Course Map
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- Access-the-Course-Map for Students New to Coursera online and SloPo Courses
- Course Overview with Sample Poems and Sample Discussion Thread
- The Library
- Week One and Two Materials: Ethnopoetics & Shaking the Pumpkin
- Jerome Rothenberg Assemblage of Materials: From Ethnopoetics to his own poetry and his work on A Big Jewish Book — texts, audio, video.
- The Q&A with Jerome Rothenberg
- Week Three Materials: Contemporary American Indian Poetry
- Week Four Materials: Pacific Islander Poetry
- Week Four Materials: Contemporary Caribbean Anglophone Poetry
- Week Five Materials: Contemporary African-American Poetry
- Week Six Materials: Contemporary Latinx-American Poetry and Performance
- Week Seven Materials: Contemporary Asian-American Poetry
- Week Eight Materials: The Ghazal, Contemporary Middle-Eastern and South-Asian Poetry
- RETURN TO COURSERA COURSE SITE PAGE
Jerome Rothenberg at the Kelly Writers House on September 10, 2015.
We will be sending questions to Jerome Rothenberg, and closing our section on his work, moving on entirely to contemporary poems written in English(es). This page will remain live as a resource for you going forward.
For now, feel free to wander around through this material, especially if there’s something new you are curious about and haven’t yet discussed in the forums. I will mark with a ****** the works that I think you MUST engage.
Rothenberg Biography and Poems at poetryfoundation.org
******Preface (1971) to SHAKING THE PUMPKIN by Jerome Rothenberg (text)
Ethnopoetics – Companion to 20th C Poetry (text)
OralPoetry. The_Princeton_Encyclopedia_of_Poetry_and_Poetics_F…_—-_(Pg_1017–1020) (text)
EthnopoeticsThe_Princeton_Encyclopedia_of_Poetry_and_Poetics_F…_—-_(Pg_502–503) (text)
And I suggest as a complement to Ethnopoetics and (Human) Poetics that you might want to go to the webpage on Jacket2 assembled from materials gathered when and where the photo above was taken. https://jacket2.org/podcasts/jerome-rothenberg-interviewed. This page contains a link to a lively discussion, described as here: “On September 10, 2015, Jerome Rothenberg re-visited the Kelly Writers House to give an evening reading. A few hours earlier, Ariel Resnikoff and Al Filreis met Rothenberg in the Wexler Studio for an extended interview/conversation that ranged across many epochs, poetic modes, and topics. Among them: the new young German poets of the mid- to late 1950s; the world of Jewish mystics Rothenberg discovered as a young poet; his time as a Masters student studying Dickinson and Whitman with Austin Warren at the University of Michigan in the early 1950s; “the four great Jewish objectivist poets”; Armand Schwerner; somewhat sudden access to major commercial presses for his anthologies in the late 1960s; Robert Duncan’s recommendation of Gershom Scholem; Paul Celan; and Rothenberg’s forays into the problem of representing the unsayable of genocide.”
******Magic Words and More More More Magic Words Inuit (text)
******Rothenberg’s Commentary on Magic Words and More More More Magic Words (text)
(One of us felt that the poems from Rothenberg were labor, lacking in the beauty one finds in poetry. I think that’s a valid point as I did pick mostly the most “disorienting” poems on the page, a decision made by the tranlators of those poems. These following poems are not “Total Translations” but I think they do convey a sense of well-being and a full moon…so here are some poems you might find pleasing, a completely reasonable desire.) from SHAKING THE PUMPKIN, the poems I’ve picked are (in one file the poems, in a second file the notes):
poem to ease birth and other poems (text)|
| NOTES on poem to ease birth and other poems (text)
1.poem to ease birth (Aztec), 2. Eskimo songs about People & Animals, 3. Conversations in Mayan, 4. Mud Events, 5. Gift Event, 6. Tepehua Thought-Songs, 7. what happened to a young man in a place where he turned into water, 8. four poems by Ray Young Bear, 9. Three Ghost Dance Songs.
