Talking Manuscripts

[Originally posted on Twitter]

Some thoughts about trying to put together a manuscript of poems...

I enjoy writing poems. And, after years of experience, I feel quite confident about the results. But putting together a manuscript of poems for a book is a different beast entirely.

Normally, organizing things is not a problem. Ask me to write a book about programming or some technical topic — no sweat. I enjoy the process of identifying and selecting the optimal structure for practical information. Even abstract concepts, websites, or taxonomies provide a rewarding challenge.

But poems are a different kettle of fish. (Actually sorting a kettle of fish might be an apt analogy. What's the point? What do you want to achieve? Is order even necessary if, say, you are cooking a fish stew?)

Part of the problem is I tend to view my poems chronologically — as a constantly evolving journey. However, it is unclear if any of that is visible to the average reader. (Unlikely.)

Another approach is to decide what story you want your poems to tell? Or more accurately, what story *do* they tell? Do they tell a story at all? And if not, is that a problem?

If not, one alternative is to sort them by subject matter, style, or length. But then you get the problem where too many similar poems together can get very samey-samey.

The converse is to deliberately intermix styles, subjects, or structures (e.g. 3 short poems, 2 long, 2 short, 1 long, and so on.) But that still results in random ordering of the other characteristics of the poems.

In the end, I usually resort to micro-sorting: selecting ~5-10% as "keystone" poems, sorting the rest into groups around each key poem, then sorting the groups. (Not unlike a UX card sort.)

The issue is, when I am done, I never feel confident that I got the order "right", since there is no ideal order I am working towards (no matter how much I'd like to think there is).

The result is that there is a constant urge to tweak the order. Or worse, start the process over from the beginning.

Only time, ultimately, solidifies the order into a fixed form, out of habit or exhaustion more than conscious decision. 

Like fossils pressed into striated layers of rock, the manuscript takes on a permanence that cannot be altered, without the risk of breaking the whole.

A Year of Games, Week #2: Chibi-Robo

I like Chibi-Robo. He is one of those quirky video game characters Nintendo is known for, along the same lines as Kirby, Olimar from Pikmin,  or any of the characters from Animal Crossing (especially my favorite video character to hate, Mr. Resetti). Besides their undeniable cuteness, they all share one trait: they don't follow the standard rules of video game conduct. Some don't fight. Some can't jump. Some don't do anything but go around cleaning up after themselves and writing each other letters.

Eventually, many of these games do end up as straight up beat-up-bad-guys or collectathons (or both). But the attraction of the game is often based on the uniqueness of the character and their non-gamey-ness.

Chibi-Robo is a robot who likes to help people. In the first game, Chibi-Robo on GameCube, you spend a lot of time cleaning up for a fairly dysfunctional family.  When I first played it years ago, the cleaning up — and the requirement that you sleep at night, which came far too frequently — ultimately interfered with my finishing the game. Similar to, but not nearly as severe as Nintendogs.

But I liked the game because of the character. Besides the oddity of being forced to clean up, his movements exemplified his personality: his movements were all a little loose as if the bolts weren't tightened enough and he blinked a lot. A real lot. A sort of robotic Charlie Chaplin.

Of the three games he has starred in, I actually think the second, Chibi-Robo: Park Ranger on the Nintendo DS is the best. You still have the naive movements, but with a little less work required. And the work is more constructive (you can grow flowers, for example). And the simplicity of the graphics played well into the DS's 3D limitations.

Which is why it is so shocking that the third game, Chibi-Robo: Zip Lash, went completely south. Oh, it is not surprising that the game play is weak. (You can read the reviews to see why it is a sub-par 2D platformer.)

Neither of the previous games were exactly perfect examples of their genres either. But what's really irksome about Zip Lash is they removed any signs of personality from the main character. He runs, he jumps, and his dashes (using his power cord). But most of all, he kills various bits of space junk — over and over again. Gone are any signs of naivety. He doesn't blink, he doesn't wobble. Even his happy dance when he completes a task has turned into some sort of egotistical victory lap.

