Doug Holder

The cartoon below was sketched in April 2005 and the poem written in 2014.  Doug Holder is still around and listed as a poet publicist for Harris Gardner's Boston National Poetry Month.  I began writing a critical poem last night after looking at Poets&Writers magazine and the Academy of American Poets website, both dross laden and thus excellent grist for creative writing.

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Notes on Artistic Sterility and the Academic Imprimatur

The dude* sent me an email announcement—a great 

self-congratulating pat on his back—, I was his bête noire.
Since he was on my list, I was now on his, though 

when I shotgunned, it was usually to announce

not the light of lime, but rather a good sledgehammering.
His press had teamed up with a regional college to promote 

the “literary arts” and the likely modus operandi

                                                of innocuous icon idolatry.

His vision of art seemed to be a castration of it, 

eliciting the approval of ladder-climbing pedagogues

—those chairs, deans, chancellors, VPs, and presidents—,

other members of the local chambers of commerce, 

and, of course, the proverbial old ladies in the audience.    

To be first in the series, as concrete illustration of the benefits 

of sucking up, kissing ass, and playing the literary game, 

he chose Boston Poet Laureate Sam Cornish, 

editor of children’s literature 
            and renowned author of An Apron Full of Beans.  

The dude’s purpose, besides pushing his own press, 

                        was to help students of creative writing

to garner not the courage to stand up and away from the herd, 

but rather to gain expertise in the fine art of literary networking.  

"This is a wonderful opportunity to be aligned

                                    with a rising academic institution,”

he declared, sounding more like a politician than a bard.  

"I want the literary community and the community at large 

to know about the vital literary programming at Endicott...”

Yet how could he proclaim “vital” the output of programmers 
who rarely, if ever, railed viscerally against the machine? 

“I am hoping to be involved in the creation of the Hub 

for the Arts on the North Shore,” he career-fully excogitated, 

when perhaps as a poet he should have instead 

                                                            truthfully excoriated.

Just what higher ed needed, I thought, a tad depressed 

by the persistence of poetry into the smiley-face verse factory 

                                    —another hub, yes, oh sadly, 

of artistic censors, blind-eye turners, PC and far too much civility.

................................................

*Doug Holder, publisher, Ibbetson Street Press, and Endicott College adjunct instructor

 

Becky Tuch and The Review Review

A Review of Becky Tuch and Her Review Review
Well, I was looking through NewPages.com and bumped into "The fastest growing literary magazine in the PNW, Belletristmagazine is 'breathtaking, a joy to read!' (The Review Review)."  Breathtaking... oh, yeah!  Vaguely, I recalled having a mano a mano with Mme Review Review.  So, I checked to see if I'd done a cartoon with her regard.  Sure enough I had (see  https://wwwtheamericandissidentorg.blogspot.com/2012/10/becky-tuch.html). 

Below is Becky Tuch's 2010 review of The American Dissident (and comments), unsurprisingly not very positive.  The bold print is mine.  After the review is the brief exchange I had with Tuch, who then essentially did not respond to any of the points made in my critique of her review.  

Ideologues generally never respond to point-by-point counterarguments.  For them, there is no room for REASON that challenges their ideology and certainly no room for VIGOROUS DEBATE.  Clearly, Tuch learned her lesson:  it is best not to respond when one does not have any cogent responses.  For ideologues, there is plenty of room, however, for broad nonsensical groupthink echo-demonization epithets as in RACIST!  ISLAMOPHOBE!  NAZI!  NEOCON! HATER! WHITE NATIONALIST!  If you do not agree with the Tuchs, then you are automatically branded with a scarlet letter A, or rather R for right-winger...

..............................................................................................................

http://www.thereviewreview.net/reviews/politics-poetry-propaganda

Politics, Poetry, Propaganda

Review of American Dissident, Winter 

2010

by Becky Tuch

Rating: 

G. Tod Slone has a bone to pick. With academia, the literary establishment, state cultural councils, and with many editors of literary magazines. Thus his literary magazine American Dissident pays tribute to his ideals, publishing poetry, cartoons, correspondences and essays which treat themes of injustice and corruption, both within the literary establishment and elsewhere.

Slone’s effort is an admirable one. As someone whose favorite summer pastime was Bread and Puppet—a giant puppet show in Vermont which united puppeteering with politics—I love to see the worlds of art and activism converge. I agree when Slone says there isn’t nearly enough of this happening in literary communities, and it is trenchant of him to observe that academia has turned many a would-be-activist into a tenure-seeking-hand-shaker.

Yet when it comes to the arguments put forth by much of the poetry in American Dissident, I am not in agreement. Nor do I find much of the poetry particularly moving. The language is often prosaic, the message as clear as a bludgeon to the head. In some cases, the politics offended me. In other cases, it was grammar mistakes and/or spelling errors which offended. 

But, the good: Lauren Fleck-Staff’s “What Would They Say” is a lovely reflection upon the disconnect between global atrocities and academic comfort—“And who am I to stick out my lip/considering famine/ between lunch and dinner?” Similarly Mather Schneider’s poem “Social” admirably addresses the flaws of health care: “It was the end of an 11 hour day and I was thinking/ the only way to get health insurance/ is to be either wealthy/ or DIRT poor.”

