Tag Archives: Robert Duncan

Enkidu Surrogate

spicer_billyannouce — Announcement for Billy the Kid, circa 1959. Collage on paper

From Stinson Beach in the late 1950s, Jess Collins and Robert Duncan published just two books under their Enkidu Surrogate imprint.

The books were distributed by White Rabbit Press.

A1. Spicer, Jack. BILLY THE KID
a. First edition, first state:
Stinson Beach: Enkidu Surrogate, October 1959
Saddle-stapled in illustrated wrappers, 6.5″ x 8.5″, 16 pages, 750 copies, offset printed. Illustrations by Jess Collins.

b. First edition, second state:
The second state includes holograph corrections to text on page 8

A2. Duncan, Robert. FAUST FOUTU
a. First edition, regular copies:
Stinson Beach: Enkidu Surrogate, November 1959
Saddle-stapled in illustrated wrappers, 7″ x 8.5″, 71 pages, 750 copies. Illustrated by Robert Duncan. (Bertholf A7c)

b. First edition, numbered and signed copies:
Stinson Beach: Enkidu Surrogate, November 1959
Saddle-stapled in illustrated wrappers, 7″ x 8.5″, 71 pages, 50 copies numbered and signed with a drawing. Illustrated by Robert Duncan. (Bertholf A7d)

Note: This is the first complete printing of the play, after a privately printed mimeographed first printing in 1953, and a second from White Rabbit Press in 1958.

Fuck You/ A Magazine of the Arts

Fuck You/ A Magazine of the Arts, published by Ed Sanders from a “secret location on the Lower East Side” of New York City, was a deliberately provocative mimeographed periodical that ran for 13 issues from 1962 to 1965. Each issue featured line drawings by Sanders and included contributions from such writers and artists as Tuli Kupferberg, Carol Bergé, John Wieners, Andy Warhol, Ray Bremser, Lenore Kandel, Charles Olson, Joel Oppenheimer, Peter Orlovsky, Philip Whalen, Allen Ginsberg, Herbert Huncke, Julian Beck, Frank O’Hara, Leroi Jones, Diane Di Prima, William Burroughs, Gary Snyder, Robert Kelly, Judith Malina, Carl Solomon, Gregory Corso, Robert Duncan, Robert Creeley, Michael McClure, Ted Berrigan, Joe Brainard, Gilbert Sorrentino, and many others.

1. FUCK YOU/ A MAGAZINE OF THE ARTS, No. 1, edited by Ed Sanders
New York: Ed Sanders, February 1962
First edition, side-stapled in printed and illustrated cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 26 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover art and illustrations by Ed Sanders.

From the Editors Note: “Send me your banned manuscripts, your peace-grams, your cosmic data, your huddled masses yearning to be free, your collections of freak-beams, plans for the pacifist holocaust, I lift my speedoprint mimeo beside the golden door…”

Contents:
Jean Morton – “To Us”
Jean Morton – “Prayer”
Ed Sanders – “Soft-Man I”
Ed Sanders – “Soft-Man II”
Ed Sanders – “Soft-Man IIII”
Ed Sanders – “Soft-Man V”
Ed Sanders – “Soft-Man VI”
Allen Hoffman – “Hymn to Amun-Ra-Sanders, The Sun Disc”
Paul Berner – “Freak-Gram: Some Notes on Nonviolent Suicide”
Nelon Barr – “A Bouquet of Fuck Yous”

2. FUCK YOU/ A MAGAZINE OF THE ARTS, No. 2, edited by Ed Sanders
New York: Ed Sanders, April 1962
First edition, side-stapled in printed and illustrated cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 34 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover art and illustrations by Ed Sanders.

From the Editors Note: “Send me yr goddamn manuscripts. Cut me in on yr freak-beams. I’ll print anything.”

Contents:
Margaret X – “Ronnie: An Unapproved Litany”
Eric Weinberger – “Brownsville Jail — Mar. 12, 1962”
Ed Sanders – “Cemetery Hill”
Ed Sanders – “Soft Man VII”
Ed Sanders – “Soft Man VIII”
Ed Sanders – “Soft Man IX”
Robert Brookings Gore – “Fishy”
Robert Brookings Gore – “What?”
Jim Forest – “Notes Written in the Night”
Nelson Barr – “Ash Wednesday Revisited”
Nelson Barr – “A Bouquet of Fuckyous, offering #2”

3. FUCK YOU/ A MAGAZINE OF THE ARTS, No. 3, edited by Ed Sanders
New York: Ed Sanders, June 1962
First edition, side-stapled in printed and illustrated cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 38 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover art and illustrations by Ed Sanders.

From the Editors Note: “Send me yr banned manuscripts, fire me yr cosmic data, visions of the incomprehensible, arcanics, outpukes from the jack-batty, notes from the all, I’ll print anything.”

Contents:
Penny X – “Crotch Poem”
Al Fowler – “Poems, Wargasms, Hymns to Young Men & Women”
Ed Sanders – “Poems”
Ed Sanders – “Soft Man X”
Bob K – “Canticle”
John Harriman – “Two Poems While High”
Nelson Barr – “A Bouquet of Fuckyous”
Tuli Kupferberg – “Pacifist Primer”
Tuli Kupferberg – “6996th Psalm”
Tuli Kupferberg – “Cool”

4. FUCK YOU/ A MAGAZINE OF THE ARTS, No. 4, edited by Ed Sanders
New York: Ed Sanders, August 1962
First edition, side-stapled in printed and illustrated cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 54 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover art and illustrations by Ed Sanders.

From the Editor’s Note: “Send me yr bloody manuscripts! I’ll print anything”

Contents:
Eric Weinberger – [untitled] “For me/ even for me…”
Carol Berge – “Lovesong”
Michael McClure – [untitled] “The mind pain comes over me…”
Taylor Mead – [untitled] “I can’t write…”
C.V.J. Anderson – “August Sixth for Reiko”
John Wieners – “Cocaine”
Ray Bremser – “Lacerations Manuscript”
Ed Sanders – “from On Guerilla Lovefare”
Tuli Kupferberg – “The Man with the Scissors”
John C. Harriman – “3 for Diane Wakoski”
Elin Paulson – [untitled] “in a forever eternity…”
John Keys – “Poem” [“what has made us…”]
John Keys – “New Age of Arm Lifting”
John Keys – “Remembrances of Things Past”
Steve Wever – [untitled] “Your Azzole is…”
Mary E. Mayo – “The Highlanders”
Jackson Mac Low – “Observations in My Neighborhood”
Nelson Barr – “Darkangelgirl”
Nelson Barr – “A Bouquet of Fuckyous, offering #4”

5. FUCK YOU/ A MAGAZINE OF THE ARTS, No. 5, Vol. 1, edited by Ed Sanders
New York: Ed Sanders, December 1962
First edition, side-stapled in printed and illustrated cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 62 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover art and illustrations by Ed Sanders.

From the Editor’s Note: “Barf me your frick data. Retch me in on your bable vectors, your arcanics, your spew, I’ll print anything.”

Contents:
Ed Sanders – “Fuck You, The Talk of the Town”
Charles Olson – “Three Poems from The Maximus Poems”
Lenore Kandel – [untitled] “to fuck with love…”
Al Fowler – “Heroin”
Al Fowler – “Takeoff”
Al Fowler – “Larson O.D.’s; Fowler Scare Shitless”
Al Fowler – “The Hip Lady Pacifist…”
Al Fowler – “Cock City”
Al Fowler – “Caroline”
Al Fowler – “Vision”
Barbara Moraff – [untitled] “Spaniel luz…”
Mark Samara – “Camping Out with Ed Sanders”
Ed Marshall – “Steps of Entering the Skin”
Bonnie Bremser – “Fowl-Play”
Millard Friedman – “Opening”
Ron Rice – [untitled] “Creation from zero…”
Charles Polandik – “Thru Service from New York to Chicago”
Joel Oppenheimer – “A Little Mayan Head”
John Keys – “Revision”
Kirby Congdon – [untitled] “I stagger under the boat…”
John Thomas – “Fat Dr. Bonelli”
Ed Sanders – “Blow Job Poem”
Mary Mayo – “Canticle”
Nelson Barr – “A Bouquet of Fuckyous”

6. FUCK YOU/ A MAGAZINE OF THE ARTS, No. 5, Vol. 2, edited by Ed Sanders
New York: Ed Sanders, December 1962
First edition, side-stapled in printed and illustrated cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 68 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover art and illustrations by Ed Sanders.

