Robert Grenier (born August 4, 1941, in

Minneapolis, Minnesota Minneapolis () is the largest city in Minnesota, United States, and the county seat of Hennepin County. The city is abundant in water, with thirteen lakes, wetlands, the Mississippi River, creeks and waterfalls. Minneapolis has its origi ...

) is a contemporary

American poet The poets listed below were either born in the United States or else published much of their poetry while living in that country. A B C D E F G H I–J K L M N O P Q * George Quasha (born 1942) R S T U–V ...

associated with the

Language School A language school is a school where one studies a foreign language. Classes at a language school are usually geared towards, for example, communicative competence in a foreign language. Language learning in such schools typically supplements fo ...

. He was founding co-editor (with Barrett Watten) of the influential magazine ''

This This may refer to: * ''This'', the singular proximal demonstrative pronoun Places * This, or ''Thinis'', an ancient city in Upper Egypt * This, Ardennes, a commune in France People with the surname * Hervé This, French culinary chemist Arts, ...

'' (1971–1974). ''This'' was a watershed moment in the history of recent American poetry, providing one of the first gatherings in print of various writers, artists, and poets now identified (or loosely referred to) as the

Language poets The Language poets (or ''L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E'' poets, after the magazine of that name) are an avant-garde group or tendency in United States poetry that emerged in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The poets included: Bernadette Mayer, Leslie Scal ...

. He is the co-editor of ''The Collected Poems of

Larry Eigner Larry Eigner (August 7, 1927 – February 3, 1996), also known as Laurence Joel Eigner, was an American poet of the second half of the twentieth century and one of the principal figures of the Black Mountain School. Eigner is associated with th ...

, Volumes 1-4'' published by

Stanford University Press Stanford University Press (SUP) is the publishing house of Stanford University. It is one of the oldest academic presses in the United States and the first university press to be established on the West Coast. It was among the presses officially ...

in 2010, and was the editor of

Robert Creeley Robert White Creeley (May 21, 1926 – March 30, 2005) was an American poet and author of more than sixty books. He is usually associated with the Black Mountain poets, though his verse aesthetic diverged from that school. He was close with Char ...

's ''Selected Poems'', published in 1976. Grenier's early work, influenced by Creeley, is noted for its

minimalism In visual arts, music and other media, minimalism is an art movement that began in post–World War II in Western art, most strongly with American visual arts in the 1960s and early 1970s. Prominent artists associated with minimalism include Do ...

. Grenier's recent work, however, is as much visual as verbal, involving multicolor "drawn" poems in special (and not always reproducible) formats.

Life and work

Robert Grenier is a graduate of

Harvard College Harvard College is the undergraduate college of Harvard University, an Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636, Harvard College is the original school of Harvard University, the oldest institution of higher ...

and the

University of Iowa The University of Iowa (UI, U of I, UIowa, or simply Iowa) is a public research university in Iowa City, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1847, it is the oldest and largest university in the state. The University of Iowa is organized into 12 co ...

Program in Creative Writing. He has taught literature and creative writing at

UC Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant uni ...

Tufts Tufts University is a private research university on the border of Medford and Somerville, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1852 as Tufts College by Christian universalists who sought to provide a nonsectarian institution of higher learnin ...

Franconia College Franconia College was a small experimental liberal arts college in Franconia, New Hampshire, United States. It opened in 1963 in Dow Academy and the site of the Forest Hills Hotel on Agassiz Road, and closed in 1978, after years of declining enro ...

New College of California New College of California was a college founded in the San Francisco Bay Area in 1971 by former Gonzaga University President John Leary. It ceased operations in early 2008. New College's main campus was housed in several buildings in the Missio ...

and

Mills College Mills College at Northeastern University is a private college in Oakland, California and part of Northeastern University's global university system. Mills College was founded as the Young Ladies Seminary in 1852 in Benicia, California; it w ...

. His works include ''Sentences'', ''Series'', ''Oakland'', ''A Day At The Beach'', ''Phantom Anthems'' and ''OWL/ON/BOU/GH''. In an essay from the first issue of ''This'', Grenier declared: "I HATE SPEECH".

Ron Silliman Ron Silliman (born August 5, 1946) is an American poet. He has written and edited over 30 books, and has had his poetry and criticism translated into 12 languages. He is often associated with language poetry. Between 1979 and 2004, Silliman wr ...

, commenting on Robert Grenier's

gesture A gesture is a form of non-verbal communication or non-vocal communication in which visible bodily actions communicate particular messages, either in place of, or in conjunction with, speech. Gestures include movement of the hands, face, or ...

some years afterward, wrote: Grenier's recent "books" have been variously described as folios of

haiku is a type of short form poetry originally from Japan. Traditional Japanese haiku consist of three phrases that contain a '' kireji'', or "cutting word", 17 '' on'' (phonetic units similar to syllables) in a 5, 7, 5 pattern, and a '' kigo'', or ...

