Tag Archives: Ira Cohen

William S. Burroughs – Books, Pamphlets, and Broadsides

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SECTION A:
This index includes books, pamphlets, and broadsides (excluding foreign language translations, interviews and some miscellaneous prose) from 1957 to 1973: roughly the period of time covered by the Maynard and Miles Bibliography (ref. M&M).

1. Lee, William. JUNKIE
a. First edition:
New York: Ace Books Inc., 1953
Perfect-bound in printed and illustrated wrappers, 4.25” x 6.5”, 320 pages, bound back to back with Maurice Helbrant’s Narcotic Agent. Publisher’s note by Carl Solomon (not credited).
(M&M A1a) *

William Burroughs’ first book, written under the pseudonym ‘William Lee’ (his mother’s maiden name).

According to Beatbooks catalog #92: Ace Books was owned by Carl Solomon’s uncle, A.A. Wyn, a connection made by Allen Ginsberg who was acting as Burroughs’s agent at the time. The publication of Nelson Algren’s novel The Man With The Golden Arm in 1949 inspired a trend for books about junkies, many of them mass-market paperbacks sold in newsagents rather than bookshops, and with commercial success in mind Wyn agreed to publish Burroughs. Though written in a noir-ish hard-boiled style, Junkie is autobiographical (the “Confessions of an Unredeemed Drug Addict”), and lacks the kind of plot that readers of the genre attracted by Al Rossi’s lurid cover art might have expected.

Burroughs’s picaresque and frequently humorous narrative, with its hip talk and junkie jargon, is also told from the detached point of view of the hipster-addict, a neutrality which Wyn sought to counter-balance by yoking it to a reprint of Helbrant’s 1941 account of his “War Against the Dope Menace”. Burroughs was initially appalled at this appendage, but his motivation for writing Junkie was, as he later wrote, money and recognition, though neither were forthcoming at first as the book was largely ignored at the time of publication. More significantly, by mixing an orthodox narrative of drug experiences with occasional forays into set-pieces, or routines, Junkie also paved the way for Naked Lunch.

b. First UK edition:
London: Digit Books, 1957
Perfect-bound in printed and illustrated wrappers, 4.5” x 7.25”, 160 pages.
(M&M A1b) *

According to Beatbooks catalog #92: First UK edition, and the first edition of Junkie as a separate item. Front cover art by Al Rossi, based on his earlier artwork for Ace Books. His sensational back cover art depicts a blonde with hypo and rolled-down stocking, and it was probably this, at least in part, that provoked the British censors to suppress the book after publication and order all the remaining copies to be pulped.

2. Burroughs, William. LETTER FROM A MASTER ADDICT TO DANGEROUS DRUGS
a. First edition:
Shrewsbury: British Journal of Addiction, 1957
Side-stapled sheets, 5.5″ x 8.5″, 13 pages,  50 copies.
(see M&M C1) *

An offprint of the Burroughs article appearing in the January 1957 issue of British Journal of Addiction (Vol. 53, No. 2) edited by John Yerbury Dent (M&M C1). This is Burroughs’ first appearance in print under his own name.

3. Burroughs, William S. THE NAKED LUNCH
a. First edition:
Paris: Olympia Press, July 1959
Sewn signatures bound in printed wrappers in printed and illustrated dust jacket, 4.5″ x 7″, 232 pages, 5000 copies. Dust jacket designed by Burroughs. Issued as No. 76 in the Traveller’s Companion Series. Preliminary issue with price on lower wrapper not canceled with over-stamp.
(M&M A2a)

According to Beatbooks catalog #89: Price on lower wrapper not canceled (copies distributed following the revaluation of the Franc in January 1960 had the printed price stamped over).

b. First US edition, revised:
New York City: Grove Press, 1962
Hardcover in paper and cloth-bound boards with gilt-stamped spine in printed and illustrated dust jacket, 5.5″ x 8″, 256 pages, 3500 copies. Printed prospectus issued.
(M&M A2b)

The contents of this edition differ from the Olympia first edition. This Grove Press edition includes as the Introduction, “Deposition: Testimony Concerning a Sickness” [first published in Evergreen Review, Vol. 4, No. 11 (January-February 1960) (M&M C12)] and, as the Appendix,“Letter from a Master Addict to Dangerous Drugs” [first published in The British Journal of Addiction, Vol. 53, No. 2 (January 1957) (M&M C1)].

According to BeatBooks catalog #20, publication of this edition triggered obscenity trials in Los Angeles and Boston.

4. Burroughs, William S. EXCERPT FROM PANTAPON ROSE
a. First edition:
San Francisco: Wallace Berman, 1959
Broadside, 4″ x 5″, letterpress printed by Wallace Berman.
(see M&M C11)

This broadside is laid into Semina, No. 4, edited by Wallace Berman (M&M C11).

5. Burroughs, William and Brion Gysin. THE EXTERMINATOR
a. First edition:
San Francisco: Auerhahn Press, 1960
Sewn signatures bound in printed and illustrated wrappers, 6.25″ x 9.25″, 64 pages, 1000 copies, letterpress printed, designed and printed by Dave L. Haselwood and James F. McIlroy. Illustrated by Brion Gysin. Printed announcement issued.
(M&M A4a)

The first collection of cut-ups, containing material that Burroughs and Gysin completed before Minutes To Go was published.

b. First edition, second printing:
San Francisco: Dave Haselwood Books, 1967
Sewn signatures bound in printed and illustrated wrappers, 6″ x 9″, 51 pages, 1000 copies. Illustrated by Brion Gysin.
(M&M A4b)

6. Burroughs, William, Sinclair Beiles, Gregory Corso, and Brion Gysin. MINUTES TO GO
a. First edition:
Paris: Two Cities Editions, April 1960
Sewn signatures bound in illustrated wrappers, 5.25″ x 8.25″, 64 pages, 1000 copies. Cover design by Brion Gysin.
(M&M A3a)

This is the second collection of cut-ups to be published.

b. First US edition:
San Francisco: Beach Books, Texts & Documents, 1968
Perfect-bound in printed and illustrated wrappers, 5.25″ x 8.5″, 66 pages, 1000 copies, distributed by City Lights Books.
(M&M A3b)

This edition is a facsimile of the first edition but for the addition of a Claude Pelieu collage.

7. Burroughs, William. THE SOFT MACHINE
a. First edition:
Paris: The Olympia Press, June 1961
Sewn signatures bound in printed wrappers in printed and illustrated dust jacket, 4.25″ x 7″, 184 pages, 5000 copies. Dust jacket designed by Brion Gysin.
(M&M A5a) *

b. First US edition, revised:
New York City: Grove Press, 1966
Hardcover in cloth-bound boards with silver-stamped spine in printed and illustrated dust jacket, 5.5″ x 8″, 184 pages, 18,000 copies. Cover art by Burroughs. Author photo by Charles Henri Ford.
(M&M A5b) *

According to Beat Books catalog #48: Burroughs completely rewrote the text for this edition, partly as a response to criticisms that the first edition had been difficult to read.

According to Am Here catalog #3: This constitutes the revised expanded edition advertised but never published by Olympia.

8. Burroughs, William. THE TICKET THAT EXPLODED
a. First edition:
Paris: Olympia Press, December 1962
Sewn signatures bound in printed wrappers in printed and photo-illustrated dust jacket, 4.25″ x 6.75″, 184 pages, 5000 copies. Dust jacket designed by Ian Sommerville. Illustrated by Brion Gysin.
(M&M A6a)

b. First US edition, revised:
New York City: Grove Press, June 1967
Hardcover in cloth-bound boards with black-stamped spine in printed and illustrated dust jacket, 5.25″ x 8″, 218 pages, 10,000 copies. Dust jacket designed by Kuhlman Associates. Author photo by Martha Rocher.
(M&M A6b) *

The Grove Press edition is a second version, a rearrangement of the first Olympia text with additions and expansions, plus “The Invisible Generation”, a piece incorporating two earlier articles from International Times (see M&M C157 and C162).

