"There are lots of rides but they don’t stop much, do they, pal?”
there is a single wavefunction that describes the entire universe
Back in the Paleolithic, when I was first in college, my great love was poetry, and my bible was Technicians of the Sacred (University of California Press, 1968), a range of poetics from Africa, America, Asia, Europe & Oceania, edited with commentaries by Jerome Rothenberg. According to the book’s Pre-Face: “PRIMITIVE MEANS COMPLEX.”
As a child I loved “primitive” art.
In high school I became fascinated with Australian aboriginals:
I absconded with my oldest sister’s copy of The Maximus Poems by Charles Olson that she’d brought back from New York City in 1967:
My hero was Claude Levi-Strauss.
From the first chapter of The Savage Mind (Chicago, 1966) :
And in our own time the’bricoleur’ is still someone who works with his hands and uses devious means compared to those of a craftsman.* The characteristic feature of mythical thought is that it expresses itself by means of a heterogeneous repertoire which, even if extensive, is nevertheless limited. It has to use this repertoire, however, whatever the task in hand because it has nothing else at its disposal. Mythical thought is therefore a kind of intellectual ‘bricolage’ – which explains the relation which can be perceived between the two.
[Levi-Strauss writes the best first chapters!]
Yesterday I was happily surprised to discover Jacket2, a poetics website that provides an archival platform for magazines committed to poetry and poetics, publishing free fully searchable facsimile PDF editions, scanned in high resolution and organized with bookmarked content, such as Alcheringa (1970–1980), edited by Dennis Tedlock & Jerome Rothenberg. Very exciting stuff!
Just to give you a taste from Alcheringa magazine, a Quechua poem from Vol. 1, No. 1:
Today I'm supposed to leave. I won't go,
I'll go off tomorrow.
When I leave you'll see me playing a flute of flies' bones with a spiderweb as my flag, an ant's egg for my drum
and my hat
will be the nest of a hummingbird.
[Spanish translation by Peruvian poet Haquel Jodorowsky (El Corno Emplumado, No. 26) put into English by Edward Kissam.]
I’m taking orders for red lacquered bowls in apple wood. If you’d like one or more, let me know at stefan@stefansaal.com. They should be ready by the end of the summer.