Michael Heller (poet)
Encyclopedia
Michael Heller is an American poet, essayist and critic. Among his many books are Exigent Futures, In The Builded Place, Wordflow and Living Root: A Memoir. He wrote the libretto for the opera, Benjamin, based on the life of Walter Benjamin
. He is recipient of awards including the NEH Poet/Scholar grant, New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship (NYFA), National Endowment for the Humanities
award, and The Fund for Poetry.
, poetry, and poetics. The impetus for his continued interest in this particular group of poets began with Heller's discovery of the poetry of George Oppen
(and with whom he began a correspondence in the 1960s). Today he is acknowledged by some readers and critics as a Jewish Objectivist poet in the tradition of Oppen, Charles Reznikoff
, Carl Rakosi
, and Louis Zukofsky
. His critical book on the Objectivist poets, Conviction’s Net of Branches, received the Di Castagnola Prize from the Poetry Society of America.
movements, Jewish and post-Holocaust poetry, poetics, and the literary environment of contemporary poetry. His is a style and gesture seen as joining personal tone with historic incident while reflecting on such themes as the nature of language, poetry, religion, and even memory itself. Heller's interests often point to a succession of American poetry that today is, for the most part, inflected by the American experimentalism of Walt Whitman
and the "make it new" of innovators such as Pound and Williams along with infusions of European dada
, surrealism
, structuralist
and post-structuralist thought.
"Aspects of Poetics," an important statement by Heller on his aesthetics, appeared in Samizdat
in 2001.
A recent book of essays, Uncertain Poetries (2005), deals with the uncertain nature of twentieth-century poetry. In his preface to the volume, Heller refers to these pieces as "selected from nearly twenty-five years of work (and) ought to be read as something of an intellectual biography of a working poet". They address Heller's on-going dialogue and confrontation with such major figures as Williams
, Pound
, Stevens
, Marianne Moore
, George Oppen
, Robert Duncan
, Lorine Niedecker
, Lorca
, Rilke, and Mallarmé
, along with poets in more contemporary modernist and postmodernist lineages.
Heller himself notes that:
If the concepts of uncertainty, disease, and anomie embody the condition of modernity itself ---as critics have also noted--- they also animate Heller's work. Concurrently, various commentators now recognize Heller's contribution to our understanding of how, although the poet embodies the exigencies of modernity, so to the poetic act can become an active shaping force which, through the charged field of poetic language, provides the hope of meaning for both history and experience.
Walter Benjamin
Walter Bendix Schönflies Benjamin was a German-Jewish intellectual, who functioned variously as a literary critic, philosopher, sociologist, translator, radio broadcaster and essayist...
. He is recipient of awards including the NEH Poet/Scholar grant, New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship (NYFA), National Endowment for the Humanities
National Endowment for the Humanities
The National Endowment for the Humanities is an independent federal agency of the United States established by the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965 dedicated to supporting research, education, preservation, and public programs in the humanities. The NEH is located at...
award, and The Fund for Poetry.
Overview
Heller is recognized as a leading expert on Objectivist poetsObjectivist poets
The Objectivist poets were a loose-knit group of second-generation Modernists who emerged in the 1930s. They were mainly American and were influenced by, amongst others, Ezra Pound and William Carlos Williams...
, poetry, and poetics. The impetus for his continued interest in this particular group of poets began with Heller's discovery of the poetry of George Oppen
George Oppen
George Oppen was an American poet, best known as one of the members of the Objectivist group of poets. He abandoned poetry in the 1930s for political activism, and later moved to Mexico to avoid the attentions of the House Un-American Activities Committee...
(and with whom he began a correspondence in the 1960s). Today he is acknowledged by some readers and critics as a Jewish Objectivist poet in the tradition of Oppen, Charles Reznikoff
Charles Reznikoff
Charles Reznikoff was the poet for whom the term Objectivist was first coined. When asked by Harriet Munroe to provide an introduction to what became known as the Objectivist issue of Poetry, Louis Zukofsky provided his essay Sincerity and Objectification: With Special Reference to the Work of...
