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Hannah Weiner's Open House
Poetry. "HANNAH WEINER'S OPEN HOUSE beckons us into a realm of poetry that bends consciousness in order to open the doors of perception. Weiner is one of the great American linguistic inventors of the last thirty years of the 20th century. She created an alchemical poetry that transforms the materials of everyday life into a dimension beyond sensory perception. The pieces collected here are as much conceptual art as sprung prose, experimental mysticism as social realism, autobiography as egoless alyric. Patrick Durgin has brought together touchstone works, some familiar and some never before published. HANNAH WEINER'S OPEN HOUSE provides the only single volume introduction to the full range of Weiner's vibrant, enthralling, and unique contribution to the poetry of the Americas." Charles Bernstein
- GenresPoetry
178 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 2006
8 people are currently reading
181 people want to read
About the author
Hannah Weiner
29 books22 followersHannah Adelle Weiner (née Finegold) (November 4, 1928 – September 11, 1997) was an American poet who is often grouped with the Language poets because of the prominent place she assumed in the poetics of that group.
Weiner was born in Providence, Rhode Island and attended Classical High School, until 1946, and then Radcliffe College. She graduated with a B.A. in 1950, with a dissertation on Graham Greene. Working in publishing and then in Bloomingdale's department store, she was married and then divorced after four years. Weiner started writing poetry in 1963 though her first chapbook, The Magritte Poems after René Magritte, was published in 1970. It is not indicative of her latter work, being "basically a New York School attempt to write verse in response to the paintings of René Magritte". During the 1960s she also organized and participated in a number of happenings with other members of the New York City art scene, where she had been living for some time. These included 'Hannah Weiner at Her Job', "a sort of open house hosted by her employer, A.H. Schreiber Co., Inc."and 'Fashion Show Poetry Event' with Eduardo Costa, John Perreault, Andy Warhol and others in a "collaborative and innovative enterprise that incorporated conceptual art, design, poetry and performance." In the early 1970s, Weiner began writing a series of journals that were partly the result of her experiments with automatic writing and partly a result of her schizophrenia. Judith Goldman claims that politics and ethics were central to a mode of writing she developed and called "clair-style," which used "words and phrases clairvoyantly seen" and that Weiner arrived at a method of composing that employed "these seen elements exclusively." Goldman also provides the insight that "Weiner let no representation of herself circulate that did not take her status as a clairvoyant into account." She influenced a number of the language poets and was included in the In the American Tree anthology of Language poetry (edited by Ron Silliman). Beginning with Little Books/Indians (1980) and Spoke (1984).
Weiner was born in Providence, Rhode Island and attended Classical High School, until 1946, and then Radcliffe College. She graduated with a B.A. in 1950, with a dissertation on Graham Greene. Working in publishing and then in Bloomingdale's department store, she was married and then divorced after four years. Weiner started writing poetry in 1963 though her first chapbook, The Magritte Poems after René Magritte, was published in 1970. It is not indicative of her latter work, being "basically a New York School attempt to write verse in response to the paintings of René Magritte". During the 1960s she also organized and participated in a number of happenings with other members of the New York City art scene, where she had been living for some time. These included 'Hannah Weiner at Her Job', "a sort of open house hosted by her employer, A.H. Schreiber Co., Inc."and 'Fashion Show Poetry Event' with Eduardo Costa, John Perreault, Andy Warhol and others in a "collaborative and innovative enterprise that incorporated conceptual art, design, poetry and performance." In the early 1970s, Weiner began writing a series of journals that were partly the result of her experiments with automatic writing and partly a result of her schizophrenia. Judith Goldman claims that politics and ethics were central to a mode of writing she developed and called "clair-style," which used "words and phrases clairvoyantly seen" and that Weiner arrived at a method of composing that employed "these seen elements exclusively." Goldman also provides the insight that "Weiner let no representation of herself circulate that did not take her status as a clairvoyant into account." She influenced a number of the language poets and was included in the In the American Tree anthology of Language poetry (edited by Ron Silliman). Beginning with Little Books/Indians (1980) and Spoke (1984).
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
February 14, 2013
i am tired of poetry that doesn't risk everything, that doesn't practically start a riot from its own edges, that doesn't feel that layered living confusion isn't the stuff of our gut puddles. i am tired of schools of poetry noticing "difficult" women like weiner, tolerating/recognizing them, but not LOVING THEM. to read this book is to be saturated by hannah, by her approach and belief that language was comprised of textured beings and beamings. she wills you to give yourself (w/out knowing what it is you will get back) as all good, difficult, god forsaken poetry does. writers like this do have the power to make us deeper, to make our understanding of poetry deeper. shrugs. you die in the fire and come out growing leaves or you don't.
September 3, 2014
review of
Hannah Weiner's Open House
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - August 31, 2014
Don't I EVER run out of things to say & 'too many words' to say it in?! Apparently not. Click on the link for the full review:
https://www.goodreads.com/story/show/...
