Interview of Harry Mathews

A year ago or so, I interviewed Harry Mathews about Oulipo and women and about politics of the members and such. This interview will be published by Critiphoria/Eoagh in their next issue. Because the interview started in response to a correction to the preface of LOOKING UP HARRYETTE MULLEN, it is now posted on Belladonna. It is a very interesting interview. Please check it out

Here's the website --

www.belladonnaseries.org/images/reviews/harry_mathews_interview.pdf//

Interview of B Henning & Book Party for LOOKING UP HARRYETTE MULLEN

Dear Friends,

An interview of me by Rafael Otto about my poetics is now on online at NOT ENOUGH NIGHT. http://www.naropa.edu/notenoughnight/spring11/index_toc.htm


Also for those of you in New York next week, the schedule of events for Harryette Mullen's readings and our conversation (Book Party for LOOKING UP HARRYETTE MULLEN) is as follows:


On Friday April 29th, at noon, Harryette will be reading her poetry at Long Island University in the Humanities Building 206 (as part of the rainbow series). Take the Q or R Train to Dekalb Avenue and the entrance near the Humanities Building is at the gate on Flatbush Avenue.

Later that same day at 7 pm at the Poet's House (10 River Terrace, dowtown), there is a book party for the book, as well a conversation between Harryette and me. We will be reading from the new book of interviews as well as looking at slides from her new Geneology project and talking about new work.

On Saturday, Harryette will be reading with two other readers for Cave Canem at 3:00, at 20 Jay Street, Brooklyn, Suite 310A.


Harryette doesn't come to New York very often so I hope to see you.

Thanks & Namaste,

Barb

LOOKING FOR HARRYETTE MULLEN: NOW AVAILABLE

Two years ago I called my friend, Harryette Mullen, and asked her if she would talk to me about the way she wrote the poems for Sleeping in the Dictionary. I was teaching her book for an MFA course at Long Island University in Brooklyn. It was summer and I had subletted an apartment on Third Street (I was living in Tucson then). I remember sitting on the floor with my computer talking into skype for the interview, for hours at a time and over several weeks. Anyhow, that was the beginning of a very long exciting conversation/interview about Harryette's book. Neither of us expected this conversation to end up becoming a book. At the time, it was just for my class. Then after I started transcribing, I thought, wow, this should be published. And so we edited and rewrote and re-thought the conversation.

Then I broke it apart and sent it to various magazines and webzines for publication. Then it became clear that this was in fact a book length interview. So I thought -- send it to Rachel Levitsky for Belladonna and see if she is interested. It is definitely political, poetic and feminist. Rachel was excited about the interview and the next thing I knew, I was invited to be part of the collaborative board of Belladonna and working with Martine Bellen to publish the book. Then it occurred to us that an earlier interview I had with Harryette in the 90's about her earlier books could also work well with this. So the book grew. Rachel's idea was to include some images to supplement the discussions. I went to LA and photographed Harryette and other places, artwork and related objects. Harryette and I rewrote the interviews again and expanded them. And the book grew some more. Juliana Spahr wrote a very thoughtful introduction. Martine worked diligently and creatively with me to develop, layout, proofread, get permissions, etc (everything). HR Hegnauer did the final layout and a beautiful cover. And now other women on the board and interns are working to get the book in the world.

I'm a fan of Harryette's writing (obviously) and I have taught her books for many years. I like the way politics, the ordinary everyday and far-out playfulness intermingle. The book of interviews will be of use to teachers, scholars and poets. And the good news is that you can now order this book by going to the Belladonna Series website. The books will be delivered to the Belladonna office in Brooklyn within a few days. On the website, you can also read more about the book. As you all may know, Belladonna is a non-profit collaborative feminist project, so it's a great press and reading series to support. The collaborative board is an exciting energetic group of women. Look through the website at the other publishing projects (The Wide Road by Carla Harryman and Lyn Hejinian and many others).

Here's the website --


http://www.belladonnaseries.org/

Also, there will be a book party at the Poet's House on Friday, April 29th at 7 pm, with a conversation between Harryette and me about the book and about her other projects in the works. Also Harryette will be reading on April 29th at noon at Long Island University, Humanities Building Room 206, at Dekalb and Flatbush (Brooklyn). And on Saturday, April 30th she will read (with Christian Campbell and Niki Herd) for Cave Canum at 20 Jay Street, Suite 310A (Brooklyn). I'll be at all three of these events. If you are in town, I hope to see you, especially at the party at the Poet's House (10 River Terrace, downtown, nyc).

Conversations with Harryette Mullen

Below is an intro to a 50 page interview with Harryette Mullen. Sections of the interview are available or will soon be available in the magazines listed below.

CONVERSATION WITH HARRYETTE MULLEN: From A to Z
With Harryette Mullen’s dense, layered and playful poems in Sleeping with the Dictionary, there is often a subtle question, almost present but not quite present, a riddle-like structure that leaves the reader wondering: How did she make this poem? As a prep for an MFA course I was teaching at Long Island University in the summer of 2009, and as a project I knew I would enjoy working on later, I decided to ask Harryette if she would be willing to talk to me about each of the poems in this collection, and then I would share sections of the interview with the class. This interview would be in the spirit of the Oulipo artists who reveal their experiments and constraints and catalogue them in their library in Paris. No secret mysterious inspired “writer-self,” but instead a writer who is seriously inventive and willing to share her methods and approaches. It was very curious and enlightening to the students to discuss and then hear some of the writer’s intentions, context, and the way she had constructed the poems. We of course weren’t searching for meaning, but instead aiming to help writers expand their own repertoire of tools for writing and to think about the reasons writers write the way they do.

For the most part, this interview follows Harryette's alphabetical structure for Sleeping with the Dictionary. Sections are available or forthcoming in The Poetry Project Newsletter Feb/Mar 10 #222(E-M), Sonora Review (R-S), and the online journals, Eoagh (B-D), Not Enough Night (A-B) and Jacket Magazine (S-Z).


Links (I'll update these as available):

Sonora Review Blog until the print version is available

E to M republished on the How2 Blog