9. Burroughs, William. DEAD FINGERS TALK
a. First edition:
London: John Calder in association with Olympia Press, November 1963
Hardcover in cloth-bound boards with gilt-stamped spine in printed and illustrated dust jacket, 5.25″ x 8″, 220 pages, 4000 copies. Cover photos by Ian Sommerville.
(M&M A7a)

Contains sections from The Naked Lunch, The Soft Machine, and The Ticket That Exploded along with some previously unpublished material.

10. Burroughs, William. and Allen Ginsberg. THE YAGE LETTERS
a. First edition:
San Francisco: City Lights Books, November 1963
Sewn signatures bound in printed and photo-illustrated wrappers, 5″ x 7.25″, 68 pages, 3000 copies, letterpress printed at Villiers Publications.
(M&M A8a) *

According to Beatbooks catalog #89: An “early epistolary novel” by Burroughs, “detailing picaresque incidents of search for telepathic-hallucinogenic-mind-expanding drug Yage” (back cover blurb). The letters date from 1953 and record Burroughs’ journeys through the Amazon jungle. Includes two drawings by Allen Ginsberg and his letters to Burroughs from 1960.

11. Burroughs, William S. ROOSEVELT AFTER INAUGURATION
a. First edition:
New York: Fuck You Press, January 1964
Saddle-stapled in printed wrappers, 4.25″ x 5.5″, 24 pages, 500 copies, mimeograph printed by Ed Sanders. Illustrated by Allen Ginsberg.
(M&M A9a)

According to Beatbooks catalog #89: The routine, created by Burroughs and Kells Elvins while students at Harvard and originally intended for inclusion in “The Yage Letters”, was censored by the English printers, and subsequently printed in Floating Bear No. 9 (M&M C33), resulting in its editor LeRoi Jones being jailed.

12. Burroughs, William. THE COLDSPRING NEWS
a. First edition:
Flint: Fenian Head Centre Press, March 1964
Broadside,7.25″ x 12.5″.
(see M&M C124)

This broadside also appears folded and bound into The Spero, Vol. 1, No. 1 edited by Douglas and Kathy Casement (Fenian Head Centre Press, 1965) with the addition of a copyright notice at the bottom. (M&M C124)

13. Burroughs, William S. PRY YOURSELF LOOSE AND LISTEN
a. First edition:
Tangier: Ira Cohen, Spring 1964
Saddle-stapled in printed and illustrated wrappers, 5″ x 8″, 14 pages.
(see M&M C68-C71)

An offprint collecting all the Burroughs appearances in Gnaoua, No. 1, edited by Ira Cohen.

14. Burroughs, William S. NOVA EXPRESS
a. First edition:
New York City: Grove Press, November 1964
Hardcover in cloth-bound boards with black-stamped spine in printed and illustrated dust jacket, 5.5″ x 8.25″, 190 pages, 10,000 copies, printed at The Book Press. Foreword Note by Burroughs. Cover design by Roy Kuhlman. Author photograph by Martha Rocher.
(M&M A10a)

According to Burroughs’ Foreword Note: The section called “This Horrible Case” was written in collaboration with Mr. Ian Sommerville, a mathematician—Mr. Sommerville also contributed the technical notes in the section called “Chinese Laundry”—An extension of Brion Gysin’ cut-up method which I call the fold-in method has been used in this book which is consequently a composite of many writers living and dead.

15. Burroughs, William. VALENTINE’S DAY READING
a. First edition:
New York: American Theatre for Poets, February 1965
Side-stapled in printed cover sheet, 8.5″ x 11″, 14 pages, mimeograph printed.
(M&M F12)

Includes “Transcript of Dutch Schultz’s Last Words” and the first column from The Coldspring News, “On The Back Porch of his Farm”.

16. Burroughs, William. TIME
a. First edition:
New York: “C” Press, 1965
Saddle-stapled in printed and illustrated wrappers, 8.5″ x 11″, 32 pages, 1000 copies (886 in a trade edition; 100 numbered and signed; 10 lettered A-J, hardbound, with original manuscript page by Burroughs and original drawing by Gysin, signed; and four hardcover numbered copies hors commerce). Cover art by Burroughs. Illustrated by Brion Gysin. Edited by Ted Berrigan, Ron Padgett, and Joe Brainard.
(M&M A11a)

b. Pirate edition:
London: Urgency Press Rip-Off, May 1972
Top-stapled with printed cover sheet, 8″ x 13″, 32 pages, 45 copies. Edited by Roy Pennington. Published on the occasion of the Bickershaw Festival.
(M&M A11b)

17. Burroughs, William S. WILT CAUGHT IN TIME
a. First edition:
New Orleans: Loujon Press, c.1965
Broadside, 6″ x 9″, letterpress printed by Jon Edgar Webb and Gypsy Lou Webb.
(see M&M C46)

An offprint of the Burroughs contribution to The Outsider, No. 2, edited by Jon Edgar Webb and Gypsy Lou Webb (M&M C46).

According to Jeff Weddle in “The Loujon Press: An Historical Analysis”: Burroughs’ submission for issue two originally bore the title, “Cuts from ‘Word Line’ William Burroughs for Hassan i Sabbah.” The piece was done using Burroughs’ distinctive, jumbled, “cut-up” technique and had no easily discernible narrative flow or quickly grasped meaning. Perhaps for these reasons, Webb heavily edited and re-titled the piece, casting it as a poem in The Outsider number two. Burroughs’ manuscript bears a notation, again in Webb’s hand, stating that the piece was “condensed and rearranged into “wilt caught in time,” the title under which it appeared in the magazine. While Webb’s version of Burroughs’ piece bears little resemblance to the author’s original submission, no record has been uncovered showing Burroughs’ response to Webb’s heavy editing of his work.

18. Burroughs, William S. HEALTH BULLETIN: APO-33
a. First edition:
New York: Fuck You Press, 1965
Side-stapled sheets with printed and illustrated cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 54 pages, 10-20 copies, mimeograph printed by Ed Sanders.
(M&M A12a) *

According to Sanders “maybe as many as ten or twenty” copies were distributed before he halted publication due to Burroughs’ dissatisfaction with the copy he’d received.

b. Second edition:
San Francisco: Beach Books, Texts, & Documents, 1966
Saddle-stapled in printed wrappers, 8.5″ x 11″, 24 pages, 3000 copies.
(M&M A12b)

This printing is a photo-offset reproduction of Burroughs’ manuscript and scrapbook pages, featuring the three-column cut-up style, compiled by Mary Beach and Claude Pélieu.

19. Burroughs, William S. THE INVISIBLE GENERATION
a. First edition:
London: Project Sigma, December 1966
Broadside, 11.5″ x 17″, 1000 copies, offset printed.
(see M&M C159)

This item was not given a Sigma index number and no evidence exists to show distribution except by International Times itself which provided the offprints. Reprinted from International Times, No. 3 (November 1966) (M&M C157).

20. Burroughs, William S. THE INVISIBLE GENERATION (continued)
a. First edition:
London: Lovebooks Ltd, December 1966
Broadside, 22.5″ x 30.25″, 200 copies, silk-screened, designed by Michael English so that part of the card could be cut out and assembled to make a word-machine. Published as International Times, No. 5.5.
(see M&M C160) *

21. Burroughs, William S., Claude Pélieu, and Carl Weissner. SO WHO OWNS DEATH TV?
a. First edition:
San Francisco: Beach Books, Texts, & Documents, 1967
Saddle-stapled in printed wrappers, 8.5″ x 5.5″, 12 pages, 3000 copies; there was a variant issue of 200 copies on black paper printed in silver ink.
(M&M A13a)

b. Second edition, expanded:
San Francisco: Beach Books, Texts, & Documents, 1967
Saddle-stapled in printed wrappers, 8.5″ x 5.5″, 20 pages, 3000 copies. This expanded edition includes photo-collages by Jean-Jacques Lebel and Liam O’Gallagher.
(M&M A13b)

22. Burroughs, William S. SCIENTOLOGY REVISITED
a. First edition:
New York: Scientology East, c.1968
Saddle-stapled in printed and illustrated wrappers, 5.5″ x 8.5″, 8 pages.
(not in M&M) *

Reprinted from Mayfair, Vol. 3, No. 1 (January 1968) (M&M C187)

23. Burroughs, William S. THE DEAD STAR
a. First edition:
San Francisco: Nova Broadcast Press, November 1969
Broadside  (8″ x 26.75″), folded and stapled into printed wrappers, 4.74″ x 8″, 2000 copies. Edited by Jan Herman. Published as Nova Broadcast, No. 5
(M&M A14a)

The first US publication of a piece done in Burroughs’ familiar scrapbook, photo-collage 3-column newspaper style, originally published in Jeff Nuttall’s My Own Mag ‘Dutch Schultz’ issue.

