I’ve been reading about the metaverse for work, which typically leaves me choking into my chamomile tea and homemade biscuits. As someone who would bike 18km to buy an item from a local specialty business rather than order it on Amazon (true story) and prefers jigsaw puzzles to video games, I have a hard time understanding the appeal of a disembodied poker night or a virtual showroom of NFTs. Have the past two years taught us nothing about what a lacklustre substitute most online meetings are for real-life connections? Rhetorical question.
One kind of online meeting that is wildly lustrous and connective, however: workshops with Poetry As_, which inspired the language theme for this round of recommendations.
Unsolicited Recommendations
Kamran Javadizadeh on Kaveh Akbar (yes, my obsession continues) and his poetic refraction of languages
Jacob Mikanowski on the global dominance of English — and what we stand to lose because of it
Jasna Jasna Žmak, translated by Samantha Farmer, on individuals as the caretakers of words — what if “with each person, language was born anew, too”?
Questions to Ask about how words die.