4/5 Stars
Review of All The Babble of the Souk
By Robin Ouzman Hislop
I had the great pleasure of reviewing “All the Babble of the Souk” by a very experienced and talented poet, Robin Ouzman Hislop.
The book is split into the two parts, The first part is “All the Babble and the Souk 1” and is very short in comparison to the second part, “All the Babble and the Souk 2”.
Reader beware, this poet is on a different level. Do not read this if you don’t want to engage your essence in a series of fantastic life/mind changing events. Many of the poems herein push the boundaries between science and philosophy and develop a sense of doubt within the reader. These poems carry you on a cosmological, philosophical journey that is sure to leave you speechless and thinking on deeper frequencies.
Part 1
These are just a few of my favorites from part one.
From the very start with the poem “Africa North,” Hislop captures the reader in a vivid description of a thriving cityscape filled with many sensuous sensations. The poem “Passage” is a psychological view into the mind of the modern human. The poem, “Non Linear” focuses on the inception of homo Sapiens and how the system we created dwarfs us into a microcosm of everything around us.
Part 2
The second part is filled to the brim with intellectually stimulating pieces that deserve at least a second read through. The poem “Accident” grasped me and made me think of past events that I thought were lost forever.
The poem, “Slant” is written in sections such as, “on the Bus” and details philosophical messages the author has gained through these experiences. I very much enjoyed this poem as it is raw, delves deep into the mind of the poet and presents the inner workings of the brain.
The poem, “Edge” touches on what I believe is our greatest political and existential battle; human extinction.
Conclusion
This book changed my perspective on the human experience. Highly recommended to anyone who is into philosophy and isn’t afraid to take a step in a different direction.
Adam Levon Brown is a poet and author residing in Eugene, Oregon. He has one published poetry book out, Musings of a Madman, which is a collection of poems made to enlighten and inspire the reader. Adam attributes his love of poetry to the many great poets he discovered in the school library during his formative years. He enjoys listening to political hip hop music and is a political activist himself.
My Author Page: www.ctupublishinggroup.com/adam-levon-brown-.html
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“Visionaries Behind the Stars,” Janet Kuypers’ Chicago 9/12/14 Poetry “Love Letter” Periodic Table of Poetry feature
In one of Janet Kuypers’ installments of Periodic Table of Poetry poem readings (in her effort to write a poem for every element in the Periodic Table, to later become a book), Janet Kuypers was the feature at “Poetry ‘Love Letter’” in Chicago on September 12th 2014 (9/12/14) with “Visionaries Behind the Stars”.
[tubepress mode=’playlist’ playlistValue=’PLYa-AZK78_hqyn9pAZTagRkC64roHVGwK’ ]
Download this poem in the free PDF file
Visionaries Behind the Stars chapbook,
w/ Periodic Table of Poetry poems.
Writings included in this show:
Seaborgium
Meitnerium
Berkelium
Hassium
Dubnium
The Movie Guys Judy Chaikin Girls in the Band
The Movie Guys interview Judy Chaikin whose recent movie The Girls in the Band is now available on video. Lady musicians is a cause Artvilla took up as part of our series on Lady Jazz Musicians.
The Movie guys is a fun show and, in this segment, Judy Chaikins talks about her start in film. We catch a glimpse of another industry where women have a hard time breaking into, movies. Oh, like music they are there as a singer or actress, but encounter barriers when it comes to the jobs behind the scenes, like director or producer. In many ways Judy is a pioneer in film just like the women musicians she presents in The Girls in the Band.
As a lad on the farm, I learned that, if I wanted that basketball goal, I had to drag that tree down the hill by myself. Judy learned that, as a woman in Hollywood, she had to buy the camera herself and go out and do it anyway. Golly bravo way to go!
After going to listen to the Lady Jazzers on our page at Artvilla, I have come to know a difference in the music that shows exactly what is broken about our media. Whether it’s music or film or TV, our art is missing its other half. By repressing the female expression we are missing the difference and “vive la différence”. The music of the men is competitive, fast and distinctly male. The music of the women is softer, not competitive and soothing.
