80 Flowers (1978) and Gamut

Commentary

In his 1975 reading of the first 22 Flowers, LZ comments at some length on #22 Bayberry; Leggot includes a transcript of these remarks in an appendix (369-372).

Corman, Cid. “In the Event of Words.” Louis Zukofsky: Man and Poet. Ed. Carroll F. Terrell. Orono, ME: National Poetry Foundation, 1979. 307-309 [on “Privet”].

Irby, Kenneth. “Some Notes on Zukofsky’s 80 Flowers and Michele J. Leggott’s Reading Zukofsky’s 80 Flowers.” Sulfur 34 (1994): 234-249.

Johnson, Kent. “A Fractal Music: Some Notes on Zukofsky’s Flowers.” In Scroggins (1997): 257-275.

Kasemets, Udo. Z for Zuk for Zukofsky: A Celebration of 80 Flowers. Toronto: Sun, 1995.

Leggott, Michele J. Reading Zukofsky's 80 Flowers. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 1989.

___. “’See How the Roses Burn!’ The Epigraph of Zukofsky’s 80 Flowers.” Sagetrieb 4.1 (Spring 1985): 115-136.

Levi Strauss, David. “Approaching 80 Flowers.” Code of Signals: Recent Writings in Poetics. Ed. Michael Palmer. Berkeley: North Atlantic Books, 1983. 79-102.

Lewis, Leon. “Aural Invention as Floral Splendor: Louis Zukofsky’s Vision of Natural Beauty in 80 Flowers.” The Writer’s Chronicle 40.4 (Feb. 2008): 24-29.

Parsons, Marnie. Touch Monkeys: Nonsense Strategies for Reading Twentieth-Century Poetry. Toronto: U of Toronto P, 1993. 150-152.

On “Gamut”

Corman, Cid. “GAMUT/LZ.” Origin, fifth series 4 (Fall 1984): 51-54.

Leggott, Michele J. Reading Zukofsky’s 80 Flowers. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 1989. 29-31, 359-361.

80 Flowers was composed from 27 Dec. 1974-21 Jan. 1978 and published in a limited fine press edition of 80 copies by the Stinehour Press in Lunenburg, Vermont in June 1978, a month after LZ’s death. LZ initiated the 80 Flowers project immediately on completion of “A”-23 (the last written movement of “A”), with the stated intention of working on it for a decade to be completed by his 80th birthday, but fortunately he worked well ahead of schedule. He immediately began a new project for his 90th birthday, Gamut: 90 Trees, of which apparently only the first was composed (5-11 Feb. 1978) and published unauthorized as a broadside in 1984 (B. Brecht, Mahogonny City [sic]). Richard Parker has pointed out that LZ’s notes indicate that the title he finally decided on for this last project was Gamut: Trees ninty 5’s. 80 Flowers and “Gamut” only became widely available with their inclusion in CSP in 1991. Leggott includes an Appendix A that gives a chart listing the specific dates of composition for each of the poems.