24. Burroughs, William S. THE LAST WORDS OF DUTCH SCHULTZ
a. First edition:
London: Cape Goliard Press,  May 1970
Hardcover in cloth-bound boards with red-stamped spine in printed and illustrated dust jacket, 6.25″ x 9.75″, 88 pages. Cover art and illustrations by R.B. Kitaj.
(M&M 17a) *

A film-script inspired by the official transcript of the last words of mobster Dutch Schultz, recorded by a police stenographer as he lay dying in hospital.

25. Burroughs, William S. ALI’S SMILE
a. First edition:
Brighton: Unicorn Books, October 1971
Hardcover in buckram-bound boards with gilt-stamped cover, 6.25″ x 8″, 44 pages, 99 copies numbered and signed, printed by Richard Moseley at Graphic Workshop. Issued in a carton which also contains a 12-inch LP record of Burroughs reading the second draft of the text.
(M&M A19a, G6) *

b. First edition, second printing:
Gottingen: Expanded Media Editions, October 1973
Perfect-bound in printed and illustrated wrappers, 5.75″ x 7.5″, 40 pages. Bilingual edition with German text translated by Carl Weissner. Photographs of the author by Udo Breger. Published as Expanded Media Editions, No. 12.
(M&M D28)

26. Burroughs, William S. THE WILD BOYS: A BOOK OF THE DEAD
a. First edition:
New York: Grove Press, 1971
Hardcover in cloth-bound boards with gilt-stamped spine and blind-stamped front cover in printed and illustrated dust jacket, 5.5″ x 8.25″, 184 pages.
(M&M A20a) *

27. Burroughs, William S. ELECTRONIC REVOLUTION 1970-71
a. First edition:
Cambridge: Blackmoor Head Press, October 1971
Perfect-bound in printed and illustrated wrappers, 8″ x 10.25″, 76 pages, 500 copies. Printed for Henri Chopin and his Collection OU by Ian Ormiston at the Blackmoor Head Press. Cover art by Brion Gysin. Text in English and French; French translation by Jean Chopin. Published as Collection OU, No. 2.
(M&M A21a)

28. Burroughs, William S., Brion Gysin, and Ian Sommerville. LET THE MICE IN, edited by Jan Herman
a. First edition:
West Glover, Vt.: Something Else Press, February 1973
Hardcover in cloth-bound boards with silver-stamped spine and front cover in printed dust jacket, 6.25″ x 9.25″, 74 pages, 500 copies (plus 1000 copies in wrappers), designed and printed by Graham Mackintosh at Noel Young Press in Santa Barbara.
(M&M A22a-b)

Includes texts and cut-ups by Burroughs (“The Invisible Generation”, “Word Authority More Habit Forming Than Heroin”, and “Parenthetically 7 Hertz”), and Ian Sommerville, plus several sepia photographs of the authors, the Dream Machine, etc.

29. Burroughs, William S. EXTERMINATOR! A NOVEL
a. First edition:
New York: Viking Press, August 1973
Hardcover in cloth-bound boards with white-stamped spine and black-stamped front cover in printed and illustrated dust jacket, 5.25″ x 8″, 170 pages, 7500 copies.
(M&M A23a) *

Note: A collection of short routines and other material, mostly from The Wild Boys.

30. Burroughs, William S. WHITE SUBWAY
a. First edition:
London: Aloes Books, September 1973
Perfect-bound in printed and photo-illustrated wrappers, 6.25″ x 8.25″, 74 pages, 1000 copies (25 of which are numbered and signed).
(M&M A24a)

A collection of various pieces, its title taken from a section of The Soft Machine, including cut-up and three-column style texts (“Who Is the 3rd…?”, “The Last Post Danger Ahead”, and “From a Distant Hand Lifted”), originally published in little literary magazines such as Gnaoua, Spero, Underground Telegram, Kulchur, Arcade, Lines, Bulletin from Nothing, and Birmingham Bulletin. Also includes a piece by Alan Ansen, and Paul Bowles’s essay, “Burroughs In Tangier”.

31. Burroughs, William S. MAYFAIR ACADAMY SERIES MORE OR LESS, edited by Roy Pennington
a. First edition:
Brighton: Urgency Press Rip-Off, 1973
Saddle-stapled in printed and photo-illustrated wrappers, 5″ x 8.25″, 104 pages, 650 pages. Printed on different colour papers, stapled and trimmed at the press operated by Bill Butler’s partner, Mike Hughes, above the Unicorn bookshop in Brighton.
(M&M A25a)

Note: Reprints ten of the Burroughs ‘Academy Bulletins’ from Mayfair magazine (there were 21 in the series all together), along with other articles he wrote for them, together with an essay on Burroughs “originally presented as an M.A. thesis in Philosophy” by the book’s publisher, Roy Pennington.

…

[* not in archive]

Gnaoua

GNAOUA, No. 1, edited by Ira Cohen
Tangier: Gnaoua Press, Spring 1964

First edition, perfect-bound in printed and illustrated wrappers, 5” x 8”, 104 pages, printed in Belgium. Designed by Rosalind Schwartz.

Poet, photographer, filmmaker, editor, and publisher Ira Cohen produced this one-shot magazine in Tangier in 1964. The title refers to an ethnic group originating in North and West Africa who eventually became part of the Sufi order in Morocco. In Cohen’s brief editorial statement, he notes that the magazine is named for the ecstatic dancing and possession trances of the North African sect of the same name, and concludes that “The object is exorcism”.

The magazine was in printed in Antwerp by Roger Binnemans and features striking cover art by Cohen’s then-girlfriend, the artist Rosalind Schwartz and features 5 black and white photographic plates illustrating Jack Smith’s “Superstars of Cinemaroc”, reproducing images from Smith’s infamous film Flaming Creatures (1963). Bob Dylan featured a copy of Gnaoua prominently on the cover of his fifth album, Bringing It All Back Home, among other artefacts chosen to pay tribute to the artist’s influences; it is possible that it was in Gnaoua that he first came across the work of William Burroughs.

Contents:

    • William S. Burroughs – “Pry Yourself Loose and Listen”, “Notes on Page One”, “Ancient Face Gone Out”, “Just So Long and Long Enough” (M&M C68-71)
    • Ian Sommerville – “Mr & Mrs D”
    • Brion Gysin – “The Pipes of Pan”
    • Harold Norse – “Sniffing Keyholes”
    • Allen Ginsberg – “A Dream”
    • Michael McClure – “The Beast Sound: Nine Poems” (Clements C48)
    • J. Sheeper [Irving Rosenthal] – “Style”, “Drugs”, “Skin”, Rubies and Diamonds”, “An Army of Fat Black Doctors”
    • Jack Smith – “Superstars of Cinemaroc”
    • Marc Schleifer – “Goodbye, I Love You”
    • Mohammed Ben Abdullah Yussufi [translated by Irving Rosenthal] – “The Three Alis”, “The First Turban”, “The First Mirror”
    • J. Weir – “Poem”
    • Stuart Gordon – “Crab Hermits Develop Language; Shall It Freely Be?”
    • Allen Ginsberg – “A Writing”
    • Tatiana – “A Rock of Ectoplasm from Thunder Island”
    • Alfred Jarry [translated by George Andrews] – “The Other Alcestis”
    • Gnaoua Song [translated by Christopher Wanklyn]

References consulted:

Clements, Marshall. A CATALOG OF WORKS BY MICHAEL MCCLURE, 1956-1965
New York: The Phoenix Book Shop, 1965

Maynard, Joe and Barry Miles. WILLIAM S. BURROUGHS: A BIBLIOGRAPHY, 1953-73: UNLOCKING INSPECTOR LEE’S WORD HOARD
Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1978. (ref. M&M)

Online resources:

· From a Secret Location – Gnaoua
· Reality Studio – Pry Yourself Loose and Listen

—

Ira Cohen – Publications Edited, Printed, and Published

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SECTION D:
This index includes publications edited printed, and published by Ira Cohen

1. GNAOUA, No. 1, edited by Ira Cohen
First edition:
Tangier: Gnaoua Press, 1964
Perfect-bound in printed and illustrated wrappers, 5″ x 8″, 103 pages. Illustrated by Rosalind (Schwartz) [aka Panama Rose]. Contributors include: William S. Burroughs, Ian Sommerville, Brion Gysin, Harold Norse, Allen Ginsberg, Michael McClure, J. Sheeper, Jack Smith, Marc Shleifer, Mohammed Ben Abdullah Yussufi (translated by Irving Rosenthal), J. Weir, Stuart Gordon, Tatiana, Alfred Jarry, (translated by George Andrews), Jabouna Min Soudan (translated by Christopher Wanklyn).