From the Editor’s Note: “Skin me with your poetry, your banned manuscripts, your babble, plans for the pacifist holocaust, I’ll print anything.”

Contents:
John Wieners – [untitled] “You talk of going…”
Tuli Kupferberg – “I Say”
Carol Berge – “How to Screw a Bear and Find God”
Taylor Mead – “from His Diary”
Paul Blackburn – “The One-Night Stand”
Barry Wallenstein – “Times of Our Time”
Ray Bremser – “Eternity Grinding Allen’s Giant Beyonds”
Ray Bremser – “Rolling with the Wind”
David Rattray – “In God We Trust”
John Keys – “Poem for Charles Olson come Summer”
Hank Dixon – “Billie the Kid Revisited”
Elin Paulson – “With Love Still”
Pasquale Cocco – [untitled] “I’d love to…”
Bob K. – “from Carolcurla”
Nelson Barr – “Call Me not Back”
Nelson Barr – “Another Bouquet of Fuckyous”
Al Fowler – “Babble”
Al Fowler – “I Want You”
Al Fowler – “Musee de Beaux Enfant”
Al Fowler – “Child”
Al Fowler – “Democracy”
Al Fowler – “Telephone Conversation”
Al Fowler – “The Room. Junk Withdrawal”

7. FUCK YOU/ A MAGAZINE OF THE ARTS, No. 5, Vol. 3, edited by Ed Sanders
New York: Ed Sanders, May 1963
First edition, side-stapled in printed and illustrated cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 80 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover art and illustrations by Ed Sanders.

Contents:
Ed Sanders – “Spurt Spurt”
Lenore Kandel – “Hero the Rider”
Rochelle Owens – “To an Arrogant Fart”
Peter Orlovsky – “Second Sex Experiment”
Jean Forest – “Queen #3”
Carol Berge – “The Love Hang”
Marc Samara – “Camping Out with Taylor Mead”
Joel Oppenheimer – “A Long Testament”
Ray Bremser – “The Cup of Sex”
Robert Kaye – “Mawdroogle”
John Thomas – “Okay Okay”
John Thomas – “For Basho”
Jay Socin – “Graffiti in a Public John”
Al Katzman – “Lament”
Barbara Moraff – “The Abdominal Snowman”
Barbara Moraff – [untitled] “during the past few months…”
Nancy Ellison – “Caca Caca”
John Keys – “Poem for the Aircraft”
Martin Segal – [untitled] “Here I have come…”
Taylor Mead – “Taylor Mead on Dope”
Jackson Mac Low – “19th Light Poem”
Szabo – “Poem for Marilyn”
Nelson Barr – “Bouquet of Fuckyous”

8. FUCK YOU/ A MAGAZINE OF THE ARTS, No. 5, Vol. 4, edited by Ed Sanders
New York: Ed Sanders, Summer 1963
First edition, side-stapled in printed and illustrated cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 74 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover art and illustrations by Ed Sanders.

Contents:
Ed Sanders – “Defiance”
Szabo – “Poem for Hustlers”
Lenore Kandel – “Grant Avenue”
Philip Whalen – “Duerden says: ‘Life is Therapy'”
Paul Blackburn – “Here They Go”
Joel Oppenheimer – “Public Affairs”
Joel Oppenheimer – “Poem in Praise of Perseverance”
John Harriman – “Antoninous Paper Number Two”
Barbara Moraff – [untitled] “im a hip song mistress…”
Barbara Moraff – [untitled] “ground like barren…”
Barbara Moraff – [untitled] “hiking out of sight…”
Barbara Moraff – [untitled] “the reactions…”
George Economou – “Carmen Mentulae”
Carol Berge – “An Answer to one of the Other Women”
Harry Fainlight – “42nd Street”
Rochelle Owens – “Manananimal”
George Montgomery – “Cockman”
Andrew Hoyem – “An Invocation to the Muse in her Low Haunts”
Al Fowler – “Junky II – Speedball”
Al Fowler – “Statutory Rape – (the plea)”
Al Fowler – “Junky”
Ed Sanders – “Three Poems from The Gobble Gang Poems”
Michael McClure – “Fuck Essay”
Nelson Barr – “A Bouquet of Fuckyous, offering #8”

9. FUCK YOU/ A MAGAZINE OF THE ARTS, Number 5, Volume 5, edited by Ed Sanders
New York: Ed Sanders, December 1963
First edition, side-stapled in printed and illustrated cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 90 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover art and illustrations by Ed Sanders.

From the Editor’s Note: “Manuscripts! Manuscripts! puke us your spew, magic, music, loves, logoi, and vapours! Onward in the Re-vectors, all you blazing m.f.’s”

Contents:
Ed Sanders – “Total Assault on the Culture”
Allen Ginsberg – “The Change: Kyoto-Tokyo Express July 18, 1963”
Isis – “Incantation for the REvival of the Dead Osiris”
Robert Kaye – “8th & 42nd”
Robert Kaye – “for Quang Duc”
Robert Kaye – [untitled] “under falling water…”
Robert Kaye – [untitled] “i’m dead…”
Lenore Kandel – “Love Fuck Poem”
Tuli Kupferberg – “A Black & White Manifesto”
Peter Orlovsky – “Allen Jerking Off on Bed”
Mary Mayo – “The Dream of the Starving Birds”
Robert Nichols – “Message”
Robert Nichols – “Bakhunin”
Diane Wakowski – “Ordinary Poem, to Bob”
Julian Beck – [untitled] “horse pimples…”
Julian Beck – “Anarchy”
Julian Beck – [untitled] “that the collective not be…”
John Keys – “Impressions Taken from the Same Canteen”
John Keys – “Erikson”
John Keys – “Lesson 2”
Jim Standish – “Three Poems from the Mushroom Poems”
Harry Fainlight – “O London”
Herbert Huncke – “The Party”
Nelson Barr – “Love Poem”
Nelson Barr – “A Bouquet of Fuck Yous, offering #9”

10. FUCK YOU/ A MAGAZINE OF THE ARTS, Number 5, Volume 6, edited by Ed Sanders
New York: Ed Sanders, April/May 1963
First edition, side-stapled in printed and illustrated cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 108 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover art and illustrations by Ed Sanders.

From the Editor’s Note: “Manuscripts!! we need high level poetic data, music, criticism, reviews, surveys, stories, magic, etc…. while we exist we should like to puke forth some totally mind-stomping issues…”

Contents:
Ed Sanders – “A Call to Action”
Harry Fainlight – “For the Ghost of Hart Crane”
Allen Ginsberg – “Walt Whitman”
Harry Fainlight – “Le Poete a Quatorze Ans”
Harry Fainlight – “Mescaline Notes”
Frank O’Hara – “Un Chant d’Amor”
Frank O’Hara – “In the Movies”
Peter Orlovsky – “Thank God….”
Ray Bremser – “Three Small Prater to the Genii”
Ray Bremser – “Frontal Phrenal Fit”
Al Fowler – [untitled] “are you going to the…”
Al Fowler – “Soup Poem”
Al Fowler – “My Last Shot of Stuff”
Szabo – “The Szabo Poems”
Diane Di Prima – “An Anniversary Poem, for Alan”
Diane Di Prima – “Take 3/16/61”
Diane Di Prima – “Take 3/15/61”
LeRoi Jones – “Houdini”
LeRoi Jones – “Letter to Elijah Muhammed”
LeRoi Jones – “Political Poem”
LeRoi Jones – “Double Feel”
Joel Oppenheimer – “Fragments of a Letter from New York to San Francisco”
Joel Oppenheimer – “For Our Cousins”
Joel Oppenheimer – “Where are My Glasses”
Joel Oppenheimer – “Balso’s Blues”
Carol Berge – “Chant for Half the World”
John Keys – “Star: Saskatchewan Two”
Nancy Ellison – [untitled] “i lie long mornings…”
Nancy Ellison – [untitled] “weed that hides rock…”
Nancy Ellison – [untitled] “i feel my body covered with dust…”
Nelson Barr – [untitled] “wingdlass, stingsalt skald’s brow hornhelmed…”
Nelson Barr – “A Bouquet of Fuckyou’s, offering #10”

11. FUCK YOU/ A MAGAZINE OF THE ARTS, Number 5, Volume 7, edited by Ed Sanders
New York: Ed Sanders, September 1964
First edition, side-stapled in printed and illustrated cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 172 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover art by Robert LaVigne and illustrations by Ed Sanders.

