Lost & Found: The CUNY Poetics Document Initiative, Fall 2010

Literary Nonfiction. Poetry History & Criticism. Poetics. African & African American Studies. LGBT Studies. Featuring Amiri Baraka, Edward Dorn, Kenneth Koch, Frank O'Hara, Philip Whalen, Robert Creeley, and Muriel Rukeyser. Edited by Claudia Moreno Pisano, Josh Schneiderman, Stefania Heim, Brian Unger, and General Editor Ammiel Alcalay.

LOST & FOUND: THE CUNY POETICS DOCUMENT INITIATIVE publishes unexpected, genre-bending works by important 20th century writers. Unearthed from personal and institutional archives in the United States and abroad, these materials are edited by doctoral students at the Graduate Center, CUNY. SERIES I is a collection of 5 chapbooks that provide access to seminal poetic conversations of the 1950s-70s. Kenneth Koch & Frank O'Hara trade transatlantic confidences even as they create a poetic lexicon for the emerging New York School of poetry. Edward Dorn & Amiri Baraka discuss poetry as political action. Excerpts from the journals of Philip Whalen explore his writing and Zen Buddhist practices, California hikes, and jazz. A heretofore unpublished essay on Darwin by Muriel Rukeyser articulates a juncture of the scientific and literary imaginations. Records of the legendary 1963 Vancouver Poetry Conference include Robert Creeley's Contexts of Poetry and notes by Daphne Marlatt. Edited, annotated, and with accompanying essays, The London Review of Books calls this "a serious and worthy enterprise." Diane di Prima calls the series "a gold mine" and Joanne Kyger writes: "What a brilliant cast of characters. Just exactly what one (myself) would like to read."

SERIES I includes:

Amiri Baraka & Edward Dorn: Selections from the Collected Letters, 1959-1960 (Claudia Moreno Pisano, editor)

The Correspondence of Kenneth Koch & Frank O'Hara: 1955-1956 (Parts I & II) (Josh Schneiderman, editor)

Muriel Rukeyser: Darwin & the Writers (Stefania Heim, editor)

Philip Whalen: Journals 1957-1977: Selections (Parts I & II) (Brian Unger, editor)

The 1963 Vancouver Poetry Conference: Robert Creeley's Contests of Poetry, with selections from Daphne Marlatt's Journal Entries (Ammiel Alcalay, editor)