Does Post-Avant work well as a term for innovative writing?

(Poetry is the site password.)

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I also am not comfortable with the term "post-avant" since, beyond attempting to "canonize" a stylistic trajectory of writing into a stable definable unity, it presupposes that the problems that faced "avant" poetry are at an end. Definitional shorthand of this order, by declaring a certain type of poetry as this or that according to lexical freezing, creates a doctrinaire program, a kind of stable tablature by which other poetry must comform as mere semblance. This kills a sense of becoming. Perhaps in a decade or more literary theorists may look back on this micro-episteme and dub it "post-avant", but these divisions are somewhat artificial, and the reality of the matter is that it is far more complex than an encyclopedia-friendly entry in the history of literary production. For example, what is so carelessly dubbed "romanticist" poetry or "beat" poetry assumes that there is a solid temporal period in which these styles began and ended. As we know, several styles overlap, and differing styles or movements work contemporaneously.

--Kane Faucher

I don't think "post-avant" works as a term for innovative writing. I think that's merely become the fashionable term. "Post" seems to imply a "pre" and also some undetermined middle stage. It seems self-limiting and narrow to describing anything in these terms. "Experimental" is wide open, but then on a certain level all creative writing is an experiment. I think describing poetry in terms of "open" and "closed" forms seems to work well. Some experimental writing seems to still contain predominant themes or repetitive devices within its structure (or nonstructure) that allow the work to cohere and gel. I think the enemy is to think of composition in some kind programmatic or dogmatic way. Those who seem overly concerned being experimental or creating experimental poetry are also slaves to dogma somewhat. In terms of method my opinion is that it's best to try to remain open to all influences. I guess I'm a Romantic. Pound said "only emotion remains" I think that can't be more true.

-Larry Sawyer

Post Avant is the name of one of our books of poetry by Daniel Zimmerman released many years ago chosen by myself with an intro by Bob Creeley. Glad to see the term has gained such cultural capital in the interim.

Be well

-David Baratier, Editor, Pavement Saw Press

http://pavementsaw.org

Post-avant is a tag I first heard used by Anne Waldman a few years ago. I think it fits the bill as well as anything else-- it's like saying "New New Poetry", being both "post-something" and involved w "avant" as well. In the UK, it's "innovative", though I believe "post-avant" has gained some ground there, too. Ultimately, I think that these kind of tags are like government-- a necessary evil. They're reductive & don't do justice to real work, but we need shorthand when we want to talk about groups of poets or artists. "Experimental" and "innovative" both sound rather tame, so I suppose "post-avant" is the best "necessarily evil" tag we have right now.

Adam Fieled

Do we have any good alternatives to post-avant? I often use post-language or experimental or innovative, but post-avant seems like a better idea, and louis armand and crew make many good arguments for a similar term in the book of essays _Avant-Post_.

Bill Allegrezza