Five Oceans in a Teaspoon

(Hardback)

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Five Oceans in a Teaspoon is an innovative, beautiful and moving collection of short visual poems written by muckraking journalist/poet Dennis J Bernstein, visualized by pioneer designer/author Warren Lehrer.

Thirty-five years after the publication of their book/play French Fries, considered a classic in visual literature and expressive typography, Bernstein and Lehrer have reunited to complete a book of visual poetry they began forty years ago. As with his journalism, Bernstein's poems reflect the struggle of everyday people trying to survive in the face of adversity. Divided into eight movements, Five Oceans in a Teaspoon reads like a memoir in poems. It spans a lifetime: growing up confused by dyslexia and a parental gambling addiction; graced by pogo sticks, boxing lessons and a mother's compassion; becoming a frontline witness to war and its aftermaths, prison, street life, poverty, love and loss, open heart surgery, caring for aging parents and visitations from them after they're gone. Lehrer's typographic compositions give form to the interior, emotional and metaphorical underpinnings of the poems. Together, the writing and visuals create a new whole that engages the reader to become an active participant in the navigation, discovery, and experience of each poem.

Reviews

"Brilliant and beautiful. Thank you for bringing in the new." Alice Walker , Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and author of The Color Purple

"Five Oceans in a Teaspoon, the new collaboration between poet Dennis J. Bernstein and artist Warren Lehrer is an engaging masterwork that has only a handful of precedents in literary and design history... If Philip Roth's classic coming-of-age novel Portnoy's Complaint had been designed in the style of Guillaume Apollinaire's Calligrammes, the result might be something like Five Oceans... This virtuosic collaboration has the tonal and experiential range of a memoir, but rendered in artfully designed poem-texts. The glimpses into American life across more than half a century are always personal, a background of current events within the alternating minutiae and milestones of existence. Each piece in this funny, poignant work is scored--almost in the musical sense--with graphic organization for performance on the page. The effect is remarkable and the range of graphic innovation is impressive: Lehrer gets inside Bernstein's writing, exploring the ways its structures can be amplified, its meanings extended, through graphical means. Bernstein fits many oceans into the well-defined parameters of Lehrer's teaspoons; this is a true collaboration, and neither artist would or could have made this work without the other." Johanna Drucker, Los Angeles Review of Books

"Bernstein and Lehrer--the Lennon and McCartney of viz-lit--have reunited at the height of their creative powers. The gutsiness and raw emotion of the writing, revelatory appeal of the visual compositions, and brevity of the form creates an intensely moving experiential journey." Steven Heller, design and visual culture historian, columnist, author of over 180 books on design

"From a kidnap note for a world held hostage by an A-bomb, to a Holocaust survivor's tattooed arms where the numbers just don't add up, Five Oceans in a Teaspoon re-envisions a poetry memoir via a textual kaleidoscope... Bernstein and Lehrer are the Rodgers and Hart of Visual Poetry." Bob Holman, poet, poetry activist and chronicler, and founder of the Bowery Poetry Club

"An ode to visual poetry, the type-based poems reflect the struggles faced by people every single day and span everything from Alzheimer's to war and peace. Curated by Lehrer from Bernstein's thousands of poems, the 200 poems have been artfully arranged into typographic compositions that bring home the emotional and metaphorical impact of their words." Aime McLaughlin, Creative Review

"The 1984 book French Fries by Dennis Bernstein and Warren Lehrer is a landmark work of visual literature. The duo's new book, Five Oceans in a Teaspoon, is a masterful contribution to the genre they've helped shape. An autobiography in poems, it is a multi-modal book project that includes animations, exhibitions and performances. Bernstein has reported on wars, taught in prisons, hosted a radio show and survived open heart surgery. As he reflects on his life, he reminds the reader that the very struggles which leave us feeling confused and alienated are part of our shared human condition. Lehrer is able to interpret the text so successfully because he approaches the poems as a writer as well as a designer. His instinct for wordplay destabilizes and extends Bernstein's concise writing--drawing out double meanings, alternative interpretations--providing an unconventional reading experience. Turning the page is like listening to a perfect jazz solo, inevitable, but unpredictable. Five Oceans in a Teaspoon is a moving testament to Bernstein's view of the world, and Lehrer's interplay of text and image (and text-as-image) packs a powerful intellectual and emotional punch." Levi Sherman, Artists' Book Reviews

"A collection of poems by Dennis J Bernstein, brought to life, visually, by Warren Lehrer--Five Oceans in a Teaspoon is a perfect book! A beautiful book, the poems put the reader to work in interesting ways... The animations that augment the book are quite wonderful and serve as their own performances of the poems." Debbie Millman, Design Matters

Author Bio

Dennis J Bernstein is a poet, investigative journalist and award-winning host/producer of Flashpoints, syndicated by the Pacifica radio network. He is a recipient of many awards and honors, including Pulse Media's Top Global Media Figure, the 2015 Pillar Award in Broadcast Journalism, and Artists Embassy's International Literary Cultural Award. He founded the Muriel Rukeyser Reading Series in Brooklyn, NY. Books include Special Ed: Voices from a Hidden Classroom, Particles of Light, and three books with Warren Lehrer including French Fries, considered a seminal works in the genre. His poetry has appeared in New York Quarterly, The Chimaera, The Progressive, Texas Observer, ZYZZYVA, and numerous other journals. Warren Lehrer is a writer/designer known as a pioneer of visual literature and design authorship. Awards include: The Brendan Gill Prize, Innovative Use of Archives Award, International Book Award for Best New Fiction, three AIGA Book Awards, grants and fellowships from the NEA, NYSCA, NYFA, Rockefeller, Ford, and Greenwall Foundations. He is a 2016 Honoree of the Center for Book Arts and a 2019 laureate of the Ladislav Sutnar Prize. His books are in many collections including MoMA, The Getty Museum, and Georges Pompidou Centre. Lehrer is a professor at SUNY Purchase, founding faculty member of SVA's Designer As Author MFA program, and co-founder of EarSay, a non-profit arts organization in Queens, NY.