Gino's Ghazal Blog

Color Radif Issue Published

Early last fall, I issued a challenge on The Ghazal Page: to write ghazals with color words as the radif. The responses were very effective and varied ghazals. The special issue of these results is now officially published. The twenty-six ghazals are divided into five groups, with one ghazal, "Rainbow Ghazal," by Elaine G. Schwartz, as a proem for the whole issue. It was harder to name the groups in this challenge than in the earlier stone, sugar, or clouds and rain challenges. In the end, I used mixed categories: Motley, The Blues, Mixed Greens, Heat, and B & W. The label for each group fits it well, I think.

While most of the ghazals use a single color word as the radif, which is what I expected, some use several color words related to an over-arching idea. Perhaps the most unusual/unexpected category is B & W. There are six ghazals in this category, three dealing with "black" and three with "white." To be technical, neither black nor white is a color, black absorbing all visible wave-lengths and white reflecting all of them. One poet even asked about white being considered a color. These six ghazals definitely belong in this issue, and, while they're monochrome, they do add needed color to it.

The next issue is for January of 2010, only ten days away. I expect that issue to be a little late: I'm redesigning the main page for 2010, with substantial changes in layout, and am also creating the design for the 2010 issues.  If there is any delay, I trust that the 2010 debut will be worth the wait.

Fish and Snake Poetry Anthology

A contributor to The Ghazal Page, Azam Abidov, has just released an international anthology of poetry, Fish and Snake poetry anthology, published in 2009 by Muharrir nashriyoti, in Toshkent (more familiar in English as Tashkent), Uzbekistan. The ISBN for the book is 978-9943-354-50-0. It has nicely designed hard covers in gray, silver, and white. Each page is decorated with borders depicting fish. The size is approximately 5" x 7" (13 cm x 17.5 cm), with a total of 127 pages including front and back matter.

Each poem in the anthology relates to fish or snake in some way. In "A Short Notice on the Project," Azam explains the traditional symbolism of the theme: the snake symbolizes wisdom, and the fish symbolizes transparency. The poets' national origins range from Uzbekistan to the US to Egypt to India. Each poem is presented in English and Uzbek. The anthology is part of Azam's goal of bridging "Uzbek literature and World Literature." As such, Fish and Snake poetry anthology makes a strong contribution.

As a contributor to the anthology, I won't go further with a review except to recommend it if you can get a copy.I don't have more information about ordering it. I will also quote a poem by Bahrom Ruzimuhammed, an important Uzbek poet, born in 1961.

A striped snake
passes through the dream
something whispers in the distance

it seems the devil giggles
right in the center of an open palm
a dark yellow grass
grows greedily as it springs to skies

Passes through the dream
the dream messes until it passes to the end
the color of the snake turns pale

Modernism and the little magazines reviewed in the TLS by Stefan Collini

"The first function of a literary magazine is to introduce the work of new or little-known writers of talent.” There is an appealing modesty about this brisk declaration, even a kind of impersonality in subordinating editorial ego to the larger good; it seems likely to provoke a murmur of agreement, not least from new or little-known writers. But this is not, of course, the only way in which the function of such publications may be conceived. The editor of one of the many new literary periodicals established in the 1920s announced a no less definite sense of purpose in quite other terms: “I shall make its aim the maintenance of critical standards and the concentration of intelligent critical opinion”. The goals expressed in these two quotations are not necessarily in conflict: editors might, it is true, maintain “critical standards” in a practical way by identifying new literary talent. But the tendency is for the pursuit of these two purposes to result in periodicals of rather different types. One, often thought of as the classic “little magazine”, largely carries new poetry and fiction, mostly by as yet unrecognized writers, often exemplifying a style of writing that is self-consciously, even determinedly, insurgent and unfashionable. The other, committed to upholding the critical or reviewing function, is largely filled with essays and book reviews, taking in the literature of both the past and the present, as well as taking in more than literature; it aspires to shape intelligent opinion and to combat the slackness and puffery of mainstream literary journalism.

via entertainment.timesonline.co.uk

This is a review of the first volume of a series on "little magazines" associated, even if loosely, with Modernism. The volume comes from the Modernist Magazines Project in the UK. The review gives a good overview of the project and this voiume. Since it's US price is $180, it's aimed at libraries.

There's a similar project in the US, the Modernist Journals Project at Brown University. This project hopes to put full, searchable texts of the journals online, a worthy if difficult goal. 

Little magazines and small presses are still an intrinsic part of the literary scene, even if much of the activity has moved to the Internet. These publishers are an important part of the literary dynamism of a culture. Perhaps, despite problems of quality and confusing numbers, the Internet versions will carry on successfully as the print publications are squeezed out by costs and the shifts in media, the reduction of poetry series in university presses and "major" (ie, corporate) publishers. Whaddayathink?

The Lynx Leaps Three Times a Year

A new issue of Lynx (October 2009) is now online. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Lynx, it has been around for quite awhile, first as a print 'zine and then a Web 'zine. Its original focus was linking poetry, collaborative verse in the spirit of Japanese renga. If you google renga, you'll get some interesting hits. AHA Poetry, published of Lynx, is a good place to start investigating renga. Lynx retains an interest in collaborative poetry, which they now label "symbiotic" poetry.

