 |
|
Computer poetry pushes the genre envelope
September 13, 2007What happens to poetry in the Digital Age? In one of the first academic works in the field, Swedish researcher Maria Engberg has studied how the ability of the computer to combine words, images, movement, and sounds is impacting both writing and reading.
The dissertation, to be publicly defended on September 14, has been jointly submitted at Uppsala University and the Blekinge Institute of Technology.
"The way digital poetry experiments with language raises questions and challenges conceptions of literature that were formed by printed books," says Maria Engberg, who has examined what this entails for literary scholarship.
She has analyzed works by English-speaking poets such as John Cayley, Stephanie Strickland, and Thomas Swiss. The focus is on space, time, movement, and word and image constructions. The poems were written, or rather created, with the help of computer technology and published on the Internet or CDs, for instance. Some of the works can be experienced as three-dimensional installations, created in space using so-called vr-cubes and augmented-reality environments. Maria Engberg examines how the forms of the poems construct different reader roles that challenge traditional views of poetry and reading, formed by the visual conventions of the printed page.
"Reading becomes one way to use the poem, and the reader becomes an active co-player. But the poems can also eliminate that possibility, leaving the reader to be a viewer looking at the digital poem, which, like a poetic film, blends words, images, sounds, and movements into a whole," she explains.
In recent years literary research has come to focus more and more on visual forms, and digital poetry brings to a head this concern with the visual. How should we examine, analyze, and interpret literature that violates the boundaries between genres" In relation to this issue Maria Engberg also discusses the materiality of literature, that is, its medium, visual appearance, and cultural context. This can involve questions regarding the importance of the appearance and placement of letters, or how music and words interact.
"For instance, how do we read a poem whose verses are obscured by images of stars and constellations?"
Uppsala University
She has analyzed works by English-speaking poets such as John Cayley, Stephanie Strickland, and Thomas Swiss. The focus is on space, time, movement, and word and image constructions. The poems were written, or rather created, with the help of computer technology and published on the Internet or CDs, for instance. Some of the works can be experienced as three-dimensional installations, created in space using so-called vr-cubes and augmented-reality environments. Maria Engberg examines how the forms of the poems construct different reader roles that challenge traditional views of poetry and reading, formed by the visual conventions of the printed page.
"Reading becomes one way to use the poem, and the reader becomes an active co-player. But the poems can also eliminate that possibility, leaving the reader to be a viewer looking at the digital poem, which, like a poetic film, blends words, images, sounds, and movements into a whole," she explains.
In recent years literary research has come to focus more and more on visual forms, and digital poetry brings to a head this concern with the visual. How should we examine, analyze, and interpret literature that violates the boundaries between genres" In relation to this issue Maria Engberg also discusses the materiality of literature, that is, its medium, visual appearance, and cultural context. This can involve questions regarding the importance of the appearance and placement of letters, or how music and words interact.
"For instance, how do we read a poem whose verses are obscured by images of stars and constellations?"
Uppsala University
Poetry Current Events and Poetry News RSSUC Davis researcher begins study of Osama bin Laden audio tapes
More than 1,500 audiocassette tapes taken in 2001 from Osama bin Laden's former residential compound in Qandahar, Afghanistan, are yielding new insights into the radical Islamic militant leader's intellectual development in the years leading up to the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
University of Minnesota study uncovers the educational benefits of social networking sites
In a first-of-its-kind study, researchers at the University of Minnesota have discovered the educational benefits of social networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook.
UW scientists unlock major number theory puzzle
Mathematicians have finally laid to rest the legendary mystery surrounding an elusive group of numerical expressions known as the "mock theta functions."
Mental declines can be reversed-report shows
As we get beyond retirement age, most of us will not be as mentally sharp as we once were. But a researcher at the University of Alberta says most people have the ability to reverse the mental declines that come with aging.
The Poetic Legacy of the Holocaust
The work of post-war poets like Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes may not immediately spring to mind as being closely connected with the Holocaust, but one researcher funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Board (AHRB) believes that the Holocaust has not only affected the political world in the last 60 years, but the poetic world as well.
Visiting writers join the Club
The University of East Anglia is going to town this week with the launch of a series of literary readings in the capital.
