Spoken Word Revolution Redux

From its earliest days to today, poetry has always been a spoken art. On the page and out loud, poetry is the home for the brilliant, the rebellious, the artists and performers who are changing the world. Today’s spoken word revolution is the literary equivalent to grabbing a culture by the collar and shaking it…hard.

In the tradition of The Spoken Word Revolution, Redux brings more of the gripping, moving, innovative, often hilarious poetry in the oral tradition. This redefining collection gathers multiple forms of “spoken word” under the same motley tent—slam, hip-hop, musical interpretations, and youth movements among them. The resulting brew is both satisfying and world-expanding. One audio CD features some of the best poems and poets, immediately live in their own electrifying words and voices.

The Spoken Word Revolution Redux includes:
--Singer-songwriter Jeff Buckley
--Slam Poetry founder Marc Smith
--Ethan Hawke reading Beat Poet Gregory Corso
--Jazz pianist Patricia Barber adapting ee cummings
--Former US Poet Laureate Ted Kooser, Bill Collins and Mark Strand
--Four-time national poetry slam champion Patricia Smith
--Jeff Tweedy of Wilco
--Hip-Hop founder Gil Scott-Heron
--Indy National Poetry Slam Champions, including Mayda da Ville
--Viggo Mortensen and Hank Mortensen
--Billy Corgan of Smashing Pumpkins

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CD Track List -
Prologue -

Nobody’s Here (Marc Smith) -
Essay: Poetry as a Basic Human Need (Ted Kooser) -

part 1: slammers and laureates
Selecting A Reader (Ted Kooser)
galumpf deez nuts . . . . galumpf deez shoulders, spines, eyes
and collarbones of mine (Anis Mojgani) -
Anne Frank Huis (Andrew Motion) -
Essay: The Raised Voice of Poetry (James Fenton) -
THICK (Sonya Renee) -
Brightly Colored Boats Upturned on the Banks of the Charles (Billy Collins) -
Labeling Keys (Taylor Mali) -
Open Letter to Neil Armstrong (Mike McGee) -
Tract (Kevin Stein) -
tongue tactics (Mayda Del Valle) -
Old Man Leaves Party (Mark Strand) -
The Great Poet Returns (Mark Strand) -
Mandate (Roger Bonair-Agard) -
Essay: The Revolution Will Be (Guy Le Charles Gonzalez) -
Bagram, Afghanistan, 2002 (Marvin Bell) -
Oya (Regie O’Hare Gibson) -
A Winter Journey (Dave Allan Evans) -
messiahs (Da Boogie Man) -

women take the slam -
When the Burning Begins (Patricia Smith) -
Hell Night (Lisa Buscani) -
Funeral Like Nixon’s (Gayle Danley) -
Essay: Read by the Author: Some Notes on Poetry in Performance
(Henry Taylor) -
Night House (Bob Holman) -

the elders -
It—the Remedy (Marc Smith) -
Maps and Wings (Gary Mex Glazner) -
Gravitas: In Three Movements (Michael Warr) -
My Name’s Not Rodriguez (Luis J. Rodriguez) -
Hammer Heistand (The Police Chief) (Michael Brown) -
Private Patrick Gass, the Carpenter, Makes His Case to Lewis and Clark (Allan Wolf) -

part 2: legacy: poetic influence-
Essay: Robert Creeley: Performance Poet (Bob Holman) -
Creeley’s Oral Tradition (Bob Holman) -
Creeley’s Answering Machine (Bob Holman) -
You Got a Song, Man (Martín Espada) -
Apples (Michael Anania) -
Short and Clear (Robert Creeley) -
Essay: A Gathering of Memories: Gregory Corso, 1930 – 2001
(Bob Holman) -
Marriage (Gregory Corso) -
Letter to Jack Kerouac (on the 30th Anniversary of his Death—2001)(Mike Henry) -
I Will Give You Christmas (Billy Lombardo) -
Keys (Daniel Ferri) -
Essay: So This Guy Walks into the Green Mill Uptown Poetry Slam (Chicago) .... (Daniel Ferri) -
My Father’s Coat (Marc Smith) -
Jonathan (Nick Fox) -
The Quicksand Hourglass (Jeffrey McDaniel) -
Essay: Another Two Poets (Jeffrey McDaniel) -
The Modernist Bowling Alley (Matt Cook) -
How the Jellyfish Wishes (Derrick Brown) -
Essay: Poet David Lerner: “Still floating, bobbing on the surface of oblivion …”
(Jeffrey McDaniel) -
Mein Kampf (David Lerner) -
BLEED, BE (hydi zasteR) -
Truce (Viggo Mortensen) -
Utopian Chaos (Hank Mortensen) -
Why I’m Not a Businessman (Hank Mortensen) -