Note: A copy of Gnaoua can be seen on the mantelpiece on the cover of Bob Dylan’s 1965 album “Bringing It All Back Home.”

2. Rose, Panama. THE HASHISH COOKBOOK
First edition:
(New York), Gnaoua Press, 1966
Saddle-stapled in printed and illustrated wrappers, 6″ x 8.25″, 28 pages, 10,000 copies, offset printed.

According to the Eddie Woods website , the Panama Rose pseudonym belongs to Ira Cohen’s then-girlfriend, Panama-born, Rosalind Schwartz. She and Ira were together from 1963, when they met in Tangier, until June 1968 in New York City. Rosalind did all the drawings for the cookbook, and then designed it. Just as she’d designed Ira’s seminal literary magazine Gnaoua, though all she was credited for in that regard were the cantharides beetles on the cover and copyright page.

3. De Roussy de Sales, Aymon. THE FOUNDING PIG *
First edition: 
Tangier/NY: Gnaoua Press, 1966
Saddle-stapled in printed and illustrated wrappers, 37 pages. Illustrated by the author.



4. THE GREAT SOCIETY, No. 1, edited by Robert J. Rickin and Ira Cohen
New York: Tompkins Square Books, 1966
Contributors include Piero Heliczer, Ray and Bonnie Bremser, Allen Ginsberg, Clive Matson, Andrew Heath, and others. Cover illustration by Jack Smith.


5. THE GREAT SOCIETY, No. 2, edited by Ira Cohen and Robert Richkin
New York: A Heddaoua Publication, 1967
Contributors include: William Burroughs, Paul Bowles, John Wieners, Ray Bresmer, Aymon de Roussy de Sales, Alexander Spingarn, Robert Richkin, Kip Coburn, Edward Marshall, Edward Field, Panama Rose, Hakin Khan, Harodl Norse, Melvin Clay, Janine Pommy-Vega, William Heine, Clive Matson, Erin Matson, Michael Perkins, Diane and Sheldon Rochlin, Piero Heliczer, Paolo Lionni, William Devore, Peter Birnbaum, Robert O’Driscoll, Jean-Jacques Lebel, Mohammed Mrabet, and Jack Smith [cover illustration].

—

[*not in archive]

Ira Cohen – Books and Broadsides

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SECTION A:
This index includes books, chapbooks, booklets and broadsides

1. Cohen, Ira. POEM FOR LA MALINCHE 
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix/Bureau of Surrealist Research, c.1974
Undboud sheets laid into printed wrappers, 500 copies. Cover art by Dana Young (uncredited).


2. Cohen, Ira. BLUE ORACLE
First edition:
Kathmandu: (Bardo Matrix), January 1975
Broadside, 11″ x 7.75″, letterpress printed on handmade paper. Illustrated by Dana Young.

3. Zaõ Gongen [pseud. Ira Cohen]. NEMBUTSU *
(Kathmandu): (Bardo Matrix), October 1975

4. Cohen, Ira. 7 MARVELS
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix, 1975
Unbound in printed and illustrated wrappers, 9″ x 11″, 15 leaves of various dimensions, 500 numbered copies, letterpress printed at Sharada Printing Press. Woodblocks hand printed by Nawang Norbu cut by Tibetan craftsmen after Marvel Comix. Colophon illustration designed by John Chick. Published as Starstreams Poetry Series Number 2.

Contents: [untitled] “O Surfer Surfing & Surfed…”, [untitled] “Forests of eyelids…”, “for Geoffrey Humphreys”, “For Frank Herbert & The Bene Tleilaxu Face Dancers”, “Silver Shoetrees in Hermes’ Closet”, [untitled] “1. I have with me the perception…”, [untitled] “The earthstealers have arrived!”

5. Cohen, Ira. POEMS FROM THE COSMIC CRYPT 
First edition:
Kathmandu: Kali Press/Bardo Matrix, 1976
Hardcover in paper-bound boards with paper title label, 7.5″ x 9.75″, 90 pages, 500 copies, illustrated by Petra Vogt, introduction by Angus MacLise.

6. Cohen, Ira. OPIUM ELEMENTALS
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix, 1976
Machine-sewn in printed and illustrated wrappers, 12″ x 9.25″, 50 pages, 350 numbered and signed copies, letterpress printed at Sharada Printing Press. Designed and illustrated by Dana Young. Published as A Starstreams Special Edition.

Contents: “Emergent Waxwork” [poem], “The Mirage Poem” [poem]

7. Cohen, Ira.  KATHMANDU PORTFOLIO
First edition:
Rotterdam: Cold Turkey Press, 1976.
Folding card wallet containing twelve 3.5″ x 5.5″ black and white postcards featuring photographs by Cohen of Kathmandu and environs.

8. Cohen, Ira. FROM THE DIVAN OF PETRA VOGT
Rotterdam: Cold Turkey Press, 1976

9. Cohen, Ira. GILDED SPLINTERS
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix, 1977
500 copies.




10. Cohen, Ira. BOMBAY BLACK *
First edition:
(Kathmandu): (Bardo Matrix), (n.d.)
Broadside. Illustrated by Adrian Brooks.




11. Cohen, Ira. NIGHT SONG *
First edition:
(Kathmandu): (Bardo Matrix), (n.d.)
Broadside. Illustrated by Adrian Brooks.




12. Cohen, Ira. AND AGAIN YOU WILL BE GONE… *
First edition:
(Kathmandu): (Bardo Matrix), (n.d.)
Broadside. Illustrated by Sidney Hushhour.
[not in archive]



13. Cohen, Ira. BALLAD OF THE GONE MACLISE
First edition:
Kathmandu: (Bardo Matrix), June 1979
Broadside, 8.5″ x 21.5″, letterpress printed on handmade paper. Illustrated by Hetty MacLise.

According to BeatBooks:  Written six days after MacLise’s death in Kathmandu in June 1979.

According to Ira Cohen in his essay “The Great Rice Paper Adventure”: In 1979 Angus MacLise died on the Summer Solstice and the cycle seemed to be over. The great rice paper adventure drew to a close as most of us left Nepal and moved on. It became more difficult to continue on limited funds, the emphasis on “bona fide” tourists increased, and the valley was filled with all the worst signs of twentieth century commodification. For a few years we were privileged to help turn the prayer wheels of this Himalayan kingdom which gave us a sense of being Akashic Agents, dedicated to preserving the records of our time, there in Shangri-La.

14. Cohen, Ira. THE STAUFFENBERG CYCLE & OTHER POEMS
First edition:
Heerlen: Uitgeverij 261, 1981
Perfect-bound in printed and illustrated wrappers, 48 pages.

15. Cohen, Ira. ON FEET OF GOLD *
First edition:
London: Synergetic Press, 1986
Perfect-bound in printed and illustrated wrappers, 142 pages.