Archbishop of Canterbury to be awarded Honorary Degree
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, is to receive an honorary degree from the University of Kent on Friday 28 November 2003 at 2.30pm at a ceremony to be held at Canterbury Cathedral. He will be awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Divinity for his contribution to theology. Rowan Williams was elected as Archbishop of Canterbury in July 2002, and was confirmed as such at a service in St Paul's Cathedral, London, in December of the same year. In February 2004, he was enthroned as the 104th Archbishop of Canterbury at Canterbury Cathedral. He was born in Swansea in 1950 and was educated at Dynevor Secondary School, then at Christ's College Cambridge where he read theology. After resear
Geordie meets Jean-Claude on-line
A Northumbria University graduate has just had a collection of his poetry - and its French translation - published by Paris-based publishers Numilog. But the work of Charlie Mansfield, who has just been awarded his postgraduate certificate in French Studies, also doubles as an e-Learning pack as it uses the new e-Book format. The book - Europa: English Verse at the Dawn of a new Millennium - forms the basis of a first level degree course in contemporary English verse. The French translations, done by Charlie, will provide students in French and English universities access to the content and meaning of each of the poems, making it a valuable study aid. He has attached exercises and suggested
Students stage UK premiere of historic landmark opera
A three hundred year old opera, the first ever performed in the New World, in Lima, Peru, is to receive its British premiere at the University of Sheffield in 27 February 2003. La p'şrpura de la rosa, (The blood of the rose) will be conducted and directed by one of the world's leading performers of early music, Andrew Lawrence-King, who has championed the opera's revival. Further performances follow in Sheffield on 28 February and 1 March, and at Manchester's Cervantes Institute on 3 March. The cast consists of University of Sheffield students and the artistic director of the production is Dr Jane Davidson. With its verse-play libretto by Pedro Calder'łn de la Barca, "the Spanish Shakesp
Enlightenment faces Denial on Shortlist for 2002 British Academy Book Prize
Volumes on multiculturalism, the British working classes, the denial of atrocities, sixteenth-century village life, radical enlightenment and the origins of the European economy, form the shortlist for the 2002 British Academy Book Prize, it was announced today.
More Poetry Current Events and Poetry News Articles
 | The Best American Poetry 2008: Series Editor David Lehman, Guest Editor Charles Wright (Best American Poetry) The Best American Poetry series is a beloved mainstay of American poetry. This year's edition was edited by one of the most admired and acclaimed poets of his generation, Charles Wright. Known for his meditative and beautiful observations of landscape, change, and time,Wright brings his particular sensibility to this year's anthology, which contains an ecumenical slant that is unprecedented for... |
 | Poetry Speaks to Children (Book & CD) (Read & Hear) In the tradition of Poetry Speaks, the anthology named a Best Book of 2002 by School Library Journal, and praised by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer as "a volume to delight longtime lovers of poetry and to spark new love for poetry, especially among the young," Sourcebooks MediaFusion is proud to introduce the joy of the written and spoken word in Poetry Speaks to Children.Parents, educators,... |
 | 101 Great American Poems (Dover Thrift Editions) by Edgar Allan Poe, Walt Whitman, Robert Frost, Langston Hughes, Emily Dickinson, T S. Eliot, Marianne Moore Rich treasury of verse from the 19th and 20th centuries, selected for popularity and literary quality, includes Poe's "The Raven," Whitman's "I Hear America Singing," as well as poems by Robert Frost, Langston Hughes, Emily Dickinson, T. S. Eliot, Marianne Moore, many other... |
 | The Random House Book of Poetry for Children "A generous collection with a distinctly upbeat tone, this gives a taste of the best poets writing for children over the last several decades. Lobel's drawings imbue the whole with action and graphic images as inventive as the verse. Successfully geared to meet home, school, and library needs."--(starred)... |
 | A Poetry Handbook by Mary Oliver With passion, wit, and good common sense, the celebrated poet Mary Oliver tells of the basic ways a poem is built-meter and rhyme, form and diction, sound and sense. Drawing on poems from Robert Frost, Elizabeth Bishop, and others, Oliver imparts an extraordinary amount of information in a remarkably short space. “Stunning” (Los Angeles Times).... |
 | The Practice of Poetry: Writing Exercises From Poets Who Teach by Robin Behn A distinctive collection of more than 90 effective poetry-writing exercises combined with corresponding essays to inspire writers of all... |
 | The Poetry Home Repair Manual: Practical Advice for Beginning Poets by Ted Kooser Recently appointed as the new U. S. Poet Laureate, Ted Kooser has been writing and publishing poetry for more than forty years. In the pages of The Poetry Home Repair Manual, Kooser brings those decades of experience to bear. Here are tools and insights, the instructions (and warnings against instructions) that poets—aspiring or practicing—can use to hone their craft, perhaps into art. Using... |
 | Poetry Matters: Writing a Poem from the Inside Out by Ralph Fletcher Maybe you've heard before that poetry is magic, and it made you roll your eyes, but I believe it's true. Poetry matters. At the most important moments, when everyone else is silent, poetry rises to speak.I wrote this book to help you write poems and to give practical ideas for making your poems sound the way you want them to sound. We're not going to smash poems up into the tiniest pieces. This... |
 | The Norton Anthology of Poetry Long the classic anthology of poetry in English, "The Norton Anthology of Poetry, Fifth Edition, adds to its wealth of known and loved poems a rich gathering of new poetry. Beginning with "Beowulf, newly represented by selections from Seamus Heaney's dazzling translation, and continuing to the present day, "The Norton Anthology of Poetry includes over 1,700 poems by 340 poets in the Regular... |
 | The 20th Century Children's Poetry Treasury (Treasured Gifts for the Holidays) "Until this century, most children's poetry was either syrupy sweet or overblown and didactic, and tended to talk down to its readers. Contemporary children's poets have thrown all that condescension and moralizing out the window, and write with today's real child in mind."- from the Introduction by Jack PrelutskyHere in one gloriously illustrated volume are 211 wonderful poems that represent the... |
| © 2008 BrightSurf.com |