Contents:
Ed Sanders – “Resistance against Goon Squads”
Charles Olson – “West Gloucester”
John Wieners – “The Imperatrice”
John Wieners – “Confession”
John Wieners – “Le Chariot”
John Wieners – [untitled] “And if to die…”
Robert Creeley – “Something”
Robert Creeley – “Two Times”
Allen Ginsberg – “from Long Unfinished Poem”
Robert Duncan – “Old Testament”
Robert Duncan – “New Testament”
William Burroughs – “Fluck you fluck you fluck you”
Norman Mailer – “The Executioner’s Song”
Gary Snyder – “Hymn to the Goddess San Francisco in Paradise”
Gregory Corso – “God is a Masturbator”
Philip Whalen – “Statement of Condition”
Philip Whalen – “The Great Beyond Denver”
Philip Whalen – “Papyrus Catalogue”
Philip Whalen – “Vector Analysis”
Philip Whalen – “Against the Magic War: An Open Letter to Robert Duncan”
Michael McClure – “Airs from a Forgotten Book”
Judith Malina – “On the Day of the Death…”
Harry Fainlight – “The Spider”
Robert Kelly – “In Commentary on the Gospel…”
Robery Kelly – “Poem for Ed Sanders”
Carl Solomon – “Nobody Tells Me the Truth Any More”
Carl Solomon – “Stringing Them Along”
Carl Solomon – “Relationships”
Carl Solomon – “The Delinquents”
Carl Solomon – “The Lunatic and Modern Art”
Arnaut Daniel – “Sirventes”
Arnaut Daniel – “Sirventes” (trans. Paul Blackburn)
Al Fowler – “Junky”
Al Fowler – “Larson O.D.’s; Fowler Scared Shitless”
Al Fowler – “Heroin”
Al Fowler – “Takeoff”
Al Fowler – “The Room. Junk Withdrawal”
Al Fowler – “Junky II – Speedball”
Antonin Artaud – [untitled] “The message of…” (trans. Robert Cordier)
Philip Lamantia – “Blue Grace”
Alden Van Buskirk – “The Ivory Bastard”
Alden Van Buskirk – “Kitchen”
Alden Van Buskirk – “Last Will And”
Alden Van Buskirk – “from Forest Park Fragments”
Alden Van Buskirk – “Lami, Leather Nightingale”

12. FUCK YOU/ A MAGAZINE OF THE ARTS, Volume 5, Number 8, edited by Ed Sanders
New York: Fug Press, March 1965
First edition, side-stapled in printed and illustrated cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 154 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover art by Andy Warhol and illustrations by Ed Sanders.

Contents:
Ed Sanders – “Fuck You – The Talk of the Town”
Lawrence Ferlinghetti – “To Fuck is to Love Again”
Michael McClure – “Poisoned Wheat”
Michael McClure – “Poem Cards”
Ed Sanders – “from the Gobble Gang Poems”
LeRoi Jones – “Word from the Right Wing”
LeRoi Jones – “Western Front”
Allen Ginsberg – “from Journals”
Allen Ginsberg – “Dream”
Ted Berrigan – “Sonnet III”
Ted Berrigan – “Sonnet LXVII”
Ted Berrigan – “Sonnet LXXVI”
Ted Berrigan – “Sonnet LXXVIII”
W.H. Auden -“A Gobble Poem”
Gerard Malanga – “Friends”
Vincent Ferrini – “IHS”
Peter Orlovsky – “Three Pages of Drawings with Notes…”
Harry Fainlight – “Street”
Gergory Corso – “At the Big A”
Claude Pelieu – “Four Shriek Pages…”
Al Fowler – [untitled] “man is the disconnected beast…”
Elise Cowan – [untitled] “A cockroach…”
Elsie Cowan – [untitled] “The first eye opens…”
Elsie Cowan – [untitled] “Easy to love…”
Elsie Cowan – [untitled] “I took the skin of corpses…”
John Keys – “The Relationships”
Robert Kaye – [untitled] “suffering cannot be merited…”
John Francis Putman – “Mythology”
John Francis Putman – “Freebie Peek at Remaindered Girlie Mags”
John Francis Putman – “All Saints Day”
Carol Berge – “Thank You”
Bill Fritsch – [untitled] “I stared into your…”
Al Katzman – “Directions I (for John Keys)”
Al Katzman – “The Bloodletting”
Gerard Malanga – “In the pores of his forehead…”
Gerard Malanga – “Some Thoughts of Jean Shrimpton”
Gerard Malanga – “Charles Olson among the White Trees”
Nancy Ellison – [untitled] “I sing the grave…”
Nelson Barr – “Guernica”

13. FUCK YOU/ A MAGAZINE OF THE ARTS, Volume 5, Number 9
New York: Ed Sanders, June 1965
First edition, side-stapled in printed and illustrated cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 100 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover art and illustrations by Ed Sanders.

Contents:
Ed Sanders – “Notes from the Editor”
Joe Brainard – untitled illustration
Pindar – “The First Olympian Ode”
Tom Veitch – “You Got a Point There, Pop”
Harry Fainlight – “Interregnum”
Harry Fainlight – “Image for Fowler”
Harry Fainlight – “The Question”
Harry Fainlight – “Cruising”
Harry Fainlight – “To Noreen”
Harry Fainlight – “Magic Song”
Gilbert Sorrentino – “from The Perfect Fiction”
John Wieners – “Memories of You”
Alden Van Buskirk – “The Pimple”
Szabo – [untitled] “Billy the Kid, the criminal…”
Taylor Mead – “My Monthly”
Robert Kelly – “Sporting News”
Lenore Kandel – “In the Comics”
David Henderson – [untitled] “David A. Wood…”
Al Fowler – [untitled] “night. in the orchards…”
Janine Pommey – “On Train From Living Theatre Heist to Paris”
Ted Berrigan – “Book Review”

References Consulted:

Clay, Steven and Rodney Phillips. A SECRET LOCATION ON THE LOWER EAST SIDE: ADVENTURES IN WRITING, 1960-1980
New York: New York Public Library / Granary Books, 1998

Marx, Jake. “Index to Fuck You / A Magazine of the Arts” in THE SERIF: QUARTERLY OF THE KENT STATE UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES, Volume VIII, Number 3
Kent: The Kent State University Libraries, September 1971

Online Resources:

· Boo-Hooray – Ed Sanders: Fuck You / A Magazine of the Arts

· From a Secret Location – Fuck You/ a magazine of the arts

· Reality Studio – Fuck You Press Archive

· Ubu Web – Fuck You: A Magazine of the Arts (1962-1965)

J

Jack Spicer’s J ran for eight issues: Nos. 1–5 were edited by Spicer in North Beach where contributions were left in a box marked “J” in The Place, a bar on Grant Avenue in San Francisco; Nos. 6 and 7 (an Apparition of the late J) were edited by George Stanley in San Francisco and New York City respectively while no. 8 was edited by Harold Dull in Rome. Spicer believed that poetry was for poets and the magazine had a small circulation but cast a long shadow. Contributors included: Robin Blaser, Richard Brautigan, Bruce Boyd, Kay Johnson, Robert Duncan, Joe Dunn, Ron Loewinsohn, Joanne Kyger, Helen Adam, and others. Covers (sometimes hand-embellished) were by Fran Herndon (Nos. 1, 2, 4, 5), Russell FitzGerald (No. 3), and George Stanley (Nos. 6, 7).