16. Cohen, Ira. FROM THE WHOLE MEGILLAH: A CRYSTAL FOR BOB KAUFMAN *
First edition:
Mokum: Visible Voice, 1986
Broadside

17. Cohen, Ira. 6 PICKS *
First edition:
N.p.: Archetypal Images, 1988
Six printed reproductions of photographs on cardstock with printed belly-band, 5″ x 7″.

18. Cohen, Ira. LICKING THE SKULL A RETROSPECTACLE OF PHOTOGRAPHIC WORKS BY IRA COHEN *
First edition:
New York: Cynthia Broan Gallery, 2000
Saddle-stapled in printed and photo-illustrated wrappers, 42 pages, 1008 copies. Commentary by Ian MacFadyen, Allen Graubard and others, as well as a chronology.

19. Cohen, Ira. POEMS FROM THE AKASHIC RECORD
First edition:
Brooklyn: Goodie Publications, 2001
Perfect-bound in printed and photo-illustrated wrappers, 94 pages.

20. Cohen, Ira. CHAOS & GLORY *
First edition:
Salt Lake City: Elik Press, 2004

21. Cohen, Ira. WHATEVER YOU SAY MAY BE HELD AGAINST YOU *
First edition:
Kathmandu: Shivastan Publishing, 2004
Saddle-stapled in printed wrappers, 333 copies.

—

[*not in archive]

Ira Cohen

Ira Cohen, a filmmaker, photographer and poet, in 1982. Photograph © by Ira Landgarten.

Ira Cohen (February 3, 1935 – April 25, 2011) was an American poet, publisher, photographer and filmmaker. Cohen lived in Morocco and in New York City in the 1960s, he was in Kathmandu in the 1970s and traveled the world in the 1980s, before returning to New York, where he spent the rest of his life.

Ira Cohen Checklist:

Section A: Books and Broadsides
Section B: Contributions to Periodicals
Section C: Recordings
Section D: Publications Edited and Published

· Bardo Matrix

In 1961, Cohen took a Yugoslavian freighter to Tangier, Morocco (the same one Jack Kerouac had taken a year earlier) where he lived for four years. In Tangier Cohen edited and published Gnaoua, a literary magazine, ostensibly dedicated to exorcism, and devoted to Beat-era writings, introducing the work of Brion Gysin, William S. Burroughs, Harold Norse and others. Gnaoua also featured Jack Smith and Irving Rosenthal. A copy of Gnaoua can be seen on the mantelpiece on the cover of Bob Dylan’s 1965 album “Bringing It All Back Home.” Cohen also produced Jilala, field recordings of trance music by a sect of Moroccan dervishes made by Paul Bowles and Brion Gysin. The original 1965 LP record was reissued in 1998 by Baraka Foundation/Mystic Fire as a CD.

Cohen returned to New York in the mid-1960s. There he published The Hashish Cookbook (Gnaoua Press, 1966), which had been written in Tangier at Brion Gysin’s suggestion by Cohen’s then-girlfriend Rosalind, under the pseudonym “Panama Rose”. In his loft on the Lower East Side, Cohen created the “mylar images”, styled as “future icons” as developed by a “mythographer”. Among the reflected artists in his mirror were John McLaughlin, Ching Ho Cheng, William S. Burroughs and Jimi Hendrix – who said that looking at these photos was like “looking through butterfly wings”. In 1968, Cohen directed the “phantasmaglorical” film Invasion of Thunderbolt Pagoda. The original drummer of the Velvet Underground, Angus MacLise, improvised the score for Invasion of Thunderbolt Pagoda, a smorgasbord of Tibetan, Moroccan and Druidic trance music. A Village Voice reviewer said one left the film “perched full-lotus on a cloud of incense, chatting with a white rabbit and smoking a banana.” Cohen also and produced Marty Topp’s Paradise Now, a film of the Living Theatre’s historic American tour.

In company with former Living Theatre member Petra Vogt, Cohen went to the Himalayas in the 1970s where he started the Starstream poetry series under the Bardo Matrix imprint in Kathmandu, publishing the work of Charles Henri Ford, Gregory Corso, Paul Bowles and Angus Maclise. Here he developed bookmaking art, working with native craftsmen. In 1972 he spent a year in San Francisco reading and performing, and then returned to New York to mount photographic shows.

Following his travels, Ira Cohen wrote countless poems; had photographic exhibitions around the world; did poetry readings; helped edit small literary magazines; released a movie about a Hindu religious festival; and became the president of a nonprofit corporation dedicated to preserving “the hidden meaning of the hidden meaning.”

Online Resources:

· The Ira Cohen Archive

· Big Bridge – Ira Cohen: The Great Rice Paper Adventure Kathmandu, 1972-1977

· Granary Books – Ira Cohen: The Bardo Matrix, Gnaoua, and The Great Society

· Granary Books – Petra Vogt Archive

Bardo Matrix – Broadsides

>> return to BARDO MATRIX main page >>

SECTION B:
This index includes broadsides of poetry and prose

1. Cohen, Ira. BLUE ORACLE
First edition:
Kathmandu: (Bardo Matrix), January 1975
Broadside, 11″ x 7.75″, letterpress printed on handmade paper. Illustrated by Dana Young.

2. Zaõ Gongen [pseud. Ira Cohen]. NEMBUTSU *
(Kathmandu): (Bardo Matrix), October 1975

3. Young, Dana. SECRET HISTORY *
First edition:
Kathmandu: (Bardo Matrix), 1976
Broadside. Illustrated by Dana Young.



4. Cohen, Ira. BOMBAY BLACK *
First edition:
(Kathmandu): (Bardo Matrix), (n.d.)
Broadside. Illustrated by Adrian Brooks.




5. Cohen, Ira. NIGHT SONG *
First edition:
(Kathmandu): (Bardo Matrix), (n.d.)
Broadside. Illustrated by Adrian Brooks.




6. Cohen, Ira. AND AGAIN YOU WILL BE GONE… *
First edition:
(Kathmandu): (Bardo Matrix), (n.d.)
Broadside. Illustrated by Sidney Hushhour.




7. [anonymous]. SHIVARATRI
Pashupatinath: Bardo Matrix, February 1979

First edition, broadside, 5″ x 15.5″, letterpress printed on handmade Nepali paper. Designed by Ira Cohen.



8. Cohen, Ira. BALLAD OF THE GONE MACLISE
First edition:
Kathmandu: (Bardo Matrix), June 1979
Broadside, 8.5″ x 21.5″, letterpress printed on handmade paper. Illustrated by Hetty MacLise.

According to BeatBooks:  Written six days after MacLise’s death in Kathmandu in June 1979.

According to Ira Cohen in his essay “The Great Rice Paper Adventure”: In 1979 Angus MacLise died on the Summer Solstice and the cycle seemed to be over. The great rice paper adventure drew to a close as most of us left Nepal and moved on. It became more difficult to continue on limited funds, the emphasis on “bona fide” tourists increased, and the valley was filled with all the worst signs of twentieth century commodification. For a few years we were privileged to help turn the prayer wheels of this Himalayan kingdom which gave us a sense of being Akashic Agents, dedicated to preserving the records of our time, there in Shangri-La.

—

[*not in archive]

Bardo Matrix – Books

>> return to BARDO MATRIX main page >>

SECTION A:
This index includes books, chapbooks, and booklets of poetry and prose

1. Maclise, Angus. THE CLOUD DOCTRINE
First edition:
Kathmandu: Dreamweapon Press, 1974
Saddle-stapled in printed and illustrated wrappers, 7.5″ x 10.75″, 16 pages, letterpress printed on handmade paper. Cover woodblock print from a photograph by Ira Cohen.

Note: The Cloud Doctrine was one of the first books produced by the Kathmandu beat poetry presses, and set the template for the books issued in this style.

2. Corso, Gregory. WAY OUT: A POEM IN DISCORD
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix, 1974
Machine-sewn in printed and illustrated wrappers, 8.5″ x 10.75″, 22 pages, 500 numbered copies, letterpress printed on handmade paper by Sharada Printing Press. Published as Starstreams Poetry Series No. 1.