Hannah Weiner & I read on the same bill at the EAR INN in NYC on January 9, 1982. You can read a description of my part of the reading here: http://idioideo.pleintekst.nl/MereOut... . I was 28, Hannah was 53. That was my 1st reading in NY. The EAR INN was where the Language Poets were reading at the time. As I recall, I had the impression that Hannah & I were on the same bill b/c we were the 'lunatic fringe' of the 'Language Poets', b/c we didn't quite fit in.
I knew about Hannah mainly as the author of Clairvoyant Journals & I'm sure I wd've read the 1978 issue of Kirby Malone & Marshall Reese's "E pod #3" wch published Hannah's "eleven days from Clairvoyant Journal 1973" along w/ Jackson Mac Low's "Homage to Leona Bleiweiss". I may've also read her Clairvoyant Journal 1974 (Angel Hair Books, 1978) by then & any contributions she might've made to "L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E" magazine such as "CAPITALISTIC USELESS PHRASES AFTER ENDLESS" amongst other things I'm not remembering. That sd, I don't think I had a broad knowledge of her work.
At this EAR INN reading I had deliberately restricted myself to only speaking prepared texts so that I'd be giving a reading the entire time I was there. I had 61 prepared single sentence texts on specially shaped cards that were for 'small talk'. This, of course, inhibited actual conversation between people. Nonetheless, somehow Hannah & I discussed guerrilla actions on the streets. I somehow told her that that was what I did & that that was one of my primary interests & Hannah told me that she had also done guerrilla actions. This upped my interest level in her.
"I am trying to understand through my continued writing which of these WORDS I see are 1) my own ordinary conscious thought; 2) from my developed superconscious mind which has precognitive, clairvoyant powers; 3) telepathic connections with living people; 4) BIG QUESTION communications from non-living forces." - "The words in CAPITALS and underlines are words I see" - p 63
"Spoke (Sun & Moon) was written differently. The words appeared on my forehead in groups short enough for me to remember and write them down and the continuation or interrruptions were included in this word-group seeing. This is true even though the style varies from a journalistic technique (June & July) to a poetic technique (August) and a prose technique (Sept.). The exceptions are the large words which appeared once on every page, about 3/4 of the way through, as I was writing down the seen forehead phrases. Words for Spoke were not seen on any furniture, in the air, or otherwise. This, as far as I can remember, was also pretty much the same technique for the long poems Nijole's House (Potes & Poets Press) and Sixteen (Awede)."
[..]
"I saw words in a wide variety of sizes, script and printed, on my own forehead (the large capital words on my forehead began in a retreat in June 1973 (Unpublished Journals, 1973) and on other people, forehead included" - "MOSTLY ABOUT THE SENTENCE" - pp 125-126 & 126
Since I knew Hannah as the writer who transcribed words that she envisioned on her own forehead & on the foreheads of others & on other such places where most people don't see words I was under the impression that she was looking at my forehead & reading from there as we spoke. I wondered whether she liked what she read. Whatever she read there, if anything, she was very friendly to me & I was relieved - after all, having someone read words on yr forehead is akin to having someone dream about you: you don't know whether you're the villain or not.
I don't know whether I met Hannah on other occasions, I suspect I did. In September of 1982 I published a tape called "Public Language" w/ her reading on it - arguably the 1st published Language Poetry recording - still available here: http://idioideo.pleintekst.nl/WdmUCat... . At any rate, I liked her - but while I found her clairvoyant writing interesting I was more interested in writers who worked from a significantly new basic structural premise for every new piece - wch basically meant just about nobody except for myself & Concrete Poets (&, as I probably later learned, OuLiPo writers) [Ha ha! Imagine the outrage of some people reading that claim!]. In other words, I think I thought that Hannah was a bit of a one-trick pony.
NOT SO! & this excellent compilation edited & introduced by Patrick F. Durgin of Kenning Editions, the publisher, is what drove that home for me. Not only was Hannah a more diverse writer than I realized, she was more politically conscious than I realized & more articulate in her writing theory.
P 9 essentially starts the bk off w/ a reprinting of a poster advertising a series of events called "HANNAH WEINER'S OPEN HOUSE" - hence explaining the title of the bk. This series consisted of events at 7 locations over 2 days (Oct 4 & 5, 1969) & involved the participation of Vito Acconci, someone whose work I deeply respect, Bernadette Mayer, ditto, John Perreault, Weiner, Abraham Lubelski, Marjorie Strider, & Arakawa (another person whose work has caught my attn). In "Sreet Works I, II, III, IV, V" she explains:
"I. March 15, 1969. In mid-town Manhattan, I pasted blank labels on signs, doors, walls, posts, etc. in order to draw attention to the environment.
"II. April 18, 1969. I met the other Hannah Weiner. She is tall and blonde. I am short and dark. She does Psychodrama."
[..]
"IV."
[..]
