Editing Jack Spicer

{{short description|American poet (1925–1965)}}
{{for-multi|the fictional character|Jack Spicer (Xiaolin Showdown)|people with a similar name|John Spicer (disambiguation)}}
{{infobox writer
| image            = Jack Spicer.jpg
| birth_name       = John Lester Spicer
| education        = University of Redlands,<br> University of California, Berkeley
| movement         = [[San Francisco Renaissance]]
| birth_date       = {{Birth date|1925|1|30}}
| death_date       = {{Death date and age|1965|8|17|1925|1|30}}
}}

'''Jack Spicer''' (January 30, 1925 – August 17, 1965) was an American [[poet]] often identified with the [[San Francisco Renaissance]].<ref name=":2" /> In 2009, ''My Vocabulary Did This to Me: The Collected Poetry of Jack Spicer'' won the [[American Book Award]] for poetry. He spent most of his writing life in San Francisco.

==Early life==
Jack was born '''John Lester Spicer''' on January 30, 1925 in Los Angeles, the elder child of parents Dorothy Clause and John Lovely Spicer.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://findingaids.library.emory.edu/documents/spicer1364/|title=Jack Spicer papers, 1938–1973|date=2016-06-07|website=Robert W. Woodruff Library, Emory University|language=en|access-date=2017-08-10}}</ref><ref name=":0">{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zZaYmNUy5BkC|title=The Postmoderns: The New American Poetry Revised|last1=Allen|first1=Donald|last2=Butterick|first2=George F.|publisher=Grove Press|year=1982|isbn=0802150357|pages=427|access-date=2017-08-09}}</ref>

He graduated from [[Fairfax High School (Los Angeles)|Fairfax High School]] in 1942, and attended the [[University of Redlands]] from 1943 to 1945.<ref name=":0" /> While attending the University of Redlands, he befriended [[Warren Christopher]].<ref name=":1">{{Cite news|last=Garner|first=Dwight|date=2008-12-23|title=Sometimes Love Lives Alongside Loneliness|language=en-US|work=[[The New York Times]]|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/24/books/24garn.html|access-date=2021-05-14|issn=0362-4331}}</ref> After graduation he lived in Los Angeles briefly, and worked as a [[Extra (acting)|movie extra]] and a [[private investigator]].<ref name=":1" />

== Berkeley ==
Spicer ended up in Berkeley, and lived in a [[boarding house]] alongside [[Philip K. Dick]].<ref name=":1" /> He spent the years 1945 to 1950; and from 1952 to 1955 at the [[University of California, Berkeley]], where he began writing, doing work as a research linguist, and publishing some poetry (though he disdained publishing). In 1950, he refused to sign a "loyalty oath" during a time of [[McCarthyism]].<ref name=":2">{{Cite web|last=Heilig|first=Steve|date=2008-12-05|title=Poetry review: 'My Vocabulary Did This to Me'|url=https://www.sfgate.com/books/article/Poetry-review-My-Vocabulary-Did-This-to-Me-3182610.php|access-date=2021-05-14|website=SFGATE|language=en-US}}</ref>

During this time he searched out fellow poets, but it was through his alliances with [[Robert Duncan (poet)|Robert Duncan]] and [[Robin Blaser]] that Spicer forged a new kind of poetry, and together they referred to their common work as the [[Berkeley Renaissance]].<ref>{{Cite web|last=Alexander|first=Christopher W.|date=1999|title=Jacket # 7 – A Spicer Chronology|url=http://jacketmagazine.com/07/spicer-chron.html|access-date=2021-05-14|website=Jacket Magazine}}</ref> The three, who were all [[gay]], also educated younger poets in their circle about their "queer genealogy": [[Arthur Rimbaud|Rimbaud]], [[Federico García Lorca|Lorca]], and other gay writers.<ref name="concise">{{Cite book |title=A Concise Companion To Twentieth-century American Poetry |url=https://archive.org/details/concisecompanion00fred |url-access=limited |first=Stephen |last=Fredman |year=2005 |publisher=Blackwell Publishing |isbn=1-4051-2003-7 |page=[https://archive.org/details/concisecompanion00fred/page/n134 110] }}</ref>  Spicer's poetry of this period is collected in ''One Night Stand and Other Poems'' (1980). His ''Imaginary Elegies'', later collected in [[Donald Allen]]'s ''[[The New American Poetry 1945-1960]]'' anthology, were written around this time.

