Joel Oppenheimer at Sir George Williams University, The Poetry Series, 3 April 1970

CLASSIFICATION

Swallow ID:
1289
Partner Institution:
Concordia University
Source Collection Label:
SGWU Reading Series-Concordia University Department of English fonds
Series:
The Poetry Series
Sub Series:
SGWU Reading Series-Concordia University Department of English fonds

ITEM DESCRIPTION

Title:
Joel Oppenheimer at Sir George Williams University, The Poetry Series, 3 April 1970
Title Source:
Cataloguer
Title Note:
"JOEL OPPENHEIMER Recorded April 3, 1970 3.75 ips, 1/2 track on 1 mil tape" written on sticker on the back of the tape's box. "JOEL OPPENHEIMER I006/SR12" written on sticker on the spine of the tape's box. "Speed 3 3/4 I006-11-012" written on sticker on the reel
Language:
English
Production Context:
Documentary recording
Persistent URL:
http://archives.concordia.ca/I086
Identifiers:
[]

Rights

CREATORS

Name:
Oppenheimer, Joel
Dates:
1930-1988
URL:
http://viaf.org/viaf/57449787
Role:
"Author", "Performer"
Notes:
Born in 1930 in Yonkers, New York, Joel Oppenheimer lived in New York City until 1950 when he attended Black Mountain College in North Carolina. There, he was influenced by Charles Olson and colleagues such as Robert Creeley, Ed Dorn, Jonathan Williams and Fielding Dawson, forming the Black Mountain Poets. Visiting writer William Carlos Williams and e.e. cummings also greatly influenced Oppenheimer. Joel published The Dancer in 1951 (Sad Devil Press at Black Mountain College), The Dutiful Son in 1956 (Short Hills, Johnathan Cape), The Love Bit in 1962 (Totem Press) and Sirventes on a Sad Occasion in 1967 (The Perishable Press) while working in a printing shop. In 1966 he became the director of the Poetry Project at St Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery, a New York City reading series and by 1969, Oppenheimer became a columnist for the Village Voice. He then published In Time: Poems 1962-1968 (Bobbs-Merrill, 1969), and in 1973 published On Occasion: Some Births, Deaths, Weddings, Birthdays, Holidays, and Other Events, a book of occasional poems (Bobbs-Merrill). The Woman Poems (Bobbs-Merrill) was published in 1975, and Names, Dates & Places (Saint Andrew’s Press, 1973) chronicled the New York Mets. He also wrote a popular book about Marilyn Monroe, called Marilyn Lives! (Delilah, 1981). In 1984 Oppenheimer taught creative writing at New England College in Henniker, New Hampshire. His last published book of poetry was New Spaces: Poems 1975-1983 (Black Sparrow Press, 1985). Joel Oppenheimer died of lung cancer on October 11, 1988.

CONTRIBUTORS

Name:
Bowering, George
Dates:
1935-
URL:
http://viaf.org/viaf/34469976
Role:
"Series organizer", "Presenter"

MATERIAL DESCRIPTION

Recording Type:
Analogue
AV Type:
Audio
Material Designation:
Reel to Reel
Physical Composition:
Magnetic Tape
Extent:
1/4 inch
Playing Speed:
3 3/4 ips
Track Configuration:
Half-track
Playback Mode:
Mono
Tape Brand:
Scotch
Sound Quality:
Excellent

