Hey Southern California folks: Here a chance to hear Jane Rosenberg LaForge read on the West Coast. She will be appearing from 3 to 5 p.m. this coming Friday, Jan. 18, 2013, at the newest branch of Bank of Books, 29169 Heathercliff Road in Malibu. (Phone: 310-457-5699). Here are directions to the store on Yelp and Google Maps in the Point Dume Plaza.
More Critical Praise for 'Apologies to Mick Jagger'
Some more reviews have come in for Jane Rosenberg LaForge's full-length poetry collection, "With Apologies to Mick Jagger, Other Gods, and All Women." [Amazon, $14]. Here are a couple of excerpts.
From Poet Hound:
"Her poems are beautiful, cynical at times, and contemplative. If you enjoy dark, rich words, soil, and/or chocolate, this is the collection for you."
From Heavy Feather Review:
"This is The Poetic Voice surviving in spite of itself. The Voice becoming a voice, 'deepened, but sheared of its depth' ('What Remains'). If nothing else, this is the voice of Walter Benjamin’s 'angel of history' played out in witness of wreckage that is both public and private. There is no heavy-handed progress here to wisdom. What the spectator accumulates leads only to the voice of the spectator. My impatience with The Poetic Voice could have kept me from this book. I’m glad it didn’t."
Hot, Fresh Poetry
The Eunoia Review has published several of Jane Rosenberg LaForge's poems: "These Are the Sounds That Haunt the Deaf," "The Funeral of My First Husband," and "Sacré-Coeur Basilica." Enjoy.
Trivia: "Eunoia" is apparently an obscure medical term that is said to be the shortest English word with all the vowels.
The Navigation of Loss
Jane Rosenberg LaForge's new chapbook, "The Navigation of Loss," is available for purchase from Red Ochre Press.
Order a copy now for $11 via Paypal.
All proceeds go to the press's Southeast Asia Mission Fund to help underprivileged students improve their English reading, writing and comprehension skills.
Here are some reviews:
"Jane Rosenberg LaForge writes poetry with focused urgency, she develops the poems, 'even as a story unraveled into diatribes and exercises for an over-exuberant intelligentsia and its discontents.' Each poem resonates with her experiences, emotional and concrete images, the reader absorbs the meanings and relates on a personal level with her poetic history. Her poetry will be read for a long time."
--Irene Koronas, Poetry Editor of Wilderness House Literary Review, and Poetry Reviewer of Cevena Barva Press and Ibbetson Street Press
"The poems in The Navigation Of Loss sit at the intersection of twin axes: personal/historical and memory/loss. They are lyrical explorations of this psychological terrain, but grounded in specific, concrete imagery that allows them to achieve a universal resonance beyond the poet's own lived experience."
--Ian Chung, Editor, The Eunoia Review
" 'Yeah, / it stank back then too, man, like it should sound / now: salt and lard slick and sugar licked to the / end.' I hear a line like that and discover a poet with a great sonic sense and with an eye unafraid to look anywhere. Her lyrical monologues drift between physical descriptions of place and meditative states of loss that find their ground in appropriate places like Bakersfield or a depressed Las Vegas sunrise. Jane Rosenberg LaForge’s poems reflect hard won realizations in both emotional and physical landscapes that try to find hope despite the loss."
--Lindsay Wilson, Editor, The Meadow: Truckee Meadows Community College Literary and Arts Journal
Reading at JujoMukti Tea Lounge
Jane Rosenberg LaForge will be the featured poet at a reading from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 16, 2012, at JujoMukti Tea Lounge, 211 East 4th St. (between Avenues A and B). The event is part of the Spoken Word Sundays series hosted by the poet George Wallace, the writer-in-residence at Walt Whitman's Birthplace and the first poet laureate of Long Island. Come hear Jane read from her full-length collection, "With Apologies to Mick Jagger...", and support the downtown poetry scene. Admission is $7, which includes a tea or other beverage. Come early; it can get crowded.
The Thair Peterson Remix of Jane's Poems
A writer and musician, Thair Peterson, was inspired to write songs based on some of Jane's poems from "With Apologies to Mick Jagger..." This is amazing. We have posted the music for downloading below.