I'm posting here about a new issue of Lynx because of their interest in, and support of, the ghazal. In fact, I first learned of ghazal form in Lynx, although I'd seen some of the early English ghazals  by poets such as Adrienne Rich, Jim Harrison, and Denise Levertov.

When you visit Lynx, click on "Solo Poems" in the left margin for a list of poems/poets. In this issue, you will find three ghazals by Steffen Horstmann, who has appeared in The Ghazal Page, and one by Ayat Ghanem. Another poet who has appeared in The Ghazal Page, C W Hawes, presents two haibun here.

My recommendation? Go to Lynx, read the poems, explore the AHA Poetry site, send them some of your own ghazals if you write them.

Farming Words

If you're not familiar with WordFarm, I recommend that you visit the site. I came to it looking for a book titled The Roswell Poems, by Rane Arroyo. I hadn't heard of Arroyo before, a measure both of how out-of-touch I am and how complex the contemporary American poetry scene is.

The front matter, including an introduction, and five poems are available on the site, downloadable in PDF format. The poems deal with the supposed crash of a UFO near Roswell, New Mexico in 1947. Arroyo's poems are both documentary and expressive. That is, the poems both present precise images related to these events and also express resonses to the events.

Thus far, I've read only the five poems in the PDF file but have ordered the book. I'll post about it again when I've had a chance to read all the poems.

Ghazalville

There's a new Web 'zine in the Ghazalverse: Ghazalville . I said, "new," but, actually, Ghazalville goes back to August, 2008. You can explore early issues for yourself; in this post, I'll describe Ghazalville as it now is.

Ghazalville is run by Nicola Mascianadaro, some of whose ghazals appeared in the summer 2008 issue.


Of especial interest is the Open Invitation to Ghazalists, posted on Tuesday, July 28.

Exploring the whole site will be rewarding, too. More comments on Ghazalville should appear here in the new future.

New Chapbook by David Jalajel

David Jalajel, a frequent contributor to The Ghazal Page, has just published a chapbook of nine ghazals. It is Moon Ghazals, published by Beard of Bees Press. Moon Ghazals can be downloaded in PDF format from Beard of Bees. I recommend it highly: the ghazals are a sort of Magical Realist take on the moon, populating it with a variety of familiar objects and attitudes. I thought of Stanislaw Lem while reading this poems; there's a similar wit int them.

These nine ghazals are finely crafted, making adroitly varied use of the same radif throughout. Some ghazal purists may object to Jalajel's enjambing a number of the couplets. However, if you've read The Ghazal Page at all, you know that several poets writing ghazals in Engish explore formal possibilities beyond those of the strict Persian/Urdu ghazal. For more information, please see David's essay, "Enjambment in Arabic Poetry - a Practical Exploration for Poets."

Even more important, download this chapbook and read it. While you're at it, have a look at this list of poets published by Beard of Bees Press. There are some very recognizable names there.

A Literate Lynx

The February 2009 Lynx is online now and has been for four weeks. This notice is belated but I hope it sends you to the 'zine itself. You will find a wide variety of forms there: symbiotic (collaborative) poetry, ghazals, sequences, mixtures of poetry and prose. You'll recognize names from The Ghazal Page also: Linda Papanicolaou and c w hawes. There's even a rondel by someone named Gene Doty.

I first learned about the ghazal from Lynx in its print incarnation and its editors have kindly published a number of my poems as well as contributing to early issues of The Ghazal Page, so I have a special feeling for this 'zine.

If you don't know, the March issue of The Ghazal Page is also online, just this weekend. Please have a look and let me know what you think (politely, of course!)

A New Collection of Ghazals in English

A frequent contributor to The Ghazal Page, Sukhdarsahn Dhaliwal, has published a collection of his ghazals. The collection, Ghazals at Twilight: Poetry from the Heart, contains about 50 well-honed ghazals in the Persian/Urdu form. These ghazals are traditional in theme and attitude as well as in form. As such, they are an excellent example of what can be done with the form in English; they are also poems worth reading in their own right. Readers with a Romantic sensibility will find them especially appealing.

To order a copy, visit Sukhdarshan's Web page. You may also read poems from the collection there.

Since I wrote the Foreword for this collection, it wouldn't be proper for me to review it also. If someone wants to write a longer review of Ghazals at Twilight, please contact me.

Ghazal + Villanelle = Guzzanelle

Steffen Horstmann sent me the link for a guzzanelle. What, you ask, is a guzzanelle? Click on the link, read the fine poem by Thomas Rodes, and you'll see. (If you'd like a refresher on the villanelle, Conrad Geller provides a very well-illustrated explanation.)

Given that both the ghazal and the villanelle require extensive repetition, the two forms meld nicely.

The journal publishing this guzzanelle, Umbrella, is new to me. It is nicely designed and well-edited. You'll find some ghazals by Chris Mooney-Singh here. (Chris has several poems in The Ghazal Page.) Another poet who has appeared in The Ghazal Page, Mary Cresswell, also has work in Umbrella.

If you want to submit poems to Umbrella, it has a detailed mission statement that is essential reading for readers and writers.

While I have your attention, there're still two weeks to submit ghazals for the "moon" radif challenge. I have several good ghazals already, but there's room for more.

The next issue should be online by early next week (around June 17, I hope).