*******excerpt -ted-chiang-the-truth-of-fact-the-truth-of-feeling A fictionalized version of an encounter between a boy from an oral culture who learns writing and reading from a missionary.(text)
THE HORSE SONGS ARE EXTREMELY COMPLEX AND DIFFICULT __ YOU MAY WANT TO SAVE THEM FOR ANOTHER TIME WHEN YOU CAN FULLY FOCUS ON THEM.
*****THIS IS NECESSARY TO READ BEFORE TACKLING THE HORSE SONGS: Total Translation: An Experiment in the Translation of American Indian Poetry by Jerome Rothenberg (text)
THE HORSE SONGS ARE VERY DIFFICULT TO MANAGE IN THEIR COMPLEXITY — ALTHOUGH I MARKED THEM WITH A ****** YOU CAN ALSO SAVE THEM FOR ANOTHER TIME!!!!!
*****Horse Songs of Frank Mitchell Navajo (text)
*****Horse Songs – Jerome Rothenberg(1977). Audio recording of vocal performance. On this tape are multi-track recordings of Rothenberg singing his “total translations” based on some of the 17 “Horse Songs” in the blessingway of Frank Mitchell, a Navajo from Chinle, Arizona who lived from 1881 to 1967
*****The 13th Horse Song of Frank Mitchell (4:53): MP3
*****from The First Horse Song of Frank Mitchell: 4-Voice Version (3:30): MP3
Horse Songs (four voices, 1978)
*****Rothenberg’s Commentary on Horse Songs (text)
Rothenberg’s Commentary on Ceremony of Sending (text)
15 Flower World Variations Yaqui. Translated by Jerome Rothenberg
Rothenberg’s Commentary on Five Flower World Variations
https://www.thing.net/~grist/l&d/lekyyq.htm
http://worldartswest.org/main/discipline.asp?i=25
http://territorymagazine.com/territory/2016/3/26/a-family-tradition-yaqui-easter
https://www.brink.com/wonder/yaqui-easter/
******Below is the beginning of the 12 Songs to Welcome the Society of Mystic Animals.
Shaking the Pumpkin – The Society of the Mystic Animals. The full text – p. 13 – 37
******Rothenberg’s Commentary on Shaking the Pumpkin – Society of the Mystic Animals (text)
Below is A Song from Red Ant Way
Rothenberg’s Commentary on Red Ant Way (text)
The Flight of Quetzalcoatl Aztec. Translated by Jerome Rothenberg (text)
From A Book of Events . edited & arranged by Jerome Rothenberg (text)
Sweat-House Ritual 1 Omaha English Version by Jerome Rothenberg from Alice Fletch and Francis LaFlesche (text)
Link back to our ModPo Group page: https://www.coursera.org/learn/modpo/discussions/forums/63bK9W4YEeauRRJJoih4XQ/threads/W-mCBOWFQDipggTlhWA41A?sort=createdAtDesc
I’d like us to not only think about Rothenberg’s “translations” from SHAKING THE PUMPKIN but his own works also. Both his own poems and some of the ethnopoetic work he did with Hebrew, Jewish, and Yiddish tradition.
We want to be sure to be familiar with some of the work from Poland/1931, including
******”The Wedding” and ******”Cokboy”
The Wedding
https://jacket2.org/commentary/jerome-rothenberg-five-translationsversions-poland1931-wedding (text)
from Poland/1931 ‘The Wedding,’ Yiddish translation by Amos Schauss (0:59): MP3from Poland/1931 ‘The Wedding’ (2:27): MP3
Reading at Wake Forest University, NC, March 27, 2018
Reading “Poland / 1931” in Yiddish and English
Video by Herman Rappaport.