"During the month of October, for IV, I did OPEN HOUSE. I invited the public into the homes of participating artists. From 3 to 26 people showed up at different places. We sat around kitchen tables, or on the floor and talked and smoked or had a party. I met new friends." - p 25
Wow! This resonates deeply w/ me. Sometime in the mid 1970s I conceived of a piece, & probably wrote instructions for it, to gather together a large group of people to cover over all locations signs in an area, such as street signs, w/ fly paper so that the words wd disappear & air-born whatevers wd adhere on the signs instead. Hannah & I were much more on the same page than I'd ever realized! (Not to mention that I was an "honorary member" of a group called "Psycodrama" [sic].)
Durgin writes in his Intro that "The entire Clairvoyant Journal project, beginning with The Fast (United Artists, 1992) and Country Girl (Kenning Editions, 2004), and continuing with Pictures and Early Words, Big Words, and the Clairvoyant Journal proper, spans a period synonymous with the onset of what was diagnosed as psychotic episodes indicative of schizophrenia." (p 13)
As a person positively inclined toward what little I know of the Anti-Psychiatry mvmt & very pro self-definition, I'm always on the lookout for people who self-define contrarily to such psychoanalysis. After all, what gives psychologists the ultimate say-so on the mindsets of others? Their expertise? Perhaps the person they're appraising is more expert on the subject of their own mind than the shrinks are - at least they shd be if they're introspective. Beware of letting other people define you!
To my delight, Weiner does an excellent job of defining her experiences in her own terms - or, possibly, in the terms of open-minded & supportive friends. As Durgin perspicaciously explains later on in the Intro:
"As Judith Goldman and others have duly noted, it is disingenuous to equate what Weiner called "clairvoyance" with either illness or a supernatural gift of fortune-telling. Although Weiner's claims regarding clairvoyance are, to many readers, her calling card, it's important to relativize those claims in terms of form and content, especially form. This is why clairvoyance can be more appropriately synonymous with, in her own words, "clairstyle."" - p 16
For those of you unfamiliar w/ what this "clairstyle" entails, the Intro quotes from a New Wilderness Audiographics audio cassettes release's liner notes:
"In 1970 Hannah Weiner began to see pictures and energy fields. Two years later she began to see words. This came after a period of intense artistic activity in the late 60s, and after experimentation with altered states of consciousness and the development of a strong belief in yoga. She was interested in signaling, and had just completed a series of Code Poem performances, using the "International Code of Signals for the Use of All Nations."
"After nine months of seeing disorganized words in small print, all over the place—on curtains, walls, toes—she went on a retreat conducted by Swami Satchitananda. There, for the first time she saw words clearly printed, in capitals, on her forehead." - p 16
She expressed this by developing a typography that distinguished between the different ways she experienced the words. More about that later. Back to how she defines her experience:
"I bought a new electric typewriter in January 74 and said quite clearly, perhaps aloud, to the words (I talked to them as if they were separate from me, as indeed the part of my mind they come from is not known to me)" - p 127
Note that she attributes the origin of the words to a part of her mind not known to her. I suspect that it's more common for people who experience such voices, usually heard instead of seen, to consider them to be of external origin. I'm reminded of a woman I met while waiting for a bus in a Greyhound stn in Harrisburg, PA. The woman told me that she hears voices originating from a man named Michael & that he constantly orders her around - telling her to do things like stand up & salute when an American flag appears on TV. Since both she & I found that oppressive & since I was trying to help her in the simplest way during this brief encounter, I suggested to her that she didn't need to follow his orders. Now cf Hannah's description(s):
"Living with these words is like living under orders. It always knows more than I do so I usually obey the directions, trying to put aside my personality, EGO, desires, habits, etc., except for fatigue which often stops me.
" - "The words in CAPITALS and underlines are words I see" - p 64
The Clairvoyant Journal published by Angel Hair (Anne Waldman again) has enuf typographical diversity to keep me visually interested & I find the clairstyle justification to make it even more interesting since it deviates from the more expected aesthetic motivations. The last page in the "CLAIRVOYANT JOURNAL" excerpt ends on "thas enough of this page" laid out as a very neat circle in wch the letters become backwards as they pass the 4 o'clock point. (p 74)
"Especially in the Clairvoyant Journal the person writing is bossed around by voices, and gives up her autonomy to the other parts of herself. A relinquishing of constant conscious control to let the other part of the mind dominate. The ego belongs to the conscious part, the writer's voice, and often, or nearly always, I reacted with some ego controlled emotion such as anger or impatience or amusement to the seen words or voices." - "MOSTLY ABOUT THE SENTENCE" - p 131
"I was afraid to leave immediately on signal and dont obey instructions" - "FROM SPOKE" - p 105
She, too, is receiving orders but she considers the orders to be from an unconscious part of her mind & she relinquishes conscious control b/c she thinks "It always knows more". I'm not convinced "It always knows more" & that following the orders is a good idea but at least Weiner self-defines the process (or, perhaps, her psychoanalyst provided this explanation) & proactively uses it to produce what I find to be interesting writing.