Note: Slip laid-in listing the cast for the first, and only, performance of this poem/play in Kathmandu, Nepal. The cast members included Ira Cohen and Angus MacLise

3. Ford, Charles Henri. 7 POEMS
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix, 1974
Side-stapled in printed and photo-illustrated wrappers, 500 numbered copies, printed by Sharada Printing Press. Cover photo of Ford by Ira Cohen. Published as Starstreams Poetry Series No. 3.

Note: This is the third book in the Starstreams series but Ira Cohen gives it a 1974 publishing date in his publication list which would have it appearing before  Cohen’s 7 Marvels, published as number two in the series.

4. Cohen, Ira. POEM FOR LA MALINCHE
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix/Bureau of Surrealist Research, c.1974
Undboud sheets laid into printed wrappers, 500 copies. Cover art by Dana Young (uncredited).


5. Cohen, Ira. 7 MARVELS
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix, 1975
Unbound in printed and illustrated wrappers, 9″ x 11″, 15 leaves of various dimensions, 500 numbered copies, letterpress printed at Sharada Printing Press. Woodblocks hand printed by Nawang Norbu cut by Tibetan craftsmen after Marvel Comix. Colophon illustration designed by John Chick. Published as Starstreams Poetry Series Number 2.

Contents: [untitled] “O Surfer Surfing & Surfed…”, [untitled] “Forests of eyelids…”, “for Geoffrey Humphreys”, “For Frank Herbert & The Bene Tleilaxu Face Dancers”, “Silver Shoetrees in Hermes’ Closet”, [untitled] “1. I have with me the perception…”, [untitled] “The earth-stealers have arrived!”

6. Maclise, Angus. THE SUBLIMINAL REPORT
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix, 1975
Machine-sewn in printed and illustrated wrappers, 8.5″ x 10.75″, 28 pages, 500 numbered copies, letterpress printed on handmade paper. Cover woodblock print from a photograph by Ira Cohen. Published as Starstreams Poetry Series, No. 4

According to Ira Cohen: “The Subliminal Report included two photos printed in silver ink on white machine made paper, one a mylar portrait of Angus taken in New York, the other a stone garuda sinking into the ground in Dhoka Tole just in front of the Raj Photo Shop where the negatives were developed and first printed…There was a very special collaboration going on here between the artists and artisans, Nepalis and foreigners, which was mutually inspiring and gives the books their unique quality. The Subliminal Report was the first book to utilize Bhutanese silk paper as cover stock.”

7. Bowles, Paul. NEXT TO NOTHING
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix, 1976
Machine-sewn in printed and illustrated wrappers, 7.25″ x 9.5″, 24 pages, 500 numbered copies, letterpress printed at Sharada Printing Press. Cover verifax by Maya, frontispiece collage by Dana Young, title page illustration by Sidney Hushour, illustration by Petra Vogt, colophon illustration by Lee Baarslag, back cover image supplied by Bowles. Published as Starstreams 5.

8. Cohen, Ira. POEMS FROM THE COSMIC CRYPT 
First edition:
Kathmandu: Kali Press/Bardo Matrix, 1976
Hardcover in paper-bound boards with paper title label, 7.5″ x 9.75″, 90 pages, 500 copies, illustrated by Petra Vogt, introduction by Angus MacLise.

9. Cohen, Ira. OPIUM ELEMENTALS
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix, 1976
Machine-sewn in printed and illustrated wrappers, 12″ x 9.25″, 50 pages, 350 numbered and signed copies, letterpress printed at Sharada Printing Press. Designed and illustrated by Dana Young. Published as A Starstreams Special Edition.

Contents: “Emergent Waxwork” [poem], “The Mirage Poem” [poem]

10. di Prima, Diane. LOBA PART II
First edition:
Pt. Reyes and Kathmandu: Eidolon Editions, 1976
Saddle-stapled in printed and illustrated wrappers, 7.5″ x 10.25″, 36 pages, 550 copies (50 hardbound), letterpress printed on handmade paper. Illustrated by Josie Grant.

From the colophon: printed for Eidolon Editions by Dreamweapon in the Kingdom of Nepal, being the 24th printing of the Independent Presses of Kathmandu…

11. Valenza, Roberto Francisco. THE CLEARING STAGE
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix, 1976
500 copies.




12. Falk, Jane. CKROWWW
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix, 1976
500 copies. Published as Starstreams Poetry Series No. 6.



13. Sagaray [pseud. Jane Falk]. THE WITCH SPEAKS
First edition:
Kathmandu: Snake Tongue, 1976
Machine-sewn in printed and illustrated wrappers, 7″ x 8.25″, 36 pages, 230 numbered copies, letterpress printed on handmade paper by Sharada Printing Press. Cover art by Chandra Man Maskay. Illustrated by author.

14. Gaynor, Iris M. EXITS
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix, 1977
Machine-sewn in printed and illustrated wrappers, 5.5″ x 10.75″, 14 pages, 200 numbered copies, letterpress printed on handmade paper by Sharada Printing Press. Cover art by Lee Baarslag. Published as a Starstreams Special Edition.

15. Cohen, Ira. GILDED SPLINTERS
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix, 1977
500 copies.

Note: cover illustration by Jimmy Thapa


16. Valenza, Roberto Francisco. LOST CONTACT
First edition:
Kathmandu: Bardo Matrix, 1977
250 copies.




—

Bardo Matrix

The Bardo Matrix Press was founded in Kathmandu in the early 1970s by original Velvet Underground drummer, artist, and poet Angus MacLise and poet, photographer, and publisher Ira Cohen as a publishing outgrowth of the Colorado artists’ collective of the same name. MacLise and Cohen commenced to issue pamphlets, booklets, posters, books, and broadsides by not only themselves and their fellow travellers, but also by some of the most important names of post-war literature: Paul Bowles, Gregory Corso, Diane Di Prima, and Charles Henri Ford were among the chosen.

The publications were printed in editions of anywhere from a couple of dozen to a few hundred, usually utilizing fine printing techniques such as wood blocks, letterpress, special inks, and handmade paper. But this was not based on traditional thoughts on fine printing, but rather on the opportunity to create something cheap and beautiful. There was a built-in audience for these publications on “Freak Street” in Kathmandu, where people in the circle of Bardo Matrix operated a small bookshop which did decent business selling wood-block printed headshop posters alongside poetry broadsides, these publications, as well as second-hand English language paperback books.

After the 1979 death of Angus MacLise, the activity of the Bardo Matrix Press quietly faded out. Ira Cohen returned to New York City where he was a highly visible member of the poetic demimonde until his passing in 2011, shortly after he had helped stage an exhibition on the life and work of Angus MacLise.

Bardo Matrix Checklist:

Section A: Books
Section B: Broadsides
Section C: Spirit Catcher Bookshop

· John Chick

Online Resources:

· The Bardo Matrix

· Big Bridge – Ira Cohen: The Great Rice Paper Adventure

· Granary Books – Bardo Matrix Collection

· University of Delaware – Bardo Matrix Press

Angus Maclise

Angus MacLise was a musician, poet, artist, and counterculture figure who was a mainstay of the downtown New York arts scene in the 1960s.

Angus MacLise Checklist:

Section A: Books and Broadsides
Section B: Contributions to Periodicals
Section C: Recordings
Section D: Publications Edited and Published

· The Dead Language [see also Piero Heliczer]
· Bardo Matrix

Angus MacLise was born in Bridgeport Connecticut in 1938. He studied music and dance before moving to Paris in the late 1950s. In Paris he and his high school friend, avant-garde filmmaker Piero Heliczer, started the Dead Language Press in 1958. The press specialized in poetry and published early works by poets such as Gregory Corso, Olivia de Haulleville, Hendrik Jan Marsman, Anselm Hollo, and others. MacLise also published several of his own poems and manuscripts through the press, including the pamphlet Year that renames all of the days of the year—a convention that MacLise and many of his friends used in dating correspondence or artworks.

