National Poetry Month

[Poster by Chin-Yee Lai.]

Hey, everybody, it’s April, National Poetry Month. The Academy of American Poets’ FAQ explains that April was chosen because it “seemed the best time within the year to turn attention toward the art of poetry.” I wish there were more to it than that, but the choice of April appears to be unrelated to Geoffrey Chaucer (“Whan that Aprill with his shoures soote”) or T.S. Eliot (“the cruellest month”). To choose April without even acknowledging these poets’ contrary representations of the month (which after all might remind us of the great variety of perspectives on reality that poems afford) seems an odd gesture indeed.

I also wish that the representation of Poetry on this poster were less — what? precious? sentimental? greeting-card-like? If you cannot make the words out, they read: “. . . wait on the wind, catch a sense of salt, call it our life.” Okay, I will do that. You can find the words in context here, forming the last line of Philip Levine’s poem “Our Valley.”

This post is for my friend Sara, who too will be exasperated.

[“The best time within the year”: within as opposed to what? Why not “the best time of year”? I saw a signboard outside a thrift store yesterday proclaiming March National Poetry Month, but that must have been an April Fools’ joke.]

Henry, getting things done

[Henry, March 26 and 28, 2012.]

Henry gets things done, and he lets the world know it by means of that ineffable gesture. Swipe swipe, done. Swipe swipe, done.

And he keeps moving forward (as must we all): another panel, or another day.

Swipe swipe, done.

Duke Ellington and erasers

I’m happy to report that Duke Ellington’s name no longer appears on the Blackwing Experience page. Thanks to Gunther and Sean for passing on the news.

Related posts
Duke Ellington, Blackwing pencils, and aspirational branding
Duke Ellington, Blackwing balalaika user
Duke Ellington, Blackwing sombrero user
Duke Ellington Blackwing Johnson’s Baby Powder user

Earl Scruggs (1924–2012)

“Earl was to the five-string banjo what Babe Ruth was to baseball”: Porter Wagoner, quoted in the New York Times obituary for Earl Scruggs, who died yesterday at the age of eighty-eight.

Adrienne Rich (1929–2012)

The New York Times reports that the poet Adrienne Rich died yesterday at the age of eighty-two. From the poem “Seven Skins”:

What a girl I was then what a body
ready for breaking open like a lobster
what a little provincial village
what a hermit crab seeking nobler shells
what a beach of rattling stones what an offshore
    raincloud
what a gone-and-come tidepool

what a look into eternity I took and did not return it

From Midnight Salvage: Poems 1995–1998 (1999).

Regency-era slang

Having just typed eh wot? in a comment, I felt compelled to look and learn a little more, and found Simone Smith’s short guide to Regency-era slang.

Jeffrey Toobin on the ACA

Jeffrey Toobin’s March 26 New Yorker comment offers a clear exposition of the arguments concerning the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act.

Duke Ellington, Blackwing Johnson’s Baby Powder user

[Duke Ellington, Paramount Theater, New York, 1946. Photograph by William P. Gottlieb. Published in Down Beat, September 23, 1946. From the Library of Congress’s American Memory. Click for a larger view.]

Not a Blackwing pencil in sight, but this dressing-room scene is rich in detail. Notice the Johnson’s Baby Powder: another item that no doubt helped Ellington to create “timeless works of art.”

The context for this post, as explained in an earlier post: a pencil company’s choice to market its merchandise by using the Ellington name. The Blackwing is a celebrated pencil that California Cedar has recreated in replica form. The company’s choice to associate Ellington with its merchandise rests on a single photograph of Ellington with a Blackwing (the real thing, not the replica) that I posted on Orange Crate Art late last year.

We now have one photograph of Duke Ellington with Johnson’s Baby Powder, one photograph of Ellington wearing a sombrero, one photograph of Ellington playing a balalaika, and one photograph of Ellington writing with a Blackwing pencil. These single photographs do not support the conclusion that Ellington had any particular attachment to Johnson’s Baby Powder, sombreros, balalaikas, or Blackwings. In the absence of evidence of such attachment, capitalizing (pun intended) on the Ellington name seems to me a cynical way to sell pencils (or the other stuff).

California Cedar has removed Frank Lloyd Wright’s name from its marketing materials. It should remove Duke Ellington’s name as well.

March 29: I’m happy to report that Duke Ellington’s name no longer appears on the Blackwing Experience page. Thanks to Gunther and Sean for passing on the news.

Related posts
Duke Ellington, Blackwing pencils, and aspirational branding
All Blackwing posts (via Pinboard)
All Duke Ellington posts (via Pinboard)

[Some Ellington preferences: Beaujolais, Coca-Cola with extra sugar, coffee with lemon, hot water, Pall Mall cigarettes. These preferences are well documented.]

Duke Ellington, Blackwing sombrero user

[Photograph by Stanley Dance, 1968.]

The Ellington orchestra toured Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina, Chile, and Mexico in 1968. The album Latin American Suite followed in 1972. It stands to reason [crosses fingers] that a sombrero must have inspired the music therein. My claim rests on this one photograph, which appears in Derek Jewell’s Duke: A Portrait of Duke Ellington (New York: W.W. Norton, 1977).

Thus far: one photograph of Duke Ellington wearing a sombrero, one photograph of Ellington playing a balalaika, and one photograph of Ellington writing with a Blackwing pencil. “The state of facts and evidence” does not support the conclusion that Ellington had any particular attachment to sombreros, balalaikas, or Blackwing pencils. A pencil manufacturer’s association of the Ellington name with its replica version of the Blackwing pencil is a matter of very wishful thinking. Some might call such marketing cynical and misleading.

Why do I care? The balalaika post explains.

March 29: I’m happy to report that Duke Ellington’s name no longer appears on the Blackwing Experience page. Thanks to Gunther and Sean for passing on the news.

Related posts
All Blackwing posts (via Pinboard)
All Duke Ellington posts (via Pinboard)

[“Facts are stubborn things, and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictums of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence”: John Adams, Blackwing quill user.]

Duke Ellington, Blackwing balalaika user

[“Jam Session in the U.S.S.R., 1971.” From Duke Ellington’s Music Is My Mistress (1973). Photographer unidentified.]

Look: it’s Duke Ellington, and he’s playing a balalaika. Can we leap to the conclusion that this instrument helped him create “timeless works of art”? Sure we can. Can you prove that it didn’t happen?

If you’re tuning in late, the context for this post is a pencil company’s choice to market its merchandise by using the Ellington name. The Blackwing is a celebrated pencil that California Cedar has recreated in replica form. The company’s choice to associate Ellington with its merchandise rests on exactly one photograph of Ellington with a Blackwing (the real thing, not the replica) that I posted late last year.

Why I care: I’ve been listening to Duke Ellington for about thirty-six years, and I don’t like seeing his name used in a tacky commercial ploy. And I think that facts ought to remain stubborn things. John Adams, as quoted in David McCullough’s 2001 biography: “Facts are stubborn things, and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictums of our passions, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.” The state of facts and evidence — a single photograph — does not support the conclusion that Duke Ellington had any particular attachment to the Blackwing pencil.

And if you’ve decided that you should really listen to some Ellington music, this post suggests the best place to start.

March 29: I’m happy to report that Duke Ellington’s name no longer appears on the Blackwing Experience page. Thanks to Gunther and Sean for passing on the news.

Related posts
Duke Ellington, Blackwing sombrero user
Duke Ellington, Blackwing Johnson’s Baby Powder user
All Blackwing posts (via Pinboard)
All Duke Ellington posts (via Pinboard)