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The beautiful contradictions, Scandals in the house of, Ins and outs of the forest rivers, Selected Poems: 1950‑2000, The Embattled Lyric: Ess
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Sarah messer interviews nathaniel tarn
Nathaniel Tarn (born 1928) is an American poet, essayist, anthropologist, and translator. He was born in Paris to a French-Rumanian mother and a British-Lithuanian father. He lived in Paris until age 7, then in Belgium until age 11; when World War II began, the family moved to England. He emigrated to the United States in 1970 and taught at several American universities, primarily Rutgers, where he was a professor from 1972 until 1985. He has lived outside Santa Fe, New Mexico since his retirement from Rutgers.
Tarn was educated at Lycée d'Anvers and Clifton College and graduated with degrees in history and English from King's College, Cambridge. He returned to Paris and, after some journalism and radio work, discovered anthropology at the Musée de l'Homme, the Ecole des Hautes Etudes and the Collège de France. A Smith-Mundt-Fulbright grant took him to the University of Chicago; he did fieldwork for his doctorate in anthropology with the Highlands Maya of Guatemala.
Career
In 1958, a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation administered by the Royal Institute of International Affairs sent him to Burma for 18 months, after which he became an instructor at London School of Economics and then lecturer in Southeast Asian Anthropology at the School of Oriental and African Studies of the University of London. Even after moving primarily to literature, he continued to write and publish anthropological work on the Highland Maya and on the sociology of Buddhist institutions, as E. Michael Mendelson.
Tarn published his first volume of poetry Old Savage/Young City with Jonathan Cape in 1964 and a translation of Pablo Neruda’s The Heights of Macchu Picchu in 1968, and began building a new poetry program at Cape. He left anthropology in 1967. From 1967-9, he joined Cape as General Editor of the international series Cape Editions and as a Founding Director of the Cape-Goliard Press, specializing in contemporary American Poetry with emphasis on Charles Olson, Robert Duncan, Louis Zukofsky and their peers and successors. He brought a great many French, other European and Latin American titles to Cape and made many visits to the U.S. as a Cape Editor. He taught English at SUNY Buffalo in the summer of 1969.
In 1970, with a principal interest in the American literary scene, he immigrated to the U.S. as Visiting Professor of Romance Languages, Princeton University, and eventually became a citizen. Later he moved to Rutgers. Since then he has taught English and American Literature, Epic Poetry, Folklore and other subjects at the Universities of Pennsylvania, Colorado, and New Mexico, as well as reading and lecturing elsewhere.
As poet, literary & cultural critic (Views from the Weaving Mountain, University of New Mexico Press, 1991, and “The Embattled Lyric, Stanford University Press, 2007), translator (he was the first to render Victor Segalen’s “Stèles” into English, continued work on Neruda, Latin American and French poets) and editor (with many magazines), Tarn has published some thirty books and booklets in his various disciplines. He has been translated into ten foreign languages.
In 1985, he took early retirement as Professor Emeritus of Poetry, Comparative Literature & Anthropology from Rutgers University and has since lived near Santa Fe, New Mexico. His interests range from bird watching, gardening, classical music, opera & ballet, and much varied collecting, to aviation and world history.
Selected publications
Old Savage/Young City. London: Cape, 1964; New York: Random House, 1966
Penguin Modern Poets. London: Penguin Books, 1966
Where Babylon Ends. London: Cape Goliard Press; New York: Grossman, 1968.
The Beautiful Contradictions. London: Cape Goliard Press, 1969; New York: Random House, 1970; New York: New Directions, 2013.
October: A Sequence of Ten Poems Followed by Requiem Pro Duabus Filiis Israel. London: Trigram Press, 1969.
The Silence. Milan: M'Arte, 1970.
A Nowhere for Vallejo: Choices, October. New York: Random House, 1971; London: Cape, 1972.
"Le Belle Contraddizioni". (tr. Roberto Sanesi). Milan & Samedan, Switz.: Munt Press, 1973
The Persephones. Santa Barbara, California, Tree, 1974; Sherman Oaks, California, Ninja Press, 2009.
Lyrics for the Bride of God. New York, New Directions, and London, Cape, 1975.
The House of Leaves. Santa Barbara, California, Black Sparrow Press, 1976.
From Alashka: The Ground of Our Great Admiration of Nature. With Janet Rodney. London, Permanent Press, 1977 .
The Microcosm. Milwaukee, Membrane Press. 1977.
Birdscapes, with Seaside. Santa Barbara, California, Black Sparrow Press, 1978.
The Forest. With Janet Rodney. Mount Horeb, Wisconsin, Perishable Press, 1978.
Atitlan / Alashka: New and Selected Poems, the *Alashka* with Janet Rodney. Boulder, Colorado, Brillig Works Press, 1979.
Weekends in Mexico. London, Oxus Press, 1982.
The Desert Mothers. Grenada, Mississippi, Salt Works Press, 1984.
At the Western Gates. Santa Fe, Tooth of Time Press, 1985.
The Mothers of Matagalpa. London, Oasis Press, 1989.
Drafts For: The Army Has Announced That From Now On Body Bags Will Be Known As "Human Remains Pouches" . Parkdale, OR, Trout Creek Press, 1992.
Flying the Body. Los Angeles, Arundel Press, 1993
A Multitude of One: The Poems of Natasha Tarn. (N.T. Editor). New York, Grenfell Press, 1994.
