So, earlier this week, I posted this blog post about the collaboration I’m doing with artist Zoe Fothergill. This is the first of the windows onto our discussion on structure and content. With the following words, Zoe launched us off into collaboration again:
‘so i contacted jennie and she i quote
would LOVE
for us to do a KL
she suggests a wee visit
to reccie the venue
as they have new hoos
but just around the corner
what say you, fancy a gander?
let me know when might suit
we chatted about a blog or sommat
to gather our thoughts
but i remember you wanted to use yours
so i haven’t set up another
not exactly sure re mechanics
so have attached a word doc
with some intial thoughts
and a pdf that relates
so just show me the way
and i’ll happily work
with what works for you’
—
Zoe started us off with some ideas on structure, going back to the Romans:
and ‘…starting with the simple palindrome.’
The Sator Square
79 AD –“The farmer Arepo has works wheels”
Another Latin palindrome,
“In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni” (We go wandering at night and are consumed by fire)
English
Never odd or even
tattarrattat, coined by James Joyce in Ulysses (1922) for a knock on the door
Music
[this was one of my favourite discoveries from Zoe’s list!]
Weird Al Jankovic – Bob
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nej4xJe4Tdg
Books
In English, two palindromic novels have been published:
Satire: Veritas by David Stephens (1980, 58,795 letters),
and
Dr Awkward & Olson in Oslo by Lawrence Levine (1986, 31,954 words).
In French, Oulipo writer George Perec’s “Grand Palindrome” (1969) is 5,556 letters in length
In Hebrew, Noam Dovev wrote a 363-word, 1331-letter palindromic story called, “Do god”
Iain again!:
There’s more to come on different types of constraint writing, but I’ll break it down into another post later in the week.
