David Antin
David Antin
David Antinis an American poet, critic and performance artist...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth1 February 1932
CountryUnited States of America
came means meant telling thinking
Thinking while talking, and thinking by any means I could, which meant thinking by telling stories, came to me at pretty much the same time.
narrative different stories
Stories are different every time you tell them - they allow so many possible narratives.
thinking newton james-watt
I wanted to be an inventor, whatever I thought that meant then. I guess I was thinking of Edison or maybe James Watt. Or maybe even Newton.
growing-up fluency language
When you grow up in a family of languages, you develop a kind of casual fluency, so that languages, though differently colored, all seem transparent to experience.
thinking giving taste
While I don't script and I don't use other performers, I think my taste for underlying precision gives me something in common with Allan and George Brecht.
distinction unsatisfied
I am quite unsatisfied by the distinctions between the oral and literate.
choices pay language
You pay your money, you take your choice. I get the audience my language attracts and I lose the ones it repels.
editing jazz-improvisation procedures
There are editing procedures for talks just as there are editing procedures in jazz improvisation.
meaningful children singing
Children frequently sing meaningful phrases to themselves over and over again before they learn to make a distinction between singing and saying.
together kind process
I was very committed to the process of composing, working at poems, putting things together and taking them apart like some kind of experimental filmmaker.
thinking way path
My way of thinking is very particular and concrete. It doesn't follow a continuous path.
sacred casual secular
I tended to emphasize the secular, the casual, the colloquial, the vernacular against the sacred.
remember hebrew enough
I learned enough Hebrew to stagger through a meaningless ceremony that I scarcely remember.
thinking want welcome
I'm standing up thinking. Anybody who wants to listen is welcome. If not, I'm happy to see them go.