I Think This May Be Eden, a CD with music by Billy Panda. Nashville & Small Press Distributors, 1997.
The Architextures: 1988-1994. Tucson, Chax Press, 2000.
Three Letters from the City: the St. Petersburg Poems. Santa Fe, The Weaselsleeves Press and St. Petersburg, Borey Art Center, 2001.
Selected Poems: 1950-2000. Middletown, Wesleyan University Press, 2002.
Recollections of Being. Cambridge and Sydney, Salt Publishing, 2004.
Avia: A Poem of International Air Combat, 1939-1945. Exeter, Shearsman Books, 2008.
Ins and Outs of the Forest Rivers. New York, New Directions, 2008.
"Sur les fleuves de la forêt (tr. Auxeméry); Paris, Vif Editions, 2012.
Translations
Stelae, by Victor Segalen, Santa Barbara, Unicorn Press, 1963 .
The Heights of Macchu Picchu, by Pablo Neruda. London, Cape, 1966.
Con Cuba: An Anthology of Cuban Poetry of the Last Sixty Years. London, Cape Goliard Press, 1969.
Selected Poems: A Bilingual Edition, by Pablo Neruda. London, Cape, 1970.
Pablo Neruda: Selected Poems. London, Penguin Books, 1975 .
Criticism & anthropology
Views from the Weaving Mountain: Selected Essays in Poetics & Anthropology. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1991.
Scandals in the House of Birds: Priests & Shamans in Santiago Atitlán, Guatemala. New York: Marsilio Publishers, 1997.
The Embattled Lyric; Essays & Conversations in Poetics & Anthropology, with a biographical & bibliographical essay by, and a conversation with, Shamoon Zamir. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2007.
Critical studies
Roberto Sanesi in Le Belle Contradizzioni, Milan: Munt Press, 1973
"Nathaniel Tarn Symposium" in Boundary 2 (Binghamton, NY.), Fall 1975
"The House of Leaves" by A. Kingsley Weatherhead, in Credences 4 (Kent, OH.), 1977
Ted Enslin and Rochelle Ratner, in American Book Review 2 (New York, NY), 5, 1980
Translating Neruda by John Felstiner, Stanford, Stanford University Press, 1980
"America as Desired: Nathaniel Tarn's Poetry of the Outsider as Insider" by Doris Sommer, in American Poetry I (Albuquerque, NM. ), 4, 1984
"II Mito come Metalinguaggio nella Poesia de Nathaniel Tarn" by Fedora Giordano, in Letteratura d'America (Rome), 5(22), 1984.
George Economou, in Sulfur (Ypsilanti, MI.), 14, 1985.
Gene Frumkin, in Artspace (Albuquerque. NM.), 10(l), 1985.
Lee Bartlett, in Talking Poetry, Albuquerque, University of New Mexico Press, 1987
"The Sun Is But a Morning Star" by Lee Bartlett, in Studies in West Coast Poetry and Poetics (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1989).
“An Aviary of Tarns” by Eliot Weinberger, in Written Reaction, New York, Marsilio Publishing, 1996
Shamoon Zamir: "Bringing the World to Little England: Cape Editions, Cape Goliard and Poetry in the Sixties. An Interview with Nathaniel Tarn. With an afterword by Tom Raworth," in E.S. Shaffer, ed., Comparative Criticism, 19: "Literary Devolution." Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, pp. 263–286, 1997.
Shamoon Zamir: "On Anthropology & Poetry: an Interview with Nathaniel Tarn," Boxkite, no.1, Sydney, Australia, 1998.
Shamoon Zamir: "Scandals in the House of Anthropology: notes towards a reading of Nathaniel Tarn" in Cross Cultural Poetics, no.5, (Minneapolis, MN.), 1999, pp. 99–122.
Brenda Hillman: Review of “Selected Poems” in Jacket, 28, (internet) Sydney, Australia, 1999.
Joseph Donahue: Review of “The Architextures” First Intensity, 16, 2001 (Lawrence, KS).
Peter O’Leary: Review of “The Architectures” in XCP Cross Cultural Poetics,. 12, 2003 (Minneapolis, MN).
Martin Anderson: Review of “Recollections of Being” in Jacket, 36, (internet) Sydney, Australia, 2008.
Daniel Bouchard: Conversation with NT, in Zoland Poetry, 3, 2009 (Hanover, NH): Steerforth Press, 2009.
Isobel Armstrong: Review of “Avia” in Tears in the Fence, 50, Blanford Forum, Dorset, UK, 2009.
Joseph Donahue: review of “Ins & Outs of the Forest Rivers” in “A Nathaniel Tarn Tribute”: Jacket, 39, (internet) Sydney, Australia, 2010.
Richard Deming: Essay on “The Embattled Lyric” & “Selected Poems” in “A Nathaniel Tarn Tribute”: Jacket, 39 (internet) Sydney, Australia, 2010.
Lisa Raphals: Reading NT’s “House of Leaves” in “A Nathaniel Tarn Tribute”: Jacket, 39 (internet) Sydney, Australia, 2010.
Toby Olson, Peter Quartermain, john Olson, Richard Deming, David Need, Norman Finkelstein, Peter O'Leary: "For N.T.'s 80th Birthday": Golden Handcuffs Review," 11, 2009 (Seattle, Wa)
