Rattapallax:
The Sound Googles the Blast for a New-Po Zine
“Rattapallax” is Wallace Steven’s onomatopoeia for “thunder.”
The sound googles the blast! for the word: a good opening crack for a New-Po Zine moniker. I came to Rattapallax first via ads in poetry media -- I couldn’t figure out the “scene,” always a good sign. Then Kathleen Masterson invited me to host a breakout session at the New York State Council’s “Latino Roundtable,” an astonishing gathering of lit-Lat lights, including Nancy Mercado (Longshot), Gregory Kanellos (Arte Publico), and many others.
My co-respondent at the “Cyber/Digital and Mediaized Poetries” session was Ram Devineni, the publisher of Rattapallax, and from the get (he had some kind of keyboardless Net catcher to demo his Web site), I knew I was in the presence of a Cyber Visionary. Mr. Ram (no comment on the omenclature applicability) agreed, so we met in cyberspace. Here’s the product (fruit!).
--Bob Holman
Bob: Why Ram and Poetry? Which poets seduced you to the poem? Do you write poetry?
Ram: I wrote my first poem a week before graduating from college and immediately fell in love with the language. For several years, I began experimenting with poetry and film and made several short films that were shown at many film festivals around the world. It was not until I moved to Philadelphia, after one of my films was shown at the Philadelphia Festival of World Cinema, that I began publishing poetry. I need to credit Charles Hewins and Lamont B. Steptoe for encouraging me to begin publishing poetry. If it were not for them and the remarkable kindness they showed me, I would never have started.
Many different people in varying mediums have influenced me. The poems of Dylan Thomas, Federico Garcia Lorca and Galway Kinnell. . . Juan Ramon Jiminez's Platero and I and R.K. Narayan's short stories. . . the books of Jean Giono, Philip K. Dick and Raymond Chandler. . . the films of John Cassavetes, Alfred Hitchcock, Mike Leigh, Powell/Pressburger and Charlie Chaplin. . . also Akira Kurosawa's Dersu Uzala & Ikiru, and Wim Wenders' Wings of Desire. . . .
Bob: How did you meet George Dickerson (Rattapallax journal's Editor-in-Chief)?
Ram: I met Dickerson at the Phoenix Reading series run by Michael Graves. Michael, George and I started the journal and from that series Rattapallax grew and eventually expanded to a press.
Bob: Please expand -- he musta lit a fire, or was it mutual. . . or. . . was it his poetry? vision? Is he tech conscious?
Ram: George has brought a remarkable and concise vision to the journal and he has expanded my understanding of poetry. Most of my knowledge and innovative approach towards publishing was developed through my experiences in politics and organizing major campaigns. The technical consciousness in the press is entirely mine. George and the rest of the staff are not technically aware, but appreciate the advantages technology brings to publishing.
Bob: What are plans for Rattapallax?
Ram: I recently expanded Rattapallax into a press, realizing that the journal can discover new poets, but it is by publishing their books that I can help to make them into national figures. And there are many remarkable poets associated with Rattapallax who deserve to be recognized for their work. The unique aspect of Rattapallax Press is that we are the only poetry publisher to include CDs featuring the poets reading their work with every book we publish and with every issue of the journal. This fall we will release all of our printed books as Rocket e-books as well as publishing a select group of poets only as e-books. Not just e-books --but, e-books with MP3 files and Real Media! Again, we will be the first poetry publisher to offer this advancement.
In addition, we have planned an extensive tour around the country featuring renowned Rattapallax poets like Pulitzer Prize winners Yusef Komunyakaa, Louis Simpson and Henry Taylor, with readings at the United Nations and at Los Angeles County Museum of Art with Dana Gioia. We will also be sponsoring, with the PSA, the 25th anniversary presentation of the Cinepoetry Film Festival in New York. And much more.
Bob: How does marketing intersect with technology and collide with poetry? (e.g., you book a tour before the manuscript is completed -- what if it stinks?)
Ram: Technology is just another tool that allows poets and publishers to reach a broader audience. The trick is to use it effectively and to understand its potential. Preparation and foresight. Those two characteristics are also needed to book a national tour. Most venues require me to book in advance, often before the book is sent to the printers. But I am always confident that the book will be ready before the scheduled reading, because I work closely with the poets in constructing and completing their books. I select the poets I want to publish a year in advance and know their work inside out. All the poets I publish have a completed manuscript for me to review, and from the manuscript I determine if I want to publish their work. Throughout the process, the poet and I are partners and determine the design and layout of the book, to the extent of their tour.
Bob: Where do you see poetry and the Net headed?
Ram: The Information Revolution has often been correlated with the Industrial Revolution. The Industrial Revolution ushered in many new social and economical ideas and ills, from communism to environmentalism, and affected art, poetry and language. Such remarkable and sometimes dangerous changes will also occur due to the Information Revolution. New ideas and models will have to be created to understand and relate with these changes. Maybe new languages will be constructed. I do not want to sound like Huxley or Orwell and I do not claim to know the answers. But working in the computer industry and being on the forefront of developing and integrating new and emerging technologies for a large corporation, I can easily observe how technology is changing our climate. What will this mean to the average poet and small publisher? Well, the Internet and recent developments in technology have enabled poets to reach their audience directly and publish their work without using many of the standard cultural filters.
Also, publishers (in the near future) will need to provide more than just books. Expanded content. My generation and every future generation will read The Great Gatsby online and then stream a digital version of the film into portable wireless browser-based terminals. We'll order clothes in the style of the Roaring Twenties and have them delivered to our houses in the correct sizes. The recent merger of America Online and Time-Warner is a perfect example of the consolidation underlying this new methodology.
Bob: That’s a perfect segue to one of your own poems, please. Could you point us? How about a technopoem?
Ram: Several of my poems are posted on the Web. The poem that I am most fond of is called “Tango in the Square.”
I have not written any poems that are about computers or even about technology. Most of my poems deal with human conditions or political issues. For example, “Tango in the Square” was written in response to the Tiananmen Square Massacre in China.
Bob: Thanks, Ram.
Ram: You are welcome, Bob.
Ram Devineni is the owner and publisher of Rattapallax Press and a film-maker who has had films shown at the Cairo International Film Festival, San Jose Film Festival, Philadelphia Festival of World Cinema, and many more. He was an Eagleton Associate at the Eagleton Institute for Politics at Rutgers University, where he studied political theory and campaign management. He has organized several state and federal elections. Currently, he determines and integrates new and emerging technologies for Salomon Smith Barney, Travelers, Citibank and Citigroup.
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