IMAGINARY HAND

ESSAYS.

 

by George Bowering.

 

Edmonton, NeWest Publishers Limited, 15 december 1988. 13oo copies issued as The Writer As Critic 1 in 2 variants:

a) 12oo softcover copies, ISBN o-92o897-52-5, as described below;

b) 1oo hardcover (without dj), ISBN o-92o897-54-1; uninspected.

 

5-7/16 x 8-7/16, 112 sheets white bond perfectbound in glossy PVC white card wrappers, all except inside covers & 14 pp printed black offset with gold, mauve & lime additionsbto covers.

 

cover design by Bob Young.

rear cover blurbs by Linda Hutcheon, Eva-Marie Kroller.

General Editor's Preface by Smaro Kamboureli.

with works quotes in full by Nicole Brossard, Robert Creeley, Allen Ginsberg, Diana Hartog, bpNichol, Michael Ondaatje, Raymond Souster, Sharon Thesen, William Carlos Williams.

 

Nichol inclusion:

i) "just another just another" (poem, 4 lines; see (iii5c) below)

 

also includes:

ii) Ondaatje Learning To Do (pp.163-17o; prose essay with passing reference to bpNichol)

iii) bpNichol on the Train (pp.186-198; prose review of Nichol's continental trance in 1o parts:

–1. "A few years back some Canadian writers, Pierre Berton and others," (pp.185-186)

–2. "It comes as no surprise that the leading train poet is bpNichol. His first" (p.186, with quotes by Nichol from (in order):

––a. "prairie, lakes, trees," (line 7)

––b. "rolling into night" (lines 6-7)

––c. "sun overhead" (lines 5-6)

––d. "father i have so much to say" (lines 14-15)

–3. ""Trans-Continental" is made of forty-nine short sections, and a trip" (p.187; quotes by Nichol from:

––a. "a drainage ditch" (lines 1-2)

––b. "a d in a cloudbank" (lines 1-2)

––c. "a longing for flesh" (line 5)

––d. "hornpayne to armstrong" (lines 1-2))

–4. "The brain of a poet like bpNichol is as much animated toward" (p.187-189; quotes by Nichol from:

––a. "a drainage ditch" (lines 8-9)

––b. "this many miles from home" (lines 1-2, 7-9)

––c. "ness" (lines 1, 2, part of 8, 5-6)

––d. "up & down" (lines 14-16))

–5. "The same reader or any other can read each speck of the poem over" (pp.189-191; quotes by Nichol from:

––a. "empty eyes" (lines 8-14)

––b. "father i have so much to say" (lines 14-15)

––c. "just another just another" (in full (see (i) above))

––d. "a longing for flesh" (lines 1-7)

––e. A Letter To Mary Ellen Solt

––f. "a trance state" (lines 1-2)

––g. "mist again at dawn" (lines 12-14)

––h. "a new beginning" (lines 1-2)

––i. "final finale" (lines 1 & 12))

–6. "The journeyingnin "Trans-Continental" is followed a decade later by" (pp.191-194; quotes by Nichol from:

––a. "minus the ALL ABOARD" (lines 1-5, stanza breaks removed)

––b. "the old guy who spoke to the porter just now said:" (part of line 16)

––c. "vanishing" (lines 13-14)

––d. "insistent instances" (line 17)

––e. "beginnings & endings" (lines 4-5)

––f. "the old guy..." (as (iii6b) above; lines 1-1o)

––g. "because i was raised on trains" (lines 16-21)

––h. "blueberry bushes, first shrunken, dried," (parts of lines 5 & 3, lines 9-11)

––i. "mile what?" (lines 1o-11)

––j. "final finale" (lines 1-2))

–7. "That is perhaps the neatest irony of the contemporary long poem –" (pp.194-196; quotes by Nichol from:

––a. "beginnings & endings" (line 8)

––b. "insistent instances" (line 1)

––c. "because i was raised on trains" (part of line 16)

––d. "beginnings & endings" (lines 2-3)

––e. "insistent instances" (line 18 with an inserted "can")

––f. "the conductor takes our luncheon reservations" (line 7)

––g. "so there it is" (lines 3, 5)

––h. "the old guy[...]" (as (iii6b) above; part of line 8)

––i. "vanishing" (part of line 8)

––j. ""where is this poem going?"" (part of line 1)

––k. "mile what?" (part of line 11)

––l. "beginnings & endings" (part of line 15)

––m. ""too juch like a rock song"" (lines 4-1o)

––n. "minus the ALL ABOARD" (part of line 1)

––o. "i don't like the "symbol"" (part of line 1, part of line 2-3, lines 5-6, part of line 8-9)

––p. "later" (line 16)

––q. ""where is this poem going?"" (part of line 7)

––r. "later" (line 17)

––s. "vanishing" (lines 19-21))

–8. "The saints, familiar to readers of The Martyrology, visit after a routing" (pp.196-198; quotes by Nichol from:

––a. "okay saints" (part of line 6, lines 1o-13)

––b. "this next bit doesn't quite cohere" (lines 5-16)

––c. "as night falls" (lines 11-14)

––d. "in Hornpayne" (parts of lines 2, 3, 7, 8, lines 12-16)

––e. "is this the poem i wanted to write?" (lines 4-6)

––f. "that's that tone" (line 3, part of line 8, lines 12-15))

–9. "The first stanza of continental trance tells of giving up a plan for the" (p.198; quotes by Nichol from:

––a. "mist again at dawn" (line 11)

––b. ""too much like a rock song"" (line 9)

––c. "mist again at dawn" (lines 12-14)

–1o. WORKS CITED (p.198; 5 titles by Nichol))

___________________________

 

note that entries (iii7h)-(iii7k) have been strung together to create a new sequence

 

 

Done