The film and TV of the male is brash, exciting, and loud. We are missing the composed, the well written, the intelligent, the quiet which can be exciting. Our media has hit a wall by being one sided. It’s time to allow for more pioneers like Judy Chaikin to bring us out of our malaise.
Watch the Movie Guys on their YouTube Channel. Their show is downright good banter about movies and worth the subscription. They do need to work on their own filming a bit. I would suggest not hiding your guest behind a microphone.
……..David Michael Jackson
Poetry Robin Ouzman Hislop’s books on Goodreads
All the Babble of the Souk by Robin Ouzman Hislop
Robin Ouzman Hislop, born UK, graduate in philosophy & religions, has travelled extensively throughout his lifetime but now lives in semi- retirement as a TEFL teacher and translator.
Robin was editor of the 12 year running on-line monthly poetry journal Poetry Life and Times. In 2013 he joined with Dave Jackson as co-editor at Artvilla.com, where he presently edits Poetry Life & Times.
He’s been previously published in a variety of international magazines, recent publications including Voices without Borders Volume 1 (USA), Cold Mountain Review (Appalachian University, N. Carolina), The Poetic Bond Volumes (thepoeticbond.com) and Phoenix Rising from the Ashes (a recently published international Anthology of Sonnets).
All the Babble of the Souk ©2015
Robin is a philosopher, poet, published author and more. It has been my privilege to reap the benefits of this man’s knowledge on an array of subjects. A man ahead of his time. A true visionary. ~Janet Caldwell, COO at Inner Child Ltd, author of the Author Den’s award winning “5 degrees to separation”
Robin is a brilliant writer and philosopher as well as a recognized poet. He is an editor and contributor for Poetry Life and Times and other publications. ~David Michael Jackson, Web Publisher at Artvilla.com
Robin is a highly innovative and gifted poet, who excels in writing sonnets, blank verse and haiku, and in translating poetry from Spanish into English. His work is first-rate. ~Richard Vallance, Linguist Linear B, Knossos & Mycenaean
…on All the Babble of the Souk
Gary Beck – All the Babble of the Souk is an elegant journey through both foreign and familiar climes. Anything but babble. Time and space bend in mysterious mists and mechanistic voyages. The poems pulsate with languid images that add to the wonder of travel to exotic places.
Scott Hastie – A collection of real substance that is long overdue. Robin writes with impressive depth and across a spread of philosophic stimuli that he makes uniquely his own. You do not have to travel long before you trip over killer lines, again and again… This is fresh, original and mature work, grown from one special creative soul’s well seasoned experience. Robin truly has a voice that is his own and it has been worth the wait to see it flower…
Robin Marchesi – High time this great Poet was properly in print. His Poems resonate like the work of Cavafy and Gibran. They are deep and revealing, resonating in one’s inner self. This book will stimulate your metaphysical being. Robin’s Poetry opens you to questions about who you are…. Essential reading……
R. W. Haynes – Robin Ouzman Hislop’s All the Babble of the Souk grips elemental tangles with wisely wistful authority, making a claim both for the adequacy of animate language and for erudite perception. Counterpointing the abstruse and the inescapably basic, these poems draw upon a power that surprises, engaging the reader in the poet’s heartfelt conversation with a tradition and its diverse voices, including T. S. Eliot and Dylan Thomas. Hislop’s retro-modernist recovery of vision argues for a refreshed perception of poetic possibility and a turn from the infinite regress of the verse which echoes the empty sophistry of twentieth-century language philosophers. Music, with its syncopation, minor chords, pauses, accelerations, jingles, knocks, and elegiac phrases constitutes a crucial part of the essence of this splendid collection.