Thair is a friend of Jane's from her school days in Los Angeles. We meant to put these up in October when he sent them to us, but we were hit by Superstorm Sandy and lost power for a week. Then there was the election, and Jane was sick, and blah-blah-blah.
So, with apologies to Thair Peterson, other poets and all musicians, here you go:
Artist: Thair Peterson & Verse
Album: With Apologies to Mick Jagger ... (Thair Peterson Remix)
Songs
Notes from the musician: "Some song titles are different from the poem titles. Long poem titles are fine, but with songs I think it's more appropriate and less pretentious to keep 'em short. The material ranges between sung and spoken word. Sometimes, the poems are included in their entirety, and other times it's my favorite phrases from the poems... On 'Before Elton John...,' 'Runyon Canyon' and a couple of others, you might want to boost the volume. These were mixed on headphones, which sometimes are better at hearing higher frequencies. I would recommend listening on headphones or earbuds and then listening on speakers. If the speaker mix doesn't sound crisp enough, then boost the treble. Some songs have a bit of silence at the end. Partly that's because you can hear soft sounds on headphones, but some of that gets lost on mp3."
All music is © 2012 Thair Peterson
All lyrics are © 2012 Jane Rosenberg LaForge
More Reviews of 'With Apologies to Mick Jagger'
Reviews continue to come in for Jane Rosenberg LaForge's full-length poetry collection, "With Apologies to Mick Jagger, Other Gods, and All Women" [Amazon, $14].
Sarah Ann writes at Dreamworld Book Reviews:
"Dark, depressing, cynical, and beautiful all at the same time. LaForge's poems remind me of a series of confusing dreams and nightmares that tend to stick with you all day long until the following night, when you hope the next dreams you have will erase the ones that came before it. I read 'With Apologies...' twice, all the way through. Some of the poems, I read three or four times... my copy has made a permanent home on my bookshelf."
G. Emil Reutter writes at Fox Chase Review:
"LaForge brings us into a world of textured darkness and light. Character poems of youth, aging and social issues flow through this collection. She writes in a narrative form in tightly constructed poems, never wasting a line or a word. This poet’s work reflects the world she lives in and the alternative world she views... This collection is on the dark side yet the pulse of life radiates in each poem, beating with a memory of a life lived and a life full of observation."
Robin Stratton writes at Boston Literary Review:
"With a title like that, you expect sexy, steamy sass. At least I did—I’ve been a fan of Jane Rosenberg LaForge for a few years, and know her to be a mistress of imagery, insight and beautiful mindfulness. But I wasn’t prepared for this melancholy LaForge, this voice of sorrow, of bittersweet looking back. From poignant memories of her parents, to watching her sister die, LaForge paints a breathtaking picture of life’s Entirety with scenes that swing from a hygiene-challenged lover to a slumber party to her own profile on Facebook. Uh huh, it’s all here, and no, it’s not all pretty. But for me, the final powerful line says it all: 'Where there is not a broken heart / but a muscle rendered blunt / into a numb instrument / there is a daughter.' "
Red Ochre Press Chapbook Competition Winner
Jane Rosenberg LaForge's collection, "The Navigation of Loss," has won a 2012 competition sponsored by Red Ochre Press and will be published as a chapbook. Jane will be reading from her current full-length collection, "With Apologies to Mick Jagger, Other Gods, and All Women," on Saturday, Oct. 20 , at the Spark Art Center in New York City.
'The Last Days of Peter Sellers' at Fiction 365
We are pleased to note that Jane Rosenberg LaForge's short story, "The Last Days of Peter Sellers," was the selection of the day on Oct. 11, 2012, at Fiction 365, which has the goal "to present one story per day, every day—providing exceptional authors with exposure and avid readers with first-rate fiction." If you like the story, please share it on Facebook, Twitter, and other social networks.
Pushcart Prize Nomination: 'Dr. Appleman's Rest'
Jane Rosenberg LaForge's poem, "Dr. Appleman's Rest," has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, Best of the Small Presses, by the Aldrich Press. The poem first appeared in the December 2011 issue (no. 41) of Red Fez, where you can read it online. It also appears in "With Apologies to Mick Jagger, Other Gods, and All Women," available at Amazon. It will be among the poems featured at a reading on Saturday, Oct. 20, at the Spark Art Center in New York City.
