Now Available at Eclipse

Eclipse, a website run by Craig Dworkin, associate professor at the University of Utah, is “a free on-line archive focusing on digital facsimiles of the most radical small-press writing from the last quarter century.” The archive includes several works from writers such as Bernadette Mayer, Robert Grenier, Clark Coolidge, Charles Bernstein, and Bruce Andrews. Many of the featured works were virtually inaccessible, particularly for readers without an academic affiliation, before being hosted by the website. Four such works have recently been added to the archive: Bob Perelman’s Braille (Ithaca, NY: Ithaca House, 1975), a.k.a. (Berkeley, Cal.: Tuumba, 1977), Primer (San Francisco, CA: This Press, 1981), and To the Reader (Berkeley, Cal.: Tuumba, 1984). The books are now freely available as facsimiles as well as downloadable reading copies. As Charles Bernstein notes in a blurb for the 1984 reissue of a.k.a by The Figures Press, this “may not be the only place to begin an education in contemporary poetry, [but] there’s no better place to start than here.” Indeed, Perelman’s work is nothing if not contemporary: “Words: wind sculpture. Mouth: wet red rubber bag. Word is form, and so many doesn’t make any difference. No sirree bob.” Despite Perelman’s playfulness, “entertaining / a numb mind is another bumpersticker for peace” and his language resists staying mere entertainment, forcing readers to make “leaps across / cracks between words.” And now that Perelman’s books are available to a wide audience, anyone can begin an education in contemporary poetry there.

Bob Perelman's Braille, a.k.a., Primer, To the Reader. Enjoy! I recommend Braille particularly.

Also note this new resource topped the list of Ron Silliman's blog for December 20, 2007.

Yay!