from Poland/1931 ‘The Wedding,’ music by Bertram Turetzky (3:05): MP3
******Cokboy by Jerome Rothenberg from his collection POLAND 1931 (text)
Listen to Jerome Rothenberg read “Cokboy #1” and “Cokboy #2”
Please go, when you have time, to the Rothenberg PennSound page and do a bit of further exploring around on your own. https://writing.upenn.edu/pennsound/x/Rothenberg.php
Of particular significance:
******from Poland/1931 (1974)
for “The Wedding” see “Five Translations of “The Wedding” (text)
the Beadle’s Testimony and the Student’s Testimony by Jerome Rothenberg (text)
from A Big Jewish Book: Poems & Other Visions of the Jews from Tribal Times to the Present (1977)
3 poems ( Yiddish, traditional) LULLABY A STORY, (Yiddish, 20th century); THE EVIL EYE (THE GOOD EYE) EINEHORE; (German & Hebrew, 14th century) A POEM TO EASE CHILDBIRTH
A Book of Writings—(Hebrew, 10th century B.c.) THE GEZER CALENDAR; ( Canaanite/Hebrew, before 13th century B.c.) YHVH’S BATTLE WITH THE SERPENT; (Hebrew, Bible, 12th/ 11th century B.c.) THE SONG OF DEBORAH; (Hebrew, Bible, c. 10th century B.c.) From THE SONG OF SONGS; ( Samaritan Arabic, c. 16th century) From MOLAD MOSHER “The Birth of Moses”
Book of Powers—Latin, from Hebrew/Greek, c. 100 A.I>.) THE FIRST’, THE LAST’ “A Poem of Ezra”;(Hebrew, c. 3rd century A..D.); Edmond 1alxs (French, b. 1912) From ELYA; Moses de Leon (Aramaic, c. 1240-130S) “The Names”; Naftali Bacharach (Hebrew, 17th century) A POEM FOR THE SEFIROT AS A WHEEL OF LIGHT
Song for the Shekinah on the Feast of the Sabbath (by Isaac Luria, trans. Rothenberg) (text)
Song for the Shekinah on the Feast of the Sabbath (by Isaac Luria, trans. Rothenberg) (3:27): MP3
from Poland/1931 (1974)
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- Esther K. Comes to America: 1931 (4:40): MP3
- Esther K Comes to America by Jerome Rothenberg (text)
******from Khurbn & Other Poems (1989)
- ******excerpts from Pre-Face and other introductory comments (4:44): MP3
- ******In the Dark Word, Khurbn (0:34): MP3
- ******Dos Oysleydikn (the Emptying) (2:52): MP3
- ******Dos Geshray (the Scream) (2:43): MP3
- ******poetry and Treblinka (6:50): MP3
- ******Jewish identity (5:01): MP3
- ******Jewish dream (7:57): MP3
******Preface to Khurbn by Jerome Rothenberg(1989) by Jerome Rothenberg (text)
******”In the Dark Word, Khurbn” by Jerome Rothenberg (text)
******Dos Oysleydikn (The Emptying) by Jerome Rothenberg (text)
******Dos Gesray – The Scream by Jerome Rothenberg (text)
PoemTalk Podcast #121, Discussing Jerome Rothenberg’s “Galician Nights” and “Poland/1931”, feat. Jake Marmer, Frank London, and Maria Damon Listen to the complete recording and read program notes for the episode at Jacket2.
“Galician Nights” by Jerome Rothenberg
“Poland / 1931″ by Jerome Rothenberg
Appearing on Cross-Cultural Poetics #13 (hosted by Leonard Schwartz), 2003. Complete program (27:45):MP3
Rothenberg & the Klezmatics, 2002 Galician Nights, 2002 (6:26): MP3
LINEbreak interview with Charles Bernstein (1996) Complete recording and more info here.
- Full program (49:56): MP3, RealAudio
- Jerome performs two selections from his poem “That Dada Strain” (3:20): RealAudio
- Jerome enacts a “total translation” of a Navaho horse blessing from The Horse Songs of Frank Mitchell (3:40): RealAudio
- Jerome reads “The Scream” from Khurbn (2:20): RealAudio
“That Dada Strain”by Jerome Rothenberg (text)
Dos Gesray (The Scream) by Jerome Rothenberg (text)
In this program Jerome discusses the relationship between Ethnopoetics and Multiculturalism and talks about the concept of “total translation.” His program was recorded in the Music Department of SUNY Buffalo in 1996.