It’s important to note that instead of the usual cover letter with a list of qualifications and publishing credits, Sloane invites submitters to describe a time they dissented in public, fought for free speech, or, as Sloane is fond of saying, spoken “the rude truth to power.”

I think this is a neat endeavor. I love the idea of caring more about writers’ activism than about their credentials. I certainly enjoy reading about people’s personal lives more than about where they went to school. In a particularly personal note, Rosalyn Becker writes that she “took tranquilizers and sleeping pills to force myself to work a job I hated—telephone operator for Ma Bell.” And Doug Draime tells of us his lifelong struggle to be a poet, giving up, starting over, giving up again, starting over again.

But mostly the poems in this journal celebrate individualism. Lauren Horth’s “Why Is It” ends with a plaintive cry for “free speech,/ individualism, reality.” Marina Sanot’s “Outsider” tells the reader that “You don’t have to do what they say/ Or believe what they think or/ Listen to their knowledge that/ they force upon you.” The editor’s own poem, “Poem #3 for a Hack of Bourgeois Hegemony” begins, “For democracy,/ I stood alone.”

Is the best way to combat political corruption by standing alone? By asserting one’s individualism? American Dissident seems to think so. Thus while the journal seeks to celebrate “literature, democracy and dissidence” it often reads as little more than libertarian propaganda.  

Or, in some cases, right-wing diatribe. Andrew Cook’s “Freedom” might find a suitable audience at a Republican rally with its nostalgia for a simpler time in America, its use of the pronoun “we” to assume an audience of alienated whites, as in “We are immigrants in our own country.” This poem's nostalgia for an old-fashioned America is both offensive and naive, as are its narrow-minded racial remarks. And it is sloppy with its grammar—“Chain-link fences and barred windows/have replace white picket fences” (italics mine.)

I found Doug Draime’s “Writers Writing Graven Images in Time” similarly offensive, but in a different way. Draime writes, “what is truth never changes/ never alters/ never stops being/ and is the only thing/ that is real.” This emphasis on the “truth” as being fixed and immutable is utterly ridiculous. Whose truth? Whose reality? Is the poet really claiming that there is one fixed truth which does not change, and is this not the very sort of claim used to justify social oppression for centuries? 

Comments

#1 Hate speech 

Posted by Ron (not verified) on Dec 21, 2010 at 7:06AM

Hate speech by its very nature self-immolating. Someone who descries not having health care insurance under an oppressive capitalism should not then rail against it because it is part of a socialist takeover. It is a blind infuriating fury that is expressed by these dissidents, no self-awareness of contradictory rhetoric, no logical development of a coherent ideology, just rancorous rage and paranoia at anyone who disagrees with them. If you don't publish their poetry you are part of a power structure that does not recognize their greatness, if you reject their ideas you are oppressing them and marginalizing them, if you don't take their fliers you are holding back the TRUTH that is the greatest truth of all truthfulness, the truth that is truest of all truth, their Truth. In psychology they call that delusional paranoia.

• reply 

#2 Ron, you are correct that one 

Posted by Ian Thal (not verified) on Dec 21, 2010 at 11:07AM

Ron, you are correct that one aspect of G. Tod Slone's on-going tirade against corruption is how his work isn't being published, how he isn't receiving grants, and how people are dismissive of his views. All of these things, to him, pointed towards a conspiracy.

This was manifested in his rage against the people associated with the (now discontinued) Foetry website, which had proved itself to be quite effective at identifying genuine corruption within the most high-profile poetry competitions.

• reply 

#3 Hi Becky, Thanks for alerting 

Posted by Ian Thal (not verified) on Dec 20, 2010 at 11:26PM

Hi Becky,

Thanks for alerting me to your review. I too have noted in my exchanges with Slone that his "dissidence" seems mostly motivated by his personal paranoia and that he often toys with extremist rhetoric (though I haven't delved into it as deeply as you have-- simply due to lack of interest in spending any more time on him.) My back-and-forth with Slone is recounted here:

http://ianthal.blogspot.com/search/label/G.%20Tod%20Slone

I've also had my own experiences with Bread & Puppet and found a similar tone of extremist ideology lurking in the background of the idealism that originally attracted me, so given that similar background, you may find this of interest:

http://ianthal.blogspot.com/2007/04/breaking-with-bread-and-puppet.html

• reply 

#4 B&P 

Posted by TheReviewReview on Dec 21, 2010 at 11:00AM

Ian,

Thanks so much for your comments. I will have to check out your blog on Bread and Puppet. I was going when I was a teenager, so of course didn't think too deeply about what views might be lurking under the surface. But it's always good to consider everything carefully before being too quickly swayed by a point of view...or by puppets!...Thanks again for reading the review, and best of luck with your own work.

• reply 

#5 You're very welcome. 

Posted by Ian Thal (not verified) on Dec 21, 2010 at 11:19AM

You're very welcome. Becky.