-like inscriptions or transcriptions. Examples of his current holograph poems can be seen on-line through the Grenier ''Author Page'' at the

Electronic Poetry Center The Electronic Poetry Center (EPC), is an online resource for digital poetry. It was founded on July 10, 1994 by Loss Pequeño Glazier and Charles Bernstein, of the Poetics Program at SUNY-Buffalo, making it one of the oldest resources for poetr ...

(see section below: "External links"). Curtis Faville (who co-edited ''The Collected Poems of Larry Eigner'' with Grenier) states that Grenier "has gone on to produce a new hybrid form--neither "poetry" nor graphic art—which treats words (letters) as a form of literal visual design, in which "legibility" hovers at the edge of apprehension". He received the Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants for Artists award (2013).

Notes

Selected publications

Books of poems

*''Dusk Road Games'' (poems, 1960–66). Cambridge, MA: Pym-Randall Press, 1967. *''Sentences Towards Birds'' (41 poems from ''Sentences''). Kensington, CA: L Press, 1975. *''Series'' (poems, 1967–71). San Francisco: This Press, 1978. *''Sentences'' (500 poems on 5" x 8" index cards, boxed, 1972–77). Cambridge, MA Whale Cloth Press, 1978. *''CAMBRIDGE M'ASS'' (265 poems on 40" x 48" poster). Berkeley, CA: Tuumba Press, 1979. *''Oakland''. Berkeley, CA: Tuumba Press, 1980. *''A Day At The Beach''. New York: Roof Books, 1985. *''Phantom Anthems''. Oakland, CA: O Books, 1986. *''What I Believe''. Elmwood, CT: Potes & Poets Press, 1988. *''What I Believe transpiration/transpiring Minnesota'' (66 8.5" x 11" pages, unbound, boxed). Oakland, CA: O Books, 1991. *''12 from r h y m m s'' (12 4-color 8-1/2" x 11" drawing poems in envelope). Columbus, OH: Pavement Saw Press, 1996. *''OWL/ON/BOU/GH'' (32 4-color 11" x 17" drawing poems in black portfolio). Sausalito, CA: Post-Apollo Press, 1997. *''16 from r h y m m s'' (16 4-color 8-1/2" x 11" drawing poems in envelope). Marfa, TX: Marfa Book Company/Impossible Objects, 2014.

External links

Robert Grenier EPC Author Page
at the Electronic Poetry Center (EPC)
Robert Grenier PennSound page''Text Festival'' Grenier Page
relates Grenier's participation on 29 September 2005, in Great Britain
''Guide to the Robert Grenier Papers, 1941-1999''
located at Department of Special Collections, Green Library, Stanford University Libraries

American poet

discusses both Robert Grenier and American poet

Aram Saroyan Aram Saroyan (born September 25, 1943) is an American poet, novelist, biographer, memoirist and playwright, who is especially known for his minimalist poetry, famous examples of which include the one-word poem "lighght" and a one-letter poem com ...

in the context of their

(On Silliman's Blog, May 21, 2007). Scroll down to the comments section for an interesting history of Grenier's various writing periods and publications provided by American poet

Curtis Faville Curtis or Curtiss is a common English given name and surname of Anglo-Norman origin from the Old French ''curteis'' ( Modern French ''courtois'') which derived from the Spanish Cortés (of which Cortez is a variation) and the Portuguese and G ...

Robert Grenier and Charles Bernstein: A Conversation
appearing in the on-line

zine A zine ( ; short for '' magazine'' or '' fanzine'') is a small-circulation self-published work of original or appropriated texts and images, usually reproduced via a copy machine. Zines are the product of either a single person or of a very s ...

Jacket A jacket is a garment for the upper body, usually extending below the hips. A jacket typically has sleeves, and fastens in the front or slightly on the side. A jacket is generally lighter, tighter-fitting, and less insulating than a coat, which ...

, No. 35 (2008)
Larry Eigner Author Page at Stanford University Press
The publisher of ''The Collected Poems of Larry Eigner, Volumes 1-4'' offers extensive resources on Eigner's life to include reviews, descriptions, and a pdf file of Grenier's "Introduction"
Robert Grenier by Paul Stephens
''

Bomb A bomb is an explosive weapon that uses the exothermic reaction of an explosive material to provide an extremely sudden and violent release of energy. Detonations inflict damage principally through ground- and atmosphere-transmitted mechan ...

''
Finding aid to Robert Grenier papers at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Grenier, Robert American male poets 1941 births Living people Harvard College alumni University of Iowa alumni Language poets American magazine founders