DIGITAL FILE DESCRIPTION

File URL:
https://files.spokenweb.ca/concordia/sgw/audio/all_mp3/joel_oppenheimer_i006-11-012.mp3
Show Content
File Path:
files.spokenweb.ca>concordia>sgw>audio>all_mp3
Duration:
01:03:25
Size:
152.2 MB
Content:
George Bowering 00:00:00 I suppose everybody knows everything that everybody would say in an introduction to Joel Oppenheimer anyway, the Black Mountain blah blah blah, and the director of the St. Mark's Poetry Project blah blah blah but what I would like to mention specifically is that there's a big fat book called In Time with about 225 pages of Joel's poetry from the 1960's published by Bobbs-Merrill distributed by McClelland & Stewart in Canada if they ever get into bookstores in Montreal . Joel Oppenheimer, thank you. Joel Oppenheimer 00:00:44 I really didn't like, George , being referred to as being a Black Mountain blah blah blah. I happen to be the finest softball pitcher Black Mountain ever had. And so that none of you lose any sleep tonight, the uniform is genuine United States Merchant Marine uniform and the fifth stripe, the purple stripe denotes me as a chief poet, which I was appointed by three captains, two chief engineers and several assorted mates of United States lines and we invented the uniform one night and they threw in all the materials and my wife gave it to me for a Christmas present, so I am responsible for the moral, religious, emotional and sexual life of the crew while at sea. It's a very serious duty! The book that's out now is actually my fourth book of poems, the first to some of you may be familiar with some of the poems from The New American Poetry and so on, The Dutiful Son and The Love Bit. And In Time is the fourth book. The third book is a little known book because Jonathan Williams has been carrying it around in his briefcase for eight years and sends me postcards every six month saying he's bringing it out. I thought maybe since it probably will never get published I should read some poems from there, it's called Friends and Lovers and most of the poems have initialed inscriptions, some of which I will name to you, and some of which somebody going for his Master's thirty years from now will have to do a lot of research to figure out. It's divided into two parts, obviously in the first part is friends and in the second part is lovers. This is the dedicatory poem. "Orpheus" . Joel Oppenheimer 00:02:52 Reads "Orpheus" [published later in Just Friends/Friends and Lovers]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:03:20 This is a poem called "Lesson I" and it's for Charles Olson . It's also as sure you all recognize upon a parody on one of Pound's Usury Cantos and it's based on an actual softball incident in which Charles was supposed to be coaching third base and instead was discussing Etruscan sculpture when I was rounding second on a long drive to left centre field. Joel Oppenheimer 00:03:54 Reads "Lesson I". Joel Oppenheimer 00:04:30 Charles got very upset about that. This is a poem for Franz Kline . Do I need to tell you who Franz was? Alright, if anybody doesn't know should ask the person next to them after the reading…”Pablo Nerruda--” It’s called “The Boys Whose Fathers". Joel Oppenheimer 00:04:57 Reads "The Boys Whose Fathers". Joel Oppenheimer 00:08:31 And this is for Cubby Selby who wrote Last Exit to Brooklyn . “A Poem In Tune With Its Time”. Joel Oppenheimer 00:08:39 Reads “A Poem In Tune With Its Time”. Joel Oppenheimer 00:09:13 This is for Phillip Guston . That's very strange, I find that now I can say the names. Philip is a still surviving member of the New York Abstract Expressionist school, or whatever they call it these days. And a marvelous painter. Joel Oppenheimer 00:09:30 Reads "A Grace for Painters". Joel Oppenheimer 00:11:21 This is another poem for Charles Olson. It's called "Okay". This is a funny book because it was written about 1961, as I say literally, it's been carried around in manuscript form for eight years and why I never pulled it back except that those damn postcards kept coming in so I kept saying, okay, six months more and it just was a scene I got into where I, personal poems to people became a thing that I was doing at that time. It's called "Okay". Joel Oppenheimer 00:12:10 Reads "Okay". Joel Oppenheimer 00:13:54 Thank you. I don't know how many of you knew Charles, that was a visit to New York and we did have a marvelous meal in New York's Chinatown and I just said to the guy, you know, bring us so many dollars worth of food, and there were eleven of us, Ed Dorn and his wife were with us and LeRoi Jones and his wife and Charles, and we sat there and they kept bringing dishes out everybody stuffed themselves and we were all sitting there and Charles, as most of you know was about 6'7” and about 250 pounds and after all this food had come out and been consumed, the guy came out with a sea bass about this big, and everybody sorta looked and Charles said, "Oh, thank you Joel" and proceeded to demolish this thing. Well, everybody just sitting...[audience laughter]. Ah, yes! I have a Canadian poem for you. I didn't even know that. This is a poem for Ed Dorn and it's called "The Fourth Ark Royal". One night at a bar called Dylan's, Ed and I had seen each other for the first time for about six years and a couple of sailors came in and they had Ark Royal on their caps and Canadian badges and finally after a couple of drinks I asked one of them what the Ark Royal was, and to their shame and my chagrin, and they really were abashed when they said it, it turns out now that the Ark Royal is now a Corvette, uh, after a long distinguished history and not that--I'm sure that it's a great Corvette, but still, a Corvette is a Corvette, you know. Joel Oppenheimer 00:16:03 Reads "The Fourth Ark Royal". Joel Oppenheimer 00:20:03 Does anybody know where the Fourth Ark Royal is anchored? I'll go see it tomorrow. I have to make a confession, I pulled a dreadful gaff yesterday and I'm sure that Stan and George are going to spread it around after I leave, so I'm going to confess it in public. I said "Gee, we're going to be here for a couple of days and there's one thing I'd really like to see. And do you suppose somebody might, you know, give us a lift to the Plains of Abraham ", and they both looked at me and said "It's 100 miles away in Quebec " and I said "Oh my god, you're right" and then I got home, to the hotel, and I was reading through, what's the name of that lovely magazine they give you at the hotel? Canada Today or something, and I was reading through, and when I saw them today, I said "Oh well, I was wrong about the Plains of Abraham, but we guys captured Montreal once" and it made me feel much better. Of course, we didn't hold it very long, I think a day we were here. This is a thing called "Spring Poem". And let's hope that it gets here. Joel Oppenheimer 00:21:24 Reads "Spring Poem". Joel Oppenheimer 00:21:39 Ahah! Yes, gee, I don't know if you're liking these, but I'm so delighted, I really haven't looked at these poems in moons, and it's...this is a poem for Gil Sorrentino called "The Aces", and it starts with a quote from Antony and Cleopatra . And it's when, it's the speech that's always quoted where the death is announced to her, and everybody always quotes the crown he bestride