There is no reason the character is there except for name recognition. He might as well be any  generic robot, a random Disney character, or a hotdog with wings. (Actually, the game might improve if it were that last item.)

Applying Chibi-Robo to a 2D platformer did not necessitate destroying his character. You can tell that by comparing Zip Lash with another recent attempt by Nintendo to capitalize on existing intellectual property. Hey! Pikmin takes characters from another quirky game series (Pikmin and Pikmin 2) and adapts them to a 2D platformer. Hey! Pikmin has its own problems. It is too simple as a game, for one. And no one would say it has the emotional draw that the original games did. (You aren't going to cry over losing your Pikmin in this one.) But they are still Pikmin and the spaceman is still very clearly Olimar.And the gameplay is a simplified version of the originals. But most of all they are recognizably Olimar and Pikmin and, quite frankly, they are fun to play with. Which is often sufficient to cover over many other flaws a game might have.

Update: @chibitrobotweets points out that Chibi-Robo appeared in two other games as well:  Clean Sweep, which was released in Japan for the DS, and Photo Finder on the 3DS. They also say  that Clean Sweep is actually the best of the games in their opinion.

A Year of Games, Week #1: Mobile Madden MVP (Minimum Viable Product)

 What is a year of games?

For those unfamiliar with agile development, minimum viable product (MVP) is where you start by delivering the simplest, most basic yet functional version of a product possible and then build out from there, incrementally improving and extending in "sprints". It's an interesting concept to keep in mind when thinking about some early mobile games. For example, you might consider Flappy Bird the penultimate example of an MVP for mobile games.

But back to my subject, Madden Football. And more specifically Madden on the Nintendo 3DS.

I've played Madden on many game consoles, starting with the N64, through GameCube, Wii, and PS2, 3 and 4. Each iteration getting more complex, more detailed, and more "realistic", graphically. I bought Madden for the 3DS when I first got the handheld (because it was one of the few day one games). However, I never played it at the time and it has sat, still shrink wrapped, on my shelf until recently, when I took it down, opened it and played it.

Considering its age and the limitations and newness of the platform at the time, Madden Football on the 3DS is actually a pretty good football game. Which surprised me.

I've played handheld Madden games before — on both the DS and PSP. But they aren't quite football. Don't get me wrong, they are fun video games. But it is kind of like playing cowboys and Indians using thread spools and clothespins as people. The sprites are clunky and malformed, everyone runs at 90 degree angles (kind of like trying to draw a diagonal line on an Eatch-A-Sketch), and the perspective is pulled back so far you're not really controlling the characters as much as bouncing them off each other in a giant game of pinball.

So if you are looking for a realistic football experience, you'll be disappointed. And frustrated. But if you forget the footballness of it and think of it simply as a type of abstract game dressed in football attire, they can be quite fun. Kind of like Pachinko with passing plays.

[Note: there was also a Game Boy Advanced version of Madden. However, I have never played it so I leave I to the reader's imagination what that might be like...]

Which is where Madden Football on the 3DS differs. It is more like its console kin than its handheld forebearers. The perspective is closer in and the controls are tighter. Mind you, this is not high end graphics in any way. It is just passably into the 3D realm — minimally viable as an actual football game.

Because it was first out on the 3DS, it also provides 3D-ish views. Which is OK, but acceptable because you can turn them off. The one feature that does irk me is that, since it was doing actual 3D polygons, the developers decided to show this off by actively rotating the camera as the play developed. A fancy but useless addition to game play and quite honestly made me a little seasick. Because the camera swings from end-to-end up to three times in a single play (such as a kickoff). This unnecessary feature, that can't be turned off, might be a fatal flaw.

Prelude to a Year of Games

 I am constantly inventing new tasks that I am not capable of completing. Some because I don't have the skill (such as playing music or learning to read Japanese), some because I don't have the time, and most due to a combination of the two. Time is more often than not the deciding factor.

I am particularly susceptible to this sort of excessive planning when I am on vacation and free from thinking about work. This holiday season is no exception.

