Dylan Krieger’s collection, no ledge left to love, is the recipient of the Ping-Pong Free Press poetry prize of 2017, chosen by judge and poetry badass, Brian Henry. It is my extreme pleasure to share with you a sneak peek–one of my favorite poems out of this fascinating and essential collection, release date: December 1, 2017. Read More >

We are happy to announce Jameson O’Hara Laurens as the winner of the Ping-Pong Free Press Poetry Prize 2016: Judge, Melissa Broder. Her collection MEDÆUM was published Fall of 2016, here is a poem from this outstanding collection. Congratulations Jameson! Read More >

Jesse Goodman has been producing benefit concerts for the Henry Miller Memorial Library since he brought Patti Smith there in 2004. The past few years he has been bringing poets in as the opening acts of these shows, which as you can imagine, pleases us here in the Republik of poets to no end. This year he is bringing in legendary San Francisco poet, David Meltzer to open for Pink Martini in this year’s benefit on December 8th at the Golden State Theatre in Monterey, California. Get your tickets baby, they’re going fast . . . So, to honor Jesse’s mad genius we are featuring his story as well as poems by David Meltzer and his wife, the poet Julie Rogers. Scroll down for his story, but first: the poets. Enjoy. Read More >

Laurie Anderson’s Yodel

In the early 80’s I heard Laurie Anderson sing “yodel-a-he-hoo, Big Science . . .” and have been possessed by the refrain every since. I had no idea at the time she would become the multimedia goddess she is today. I didn’t know she’d take me with her into the endless universe of her art, with the admonition, “don’t forget your mittens.”

Since that time electronic music has found its way into the mainstream and, as often happens, has often been watered down to a barely palatable mush. Laurie has kept pushing the limits of her art by simultaneously interacting with and reinterpreting popular culture through her shows. Each performance is a singular experience because she is attuned to her audience. She reminds us of the limitless capacity for creation we each have as individuals while awakening our collective mindfulness.

You cannot help but be present at one of Laurie’s shows. I often look out at the sea of faces filled with silent “O’s”: it is not so much awe or worship, it is the recognition of the boundless possibilities inherent in each of us.

Universe: E=mc2

Art: Laurie Anderson = (strangeness + beauty)music

Maria Garcia Teutsch

President, Henry Miller Memorial Library

Editor-in-chief, Ping-Pong Publications

(Original program note for Laurie Anderson’s concert at the Henry Miller Memorial Library July 26, 2005, signed for my son).

“It was sublime to play in the mist under the gigantic trees.
One of the most beautiful and spiritual places in the world.”
– Laurie Anderson about the Henry Miller Memorial Library.

Cheyanne Gustason wrote a wonderful review of Ping-Pong 2014 for this issue of NewPages. This issue of Ping-Pong focused on Free speech as we celebrated the 50th anniversary of the free speech trial of Henry Miller’s book, Tropic of Cancer.

Ping•Pong

2014

Annual

Review by Cheyanne Gustason

If you have ever visited the Henry Miller Library in Big Sur, California, you likely noticed a ping-pong table. This table, nestled amidst towering redwood trees, brings the library’s many visitors together in a single place, with a single purpose: ping-pong. It is appropriate, then, that the Library’s literary journal, Ping•Pong, unites a wide array of voices and works in a single volume, and to common purpose.

The 2014 issue of Ping•Pong centers on topics of freedom and censorship, themes central to the life and legacy of Henry Miller himself. Editor-in-Chief Maria Garcia Teutsch begins her opening letter with the statement, “speech is not free, someone has paid the tab for you.” (iii) While the journal contains a variety of poems, artwork, short stories, and more, there runs throughout its pages an appreciation of those who paid the tab and paved the way.

Some of this appreciation is obvious, like the discussion and inclusion of works by Russian poets including Anna Akhmatova and Vladimir Mayakovsky, who were mercilessly persecuted in early 20^th century Russia. Works by these two, and some of their peers, have been translated into English included in this issue of Ping•Pong. These pieces, surrounded by modern works, raise questions about the nature of censorship and its cost, to both individuals and society. Many of the translated Russian pieces have a surreal slant, which makes it all the more biting when they depict cruelties and violent ironies that are all too real. In an excerpt from “Wild Honey Is a Smell of Freedom,” Akhmatova writes “Wild honey has a scent – of freedom [. . .] But we have learned that// blood smells only of blood.” (100) Written in Leningrad in 1934, one can hear the echoes of revolution, of strong spirits and stronger institutions, and the realities of censorship and the importance of the creative voice are made all the more resoundingly clear.