the continents like [unintelligible] and crowns--the crown would drop from his pocket, but I always love the end of it, near the end, she says "His delights were dolphin-like, they showed his back above the element they lived in". Joel Oppenheimer 00:22:28 Reads "The Aces". Joel Oppenheimer 00:23:36 For J.C. Just to add a little mystery. Joel Oppenheimer 00:23:56 Reads unnamed poem "There are waterfalls pour straight down". Joel Oppenheimer 00:24:48 "La Revolución", for J.S. Joel Oppenheimer 00:24:51 Reads "La Revolución". Joel Oppenheimer 00:25:55 I think what I'll do is read one--this is kind of a long poem, are you up to a longish poem and then we'll call a break? "A Little Mayan Head", for E.W. Joel Oppenheimer 00:26:23 Reads "A Little Mayan Head". Unknown 00:30:22 [Cut or edit made in tape. Unknown amount of time elapsed]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:30:23 It's titled "N.B.", but that isn't for a lady, that's Nota Bene, if I am correcting--if I am pronouncing that correctly, or correcting that pronouncedly. Joel Oppenheimer 00:30:34 Reads "N.B." Joel Oppenheimer 00:31:10 "Poem for New Children", for E. and L. Joel Oppenheimer 00:31:14 Reads "Poem for New Children". Joel Oppenheimer 00:31:35 "Peire Vidal at Thirty-Two" and any of you who don't know Peire Vidal are instructed to report to George Bowering on Monday morning and he will give you a lecture on Peire Vidal. And George, if you don't have a lecture prepared, you better by then. Peire Vidal was the most marvelous poet in the world, his vida begins, Peire Vidal was the son of a rich fourrier in Toulouse , he sang better than any man in the world and he wrote good songs and he was the biggest fool the world has ever known because he believed that what a woman told him in love was true. He also [audience laughter] wrote a poem, this will get an even bigger hit when he was an old man he wrote a gorgeous poem that I can't quote, and you can thank me for that, he wrote a gorgeous poem in which in the first stanza, he avowed his eternal love to four different chicks [audience laughter]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:32:4 Reads "Peire Vidal at Thirty-Two". Joel Oppenheimer 00:33:16 "The Truck Farmer", for R. F. Joel Oppenheimer 00:33:25 Reads "The Truck Farmer". Joel Oppenheimer 00:35:01 "Dutch Interior: Sewing", also for R.F. R.F. was my first wife. Joel Oppenheimer 00:35:07 Reads "Dutch Interior: Sewing". Joel Oppenheimer 00:35:36 "Clams on the Half-Shelf" for M.M. And I must say I've been very disappointed, because everybody kept telling me what great seafood restaurants Montreal has and the only seafood I can really stand is fresh clams and every restaurant I go into says, "Oh, yeah, we have oysters but we don't serve clams". Does anyone know a restaurant where I can get fresh clams?...This is for M.M. Joel Oppenheimer 00:36:09 Reads "Clams on the Half-Shelf". Joel Oppenheimer 00:36:48 I must confess to the ladies in the audience that my book has been branded by women's lib in New York as insulting to women, and I have great fights with all of them, I praise their bosoms, and they sort of calm down then, but they still keep putting up stickers on my book jackets. It's amazing what you can do to a women's lib chick if you just tell her that she has very nice tits, really. Immediately they desert the movement. "New Blues for the Moon" for D.D. Joel Oppenheimer 00:37:34 Reads "New Blues for the Moon" [from In Time: 1962-1968]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:38:10 It took me four years after, I got the rhyme line to "I know your door better than my own" but now it's too late to write the blues, but if anybody's interested, it's "And if you won't have me I still ain't goin' home." "A Love Poem" for M.S. Joel Oppenheimer 00:38:33 Reads "A Love Poem". Joel Oppenheimer 00:39:08 Oh yeah, that's a nice poem for today. "Third of April", for M.R. Joel Oppenheimer 00:39:16 Reads "Third of April". Joel Oppenheimer 00:39:59 "A Five Act Play" for B.J. Joel Oppenheimer 00:40:02 Reads "A Five Act Play". Joel Oppenheimer 00:40:27 "Nature Boy" for B.C. Helen, are you keeping notes on these initials? Joel Oppenheimer 00:40:41 Reads "Nature Boy". Joel Oppenheimer 00:41:22 "Flora" for J.G. Annotation 00:41:31 Reads "Flora". Joel Oppenheimer 00:42:04 I'm not sure I like this poem but the story behind it is funny. The really, the fairest break-up, for very strange reasons, and this one literally broke up because the first day that the chick made me sunny-side up eggs, she mashed the yolk with her fork. [Audience laughter]. I knew that no matter how beautiful the scene had been I couldn't stay there anymore. It's called "Purple Flowers" and it's for S.G., wherever you might be. Joel Oppenheimer 00:42:54 Reads "Purple Flowers" [audience laughter throughout]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:43:29 "The Apples" for D.R. Joel Oppenheimer 00:43:35 Reads "The Apples". Joel Oppenheimer 00:44:10 I have--this is the last poem in the book and if you want to hear some stuff from--this is a longish one, why don't we call a stop after this, and if people want to split, split and if people want to stay I'll read a little bit more from the new book. "When What You Dream" for F.E. Joel Oppenheimer 00:44:45 Reads "When What You Dream". Joel Oppenheimer 00:51:07 This book starts with a poem that was turned down by at least 37 little magazines, and I finally blackjacked it in as the introductory poem. It's called "The Poem". Joel Oppenheimer 00:51:36 Reads "The Poem" [from In Time: 1962-1968]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:51:45 Nobody liked it. Dan Rice is the only person in the world I know that likes that poem. And I think it's the best poem I ever wrote. This is a poem for the other poet I have to most love for, Li Po , the Chinese poet from 700, 800, roughly. It's called "shooting the moon". Li Po, his particular distinctions were that he seduced the emperor of China's favourite courtesan, and showed up two hours late for the date, bombed out of his skull, and fell asleep on her bosom before doing anything, and the emperor was not terribly amused by it but at the same time he was impressed by the enormity of the action so he exiled him to the mountains but he gave him like 50 thousand acres and bread for life, it's just he was not to show up in court ever again. While there, he did several notable things, one of which is writing the best lush poem that's ever been written cause he got up on a beautiful spring day and was sitting out on his terrace and his servant brought him breakfast and he ate it and he started drinking some sake and the next thing he knew it was nine o'clock at night and like he had sorta missed spring so he started drinking again, and the last line of the poem is something like "two hours later I was dancing with the moon". So, he worked it out. The only problem was, that he was literally in love with the moon, and this image runs through his poem, and one night on the way home from a wine tavern, he decided finally to make it with the moon and he sat down at the edge of the river, left it under a rock with his clothes and dove in to screw the moon, literally, the reflection in the water, and drowned. And one hopes that--I don't know what the autopsy