1. J, No. 1, edited by Jack Spicer
San Francisco: J, 1959
First edition, corner-stapled sheets in printed cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 38 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover by Fran Herndon.

Contents:
1. James Alexander – “The Jack Rabbit Poem”
  Ebbe Borregaard – “Ballad for S A D”
  Ebbe Borregaard – “Ballad of Billy Swan”
  Robin Blaser – “Two Astronomers with Notebooks”
  Jack Spicer – “Hokkus”
  Joe Dunn – “Love”
  Richard Brautigan – “The Fever Monument”
  Sam the Tenor Man – “The Radio said Giants Cinch Loop Flag”
  Bois Burk – “Ode to Pierre”
  Bruce Boyd – “After Midnight”
  Roland March – [untitled] “Mister Brustein…”
  Damon Beard – [untitled] “Adverse repercussionless…”
  Kay Johnson – [untitled] “My soul is the absurdity…”
  Kay Johnson – [untitled] “The door in the dream…”
  Robert Duncan – “Dream Data”
  Sagen – “Dear Sprach” [pseuds. Borregaard and Spicer]
  Harvey Harmon – “A Soldier and His Shadow”
  Tony Richards – “Summer”

2. J, No. 2, edited by Jack Spicer
San Francisco: J, 1959
First edition, corner-stapled sheets in printed cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 36 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover by Fran Herndon.

Contents:
1. George Stanley – “Tete Rouge”
  Fran Herndon – untitled illustration
  Jess Collins – “I Ups to My Self And”
  Harvey Harmon – [untitled] “More paths…”
  Jack Spicer – [untitled] “Down to new beaches…”
  Robert Duncan – “Dear Carpenter”
  Harvey Harmon – “A New Estate”
  William Morris – “Dear Senior Poet”
  Stan Persky – [untitled] “but it was a moment…”
  Mary Murphy – “In-”
  Will Holther – ” Lament for Otto de Fey”
  Jack Spicer – “Epilog for Jim”
  J.P. Shark – [untitled] “On account of changing tidal conditions…”

3. J, No. 3, edited by Jack Spicer
San Francisco: J, 1959
First edition, corner-stapled sheets in printed and hand-painted cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 38 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover by Russell FitzGerald.

Contents:
1. Bruce Boyd – “Introduction”
  Bruce Boyd – “Toward Morning”
  Bruce Boyd – “War”
  R.H. Blyth – “Letters to the Editor”
  Rueban – “Q”
  Mary Murphy – [untitled] “The skull is not the bones…”
  Leo Krikorian – [untitled] “1. No drinking on duty…”
  Ron Loewinsohn – “Entangling Alliances”
  George Stanley – “Tete Rouge (continued)”
  Jack Spicer – [untitled] “The slobby sea where you float…”
  Damon Beard – [untitled] “Even —…”
  Jack Spicer – “Last Hokku”
  JBH [James Herndon?] – [untitled] “I don’t know how many…”

4. J, No. 4, edited by Jack Spicer
San Francisco: J, 1959
First edition, corner-stapled sheets in printed and hand-painted cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 36 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover by Fran Herndon.

Contents:
1. Robert Duncan – “A Sequence of Poems…”
  Richard Brautigan – “The Pumpkin Tide”
  Richard Brautigan – “The Sidney Greenstreet Blues”
  Richard Brautigan – “Surprise”
  Garln – “Garln to His Friend”
  Joanne Kyger – “Tapestry #3”
  Josef Elias – “Joetry”
  Donald Allen – “for Barbara”
  John Ryan – “Pecadillo”
  Jack Spicer – “Jacob”
  George Stanley – “Tete Rouge (continued)”
  Wallace Allen Healey – “Politics”

5. J, No. 5, edited by Jack Spicer
San Francisco: J, 1959
First edition, corner-stapled sheets in printed and hand-painted cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 34 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover by Fran Herndon.

Contents:
1. L. Frank Baum – “from Sky Island”
  Larry Eigner – “Front”
  Jess Collins – “The Poets Corner” [comic strip]
  Richard Brautigan – “1942”
  Mary Murphy – [untitled] “Lack of oxygen…”
  D.D. – “Fishing on Saturday”
  Kay Johnson – “The Space is Too Wide”
  Ron Loewinsohn – “WIBC Poems”
  George Stanley – “Tete Rouge (continued)”
  Robert Duncan – “The Song of the River to its Shores”
  Richard Duerden – “Right Now”
  Sheila Roche Harmon – [untitled] “A young devil sat…”
  Jack Spicer – “Fifth Elegy”
  William Berryman – “On the Composition of Bones”
  William R. Allen – “Letter”

6. J, No. 6, edited by George Stanley
San Francisco: J, 1959
First edition, corner-stapled sheets in printed cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 38 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover by George Stanley.

Contents:
1. Helen Adam – “Scenes from San Francisco’s Burning”
  Paul Goodman – “I Love You, Necessary–”
  Joanne Kyger – “Pan as the Son of Penelope”
  Lucio Manisco – “Un Misto di Boheme Mistica e Letteraria”
  William A. Berryman – [untitled] “in the after hours…”

7. J, No. 7, edited by George Stanley
New York: J, 1960
Corner-stapled sheets in printed cover, 8.5″ x 11″, 32 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover by George Stanley.

All contents are anonymous.

8. J, No. 8, 1961, edited by Harold Dull *
Rome: J, 1961
Contributors: Harold Dull, Stan Persky.

—

[*not in archive]

online excerpt from A Secret Location on the Lower East Side (Granary Books, 1998):

“In many ways the most beautiful of all the mimeo magazines, J had an eight-issue run. The first five issues were edited from North Beach bars by Jack Spicer with Fran Herndon as art editor. Spicer, who embodied the spirit of poetry in the Bay area, collected pieces for his magazine from a box marked “J” in The Place, a bar at 1546 Grant Avenue in San Francisco. A refugee from Los Angeles with two degrees from Berkeley, he had been a student of Josephine Miles there in the mid-1940s. They became close friends, and Spicer participated in the Friday afternoon poetry readings in Wheeler Hall during the late 1940s as well as the readings organized with Rockefeller money by Ruth Witt-Diamant at the new Poetry Center at San Francisco State. Into the cauldron of poetic politics surrounding Miles, Kenneth Rexroth, Robert Duncan, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, and others, Spicer introduced his freest of spirits, sometimes more Caliban than Ariel. Spicer lived for words (even making his living as a research assistant on a lexicographical project at Berkeley). He could be found most evenings in one of the North Beach bars or coffeehouses leading the discussion on poetry, poetics, myth, linguistics, and other mysteries. Like Blake and Yeats (with the help of Mrs. Yeats), Spicer attempted to clear his mind and open himself to “dictation” from other sources, which he devotedly pursued. Spicer also believed wholeheartedly in the necessity of human beings’ helping each other through communication, which he confronted in the editorship of J, a little newsletter of the poetic spirit. Donald Allen acted as J’s distributor in New York (“New York Contributions are not forbidden. But quotaed”), selling copies for Spicer to the Wilentz brothers of the Eighth Street Book Shop. In an early letter to Spicer, Allen eagerly wondered “what your editorial policy may be. Seduction by print.””

Further Reading:

Mimeo Mimeo on J

Measure

“The three simple, almost starkly working-class issues of Measure followed glorious and overlooked “underground” poet John Wieners from Black Mountain College home to Boston, across country to San Francisco, and back to Boston again. In his years in San Francisco, from 1958 to 1960, Wieners attended (sometimes serving as host at his Scott Street apartment) the legendary Sunday afternoon poetry workshops of the charismatic poets Robert Duncan and Jack Spicer. Also present at the workshops were George Stanley, Harold Dull, Robin Blaser (The Pacific Nation), and many others…”
— from A Secret Location on the Lower East Side (Granary Books, 1998)

1. MEASURE, No. 1, edited by John Wieners
Boston: Measure, Summer 1957
First edition, saddle-stapled in printed wrappers, 5.5″ x 8.5″, 48 pages, letterpress printed at the Press of Villiers Publications.