For a couple of years, I became quite notorious in Bread & Puppet circles and that particular blog entry developed into a series of analyses and interviews.

I enjoyed my time working with Bread & Puppet, but quickly came to see Schumann's frequent heavy-handedness defeating his more poetic tendencies-- and as a consequence some of the same tendencies we see in The American Dissident make themselves manifest. Of course, a major problem is that Schumann never really got over the fact that Germany lost WWII-- and every now and then this will come up in an interview, or more subtly in his art.

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From: George Slone [todslone@hotmail.com]
To: 99review@gmail.com
Sent: Mon, January 3, 2011 10:46:49 AM
Subject: Review of a Review

Hi Becky Tuch,

A friend just told me yesterday that your review of The American Dissident was up on your site.  If you’d told me you’d posted it, I would have responded a lot sooner.  Perhaps you didn’t want me to see it or respond?  After all, your review is a far cry from your initial email sent in October.

Hi Mr. Slone,
My name is Becky Tuch.  I just came upon American Dissident while doing a search for "Literary Industrial Complex." Your journal looks awesome. Of course, I'd seen it before at bookstores, but am especially excited to see all the past essays posted on your site.
I edit a website that reviews literary magazines, The Review Review. I was wondering if you might like to add us to your mailing list? I would love to review an issue of AD, to get the word out to readers about what a great journal it is.
Thanks so much, and keep up the great work,
Becky

“G. Tod Slone has a bone to pick,” begins your review in a rather “offensive” fashion, to use your term of predilection.  Yet could an independently thinking citizen actually not have a “bone to pick,” given the intrinsically corrupt nature of our society, including the academic/literary establishment sector?  Since you live in Massachusetts, are you totally unaware of the intrinsic corruption in state and local government?  Only a non-thinker or perhaps a thinking ladder climber, who’s learned the fine art of turning a blind eye and muzzling herself, would not have a “bone to pick.”  

Anyhow, thanks for the initial compliment, though one-star is not exactly laudatory.  Does every review get at least one star?   Or do some actually get no stars at all?  I’d love to consult a review you gave five-stars.  Now, that would really be fun.  Yes, I’d love to see that poetry!  

You note, “Nor do I find much of the poetry particularly moving. The language is often prosaic, the message as clear as a bludgeon to the head.”  As you likely know, most poets do not write dissident verse.  They tend instead to write anything but.  In fact, that’s why I like to bludgeon.  In that sense, I certainly stand at antipodes to the flowery, court-jestering poet herd.  My message is blindingly clear that way.  Who said poetry had to be obfuscatory and wordy?  Art for art saking is evidently not my purpose.  It’s the purpose of the poet herd.  Who said TRUTH cannot be BLUNT and BLUDGEONING?  Ralph Waldo Emerson did pair the word RUDE with TRUTH ("go upright and vital and speak the RUDE TRUTH in all ways").  And that makes a lot of sense, at least to me.  The RUDE TRUTH pisses people off… or, in your words, is offensive, prosaic, bludgeoning.  

“In some cases, the politics offended me,” you state.  As I tell my university students, always include an example or two to back such statements.   I also tell them to buck up and not be so easily offended!  What precise politics offended you?  If you remain vague, I can’t possibly counter-argue.  

“In other cases, it was grammar mistakes and/or spelling errors which offended,” you state.  Reading that statement, one would think The American Dissident to be loaded with botched grammar and spelling errors.  I know that not to be even remotely true.  Your implication is botched reportage.  BTW, you’ve misspelled my name several times!  Should I therefore be offended and conclude that your reviews are riddled with offensive spelling errors?  Likely, you’ll ignore that riposte.  

 “Is the best way to combat political corruption by standing alone?” you state regarding your belief that that’s my belief. Yet never do I state such a thing… anywhere.   On the contrary, the best way is likely via compromise and that means compromising ones principles.  That’s not my way.  My way is not the best way.  But democracy demands different ways be given voice in the marketplace of ideas.  It demands the possiblity of the RUDE-TRUTH way, which is evidently my way, not your way.  My purpose is to denounce corruption, be it in academe, the public-funding process, and/or in the poetry milieu.  It is to stand up and express myself with as little self-censoring as possible.  I do not filter my writing in order to get published and climb the literary ladder, which seems to be the litmus test for “success” applied by one of your commenters, Ian Thal.  Speaking the truth as I see it, as opposed to how you want me to see it, is what I try to do.   And like others, I too know damn well when opening my mouth might prove detrimental to my literary or career “success.”   However, it is likely that I break the taboos much more often than most poets or artists, you and Thal included, would ever dare.  That’s what makes me different.  That’s what gets me ostracized.  That’s what works against “success.”  That’s what doesn’t get me cultural-council grants.  That’s what did not get me tenure.  That’s what pissed Thal off.  

