Alice Notley (November 8, 1945 – May 19, 2025).
I met Alice Notley in the late 60’s when I was an undergraduyate and later while living in Blatimore we did an iterview.
In recent years whenever I was in Paris I always looked up Alice and we had lunch together and hung out. our conversations were funny,frank and we spoke a lot about dreams which fasicnated both of us. One of Alice’s masterpieces, The Descent of Alette draws on our oldest traditions in poetry going. back to Sumer and at the same time is as fresh as tomorrow and deep as the underworld her characters ride around in. In this interview which took place in 2019 on a tender date in Alice’s peronal character she connected the poem to her dreams.
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I’ve been writing down my dreams my whole life. As a child I had recurring dreams. When Iphones became available I bought one right away because there was a microphone – and I could record my dreams. I have a file on my computer of “Dreams” that were transferred from my phone. I’ve only used dream images a few times in my poetry – mostly I allow my dreams to teach me my obsessions. I seem to pay attention to colors and textures in my dreams: white, water, buildings, trees, etc. And, of course, my feelings, my wants. In this way, my dreams occur in my poems. This interview has inspired me to be more explicit and write a number of “dream” poems.
Thank you Joy. As for poetry I found it wasn’t so much drawing on the dream, but writing in the “perfume of the dream” often
like you usingn the iphone to write poems while still in the wake of the dream.
I always found that poetry and dreams are born in the same place.
Thank you– I agree!