"The manuscript begins in the fall of 1970, describing a 3 week fast. The early material contains much information on the nature of the kundalini energy and electro magnetic sensitivity that I have never seen elsewhere. KNOWLEDGE. I was receiving messages" [reviewer's note: the original typography has the word "FORCE" above the word "messages" & slightly encroaching on the word "magnetic" wch appears above it. I don't know how to reproduce that arrangement in this review.] "through FEELING energy at that time. Later pictures developed, and colors. Then in Aug. 1972 words developed.
"Unfortunately the fasting experience left my body weakened and I am still ill often and tire easily. I feel that I should spend my time working with this gift. MONEY. It leaves me without a source of income." - "The words in CAPITALS and underlines are words I see" - p 63
A few words about fasting.. & MONEY. I've fasted many times, more than I can recall but at least 10, probably more. I started when I was, perhaps, 28, most recently when I was 59. I've fasted for 3 wks at least twice, for 4 wks definitely twice. Let's say Hannah was 41 when she fasted. I was 43 when I last fasted for 4 wks. That was the 1st time fasting seemed to take a toll on me. Before that I'd always felt excellent during the fast & after. Last yr when I fasted for 3 wks at age 59 I felt great, psychologically & physically. Thanks to the vicious shenanigans of a former friend of mine, I was in dire poverty & cdn't really 'afford' to eat anyway. It felt great to lose weight, averaging about a pound a day, but I've noted that my body has developed the habit of gaining it bak ASAP - the weight loss, despite its being healthy, is responded to as an emergency. Fast w/ care but don't be put off it altogether.
"MONEY"? Yeah, what a drag. I've never had much of it & never will. No matter how intelligent you are, no matter how creative you are you're going to be 'valued' mostly by what class you're in: if you're born into ruling elites yr value is immediately higher for one yr than what I have to live on throughout my entire life. No need for a get-out-of-jail card either: you're considerably less likely to ever go there. As I'm fond of saying: "I hate money but my _____ [originally I put "landlady" in the blank but any bill collector will do] loves it!" In other words, those of us born into the 'Western World' are mostly born indentured servants. Is it any wonder so many of us try to be runaway slaves?
But let's get back to the beginning of the bk again:
""My life is my art. I am my object, a product of the process of self-awareness. I work part-time as a designer of ladies underwear to help support myself. I like my job, and the firm I work for. They make and sell a product without unnecessary competition. The people in the firm are friendly and fun to work with. The bikini pants I make sell for 49¢ and $1.00. If things can't be free, they should be as cheap as possible. Why waste time and energy to afford?
"Art is live people. Self respect is a job if you need it. On 3 Wednesday evenings I will be at my studio, where I work. My boss, Simeon Schreiber, will be with me. There will be bikini underpants for sale, at the usual prices, and one made especially for this show by August Fabrics and A. H. Schreiber, to whom I am grateful."" - "OPEN GROUND PRESENTS HANNAH WEINER AT HER JOB" - p 23
I wrote above that "I was more interested in writers who worked from a significantly new basic structural premise for every new piece" & this compilation gives an excellent glimpse into the variety that Weiner produced w/o my having previously known about it. How many people have people visit them at their job as an opening of their "first one man show"? (p 23)
What I'd like to know more about, tho, is why Weiner seems to've started such activities so late in life. She was born November 4, 1928. This "first one man show" was March 11, 18, & 25, 1970ish. She wd've been 41 at the time. The earliest work represented in this bk seems to date from 1969 when she was 40. "i had just at 35 started to write" (p 59) Why so late? What was she doing before then?! The earliest significant writing of mine that I can remember was done at age 13.
In "THE MAGRITTE POEMS", footnote numbers are interpolated. These footnotes are extensions of the poems rather than the more typical explication - a formal device that I enjoy:
"Amorous Perspective
I rushed through the door.
You had bitten a way for me. (1)
1. See your dentist every six months for a regular check up." - pp 26 & 28
"The Golden Legend
Magritte, damn
your stone loaves (8)
that float past
my hungry
window!
8. made from wheat and rye flour, rye meal, yeast, table salt, vegetable shortening, malt, caraway seeds, caramel, onion powder, calcium propionate and water." - pp 28 & 29
& then there are the Code Poems. I love these. When I started reading this I realized that the entire bk is 'waiting' to be read on one of my voluminous bk piles. "These poems and performance pieces are from the INTERNATIONAL CODE OF SIGNALS for the Use of All Nations, British Editions 1859, 1899 and American Edition, post-war, 1931, a visual signal system for ships at sea." (p 34) Wonderful! Taking these very purposeful codes out of context & repurposing them has an OuLiPian quality of humor-producing restraint. I found her "Romeo and Juliet" particularly rich:
"
SDQ Romeo: What is her name?
SDL Juliet: My name is
J Juliet
ENC dazzling, am, is, are
SDT What is your name?