“Thus while the journal seeks to celebrate ‘literature, democracy and dissidence’ it often reads as little more than libertarian propaganda,” you write.  “Or, in some cases, right-wing diatribe.”  Again, you fail to present one precise example of “libertarian propaganda.”  And your one example of “right-wing diatribe” is not at all clear.  Of course, one would have to ask what your definition of right-wing might be?  Do you define “right-wing diatribe” as anything critical of the left-wing?  If so, then, yes, certainly accuse me of “right-wing diatribe”!  But who cares?  Your accusation only serves to divert attention.  It would be a lot more pertinent if you’d point to one precise example of a LIE in The American Dissident.  Where precisely have I, as editor, prevaricated?  That’s the real question, not whether or not I’m right-wing or libertarian or tea party or neocon.  The question is not whether or not I RAGE or BLUDGEON.  

Criticize the left, and the left will ineluctably dismiss the criticism as “right-wing diatribe,” no matter how true.  That’s been my experience.  That’s become both the shame and weakness of the left.  Just the same, I am certainly not right wing.  I detest the corporations that Obama snuggles with.  I detest the wars that Obama wages.  I detest religions:  christian AND muslim.  I detest the lack of transparency that Obama surrounds himself in (thanks Wikileaks!).   Yes, but I also detested those things when they involved Bush.  I’ve never voted for a Democrat or Republican.  I did vote for Ralph Nader in 2000.  Is he now viewed as a right-winger because he upset Gore?  I wouldn’t be at all surprised.  I am against the corporate feeding frenzy on illegal CHEAP labor.  Since that is not the PC-party line, does that automatically make me a racist or someone who publishes racists?  Or perhaps that makes you right-wing, since, if you favor illegal immigration, you must also favor that corporate-feeding frenzy.  Ideologues can never reason with clarity.  Am I automatically racist because I criticized Obama?  Is that how you think?  Wasn’t your remark on alienated white people a racist remark against whites?  You write as if the Republican Party had no black members at all!  Oh, yes, those aren’t blacks, they’re Uncle Toms.  Is it right-wing to note that the death of Ted Kennedy’s DOG was front page news in the Cape Cod Times recently, while the deaths of soldiers in Afghanistan in the same paper were listed on the last page?  In what sands do you bury your head, Mme Review Review?  I’m really curious!  

You’ve used the PC-leftist mantra “offensive” three times in your review.  Should I conclude therefore that you are a PC-leftist?  Can a few spelling errors actually “offend” you?  What did your mother teach you?  Mine taught me, “sticks and stones…”  In other words, she taught me to toughen up and build spine.  The PC-left wants everyone to wimper down, not to question and challenge, so it can control and live in un-ecological mansions, drive in un-ecological limos and fly in un-ecological jets, while parading around as green.  No thanks!  And who gives a damn if you’re offended… by the TRUTH?  I for one certainly don’t.  

You note that “narrow-minded racial remarks,” are present in The American Dissident as if the journal is a racist review.  But I do not publish racial negativity… unless TRUTH.  Besides, what precisely are those remarks?  Are they made throughout the journal?  

As for your two commenters, Ron Anonymous sounds like his mind is also anonymous.  He puts all dissidents into one narrow “rancorous-rage” basket.  How easily bourgeois.  For him, I quote Leonard Weinglass, Defense Attorney for dissident Daniel Ellsberg:  “And the psychiatrist said to us you don’t want on this jury men of middle age because these are people who in the course of their lives might possibly have sacrificed principle for the sake of career, for the sake of family, and they live with that compromise and they will have and they will have a lot of disdain, even contempt for two men who did it for the sake of principle and took the risk.”   

Principle vs. Career.  Yes, they’ll hate you if you choose the former!  I do not sacrifice my principles for a dubious literary or academic career.  As for Ian Thal, he ought to focus on that quote.  I decried his nonsensical courtjester poet stage act.  Does poetry really need more jesters on the stage?  Christ, Thal even dresses up like a jester during his performances!  In any case, he too needs to support his general dismissal of me with a concrete example or two.  How else can I defend myself against his “tirade” of  my purported “on-going tirade against corruption”?  Thal too lives in Massachusetts.  Can he be blind to Democrat-party corruption in state government?  Is it a “tirade” that PEN New England (“defending freedom everywhere”… except in New England) refuses to respond to my criticism?  Is it a “tirade” that the Massachusetts Cultural Council refuses to respond to my criticism?  Is it a tirade that Doug Holder, Ian Thal, Charles Coe, Joan Houlihan, Fred Marchant, and others in the state refuse to open their doors to vigorous debate, cornerstone of democracy?   They shamefully reject criticism of their incestuous milieu.  

And how does Thal know I am not being published?  I’ve had things published and without doubt much more than he.  The list of my publications runs well over 10 pages long, single spaced, New Times Roman 10 pica.  But I don’t broadcast those things every time I write!  In fact, I never do… unless I have to defend myself against unfounded accusations like Thal’s.  A new book of my caustic cartoons will soon be published (and not by me or a friend).  Recently, I had a bilingual book of poetry (French/English) published by Gival Press, and a chapbook published by Petroglyph.  Why does Thal insist pushing the lie that I’m not published?  Does my being published break his stereotypical view of me?  My cartoons are published on National Free Press’ website (see www.nationalfreepress.org/cartoonists) and the Camel Saloon recently did a special on them (see http://camelsaloonmaudit.blogspot.com).  I’ve even had highly dissident essays published (and not by friends).  But these things will not change Thal’s view.  Slone is not published.  That’s all Thal’s mind will accept.  It doesn’t matter how much proof is thrown before it.  Hell, I’ve even got a doctoral degree from a French university and wrote a 335-page thesis in French, a language I worked my ass off to learn.  What the hell does Thal have?  I’m fluent in French and Spanish, and read in Italian and German.  In fact, almost every day I read through the headlines (and articles of interest) in Der Spiegel, El Pais, Le Monde, Le Devoir, and Il Corriere della Sera.  