part 3: musicians meeting poets/
music meeting poetry -
8 Fragments of Kurt Cobain (Jim Carroll) -
Tom Waits, I Hate You (Simone Muench) -
RULEBOOK (Vernon Reid) -
Interruption in Arc (Phil West) -
A Letter to Bob Dylan (Jeff Buckley) -
A house is not a home (Scott Woods) -
put off your faces,Death:for day is over (E. E. Cummings) -
Love, put on your faces (Patricia Barber) -
When I Say My Heart (Jeff Tweedy) -
Another Great Thing (Jeff Tweedy) -
Poetry of My Heart (Billy Corgan) -
Sonny’s Lettah (Linton Kwesi Johnson) -

part 4: slam poetry -
Essay: Answering Carol: An Open Letter from the Margin
(Jack McCarthy) -
A Quick Thank You Note to Anne Sexton and Sylvia Plath
(Genevieve Van Cleave) -
Saint Catherine of Siena to Mary-Kate Olsen (Marty McConnell)
my southern heritage (Jason Carney) -
Essay: from poetryslam.com News, Posted by“Slamuncle” (Steve Marsh) -
Thirty? Again (Elizabeth Lewis) -
Essay: On Poet Elizabeth Lewis (Dave Allan Evans ) -
Guitar Repair Woman (Buddy Wakefield) -
Echo (Sou MacMillan) -
The Vagabond Heart says, (Lynne N. Procope) -
You Are Dangerous (Sarah McKinstry-Brown) -
Eulogy for Gregory Hines (Ed Mabrey) -
Jazz Funeral (Chuck Perkins) -
The Good News (Matt Mason) -
Letters from a Young Poet, Letter #1 (Young Male Poet) -
Phone Sex Operator (Cynthia French) -
Letters from a Young Poet, Letter #2 (Young Male Poet) -
Slut (Daphne Gottlieb) -
Letter My Dad Never Gave Me (Corbet Dean) -
Letters from a Young Poet, Letter #3 (Young Male Poet)
Ophelia’s Technicolor G-String: An Urban Mythology
(Susan B.A. Somers-Willett) -
Undressing Virginia Dare (Victor D. Infante) -
Essay: On Poet Paula L. Friedrich (Jack Foley) -
Essay: What Legitimizes Poems (Paula L. Friedrich) -
Ode to Pablo Neruda (Paula L. Friedrich) -
conquered, colonized, colonialized (Beau Sia) -
Essay: On Poet Beau Sia (Jack Foley) -

slam poets writing in form -
Delilah and Samson (Michael Kadela)
Epithalamion (Michael Kadela) -
Epithalamion: A Few Words for Kathleen (Jack McCarthy) -
Sylvia Plath’s Gangsta Rap Legacy (Jeremy Richards) -
T. S. Eliot’s Lost Hip-Hop Poem (excerpt) (Jeremy Richards)
Essay: Parody’s Hidden Agenda (Jeremy Richards) -
Medusa (Patricia Smith) -
Essay: “Unable to untangle ourselves from this starkly crafted drama…” (Patricia Smith) -
mistress stella speaks (Tyehimba Jess) -
Candler (James Nave) -
MY THIRD 9AM APPOINTMENT WITH THE UNIVERSITY’S
WRITER-IN-RESIDENCE (Karyna McGlynn) -
Eve’s Sestina for Adam (Lucy Anderton) -

part 5: the spoken world: poetry abroad -
It’s History (Brendan Murphy) -
Moment Auf Rattanbank (Nora Gomringer) -
Moment on Rattan Bench (Nora Gomringer) -
Liebesrost (Nora Gomringer) -
Love Rust (Nora Gomringer) -
Trois (Pilote le Hot) -
Three (Pilote le Hot)
An American Dream (Jürg Halter a.k.a. Kutti MC) -
Infected (David Stavanger a.k.a. Ghostboy) -
Amrit Sar (Chris Mooney-Singh ) -
Prelude to a Journey (Matthew Shenoda) -
Remembering (Matthew Shenoda) -
love poem (Suheir Hammad) -

part 6: the young and spoken: youth poetry -
Essay: The “Youuuuths”: “At base, we humans want to connect with each other” (Jeff Kass) -
Sixteen Fragments of Islam (Caronae Howell) -
Two Cities (Kelly McWilliams) -
Lebron James (Nate Marshall) -
Superfabulous (Molly Kennedy) -
Dear son, part 1 (Zora Howard) -
Dead Ass (Michael Cirelli) -