SLD Romeo: My name is
R Romeo
EBQ Juliet: Your name is not on my list: spell it alphabetically
JG Romeo: I wish to have personal communication with you
" - p 36
Weiner takes advantage of this Semaphore code's use of the International Radiotelephony Spelling Alphabet's inclusion of "Romeo" as the way of clarifying the letter "R" & the word "Juliet[t]" as the clarification of the letter "J". Obviously, these 2 names wd've been picked b/c of the familiarity of the famous Shakespeare play. Hannah takes this a step further. For those of you not familiar w/ this alphabet:
"The NATO phonetic alphabet, more accurately known as the International Radiotelephony Spelling Alphabet and also called the ICAO phonetic or ICAO spelling alphabet, as well as the ITU phonetic alphabet, is the most widely used spelling alphabet. Although often called "phonetic alphabets", spelling alphabets are not associated with phonetic transcription systems such as the International Phonetic Alphabet. Instead, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) alphabet assigned code words acrophonically to the letters of the English alphabet so that critical combinations of letters and numbers can be pronounced and understood by those who transmit and receive voice messages by radio or telephone regardless of language barriers or the presence of transmission static.
"The 26 code words in the NATO phonetic alphabet are assigned to the 26 letters of the English alphabet in alphabetical order as follows: Alfa, Bravo, Charlie, Delta, Echo, Foxtrot, Golf, Hotel, India, Juliett, Kilo, Lima, Mike, November, Oscar, Papa, Quebec, Romeo, Sierra, Tango, Uniform, Victor, Whiskey, X-ray, Yankee, Zulu." - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_pho...
Hannah Weiner's Open House
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - August 31, 2014
Don't I EVER run out of things to say & 'too many words' to say it in?! Apparently not. Click on the link for the full review:
https://www.goodreads.com/story/show/...
Hannah Weiner & I read on the same bill at the EAR INN in NYC on January 9, 1982. You can read a description of my part of the reading here: http://idioideo.pleintekst.nl/MereOut... . I was 28, Hannah was 53. That was my 1st reading in NY. The EAR INN was where the Language Poets were reading at the time. As I recall, I had the impression that Hannah & I were on the same bill b/c we were the 'lunatic fringe' of the 'Language Poets', b/c we didn't quite fit in.
I knew about Hannah mainly as the author of Clairvoyant Journals & I'm sure I wd've read the 1978 issue of Kirby Malone & Marshall Reese's "E pod #3" wch published Hannah's "eleven days from Clairvoyant Journal 1973" along w/ Jackson Mac Low's "Homage to Leona Bleiweiss". I may've also read her Clairvoyant Journal 1974 (Angel Hair Books, 1978) by then & any contributions she might've made to "L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E" magazine such as "CAPITALISTIC USELESS PHRASES AFTER ENDLESS" amongst other things I'm not remembering. That sd, I don't think I had a broad knowledge of her work.
At this EAR INN reading I had deliberately restricted myself to only speaking prepared texts so that I'd be giving a reading the entire time I was there. I had 61 prepared single sentence texts on specially shaped cards that were for 'small talk'. This, of course, inhibited actual conversation between people. Nonetheless, somehow Hannah & I discussed guerrilla actions on the streets. I somehow told her that that was what I did & that that was one of my primary interests & Hannah told me that she had also done guerrilla actions. This upped my interest level in her.
"I am trying to understand through my continued writing which of these WORDS I see are 1) my own ordinary conscious thought; 2) from my developed superconscious mind which has precognitive, clairvoyant powers; 3) telepathic connections with living people; 4) BIG QUESTION communications from non-living forces." - "The words in CAPITALS and underlines are words I see" - p 63
"Spoke (Sun & Moon) was written differently. The words appeared on my forehead in groups short enough for me to remember and write them down and the continuation or interrruptions were included in this word-group seeing. This is true even though the style varies from a journalistic technique (June & July) to a poetic technique (August) and a prose technique (Sept.). The exceptions are the large words which appeared once on every page, about 3/4 of the way through, as I was writing down the seen forehead phrases. Words for Spoke were not seen on any furniture, in the air, or otherwise. This, as far as I can remember, was also pretty much the same technique for the long poems Nijole's House (Potes & Poets Press) and Sixteen (Awede)."
[..]
"I saw words in a wide variety of sizes, script and printed, on my own forehead (the large capital words on my forehead began in a retreat in June 1973 (Unpublished Journals, 1973) and on other people, forehead included" - "MOSTLY ABOUT THE SENTENCE" - pp 125-126 & 126
Since I knew Hannah as the writer who transcribed words that she envisioned on her own forehead & on the foreheads of others & on other such places where most people don't see words I was under the impression that she was looking at my forehead & reading from there as we spoke. I wondered whether she liked what she read. Whatever she read there, if anything, she was very friendly to me & I was relieved - after all, having someone read words on yr forehead is akin to having someone dream about you: you don't know whether you're the villain or not.
