Welcome to the internet anthology of Minutes of the Charles Olson Society, a scholarly journal published in Vancouver, Canada since 1991. These articles offer a sampling of Minutes' breadth, depth and scholarly rigor. You may wish to subscribe, order back issues of the journal or join the society.
The poet, the scholar, his journal, this anthology
Chronology of Charles Olson's life and work
From a family photo collection
Memoirs
"Oh, Charlie me boy"
Memories of Charles Olson by his sister-in-law Jane Atherton
"Just live. . . The writing will take care of itself"
Peter Anastas traces a long association with Olson in Gloucester
This beloved companion
Robin Blaser on his beginnings with Olson
"Quicks and Strings," a memoir of 1957-59, with 15 letters and a poem from Olson
Conversations intoxicated him far more than alcohol
Herbert Kenny remembers ten years of friendship
"Don't ever want to be a poet!"
Albert Glover's recollections of Olson at State University of New York in Buffalo (1964-65) and after
Unprepared for his immensity
William Corbett recalls encounters with Olson in 1965 and thereafter
. . . coffee-ringed first-editions, original Ms from Ezra Pound used as bookmarks. . .
Barry Miles's notes from a 1969 visit to Olson's home to tape readings from Maximus Poems IV, V, VI
"I will hate to leave this terrestrial paradise"
Ralph Maud's notes of a visit with Olson in 1969
Transcriptions
"You live with your people as well as your ghosts"
Filming in Gloucester: a new transcript of Olson in conversation at home for a 1966 NET USA: Poetry TV show
"The man who made me a poet"
A photo of Louis Douglas and an excerpt from Herbert Kenny's interview with Olson
"The curvature of the universe is love"
Jeremy Prynne's lecture on Maximus Poems IV, V, VI at Simon Fraser University, 1971
"No one has loved a city — with some anger added — as Charles Olson loved this wonderful town"
A
panel discussion at the Charles Olson Festival, Gloucester, August 1995
"You read it, you
don't quite understand it, you become engaged with it and it furthers your own
engagement with being"
Poets Charles Stein and George Quasha assess Olson's
achievement at a 2001 meeting
Essays
"The nervousness
because love is not born"
Ralph Maud traces the genesis of the first Maximus poem through a letter and three drafts
Into such a thicket did love
of two women take him
Ralph Maud corrects misrepresentations of the Olson-Boldereff correspondence
The poem as a primary
engagement with the real
Robert
Duncan's hand-out introducing Olson
for a reading at the Poetry Center, San Francisco, in 1957
The image of the most
exact freedom to be gained, now
Jeremy
Prynne's review of Maximus Poems IV, V, VI (1969)
"That same flatness (& strung-out quality I want, & require"
Poet and typesetter Gerald Burns on the format
of Maximus, with three
letters from Olson to Barry Hall, Cape Goliard Press, 1968 New
February 2006
Olson found himself able to
step into the world he had foreseen
In "Tom
Clark and the Collected Prose"
Ralph Maud addresses two
misinterpretations
Guides
My involvement in Charles Olson studies
by Ralph Maud
Topics
for Charles Olson studies
Works by and about Charles
Olson
An unspeakably valuable
book
Gerald
Burns's review of Charles Olson's Reading: a Biography
The Ralph Maud collection of Charles Olson's books
An overview of this
reconstructed library
My interest in seeing 28
Fort Square preserved for future generations
Ralph Maud's report of a 1991 visit to Olson's Gloucester
home
Links Updated
September 2005
to the Charles Olson
Collection and other resources on the Internet
Service
The Charles Olson Society Updated
September 2005
To join, obtain back issues
of Minutes of the Charles Olson Society, or contact Ralph Maud
Sample copy of Minutes of the
Charles Olson Society: issue #30 in PDF
(downloadable) New
September 2005
News from Gloucester
The Charles Olson Society of Gloucester,
Massachusetts
Comments, queries,
submissions. . .