part 7: a hip-hop poetica -
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised (Gil Scott-Heron) -
harlem love poem (yvonne fly onakeme etaghene) -
Brooklyn’s Atlas (Kyle G. Dargan) -
Microphone Fiend (Kyle G. Dargan) -
1707 (Idris Goodwin) -
Detroit Winter (excerpt) (Invincible) -
Essay: Toward A Hip-Hop Poetica (Kevin Coval) -
The Day Jam Master Jay Died (Kevin Coval) -
what norman rockwell didn’t capture (Kevin Coval) -
Crazy Bunch Barbeque at Jefferson Park (Willie Perdomo) -
B-Boy Infinitives (Patrick Rosal) -
Freddie (Patrick Rosal) -
Born under Punches (Major Jackson) -
All Eyez On U (Nikki Giovanni) -
Mr. Dynamite Splits (Thomas Sayers Ellis) -
Essay: The New Oral Poetry: An Excerpt from the Essay
‘Disappearing Ink: Poetry at the End of Print Culture’ (Dana Gioia) -
Villanelle: for the dead white fathers (Duriel E. Harris) -
Drag (Duriel E. Harris) -
self portrait at the millennium (Duriel E. Harris) -
Rasta Not (Tracie Morris) -
Indigo (Tracie Morris) -
Life Saver (Tracie Morris) -
HIP HOP HAIKU (17 Skillables) (Douglas Kearney and Bao Phi)
makémake ghetto bodypartscasta (LaTasha N. Nevada Diggs)
My Father’s Brother (Christina Santana) -
hoodology (west side of chicago) (Mike Booker) -
For Those Who Need a True Story (Tara Betts) -
Lili’s Hands (Kelly Tsai) -
Blue Monday (Xero) -
,said the shotgun to the head. (excerpt) (Saul Williams) -
Essay: Stealing from a Jeff Chang Book on Hip-Hop (Jeff Chang) -

Epilogue (Victor D. Infante) -
A Tree in the Forest (Marc Smith) -

About the Editors -
Acknowledgments -
Contributor Biographies -
Permissions and Credits -
Index -

Part 2
Café, celebrated in song, story, and The United States of Poetry, which has been both a TV program and a book.
Here, excerpted from the book, is co-editor Bob Holman’s characterization...

This well-crafted, dynamic book/ CD combination will enliven any poetry classroom with forms that speak to today’s students. Eleveld gathers examples of many contemporary styles—slam, hip-hop,...

This well-crafted, dynamic book/ CD combination will enliven any poetry classroom with forms that speak to today’s students. Eleveld gathers examples of many contemporary styles—slam, hip-hop, song lyrics, youth poetry—and intersperses them with short critical essays such as "What Legitimizes Poems?" and "Parody’s Hidden jKgenda," written by a variely of writers. Narrators Marc Smith’s and Kevin Coval’s spirited readings on the CD finnly place the poems in oral culture. The juxtaposition of traditional poets’ work next to cutting-edge performance artists’ forces readers to confront the very definition of poetry in today’s society.

The Spoken Word Revolution: Redux is the second installment of an anthology of spoken word poetry featuring the work of traditional Poets Laureate juxtaposed with slam poets. Slam poetry has come a long way in the last two decades — through its creation by Marc Smith in 1985, to Def Poetry Jam, the groundbreaking television show produced by Russell Simmons, which also enjoyed a Broadway showing, to the peak of slam poetry in the late 1990s. Here, Eleveld again pairs with Marc Smith, cited as the founder of modern-day slam poetry, for their second volume, which follows much of the same format as the first edition. With over 150 poems, an audio CD featuring more than 75 minutes of live readings, and commentary to contextualize each poetry theme, Spoken Word is all about fun.

I can remember my first experience with slam poetry: the Nuyorican Poet’s Cafe, a place of myth, New York City grit and sophistication, and nearly unbearably hip. A place where, for me, language bounced. Eleveld and Smith do much to recapture many of my initial sensations when hearing spoken word poetry. The two have selected broadly, though there are some notable absences — at least to this novice — of Southern writers and well-known artists like Staceyann Chin. Nevertheless, they have created an engaging romp through the world of spoken word poetry.

Both Smith and Eleveld assert that spoken word poetry arises from Beat generation poems, and while certainly mainstream spoken word is connected to the Beat poetry of the 1950s, much of the poetry in urban centers of the country, where slam poetry has thrived, have been just as heavily influenced by rap and the spoken word cultures of the Caribbean, African, and African American people who popularized slam poetry through Def Poetry Jam. Neither Eleveld nor Smith offer a broader overview of slam poetry’s history, and that does the anthology a disservice. Jeff Chang, author of Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation donates a chapter from his book for the Hip-Hop Poetica section, which does provide a different insight on how culture contributed to the burgeoning spoken word movement, but it didn’t give me the broad outline I would have liked.

