Corner Jump

1. In 1991 I wrote critical notes on the nature of The Poet: "I have a fixation with a poem’s disgrace".
2. I recorded myself reading from these notes.
3. Soon after, while the audio track played, I had myself video-taped leaping into a corner.
4. I was to present the video to an audience at the Bijou Theater at CalArts.
5. Just prior to the screening, I previewed the video to a friend who told me, rather severely, that I
mispronounced a key term: Polyphony. I uttered "poly-phone-ee." The correct pronunciation is pa-l-f’a-nee.
6. Panic-stricken, I immediately told the projectionist to mute the audio. I then acquired a podium, which I could re-read the text live behind, and in front of the projection, thereby saving myself the embarrassment the mispronunciation would have caused. In front of an audience reading critical notes on the nature of The Poet with a supporting video demonstrating the body of The Poet in the moment of critique, I inadvertently embodied the role of "The Documentarian".

A few days after the event, I rendered the initial diagrams.

Jimmy Raskin