== San Francisco ==
In 1954, he co-founded the Six Gallery in San Francisco, which soon became famous as the scene of the October 1955 [[Six Gallery reading]] that launched the West Coast [[Beat generation|Beat]] movement.<ref name=":1" /> In 1955, Spicer moved to New York City and then to Boston, where he worked for a time in the Rare Book Room of [[Boston Public Library]]. Blaser was also in Boston at this time, and the pair made contact with a number of local poets, including [[John Wieners]], Stephen Jonas, and Joe Dunn.

Spicer returned to San Francisco in 1956 and started working on ''After Lorca''. This book represented a major change in direction for two reasons. Firstly, he came to the conclusion that stand-alone poems (which Spicer referred to as his ''one-night stands'') were unsatisfactory and that henceforth he would compose serial poems. In fact, he wrote to Blaser that 'all my stuff from the past (except the Elegies and Troilus) looks foul to me.' Secondly, in writing ''After Lorca'', he began to practice what he called "poetry as dictation". His interest in the work of [[Federico García Lorca]], especially as it involved the ''[[cante jondo]]'' ideal, also brought him near the poetics of the [[deep image]] group. The Troilus referred to was Spicer's then unpublished play of that name. The play finally appeared in print in 2004, edited by Aaron Kunin, in issue 3 of ''No – A Journal of the Arts''.

In 1957, Spicer ran a workshop called ''Poetry as Magic'' at [[San Francisco State College]],<ref name=":2" /> which was attended by Duncan, [[Helen Adam]], [[James Broughton]], Joe Dunn, [[Jack Gilbert]], and [[George Stanley (poet)|George Stanley]]. He also participated in, and sometimes hosted, Blabbermouth Night at a literary bar called ''The Place''. This was a kind of contest of improvised poetry and encouraged Spicer's view of poetry as being dictated to the poet.

Spicer refused to have his work [[copyright]]ed, and after 1960, Spicer refused to publish his work outside of California.<ref>{{Cite web|last=Nichols|first=Travis|date=2009-01-01|title=My Vocabulary did this to me: Collected Poetry of Jack Spicer|url=https://believermag.com/my-vocabulary-did-this-to-me-collected-poetry-of-jack-spicer/|access-date=2021-05-14|website=Believer Magazine, Issue Fifty-Nine|language=en-US}}</ref> He considered [[City Lights Bookstore]] a tourist destination, and boycotted selling his work there.<ref name=":3">{{Cite web|last=Finch|first=Zach|date=2012-06-21|title=Listening to Poetry, Jack Spicer's My Vocabulary Did This to Me.|url=http://bostonreview.net/finch-on-what-my-vocabulary-did-to-me-jack-spicer|access-date=2021-05-14|website=Boston Review|language=en}}</ref> He was unable to hold a job and fell into poverty, however, so by 1964 he started selling books at City Lights.<ref name=":3" />

==Death and legacy==
After many years of alcohol abuse, Spicer fell into a [[Hepatic encephalopathy|hepatic coma]], a brain disorder precipitated by liver failure, in the elevator of his apartment building, and later died aged 40 in the poverty ward of [[San Francisco General Hospital]] on August 17, 1965.<ref>{{cite web|title=Jack Spicer|url=http://www.ashevillepoetryreview.com/tag/jack-spicer|website=Asheville Poetry Review}}</ref>

Spicer's view of the role of language in the process of writing poetry was probably the result of his knowledge of modern [[Noam Chomsky|pre-Chomskyan]] linguistics and his experience as a research-linguist at Berkeley. In the legendary Vancouver lectures he elucidated his ideas on "transmissions" (dictations) from the Outside, using the comparison of the poet as crystal-set or radio receiving transmissions from outer space, or Martian transmissions. The radio oracle derived from Cocteau's film ''Orphée,'' often cited by Spicer in his lectures.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://writing.upenn.edu/pennsound/x/Spicer.php|title=Vancouver Lectures|last=Spicer|first=Jack|date=June 13–17, 1965|website=PennSound|access-date=2020-01-19}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=The House that Jack Built: The Collected Lectures of Jack Spicer|last=Spicer|first=Jack|publisher=Wesleyan University Press|year=1998|pages=passim}}</ref> Although seemingly far-fetched, his view of language as "furniture", through which the transmissions negotiate their way, is grounded in the structuralist linguistics of [[Zellig Harris]] and [[Charles Hockett]].{{Citation needed|date=May 2014}} (Poems of his final book, ''Language,'' refer to [[morpheme]]s and [[grapheme]]s). Spicer is acknowledged as a precursor for the [[Language poets]].{{Citation needed|date=August 2014}}

