John Riddell is best known for H and Pope Leo, El ELoPE, a pair of graphic fictions written in collaboration with, or dedicated to, bpNichol, but his work moves well beyond comic strips into a series of radical fictions. In Writing Surfaces , derek beaulieu and Lori Emerson present Pope Leo, El ELoPE and many other works in a collection that showcases Riddells remarkable mix of largely typewriter-based concrete poetry mixed with fiction and drawings. Riddells work embraces game play, unreadability and illegibility, procedural work, non-representational narrative, photocopy degeneration, collage, handwritten texts, and gestural work. His self-aware and meta-textual short fiction challenges the limits of machine-based composition and his reception as a media-based poet. Riddells oeuvre fell out of popular attention, but it has recently garnered interest among poets and critics engaged in media studies (especially studies of the typewriter) and experimental writing. As media studies increasingly turns to media archaeology and the reading and study of antiquated, analogue-based modes of composition (typified by the photocopier and the fax machine as well as the typewriter), Riddell is a perfect candidate for renewed appreciation and study by new generations of readers, authors, and scholars.
- ISBN10 1554588529
- ISBN13 9781554588527
- Publish Date 24 June 2013 (first published 28 February 2013)
- Publish Status Transferred
- Publish Country CA
- Imprint Wilfrid Laurier University Press
- Format eBook
- Pages 164
- Language English