Years ago I started a project to read a poem by a different poet each day for a month and write about it. This worked for a month or two but by the third month time got away from me and it was abandoned mid-month. I tried to pick it up again, but that too failed.

This year, being overly optimistic as I always am, I thought "maybe I should play a video game for 15 minutes every day for a month and write about that." I have more than enough lying around to fill a month or more and I wouldn't be attempting any sort of serious review — more like a comment on any quirks or minor treats I encounter.

But seriously, this is never going to happen. I barely have the 15 minutes a day to play the game, never mind the time to write down my thoughts. (For example, this prelude itself has been underway for three days now. I am not a fast writer.)

But then I thought, well, if I can't play every day, maybe I should aim to play once a week. So a game every week for a year. That would be only 52 games. I should be able to do that...

Well, we shall see. A year of games? Might end up being only a few weeks or a month or so. But could be fun. Let's try it!

• Week #1: Madden

What I'm Playing: Legend of Zelda, Breath of the Wild

A lot of ink has been spilled over the latest entry in the Legend of Zelda series, almost all of it highly complimentary. And the praise is well deserved. It is an amazing game. So I won't try to compete with what has already been said.

But I will point out a few things that make it such a treat, from a player's perspective. At least, this player's perspective....

Besides the graphics that are, as might be expected, a serious step up from previous titles, the first thing you notice is that this game skips the lengthy prologue so many Nintendo titles use. In five minutes or less you are out playing the game. And in that five minutes you learn enough to make yourself comfortable with the controls, dressed (yes, dressed), and ready to go adventuring. This fast startup was not only a surprise, but an unalloyed pleasure. I have begun to dread the opening of games because I rarely have the 30-60 minutes needed just to get through  the openings! To be able to turn it on, get right into the mood and get started was a sheer joy.

Second, there are squirrels! And lots of other things. but squirrels! I have no idea whether the squirrels (and other wildlife) play any serious role in the game. In fact, it doesn't matter. Just watching them hop around and then scatter at your approach is delightful — one of the innumerable ways the game draws you in unrelated to the challenges and mechanics of game play. I could spend days just wandering around without taking on any challenges just to revel in that sense of wonder and newness the game aims for.

Which brings me to my last point. None of this is new. The graphics are tremendous. But other games have achieved this level of world-building before. Superfluous animal life appears in other games (the birds and lizards in Shadow of the Colossus come to mind). Other games have cooking (e.g. Monster Hunter). Ditto climbing and limited stamina (again Shadow of the Colossus and Monster Hunter). The same is true for large open worlds (name your favorite: Red Dead Redemption, etc.). So it is not unique play mechanics or game features that make Breath of the Wild stand out. It is the whole; the sum of the parts and how they are used in just the right amounts to make a wholly engrossing, delightful, internally consistent, and surprising world that makes the game the major achievement it is. 

Reading Chinese Poetry

"I am a guest of the mountains and the woods."

When I was younger and my parents and I went to pick up my older brother from college, there was a drive-in movie theater at the turnpike exit. As you approached the exit, then again as the exit ramp circled around, and one last time as you passed through the tollbooth you got a few seconds glimpse of the film they were showing. With no soundtrack and mixed in with the whir of tires and roar of semis going by, you could occasionally catch enough to guess what movie it was. But more often than not it was simply incongruous flashes of an imagined life rising unexpectedly out of the corn fields of northern Ohio.

The experience of reading Chinese poetry is very much like that for me. Momentary images — without context or logic — arising out of a jumble of words. Part of the problem is that I don't read Chinese, so I must read the poems in translation. The same is true of other foreign poetry: Italian, German, Spanish, Russian, etc. But the disassociative sensation is not nearly as severe in other languages as it is in Chinese and Japanese.

There are a number of forces at work here:

• First, there is the language. I must read the poems at a distance due to translation.
  
• Next, there is a difference in culture that is likely to create some gaps in understanding.
  
