Early Tomaž Šalamun and American Experimental Poetry

Abstract

I discuss early Tomaž Šalamun’s poetry with the focus on book Poker published in 1966 as a Cold War product realized within the geopolitical and geocultural context of socialist Yugoslavia. The study shows how transnational flows shape the work of this important Slovenian poet specially under the hegemonically influential poetry field of American poetry and its counterpoetic streams well known by the title of now iconic Donald Allen’s anthology New American Poetry from 1960. At the beginning of this paper, I outline the different contexts in which Šalamun’s poetry and American experimental poetry is written, contrasting the Cold War socialist and capitalist poetry cultures. This is a moment in which the fields of art and poetry went through dramatic transformations that involved questioning the traditional approach to art and poetry. I explain the importance of T. S. Eliot for poetry production at that time. Then I focus on Šalamun’s early poetry of Poker. In my discussion I compare reism in Slovenian poetry and the objectivist impulse in American poetry. Finally, I compare Šalamun’s writing procedures with the procedures engaged in by the Beat poets and the New York school, as well as by the early language poetry.