128 contemporary poetry
structures of language. Thriving on the contradictions between
verbal and visual performance, Bergvall’s poetry offers us a simul-
taneous examination of poetry on and off the page.
SUMMARY OF KEY POINTS
- Contemporary poetry has been viewed as a score for the voice.
Modulations and pauses in the text can be represented spatially
and graphically on the printed page. - Poetry can often perform orally, especially in the context of dub
poetry. - The impression of spontaneity is often key to oral performance,
particularly as a political or countercultural response. - For some contemporary poets, performance can also be consid-
ered as the use of dramatic devices. The intervention of formal
structures or self-imposed rules provides a framework for the
poet to explore the act of composition. - In considering the ‘performative’, contemporary poets such as
Lyn Hejinian and Caroline Bergvall examine how gender is con-
structed and iterated. - Intradisciplinary writing is often considered as ‘performance
writing’, which often explores the dichotomy between perform-
ance on the page and oral performance.
NOTES
1. Charles Olson, ‘Projective Verse’, in Donald Allen and Warren
Tallman (eds), The Poetics of a New American Poetry (New
York: Grove, 1973 ), pp. 147 – 58.
2. Michael Davidson, Ghostlier Demarcations: Modern Poetry and
the Material Word (Berkeley: University of California Press,
1997 ).
3. Davidson, Ghostlier Demarcations, p. 9.
4. Lyn Hejinian, ‘Materials (for Dubravka Djuric)’, in The
Language of Inquiry (Berkeley: University of California Press,
2000 ), pp. 161 – 76 (p. 166 ).