Today's birthday

Born on this day, in 1651, was Juana de Asbaje, the first feminist poet of the Americas. Typically, she was forced to stop writing by the Church, and forced to sell her library and donate the money to the poor. Another argument for women to be angry and become atheists, no?

"Sailing to Byzantium", by W. B. Yeats

Poets Forum on Aesthetic Diversity

A full report about the recent poets forum on aesthetic diversity can be found here. It makes for interesting reading, and would have been an event well worth attending.

Embargo Poets

Read the poets that you would never otherwise read: Embargo Poets are poets from those countries, such as Iran, North Korea and Cuba, that the west is refusing to deal with. These are the human voices that we don't hear, these are the consciences of nations that we demanise and dehumanise into charicatures of our own definitions of evil. And these are the voices that may well help save us, in the end.

Good Witz

You can find the entire run of Witz magazine being put online in pdf formats at Christopher Reiner's website. This is an indispensible resource for studying late 20th century poetics, and is well worth a browse.

The Threat of Cheap Books

This article discusses the threat on the German book by cheap Swiss imports. Interesting reading.

Charles Bukowski