Many Subtle Channels: In Praise of Potential Literature

Daniel Levin Becker

Published by Harvard University Press 2012

Many Subtle Channels

In Praise of Potential Literature

Daniel Levin Becker

https://doi.org/10.4159/harvard.9780674065277

Overview
Contents

About this book

What sort of society could bind together Jacques Roubaud, Italo Calvino, Marcel Duchamp, and Raymond Queneau—and Daniel Levin Becker, a young American obsessed with language play? Only the Oulipo, the Paris-based experimental collective founded in 1960 and fated to become one of literature’s quirkiest movements.

An international organization of writers, artists, and scientists who embrace formal and procedural constraints to achieve literature’s possibilities, the Oulipo (the French acronym stands for “workshop for potential literature”) is perhaps best known as the cradle of Georges Perec’s novel A Void, which does not contain the letter e. Drawn to the Oulipo’s mystique, Levin Becker secured a Fulbright grant to study the organization and traveled to Paris. He was eventually offered membership, becoming only the second American to be admitted to the group. From the perspective of a young initiate, the Oulipians and their projects are at once bizarre and utterly compelling. Levin Becker’s love for games, puzzles, and language play is infectious, calling to mind Elif Batuman’s delight in Russian literature in The Possessed.

In recent years, the Oulipo has inspired the creation of numerous other collectives: the OuMuPo (a collective of DJs), the OuMaPo (marionette players), the OuBaPo (comic strip artists), the OuFlarfPo (poets who generate poetry with the aid of search engines), and a menagerie of other Ou-X-Pos (workshops for potential something). Levin Becker discusses these and other intriguing developments in this history and personal appreciation of an iconic—and iconoclastic—group.

Author / Editor information

Levin Becker Daniel :

Daniel Levin Becker is Reviews Editor for the Believer and has been a member of the Oulipo since 2009.

Topics

Frontmatter Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	i
Contents Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	vi
A NOTE ON FORMATTING Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	ix
I. Present
A Library Burning Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	3
Reading Out Loud Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	35
Little Demons of Subtlety Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	67
Get It in Writing Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	87
II. Past
Let There Be Limit Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	115
The Rat in Laboratory Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	159
Publish and Perish Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	209
III. Future
Packrats Who Build the Library Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	235
Safety in Letters Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	251
Potential Weaving Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	291
Questions and Answers Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	305
Acknowledgments. Index
Acknowledgments Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	321
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	323

Language: English
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Audience: General/trade;
Pages
- Main content: 352

eBook

Published: May 8, 2012
ISBN: 9780674065277