, Carl Rakosi
Carl Rakosi
Carl Rakosi was the last surviving member of the original group of poets who were given the rubric Objectivist. He was still publishing and performing his poetry well into his 90s.-Early life:...
, and Louis Zukofsky
Louis Zukofsky
Louis Zukofsky was an American poet. He was one of the founders and the primary theorist of the Objectivist group of poets and thus an important influence on subsequent generations of poets in America and abroad.-Life:...
. His critical book on the Objectivist poets, Conviction’s Net of Branches, received the Di Castagnola Prize from the Poetry Society of America.
Life and work
Throughout his career, Michael Heller has addressed contemporary avant-gardeAvant-garde
Avant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....
movements, Jewish and post-Holocaust poetry, poetics, and the literary environment of contemporary poetry. His is a style and gesture seen as joining personal tone with historic incident while reflecting on such themes as the nature of language, poetry, religion, and even memory itself. Heller's interests often point to a succession of American poetry that today is, for the most part, inflected by the American experimentalism of Walt Whitman
Walt Whitman
Walter "Walt" Whitman was an American poet, essayist and journalist. A humanist, he was a part of the transition between transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works. Whitman is among the most influential poets in the American canon, often called the father of free verse...
and the "make it new" of innovators such as Pound and Williams along with infusions of European dada
Dada
Dada or Dadaism is a cultural movement that began in Zurich, Switzerland, during World War I and peaked from 1916 to 1922. The movement primarily involved visual arts, literature—poetry, art manifestoes, art theory—theatre, and graphic design, and concentrated its anti-war politics through a...
, surrealism
Surrealism
Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early 1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members....
, structuralist
Structuralism
Structuralism originated in the structural linguistics of Ferdinand de Saussure and the subsequent Prague and Moscow schools of linguistics. Just as structural linguistics was facing serious challenges from the likes of Noam Chomsky and thus fading in importance in linguistics, structuralism...
and post-structuralist thought.
"Aspects of Poetics," an important statement by Heller on his aesthetics, appeared in Samizdat
Samizdat (poetry magazine)
Samizdat was an international poetry magazine published in Chicago from 1998 until 2004 and edited by the poet Robert Archambeau. It was noted for its unusual format, being printed on large newsprint pages. Contributors included Adam Zagajewski as well as Clayton Eshleman, Pierre Joris, Jerome...
in 2001.
A recent book of essays, Uncertain Poetries (2005), deals with the uncertain nature of twentieth-century poetry. In his preface to the volume, Heller refers to these pieces as "selected from nearly twenty-five years of work (and) ought to be read as something of an intellectual biography of a working poet". They address Heller's on-going dialogue and confrontation with such major figures as Williams
William Carlos Williams
William Carlos Williams was an American poet closely associated with modernism and Imagism. He was also a pediatrician and general practitioner of medicine, having graduated from the University of Pennsylvania...
, Pound
Ezra Pound
Ezra Weston Loomis Pound was an American expatriate poet and critic and a major figure in the early modernist movement in poetry...
, Stevens
Wallace Stevens
Wallace Stevens was an American Modernist poet. He was born in Reading, Pennsylvania, educated at Harvard and then New York Law School, and spent most of his life working as a lawyer for the Hartford insurance company in Connecticut.His best-known poems include "Anecdote of the Jar",...
, Marianne Moore
Marianne Moore
Marianne Moore was an American Modernist poet and writer noted for her irony and wit.- Life :Moore was born in Kirkwood, Missouri, in the manse of the Presbyterian church where her maternal grandfather, John Riddle Warner, served as pastor. She was the daughter of mechanical engineer and inventor...