• Add to that the distance in time — especially when reading classical Chinese poetry (Li Bai, Wang Wei, etc.) — which can further detach the reader from the shared contemporary zeitgeist of the poet.
  
• Finally, there is the syntactic difference between the Chinese and English languages which seems to make translations particularly difficult.

Add all of these distractions together and you have what appears to be an impossible separation to overcome. But strangely enough it appears to be the last item, the syntactic difference, that causes the most difficulty.

The lack of articles in Asian languages as well as the difference in sentence structure seems to overwhelm many translators. They get caught up in conveying the linguistic structure as much as the actual meaning of the poem, creating instead a mutant child belonging to neither world. For example:

I hear the apes howl sadly
In dark mountains.
The blue river
Flows swiftly through the night.

— Meng Hao-jan translated by Greg Whincup

The translation sounds like  missing pages from Fun with Dick & Jane — all adjectives and adverbs: sadly, dark, blue, swiftly. The words may approximate the original poem, but somehow both the poetry and any sense of subtly is lost.

And the situation can get even worse when the translators try to be precise and seem to lose track of English as a language.

 This night to the west of the river-brim
There is not one cloud in the whole blue sky,
As I watch from my deck the autumn moon,
Vainly remembering old General Hsieh....

— Li Po translated by Witter Bynner

Why "river-brim"?  There are so many other expressions in English that would seem better suited: river's edge, river bank, shore...  or is "brim" the key term? As in "brimming over"? But that connotation doesn't help the poem at all (or be supported by what follows).

Finally, some translators give up on poetry all together and seem to translate the poems at pure text — prose, or some variety thereof. For example:

A bend of the river brings into view two triumphal arches;
That is the gate in the western wall of the suburbs of Hsun-yang.
I have still to travel in my solitary boat three or four leagues—
By misty waters and rainy sands, while the yellow dusk thickens.

— Po-Chu-i translated by Arthur Waley

This might come close to a literal translation of the original text. But it is like trying to appreciate a song by reading the lyrics: without knowing the melody or hearing the music, at least half if not more is lost: the essence is missing.

So what can we do? Short of learning Chinese (which is not out of the question, but given the number of languages in the world, even that is just a partial solution) our best offering is to try again. And again. And again.

Each time I read a translation, I get another tiny glimpse into what makes this literature so enduring. For example, the quote I opened with ("I am a guest of the mountains...") strikes a chord with me. I don't even remember  what translation I found it in — the rest was not as memorable — but this brief passage is English. It is lyrical. And it conveys a message and a feeling you are not likely to find in western literature.

But is it accurate? That I cannot tell. Ultimately, the goal is to find literature that touches you, speaks to you, across the languages and cultures and centuries that separate you. Literature that adds to what you know and, at its best, how you want to be as a human being. That is what I am looking for.

Ode to Favorite Book Stores

On a recent visit to Norwich Vermont I stopped in at the Norwich Bookstore, a lovely little book store — warm, welcoming with a small but smartly chosen selection. If you ever get a chance, stop by.

It reminded me how much I love book stores: browsing through what seems like an infinite amount of fascinating possibilities. Even after I was familiar with most of the current work in my particular areas of interest (modern poetry, mainly) book stores could surprise me with something new, something unknown, something unexpected.

Which got me to thinking about my favorite book stores. Which in turn got me to thinking about how many of my favorites are no longer around. It's sad, but not surprising after 30-40 years. And also not too sad since the fact is I have very fond memories of each store that keeps them in my thoughts. As I look over my bookshelves, certain books are intimately connected to the store in which I found them.

So here's an ode, an elegy if you will, to some of my favorite book stores that are no longer with us.