“Measure is edited by John Wieners. It will be issued with the four seasons only through your support… Please understand that the opinions expressed in this magazine do not necessarily reflect those of the city.”

Contents:
1. Tom Balas – “Le Fou”
  Charles Olson – “Le Bonheur!”
  Charles Olson – “The Charge”
  Charles Olson – “Spring”
  Edward Marshall – “One:”
  Edward Marshall – “Two:”
  Robin Blaser – “Poem”
  Robin Blaser – “Letters to Freud”
  Robin Blaser – “Poem by the Charles River”
  Edward Dorn – “The Rick of Green Wood”
  Larry Eigner – “Millionem”
  Larry Eigner – “Brink”
  Frank O’Hara – “Section 9 from Second Avenue”
  Fielding Dawson – “Two Drawings”
  Stephen Jonas – “Word on Measure”
  Stephen Jonas – “Expanded Word on Measure”
  Michael Rumaker – “Father”
  Gavin Douglas – “The Blanket”
  Jack Spicer – “Song for Bird and Myself”
  Jonathan Williams – “Two Poems for Whitman, the Husbandman”
  Robert Duncan – “The Propositions”

2. MEASURE, No. 2, edited by John Wieners
San Francisco: Measure, Winter 1958
First edition, saddle-stapled in printed wrappers, 5.5″ x 8.5″, 64 pages, letterpress printed at the Press of Villiers Publications.

“Magick is for the ones who ball, i.e. throw across”

Contents:
1. Michael Rumaker – “The Use of the Unconscious”
  Robin Blaser – “The Hunger of Sound”
  Robert Creeley – “Juggler’s Thot”
  Michael Rumaker – “8 Dreams”
  Jack Kerouac – “4 Choruses”
  Charles Olson – “Descensus Spiritus No. 1”
  Robert Duncan – “The Maiden”
  Robert Creeley – “They Say”
  Robert Creeley – “She Went to Say”
  Jack Kerouac – “235th Chorus”
  Edward Dorn – “Notes from the Fields”
  Robert Duncan – “The Dance”
  Stuart Z. Perkoff – “Feats of Death, Feasts of Love”
  V. R. Lang – “The Recidivists”
  Gregory Corso – “Yaaaah”
  James Broughton – “Feathers or Lead”
  Michael McClure – “The Magazine Cover”
  Michael McClure – “One & Two”
  Robert Creeley – “The Tunnel”
  Robert Creeley – “Just Friends”
  Richard Duerden – “Musica No. 3”
  Stephen Jonas – “Books 3 & 4 from a Long Poem”

3. MEASURE, No. 3, edited by John Wieners
Milton: Measure, Winter 1962
First edition, saddle-stapled in printed wrappers, 5.5″ x 8.5″, 36 pages, letterpress printed at the Press of Villiers Publications.

“THE CITY / 1 AM – Unreasonable fear, of the shadows of Harry Lime, of the dead reappearing”

Contents:
1. James Schuyler – “Shed Market”
  James Schuyler – “Joint”
  Gerrit Lansing – “Explorers”
  Barbara Guest – “Safe Flights”
  Barbara Guest – [untitled] “Once when he was a small boy…”
  Barbara Guest – “Abruptly, as if a Forest Might Say”
  Helen Adam – “Anaid si Taerg (Great is Diana)”
  Madeline Gleason – “Wind Said, Marry”
  Robert Duncan – “What do I Know of the Old Lore?”
  Jack Spicer – “Central Park West”
  Larry Eigner – “Poem”
  Tom Field – [untitled] “Form is never more than the extension…”
  Edward Marshall – “Times Square”
  Edward Marshall – “2”
  Edward Marshall – “3”
  John Wieners – “The Imperatrice”
  Philip Lamantia – “Opus Magnum”
  Sheri Martinelli – “Ruth Gildenberg”
  Michael Rumaker – “The River at Night”
  Charles Olson – “The Year is a Great Circle…”
  Charles Olson – “The Post Virginal”
  Charles Olson – [untitled] “Descartes, age 34…”
  John Haines – “Poem”
  John Haines – “Pawnee Dust”

Berkeley Miscellany

Berkeley Miscellany, No. 1, edited by Robert Duncan
Berkeley: Berkeley Miscellany, 1948
First edition, saddle-stapled in printed wrappers, 6″ x 9.5″, 24 pages, letterpress printed at the Libertarian Press.

Contents:
1. Robert Duncan – “A Description of Venice”
  Jack Spicer – “A Night in Four Parts”
  Mary Fabilli – “The Lost Love of Aurora Bligh”

Berkeley Miscellany, No. 2, edited by Robert Duncan
Berkeley: Berkeley Miscellany, 1949
First edition, hand-sewn in printed wrappers, 6″ x 9.5″, 32 pages, letterpress printed at the Libertarian Press.

Contents:
1. Mary Fabilli – “An Hour or Two or Quiet Talk”
  Mary Fabilli – “The Garden”
  Robert Duncan – 3 Poems in Homage to the Brothers Grimm: “The Robber Moon”, “The Strawberries Under the Snow”, “The Dinner Table of Harlequin”
  Gerald Ackerman – “At the Beach”
  Jack Spicer – “The Scroll-Work on the Casket”

The Rivoli Review

The Rivoli Review, Vol. Zero, No. One, edited by Richard Duerden
San Francisco: The Rivoli Review 1963

Side-stapled illustrated wrappers, 8.5″ x 11″, 24 pages, mimeograph printed. Cover illustration by Jess Collins.

Contributors:
Ford Madox Ford – “Meary Walker”
Robert Duncan – “Weaving the Design”
James Koller – [untitled] “mottled brown birds…”
Richard Duerden – “Seven: #2 La Martine Place”
Denise Levertov – “Hypocrite Women”
Lynn Lonidier – “Chagall and Bella”
Ron Loewinsohn – “Art for Art’s Sake”, “The Rain, The Rain”
Gerald Gilbert – [untitled] “Sunshine…”
Lorenzo Thomas – “Grass”, “West”
Robert Peterson – “Critical Times”
Ron Loewinsohn – “Fuck You Roger Maris”
Philip Whalen – “Plums, Metaphysics, An Investigation, A Visit and a Short Funeral Ode”
Ron Loewinsohn – “It is to be Bathed in Light”

The Rivoli Review, Vol. Zero, No. Two, edited by Richard Duerden
San Francisco: The Rivoli Review 1964

Side-stapled illustrated wrappers, 8.5″ x 14″, 30 pages, mimeograph printed.

Contributors:
James Koller – “The People are Coming”
Ron Loewinsohn – “A Place to Go”
Jess Collins – “Song of the Pied Parrot”
Lew Brown – “from Lionel”
Deneen Brown – “Azalea Poem”
George Stanley – “Argus”
Robert Duncan – “Passages III”, “Passages 3-4”
Richard Duerden – “Silence, and Katharsis”
Lew Brown – “The Broadjump”, “from Lionel”
Jack Anderson – “The Scale of It”
Richard Duerden – “The Sonata”
Jack Anderson – “Man in a Doorway”
Gerard Malanga – “Final Sonnet XC”

Jess Collins

Jess Collins (August 6, 1923 – January 2, 2004) was born Burgess Franklin Collins in Long Beach, California. He was initially educated as a chemist, having received his B.S. at the California Institute of Technology in 1948, and in his career worked on the production of plutonium for the Manhattan Project. In 1949 he abandoned his scientific career and moved to San Francisco where he enrolled in the California School of Fine Arts (now the San Francisco Art Institute) and began referring to himself simply as “Jess”. He met Robert Duncan in 1951, a relationship that lasted until the poet’s death in 1988.

jess002 — Alternative cover for O!, 1959

In 1952 Jess, Duncan, and Harry Jacobus opened the King Ubu Gallery, which became an important venue for alternative art in San Francisco. And it remained so when it was reopened as the Six Gallery in 1954 by Wally Hedrick, Deborah Remington, John Ryan, Jack Spicer, Hayward King, and David Simpson.