showed, but one hopes that he did make it before he drowned, you know, like, you have to love, you know, a guy like that. Joel Oppenheimer 00:54:28 Reads "Shooting the Moon" [from In Time: 1962-1968]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:56:37 Helen, do you remember, by any chance, where the other moon poem is? Hold on one--I think I have it. Marvelous picture in the Times one day, the first time they took a--the first time one of the things went around the moon, and I wrote a very funny poem about it I think, if I can find it here. Oh well, while I'm looking for it, I'll read you "Zeus, in May, Reflects on a Recent Letter from Astarte". Joel Oppenheimer 00:57:53 Reads "Zeus, in May, Reflects on a Recent Letter from Astarte" [from In Time: 1962-1968]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:58:37 Am I allowed to read dirty poems here? Yeah? This is a poem called "Poem in Praise of Perseverance". And anybody who doesn't want to hear it should close their ears. This is another poem that was rejected by about 40 magazines. Joel Oppenheimer 00:59:05 Reads "Poem in Praise of Perseverance" [from In Time: 1962-1968]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:59:34 I really do want to find that damn moon poem. Alright, "The New Standard Simplified American Cabala for Home Use". Joel Oppenheimer 00:59:53 Reads "The New Standard Simplified American Cabala for Home Use" [from In Time: 1962-1968]. Joel Oppenheimer 01:00:12 "The Three Old Ladies". Joel Oppenheimer 01:00:24 Reads "The Three Old Ladies" [from In Time: 1962-1968]. Joel Oppenheimer 01:01:14 That poem incidentally was because of a little incident in a college in Brooklyn because they had a lady faculty member as a cop and she listened to me read and she objected to only one word in the entire reading and that was 'hard-on' and I suggested gently to the woman who called me about it that that might be that lady's problem, if she could listen to my--I found the moon poem, thank god--if that was the only word she found to object to that I really thought she might need a little help somewhere from somebody. "Wrong Again". Joel Oppenheimer 01:02:11 Reads "Wrong Again" [from In Time: 1962-1968; audience laughter throughout]. END 01:03:25 [Cut off abruptly].
Notes:
Joel Oppeheimer reads from In Time: Poems 1962-1968 (Bobbs-Merrill,1969) as well as poems from Just Friends/Friends and Lovers (Jargon Society) which was only published in 1980. 00:00- Introduction for Joel Oppeheimer, by George Bowering [INDEX: Black Mountain, director of the St. Mark’s Poetry Project, In Time published by Bobbs-Merrill distributed by McCaulin Stewart.] 00:44- Joel Oppenheimer speaks, introduces “Orpheus” [INDEX: Black Mountain Softball pitcher, United States Merchant Marine uniform. The New American Poetry, The Dutiful Son, Love Bit, Johnathan Williams, Friends and Lovers, initialed inscriptions explained] 02:52- Reads “Orpheus” from Friends and Lovers 03:20- Introduces “Lesson I” [INDEX: Charles Olson, Ezra Pound’s Usury Cantos, Etruscan sculpture] 03:54- Reads “Lesson I” 04:30- Introduces “The Boys Whose Fathers” [INDEX: Franz Klein] 04:57- Reads “The Boys Whose Fathers” 08:31- Introduces “A Poem In Tune With Its Time” [INDEX: Cubby Selby’s Last Exit to Brooklyn] 08:39- Reads “A Poem In Tune With Its Time” 09:13- Introduces “New York Abstract Expressionist School: For Philip Guston”, published as “A Grace for Painters” [INDEX: Philip Guston, New York Abstract Expressionist school] 09:30- Reads “A Grace for Painters” 11:21- Introduces “Okay” [INDEX: Charles Olson, written in 1961, personal poems for friends] 12:10- Reads “Okay” 13:54- Introduces “The Fourth Ark Royal” [Howard Fink List “The Fourthork Royal”] [INDEX: Charles Olson, New York’s China Town. Ed Dorn, LeRoi Jones, Dylan’s Bar, Forth ArK Royal sailors, Corvette] 16:03- Reads “The Fourth Ark Royal” [INDEX: Stan[ley Hoffman], George [Bowering], Plains of Abraham, Quebec City, Canada Today magazine] 20:03- Introduces “Spring Poem” 21:24- Reads “Spring Poem” 21:39- Introduces “The Aces” [INDEX: Gil[bert] Sorrentino, Shakespeare’s “Anthony and Cleopatra”] 22:28- Reads “The Aces” 23:36- Introduces poem for J.C, first line “There are waterfalls pour straight down...” 23:56- Reads first line “There are waterfalls pour straight down...” 24:48- Introduces “La Revolucion” 24:51- Reads “La Revolucion” 25:55- Introduces “A Little Mayan Head” 26:23- Reads “A Little Mayan Head” 30:23- Introduces “N.B.” [INDEX: “Nota Bene”] 30:34- Reads “N.B.” 31:10- Introduces “Poem for New Children” [INDEX: poem for children] 31:14- Reads “Poem for New Children” 31:35- Introduces “Peire Vidal at Thirty-Two” [Howard Fink List “Pervy Dahl at 32”] [INDEX: George Bowering, Peire Vidal, Toulouse] 32:44- Reads “Peire Vidal at Thirty-Two” 33:16- Introduces “The Truck Farmer” 33:25- Reads “The Truck Farmer” 35:01- Introduces “Dutch Interior: Sewing” [INDEX: R.F. initial is his first wife] 35:07- Reads “Dutch Interior: Sewing” 35:36- Introduces “Clams on a Half-Shelf” 36:09- Reads “Clams on a Half-Shelf” 36:48- Introduces “New Blues for the Moon” [INDEX: Women’s Liberation Movement branded as insulting to women] 37:34- Reads “New Blues for the Moon” 38:10- Introduces “A Love Poem” 38:33- Reads “A Love Poem” 39:08- Introduces “Third of April” 39:16- Reads “Third of April” 39:59- Introduces “A Five Act Play” 40:02- Reads “A Five Act Play” 40:27- Introduces “Nature Boy” 40:41- Reads “Nature Boy” 41:22- Introduces “Flora” 41:31- Reads “Flora” 42:04- Introduces “Purple Flowers” 42:54- Reads “Purple Flowers” 43:29- Introduces “The Apples” 43:35- Reads “The Apples” 44:10- Introduces “When What You Dream” 44:45- Reads “When What You Dream” 51:07- Introduces “the poem” from In Time Poems 51:36- Reads “the poem” 51:45- Introduces “shooting the moon” [INDEX: Dan Rice, Li Po seducing the moon, moon imagery] 54:28- Reads “shooting the moon” 56:37- Introduces “zeus, in may, reflects on a recent letter from astarte” [Howard Fink List: Xertes] [INDEX: Times magazine picture of the moon] 57:53- Reads “zeus in may, reflects on a recent letter from astarte” 58:37- Introduces “poem in praise of perseverance” [INDEX: “dirty” poems] 59:05- Reads “poem in praise of perseverance” 59:34- Introduces “the new standard simplified american cabala for home use” 59:53- Reads “the new standard simplified american cabala for home use” 1:00:12- Introduces “the three old ladies” 1:00:24- Reads “the three old ladies” 1:01:14- Introduces “wrong again” [INDEX: reading at a college in Brooklyn] 1:02:11- Reads “wrong again” 1:03:25- END OF RECORDING Howard Fink List: Introduction by George Bowering Recorded April 3, 1970 page 77
Content Type:
Sound Recording
Featured:
Yes
File URL:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1-0cAe1GF8xZsc62jpUDXwgvyCd6ZmvSw
Show Content
Title:
Joel Oppenheimer Tape Box - Back
Credit:
Drew Bernet
Content Type:
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File URL:
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Title:
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Drew Bernet
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Joel Oppenheimer Tape Box - Reel
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Drew Bernet
Content Type:
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Dates