MacLise and Heliczer moved back to the United States in the early 1960s, settling in New York and bringing the press with them. In New York, MacLise continued his publishing efforts, while also pursuing music and becoming involved in avant-garde theatrics and performance art pieces. He was a member of the Theater of Eternal Music, started and organized by composer and musician LaMonte Young. He was a regular participant in Fluxus events in New York City and appeared in many experimental films being made by his friends in the downtown arts scene at the time, notably Piero Heliczer and Ira Cohen.

MacLise was a founding member of the Velvet Underground—he was introduced to the band through his roommate John Cale and became the band’s first drummer. Though he helped to found the band, and may have even given it its name, his time with the Velvet Underground was short due to MacLise’s disinterest in creating art for profit or on a schedule dictated by anything other than his own inspiration. He does not appear on any of the band’s recordings.

In 1967 MacLise moved briefly to Berkeley, where he joined the Floating Lotus Magic Opera Company, a street performance troupe that included the painter and illustrator Hetty McGee. McGee and MacLise were married in Golden Gate Park in a ceremony officiated by Timothy Leary. The two would later have a son, Ossian, who began living in a Tibetan monastery at the age of 4 and was recognized at 7 as a tulku—a reincarnation of a lama.

The couple moved back to New York where MacLise again collaborated with Ira Cohen, scoring and appearing in Cohen’s film The Invasion of the Thunderbolt Pagoda.

In 1970 Angus and Hetty began a tour of Asia that ended with their settling in Kathmandu, Nepal. In Nepal, MacLise helped operate the Spirit Catcher Bookshop in Kathmandu which became a gathering place for the growing community of artist and poet expatriates living and working in the area. He founded a literary and poetry journal, Ting Pa, and in 1974 he and Ira Cohen started the Bardo Matrix publishing venture. They published work by MacLise, Paul Bowles, Charles Henri Ford among others.

During this time he was particularly interested in calligraphic art and works on paper. Much of his own work from his time in Nepal includes calligraphic illustrations in a made-up script. He was working on establishing a handmade paper company, Himalayan Paper, Inc. at the time of his death.

MacLise died in 1979 in Kathmandu, Nepal at the age of 41.

References Consulted:

Dreamweapon: The Art and Life of Angus MacLise 1938-1979
New York: Boo-Hooray, 2011

Online Resources:

Blastitude – Angus MacLise: Master of Synthesis

Columbia University Libraries – Angus MacLise papers

Mela Foundation – Angus Maclise: A Brief Chronology

Piero Heliczer – Film

>> return to PIERO HELICZER main page >>

SECTION D:
This index includes films by Piero Heliczer, with a short section at the end highlighting films that Piero Heliczer appears in

Films by Piero Heliczer: 

1. THE AUTUMN FEAST (1961) [film on Ubu Web]
Format: 8mm, 14 minutes, black and white and color, silent / sound on tape
Writer/Director: Piero Heliczer
Cinematography: Jeff Keen
Cast: Piero Heliczer, Kate Heliczer, Jacqueline Keen and others
Music: Angus MacLise – cembalum, Tony Conrad – mandolin, Piero Heliczer – flute

Note:  a deliberately non-synchronous film, shot in 8mm with the sound on tape. Piero Heliczer reads his poem “The Autumn Feast,” and the visuals interact with, but do not represent what is read.

“A grown up fantasy based on Guy Fawkes Day, the great children’s holiday of England, which is a combination of Halloween and the Fourth of July.” – Piero Heliczer.

“The Autumn Feast lays bare (there should be something that rhymes with hair here or bare there) the mythic structure behind the orange domes and cardboard battlements and gilded gables of our Pasty National Howard Johnsons Baghdad. It rubs the very noses of our mannequins in our mold and sends us spinning into the street – undone and toothless” – Jack Smith

2. THE SOAP OPERA (c. 1964)
Format: 16mm, 13 minutes, silent
Cinematography: Piero Heliczer
Cast: Piero Heliczer, Angus MacLise, Jack Smith, Marian Zazeela, LaMonte Young and others.

“This is basically a documentary on the beginnings of the cultural revolution on the Lower East Side, New York. While finishing this film, Piero Heliczer starred in Jack Smith’s FLAMING CREATURES and later in Bill Vehr’s AVOCADA.” – The Film-Makers Coop

“Also known as THE HOME OPERA and THE PANIC OPERA. At home in a small loft in the early days of the Golden Age of the Lower East Side. With Piero Heliczer, Angus Maclise, Jack Smith, LaMonte Young, Marian Zazeela and others.” – Piero Heliczer.

3. DIRT (1965) [film on Ubu Web]
Format: 8mm, 12 minutes, color/black and white, silent with sound on tape
Writer/Director: Piero Heliczer
Producer: Andy Warhol
Cast: John Cale, Storm De Hirsch, Bobby Driscoll [Nun], Dee Dee Driscoll, Rose Feliu-Pettet [Bride], Charles Henri Ford, Julie Garfield, Kate Heliczer, Sally Kirkland, Gretl Learned, Angus MacLise, Gerard Malanga, Jack Martin, Ann Mattingley, Barbara Maultsby, Jonas Mekas, Mario Montez, Irene Nolan, Bobby Notkoff, Barbara Rubin, Edie Sedgwick, Harry Smith, Jack Smith, Charles Stanley, Andy Warhol, La Monte Young, Marian Zazeela
Music: Marc Antoine Charpentier: Kyrie and Credo from the mass, “Assumpta Est Maria”
Filming location: New York City

Note: planned as a three hour epic, but when finished was only 12 minutes: also known as BATH SEQUENCE.

“Two nuns take a bath, then meet a sailor on the Staten Island Ferry. With Irene Nolan, Gretl Learned, Angus Maclise, Mario Montez and others.” – Piero Heliczer.

“Among all the new movies (it has been quiet lately on the underground scene) Piero Heliczer’s Dirt touched me most deeply. Its beauty is very personal and lyrical. And every frame of it is cinema. I can do not justice to this beautiful work in one paragraph. It was shot on 8mm and much of its beauty and its cinema come from 8mm properties of camera and film. It is all motion. Together with Brakhage’s Songs, Branaman’s abstractions and Ken Jackob’s not yet released work, Heliczer’s Dirt is one of the four works that use 8mm film properly and for art’s sake” – Jonas Mekas, Village Voice.

4. THE LAST RITES (1965)

5. SATISFACTION (c. 1965)
Format: 16mm, 10 minutes, color/black and white, silent with sound on tape
Writer/Director: Piero Heliczer
Cinematography: Piero Heliczer
Cast: John Cale, Sally Kirkland [The Nun], Angus MacLise, Gerard Malanga [Flash Gordon], Mario Montez, Irene Nolan [School Girl], Barbara Rubin [The Nun], Jack Smith [God], Frances Stillman [The Nun]
Music: The Rolling Stones (“Satisfaction”)
Sound Engineer: Tony Conrad

“A nun goes to Heaven and arrives there at the same time as Flash Gordon. With Sally Kirkland (as the Nun), Irene Nolan (as the School Girl), Frances Stillman and Barbara Rubin (as Nuns), Gerard Malanga (as Flash Gordon, Jack Smith (as God), Jack Martin, Angus Maclise, Mario Montez, and others.” – Piero Heliczer.

6. VENUS IN FURS (1965)
Format: 16mm, 16 minutes, color, silent with sound on tape
Director: Piero Heliczer
Cinematography: Piero Heliczer
Cast: John Cale, Piero Heliczer, Angus MacLise, Lou Reed, Barbara Rubin, The Velvet Underground
Music: The Velvet Underground (“Heroin”, “Venus in Furs” with Piero Heliczer on saxophone)
Sound Engineer: CBS-TV News

“This companion film to SATISFACTION is set at the opposite solstice and recapitulates part of DIRT. With Julie Garfield and Barbara Rubin (as Nuns), Chas Stanley (as Death), Margaret Boyce Cam (as the Nurse), Lou Reed, John Cale, Angus Maclise and others. A chess game under the bridge becomes a party in Hell. A must for lepidopterists.” – Piero Heliczer.

