Peyton Place: A Haiku Soap Opera

by David Trinidad

"David Trinidad turns the paste jewels of pop art into the real thing."—James Schuyler "In David Trinidad's Peyton A Haiku Soap Opera , the moment-by-moment particulars of traditional haiku collide with the time-stretching serial narratives of contemporary soap operas. As Trinidad's haiku chart the changing seasons, don't be surprised if the snow falling under moonlight is artificial, dumped by overworked stagehands off-camera. Seventeen syllables mediated by television—the continuing story of Peyton Place making a high-def splash in Basho's pond."—Tony Trigilio "The world of art can appear anywhere, so it's no wonder to me that Trinidad finds something worthwhile in producing a haiku for each of the episodes of Peyton Place and that, embedded in the strange curl of Dorothy Malone's hairdo, is yet one more space still untouched and undefined by a poet."—Manuel Muñoz This is the continuing story of Peyton Place . One irreverent haiku for each of the over five hundred prime time 1960s era "adult" soap opera episodes. Fraught relationships, courtroom cliffhangers, and sensational storylines are condensed into seventeen-syllable episodes, as stereotypic characters weather the passing TV seasons. This haiku soap epic is ingenious, funny, and totally addictive. Excerpts from Peyton A Haiku Soap Opera have been selected by Denise Duhamel for inclusion in Best American Poetry, 2013 .

Genres: Poetry, Humor

192 pages, Paperback

First published October 15, 2013

Reviews

[Jack Skelley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hairdos and dumb plots
inspire poet to peak
pop art satire

[Dana Jerman · Rating 3 out of 5]

This poor, poor, wonderful man, who melted his own brain on this stuff!
I have several favorites that seem to stand alone independent of themselves and of inherent subject matter. They include:
4, 19, 23, 29, 43, 44, 48, 50, 84, 86, 95, 106, 120, 150, 179, 185, 222, 230, 242, 258, 293, 294, 310, 329, 348, 391, 434, 444, 447, 470, 503...
And all of page 39.
;>

[Kathleen · Rating 5 out of 5]

The restrictiveness of the haiku form is the perfect pairing for the bloatedness of the soap opera. Super-fun poetry.

[Brent Reichenberger · Rating 3 out of 5]

A poet watches every episode of Peyton Place and then writes a haiku for each one. Most of them are about the butts and bulges of the males stars. Of course I loved it.

[Ja'net · Rating 5 out of 5]

How could I give this
brilliant book anything but
a five-star rating?

[Julie · Rating 5 out of 5]

The long story of how I came to read this book:

Once upon a time, an elementary school teacher assigned Billy Joel's "We didn't start the fire" as a history project. I guess I researched the stanza mentioning Peyton Place, because I've been low-key obsessed ever since, and because I know things about the Suez Canal that I can't explain.

Last year, finally, ratty paperback copy of Peyton Place found me. I started reading it. It fell apart. I lost some pages. I tried to get another copy from the library, but we didn't have it! However, my catalog search found these haiku, and I was like, what the hell I like haiku and write them sometimes.

So I checked out the haiku book and interlibrary loaned PP. And then shit got exciting! Because I had to do an internet search to find out why Micheal Rossi in the ILL book was Tom Makris in the pb copy, and I had to read this wicked Vanity Fair article about Grace Metalious who I now love, and then I had to rant about feminism and the 50s, and then sooner or later I came back around to David Trinidad's haiku book.

I read this haiku soap opera in one day. It would have been one sitting but I can't read at the pool yet, the kids are still too young. I laughed out loud at a bunch of the haiku and loved them all. Because they are beautiful and sarcastic and flat and deep at the same time. Because I have apparently loved PP my whole life and because this plumps up my very own PP canon quite satisfactorily.