Pi O

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Pi O or П O (born 1951) is an Australian, working class, anarchist, poet of Greek origin.

Came to Australia with his family to Bonegilla migrant camp around 1954 from where they escaped to Fitzroy. He started writing poetry in 1970 when he heard Johnny Cash reciting (religious) poetry while tunning up his guitar and thought he could do better. His work ranges from standup-type rants to 'conceptual' page poetry, with a heavy emphasis on wordplay and capturing the vitality of everyday speech. Thematicaly he commonly portrays the issues of migrant working class life. He has had numerous books published since his first, Fitzroy Brothel in 1974, more notably the epic verse novel 24hrs. From 1978 to 1983 he was involved in producing the radical poetry magazine 925 in Melbourne. He is a fixture of that city's performance poetry scene and has edited an anthology of perforamnce poetry (Off the record) for Penguin.

[edit] Bibliography

• Fitzroy brothel: Poems (1974)
• Emotions in concrete (1975)
• л. o. Revisited (Wild and Woolley, 1976) ISBN 0-909331-23-5
• Panash (Collective Effort, 1978)
• Missing Form: Concrete, visual and experimental poems (Collective Effort, 1981)
• The Fitzroy poems (Collective Effort, 1989)
• 24 hrs: The day the language stood still (Collective Effort, 1996) ISBN 0646269038

[edit] References

• interview at cordite.org.au

[edit] External links

• The Poetry of Π Ο
• Pi O - An appreciation by Billy Marshall Stoneking
• visual poetry
• TERRIBLENESS Essay by PI O (in another nomenclature)