Lecture on oral performance at the University at Buffalo, April 17, 1980
Courtesy of The Poetry Collection of the University Libraries, University at Buffalo, The State University of New York.
Horse Songs (four voices, 1978)
Multitrack recording with Jean-Charles Francois, percussion, and Bertram Turetzky, bass, circa 1975, That Dada Strain
Horse Songs & Other Soundings (S Press, 1975)
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- Horse Songs I (7:47): MP3
- Horse Songs X (4:25): MP3
- Horse Songs XI (4:09): MP3
- Horse Songs XII (5:57): MP3
- Horse Songs XIII (5:44): MP3
- Salamanca a Prophecy (Seneca Journal) (0:26): MP3
- Shaking the Pumpkin – opening songs (13:26): MP3
- Shaking the Pumpkin & Seneca Journal (3:08): MP3
- Seneca Journal 1 (10:11): MP3
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Rothenberg discusses “Horse Songs” and “total translation” at UBUWEB.
Reading Navajo Songs at the University of Warwick, November 4, 1971
Courtesy of University of Warwick.
Complete recording (55:39): MP3
Reading Poland/1931 at the University of Warwick, 1970s (Date Unknown)
Complete recording (36:06): MP3
Courtesy of the University of Warwick.
Private Reading and Translation of Primitive Poetry for Nathaniel Tarn, University at Buffalo, July 4, 1969
Complete recording (50:06): MP3
Link back to our ModPo Group page: https://www.coursera.org/learn/modpo/discussions/forums/63bK9W4YEeauRRJJoih4XQ/threads/W-mCBOWFQDipggTlhWA41A?sort=createdAtDesc
THIS COMPLETES THE ROTHENBERG TEXT AND AUDIO PORTION OF THE PAGE.
BELOW ARE SOME SELECTED ARTICLES AND BOOK CHAPTERS THAT MIGHT GIVE YOU FURTHER PERSPECTIVES
The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis
LANGUAGE_THOUGHT_and_REALITY_Benjamin Whorf
The Whorf Hypothesis as a Critique of Western Science and Technology Author(s)- Peter C. Rollins
Alan Lomax’s Cantometrics
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantometrics
WORLD MUSIC AND TAXONOMY: AN ANALYSIS EXAMINING BOTH THE MUSIC GENOME PROJECT AND CANTOMETRICS
More on Rothenberg
A_Re-Vision_of_Jerome_Rothenbergs_Poetry
Twentieth-Century_Experiments_in_Form
In Vain I Tried to Tell You_ Essays in Native American Ethnopoetics – PDF Free Download
Link back to our ModPo Group page: https://www.coursera.org/learn/modpo/discussions/forums/63bK9W4YEeauRRJJoih4XQ/threads/W-mCBOWFQDipggTlhWA41A?sort=createdAtDesc
Course Map
-
- Access-the-Course-Map for Students New to Coursera online and SloPo Courses
- Course Overview with Sample Poems and Sample Discussion Thread
- The Library
- Week One and Two Materials: Ethnopoetics & Shaking the Pumpkin
- Jerome Rothenberg Assemblage of Materials: From Ethnopoetics to his own poetry and his work on A Big Jewish Book — texts, audio, video.
- The Q&A with Jerome Rothenberg
- Week Three Materials: Contemporary American Indian Poetry
- Week Four Materials: Pacific Islander Poetry
- Week Four Materials: Contemporary Caribbean Anglophone Poetry
- Week Five Materials: Contemporary African-American Poetry
- Week Six Materials: Contemporary Latinx-American Poetry and Performance
- Week Seven Materials: Contemporary Asian-American Poetry
- Week Eight Materials: The Ghazal, Contemporary Middle-Eastern and South-Asian Poetry
- RETURN TO COURSERA COURSE SITE PAGE