AustLit

'In their performative essay, 'E Lit Jazz,' Sandy Baldwin and Rui Torres suggest that electronic literature - literature that is based in computer coding - can learn from jazz (Baldwin and Torres 2017). they draw attention to qualities that electronic literature has in common with jazz, such as a tendency towards collaboration and textual variability. But they also suggest that there are aspects of jazz that electronic literature could emulate further, such as its daring and vitality, thematic complexity and engagement with the body. Although jazz has many evolving harmonic, rhythmic and timbral features that distinguish it aesthetically and culturally from other musics, the essential distinguishing feature of jazz is improvisation. Therefore the most fundamental question Baldwin and Torres ask is 'can code improvise?'' (Introduction)

'Hazel Smith’s new poetry collection engages in a direct way with contemporary political and social issues – civil war and the flight of populations, oppressive regimes and the disappearance of dissidents, the unpredictable effects of climate change – relating these issues to the personal experience of death and dementia, abuse and disability and childlessness. The poems project intense psychological states of indecisiveness, anxiety, disorientation and guilt, making use of surreal conjunctions and metaphor to dramatise the sense of unease. Smith is a new media artist and musician, and the poems employ a variety of techniques drawn from these fields, flourishes of linguistic coloratura, the evocation of virtual realities, cutting and pasting from the internet, remixing, sampling and quotation, to drive home their effects.' (Publication summary)