The issue is not all heavy-handed. Quite the contrary. There are many pieces that are not only thought-provoking, but artfully elicit smiles and laughter, both bitter and mirthful, as well. Yet even these lighter pieces explore themes of censorship and material that might be condemned if not for our forefathers of free speech. Jeanine Deibel’s poem “A-Team: Swinging the Lead” is a delightful trip through the possibilities of alliteration. Some favorite lines: “My power animal is an antelope/ I worship Angus idols/I curse in my alphabet soup.” (36) Even this- to curse in alphabet soup, is that not a subversion of a comfortable classic? Is such subversion necessary, imperative, even just plausible, to bolster artistic freedom? Throughout Ping•Pong, even moments of levity harbor serious and thought-provoking undercurrents.

Resting at the end of the issue is an interview with poet Alice Notley. It is a fitting finale, as Notley discusses many themes pertinent to the other works and the issue in general. She mentions her work with Allen Ginsberg, who was no stranger to issues of censorship and artistic freedom. She discusses her process, sharing her work (or not), and differences between France, the United States, and Germany in both language and acceptance. At one point she claims, “Sometime [sic] I suspect the French of not liking poetry at all.” (196)

Ping•Pong is host to many styles of writing and expression, and a wide array of authors, which makes it a dynamic petri dish of creativity (and a lot of fun to read). Some pieces brought tears to my eyes (I won’t say which, you’ll have to guess). Others had me shaking my head, or my fist, at either the content, or the way it would once have been (or still might be) suppressed. There is humanity, beauty, heartbreak, and elation, as well as (sometimes disturbing) profanity, sexuality, and violence; and all have a voice in the poems and fiction seen here. The art included in this issue is also intriguing and thought provoking, fitting nicely with the themes and emotions displayed in the written pieces. In fact, I would look forward to seeing a bit more visual art included in Ping•Pong’s next issue.

Appropriately, this year marks the fiftieth anniversary of the Supreme Court decision that made Henry Miller’s classic Tropic of Cancer legal to read and sell in the United States. While Miller’s persecution may not have equaled that of writers like Ahkmatova and Mayakovsky, it is also not so long ago that Miller’s work was verboten in our “land of the free.” Ping•Pong, much like the library that publishes it, perpetuates the legacy of Henry Miller’s work, which includes the freedom of all writers and artists to be seen and heard. This edition of the journal explores and expands on these themes, making it not only an enjoyable read, but an important one as well.

Originally published on NewPages here.

Henry Miller Memorial Library blog here.

Author Bio:

Cheyanne Gustason is a writer and artist living in Los Angeles, California. She has written for Backstage Magazine and is currently working on her first children’s book. She has Bachelor of Arts degrees in Film & Media Studies and History, and recently earned a Juris Doctor.

Henry Miller Memorial Library announces “Speech is Not Free! 50th Anniversary: Tropic of Cancer Obscenity Trial”

Friday, November 7th at Coagula Curatorial Gallery in Los Angeles
Henry Miller is responsible for — to quote scholar James Decker — “the free speech that we now take for granted in literature.” It began fifty years ago when Miller’s novel “Tropic of Cancer” was deemed not obscene by the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Henry Miller Memorial Library in Big Sur and its literary magazine, Ping-Pong, will be throwing a party at the Coagula Curatorial Gallery in Los Angeles to honor this landmark event while ruefully acknowledging that free speech is once again under siege.

“Speech is Not Free! 50th Anniversary of the Tropic of Cancer Obscenity Trial” will celebrate this historic win for free speech by bringing together writers, poets, and authors who will read or display a piece of art/prose/poem/song that was banned and that effected them in a transformative way. Participants will also read or sing an original piece.

The event also doubles as an opening party for the latest installment of Ping Pong, the Henry Miller Memorial Library’s literary magazine. The newest edition builds upon this theme of pervasive and seemingly universal censorship by featuring banned Russian writers and poets both past and present. Poets such as Anna Akhmatova, whose work was banned from 1925-1953 as a threat to the social order. Akhmatova was labeled “alien to the Soviet people” for her “eroticism, mysticism, and political impartiality.”

In fact, a recurring theme of this event and of the newest Ping-Pong installment is that for all our advancements, speech is still not free, as contemporary Russian poet Ilya Kaminsky reminds us of this in his poem, “We Lived Happily During the War,” featured in the current issue of Ping-Pong.
Complacency is the enemy and vigilance is key.