Date:
1970 4 3
Type:
Performance Date
Source:
Accompanying Material
Notes:
Date written on sticker on the back of the tape's box. Date also specified in previous written announcement "Poetry Four: Sir George Williams Poetry Series"

LOCATION

Address:
1455, Boul de Maisonneuve Ouest, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Venue:
Hall Building Room H-651
Latitude:
45.4972758
Longitude:
-73.57893043
URL:
https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/22080570
Notes:
Location specified in previous written announcement "Poetry Four: Sir George Williams Poetry Series," but not confirmed

CONTENT

Contents:
joel_oppenheimer_i006-11-012.mp3 George Bowering 00:00:00 I suppose everybody knows everything that everybody would say in an introduction to Joel Oppenheimer anyway, the Black Mountain blah blah blah, and the director of the St. Mark's Poetry Project blah blah blah but what I would like to mention specifically is that there's a big fat book called In Time with about 225 pages of Joel's poetry from the 1960's published by Bobbs-Merrill distributed by McClelland & Stewart in Canada if they ever get into bookstores in Montreal . Joel Oppenheimer, thank you. Joel Oppenheimer 00:00:44 I really didn't like, George , being referred to as being a Black Mountain blah blah blah. I happen to be the finest softball pitcher Black Mountain ever had. And so that none of you lose any sleep tonight, the uniform is genuine United States Merchant Marine uniform and the fifth stripe, the purple stripe denotes me as a chief poet, which I was appointed by three captains, two chief engineers and several assorted mates of United States lines and we invented the uniform one night and they threw in all the materials and my wife gave it to me for a Christmas present, so I am responsible for the moral, religious, emotional and sexual life of the crew while at sea. It's a very serious duty! The book that's out now is actually my fourth book of poems, the first to some of you may be familiar with some of the poems from The New American Poetry and so on, The Dutiful Son and The Love Bit. And In Time is the fourth book. The third book is a little known book because Jonathan Williams has been carrying it around in his briefcase for eight years and sends me postcards every six month saying he's bringing it out. I thought maybe since it probably will never get published I should read some poems from there, it's called Friends and Lovers and most of the poems have initialed inscriptions, some of which I will name to you, and some of which somebody going for his Master's thirty years from now will have to do a lot of research to figure out. It's divided into two parts, obviously in the first part is friends and in the second part is lovers. This is the dedicatory poem. "Orpheus" . Joel Oppenheimer 00:02:52 Reads "Orpheus" [published later in Just Friends/Friends and Lovers]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:03:20 This is a poem called "Lesson I" and it's for Charles Olson . It's also as sure you all recognize upon a parody on one of Pound's Usury Cantos and it's based on an actual softball incident in which Charles was supposed to be coaching third base and instead was discussing Etruscan sculpture when I was rounding second on a long drive to left centre field. Joel Oppenheimer 00:03:54 Reads "Lesson I". Joel Oppenheimer 00:04:30 Charles got very upset about that. This is a poem for Franz Kline . Do I need to tell you who Franz was? Alright, if anybody doesn't know should ask the person next to them after the reading…”Pablo Nerruda--” It’s called “The Boys Whose Fathers". Joel Oppenheimer 00:04:57 Reads "The Boys Whose Fathers". Joel Oppenheimer 00:08:31 And this is for Cubby Selby who wrote Last Exit to Brooklyn . “A Poem In Tune With Its Time”. Joel Oppenheimer 00:08:39 Reads “A Poem In Tune With Its Time”. Joel Oppenheimer 00:09:13 This is for Phillip Guston . That's very strange, I find that now I can say the names. Philip is a still surviving member of the New York Abstract Expressionist school, or whatever they call it these days. And a marvelous painter. Joel Oppenheimer 00:09:30 Reads "A Grace for Painters". Joel Oppenheimer 00:11:21 This is another poem for Charles Olson. It's called "Okay". This is a funny book because it was written about 1961, as I say literally, it's been carried around in manuscript form for eight years and why I never pulled it back except that those damn postcards kept coming in so I kept saying, okay, six months more and it just was a scene I got into where I, personal poems to people became a thing that I was doing at that time. It's called "Okay". Joel Oppenheimer 00:12:10 Reads "Okay". Joel Oppenheimer 00:13:54 Thank you. I don't know how many of you knew Charles, that was a visit to New York and we did have a marvelous meal in New York's Chinatown and I just said to the guy, you know, bring us so many dollars worth of food, and there were eleven of us, Ed Dorn and his wife were with us and LeRoi Jones and his wife and Charles, and we sat there and they kept bringing dishes out everybody stuffed themselves and we were all sitting there and Charles, as most of you know was about 6'7” and about 250 pounds and after all this food had come out and been consumed, the guy came out with a sea bass about this big, and everybody sorta looked and Charles said, "Oh, thank you Joel" and proceeded to demolish this thing. Well, everybody just sitting...