Critics Page
Guest Critic
From the Threshing Floor
By Norma ColeThreshold: the magnitude or intensity that must be exceeded for a certain reaction, phenomenon, result or condition to occur or be manifested.
Goodbye Pork Pie Hat
By David MarriottDavid Marriott teaches in the Philosophy Department, Penn State University, is the author of several books of poetry and criticism. His most recent books are Duppies (Commune Editions: 2019), and Whither Fanon? Studies in the Blackness of Being (Stanford, 2018). Bluetown is forthcoming from Omnidawn.
Thresh:
By Cole SwensenCole Swensen is a poet and a translator. Her most recent book is On Walking On (2017).
Notes on The New Threshing Floor
By Cedar SigoCedar Sigo, the Bagley-Wright lecturer for 2019, has just completed work with Joy Harjo and several other poets on a new Norton Anthology of Native Nations Poetry and his recent 2019 poetry has appeared in Harper’s, Freak Fam, and Splinter. He currently lives in Lofall, Washington.
The Trajectory of a Bullet Never Shot
By Susan BrianteSusan Briante, a poet, essayist and translator, is the author of books of poetry: Pioneers in the Study of Motion, Utopia Minus, and The Market Wonders. Defacing the Monument, a series of essays on immigration, archives, aesthetics and the state, will be published by Noemi Press in 2020.
from Another Sky
By Dale Martin SmithDale Martin Smith lives in Toronto, Ontario, and teaches at Ryerson University. With Robert J. Bertholf, he edited An Open Map: The Correspondence of Robert Duncan and Charles Olson (2017), available in a new paperback edition from the University of New Mexico Press.
Mirage As Errata
By Will AlexanderWill Alexander, poet, novelist, essayist, aphorist, playwright, visual artist, and pianist, has written nearly 40 books in the above-mentioned genres, with forthcoming amounts along the way. He is currently Poet-in-Residence at Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center in Venice, California.
Resolved
By Laura MoriartyLaura Moriarty is the author of Personal Volcano from Nightboat Books (2019). She lives in Richmond, CA.
A chessboard drawn by the child Kuba
By Erín MoureErín Moure’s most recent poetry is The Elements (Toronto: House of Anansi) and most recent translation is Uxío Novoneyra’s The Uplands: Book of the Courel and other poems (El Paso: Veliz Books) from Galician. She folds paper in Montreal.
[Exemplary Title in the Theme of “From the Threshing Floor ”] [?]
By Carlos LaraCarlos Lara is the author of The Green Record (Apostrophe, 2018) and Like Bismuth When I Enter (Nightboat, 2020). He lives with his wife and son in the greatest goddamn city on the planet, Los Angeles.
Three Threshing Floors
By Susan GevirtzSusan Gevirtz is an author. Her books of poetry include Hotel abc (Nightboat, 2016) and Aerodrome Orion & Starry Messenger (Kelsey Street, 2010). Her critical books are Narrative’s Journey: The Fiction and Film Writing of Dorothy Richardson (Peter Lang, 1996) and Coming Events (Nightboat, 2013). She is based in San Francisco.
Shake
By Aaron ShurinAaron Shurin is Professor Emeritus in the University of San Francisco’s MFA Writing Program, and the author of 14 books of poetry and prose.
from A Thousand Times You Lose Your Treasure
By Hoa NguyenHoa Nguyen’s books include Red Juice: Poems 1998–2008 (Wave Books, 2014), Violet Energy Ingots (Wave Books, 2016) and A Thousand Times You Lose Your Treasure (April 2021, Wave Books). Hoa teaches poetics for Miami University’s low residency MFA program, the Milton Avery School for Fine Arts at Bard College, and in a popular, long-running poetics workshop she leads from cyberspace and Toronto.
Video Tryouts for an American Grammar Book
By Farid MatukFarid Matuk is the author of The Real Horse. Redolent, a book-arts collaboration between Matuk and Colombian artist Nancy Friedemann-Sánchez, is forthcoming from Singing Saw Press.
The Prayers of the Saints
By Steven SeidenbergSteven Seidenberg’s most recent works are plain sight (Roof, 2020) and Situ (Black Sun Lit, 2018). His collections of photographs include Pipevalve: Berlin (Lodima, 2017) and Imaging Failure: Abandoned Lives of the Italian South (due from Contrasto in 2020). He lives in San Francisco.