A celebrated painter and collage artist, Jess was a leading light of the San Francisco art scene from the 1950s until his death in 2004, and one of the most original artists of the second half of the 20th century.

Jess was a quietly independent artist who in his paintings, collages, and sculptures developed a complex synthesis of art and literary history. Jess’ unique imagery, evolved from mythology and fables both playful and profound, has long been admired by critics, curators and writers. Using paper collage or his eccentric painting techniques, Jess’ pictures referenced ancient stories and invented symbols. Jess constructed a private world of delicate beauty and gentle absurdity.

A. Books and Broadsides

1. Artists View #8
Tiburon: Artist’s View, 1954
Poems and paste-ups, folded broadside, entire issue devoted to the work of Jess.

2. O!
New York: Hawks Well Press, 1960
Paste-ups and poems, stapled wrappers, with a preface by Robert Duncan.

3. The Dios Kuroi
Off-print from The Northwest Review, 1963
Paste-up sequence.

B. Contributions to Books and Other Publications

1. Jess Collins and Robert Duncan. Boob #1
San Francisco: [privately printed], 1952
Broadside. Paste-up.

2. Jess Collins and Robert Duncan. Boob #2
San Francisco: [privately printed], 1952
Broadside. Paste-up.

3. Duncan, Robert. Caesar’s Gate
Mallorca: Divers Press, 1955.
Cover and 16 paste-ups.

4. Jonas, Steve. The Poem, The Sea & Other Pieces Examined.
San Francisco: White Rabbit Press, 1957.
Cover illustration and titling. (Johnston A1)

5. Spicer, Jack. AFTER LORCA
San Francisco: White Rabbit Press, 1957
Cover illustration. (Johnston A2)

6. Levertov, Denise. FIVE POEMS
San Francisco: White Rabbit Press, 1958
Cover illustration. (Johnston A3)

7. Adam, Helen. The Queen O’ Crow Castle
San Francisco: White Rabbit, 1958
Cover illustration, titling, and six drawings. (Johnston A9)

8. Olson, Charles. O’Ryan 2 4 6 8 10
San Francisco: White Rabbit, 1958
Cover illustration. (Johnston A10)

9. Spicer, Jack. Billy The Kid
Stinson Beach: Enkidu Surrogate Press, 1959
Cover illustration and seven drawings.

10. Duncan, Robert. The Opening of The Field
New York: Grove Press, 1960
Frontispiece drawing.

11. Adam, Helen and Pat. San Francisco’s Burning
Berkeley: Oannes Press, 1963
Cover illustration and six drawings.

12. Duncan, Robert. Unkingd by Affection
San Francisco: San Francisco Arts Festival, 1963
Illustrated broadside.

13. Adam, Helen. Ballads
New York: Acadia Press, 1964
Cover illustration, titling, title page, and 15 drawings. Two additional drawings included in limited edition with hand-tinted cover.

14. Borregaard, Ebbe. When Did Morning Wind Rip Callow Flowers in May…
San Francisco, San Francisco Arts Festival, 1964
Illustrated broadside.

15. Duncan, Robert. A Book of Resemblances
New Haven: Henry Wenning, 1966
Illustrations in two colors.

16. Duncan, Robert. The Cat and The Blackbird
San Francisco: White Rabbit Press, 1967
Cover illustration, titling, and drawings.

17. Duncan, Robert. Names of People
Los Angeles: Black Sparrow Press, 1968
Illustrations.

18. Dunn, Joe. Better Dream House
San Francisco: White Rabbit Press, 1968
Cover and 11 paste-ups.

19. Morgenstern, Christian. Gallowsongs
Los Angeles: Black Sparrow Press 1970
Illustrations.

C. Contributions to Periodicals

1. Artists View #0. Tiburon, 1952. Paste-up poem

2. Artists View #5. Tiburon, 1953. Cover illustration.

3. Poems & Pictures #1. 1954. Poem

4. Black Mountain Review #4. 1956. Paste-up poem.

5. Black Mountain Review #6. 1956. Paste-ups

6. Ark II, Moby I. 1956. Translations.

7. J #2. 1959. Notes on painting.

8. J #5. 1959. Cover illustration and comic strip.

9. J #6. 1959. Comic strip.

10. Chelsea #7. 1960. Translations.

11. An Apparition of The Late J. 1960. Poem.

12. Folio 3. Bloomington, Summer 1960. Paste-up.

13. Foot #1. 1960. Poem.

14. Foot #2. 1962. Poem.

15. The Northwest Review 4. Eugene, Winter 1963. Paste-up sequence.

16. Semina 8. Los Angeles, 1963. Paste-up.

17. The Rivoli Review #1. 1964. Cover illustration.

18. The Rivoli Review #2. 1964. Poem.

19. Writing 3. 1964. Cover illustration and five drawings.

20. Open Space #1. 1964. Dream record.

21. Open Space #2. 1964. Dream record and letter.

22. Open Space #Twin 4. 1964. Dream record.

23. Open Space #6. 1964. Dream record and drawing.

24. Open Space #7. 1964. Cover illustration and dream record.

25. Open Space #8. 1964. Paste-up.

26. Open Space #9. 1964. Drawing.

27. Open Space #10. 1964. Cover illustration and paste-up.

28. Open Space #12. 1964. Drawing.

29. Floating Bear #31. 1965. Cover illustration.

30. Insect Trust Gazette #2. 1965. Paste-up.

31. Some / Thing #8. 1966. Paste-up.

32. The Tenth Muse #14. 1967. Cover illustration.

33. The Tenth Muse #15. 1967. Cover illustration.

34. The Tenth Muse #21. 1968. Cover illustration.

35. The Tenth Muse #26. 1969. Cover paste-up.

Poet as Crystal Radio Set

December 11, 2014 jason

Although known primarily among a coterie of poets in the San Francisco Bay Area at the time of his death in 1965, Jack Spicer has slowly become a towering figure in American poetry. He was born in Los Angeles in 1925 to midwestern parents and raised in a Calvinist jack-spicer home. While attending college at the University of California-Berkeley, Spicer met fellow poets Robin Blaser and Robert Duncan. The friendship among these three poets would develop into what they referred to as “The Berkeley Renaissance,” which would in turn become the San Francisco Renaissance after Spicer, Blaser and Duncan moved to San Francisco in the 1950s.

In 1954, he co-founded the Six Gallery in San Francisco, which soon became famous as the scene of the October 1955 Six Gallery reading that launched the West Coast Beat movement. In 1955, Spicer moved to New York and then to Boston, where he worked for a time in the Rare Book Room of Boston Public Library. Blaser was also in Boston at this time, and the pair made contact with a number of local poets, including John Wieners, Stephen Jonas, and Joe Dunn.

Spicer returned to San Francisco in 1956 and started working on After Lorca. This book represented a major change in direction for two reasons. Firstly, he came to the conclusion that stand-alone poems (which Spicer referred to as his one-night stands) were unsatisfactory and that henceforth he would compose serial poems. In fact, he wrote to Blaser that ‘all my stuff from the past (except the Elegies and Troilus) looks foul to me.’ Secondly, in writing After Lorca, he began to practice what he called “poetry as dictation”.

In 1957, Spicer ran a workshop called Poetry as Magic at San Francisco State College, which was attended by Duncan, Helen Adam, James Broughton, Joe Dunn, Jack Gilbert, and George Stanley. He also participated in, and sometimes hosted, Blabbermouth Night at a literary bar called The Place. This was a kind of contest of improvised poetry and encouraged Spicer’s view of poetry as being dictated to the poet. (more…)

Jack Spicer

youngspicer

Although known primarily among a coterie of poets in the San Francisco Bay Area at the time of his death in 1965, Jack Spicer has slowly become a towering figure in American poetry. He was born in Los Angeles in 1925 to midwestern parents and raised in a Calvinist home. While attending college at the University of California-Berkeley, Spicer met fellow poets Robin Blaser and Robert Duncan. The friendship among these three poets would develop into what they referred to as “The Berkeley Renaissance,” which would in turn become the San Francisco Renaissance after Spicer, Blaser and Duncan moved to San Francisco in the 1950s.

