Introduction to Postmodern and Contemporary Poetry (c.1960 - present)

This lecture on postmodern and contemporary poetry considers how poetry has taken on a transpersonal and trans-geographical, even redemptive and spiritual valence since the mid-twentieth century up to the recent decade. Last lecture we considered the struggle underlying modernist poetry to hold together the fragments of a fragmented world, to connect other lives with our own, in some respects to critique the modern world, and to sustain the human spirit amid the chaos of modern experience.

I focus on connections and how contemporary poetry often involves a connecting hermeneutic that interprets or arranges sound and text into a larger meaning, or, where meaning is impossible, to achieve a toleration of meaninglessness; it attempts to connect voice and form in its expression of life, and it aims at connecting other past traditions that we explored in this series.

Introduction: 0:00-4:56
Jacques Derrida's Deconstruction 4:56-8:07
Caroline Bergvall's Drift: 8:07-21:26
Jorie Graham's "The Geese": 21:26-33:07
Susan Howe's "Frolic Architecture": 33:07-47:25

Caroline Bergvall's performance of Drift:    • A Reading by Caroline Bergvall  

Susan Howe's Performance of Frolic Architecture:    • FROLIC ARCHITECTURE: A Performance by...  

Thumbnail image from the following citation:
Howe, Susan. “Frolic Architecture, by Susan Howe and David Grubbs.” Susan Howe and David Grubbs, Susan Howe and David Grubbs, 9 Feb. 2021, susanhowedavidgrubbs.bandcamp.com/album/frolic-architecture.