Straight Up | Jan Herman

Arts, Media & Culture News with 'tude

‘America: How It Works’ by Heathcote Williams

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The fierce dissidence of Williams’s polemical poetry is as radical as Shelley’s. “America: How It Works” bears witness to the monster within “the most dangerous country in world history.” Words by Heathcote Williams. Narration and montage by Alan Cox. The business of America is business, And it’s number one business is war. It uses Hollywood […]

Centennial Conference on Life & Myth of William Burroughs

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William S. Burroughs was born 100 years ago today. A centennial conference will be held at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York as part of a month-long WSB@100 Festival in April. The conference, sponsored by The Center for Humanities, “will explore the life and myth of one of the most innovative […]

Clayton Patterson on Jewish History of the Lower East Side

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Nobody I know is better versed in the history of Manhattan’s Lower East Side than Clayton Patterson. And I’d be willing to bet that nobody at all is more devoted to, or more articulate about, the history of the Jews who lived on the Lower East Side. He was interviewed a year ago — Feb. […]

Whom Do You Believe? Clapper or Snowden?

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You won’t see Edward Snowden being interviewed on American TV. But you will see the nation’s top intelligence official James R. Clapper Jr., all over the news this morning accusing him of damaging national security.

Do Many Women Admire William Burroughs?

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My staff of thousands hasn’t taken a survey, but I can count his female fans on one hand. When it comes to the number I actually know, make that one finger. Her name is Hanne Lippard, the Berlin-based poet and performance artist with the killer voice. I’ve blogposted about her before: Prick Up Your Ears […]

Ginsberg Does Indian Mantras on Sloow Tapes

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Speaking of Allen Ginsberg, I’m told a new Sloow Tapes cassette entitled “London Mantra” is about to be released. Bart de Paepe, producer of the indie label, writes, “It’s a recording George Dowden made at his home in July 1973.” The tape features “Ginsberg solo on his harmonium, singing Indian mantras and a few of […]

‘The Red Dagger’ by Heathcote Williams

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London’s symbol for the hub of global finance in the City (Shown on the city’s flag to convey heraldic grandeur) Comes from a blood-soaked dagger that killed the rebel, Wat Tyler, For Tyler had challenged London on behalf of the poor. The dagger survives and is on display at Fishmonger’s Hall In the City’s secretive […]

Nelson Algren on Frank Lloyd Wright

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This is Algren reading his poem “On the Heart It Don’t Matter How You Spell It.” It’s from a 1972 recording. Frank Lloyd Wright was the saint of American architecture. He liked steel buildings, stone buildings, tall buildings, low buildings. He liked new buildings and old buildings. He like dry buildings and damp buildings. He […]

Terkel Reads from ‘Chicago: City on the Make’

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I’ve been going through all my old Nelson Algren files to give to Colin Asher. He recently landed a contract to write Algren’s biography for Norton — that’s W.W. Norton & Co. (one of the last big indie publishers, and a great one, too). My files include all sorts of primary documents, among them a […]

‘Aletheia,’ a Work-in-Progress

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“Aletheia” is chamber music theater work about a musician in a dressing room preparing to perform for a gala benefit for an opera house that is taking place in the courtyard below her window. Though excited at first, she can’t bring herself to go down and perform. As her sense of isolation increases, she becomes, […]

‘Every Crumb Can Become a Piece of Cake’

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Here are a couple of Hanne Lippard’s vocal tone poems. She combines a voice and accent to kill for with a witty, whimsical sense of humor. The words and the way she says them are a kick. EmailFacebookTwitterReddit

Antwerp Public Linguistic Poem

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‪ “It doesn’t matter what happens. I like it when there are accidents. If anybody starts to argue that’s OK. … This is a public poem. This is the work I do for 45 years. I am completely meshuga. I do one every year.” — Alain Arias-Misson EmailFacebookTwitterReddit

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