Linear Critic
by Ann Bogle
1) I used to view women's studies research of lost women writers as similar to archaeology — the discovery of valuable ruins or historia.
2) Women's studies professors in literature, not all, told us that “the boys” excluded women writers from literary canons throughout time.
3) Now I feel that women exclude one another from canon consideration after one dies — expertly in review publications — or before, upfront
4) Whereas, in considering men writers who have earned their names, even long ago, even after they have died, all of us protect and defend.
5) Understanding contributions of men writers is more variegated. Men land suitably in specific lineages, one more dominant than others.
6) There are collective poetries and figures in literature, including poets. Collective poetries flow from cities, meet in private and online.
7) Flash fiction flows online and travels to meet in cities as possible. Flash fiction includes stories 6 words to 1,000 words in length.
8) An exercise online calls for the first sentence on page 45 of the book nearest you as a suggested description of your love life. The book
9) nearest me still is The Quarterly, 1, spring 1987, that I have on my desk in preparing to write an essay. The first sentence on page 45
10) is from the story by J.S. Marcus, “It's Freezing Here in Milwaukee,” and goes as follows: “The company liked using real people instead
11) of models for their brochures, and I remember one of the vice-presidents coming around every July to pick people out.” I paused to reread
12) the story I'd read living in upstate New York when it appeared. Milwaukee seemed an eastern point west of Binghamton related to New York.
13) Twenty-seven years ago will be half my life in two years. One participant posted the following as the first sentence on page 45 of Sylvia
14) Plath's Collected: “Call here with flying colors all watchful birds/To people the twigged aisles; lead babel tongues/Of animals to choir:
15) 'Look what thresh of wings/Wields guard of honor over these!'" The fifteenth tweet of 140 characters in manuscript format is kill page.
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Author's Note
A Reader's Selection, Meg Pokrass, selected by reader David James:
August 28, 2014
Is the medium the message? Intriguing set.
Page 45 "The sentence unites the fragmentary concept, and its run-on punctuation continues the fragmentary momentum."Virginia Tufte "Artful Sentences."
Sometimes p.45 is a good place to start, male or female, dead or alive. *
Tweet fiction. Here to stay, or just chirping on thru? *
I always love the unexpected trajectory/connections in your work which makes reading a fresh experience all over again. *
Thanks, J.A. And you who read it. The form of this type of poem emerged the third time I wrote one using this method this year. Until the third time, I didn't see a form; then I did: sentences about literary subject matter that look like couplets, one poet said, because the basic scheme of the first set was seven paired lines. This one is double that length, a linear critical double-helix sonnet. Thanks for trying to read it. And do enjoy the exercise: p. 45. It's a fun one. Dan, your exercise seems dry, like a nub out of ink. It amuses to slit the pasta strand lengthwise that way.
Your work, Ann - all modes & forms - always find an edge. I like - envy, really - your writing's shifts that maintain balance. All the leaps and landings.
"Collective poetries flow from cities" *
*, Ann. Your work always surprises me in a good way – in both the form and the matter.
Such is the mirth of candour.
Always surprising. Always exciting.
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12)the story I’d read living in upstate New York when it appeared. Milwaukee seemed an eastern point west of Binghamton related to New York.
Rev., 8/28/14, 2:35 a.m.
I like the form and the ideas here, Ann. Part fiction, part philosophy, part cnf. I like how you move all over the place and keep it tight, all at once. This requires a few reads, for me.
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