#124 / 2010 Survival Camp Interview

BEATLICK JOE SPEER INTERVIEW

#124

Beatlick Joe interviewed at his winter headquarters by Big Bend National Park by Pamela Adams Hirst

Beatlick Joe Speer is best known as the editor of Beatlick News, a poetry and arts newsletter, published out of Las Cruces, NM.  A great advocate of minimalism, Beatlick Joe lives and works in a 1977 VW camper bus currently parked by Big Bend National Park, just a few miles north of the Mexican border.

Hirst: The raw simplicity of the land is a major draw this time of year for many wandering souls here in Study Butte, Texas/What have you been reading lately?

Beatlick Joe: Short stories by Anton Chekhov and a novella by Richard Thomas, called “Prism: The Journal of John Fish.” John morphs into a dolphin and swims to Delphoi – the original city of dolphins – where he learns that what your mind sees that you cannot reach is what you must continue to pursue. It is the story of a man caught up in a drudgery job and familial responsibilities. He yearns to drop it all and pursue his studies in dolphinology.

Hirst: Your bios always emphasize that you study specific artistic periods. Where are you now?

Beatlick Joe: I’m mostly interested these days in the modernist in literature. I also like the Dadaist movement which began in Zurich during World War I. Switzerland was a neutral country not engaged in war. Dada was a reaction to the meaninglessness of the trenches, bombs, and poison gas of modern warfare. German artist George Grosz said Dadaist art was intended as a protest against this world of mutual destruction. WWI was such a horrid experience that the aftermath led towards a swing in the other direction, toward the arts and creativity. 

      The decade of the 1920s hosted cultural centers like Berlin, Paris, New York City with Greenwich Village and Harlem. Dada art was non-commercial and intended to offend. In Cologne they had an exhibition in a pub where participants walked past urinals while being read lurid poetry by a woman in a communion dress. Marcel Duchamp put a moustache and beard on the image of the Mona Lisa. 

        They pulled off happenings like an art exhibit where at the end of the show all the art was destroyed. This probably influenced band members of The Who to destroy their instruments at the end of a concert. The Dadaists had an outlandish approach to art and is continued with Cristo wrapping monuments and landscapes with fabric. Great energy was expended on the arts and a vigorous rupture with the past unleashed a search for new forms. 

        Herman Hesse captured the spirit of Dada in his novel. “Demian” 1919, where he writes: “the man who only seeks his destiny has neither models nor ideals, has nothing dear and consoling!” He felt the community spirit of pre WWI was only a manifestation of the herd instinct.

          In theater Tristan Tzara staged “The Gas Heart” in 1921. The production was received with howls of derision and the audience began to leave while the performance was still in progress. The characters were represented by body parts and spoke in absurd dialog. When a more professional production was staged later a riot broke out. It was provoked by Andre Breton who hoisted himself on the stage and started to belabor the actors.

       The painters created some new images. “The Persistence of Memory” by Salvador Dali features melted clocks. In “Girl Before a Mirror” Pablo Picasso distorts the human form.

       Hogarth Press was created by Leonard and Virginia Woolf to publish her works. This encouraged me to print and distribute my own material. I admire Virginia Woolf because each novel is an experiment with form. Another experimenter is William Faulkner. His novel “The Sound and the Fury” has no definable beginning, middle or end. The poetry of e.e. cummings lays out the lines in erratic patterns.

        James Joyce wrote one sentence for thirty pages without punctuation. These experiments taught me to slap words down any new way.

Hirst: What is it about Surrealism that turns you on?

Beatlick Joe: The Surrealists along with their older brothers the Dadaists set outlandish parameters to their works. I think they made their strongest statements in film with images that are void of anything rational, dreamlike and beyond explanation. Most of these films are short, ten to thirty minutes, because chaos is difficult for the mind to focus on. 

          Three of the best surrealist films came at the end of this period: “Un Chine Andalou”, 1929, “L’ Age d’Or” and “Blood of a Poet”, 1930. All the artists were cranked up. The photographers created photomontage, using illustrations and advertisements cut out of popular magazines.

Hirst: Give me a State of Poetry Address.

Beatlick Joe: I think poetry thrives during depressed times. Few poets make a living as wordsmiths and the small press where we mostly submit does not pay residuals. Poetry is a low investment activity. Most poetry venues are free to attend and submitting to magazines via email is cost free.  Open mics can be found all over the country.

Hirst: Tell me about the Circle A.

Beatlick Joe: The Circle A Ranch and youth hostel near Cuba, New Mexico, is at the end of a dirt road and bumps up against a vast San Pedro Parks Wilderness. I worked for Alice Wolfe who was a Utah pioneer woman. It was a hunting lodge in the 1920s. 

        Twice a day I fed the goats, the horses, the chickens. We used wood stoves so I often had a workout with an ax. Alice made cheese from the goat’s milk. It is a great place to hike and meditate. I seldom left the ranch, but because of the international youth hostel status of the Circle                      
        A the world came to us. I had an urban experience that was diametrically exciting. A woman I met in Mexico invited me to enjoy her Paris flat. All I needed was to pay for the plane ticket and pocket money. A few days after my arrival she announced her plans for a sojourn in the Sahara Desert. I was invited but opted to remain in Paris rather than clomping around in sand. So I had several months of going to the Cinematheque Francaise, I’d go to the Pompidou Center during the day and recite poetry in the open air where the buskers performed.

Pamela: Do you have any chap books?

I’m mostly interested in publishing as part of a collective. I’ve always been that way. In the 1970s I started a magazine called Kameleon. It included photos, poems, songs, drawings by children and as many friends as I could solicit material from. The submissions were forthcoming and generous. Being editor of a magazine is a sure way to find inclusion and distribution is ongoing. On some issues I’ve had assistants. Freebird Cody of Albuquerque helped me typeset my publications. He helped with PR, set up book release parties and took on the promo, the heaviest burden.  In 1988 I found a publishing GF. That would be you of course. When we combined our energy we created Beatlick News: Poetry & Arts Newsletter. I like the lightweight design for mail outs.

My two favorite government agencies have always been the postal service and the national park system.