The Better Dream House by Joe Dunn / collages by Jess (1968)

 

The Better Dream House

Joe Dunn with collages by Jess

White Rabbit Press

San Francisco, CA

(c)1968

This is an intriguing one to be sure. I knew who "Jess" (Collins) was, he was an artist in the Poetry scene in SF during the 'Renaissance' there prior to the arrival of the Beats. He was connected to the Jack Spicer circle somehow - I thought I remembered but I don't and as I collect more data, I wlll alter this posting - whereas Joe Dunn, who was involved with the same Jack Spicer group and was a founder of White Rabbit Press and verdant press, somehow has not been deemed important enough to have his own Wikipedia page. Go figure. 

This book is stuffed with collages by Jess, one will spend a good deal of time studying them all. The poetry appears to have been created on a typewriter and feels very stream-of-consciousness, like floating across the page and then pulsating through the collage to begin anew on the next page of text. Red pages flyleaf between cover and text also adds a nice touch to the book. I also appreciate that the pages actually feel like something instead of many newer books that are so slick I feel the need to wash my hands after holding them just to feel something on my finger tips. Some books might as well be printed on plastic. 

This one, however, is better than fine just as it is. 

UPDATE ; I never do this but this time I have to. I reread this book and oh my god it is weird. Nonlinear text, collages that may or may not have anything whatsoever to do with the text. It startled me. I read it aloud. It didn't make any more sense that way than silent reading. Holy moly is it weird. How is this not better known? So original. 

fifteen false propositions about god - Jack Spicer

There's a bookstore I frequent in southeastern PA that has a dwindling collection of Beat Generation books and chapbooks from the private collector who has bought up chapbooks and books by Kerouac, Burroughs, Ginsberg as well as lesser known members of that "generation". Among the material that is still there, I found this chapbook. 1974, Manroot Book, South San Francisco, CA. Cover design by Robert Berner. Unnumbered pages. The particular copy that I found, interestingly enough, seems to have some critical errors in it. For while the title of the chapbook is fifteen false propositions about god, the copy I have has only 13 such "propositions" as there is no #3 nor a #14. Each page where a numbered poem ought to be is blank.

Now, maybe, just maybe, all copies are like that. But I think I have an "oh-oh" printer mistake. Making the chapbook that much more rare. Potentially.

I am not the largest fan in the world of Jack Spicer, but a chapbook like this doesn't appear everyday so....