The public-grant according machine is corrupt and generally run by PC-leftists who practice viewpoint discrimination.  I will never get a grant from the MCC or NEA as long as such leftists favor bourgeois-type art and literature with the PC-stamp of approval.  There is indeed a kind of conspiracy against critical art and critical literature.  But it is not the kind of conspiracy where people sit together in a dark room.  It is a general conspiracy of dogmatism.  Thal can keep his head buried in the sand if he likes.  That’s his problem, not mine.  All Thal seems capable of is ad hominem insult.  Just call it “rage”.  How facile.  No need to disprove any points made.  Just dismiss it as “rage” or “personal paranoia.”  For the cartoon that ENRAGED Thal and provoked him to carry an interminable grudge with my regard, see http://wwwtheamericandissidentorg.blogspot.com/2010/01/ian-thal-poet-court-jester.html.  

Now, these things said, Becky, is my “effort” still “an admirable one”?  If so are you still going to do that interview, so we might get into a little more than Thalian name calling?  We could deal with some facts and I can show you actual documents, although it seems the paranoid do not have actual documents.  Yes, I can show you the no-trespass order issued by the Watertown Free Public Library without due process or the no-politcal culture regulation created by the Concord Cultural Council to keep me from funding or the letter from the NEA refusing to provide any concrete examples of why it designated The American Dissident as “low” and “poor” or the email from Doug Holder stating he would stand up on his hindlegs to insist that all viewpoints have voice in the Massachusetts poetry scene.  Sadly, Holder never did stand up.  His friend Harris Gardner refuses to allow my voice at his National Poetry Month festival in Boston.  Do you care?  Of course not!  There’s more of course… if you’re at all interested.  You might wish to look at the syllabus I created for a course in literature, democracy and dissidence, a course that so far not one college will permit me to teach.  Or how about the director of the Cape Cod Cultural Council arguing that art in the public library, which she also directs, must be “family friendly” and that there is a thin line between provocative and offensive.  Perhaps you know each other since you both seem to favor the knee-jerk, PC-offensive mantra.  

It would be interesting to discuss what a poet ought to be.  Perhaps for you a poet is an adept juggler of words, someone who fits in.  But for me, a poet should be much, much more, as should his poetry.  In any case, hope to hear from you soon and hope you have a little spine and will not be offended by this review.

Best,
    

G. Tod Slone, Founding Editor

The American Dissident, a 501 c3 Nonprofit 

Journal of Literature, Art, Democracy & Dissidence

www.theamericandissident.org

todslone@yahoo.com

217 Commerce Rd.
Barnstable, MA 02630

From: Becky Tuch <99review gmail.com="">
To: George Slone
Sent: Tue, January 4, 2011 1:12:52 PM
Subject: Re: Review of a Review

Hi Tod,

Thanks for your in-depth reply to my review. Your comments are much appreciated.

It is true that my initial email to you was upon first discovering AD. I had a lot of excitement over what I thought the journal was, or could be. Alas, upon taking a more careful look at its contents, I found myself to be in strong disagreement with many of the expressed sentiments and values contained within. I have already stated my beliefs in my review, and don't think they need to be reiterated here.

As for the misspellings of your name, I made the appropriate corrections.

Take care,

Becky

From: George Slone
To: 99review@gmail.com
Sent: Fri, March 4, 2011 12:42:14 PM
Subject: The Amer Diss

Becky,
Your review appears in the current issue of The American Dissident followed by my revised rebuttal.  You inspired me.  Inflexible minds always seem to inspire me.  And so many there are out there!  I wrote a poem.  You can read it and see your name here:  

http://thecamelsaloon.blogspot.com/2011/01/frozen-in-mind-donkeys-vs-elephants.html.  I know you probably won’t understand it.  No matter.  You’ve also inspired me to do a cartoon/aquarelle on you further inspired by a Goya print.  It too appears in next issue.  Please do not think I am angry or think that I think that you’re angry.  I am a satirist a la Juvenal and Daumier.  En avant!

Sincerely,

G. Tod Slone

www.theamericandissident.org

Gregory Orr and Elizabeth Lund

.........................................

