“In centuries gone, they had called him a myth, a creature formed of stone and clay and the blood of a people’s oppression – a moving monolith who rose before the voice of tyranny – shattered it in his monumental fists – then vanished into the sands of time – there to be almost forgotten – until today! Now, once more, he rises – summoned from his eons-long sleep to protect those he loves. Now for the first time in untold decades – there walks the Golem!”

More.

(photo courtesy No Age and Stereogum)

From Arthur editor/publisher Jay Babcock:

Last week I got a call from Randy Randall, guitarist for Los Angeles rock duo No Age, who are currently on the Sub Pop record label. Randy was flustered, talking a mile-a-minute, about what had just gone down. The band had just finished performing a song for some sort of Craig Ferguson/CBS TV thing that was to be broadcast October 27–just over a week before the presidential election. Cameras were about to roll when suddenly they were told by an on-set CBS underling that something needed to go: Randy’s pro-Obama t-shirt.

continues…

Shivastan Press Woodstock Mountain Poetry Festival
“In the Spirit of Allen Ginsberg”
At the Woodstock Mothership – 6 Hillcrest Ave, Woodstock NY
info 845 679 8777

Saturday Oct 11 ~ 7 to 9pm:
Political Poetry of Change with
Janine Pommy Vega :: Andy Clausen
Peter Lamborn Wilson :: Eliot Katz
Vivian Demuth :: Diana Ayton-Shenker

9:30 to 11pm: Alternative Sexuality Poetry with
R. Dionysus Whiteurs
Followed by Open Mic

Sunday Oct 12 ~ 6 to 8pm:
Home Planet News Benefit with
Donald Lev + Special Guests & Open Mic

8 to 10pm: Buddhist Poetry Love-In
& Wildflowers Anthology Release Party with
George Quasha :: Shiv Mirabito
Ziska :: Loren Standlee + Special Guests
Shivastan Press Woodstock Mountain Poetry Festival

Event & Poet Info:
Political Poetry for Change, Sat Oct 11, 8pm: this event emphasizes (as Ginsberg proved) that poetry can change the world by raising awareness of political issues such as inequality, environmental issues, the current elections, etc, etc.

Janine Pommy Vega: Poet who teaches in local schools and in prisons and with migrant farmers in Upstate NY. Author of Tracking The Serpent & The Green Piano.
Andy Clausen: Ginsberg said “I would take my chance on a President Clausen…”
Author of 40th Century Man.

Peter Lamborn Wilson: Poet Provacatuer & an editor at Autonomedia, which publishes the magazine Semiotext(e). He is also a writer, teacher and New York radio personality, as well as a longtime student of the history of politics & religion. Author of Sacred Drift: Essays on the Margins of Islam.

Eliot Katz: A major inheritor of Ginsberg’s political activism & author of When the Skyline Crumbles: Poems for the Bush Years (Cosmological Knot Press, 2007). He & Andy Clausen were coeditors of Poems for the Nation (Seven Stories Press, 2000), a collection of contemporary political poems compiled by Ginsberg. Katz is also cofounder and former coeditor of Long Shot literary magazine.

Vivian Demuth: Fire lookout poet who hosts an annual Poetry on the Peaks event in the Canadian Rockies. Author of the poetry collection, “Breathing Nose Mountain,” & the environmental novel, “Eyes of the Forest.”

Diana Ayton-Shenker: Poet who is author of numerous articles on human rights, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), sustainable development and culture. Her most recent book, A Global Agenda, analyzes contemporary issues facing the UN. Her book of poems is entitled Tumbalalaika.

Alternative Sexuality Poetry Reading, Sat Oct 11, 9:30pm: The rights & freedoms of those who are not in the mainstream will be discussed, debated & celebrated through the poetry of the sexual revolution exemplified by Ginsberg.

R. Dionysus Whiteurs: A New Paltz legend – “One of the most humorous & rhythmic poets around”
+ Open Mic.

Home Planet News Benefit, Sun Oct 12, 6pm:
For decades this important literary journal/magazine/newspaper/review has published the best poets in the Woodstock & NY area.

Donald Lev: Has published HPN with his late wife, poet Enid Dame (who was an expert in “Midrash” poetry) and continues to publish and read his poems around the Northeast.
+ Open Mic.