I don't know whether I met Hannah on other occasions, I suspect I did. In September of 1982 I published a tape called "Public Language" w/ her reading on it - arguably the 1st published Language Poetry recording - still available here: http://idioideo.pleintekst.nl/WdmUCat... . At any rate, I liked her - but while I found her clairvoyant writing interesting I was more interested in writers who worked from a significantly new basic structural premise for every new piece - wch basically meant just about nobody except for myself & Concrete Poets (&, as I probably later learned, OuLiPo writers) [Ha ha! Imagine the outrage of some people reading that claim!]. In other words, I think I thought that Hannah was a bit of a one-trick pony.
NOT SO! & this excellent compilation edited & introduced by Patrick F. Durgin of Kenning Editions, the publisher, is what drove that home for me. Not only was Hannah a more diverse writer than I realized, she was more politically conscious than I realized & more articulate in her writing theory.
P 9 essentially starts the bk off w/ a reprinting of a poster advertising a series of events called "HANNAH WEINER'S OPEN HOUSE" - hence explaining the title of the bk. This series consisted of events at 7 locations over 2 days (Oct 4 & 5, 1969) & involved the participation of Vito Acconci, someone whose work I deeply respect, Bernadette Mayer, ditto, John Perreault, Weiner, Abraham Lubelski, Marjorie Strider, & Arakawa (another person whose work has caught my attn). In "Sreet Works I, II, III, IV, V" she explains:
"I. March 15, 1969. In mid-town Manhattan, I pasted blank labels on signs, doors, walls, posts, etc. in order to draw attention to the environment.
"II. April 18, 1969. I met the other Hannah Weiner. She is tall and blonde. I am short and dark. She does Psychodrama."
[..]
"IV."
[..]
"During the month of October, for IV, I did OPEN HOUSE. I invited the public into the homes of participating artists. From 3 to 26 people showed up at different places. We sat around kitchen tables, or on the floor and talked and smoked or had a party. I met new friends." - p 25
Wow! This resonates deeply w/ me. Sometime in the mid 1970s I conceived of a piece, & probably wrote instructions for it, to gather together a large group of people to cover over all locations signs in an area, such as street signs, w/ fly paper so that the words wd disappear & air-born whatevers wd adhere on the signs instead. Hannah & I were much more on the same page than I'd ever realized! (Not to mention that I was an "honorary member" of a group called "Psycodrama" [sic].)
Durgin writes in his Intro that "The entire Clairvoyant Journal project, beginning with The Fast (United Artists, 1992) and Country Girl (Kenning Editions, 2004), and continuing with Pictures and Early Words, Big Words, and the Clairvoyant Journal proper, spans a period synonymous with the onset of what was diagnosed as psychotic episodes indicative of schizophrenia." (p 13)
As a person positively inclined toward what little I know of the Anti-Psychiatry mvmt & very pro self-definition, I'm always on the lookout for people who self-define contrarily to such psychoanalysis. After all, what gives psychologists the ultimate say-so on the mindsets of others? Their expertise? Perhaps the person they're appraising is more expert on the subject of their own mind than the shrinks are - at least they shd be if they're introspective. Beware of letting other people define you!
To my delight, Weiner does an excellent job of defining her experiences in her own terms - or, possibly, in the terms of open-minded & supportive friends. As Durgin perspicaciously explains later on in the Intro:
"As Judith Goldman and others have duly noted, it is disingenuous to equate what Weiner called "clairvoyance" with either illness or a supernatural gift of fortune-telling. Although Weiner's claims regarding clairvoyance are, to many readers, her calling card, it's important to relativize those claims in terms of form and content, especially form. This is why clairvoyance can be more appropriately synonymous with, in her own words, "clairstyle."" - p 16
For those of you unfamiliar w/ what this "clairstyle" entails, the Intro quotes from a New Wilderness Audiographics audio cassettes release's liner notes:
"In 1970 Hannah Weiner began to see pictures and energy fields. Two years later she began to see words. This came after a period of intense artistic activity in the late 60s, and after experimentation with altered states of consciousness and the development of a strong belief in yoga. She was interested in signaling, and had just completed a series of Code Poem performances, using the "International Code of Signals for the Use of All Nations."
"After nine months of seeing disorganized words in small print, all over the place—on curtains, walls, toes—she went on a retreat conducted by Swami Satchitananda. There, for the first time she saw words clearly printed, in capitals, on her forehead." - p 16
She expressed this by developing a typography that distinguished between the different ways she experienced the words. More about that later. Back to how she defines her experience:
"I bought a new electric typewriter in January 74 and said quite clearly, perhaps aloud, to the words (I talked to them as if they were separate from me, as indeed the part of my mind they come from is not known to me)" - p 127
Note that she attributes the origin of the words to a part of her mind not known to her. I suspect that it's more common for people who experience such voices, usually heard instead of seen, to consider them to be of external origin. I'm reminded of a woman I met while waiting for a bus in a Greyhound stn in Harrisburg, PA. The woman told me that she hears voices originating from a man named Michael & that he constantly orders her around - telling her to do things like stand up & salute when an American flag appears on TV. Since both she & I found that oppressive & since I was trying to help her in the simplest way during this brief encounter, I suggested to her that she didn't need to follow his orders. Now cf Hannah's description(s):
"Living with these words is like living under orders. It always knows more than I do so I usually obey the directions, trying to put aside my personality, EGO, desires, habits, etc., except for fatigue which often stops me.
