Today is Bob Grumman’s birthday and I wish him (as ancient as he is) many more!
Bob is the owner/editor of Runaway Spoon Press.
Bob is a tireless advocate for visual and minimalist poetries.
Bob’s a creative… a visual poet, creator of wonderful poetry such as his Mathemaku. Here’s another one I like:
And other kinds of poetry too.
Bob is an inveterate coiner of terms, only a few of which are scattered around his Comprepoetica Dictionary (so far). If Bob didn’t actually coin Wilshberia, Wishberia, Knownstream and Burstnorm, he should (or could) have.
Bob’s a good interviewee.
Bob argues with me about poetry and poetics and sometimes in this way drives me to despair, drink and seclusion… but I always learn something. I admire his dedication, of course, but also his total honesty about what he believes and who he is. I’ve learned a lot from Bob. He’s opened my eyes and ears, bit by bit, to poetry I’d have otherwise dismissed and positions about aesthetics that I continue to learn from.
Thanks, Bob! And happy birthday!
I still like your WEPD list [What Excellent Poems Do], Bob. And Mathemaku No. 8 ain’t bad, either. Kinda cute, in fact.
I know that we agree on one thing: the Earl of Oxford did not write the plays attributed to the actor William Shaksper. I think that he had neither the interest, the time, nor the talent to write the plays…..but I do think that the actor Shaksper didnae write them, either. That’s a whole nother issue, tho, innit?
Burstnormly yrs,
Moll Frisky
You might have to send this to NewPoetry because I don’t think Bob ever saw this post.
And you’re outed as a Shakespeare doubter! I never woulda thunk it.
That gadabout Bob! I’ll alert him, then.
But, Chris, I’ve outed m’sel’ in the biog tags on thenervousbreakdown as well as my poetry pamphlets; to wit, “She’s now at work on a play about Shakespeare the woman.” This follows some 11 years of research….and has always seemed to me a “no-brainer”, but folk do, strangely, protest much. In a few years, I’m thinking, the world will agree. I’m curious as to why you “never woulda thunk it”?
poetically cosmic Judy
Hey, Chris, thanks for the Very Nice mention. As for Judy, well she has earlier outed herself concerning who wrote Shakespeare, but it was obvious long before that from her lack of what we in the authorship field call sanity that she would ignore the overwhelming evidence for Shakespeare and go off on her own. But she’s a good kid, and creatively wrong about the Bard, not boring wrong about him like so many other authorship wacks.
By the way, all the coinages you mention are mine; they may also have been someone else’s before that, but not to my knowledge.
all best, Bob
Quick correction–the interesting word “wishberia” is not mine. Yours, Chris?
Bob
You do realise the danger of placing yourself–p’raps for the only time ever–in the “Knownstream” of Shaksper authorship, Bob, you wily devil you.
‘Tis true, we both go “YUK!” whilst eyeballing the crazies’ defenses for E of Ox. But equally I go “YUK!” at the “evidence” for actor Will as author of some 35 awesome plays. As a dear friend often says: “We’ll see; we’ll see.”
And, truly, after all, the authorship issue’s one of the most exciting mysteries ever debated—experts fill the critical world, actors still rock the bard’s boards, and we still swoon at those beautiful lines.
Bob, Wishberia was yours. You once wrote:
“Among them are composers of conventional haiku too numerous to name. I think the school of conventional contemporary American haiku is still not part of Wilshberia though it should be. It’s in Wishberia.”
I thought that was a rather clever creation!