[audience laughter]. Ah, yes! I have a Canadian poem for you. I didn't even know that. This is a poem for Ed Dorn and it's called "The Fourth Ark Royal". One night at a bar called Dylan's, Ed and I had seen each other for the first time for about six years and a couple of sailors came in and they had Ark Royal on their caps and Canadian badges and finally after a couple of drinks I asked one of them what the Ark Royal was, and to their shame and my chagrin, and they really were abashed when they said it, it turns out now that the Ark Royal is now a Corvette, uh, after a long distinguished history and not that--I'm sure that it's a great Corvette, but still, a Corvette is a Corvette, you know. Joel Oppenheimer 00:16:03 Reads "The Fourth Ark Royal". Joel Oppenheimer 00:20:03 Does anybody know where the Fourth Ark Royal is anchored? I'll go see it tomorrow. I have to make a confession, I pulled a dreadful gaff yesterday and I'm sure that Stan and George are going to spread it around after I leave, so I'm going to confess it in public. I said "Gee, we're going to be here for a couple of days and there's one thing I'd really like to see. And do you suppose somebody might, you know, give us a lift to the Plains of Abraham ", and they both looked at me and said "It's 100 miles away in Quebec " and I said "Oh my god, you're right" and then I got home, to the hotel, and I was reading through, what's the name of that lovely magazine they give you at the hotel? Canada Today or something, and I was reading through, and when I saw them today, I said "Oh well, I was wrong about the Plains of Abraham, but we guys captured Montreal once" and it made me feel much better. Of course, we didn't hold it very long, I think a day we were here. This is a thing called "Spring Poem". And let's hope that it gets here. Joel Oppenheimer 00:21:24 Reads "Spring Poem". Joel Oppenheimer 00:21:39 Ahah! Yes, gee, I don't know if you're liking these, but I'm so delighted, I really haven't looked at these poems in moons, and it's...this is a poem for Gil Sorrentino called "The Aces", and it starts with a quote from Antony and Cleopatra . And it's when, it's the speech that's always quoted where the death is announced to her, and everybody always quotes the crown he bestride the continents like [unintelligible] and crowns--the crown would drop from his pocket, but I always love the end of it, near the end, she says "His delights were dolphin-like, they showed his back above the element they lived in". Joel Oppenheimer 00:22:28 Reads "The Aces". Joel Oppenheimer 00:23:36 For J.C. Just to add a little mystery. Joel Oppenheimer 00:23:56 Reads unnamed poem "There are waterfalls pour straight down". Joel Oppenheimer 00:24:48 "La Revolución", for J.S. Joel Oppenheimer 00:24:51 Reads "La Revolución". Joel Oppenheimer 00:25:55 I think what I'll do is read one--this is kind of a long poem, are you up to a longish poem and then we'll call a break? "A Little Mayan Head", for E.W. Joel Oppenheimer 00:26:23 Reads "A Little Mayan Head". Unknown 00:30:22 [Cut or edit made in tape. Unknown amount of time elapsed]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:30:23 It's titled "N.B.", but that isn't for a lady, that's Nota Bene, if I am correcting--if I am pronouncing that correctly, or correcting that pronouncedly. Joel Oppenheimer 00:30:34 Reads "N.B." Joel Oppenheimer 00:31:10 "Poem for New Children", for E. and L. Joel Oppenheimer 00:31:14 Reads "Poem for New Children". Joel Oppenheimer 00:31:35 "Peire Vidal at Thirty-Two" and any of you who don't know Peire Vidal are instructed to report to George Bowering on Monday morning and he will give you a lecture on Peire Vidal. And George, if you don't have a lecture prepared, you better by then. Peire Vidal was the most marvelous poet in the world, his vida begins, Peire Vidal was the son of a rich fourrier in Toulouse , he sang better than any man in the world and he wrote good songs and he was the biggest fool the world has ever known because he believed that what a woman told him in love was true. He also [audience laughter] wrote a poem, this will get an even bigger hit when he was an old man he wrote a gorgeous poem that I can't quote, and you can thank me for that, he wrote a gorgeous poem in which in the first stanza, he avowed his eternal love to four different chicks [audience laughter]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:32:4 Reads "Peire Vidal at Thirty-Two". Joel Oppenheimer 00:33:16 "The Truck Farmer", for R. F. Joel Oppenheimer 00:33:25 Reads "The Truck Farmer". Joel Oppenheimer 00:35:01 "Dutch Interior: Sewing", also for R.F. R.F. was my first wife. Joel Oppenheimer 00:35:07 Reads "Dutch Interior: Sewing". Joel Oppenheimer 00:35:36 "Clams on the Half-Shelf" for M.M. And I must say I've been very disappointed, because everybody kept telling me what great seafood restaurants Montreal has and the only seafood I can really stand is fresh clams and every restaurant I go into says, "Oh, yeah, we have oysters but we don't serve clams". Does anyone know a restaurant where I can get fresh clams?...This is for M.M. Joel Oppenheimer 00:36:09 Reads "Clams on the Half-Shelf". Joel Oppenheimer 00:36:48 I must confess to the ladies in the audience that my book has been branded by women's lib in New York as insulting to women, and I have great fights with all of them, I praise their bosoms, and they sort of calm down then, but they still keep putting up stickers on my book jackets. It's amazing what you can do to a women's lib chick if you just tell her that she has very nice tits, really. Immediately they desert the movement. "New Blues for the Moon" for D.D. Joel Oppenheimer 00:37:34 Reads "New Blues for the Moon" [from In Time: 1962-1968]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:38:10 It took me four years after, I got the rhyme line to "I know your door better than my own" but now it's too late to write the blues, but if anybody's interested, it's "And if you won't have me I still ain't goin' home." "A Love Poem" for M.S. Joel Oppenheimer 00:38:33 Reads "A Love Poem". Joel Oppenheimer 00:39:08 Oh yeah, that's a nice poem for today. "Third of April", for