Metropolis16-29 (Metropolis (Coach House Books)) - Softcover

Fitterman, Rob

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1552451046 ISBN 13: 9781552451045

Publisher: Coach House Books, 1998

Synopsis

Robert Fitterman's poetry, like the man himself, is urban, sophisticated and eclectic. This second volume of poems from Fitterman's award-winning Metropolis project ranges far and wide over the cultural geography, from Milton to Black Mountain to conceptual art to Objectivism to the Steve Miller Band to the Kootenay School of Writing and back again. In addition to Fitterman's solo explorations of poetic possibility, this volume of Metropolis also contains a section of Cedars Estates, a visual poetic collaboration with designer/artist Dirk Rowntree.

Fitterman uses poetic form like a pro golfer uses clubs, carefully selecting his tools to address particular aesthetic challenges, propelling his sentences over obstacles in great singing arcs of words. This is a truly urbane poetry, fully cognizant of the aesthetic and political conversations that carry on around it, ready to engage with any serious argument. Generous, polyglot and full of possibilities, Book 2 of Metropolis is essential reading.

About this title

About the Author

Robert Fitterman has published seven books of poetry since 1986. The first volume of Metropolis received the Sun & Moon New American Poetry Award in 1997. He is the editor-publisher of Object and Object/poetscoop books. His writing has appeared in Grand Street, Sulfur, West Coast Line and Boston Review. He teaches Prose Composition and Creative Writing at New York University.

Reviews

This second installment of Fitterman's ongoing long poem shows him moving further from a spare, Objectivist (a la Zukofsky) style to visual poetry and lyricizations of "found" texts. As before, Fitterman displays a deft control of sound pattern and surface textures, often revealing amusing microtonal narratives in the crevices between dissimilar genres. "Dream Cuisine" hilariously mixes the diaries of Lewis & Clark with New York City menus, exposing the predatory, survivalist mode in which even the most urbane restaurant-goer gets caught up: "we had the trumpet sounded, and fired several shots,/ but he did not join us, the evening's growing influence/ of a black root; a kind of Licquirish/ social fabric,/ croquetted wontons/ sustaining the loss/ of two very large bear skins." Other highlights include a poem that is composed entirely of the names of major corporate franchises (oddly stirring amidst our recent rash of bankruptcies and scandals) and a poem composed of Miltonic fragments that relates, in clipped DC-comics fashion, a poignant narrative about one of the city's millions of anonymous protagonists: "NEXT DAY/ brow of night/ her dragon yoke/ She looked at the clock midnight./ A large tear/ forced its way/ through the cream/ on her face... / I hear the far-off, Oh God! Geez,/ the pills aren't working." These poems insist that all objects, especially textual ones, are able to be exploited, whether for distinctive creative ends or by the hand of kitsch (or malevolent propaganda). The result is a political stance that treats the cultural consumer not as a blind, voiceless receiver of corporate wisdom but as a textual Maxwell's demon: a self-employed soldier on a determined, good natured, mischievous crusade to reforge civic agency amid the dross.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Coach House Books
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1552451046
• ISBN 13: 9781552451045
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 120