" - "The words in CAPITALS and underlines are words I see" - p 64
The Clairvoyant Journal published by Angel Hair (Anne Waldman again) has enuf typographical diversity to keep me visually interested & I find the clairstyle justification to make it even more interesting since it deviates from the more expected aesthetic motivations. The last page in the "CLAIRVOYANT JOURNAL" excerpt ends on "thas enough of this page" laid out as a very neat circle in wch the letters become backwards as they pass the 4 o'clock point. (p 74)
"Especially in the Clairvoyant Journal the person writing is bossed around by voices, and gives up her autonomy to the other parts of herself. A relinquishing of constant conscious control to let the other part of the mind dominate. The ego belongs to the conscious part, the writer's voice, and often, or nearly always, I reacted with some ego controlled emotion such as anger or impatience or amusement to the seen words or voices." - "MOSTLY ABOUT THE SENTENCE" - p 131
"I was afraid to leave immediately on signal and dont obey instructions" - "FROM SPOKE" - p 105
She, too, is receiving orders but she considers the orders to be from an unconscious part of her mind & she relinquishes conscious control b/c she thinks "It always knows more". I'm not convinced "It always knows more" & that following the orders is a good idea but at least Weiner self-defines the process (or, perhaps, her psychoanalyst provided this explanation) & proactively uses it to produce what I find to be interesting writing.
"The manuscript begins in the fall of 1970, describing a 3 week fast. The early material contains much information on the nature of the kundalini energy and electro magnetic sensitivity that I have never seen elsewhere. KNOWLEDGE. I was receiving messages" [reviewer's note: the original typography has the word "FORCE" above the word "messages" & slightly encroaching on the word "magnetic" wch appears above it. I don't know how to reproduce that arrangement in this review.] "through FEELING energy at that time. Later pictures developed, and colors. Then in Aug. 1972 words developed.
"Unfortunately the fasting experience left my body weakened and I am still ill often and tire easily. I feel that I should spend my time working with this gift. MONEY. It leaves me without a source of income." - "The words in CAPITALS and underlines are words I see" - p 63
A few words about fasting.. & MONEY. I've fasted many times, more than I can recall but at least 10, probably more. I started when I was, perhaps, 28, most recently when I was 59. I've fasted for 3 wks at least twice, for 4 wks definitely twice. Let's say Hannah was 41 when she fasted. I was 43 when I last fasted for 4 wks. That was the 1st time fasting seemed to take a toll on me. Before that I'd always felt excellent during the fast & after. Last yr when I fasted for 3 wks at age 59 I felt great, psychologically & physically. Thanks to the vicious shenanigans of a former friend of mine, I was in dire poverty & cdn't really 'afford' to eat anyway. It felt great to lose weight, averaging about a pound a day, but I've noted that my body has developed the habit of gaining it bak ASAP - the weight loss, despite its being healthy, is responded to as an emergency. Fast w/ care but don't be put off it altogether.
"MONEY"? Yeah, what a drag. I've never had much of it & never will. No matter how intelligent you are, no matter how creative you are you're going to be 'valued' mostly by what class you're in: if you're born into ruling elites yr value is immediately higher for one yr than what I have to live on throughout my entire life. No need for a get-out-of-jail card either: you're considerably less likely to ever go there. As I'm fond of saying: "I hate money but my _____ [originally I put "landlady" in the blank but any bill collector will do] loves it!" In other words, those of us born into the 'Western World' are mostly born indentured servants. Is it any wonder so many of us try to be runaway slaves?
But let's get back to the beginning of the bk again:
""My life is my art. I am my object, a product of the process of self-awareness. I work part-time as a designer of ladies underwear to help support myself. I like my job, and the firm I work for. They make and sell a product without unnecessary competition. The people in the firm are friendly and fun to work with. The bikini pants I make sell for 49¢ and $1.00. If things can't be free, they should be as cheap as possible. Why waste time and energy to afford?
"Art is live people. Self respect is a job if you need it. On 3 Wednesday evenings I will be at my studio, where I work. My boss, Simeon Schreiber, will be with me. There will be bikini underpants for sale, at the usual prices, and one made especially for this show by August Fabrics and A. H. Schreiber, to whom I am grateful."" - "OPEN GROUND PRESENTS HANNAH WEINER AT HER JOB" - p 23
I wrote above that "I was more interested in writers who worked from a significantly new basic structural premise for every new piece" & this compilation gives an excellent glimpse into the variety that Weiner produced w/o my having previously known about it. How many people have people visit them at their job as an opening of their "first one man show"? (p 23)
What I'd like to know more about, tho, is why Weiner seems to've started such activities so late in life. She was born November 4, 1928. This "first one man show" was March 11, 18, & 25, 1970ish. She wd've been 41 at the time. The earliest work represented in this bk seems to date from 1969 when she was 40. "i had just at 35 started to write" (p 59) Why so late? What was she doing before then?! The earliest significant writing of mine that I can remember was done at age 13.
