Lox to Loy

Today I woke up to an email telling me to send in my flash piece on Mina Loy and the development of the modern[ist] feminist voice. Obviously this called for a celebratory brunch for one: smoked salmon on a bagel.

I drove to Bruegger's, and on the way, considered the flash piece. I had to get a 5,500 words down to 500-1,000 words. What was most important about Mina Loy? What was most essential that I wanted to preserve in my paper?

The most important thing about Loy is her wordplay, what Pound referred to as "logopoeia." Loy--like many of the modernists--synthesized high and low, east and west, old and new, etc. Perhaps most interesting, though, is the way she fuses traditionally masculine and feminine language and symbols to challenge stereotypical gender identities.

I munched on my sandwich, capers slipping onto the plate as I considered which poems best embodied her wordplay. "Parturition," "Gertrude Stein," "Lunar Baedeker," "The Dead," and "Cylinders." I thought about them and landed on "Brancusi's Golden Bird."

On of the ways to challenge traditional systems is to replace them or supplant them. To replace "masculine" art--art that relies on phallic symbols, penetrative imagery--is to use feminine symbols and imagery. Loy and other female modernist writers used circular language and imagery to create a new system. We see the “circular female principle” emerge in the very structure of female modernist texts like Gertrude Stein’s Three Lives, the physical mobility of Helga in Nella Larsen’s Quicksand, or in the shift of the associative symbols of Mina Loy’s poems.

Playing with an early draft of my flash piece, I sipped my iced coffee. On my computer screen, I had: "Loy opens the poem with an “aesthetic archetype.” Those familiar with Constantin Brancusi’s “Golden Bird” might immediately imagine the looming golden crescent which penetrates the air—an almost archetypal phallic symbol." Loy uses language--circular imagery, religious references--to transform an abstract phallus into a archetype of femininity. She takes a representation of modern art--cutting edge modern art--and makes it a representation of feminine creation.

At this point, I'm over-caffeinated, but I'm mostly buzzing about what a badass Mina Loy was. The woman wore thermometers for earrings, traveled for her art, and challenged longstanding concepts of art and gender. I can't imagine the depths of her creativity or personality, but I don't have time to anyways. My sandwich is finished and I need to finish the flash piece so I can send it to my friend for editing.

Meal:

Everything bagel with smoked salmon, cream cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, and capers.

Hazelnut iced coffee.

#loy #brancusisgoldenbird