Buddhist Poetry Love-In & Wildflowers Anthology Release Party, Sun Oct 12, 8pm: this 9th annual edition of Woodstock’s only poetry magazine has a Buddhist theme featuring poems by some of America’s most accomplished poets such as Diane DiPrima, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, H.H. Karmapa and several local poets.

Printed on handmade paper in Nepal by Shivastan Press (Woodstock~Kathmandu) – which has published almost 50 different poetry chapbooks, anthologies & broadsides over the past 10 years.

George Quasha: His 15 books include poetry: Somapoetics, Giving the Lily Back Her Hands, Ainu Dreams [with Chie Hasegawa], Preverbs [forthcoming]; anthologies (America a Prophecy [with Jerome Rothenberg], Open Poetry [with Ronald Gross], An Active Anthology [with Susan Quasha], The Station Hill Blanchot Reader [with Charles Stein]); and writing on art (Gary Hill: Language Willing; with Charles Stein: Tall Ships, HanD HearD/liminal objects, Viewer). Awards include a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in poetry. He has taught at Stony Brook University (SUNY), Bard College, New School University (Graduate Anthropology Department), and Naropa University. With Susan Quasha he is founder/publisher of Barrytown/Station Hill Press.

Shiv Mirabito: Poet, Publisher & Editor of Shivastan Press (Woodstock & Kathmandu) & author of Transcendental Tyger.

Loren Standlee & Ziska: Poets who have hosted great lamas such as H. H. 16TH Karmapa, Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche, Kalu Rinpoche & Kunsang Dechen Lingpa at their Woodstock home.

“Please join us at Desert Island this Wednesday, October 8th from 7:00–9:00 PM for “Happy Accident,” a book signing, slide show and party with Dash Shaw, Ken Dahl, Jesse Reklaw, and Trevor Alixopulos. Don’t miss this chance to purchase a limited-edition Monster Face screenprint—a collaborative artwork by all four artists. The artists will be here to sign the prints and their recent graphic novels, and several will present slide-shows of their work.”

Happy Accident: Dash Shaw, Ken Dahl, Jesse Reklaw, and Trevor Alixopulos

Wednesday, October 8th, 7:00 – 9:00 PM

Desert Island
540 Metropolitan Ave, between Union and Lorimer
Brooklyn NY 11211
(718) 388-5087
http://www.desertislandbrooklyn.com

Dash Shaw, whose comics are known for their emphasis on emotional, lyrical logic and innovative design, was named one of the top ten artists to check out at the 2002 “Small Press Expo” when he was just 19 years old. He is the author of Love Eats Brains (Odd God Press; 2004), Goddess Head (Teenage Dinosaur Press; 2002-04), The Mother’s Mouth (Alternative Comics; 2006), and most recently The Bottomless Belly Button (Fantagraphics; 2008). His comic short stories have appeared in multiple anthologies, newspapers and magazines. In
addition, Shaw is a member of the weirdo pop band Love Eats Brains! and has co-written and acted in various short film projects.
www.dashshaw.com

Ken Dahl is the name Gabby Schulz uses to make it harder for his relatives to connect him to the comics he draws. Born in Honolulu, Ken has spent most of his adult life in a dreary transit about the continental United States. In May of 2007 he completed a one-year Fellowship at the Center for Cartoon Studies, and is now living in a truck in Vermont, figuring out how to continue to draw comics while avoiding inconveniences like paying rent or working a job. Ken is the author of Monsters (Secret Acres), which won the 2006 Ignatz Award for Best Minicomic.

Cartoonist Jesse Reklaw turns the dreams submitted by strangers into insightful, humorous, and clever four-panel comic strips in Slow Wave, which appears in alternative newsweeklies all over the country, and was nominated for a 2008 Ignatz award. The Night of Your Life, the
recently released collection of over five years of Slow Wave, is a testament to the ability of comics to illuminate the corridors of the imagination with wit, sincerity, and delight. www.slowwave.com

After completing the two lengthy, ambitious comics Dread and Mine Tonight earlier this year, Trevor Alixopulos released The Hot Breath of War (Sparkplug Comic Books), which filters the cartoonist’s romantic, restless nature and growing political consciousness through a style reminiscent of the magazine cartoon essay of decades past. www.alixopulos.com

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