The story? Two people each having an affair with their house guest. “What to Do,” a seven-page story by Brainard and James Schuyler from a play by Georges Feydeau, is essentially clip art with lots of text streaming in balloons down the pages. This rare and long out-of-print publication assumes readers will have a command of the comics vernacular. 1 (Lorenz Gude, 1964) is filled with collaborations between Joe Brainard and New York School poets. Is it possible to turn visual language into what we’ve just defined as poetry? Several publications indexed below (some discovered in the graphic novels collection of the Columbia University library), do just that.Ĭ Comics No. According to Rothman, comics is a medium that treats images like language. What is comics? is also a complicated question. Rothman insists it is the taking and tweaking of a language that is at the heart of poetry, where language is the very medium itself. What binds these forms together is their common origin in the oral tradition, involving rhythms, rhymes, and even mnemonic devices. Presenter Alexander Rothman chooses the words “comics poetry,” and defines, in his presentation “The Comics Poetry Toolbox,” what it is, and how cartoonists have used it.įirst, what is poetry? Many things are categorized as poetry, but they are so diverse that they seem unrelated: sonnets, concrete poetry, Haiku, slam performances, and so on. Rand’s presentation will appear in this column next week.Ĭomics poetry! At first a strange-sounding phrase, but an increasing number of literary people have come to compare, if not equate, comics with poetry. Alexander Rothman presented “The Comics Poetry Toolbox.” Artist and cartoonist Archie Rand presented his Psalm 68 project and other poetry-image works. The 115th meeting of the NY Comics & Picture-Story Symposium was held on Tuesday, February 17th, 2015. Presentations vary weekly and include everything from historical topics and technical demonstrations to creators presenting their work. Open to the public, it meets Tuesday nights 7-9 p.m. The New York Comics & Picture-Story Symposium is a weekly forum for discussing the tradition and future of text/image work. By The New York Comics & Picture-Story Symposium

How To Be Everywhere by Warren Craghead