, George Oppen
George Oppen
George Oppen was an American poet, best known as one of the members of the Objectivist group of poets. He abandoned poetry in the 1930s for political activism, and later moved to Mexico to avoid the attentions of the House Un-American Activities Committee...
, Robert Duncan
Robert Duncan (poet)
Robert Duncan was an American poet and a student of H.D. and the Western esoteric tradition who spent most of his career in and around San Francisco. Though associated with any number of literary traditions and schools, Duncan is often identified with the poets of the New American Poetry and Black...
, Lorine Niedecker
Lorine Niedecker
Lorine Faith Niedecker was a Wisconsin poet and the only woman associated with the Objectivist poets...
, Lorca
Lorca
Lorca is a municipality and town in the autonomous community of Murcia in southeastern Spain, 36 miles southwest of the city of Murcia. It had a population of 92,694 in 2010, up from the 2001 census total of 77,477. Lorca is the municipality with the second-largest surface area in Spain with...
, Rilke, and Mallarmé
Stéphane Mallarmé
Stéphane Mallarmé , whose real name was Étienne Mallarmé, was a French poet and critic. He was a major French symbolist poet, and his work anticipated and inspired several revolutionary artistic schools of the early 20th century, such as Dadaism, Surrealism, and Futurism.-Biography:Stéphane...
, along with poets in more contemporary modernist and postmodernist lineages.
Heller himself notes that:
If the concepts of uncertainty, disease, and anomie embody the condition of modernity itself ---as critics have also noted--- they also animate Heller's work. Concurrently, various commentators now recognize Heller's contribution to our understanding of how, although the poet embodies the exigencies of modernity, so to the poetic act can become an active shaping force which, through the charged field of poetic language, provides the hope of meaning for both history and experience.
Selected publications
- Accidental Center (Sumac Press, 1972); poetry
- Knowledge (1980); poetry
- Conviction's Net of Branches: Essays on the Objectivist Poets and Poetry (Southern Illinois University Press, 1985); criticism
- In the Builded Place (Coffee House Press, 1989); poetry
- Carl Rakosi: Man and Poet (Orono, ME: National Poetry Foundation, 1993); Heller is editor of this volume on the renowned Objectivist poet
- Wordflow: New and Selected Poems (Talisman House, 1997); poetry
- Living Root: A Memoir (SUNY Press, 2000); memoir of his youth in Brooklyn and Miami Beach, FL, that mixes in history regarding his family's hometown of Bialystock, Poland, and World War II
- Exigent Futures: New and Selected Poems (Salt PublishingSalt PublishingSalt Publishing is an independent publisher whose origins date back to 1990 when poet John Kinsella launched Salt Magazine in Western Australia. The journal rapidly developed an international reputation as a leading publisher of new poetry and poetics...
, 2003); poetry: gathers together poems from four of his major collections - Uncertain Poetries : Selected Essays on Poets, Poetry and Poetics (Salt Publishing, 2005); essays
- Speaking the Estranged: Essays on the Work of George Oppen, (Cambridge UK: Salt PublishingSalt PublishingSalt Publishing is an independent publisher whose origins date back to 1990 when poet John Kinsella launched Salt Magazine in Western Australia. The journal rapidly developed an international reputation as a leading publisher of new poetry and poetics...
, 2008); essay/memoir - Eschaton, (Jersey City, NJ: Talisman House, 2009)
External links
- Heller Survey @ Light & Dust Anthology of Poetry read selections from entire range of Heller's work available on-line
- Interview with Heller in September 1998
- Patrick Pritchett reviews Exigent Futures @ Jacket Magazine website
- Jon Curley reviews Uncertain Poetries @ Jacket Magazine website
- UtopocalypticMoments: Objectivist Poetics, a talk by Michael Heller a talk by Heller at Small Press Traffic on March 20, 1998
- Accidental Center (e-book) long out of print, this book is reproduced here complete
- Will to Exchange: Heller Interviewed by Thomas Fink in January 2006