Perhaps I should have called the above cartoon, "The Silence of the Poet Lambs."  Lund does not provide her email at the Washington Post, so I could not send it to her.  However, I did send it to establishment-poet Doug Holder of Ibbetson Press, since I finally managed to obtain an image of Lund, after hunting for a while on the net, from an interview/hagiography video she did with Holder.  Also, I sent it to Gregory Orr, the subject of Lund's hagiography.  Will either poet respond?  Or will they automatically abide by the Poet Lamb creed:  thou shalt not respond to criticism from critical plebe poets, no matter how truthful?  The key in all of my cartoons is TRUTH.  The goal of satirical targets should be to find something, anything, in the cartoons that is not TRUTH.   Then they should inform me of their finding(s) and, if indeed an error, I will correct it and apologize for it.  BUT poets, especially when criticized, tend to hate vigorous debate and freedom of speech, democracy's cornerstones...

Sam Cornish

Notes on Artistic Sterility and the Academic Imprimatur

The dude* sent me an email announcement—a great

self-congratulating pat on his back—, I was his bête noire.
Since he was on my list, I was now on his, though

when I shotgunned, it was usually to announce

not the light of lime, but rather a good sledgehammering.
His press had teamed up with a regional college to promote

the “literary arts” and the likely modus operandi

                                                of innocuous icon idolatry.

His vision of art seemed to be a castration of it,

eliciting the approval of ladder-climbing pedagogues

—those chairs, deans, chancellors, VPs, and presidents—,

other members of the local chambers of commerce,

and, of course, the proverbial old ladies in the audience.    

To be first in the series, as concrete illustration of the benefits

of sucking up, kissing ass, and playing the literary game,

he chose Boston Poet Laureate Sam Cornish,

editor of children’s literature
            and renowned author of An Apron Full of Beans. 

The dude’s purpose, besides pushing his own press,

                        was to help students of creative writing

to garner not the courage to stand up and away from the herd,

but rather to gain expertise in the fine art of literary networking. 

"This is a wonderful opportunity to be aligned

                                    with a rising academic institution,”

he declared, sounding more like a politician than a bard. 

"I want the literary community and the community at large

to know about the vital literary programming at Endicott...”

Yet how could he proclaim “vital” the output of programmers
who rarely, if ever, railed viscerally against the machine?

“I am hoping to be involved in the creation of the Hub

for the Arts on the North Shore,” he career-fully excogitated,

when perhaps as a poet he should have instead

                                                            truthfully excoriated.

Just what higher ed needed, I thought, a tad depressed

by the persistence of poetry into the smiley-face verse factory

                                    —another hub, yes, oh sadly,

of artistic censors, blind-eye turners, PC and too much civility.

................................................

*Doug Holder, publisher, Ibbetson Street Press, and Endicott College adjunct instructor

Harris Gardner

Harris Gardner, Another Little Caesar CensorAbout a decade ago I met Harris Gardner at the Jack Kerouac Festival in Lowell. I was manning a table for The American Dissident in the small press area. Gardner and Jack Powers were the bosses of that area. I recall Gardner sneering down at a book I had on the table: FUCK MASSACHUSETTS. He chatted with Powers. Both questioned me as to whether they should permit me to keep the book there because, well, it might anger their puppet masters. Gardner is one of thousands of little caesar censors in the literary world. His principle concern is obtaining cash from the state politicos so he can dole it out to his literary cronies.

What of course viscerally disgusts me about Gardner, besides his evident disdain for vigorous debate and democracy, are his hypocritical statements. “The poets are today’s prophets,” he blathers. “Poets should be examples of social consciousness, and awareness.” But awareness of what? The viewpoint discrimination effected by the likes of Harris? And what is social consciousness, being conscious of PC and its nefarious campaign of censorship and indoctrination?

“Poets are social critics, and social criticism is one part of the art,” he states, while excluding me from his National Poetry Month because of my evident rude-truth social criticism. But for Harris some social criticism is clearly taboo because it inevitably denounces his ilk.

“Political poetry is only a problem when it becomes a rant,” he continues. Rant, of course, is key! Anything apt to expose Gardner's hypocrisy would have to be dismissed as RANT!

“If it is done well, it still is poetry,” he states. Done well? But according to whom? The real-estate-broker, friend-of-the-Chamber-of-Commerce Gardner?

“You can have political poetry that uses metaphor without shaking a fist in someone’s face,” he argues. But how not to “shake a fist” in his face? And who would want to hide the fist behind metaphor?

To be invited to read at the Boston National Poetry Month Festival, one has to actually pass Gardner’s “audition,” as he terms it! Am I fucking dreaming? How did it ever get so rotten in the world of poetry? Where the fuck are the other barbarians? With flaccid bagel-bards like Gardner at the helm, the barbarians should be storming the gates in hoards!

