B. W. Powe is a Canadian poet, novelist, essayist and professor at York University, in Toronto. His work, though it covers an immense range of topics from politics and poetics to magic and technology, proceeds from a mystical apprehension of the universe as the locus of magical operations, the site of experiments in cosmic becoming. In his various books and essays, Powe continues a uniquely Canadian form of the visionary tradition whose luminaries include his former teachers Marshall McLuhan and Northrop Frye. In this episode, he joins JF and Phil for an exploration of the meaning, potency, and danger of the visionary in art and literature.

Header image: Detail of "Green Color" by Gausanchennai (Wikimedia Commons).

REFERENCES

B. W. Powe's website

B. W. Powe, The Charge in the Global Membrane

B. W. Powe, Marshall McLuhan and Northrop Frye: Apocalypse and Alchemy

Frank Lentricchia, "Last Will and Testament of an Ex-Literary Critic"

Lorca's concept of duende

Hildegard of Bingen's concept of viriditas

Gilles Deleuze, Cinema II

Ernest Hemingway, The Old Man and the Sea

Marshall McLuhan, Understanding Media

Marshall McLuhan, The Gutenberg Galaxy

Marshall McLuhan, "Notes on William Burroughs"

Phil Ford, Dig: Sound and Music in Hip Culture

John Clellon Holmes, beatnik

Northrop Frye, Canadian literary critic

Hildegard von Bingen, Ordo Virtutum

Joni Mitchell, "Woodstock"

Genesis 32, Jacob and the Angel

R. D. Laing, Scottish psychologist

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, The Phenomenon of Man

William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience

Sylvia Plath, "Lady Lazarus"

Sylvia Plath, "Daddy"

Jack Kerouac, American writer

Allen Ginsberg, American poet

Lionel Snell, British philosopher and magician

Special Guest: B. W. Powe.

Podden och tillhörande omslagsbild på den här sidan tillhör Phil Ford and J. F. Martel. Innehållet i podden är skapat av Phil Ford and J. F. Martel och inte av, eller tillsammans med, Poddtoppen.