"That Tongue Be Time"

Originally from Canada, Norma Cole is a revered writer and visual artist who has authored and translated over thirty books and chapbooks. Though highly esteemed internationally in both visual art and poetry circles, Cole's association with the New College of California and her influence on artists and poets has been overlooked by scholars. In "That Tongue Be Time," Dale M. Smith seeks to remedy this oversight by bringing together sixteen noted scholars, editors, and poets to examine Cole's poetry, translations, and visual art in order to place her within the larger scholarly conversation about contemporary poetry and poetics. The book also includes a number of black-and-white reproductions of Cole's art and a contextual introduction by Smith. "That Tongue Be Time" provides a groundbreaking look at Norma Cole's lasting influence on multiple generations of poets, visual artists, and scholars and should be on the shelf of anyone interested in contemporary poetry.

Dale M. Smith is a professor in the Department of English at Toronto Metropolitan University. He is author and coeditor of several other books, including An Open Map: The Correspondence of Robert Duncan and Charles Olson (UNM Press).

List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Introduction. Norma Cole and a Continuous Making Dale M. Smith PART I. NEWS AND MYTH Chapter 1. Norma Cole's Mythology: “And it was always drainage for angels” Kaplan Harris Chapter 2. Apprehending Terror: Norma Cole as Poet and Translator from the French Teresa Villa-Ignacio Chapter 3. Norma Cole's Fate News: The Small Essential Truths of Poetry Martin Corless-Smith Chapter 4. Aggregates of Order: The Deedless Deed of Meaning and the Ontology of Play Steven Seidenberg PART II. METHODS OF ABSTRACTION AND MEDIATION Chapter 5. From “Paper House” to SCOUT: Norma Cole's Abstraction on a Sliding Scale Roberto Tejada Chapter 6. “Documents / that document”: Norma Cole's Archival Writings Claire Tranchino Chapter 7. Resonance and the Art of Teaching Dale M. Smith Chapter 8. “It's the doing that matters. The making.”: An Introduction to the Poetry Collection's Norma Cole Collection James Maynard PART III. “WORD/ACTION/IMAGE/WORD” Chapter 9. Art Movements Behind Nine Drawings: The Early Years, 1945–1984 Joseph Shafer Chapter 10. All Writing Is Projective Jean Daive Chapter 11. Befriending French Cole Swensen Chapter 12. “Louise Labé”: A Test of Translation Ted Byrne PART IV. IN COMPANY WITH OTHERS Chapter 13. This Questioning, Witnessing, to Play too Much, Prophetically: Norma Cole and the Community of Poetry David Levi Strauss Chapter 14. Portrait of Norma Cole Laura Moriarty Chapter 15. Editing Norma Cole's Where Shadows Will Garrett Caples Chapter 16. Norma Cole's Natural Light: A Memoir, Reflection, and Critical Encounter Vincent Katz Bibliography Contributors