M.R. Joel Oppenheimer 00:39:16 Reads "Third of April". Joel Oppenheimer 00:39:59 "A Five Act Play" for B.J. Joel Oppenheimer 00:40:02 Reads "A Five Act Play". Joel Oppenheimer 00:40:27 "Nature Boy" for B.C. Helen, are you keeping notes on these initials? Joel Oppenheimer 00:40:41 Reads "Nature Boy". Joel Oppenheimer 00:41:22 "Flora" for J.G. Annotation 00:41:31 Reads "Flora". Joel Oppenheimer 00:42:04 I'm not sure I like this poem but the story behind it is funny. The really, the fairest break-up, for very strange reasons, and this one literally broke up because the first day that the chick made me sunny-side up eggs, she mashed the yolk with her fork. [Audience laughter]. I knew that no matter how beautiful the scene had been I couldn't stay there anymore. It's called "Purple Flowers" and it's for S.G., wherever you might be. Joel Oppenheimer 00:42:54 Reads "Purple Flowers" [audience laughter throughout]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:43:29 "The Apples" for D.R. Joel Oppenheimer 00:43:35 Reads "The Apples". Joel Oppenheimer 00:44:10 I have--this is the last poem in the book and if you want to hear some stuff from--this is a longish one, why don't we call a stop after this, and if people want to split, split and if people want to stay I'll read a little bit more from the new book. "When What You Dream" for F.E. Joel Oppenheimer 00:44:45 Reads "When What You Dream". Joel Oppenheimer 00:51:07 This book starts with a poem that was turned down by at least 37 little magazines, and I finally blackjacked it in as the introductory poem. It's called "The Poem". Joel Oppenheimer 00:51:36 Reads "The Poem" [from In Time: 1962-1968]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:51:45 Nobody liked it. Dan Rice is the only person in the world I know that likes that poem. And I think it's the best poem I ever wrote. This is a poem for the other poet I have to most love for, Li Po , the Chinese poet from 700, 800, roughly. It's called "shooting the moon". Li Po, his particular distinctions were that he seduced the emperor of China's favourite courtesan, and showed up two hours late for the date, bombed out of his skull, and fell asleep on her bosom before doing anything, and the emperor was not terribly amused by it but at the same time he was impressed by the enormity of the action so he exiled him to the mountains but he gave him like 50 thousand acres and bread for life, it's just he was not to show up in court ever again. While there, he did several notable things, one of which is writing the best lush poem that's ever been written cause he got up on a beautiful spring day and was sitting out on his terrace and his servant brought him breakfast and he ate it and he started drinking some sake and the next thing he knew it was nine o'clock at night and like he had sorta missed spring so he started drinking again, and the last line of the poem is something like "two hours later I was dancing with the moon". So, he worked it out. The only problem was, that he was literally in love with the moon, and this image runs through his poem, and one night on the way home from a wine tavern, he decided finally to make it with the moon and he sat down at the edge of the river, left it under a rock with his clothes and dove in to screw the moon, literally, the reflection in the water, and drowned. And one hopes that--I don't know what the autopsy showed, but one hopes that he did make it before he drowned, you know, like, you have to love, you know, a guy like that. Joel Oppenheimer 00:54:28 Reads "Shooting the Moon" [from In Time: 1962-1968]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:56:37 Helen, do you remember, by any chance, where the other moon poem is? Hold on one--I think I have it. Marvelous picture in the Times one day, the first time they took a--the first time one of the things went around the moon, and I wrote a very funny poem about it I think, if I can find it here. Oh well, while I'm looking for it, I'll read you "Zeus, in May, Reflects on a Recent Letter from Astarte". Joel Oppenheimer 00:57:53 Reads "Zeus, in May, Reflects on a Recent Letter from Astarte" [from In Time: 1962-1968]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:58:37 Am I allowed to read dirty poems here? Yeah? This is a poem called "Poem in Praise of Perseverance". And anybody who doesn't want to hear it should close their ears. This is another poem that was rejected by about 40 magazines. Joel Oppenheimer 00:59:05 Reads "Poem in Praise of Perseverance" [from In Time: 1962-1968]. Joel Oppenheimer 00:59:34 I really do want to find that damn moon poem. Alright, "The New Standard Simplified American Cabala for Home Use". Joel Oppenheimer 00:59:53 Reads "The New Standard Simplified American Cabala for Home Use" [from In Time: 1962-1968]. Joel Oppenheimer 01:00:12 "The Three Old Ladies". Joel Oppenheimer 01:00:24 Reads "The Three Old Ladies" [from In Time: 1962-1968]. Joel Oppenheimer 01:01:14 That poem incidentally was because of a little incident in a college in Brooklyn because they had a lady faculty member as a cop and she listened to me read and she objected to only one word in the entire reading and that was 'hard-on' and I suggested gently to the woman who called me about it that that might be that lady's problem, if she could listen to my--I found the moon poem, thank god--if that was the only word she found to object to that I really thought she might need a little help somewhere from somebody. "Wrong Again". Joel Oppenheimer 01:02:11 Reads "Wrong Again" [from In Time: 1962-1968; audience laughter throughout]. END 01:03:25 [Cut off abruptly].
Notes:
Joel Oppeheimer reads from In Time: Poems 1962-1968 (Bobbs-Merrill,1969) as well as poems from Just Friends/Friends and Lovers (Jargon Society) which was only published in 1980.