Robert Pinsky

For Justice, Equity, and Freedom of Expression in Massachusetts


[Essay sent to Massachusetts Cultural Council, Concord Cultural Council, Massachusetts Poetry Festival, Massachusetts Attorney General, Boston Herald, Boston Globe, Concord Poetry Center, University of Massachusetts, Lesley University, Salem State College, and Others (see below for email addresses)]

As a citizen of our purported “democracy,” I write to inform of various grievances, mostly occurring in the State of Massachusetts over the past 15 years. This initiative was sparked by one of those grievances with regards the taxpayer-funded Massachusetts Poetry Festival, sponsored by the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, which simply refuses to respond to my queries sent last November, this May, and again on the first of June as to how The American Dissident, a 501 c3 nonprofit journal of literature, democracy, and dissidence, might become a “Poetry Partner” and be listed on its webpage next to, amongst others, Cave Canem, Bagel Bards, Wild Apples, Concord Poetry Center, and Citizen’s Bank, which by the way is my bank. Its Director of the Massachusetts Poetry Outreach Project, Chloe Garcia-Roberts, will not respond. My list of grievances include the following and mostly pertain to the State of Massachusetts:

1. The ACLU of Massachusetts refused to help me and the state press refused to report on my tenure battle at Fitchburg State College in 1996, where corruption included highly whimsical faculty evaluations, nepotism, and my eviction mid-semester from my office w/o due process. Unlike Florida and other states, no Freedom of Information legislation exists in Massachusetts. The transcripts of my arbitration hearing are thus kept secret. Why do journalists and others accept this sad status quo of lack of transparency? For actual documents, including a rather humorous page I managed to grab from the arbitration transcript, consult www.theamericandissident.org/FitchburgStateCollege.htm.

2. The state police arrested and incarcerated me in a Concord jail cell in 1999 for protesting the absence of free speech at Walden Pond State Reservation. The refusal of the local and state media to report on the incident was deplorable. Moreover, the state park continues to refuse to permit me to stock flyers critical of it and other state matters at its kiosks, despite the following:

“Since the Supreme Court’s decision in Hague v. Committee for Industrial Organization (1939), it has been settled in the law that public parks—since they are held in trust for the public and have traditionally been used for assembly, communication, and public discussion—are ‘traditional’ public forums. […] Once a place has been designated a public forum, the government’s power to limit speech there is extremely narrow. Viewpoint discrimination is never permissible. Content discrimination (discrimination based on the subject matter of the speech, whatever the point of view taken on it) is acceptable only if the government can show the following:

1) There is a compelling state interest for the exclusion.
2) The regulation making the exclusion is narrowly drawn to achieve that state interest
3) The regulation leaves open ample alternative channels for the communication.
Speech has been broadly defined as an expression that includes, but is not limited to, what you wear, read, say, paint, perform, believe, protest, or even silently resist. ‘Speech activities’ include leafleting, picketing, symbolic acts, wearing armbands, demonstrations, speeches, forums, concerts, motion pictures, stage performances, remaining silent, and so on." (Foundation for Individual Rights in Education)

For details and documents regarding my arrest and incarceration, consult http://www.theamericandissident.org/WaldenPondStateReservation.htm.

3. The publicly-funded Concord Poetry Center ostracized me as a local dissident poet. Director Joan Houlihan sums up its twisted mentality: “The idea of your teaching a workshop or delivering a lecture on the art of literary protest or poetry protest, or simply protest (Concord is where it all started!) occurred to me even before you mentioned it, so, yes, it’s something I will consider as we progress (this is only our first event). However, I must say I don’t favor having you teach at the center if you protest the reading.” Evidently, I chose to protest and was thus never offered a workshop to teach. For details on my protests at the CPC, consult http://www.theamericandissident.org/ConcordPoetryCenter.htm.

4. The publicly-funded Academy of American Poets censored (i.e., removed) my comments and banned me from participating in its online forums in 2006. The AAP is connected with the publicly-funded Massachusetts Poetry Festival and sponsors National Poetry Month, which is propagated in the nation’s public schools and colleges. For details, censored comments, and AAP chancellor remarks, see http://www.theamericandissident.org/AcademyAmericanPoets.htm.

5. The Massachusetts Cultural Council refuses to accord public-grant monies to The American Dissident because the journal has an annual budget inferior to the Council’s arbitrarily imposed $10,000 annual budget minimum for grant applicants. It thus funds journals like Agni, which is connected to Boston University, which has an endowment of over one-billion dollars. For my attempts to breach the proverbial brick wall, consult my correspondence with Council apparatchiks, including Council coordinator Charles Coe, who is also a founding director of the Massachusetts Poetry Festival, at http://www.theamericandissident.org/CharlesCoe.htm.

6. The Concord Cultural Council adopted a regulation in 2009 prohibiting funding to any project it arbitrarily deemed to be of a “political nature. This regulation was clearly adopted to prevent The American Dissident from receiving public funding. Indeed and in futility, I’ve been applying as a publisher and poet in Concord for such funding over the past decade. The Concord Cultural Council, Massachusetts Cultural Council, and state Attorney General Martha Coakley refused to address my grievance with this regard. For details, see http://www.theamericandissident.org/CCC.htm.

7. Director Karen Wulf of PEN New England (“defending freedom of expression”) refuses to respond to any of my grievances regarding impediments to my freedom of expression in New England. It is likely that Joan Houlihan (see above) and PEN director Karen Wulf, both comfortably installed at Lesley University, are friends. It is likely that Charles Coe is also a friend.

