desk they are ultimately rejected by the firm's finance department. And the miniature "business guy" inside me thinks: that's pretty smart, I should get a finance department. But I'd have to pay said department more than my yearly budget to publish 15-20 books of literature to turn the things I want to publish away. And after they tell me how courageous I am these people don't buy any of the books I publish anyway, so I guess I'm stuck in the cottage industry the mass media as defined for me. So yay!

Secret Blogging

It has been ages since I wrote anything here on this blog. I have often begun to write out my thoughts on something and then suddenly hit a wall: It dawns on me that no one cares about what I think, mostly because what I think couldn't possibly be of interest to someone I don't know. So why bother with the diffraction of publicity? It's a hurdle. So in the interest of leaping over hurdles I am challenging myself to write publicly in this space while considering it an act of secret blogging.