NOTES

Type:
General
Note:
Year-Specific Information: In Time: Poems 1962-1968 was published in 1969 while Joel Oppenheimer was writing columns for the Village Voice in New York City.
Type:
General
Note:
Local Connections: No direct connections to Montreal or Sir George Williams University are known, however Oppenheimer was an influential member of the Black Mountain group, and a director of the Poetry Project at St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery in New York. George Bowering’s name appears on the list of correspondences between 1969 and 1978, in Joel Oppenheimer’s Papers. (See Related Works).
Type:
Cataloguer
Note:
Original transcript, research, introduction and edits by Celyn Harding-Jones Additional research and edits by Ali Barillaro
Type:
Preservation
Note:
Reel-to-reel tape>CD>digital file

RELATED WORKS

Citation:
Foster, Edward."Oppenheimer, Joel". The Oxford Companion to Twentieth-Century Poetry in English. Ian Hamilton (ed). Oxford University Press, 1996.
URL:
https://www.worldcat.org/title/oxford-companion-to-twentieth-century-poetry-in-english/oclc/807465072&referer=brief_results
Citation:
“Joel Oppenheimer Papers”. Archives & Special Collections at the Thomas J. Dodd Center, University of Connecticut, 2003.
URL:
http://doddcentre.uconn.edu/ findaids/Oppenheimer/MSS19900056.html
Citation:
Oppenheimer, Joel. In Time: poems 1962-1968. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merril, 1969.
URL:
https://www.worldcat.org/title/in-time-poems-1962-1968/oclc/48666?referer=di&ht=edition
Citation:
Oppenheimer, Joel. Just Friends/Friends and Lovers. Asheville: Jargon Society, 1980.
URL:
https://www.worldcat.org/title/just-friendsfriends-and-lovers-poems-1959-1962/oclc/869017166&referer=brief_results
Citation:
“Oppenheimer, Joel”. Literature Online Biography. Proquest, 2008.
Citation:
“Poetry Four: Sir George Williams Poetry Series, Ninth Reading, Al Purdy”. Montreal: Sir George Williams University, 1970. Found in “The Stephen Morrissey Papers, 1963 - 1998”, McGill McLennan Library, Special Collections and Rare Books, Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

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