Our world is again in a period of censorship. From perhaps the most absurd act being a push to do a kind of color coding of college books in an effort to be ‘sensitive,’ to the more pervasive evil of state censorship. I say, fuck all that.

Toni Morrison says it is the job of the free to free others. We can do this by supporting other artists and those others working for change. We need to do this now more than ever, we need to do it today.

Featured Artists:
Tim Youd
Sesshu Foster
Claire Cottrell
Mark Lamoureux
Melissa Broder
Maria Garcia Teutsch
Magnus Torén

Bios (in order of appearance)

Performance Artist Tim Youd has undertakien the task of retyping one hundred classic novels, staging his durational perfomrances at locations relevant to the author’s life and/or the plot of the novel.

Maria Garcia Teutsch is a poet, film producer, editor and world wanderer. She is editor-in-chief of Ping-Pong journal of art and literature published by the Henry Miller Library in Big Sur, California, where she also serves as president of the board.   www.marialoveswords.com

Mark Lamoureux lives in New Haven, CT. He is the author of thee full-length collections of poetry: Spectre (Black Radish Books 2010), Astrometry Orgonon (BlazeVOX Books 2008), and 29 Cheeseburgers / 39 Years (Pressed Wafer, 2013). His work has been published in print and online in Fence, miPoesias, Jubilat, Denver Quarterly, Conduit, Jacket, Fourteen Hills and many others.

Claire Cottrell works as a film director / creative director/ editor/ and photographer. She is the founder of Book Stand. She is the Los Angeles editor of Berlin-based Freunde von Freunden. She has contributed to The Atlantic, the Paris Review, VICE and Wilder Quarterly on the subjects of art, fashion, design and plant life. Her work has been featured in Vogue, T: The New York Times Style Magazine and purple FASHION, to name a few.

Sesshu Foster has taught composition and literature in East L.A. for 20 years. He’s also taught writing at the University of Iowa, the California Institute for the Arts, the University of California, Santa Cruz and Naropa University’s Summer Writing Program. His work has been published in The Oxford Anthology of Modern American Poetry, Language for a New Century: Poetry from the Middle East, Asia and Beyond, and State of the Union: 50 Political Poems. His most recent books are the novel Atomik Aztex and World Ball Notebook. Atomik Aztex won a 2006 Believer Magazine Annual Book Prize and World Ball Notebook won the 2009 Asian American Writers Workshop Poetry Prize.

Melissa Broder is the author of three poetry collections, Scarecrone, Meat Heart, and When you Say One Thing but Mean Your Mother. By day, she is Director of Media and Special Projects at NewHive. Broder received her BA from Tufts University and her MFA from City College of New York.

Well, almost. The Henry Miller Memorial Library’s journal of literature and art will host an evening of poetry, music and wine at the world renown bookstore, Shakespeare and Company in Henry’s old stomping grounds, Paris, France.

Featured Readers:

J Hope Stein is the author of the chapbooks: Talking Doll (Dancing Girl Press), Mary (Hyacinth Girl Press) and Corner Office (H_ngm_n). Her poems are published or forthcoming in Verse, HTML Giant, Tarpaulin Sky, Everyday Genius, Ping Pong, Talisman, and Poetry International. She is also the editor ofpoetrycrush.com and the author of the poetry/humor site eecattings.com.

 
Jean-Noël Chazelle is a Paris-based painter who will read French poetry from Ping-Pong, as well as some of his own work.

 
Maria Garcia Teutsch will be reading from the new bilingual (French and English) edition of Pussy/Chatte, as well as from her new manuscript: Whore-son, poems written in response to the underlined sections of Jean Genet’s The Balcony. She has or will be published in: Otoliths, The South Carolina Review, Prairie Schooner, The Lullwater Review, The Cold Mountain Review, The Haight-Ashbury Literary Journal, The Sierra Nevada Review, Women’s Arts Quarterly, and Whole Beast Rag.

Shelley Marlow wrote the lyrics to UnKnot Turandot, performed at La Mama Theater NYC. Marlow presented International Witch Stories at the 48th Venice Biennial. Her writing and visual art is published in the St. Petersburg Review; LTTR (Lesbians to the Rescue); Drunken Boat; as a cover of The Literary Review; saint-lucy.com; zingmagazine; Girlfriends Magazine; Sandbox Magazine; Log Illustrated; New Observations; and in various art catalogues.  Marlow collaborates with performance artists, exhibits paintings and drawings, and writes fiction. Marlow resides in Brooklyn.