Jack Spicer Checklist:

Section A: Books, Chapbooks, and Pamphlets
Section B: Broadsides, Posters, and Postcards
Section C: Contributions to Books and Other Publications
Section D: Contributions to Periodicals
Section E: Miscellaneous Prose

At Berkeley, Spicer studied linguistics, finishing all but his dissertation for a PhD in Anglo-Saxon and Old Norse. In 1950 he lost his teaching assistantship after refusing to sign a “loyalty oath” to the United States, which the University of California required of all its employees under the Sloan-Levering Act. Spicer taught briefly at the University of Minnesota and worked for a short period of time in the rare books room at the Boston Public Library, but he lived the majority of his life in San Francisco working as a researcher in linguistics.

Spicer helped to form the 6 Gallery with five painter friends in 1954. It was at the 6 Gallery during Spicer’s sojourn east that Allen Ginsberg first read Howl. As a native Californian, Spicer tended to view the Beats as usurpers and criticized the poetry and self-promotion of poets like Ginsberg and Lawrence Ferlinghetti, as well as the Beat ethos in general. Always weary of labels and definitions, Spicer tended to associate with small, intimate groups of poets who lived in the North Beach neighborhood of San Francisco. Spicer acted as a mentor and teacher to these young poets by running poetry workshops and providing (sometimes caustic) advice for young poets.

In a 1975 New York Times article, Richard Ellman concluded: “Jack Spicer’s poems are always poised just on the face side of language, dipping all the way over toward that sudden flip, as if an effort were being made through feeling strongly in simple words to sneak up on the event of a man ruminating about something, or celebrating something, without rhetorical formulae, in his own beautiful inept awkwardness. It’s that poised ineptitude and awkwardness of the anti-academic teacher, the scholar of linguistics who can’t say what he knows in formal language, and has chosen to be very naive and look and hear and do. Spicer was not a very happy poet. He was obsessed with possibilities he could only occasionally realize, and too aware of contemporary life to settle for anything less in his work than what he probably could not achieve. He must have been a great spirit.”

Further Reading:

Herndon, James. EVERYTHING AS EXPECTED
San Francisco, Winter 1973

Foster, Edward Halsey. JACK SPICER
Boise: Boise State University, 1991

Killian, Kevin and Lewis Ellingham. POET BE LIKE GOD: JACK SPICER AND THE BERKELEY RENAISSANCE
Hanover: Wesleyan University Press, 1998

Gizzi, Peter. THE HOUSE THAT JACK BUILT THE COLLECTED LECTURES OF JACK SPICER
Hanover: University Press of New England, 1998

Gizzi, Peter and Kevin Killian. MY VOCABULARY DID THIS TO ME: THE COLLECTED POETRY OF JACK SPICER
Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 2008

Online Resources:

Academy of American Poets
The Bancroft Library – Jack Spicer Papers 1939-1982
Book Forum
Emory University – Jack Spicer Papers
Jacket Magazine – excerpt from Vancouver Lecture 3
Penn Sound – audio recordings
Poetry Foundation
University of Buffalo

References Consulted:

Clay, Steven and Rodney Phillips. A SECRET LOCATION ON THE LOWER EAST SIDE: ADVENTURES IN WRITING, 1960-1980
New York: New York Public Library / Granary Books, 1998

Dorbin, Sanford. A CHECKLIST OF THE PUBLISHED WRITING OF JACK SPICER*
Sacramento: California Librarian, October 1970
[* the first (and only?) checklist of Jack Spicer’s writing]

Johnston, Alastair. A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE AUERHAHN PRESS & ITS SUCCESSOR DAVE HASELWOOD BOOKS
Berkeley: Poltroon Press, 1976

Johnston, Alastair. A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE WHITE RABBIT PRESS
Berkeley: Poltroon Press, 1985

Lepper, Gary M. A BIBLIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION TO SEVENTY-FIVE MODERN AMERICAN AUTHORS
Berkeley: Serendipity Books, 1976

Four Seasons Foundation

Donald Merriam Allen (Iowa, 1912 – San Francisco, August 29, 2004) was an influential editor, publisher, and translator of contemporary American literature. He is perhaps best known for his project The New American Poetry 1945-1960 (Grove Press, 1960), a seminal anthology that introduced a revolutionary new generation of postwar poetry that was to change the course of American literature.

In 1960, Allen moved from New York to San Francisco, where he established Grey Fox and the Four Seasons Foundation, two significant literary presses where he continued to publish work from Beat, San Francisco Renaissance, Black Mountain, and New York School writers, as well as younger new voices. Among the authors he published were Richard Brautigan, Robert Creeley, Edward Dorn, Robert Duncan, Jack Kerouac, Joanne Kyger, Philip Lamantia, Frank O’Hara, Charles Olson, John Rechy, Aaron Shurin, Gary Snyder, Jack Spicer, Lew Welch, and Philip Whalen.

Four Seasons Foundation, A Preliminary Checklist

1. Welch, Lew. STEP OUT ONTO THE PLANET
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation 1963
First edition, broadside, 9.5″ x 12.5″, 300 signed copies, offset printed. Printed for the occasion of a reading at Longshoreman’s Hall, San Francisco, June 12, 1964.

2. Whalen, Philip. THREE MORNINGS
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation 1963
First edition, broadside, 9.5″ x 12.5″, 300 signed copies, offset printed. Printed for the occasion of a reading at Longshoreman’s Hall, San Francisco, June 12, 1964.

3. Snyder, Gary. NANAO KNOWS
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation 1964
First edition, broadside, 9.5″ x 12.5″, 300 signed copies, offset printed. Printed for the occasion of a reading at Longshoreman’s Hall, San Francisco, June 12, 1964.

4. Olson, Charles. A BIBLIOGRAPHY ON AMERICA FOR ED DORN
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation (1964)
First edition, saddle-stapled printed wrappers, 6″ x 8″, 16 pages. Published as Writing 1

5. Dorn, Edward; Rumaker, Michael; Tallman, Warren. PROSE 1
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1964
First edition, saddle-stapled printed wrappers, 36 pages. Published as Writing 2

6. 12 POETS & 1 PAINTER
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1964
First edition, saddle-stapled printed and illustrated wrappers, 32 pages. Contributors include: LeRoi Jones, Joanne Kyger, Robert Creeley, Denise Levertov, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Robert Duncan, Gary Snyder, Lew Welch, Allen Ginsberg, Charles Olson, Max Finstein, Bruce Boyd. Illustrated by Jess Collins. Published as Writing 3

7. Loewinsohn, Ron. AGAINST THE SILENCES TO COME
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1965
— a. First edition, stapled wrappers, 7.75″ x 9.75″, 16 pages, 1000 copies.
— b. First edition, stapled wrappers, 7.75″ x 9.75″, 16 pages, 26 lettered and signed copies.
Published as Writing 4

8. Kyger, Joanne. THE TAPESTRY AND THE WEB
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1965
— a. First edition, paperback, 61 pages
— b. First edition, hardcover, 61 pages
Published as Writing 5

9. Olson, Charles. PROPRIOCEPTION
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1965
First edition, saddle-stapled wrappers, 18 pages. Published as Writing 6

10. Snyder, Gary. RIPRAP & COLD MOUNTAIN POEMS
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1965
First edition, stapled wrappers, 7.75″ x 9.75″, 50 pages. Published as Writing 7

11. Welch, Lew. HERMIT POEMS
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1965
— a. First edition, saddle-stapled wrappers, 16 pages, 974 copies.
— b. First edition, saddle-stapled wrappers, 16 pages, 26 numbered and signed copies.
Published as Writing 8

Snyder, Gary. SIX SECTIONS FROM MOUNTAINS AND RIVERS WITHOUT END
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1965
stapled wrappers, 42 pages, 1000 copies. Published as Writing 9

Koller, James. THE DOGS & OTHER DARK WOODS
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1966
— a. stapled wrappers, 33 pages, 1000 copies
— b. hardcover, 33 pages, 26 copies, numbered signed
Published as Writing 10

McClure, Michael. LOVE LION BOOK
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1966
— a. stapled wrappers, 24 pages, 1000 copies
— b. hardcover, 24 pages, 40 copies, numbered, signed
Published as Writing 11

Olson, Charles. STOCKING CAP: A STORY
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1966
stapled wrappers, 15 pages
Published as Writing 13

Olson, Charles. IN COLD HELL, IN THICKET
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1967
[Published as Writing 12 ?]