Ian Irvine (Hobson) – The metaphor of the ‘marketplace’ or ‘bazaar’ – symbolic in this collection of public spaces generally (both physical and cultural/mediatised) – launches this remarkable collection of poems by a poet, editor and creative thinker of international significance. The ‘souk’ is a place of trade, chance meetings, overheard conversations and communal eating. This collection also links it to our post-post modern state of life in the face of cultural globalisation. However, rather than theorise key aspects of our world we are invited to explore them instead as states of being – with joyous and anxious dimensions. As the poet/narrator mingles, observes, samples and digests (in poem after poem) a colourful array of stimuli – sensorial, relational and intellectual – we gradually feel our perception of life and the species crisis/moment deepen and expand. The melancholy grandeur of the human predicament slowly comes into focus – largely through the poet’s gift of empathy. A wonderful selection of poems updating for the new millennia themes mulled over by the likes of Baudelaire (in Paris Spleen), Apollinaire (in Zone), George Oppen (in Of Being Numerous) and many other great 19th and 20th century poets.
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Review Phoenix Rising from the Ashes
An appeal to poetry critics to review The Phoenix Rising from the Ashes: Anthology of Sonnets of the Early Third Millennium
Since its publication in November 2013, The Phoenix Rising from the Ashes: Anthology of Sonnets of the Early Third Millennium, has generally been met with positive reviews from purchasers and poetry reviewers. As editor of the anthology, I for one freely admit that several authors display considerable talent, while some, I believe, are exceptional sonneteers who have penned poems, which may one day be viewed as masterpieces of the genre.
There are also scores of sonnets in languages other than English,French, Spanish, Chinese, German and Farsi, while the English sonnets run from page 15 to 135, comprising 60% of the total in the anthology, sonnets in all other languages span pages 142 to 222, accounting for the remaining 40%.
A number of reviewers have already accorded decent marks to the anthology and I sincerely believe that most new critics and informed readers will be able to dispassionately review the anthology. On the other hand, it is equally incumbent to flag at least a few of the sonnets which display considerable talent and especially those which you, as a reviewer, consider to be jewels, pièces de résistence.
I am not saying that those of you poetry critics who read English only should feel discouraged from reviewing the anthology. Far from it, it is generally taken for granted that the majority of literary critics of English literature are allophone English, given that English is almost universally considered lingua franca of the world. Of course, I also welcome bilingual or multilingual critics, who are well positioned to critique the remaining 40% of “foreign- language” sonnets.
I entreat those of you who are poetry critics to give your dispassionate opinion of the anthology, what we are looking for is an objective appraisal, insofar as it is humanly possible. It does not matter whether you find the anthology below average, average or superior.
Regardless of your overall appraisal of the merits and demerits of this anthology, I shall send you all your own copy of the PDF version. Finally, it would be beneficial to the editors and sonneteers alike if you would rate it on a scale from 1 to 5. Also, the Editor who is at present publishing this appeal, every reviewer should bear this in mind, has promised to publish any of the reviews providing they are fair minded & objective in at at least two of the three sites herein listed: Motherbird.com, Artvilla.com or Poetry Life & Times.
I am grateful for the endorsement of this appeal by Robin Ouzman Hislop of Poetry, Life and Times. Richard Vallance
The Phoenix Rising from the Ashes http://vallance22.hpage.com is also available in hard cover, soft cover and PDF formats from Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble and Chapters.ca, among other online outlets.
The home page of the author, Richard Vallance, now a well-established professional historical linguist of ancient Mycenaean Greek, is Linear B, Knossos & Mycenae https://linearbknossosmycenae.wordpress.com, which has become the premier site for research into Linear B on the Internet since its inception in 2013. An internationally acknowledged historical linguist, in 2015 he was published in an international European conference proceedings and in the prestigious annual, Archaeology and Science (Belgrade), and is set to be published later this year in at least one other major international venue for historical linguistics. He is also an active member of one of the world’s most professional research sites, academia.edu, where you will find his page at https://westernu.academia.edu/RichardVallance/Papers
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