Instead, Spoken Word is truly about just that: the poetry. There are outstanding poems in the anthology — made even more powerful by their moving readings included on the accompanying audio CD. Hollywood junkies and cult fans of the 1990s film, Reality Bites, will find Ethan Hawke’s recitation of Gregory Corso’s “Marriage,” which he also read in the beginning of that film, deliciously subversive and ironic. Viggo Mortensen and his son Hank also appear, both providing solid work. Keven Stein’s “Tract,” which is an ode to a cantaloupe, brings forth recollections of Pablo Neruda’s work in Full Woman, Fleshly Apple, Hot Moon. Patricia Smith, one of only a little more than two dozen female poets featured, soars on “When the Burning Begins,” a beautiful eulogy to a murdered father. This poem’s strength lay in its ability to be just as powerful read out loud as it is on the page, and is a gem.

Other notable work in the anthology includes Simone Muench’s “Tom Waits, I Hate You;” an adapted jazz rendition of e.e. cummings’ “put off your faces, Death:for day is over,” which in some ways is more intriguing than the original. Jeremy Richards does a hilarious and yet on point parody of Sylvia Plath that’s worth listening to him read aloud. Brendan Murphy and Linton Kwesi Johnson both provide international poetry with decidedly political undertones. Nora Gomringer, who hails from a poetry legacy, shows her chops for performance poetry in “Moment on Rattan Bench,” a sublime treat.

Spoken Word might be most appropriate for those new to spoken poetry: for instance high school English students, those trying to expand their knowledge of modern poetry, or those who want to build up their library of spoken word poets. The CD is a great way to follow along with each artist as they read or perform. Though this can be distracting, as many of the readers transpose their words, it is interesting to witness the words taking flight off of the page and coming directly from the author’s mouth. As an overview it’s wonderful; for those with more spoken word experience this may not appease your appetite.

Gr 9 Up–As in The Spoken Word Revolution (Sourcebooks, 2003), Redux provides an overview of the many movements–among them slam and hip-hop–that comprise a modern renaissance of performance poetry, a shout-out to poetry’s oral roots. Teens will recognize some of the writers and performers, from actor Ethan Hawke to Smashing Pumpkins front man Billy Corgan. The placement of traditional poets’ work and readings next to those of today’s performance artists forces readers/listeners to question the very definition of poetry. Critical essays punctuate the selections, further unraveling such questions as, “What is poetry’s intent?” Or, simply, “What is poetry?” Clearly, in a collection dedicated to performance poetry, the accompanying CD is of vital importance. It includes only a selection of the book’s poems, complete with sometimes-explicit but never gratuitous lyrics, and not all are performed in their entirety. While the CD gives the book its legs, today’s students and educators will undoubtedly itch for a DVD or even downloadable video file to experience the full effect of the poem’s delivery. Ultimately, much of Redux retreads the same ground as its predecessor, but it remains a well-crafted, dynamic tool that will not only enliven any poetry classroom, but also legitimizes art forms that are important to many of today’s students.–Jill Heritage Maza, Greenwich High School, CT

“In an essay titled, "Poetry as a Basic Human Need," Ted Kooser, U.S. poet laureate, describes spoken word or performance poetry as "a turning back toward the excitement our ancestors felt as they sat close to the fire and listened to their shaman tells stories." And excitement abounds in this welcoming, inclusive, and expert collection and substantial accompanying performance CD. Mark Eleveld, coeditor with the legendary performance poet Marc Smith of Spoken Word Revolution
(2003), has selected poems of high energy and deep feeling, vivid imagery and mischievous wit. Poems that can hold their own on the page. Eleveld traces rivers of influence by mixing together works by Mark Strand and Nikki Giovanni, performance “elders,” poetry slam winners, high school students, and poets from abroad. The bond between music and poetry is explored in poems by musicians, including Gil Scott-Heron, Jeff Tweedy, and Billy Corgan, and in poems about music. With razor-sharp critical essays from diverse perspectives interleaved among poems forthright, shrewd, and fired by compassion and love, this is a galvanizing, mind-expanding, and hopeful collection. —Donna Seaman

Format: Hardcover

Dimensions
Length: 9.125 in
Width: 7.375 in
Weight: 28.00 oz
Page Count: 256 pages

Spoken Word Revolution Redux

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Spoken Word Revolution Redux

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