Monday, July 11, 2011

Atlas Poetica announces '25 Tanka Prose'


Atlas Poetica : A Journal of Poetry of Place in Contemporary Tanka is pleased to announce ’25 Tanka Prose’ edited and with an introduction by Bob Lucky. The sixth installment in the Special Features hosted at Atlas Poetica, the website for Atlas Poetica : A Journal of Poetry of Place in Contemporary Tanka. ’25 Tanka Prose’ is a substantial collection of prosimetrum, the art of combining poetry and prose. Editor Bob Lucky is a well-known and highly regarded tanka poet who brings his unique view to the form.

Tanka prose originated more than a thousand years ago in Japan as poets combined tanka with prose in the form of tales, diaries, essays, and more. Tanka, with its emphasis on ‘dreaming room’ invites the reader to expand the poem with their own associations, so it is not surprising that poets themselves welcome tanka prose as a way to expand their own associations and share them with the reader.

The selections in ’25 Tanka Prose’ present an international spectrum of experiences from Tibet to the United States to New Zealand to India and many other places, thus melding Atlas Poetica’s emphasis on poetry of place with the diversity of tanka prose. New voices appear alongside well-known names—a hallmark of Atlas Poetica’s approach—and present a wide variety of formats and subject matters. Terry Ingram tells us about being a child shill for the dubious doings of a Baptish minister while Amelia Fielden remembers life in Morocco during an attempted coup. History looms large: World War II, Machiavelli’s Florence, and the monastery of El Escorial where Phillip II of Spain directed the Counter-Reformation. Many of the pieces feature journeys: to hike a glacier, to visit a village in Thailand, to pilgrimage the Dalai Lama’s Tibet, but most of all, into the depths of the human experience.

Atlas Poetica is an international tanka journal that publishes all forms of tanka literature: tanka, kyoka, and gogyoshi, along with prose, sequences and sets, shaped poetry, and non-fiction. The Atlas Poetica Special Features section highlights different aspects of the literature. 2010 focussed on tanka traditions from around the world, while 2011 will focus on different aspects of the literature. Upcoming Special Features will present 'From Lime Trees to Eucalypts : A Botany of Tanka,' edited by Angela Leuck and ’25 Tanka Poets from Great Britain and the United Kingdom,’ edited by Jon Baldwin.

Designed by Alex von Vaupel, Technical Director for Atlas Poetica, the website hosts information about the journal, submission guidelines, ordering information and sample issues. Previous Special Features are archived free online.

Contact:
M. Kei, publisher and editor
Keibooks
P O Box 516,
Perryville, MD, 21903, USA.
Email: Keibooks (at) gmail.com
http://AtlasPoetica.org

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