7. JOAN OF ARC
Format: 16mm, 11.5 minutes, color, silent with sound on tape
Cast: Arnold Rockwood (as the Policeman), Jack Smith (as LBJ), Rene Ricard, Ira Cohen, Wm. de Vore, Gerard Malanga, Tuli Kupferberg (as Bonnie Prince Charlie), Jose Rodriguez Soltero (as the Priest), Angus MacLise, Irene Nolan (as Marlene Dietrich), Chas Henry Ford, Jane Waldren, Wendy Norins, Andy Warhol, and many others
Music: Tony Conrad

“The story of Joan of Arc as applied to the present revolution in arts and mores. The Gothic is applied to the War in Vietnam. The film is experimental in the sense that in it the visual becomes tactile. With Arnold Rockwood (as the Policeman), Jack Smith (as LBJ), Rene Richard, Ira Cohen, Wm. de Vore, Gerard Malanga, Tuli Kupferberg (as Bonnie Prince Charlie), Jose Rodriguez-Soltero (as the Priest), Chas. Henri Ford, Jane Waldren, Wendy Norins and many others.” – Piero Heliczer.

8. THE STONE AGE
Format: 16mm, 24 minutes, color/black and white, silent with sound on tape
Cast: Tom Raworth, Mary and Gudmundur Gudmunsson Erro, Agneta Freiberg, Jane Fagin, Michael Malce, Francois le Coeur, Jackie Curtis, Viva, Michal Auder, Terence Ork, Mario Anniballi, Jud & Jeni Yalkut, Marion Brown, Mossa Bildner, Dexter Kelly, Betsy Greenstein, Gerorge Whitman, Alferdo Leonardi, Patti-Lee Chenis, Cornelia Wessels, Joseph Arak, Jose Rodriguez-Soltero, Rolando Pena, Suzanne de Maria, Lohr Wilson, Jerry Benjamin, Jack Smith (as Casanova), Michael Snow (as Aristotle), Gerard Malanga (as Orfeo) and many others
Music: Claudio Monteverdi (“Orfeo – Act III”)

9. HARUNOBU
Format: 8mm, 5 minutes, color, silent with sound on tape
Cast: Antoine Perich and others

“The action takes place in a pissoir in june/1958 the weather is very good every now and then it/ rains very hard at night there is lightning in/ the day time bright sun without rain bows the / day is bright as urine/ some of the action takes place on the outer/ surface of the pissoir shell/ harunobu wears a white noh mask and/ reddish black wig her japanese dress is white/ lack and red like a st raphael advertisement/ jean sebastien bach/ gregory shaxper/ with antoine perich and others.” – Piero Heliczer.

10. BESSIE SMITH (1967)
Format: 16mm, 6 minutes, color, silent with sound on tape

“Photographed by gerard malanga in the subways of new york (actually the set of the blue centaur left over from the economy cutbacks at mgm and paramount/ joseph smith; patti lee chenis/ barrabas son to joseph smith: bill iwata/ captain john smith/ captain smiths band white masks mustaches armored round quattrocento helmets/ angel black face wears a checkered ginham dress/ band of angels/ johann sebastian back wears a wig in blackface looks a lot like george washington two fingers of his left hand are missing/ bessie smith: lily ocasio/ joseph smith and barabbas smith are played by one man preferably buster keaton/ angel and bach are played by one man preferably django reinhardt/ captain smiths band is played by the band of angels.” – Piero Heliczer.

11. THE NAKED LUNCH (1968)
Format: 1/4″ magnetic tape, 30 minutes

“A film for tape recorder no projector needed/ sound by wm burroughs.” – Piero Heliczer.

12. ST. THERESE DE L’ENFANT JESUS
Format: 16mm, 40 minutes, black and white, silent

13. ROBIN HOOD
Format: 16mm, 39.5 minutes, black and white, silent

Film with Appearances by Piero Heliczer: 

1. BENGASI (1942)
Director: Augusto Genina
Writers: Edoardo Anton, Ugo Betti, Alessandro De Stefani, Augusto Genina
Piero Heliczer (as Sandrino Berti (aka “Pucci”))

2. ACQUE DI PRIMAVERA (1942)
Director: Nunzio Malasomma
Writers: Nunzio Malasomma, Sergio Pugliese
Piero Heliczer (as “un altro bambino”)

3. FLAMING CREATURES (1963)
Format: 16mm, 45 minutes, black and white, mono
Writer/Director: Jack Smith
Cinematography: Jack Smith
Cast: Francis Francine (as himself), Sheila Bick (as Delicious Dolores), Joel Markman (as Our Lady of the Docks), Mario Montez (as The Spanish Girl (aka Dolores Flores)), Arnold Rockwood (as Arnold), Judith Malina (as The Fascinating Woman), Marian Zazeela (as herself), Beverly Grant (as Whirling Dervish), Piero Heliczer (as himself)
Music: Tony Conrad
Filming Location: New York City

“An experimental film that features graphic sexual imagery, an earthquake, and a lipstick commercial.”

4. COUCH (1964)
Format: 16mm, 54 minutes, black and white, silent
Director: Andy Warhol
Producer: Andy Warhol
Cast: Bingingham Birdie, Rufus Collins, Gregory Corso, Allen Ginsberg, Kate Heliczer, Pierre Helzicer, Jane Holzer, Jack Kerouac, Mark Lancaster, Joseph LeSeuer, Naomi Levine, Gerard Malanga, Taylor Mead, Billy Name (as Billy Linich), Ivy Nicholson, Ondine, Peter Orlovsky, John Palmer, Amy Taubin, Gloria Wood

The couch at Andy Warhol’s Factory was as famous in its own right as any of his Superstars. In Couch, visitors to the Factory were invited to “perform” on camera, seated on the old couch. Their many acts-both lascivious and mundane-are documented in a film that has come to be regarded as one of the most notorious of Warhol’s early works. Across the course of the film we encounter such figures as poets Allen Ginsberg and Gregory Corso, the writer Jack Kerouac, and perennial New York figure Taylor Mead.

5. SCREEN TEST(1965)
Format: 16mm, 3 minutes, black & white, silent
Director/Producer: Andy Warhol
Cinematography: Gerard Malanga

Piero Heliczer, dressed in a broad-brimmed black hat and high collar, is placed in front of a plastic sheeting. He slowly smokes a cigarette, occasionally blowing a smoke ring. Towards the end of the roll he smiles, closes his eyes and sticks his tongue out at the camera

Note:between 1964 and 1966 Andy Warhol made about 500 different Screen Tests of various personalities who visited his atelier Factory.

6. BROTHEL (1966)
Format: 16mm, 45 minutes, color, mono
Director/Writer: Bill Vehr
Producer: Bill Vehr
Cinematrography: Bill Vehr
Cast: Mario Montez, Jack Smith, Piero Heliczer, Tosh Carillo, Francis Francine

Brothel is a 45-minute color film starring Mario Montez, Jack Smith, Piero Heliczer, Tosh Carillo, and Francis Francine. Filmmaker Carl Linder was particular taken with Vehr’s film, describing the film’s protagonist as “neo-romantic, Beardsley-esque phantoms from an Oscar Wilde garden.”

7. HOMEO (1967) [link to Dailymotion]
Format: 16mm, 38 minutes, color
Director: Étienne O’Leary
Cast: Michel Asso, Michel Auder, Yves Beneyton, Dennis Berry, Juliet Berto, Margareth Clémenti, Pierre Clémenti, Francis Conrad (as Konrad), Billy Copley, François De Menil, Barbara Girard, Michèle Giraud, Piero Heliczer, Nicole Laguigner, Taylor Mead

O’Leary’s second film is a disjointed collage of beautifully shot footage: cityscapes, signs and billboards, nudes and cameos by other French actors/filmmakers of the day.

8. NO PRESIDENT (1967)
Format: 16mm, 50 minutes, black and white
Director: Jack Smith
Cast: Tally Brown, Tosh Carillo, Doris Desmond, Charles Henri Ford (as Lady Dracula), Bill Fortenberry, Francis Francine, Piero Heliczer, Donna Kerness, Nancy King, Robert Lavigne, Gerard Malanga, Joel Markman, Gay Martini, Mario Montez, Irving Rosenthal

Note: original title was “The Kidnapping of Wendell Willkie by the Love Bandit”

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