Nicole Brossard

“Pleasure,” Jennifer Moxley writes in her introduction to this volume, “is the word that first comes to mind at the mention of Nicole Brossard's poetry.” This volume provides English-language readers with an overview of the life and work of Nicole Brossard, poet, novelist, and essayist, who is widely recognized in her native Québec and throughout the French-speaking world as one of the greatest writers of her generation. Brossard's poetry is rooted in her investigations of language, her abiding commitment to a feminist consciousness, and her capacity for renewing meaning as a virtual space of desire. The reader enters a poetic world in which the aesthetic is joined with the political, and the meaning of both is enriched in the process. The selections in this volume include translations of some of Brossard's best-known works-Lovhers, Ultra Sounds, Museum of Bone and Water, Notebook of Roses and Civilization-along with short prose works, an interview with Brossard, and a bibliography of works in French and English, and constitute the most substantial English-language sampling published to date of one of Canada's greatest living poets.

Nicole Brossard is a poet, novelist, and essayist and the author of more than thirty books. She is a major voice in French-language avant-garde poetry and one of Canada's greatest living writers. Jennifer Moxley is a poet, translator, and editor, and the author of many books including Often Capital.

Contents
Introduction
Key to Translators
Texts

The Echo Moves Beautiful (1968)

from Logical Suite (1970)
everything gels white
mutual attractions
between the lines the liquid slides
afterward it's so little
it's ony initial and doesn't stop being so
to act and tend
again and without cease
there is the palpable night shifts feverish
suspension of the act
Subordinating Words

The White Centre (1970)

from Daydream Mechanics (1974–1980)
Reverse{hrs}/{hrs}Drift
A Rod for a Handsome Price

The Part for the Whole (1975)

from Lovhers (1980–1986)
(4): Lovhers/write
July the Sea
The Barbizon Hotel for Women

from Double Impression (1984)
The Marginal Way

from Aviva (excerpts, 1985, 2008)

from To Every Gaze (1989)
Cities by the Touch
If Yes Seismal

Obscure Languages (1992)

Vertigo of the Proscenium (1997)

from Installations (1989-2)
Passage
Eternity
Taboo
Color Separation
Margin
Tongue
Shadow
Installation
Contemporary
Tympanum
Generation
Mores
Downtown
Sweep
Encore
Gesture
Rai

Matter Harmonious Still Maneuvering (1990)

Ultrasounds (1992)

from Museum of Bone and Water (1999–2003)
Museum of Bone and Water
Typhoon Thrum
The Throat of Lee Miller

Shadow: Soft et Soif (excerpts from Ardor, 2003)

from Notebook of Roses and Civilization (2003–2007)
while caresses draw us close
the color of tears at the bottom
whatever the month or wound
to the dawn add i am
in a time blue and easy
Precautions
Suggestions Heavy-Hearted
Smooth Horizon of the Verb Love
Rustling and Punctuation
Every Ardor
It’s Lively
Soft Link 3

from Ardor (2008)
all thirsts are hollows of light
one calls noise of beauty
Nape 9
Nape 10
Nape 12

from After the Words (2007)

Documents

Poetic Politics (1990)

I am a woman of the present (1999)

Process of a Yes Its Energy in Progress (1993)

Why Do You Write in French? (2)

Interview with Nicole Brossard by Lynne Huffer (1993)

Catalog of Works
Credits