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Loading... The Lost Lunar Baedeker: Poems of Mina Loy (1996)by Mina Loy
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Mina Loy's technique and subjects - prostitution, menstruation, destitution, and suicide - shock even some modernists and she vanished from the poetry scene as dramatically as she had appeared on it. Roger Conover has resuced the key texts from the pages of forgotten publications, and has included all of the futurist and feminist satires, poems from Loy's Paris and New York periods, and the complete cycle of "Love Songs," as well as previously unknown texts and detailed notes. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)811.52Literature English (North America) American poetry 20th Century 1900-1945LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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I want someone with the tendency to obsess over Modernism and Futuruism and other Patriarchal Eurocentric Difficult Things (I know you're out there) to pore over this with a fine-tooth comb. I know I missed the most of it, what with not being fluent in French/German/Italian/smattering of Spanish and all the requisite references, but what I did manage to get is simply extraordinary. There's also the Latin business, but let's work our way up, shall we?
Most of what I got went along the lines of sex and censor and the matter of thought not fitting into body into box. History talks about First Wave Feminism and its complacency with legality, a nice and neatness that would work if Loy hadn't been rocking around Second Wave (right to fuck) and Third Wave (right to not be white/rich/straight/cis) with her poems on childbirth and
and likely the only reason she and they survived is due to her not making a ruckus in the society spreadsheet of the time and drawing as much attention as the rest, aka
but of course must one keep in mind that she spent a good portion of that talked-about time unmarried and taking care of her child. Which meant money, which meant reputation, which meant her not only seeing everything in terms of sex but writing about it in as esoterically linguistic a manner as possible just wouldn't do while she was a woman if she wanted to eat.
As you can see, it didn't stop her from publishing every so often, drawing enough attention and the rare combo of literary editor and rabid fan to bring her work into the new millenium. I question the "new", really, for her life will still attract the "whore" and "slut" and every other word the gynephobic use when especially afraid of women embracing their sex drive. You are not free to malign such a phenomenal spirit in such a way, but if you wish to say as such while fucking a pinecone, be my guest.
She hung out with Stein and Barnes and this Nancy Cunard person whom I'd kick myself for not hearing about sooner except for, well, she's exactly the type to be buried in the chronicles posthaste.
Seriously, Modernist Extraordinare. She wrote a poem about [Ulysses]. Go forth. ( )