Pierre Joris

Pierre Joris, born in Strasbourg, France in 1946 and raised in Ettelbruck, Luxembourg, is a poet, translator, anthologist and essay writer. He left Luxembourg at nineteen and since then has lived in the US, Great Britain, North Africa and France. In 1992 he returned to the Mid-Hudson valley and teaches in the Department of English at University at Albany. He currently lives in Brooklyn, NY.

Contents

Selected publications

Poetry and translations

Joris has published over 20 books and chapbooks of his own poetry, among these :

  • Breccia: Selected Poems 1972-1986 (Editions PHI / Station Hill)
  • Poasis: Selected Poems 1986-1999 (Wesleyan University Press)
  • h.j.r. (EarthWind Press, Ann Arbor)
  • Winnetou Old (Meow Press, Buffalo, NY)
  • Turbulence (St. Lazaire Press, Rhinebeck)
  • Aljibar (PHI, 2007), a bilingual edition with French translations by Eric Sarner.
  • Meditations on the Stations of Mansour Al-Hallaj (Anchorite Press)
  • Aljibar II (PHI, 2008), again a bilingual edition with French translations by Eric Sarner.

He has equally written and published many essays, introductions etc.:

  • A Nomad Poetics (Wesleyan University Press) 2003.
  • Justifying the Margins: Essays 1990-2006 (Salt Publishing) 2009.

Joris has also published a range of translations, both into English & into French, the most recent being :

Miscellaneous:

  • In 2007 his CD Routes, Not Roots appeared, with Munir Beken (oud), Michael Bisio (bass), Ben Chadabe (percussion) & Mitch Elrod (guitar).

Celan translations

Joris has translated in full three acclaimed works of poetry by Paul Celan into English (published by Green Integer and Sun&Moon Press); a "Selections" edition of Celan; and most recently his "Meridian" speech with materials:

He is currently preparing a translation of the complete late poetry of Celan (with commentaries).

Collaborations with Jerome Rothenberg

With Jerome Rothenberg he has published a two-volume anthology of 20th Century Avant-Garde writings, Poems for the Millennium: The University of California Book of Modern & Postmodern Poetry, (University of California Press) the first volume of which received the 1996 PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Literary Award.

Rothenberg's & Joris's previous collaboration, pppppp: Selected Writings of Kurt Schwitters (Temple University Press, 1993, reissued in 2002 by Exact Change) was awarded the 1994 PEN Center USA West Literary Award for Translation.

Rothenberg & Joris recently co-edited & co-translated The Burial of the Count of Orgaz & Other Writings of Pablo Picasso (Exact Change, 2004).

Anthologies

Joris's first anthology was the bi-lingual Matières d'Angleterre. Anthologie de la nouvelle poésie anglaise. (Les Trois Cailloux, 1984). With Jean Portante he edited Poésie internationale in 1987.

Poems for the Millennium. The University of California Book of North African Poetry, edited by Joris and Habib Tengour appears in 2012.

About Pierre Joris

An issue of Samizdat commemorates the Joris/Rothenberg collaboration with original work and translations by both poets, and essays and poems for and about the poets.

In late 2011, Peter Cockelbergh edited a book on Joris entitled Pierre Joris--Cartographies of the In-between (Litteraria Pragensia Press), with essays by writers and critics from three continents.

Performance art and collaboration

As reader and performance artist, Joris's work with performance artist / singer / painter Nicole Peyrafitte includes :

Other performances include:

External links