Phoenix Book Shop, New York  City  

I had no idea of the heritage of Phoenix Book Shop when I found it, near where a friend lived in Greenwich Village. I just knew it was a tiny store chock full of amazing poetry books in the lower level of a residential street. I found old copies of Big Table magazine there. And I found a copy of the original The Nights of Naomi by Bill Knott. It was like discovering King Tut's tomb. What's more it was affordable! The price written in pencil on the inside front cover is $3.50. Even then, unnaturally cheap for a book whose publisher went out of business before it could be distributed. I took it to the front where the person sitting at the desk looked at the price, looked at me, then looked at the price again and said "This can't be right." I felt like a thief caught in the act. But after what seemed like 2-3 minutes silence he shrugged and sold it to me for the price as marked. The store was full of beautiful volumes, most well beyond my means. But even a few old magazines and the rare find like the Knott book made me feel like I came away with buried treasure.

Gotham Book Mart, New York City

What can I say? It was Gotham Book Mart.  The holy grail of book lovers, and particularly poetry lovers, in New York City. So much to discover. Barely room to stand up. The books (at least in the poetry section) were double stacked on the shelves, making browsing a physical challenge. But always worth it. And then there were the tables with stacks of books (recommended? I guess) when you got tired of struggling with the shelves. Anything but a relaxed ambience, but you had the feeling you were knee-deep in literature itself.

Compendium Books, Camden Town London

When I was in London in 1977, someone told me about Compendium Books. So I took the train over to see it and ended up making several stops there before I had to leave England. Wow! It was like Gotham Book Mart, except in London and without the NYC bustle. More relaxed. The shelves were crammed, but the aisles were wide enough you could take your time. Camden wasn't hip then — just a cheap place to rent space. And the ambience was more hippy flea market than NYC subway. Among the British poets, they had a surprising array of American poets too, including a number of Kayak books. I found Charles Simic's What the Grass Says there. And it was my first discovery of Portugal's Fernando Pessoa in Jonathan Griffin's exquisite translations published by Carcanet. I always felt like I came away with only a fraction of what I needed to know or experience. But even at their prices, I only had so much money — and time — to spend.

Asphodel Books, Burton, Ohio

 I didn't know Asphodel when it was located in downtown Cleveland. I discovered it after James Lowell moved it into the garage of his house in Burton Ohio. Not a regular bookstore — you had to call to arrange a visit. But Lowell's"shop" was packed with the most amazing collection of books. Given his history, and my lack of funds, I'm surprised he put up with me. But I was in love with modern poetry and he liked to talk. So he let me look through his shelves oohing and aahing over marvelous books (most of which I clearly couldn't afford). He talked about visiting Ian Hamilton Findlay — one of my recent personal "discoveries" — and complained about how Findlay never took enough care packing anything so half of what he ordered arrived damaged. Which is why he would go in person to Scotland once a year to restock. Asphodel is where I first saw an original copy of Andre Breton's Le Surréalisme au service de la révolution; several issues. I don't remember what I bought there. Probably not much. But I did buy a Findlay silk screen of tug boats entitled "Triptych". (Sadly, lost during one of many moves over the years.) And James gave me a signed pamphlet by Robert Bly for free. Because,  he claimed, "Bob gave it to me to make a few extra bucks off people who can afford it."

Spring Church Book Company, Spring Church, Pennsylvania

  Before there was the internet, before there was Amazon, there was mail order. And if you were interested in modern poetry, Spring Church was an absolute necessity and life support system. I don't know who told me about Spring Church — maybe Tom Lux or David Young, maybe Phyllis Jones my freshman college English professor. But whoever did, thank you. Spring Church was a mail order book service originating from Pennsylvania focusing on poetry. Living in Ohio in the 70's it was difficult to know what was happening in modern poetry. Spring Church provided three invaluable services: 1.) a catalog of recent books sent out four times a year or thereabouts, including many small press offerings; 2.) recommendations of books of particular note; 3.) a discount on the books themselves!  I lived off Spring Church much of the time I was in college and the two years after while I was still in Ohio. I suspect I bought more books from them than from all of the traditional book stores combined. They were a lifeline, a source and trusted companion in this new world I was exploring.


I have since found other wonderful book stores and many happy surprises in quite ordinary shops. But these four in particular are experiences I will never forget and I will always cherish as significant milestones in my growth as a poet, a reader, and a person. I will always be indebted to the people who made such wonderful oases of art and literature available. Thank you.