In "THE MAGRITTE POEMS", footnote numbers are interpolated. These footnotes are extensions of the poems rather than the more typical explication - a formal device that I enjoy:
"Amorous Perspective
I rushed through the door.
You had bitten a way for me. (1)
1. See your dentist every six months for a regular check up." - pp 26 & 28
"The Golden Legend
Magritte, damn
your stone loaves (8)
that float past
my hungry
window!
8. made from wheat and rye flour, rye meal, yeast, table salt, vegetable shortening, malt, caraway seeds, caramel, onion powder, calcium propionate and water." - pp 28 & 29
& then there are the Code Poems. I love these. When I started reading this I realized that the entire bk is 'waiting' to be read on one of my voluminous bk piles. "These poems and performance pieces are from the INTERNATIONAL CODE OF SIGNALS for the Use of All Nations, British Editions 1859, 1899 and American Edition, post-war, 1931, a visual signal system for ships at sea." (p 34) Wonderful! Taking these very purposeful codes out of context & repurposing them has an OuLiPian quality of humor-producing restraint. I found her "Romeo and Juliet" particularly rich:
"
SDQ Romeo: What is her name?
SDL Juliet: My name is
J Juliet
ENC dazzling, am, is, are
SDT What is your name?
SLD Romeo: My name is
R Romeo
EBQ Juliet: Your name is not on my list: spell it alphabetically
JG Romeo: I wish to have personal communication with you
" - p 36
Weiner takes advantage of this Semaphore code's use of the International Radiotelephony Spelling Alphabet's inclusion of "Romeo" as the way of clarifying the letter "R" & the word "Juliet[t]" as the clarification of the letter "J". Obviously, these 2 names wd've been picked b/c of the familiarity of the famous Shakespeare play. Hannah takes this a step further. For those of you not familiar w/ this alphabet:
"The NATO phonetic alphabet, more accurately known as the International Radiotelephony Spelling Alphabet and also called the ICAO phonetic or ICAO spelling alphabet, as well as the ITU phonetic alphabet, is the most widely used spelling alphabet. Although often called "phonetic alphabets", spelling alphabets are not associated with phonetic transcription systems such as the International Phonetic Alphabet. Instead, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) alphabet assigned code words acrophonically to the letters of the English alphabet so that critical combinations of letters and numbers can be pronounced and understood by those who transmit and receive voice messages by radio or telephone regardless of language barriers or the presence of transmission static.
"The 26 code words in the NATO phonetic alphabet are assigned to the 26 letters of the English alphabet in alphabetical order as follows: Alfa, Bravo, Charlie, Delta, Echo, Foxtrot, Golf, Hotel, India, Juliett, Kilo, Lima, Mike, November, Oscar, Papa, Quebec, Romeo, Sierra, Tango, Uniform, Victor, Whiskey, X-ray, Yankee, Zulu." - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_pho...
January 8, 2009
Utter polyphonic bliss. Shifting rhetorical directions & a multiplicity of selves maneuver the flows of this work. Reflections on the moment by moment incidents of life, yet recognizing each moment as temporally, subjectively insecure—that self & social scatters over a range of simultaneous beings, voices. A lesson in the absence of separation between our selves & all that we encounter.
December 12, 2016
Some of the earlier, more "linear" works are really cool--Magritte Poems. code Poems. The later work, schizophrenic or clairvoyant, can be very difficult to get a sense of because she wanted to disrupt sense/meaning.
January 18, 2018
Excellent compendium of the work of Language poet Hannah Weiner. Includes good notes and introduction to help reader understand her life and work. Well worth the cost for those who are interested in this genre. I will continue to use this as a treasured resource.
May 31, 2020
A radical approach to poetry, but did it “alter my consciousness” (Weiner’s aim)? No. I think work can be radical, or theoretically interesting, without actually being interesting, and unfortunately, for me, this was the latter.
October 12, 2022
Not great on the page. A little dated. Some bullshit, some cool shit.
September 7, 2007
this is one of the most exciting books I've ever read
Read
December 11, 2007form, form, form. Did she channel? Is channeling writing? ethers to some, psychic to others. experimental, avant-garde, appropriate terms. a true Language poet.
February 17, 2008
Again, not another book you necessarily sit and read, but an eye-opening piece of visionary poetic writing by a woman who saw words on people's foreheads.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 23, 2008
We've barely begun to scratch the surface of Weiner's achievement, but thanks to Patrick Durgin the glacier's at least now visible, and portable. Full speed ahead.
May 30, 2008
Everything that makes Weiner's writing so fascinating to so many is immediately apparent. A poetry of interruptions. But try as I might, I can't get into most of this work.
May 26, 2011
I find Hannah Weiner's writing extremely fascinating--and puzzling.
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