8. Professor Fred Marchant, director of Suffolk University’s Poetry Center, refuses to respond to my requests that it consider, for the sake of students, including The American Dissident. Marchant is a friend of Houlihan. For a cartoon depicting the rampant cliquishness of the poetry milieu in Massachusetts, see http://www.theamericandissident.org/SuffolkUniversityPoetryCenter.html.

9. The Watertown Free Public Library issued me a no-trespass order without due process for my attempting to interest its reference librarian, Ardis Francoeur, in subscribing to The American Dissident. Again, State Attorney General Coakley and the press refused to respond regarding my grievance.

10. Word censorship is now automatically effected by The Boston Globe on its website. Globe journalists favor that censorship. I was censored by them. For a cartoon I drew regarding that indifference, featuring Jeff Jacoby and Editor David Beard, see http://www.nationalfreepress.org/cartoonists-mainmenu-250/g-tod-slone-mainmenu-406.

11. Some 200 Massachusetts college English professors were contacted regarding my attempts to interest them in radically altering the academic culture of sycophancy, turning a blind eye, careerism, PC, prevarication, and apathy to censorship. Only four responded. Professor Ruth Jennison wrote: "Please remove me from your list." Professor William Nelles briefly argued: “you loser.” Professor J T Skerrett, Jr. was a little more voluble: “Do you really think that insulting and reviling the faculty is the way to persuade us to read your publication?” As for Professor Jack Conway, read his lengthy diatribe (with student support) here: http://wwwtheamericandissidentorg.blogspot.com/2008/11/unspoken-mantra-of-u-mass-english.html. Yes, how dare anyone think, let alone state, that all is not rosy in academe in Massachusetts. University of Massachusetts poet-professor, leftist luminary Martin Espada refuses to respond to any of the criticism I’ve sent his way. After all, silence, not democracy’s cornerstone, vigorous debate, is always the most effective response for those in power positions, no matter how little.

12. As testimony to the ambient ideological requisites for teaching in Massachusetts, cite North Shore Community College, to which I’d applied unsuccessfully for a job as an English instructor: “Appreciation of multiculturalism required.” Well, I brought that to the attention of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, which then wrote the college, resulting in the college’s removal of that unconstitutional requisite. Sadly, however, the concept still remains firmly implanted in the brains of the administrators and faculty who enacted it.

As a footnote, the response of Paul Lappin, director of the Parker Lecture Series (University of Massachusetts at Lowell), to my query is quite interesting and revealing in its refreshing honesty. I’d asked whether or not the PLS was closed to dissident voices as lecturers and only open to those who would please the comfy bourgeois mindset. Lappin responded: “comfy bourgeois” [only].

Finally, my staging of various solo protests critical of state-sponsored poets and poetry events at the Concord Poetry Center, Concord Free Public Library, Robert Creeley Prize in Acton, and elsewhere confirm the indifference of poets, teachers and professors to questions of free speech and vigorous debate. My numerous critical letters to the editor of student newspapers at colleges employing me over the years confirm professorial indifference to matters of corruption, free speech, and vigorous debate For examples of these letters, consult http://www.theamericandissident.org/ElmiraCollege.htm and http://www.theamericandissident.org/GramblingStateUniversity.htm. Unfortunately, during my five years at Fitchburg State College in Massachusetts, the student newspaper refused to publish anything I submitted of a critical nature. It is truly appalling to observe how little so many well-educated persons really care about censorship and democracy.

Will any of the individuals and organizations contacted stand up to help me open Massachusetts to equality of opportunity and freedom of expression, including and especially regarding dissident points of view? How did it ever get so bad, where literature operates like politics and anything but truth and courage becomes manifest? Money? Is that how? Democracy is in peril in Massachusetts. It is in peril when persons in publicly-funded positions remain unresponsive to citizen grievances, preferring instead to ostracize such citizens.

It is my experience that NONE of the individuals and organizations contacted will respond and stand up apart from the literary herd where the feed is quite plentiful. We’re talking here not about the myth of the proverbial starving poet, but rather about the fattened academic poet. It is astonishing how very bourgeois literature has become today. Take a look at the Lesley University Creative Writing faculty page, where most of the instructors simply link to their publishers. You’d be hard-pressed to find personal email addresses for the instructors, who proudly equate themselves with their published books… and sadly not much else. In America, it’s all about gaining a recognizable name a la Simic, Pinsky, Gluck, or whomever. And once you’ve reached that stage of intellectual sellout, then you’re all set monetarily and with invitations and prizes galore. It is sickening that our students are not being taught to question and challenge that troubling status quo. Can this sad sell, sell, sell of names be stopped? Probably not. It’s become an integral part of America. Our students are being taught to blindly admire the famous and strive to become one of them. Buck that trend and expect severe ostracizing.

What can you, the individuals and organizations contacted, do as citizens? Well, for starters, you could write the freedom-disdaining organizations mentioned in this missive and tell them that you’ve been made aware that some of they censor, treat with inequity, break the law, scorn vigorous debate, do not tolerate criticism, demand ideological adherence, etc., and that you do not favor those things. In fact, you could also request to have your organization removed from the Massachusetts Poetry Festival “Poetry Partner” list. Pipedream? But of course!
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