Since the publication of ''[[The Collected Books of Jack Spicer]]'' (1975, 1st ed.), his reputation has grown. ''The Collected Books of Jack Spicer'' gathered Spicer's works beginning from 1957, and specifically did not include his earlier poetry per Spicer's requests.<ref name=":3" /> A selection of his earlier work was published in ''One Night Stand and Other Poems'', edited by [[Donald Allen]].<ref name=":3" /> ''My Vocabulary Did This to Me: The Collected Poetry of Jack Spicer'' (2008) edited by Peter Gizzi and [[Kevin Killian]], won the [[American Book Award]] in 2009.

== Bibliography  ==
A select list of publications authored by Spicer, in order by ascending date published.

*{{Cite journal|last=Spicer|first=John L.|date=Fall 1949|editor-last=Brown|editor-first=Lynne|title=The Poet and Poetry: A Symposium|journal=The Occident|type=essay|location=Berkeley, California|publisher=[[University of California, Berkeley]]}}
*{{Cite journal|last1=Spicer|first1=John L.|title=Correlation Methods of Comparing Ideolects in a Transition Area|last2=Reed|first2=David W.|type=essay|date=July 1952|journal=[[Language (journal)|Language]]|volume=28|issue=3|publisher=Waverley Press Inc.|location=Baltimore, Maryland|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/410105|pages=348–359|doi=10.2307/410105|jstor=410105|url-access=subscription}}
*{{Cite book|last=Spicer|first=Jack|title=A Redwood Forest|work=letterpress book|publisher=White Rabbit Press|year=1965|location=San Francisco, California}}
*{{Cite book|last=Spicer|first=Jack|title=The Collected Books of Jack Spicer|publisher=[[Black Sparrow Press]]|year=1975|isbn=9780876852422|editor-last=Blaser|editor-first=Robin|editor-link=Robin Blaser|edition=1|location=Santa Rosa, California}}
*{{Cite book|last=Spicer|first=Jack|title=One Night Stand and Other Poems|publisher=Grey Fox Press|year=1980|isbn=978-0912516462|editor-last=Allen|editor-first=Donald|editor-link=Donald Allen|location=San Francisco, California}}
*Spicer, Jack (1994). ''The Tower of Babel: Jack Spicer's Detective Novel'' (1994), with afterword by Lew Ellingham & Kevin Killian, Hoboken, NJ: Talisman House.
*{{Cite book|last=Spicer|first=Jack|title=The House That Jack Built: The Collected Lectures of Jack Spicer|publisher=[[Wesleyan University Press]]|year=1998|isbn=9780819569622|editor-last=Gizzi|editor-first=Peter|editor-link=Peter Gizzi|location=Hanover, New Hampshire}}
*Spicer, Jack (2008). ''My Vocabulary Did This to Me: The Collected Poetry of Jack Spicer'', edited Peter Gizzi & Kevin Killian, Wesleyan UP.
*Spicer, Jack (2011). ''Jack Spicer’s Beowulf, Part 1'', edited by David Hadbawnik & Sean Reynolds, introduction by David Hadbawnik, Lost and Found: The CUNY Poetics Documents Initiative, New York.
*Spicer, Jack (2011). ''Jack Spicer’s Beowulf, Part II'', edited by David Hadbawnik & Sean Reynolds, afterword by Sean Reynolds, Lost and Found: The CUNY Poetics Documents Initiative, New York.
*Spicer, Jack (2021). ''Be Brave to Things: The Uncollected Poetry and Plays of Jack Spicer'', ed. Daniel Katz, Wesleyan UP.

