Collaborations

by Greg Masters

Collaborations, a celebration of the East Village Poetry Scene, circa 1980The family album of collaborative poems is a celebration of a community of poets in the East Village of Manhattan at the end of the 1970s and beginning of the 1980s. The book gathers poems written collaboratively between Greg Masters and a number of other poets: Ted Berrigan, Jim Brodey, Cliff Fyman, Allen Ginsberg, Jim Hanson, Bob Holman, Gary Lenhart, Steve Levine, Elinor Nauen, Vito Ricci, Michael Scholnick, Lorna Smedman, Nellie Villegas, Tom Weigel, Jeffrey Cyphers Wright.In addition, the book is greatly enhanced with a selection of photos by Monica Claire Antonie chronicling the East Village poetry scene of the era.The collection gathered here mixes some of the biggest names of the poetry world with a batch of poets who have at times been referred to as a third generation of New York School poets centered around the Poetry Project at St. Mark's Church. Likely there would be denials from some who'd prefer to not align themselves with any group.The East Village of the time was gritty, but it attracted writers, artists, musicians, filmmakers, dancers and uncategorizable performers willing to forgo amenities for affordable rents. Collaboration was rampant among many of the locals – extending boundaries, crossing genres, reaching new audiences eager for expression and new forms that diverged from mainstream values.This new volume represents a segment of the collaborative activity, affording a peek at an artistic scene that though vibrant has been little documented.

140 pages, Paperback

Published May 1, 2020

Reviews

[Sparrow .]

Can we call this an experiment in literary socialism? When two or three, or four people write a poem together (four is the maximum in this collection) the whole concept of authorship as we know it under capitalism – the war of one against all – crumbles. Who can add a collaborative poem to their résumé without looking silly?

Greg Masters, that’s who. He seems to be a master at disappearing into a collective poem like salt in split pea soup. You search for his coloration, and never quite find it. For example:

the hilltop road
to our stadium
where crowds grow volatile
but strangely reminiscent
of that long mile
along which heroes stride

(from “Untitled,” written with Gary Lenhart). It doesn’t sound like two people – and perhaps it isn’t. (One never knows for sure what “collaboration” means. Maybe each poet writes 10 lines at a time!)

“Well, shit, I sorta think you’ve (somehow)
gone too far afield from our normal lives.
And, yes, just fallen off the edge of yourself.

(That’s from “Untitled,” with Jim Brodey.) Not very similar to the first specimen, I’d say.

(Incidentally, most of these poems are not untitled. In fact, they have great titles like “Burn My House,” “Well, Hello,” “Bellarmin’s Reply to Hyperion,” “(Figure 30),” “Heaven Swoops Down on Your Tears,” “The Sal Mineo Story,” and “Kiev.” (The latter, I suspect, was written in the restaurant of that name on Second Avenue. This book is very East Village.) Pretty impressive to entitle a poem “Punk is Dead” in 1978 (though admittedly in December) – then to dedicate it to Rene Ricard! The black-and-white photographs by Monica Claire Antonie are shrewd, populist and addictive.)

[Jeffrey Wright · Rating 5 out of 5]

From a cauldron of poetic fervor centered around Ted Berrigan and the scene at St. Mark's Church, these works were created. Writing collaborations on typewriters was a social pastime, especially for the third generation of New York School Poets. We'd hang out at someone's house and ping pong pages.

Greg has saved the ones he was involved in and now made the best ones public. With poignant, powerful photos by Monica Claire Antonie, the sister of the late Tom Weigel. Tom was a true devotee of the underground ethos that reined, hanging out with Jackie Curtis and starting a mimeo magazine like Ted had done (and told us to do as well). Tangerine. And Greg started one with his co-hearts Gary Lenhart and the late Michael Scholnick. Mag City!

Collaborating was a thing of the moment. It was a time when the legendary, late Jim Brody lit joints at his workshop and passed around a half a dozen collaborations at a time. "Vom Sheet" was the emblematic, Brody-worthy title of one.

"This is where I can live with you." The spirit of those times lives on in these lively, bold, experimental samples of literary exuberance and camaraderie.

Offers a snapshot of a heady time in East Village Bohemia when punk and avant spun wildly together.

[Matt Proctor · Rating 5 out of 5]

much needed volume, beautiful pictures and poems that map important parts of the 2nd and 3rd generation ny school