Brautigan, Richard. TROUT FISHING IN AMERICA
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1967
paperback
Published as Writing 14

Hadley, Drummond. THE WEBBING
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1967
stapled wrappers, 52 pages, 500 copies
Published as Writing 15

McClure, Michael. THE SERMONS OF JEAN HARLOW & THE CURSES OF BILLY THE KID
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation with Dave Haselwood Books, 1968
— a. First edition, saddle-stapled printed wrappers, 1200 copies, letterpress printed. Printed by Dave Haselwood.
— b. First edition, hardcover, 50 numbered and signed copies, letterpress printed. Printed by Dave Haselwood.
[Published as Writing 12 ?]

Olson, Charles. CAUSAL MYTHOLOGY
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1969
— a. paperback, 40 pages
— b. hardcover, 40 pages
Published as Writing 16

Blaser, Robin. CUPS
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1968
— a. First edition, saddle-stapled printed wrappers, 24 pages, 1000 copies, letterpress printed. Printed by Graham Mackintosh.
— b. First edition, hardcover, 24 pages, 40 numbered and signed copies, letterpress printed. Printed by Graham Mackintosh.
Published as Writing 17

McClure, Michael. GHOST TANTRAS
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1969
paperback. [Published as Writing 18 ?]

Upton, Charles. TIME RAID
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1969
stapled wrappers, 30 pages
Published as Writing 19

Brautigan, Richard. THE PILL VERSUS THE SPRINGHILL MINE DISASTER
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1968
— a. First edition, perfect-bound photo-illustrated wrappers, 108 pages.
— b. First edition, hardcover, 108 pages, 50 numbered and signed copies.
Published as Writing 20

Brautigan, Richard. IN WATERMELON SUGAR
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1968
— a. First edition, perfect-bound photo-illustrated wrappers, 5.25″ x 8″, 138 pages.
— b. First edition, hardcover, 138 pages, 50 numbered and signed copies.
Published as Writing 21

Creeley, Robert. A Quick Graph: Collected Notes & Essays
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1969
— a. First edition, perfect-bound photo-illustrated wrappers, 365 pages, 1000 copies
— b. hardcover, 365 pages
— c. hardcover in dust jacket, 365 pages
Published as Writing 22.

Creeley, Robert. THE CHARM: EARLY AND UNCOLLECTED POEMS
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1969
— a. First edition, perfect-bound photo-illustrated wrappers, 97 pages
— b. First edition, hardcover, 97 pages
— c. First edition, hardcover, 97 pages, 100 numbered and signed copies,
Published as Writing 23

Whalen, Philip. SEVERANCE PAY
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1970
— a. paperback, 51 pages
— b. paperback, 51 pages, 50 copies, numbered, signed
Published as Writing 24

Lamantia , Philip. THE BLOOD OF THE AIR
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1970
— a. paperback, 45 pages
— b. hardcover, 45 pages, 50 copies, numbered, signed
Published as Writing 25

Millward, Pamela. MOTHER: A NOVEL OF REVOLUTION
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1970
paperback, 57 pages
Published as Writing 26

Olson, Charles. POETRY AND TRUTH: THE BELOIT LECTURES
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1971
— a. paperback, 75 pages
— b. hardcover, 75 pages
Published as Writing 27

Schaff, David. THE MOON BY DAY
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1971
paperback, 114 pages
Published as Writing 28

Herd, Dale. EARLY MORNING WIND AND OTHER STORIES
Bolinas: Four Seasons Foundation, 1972
paperback
Published as Writing 29

Snyder, Gary. MANZANITA
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1972
paperback

Creeley, Robert. CONTEXTS OF POETRY: INTERVIEWS 1961-1971
Bolinas: Four Seasons Foundation, 1973
First edition, perfect-bound photo-illustrated wrappers, 214 pages.
Published as Writing 30

Conze, Edward. THE PERFECTION OF WISDOM IN EIGHT THOUSAND LINES AND ITS VERSE SUMMARY
Bolinas: Four Seasons Foundation 1973
Published as Wheel Series, 1

Olson, Charles. ADDITIONAL PROSE: A BIBLIOGRAPHY ON AMERICA, PROPRIOCEPTION, & OTHER NOTES & ESSAYS
Bolinas: Four Seasons Foundation, 1974
— a. paperback, 109 pages
— b. hardcover, 109 pages
Published as Writing 31

Lamantia, Philip. TOUCH OF THE MARVELOUS
Bolinas: Four Seasons Foundation, 1974
— a. paperback, 47 pages
— b. hardcover, 47 pages
Published as Writing 32

Whalen, Philip. THE KINDNESS OF STRANGERS: POEMS 1969-1974
Bolinas: Four Seasons Foundation, 1976
paperback, 57 pages
Published as Writing 33

Dorn, Edward. THE COLLECTED POEMS 1956-1974
Bolinas: Four Seasons Foundation, 1975
— a. paperback, 277 pages
— b. hardcover, 277 pages
Published as Writing 34

Olson, Charles. MUTHOLOGOS; COLLECTED LETTERS & INTERVIEWS
Bolinas: Four Seasons Foundation, 1979
— a. paperback, 230 pages, 2 volumes
— b. hardcover, 230 pages, 2 volumes
Published as Writing 35

Olson, Charles. THE FIERY HUNT AND OTHER PLAYS
Bolinas: Four Seasons Foundation, 1977
paperback, 125 pages
Published as Writing 36

Whalen, Philip. OFF THE WALL: INTERVIEWS WITH PHILIP WHALEN
Bolinas: Four Seasons Foundation, 1978
paperback, 88 pages
Published as Writing 37

Dorn, Edward. INTERVIEWS
Bolinas: Four Seasons Foundation, 1980
paperback, 117 pages
Published as Writing 38

Creeley, Robert. WAS THAT A REAL POEM & OTHER ESSAYS
Bolinas: Four Seasons Foundation 1979
— a. paperback, 149 pages
— b. hardcover, 149 pages
Published as Writing 39

Dorn, Edward. VIEWS
Bolinas: Four Seasons Foundation, 1980
— a. paperback, 142 pages
— b. hardcover, 142 pages
Published as Writing 40

Gluck, Robert. ELEMENTS OF A COFFEE SERVICE
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1982
paperback, 97 pages
Published as Writing 41

Whalen, Philip. HEAVY BREATHING: POEMS 1967-1980
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1983
paperback, 207 pages
Published as Writing 42

Shurin, Aaron. THE GRACES
San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1983
paperback, 72 pages
Published as Writing 42

References consulted:

Bohn, Dave. OYEZ: THE AUTHORIZED CHECKLIST
Berkeley: n.p., 1997

Hawley, Bob. CHECKLISTS OF SEPARATE PUBLICATIONS OF POETS AT THE FIRST BERKELEY POETRY CONFERENCE 1965
Berkeley: Oyez/Cody’s, 1965

Johnston, Alastair. A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE AUERHAHN PRESS & ITS SUCCESSOR DAVE HASELWOOD BOOKS
Berkeley: Poltroon Press, 1976

Lepper, Gary M. A BIBLIOGRAPHICAL INTRODUCTION TO SEVENTY-FIVE MODERN AMERICAN AUTHORS
Berkeley: Serendipity Books, 1976

verdant press