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
*Davidson, Michael (1977). "Incarnations of Jack Spicer: Heads of the Town up to the Aether". ''Boundary 2,'' ''6''(1), 103–134. {{doi|10.2307/302472}}
*{{Cite book|last=Diaman|first=N. A.|title=Following My Heart: A Memoir|date=2007|publisher=Persona Press|isbn=978-0931906091|location=San Francisco|author-link=N. A. Diaman}}
*{{Cite book|last=Diaman|first=N. A.|title=The City: A Novel|date=June 2007|publisher=Persona Press|isbn=978-0931906107|location=San Francisco|publication-date=August 2007}}
*{{Cite magazine|last=Diaman|first=N. A.|date=1984|title=Sitting With Jack At The Poets Table|magazine=[[The Advocate (LGBT magazine)|The Advocate]]|location=Los Angeles}}
*{{Cite book|last=Diaman|first=N. A.|title=Second Crossing: A Novel|publisher=Persona Press|year=1982|isbn=978-0931906039|location=San Francisco}}
* {{Cite book|last1=Ellingham|first1=Lewis|title=Poet, Be Like God: Jack Spicer and the San Francisco Renaissance|last2=Killian|first2=Kevin|publisher=[[Wesleyan University Press]]|year=1998|isbn=9780819553089|location=Middletown, Connecticut|author-link2=Kevin Killian}}
*{{Cite book|last=Foster|first=Edward Halsey|title=Jack Spicer|publisher=[[Boise State University]]|year=1991|isbn=0-88430-096-X|location=Boise, Idaho}}
*[[James Herndon (writer)|Herndon, James]]. (1973) ''Everything as Expected,'' San Francisco, California:
*Katz, Daniel. [https://books.google.com/books?id=GbRvAAAAQBAJ&q=the+poetry+of+jack+spicer,+katz The Poetry of Jack Spicer]. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2013, {{ISBN|978-0-7486-4549-7}}
*{{Cite book|title=A Book of Correspondences for Jack Spicer|publisher=ACTS|year=1987|editor-last=Levi Strauss|editor-first=David|series=A Journal of Acts|volume=6|editor-last2=Hollander|editor-first2=Benjamin}} This is a collection of essays, poetry, and documents celebrating Spicer.
*[[Warren Tallman|Tallman, Warren]]. (1992) ''In the Midst''. Vancouver, Canada: [[Talonbooks]]
*Vincent, John Emil, eds. (2011) ''After Spicer: Critical Essays''. Middletown, Connecticut: [[Wesleyan University Press]], {{ISBN|978-0-8195-6942-4}}

==External links==
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*[http://epc.buffalo.edu/authors/spicer/ Jack Spicer at the EPC]
*[http://writing.upenn.edu/pennsound/x/Spicer.html Jack Spicer at PennSound]
*[http://www.oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/kt9199r33h/ Guide to the Jack Spicer Papers] at [[The Bancroft Library]], [[University of California, Berkeley]]
*[http://pid.emory.edu/ark:/25593/rn825 Jack Spicer papers, 1938–1973] at [[Emory University Libraries|Stuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library]], [[Emory University]]
*[https://atom.archives.sfu.ca/index.php/jack-spicer-fonds Records of Jack Spicer] at [[Simon Fraser University]] Library Special Collections and Rare Books
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20110109101607/http://katiepants.blogsome.com/2007/03/03/vocabulary-lesson Vocabulary Lesson] by Katherine Montgomery, an essay on Jack Spicer. Winner of 2006 Hopwood Award for creative nonfiction
*[http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/1656 Profile of Jack Spicer] on Poets.org includes links to further readings, related prose including information on Other San Francisco Renaissance Poets, and some Spicer poems including "A Book Of Music", "Improvisations On A Sentence By Poe", "Orfeo", "Psychoanalysis: An Elegy",

{{Authority control}}

{{Poets in The New American Poetry 1945–1960}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Spicer, Jack}}
[[Category:1925 births]]
[[Category:1965 deaths]]
[[Category:Poets from Los Angeles]]
[[Category:University of Redlands alumni]]
[[Category:Beat Generation poets]]
[[Category:American gay writers]]
[[Category:American LGBTQ poets]]
[[Category:LGBTQ people from California]]
[[Category:20th-century American poets]]
[[Category:American male poets]]
[[Category:Writers from the San Francisco Bay Area]]
[[Category:American Book Award winners]]
[[Category:20th-century American male writers]]
[[Category:Burials at Cypress Lawn Memorial Park]]
[[Category:20th-century American LGBTQ people]]
[[Category:Gay poets]]