The American Dissident: Literature, Democracy & Dissidence


SPEECH PUNISHED as if a CRIME IN BARNSTABLE, MASSACHUSETTS

Sturgis Library Director Lucy Loomis permanently banned the editor without warning or due process on June 19, 2012 for written criticism of the hypocritical policy that "libraries should provide materials and information presenting all points of view.” The banning clearly proved the point! My civil rights were being denied because I could not attend any political or cultural events held at my neighborhood library. The ACLUM, PEN New England, Office for Intellectual Freedom (American Library Association), Barnstable County Human Rights Commission refused to help the editor obtain justice. The local hacks, poets, artists, journalists, and other librarians didn't give a damn either. TheCape Cod Times refused to even cover the story. Russell Streur, however, pursued the matter (see Camel Saloon). A decade later, at my request, Loomis agreed to finally lift the ban (November 2022). Check out The American Dissident blog for P. Maudit socio-political cartoons et al. The American Dissident, a biannual 501 c3 nonprofit publication founded in 1998, seeks "rude truth" submissions, preferably stemming from the questioning and challenging of power, preferably local, and with a touch of personal risk.

Updated 08/14/2024. Issue #47 distributed.

 

 

Focus

The American Dissident seeks to publish truth—left or right—and especially opposes political correctness and its facile knee-jerk dismissal of any valid criticism as racist, islamophobic, sexist, homophobic, right-wing extremist, nazi, etc. Read more...

 

The Editor's Curriculum Mortae

To get a teaching job in academe, one must present a CV or Curriculum Vitae, which inevitably presents reasons why one will likely fit in, and otherwise not buck the university system, go against the collegial grain, or make controversial waves. Thus, I present the opposite of a CV, the CM or Curriculum Mortae. Academe is a mess today of pc, anti-free expression, and multiculti-diversity crap. So, why not hire those who present CMs to help shake the shit up? Read the CM...

 

Notes on Risk and Rude Truth

Few poets and writers dare risk anything at all—certainly not career, nor publication and invitation opportunities. Few dare speak the rude truth because most are driven by hopes of "success," fame, and recognition. Read more...

 

Démocratie en péril... au Québec

Cette partie du site contient, entre autres, les notes critiques du rédac'chef sur le Festival International de la Poésie de Trois-Rivières. Lire encore...

 

Why Poetry Doesn't Matter

Harvard’s Stephen Burt and an army of similar academic literary clones control poetry, act as offical Soviet-like gatekeepers of poetry, censor what they do not like, ban those who criticize them, assure the high-brow bourgeois innocuity of poetry, and thus constitute the main reason why poetry does not matter. Burt is depicted in the cartoon below. For a larger version, click on the cartoon. Scroll down to check out other parts of why poetry doesn't matter, including the Academy of American Poets, which permanently banned me from commenting on its website.

Stephen Burt

 

Censorship and general disdain for vigorous debate seem to be increasing deplorably in America today.  Dismissing criticism and critics with denigrating epithet has become common practice. Rare is the person who will examine the facts and logic presented. Read more...

 

Newfoundland by the Editor

Photo Exhibit at Camel Saloon.

The Road to Big Brook" (Downhome magazine)

"Great Caribou Island" (Downhome magazine)

 

Other Essays and Cartoons by the Editor

See Global Free Press and GFP.

 

Books by the Editor

We Come and We Go. 2020. 54 pp poems. $9.

We Come and We Go

 

Loser: Chronicles of a Failed Academic. 2020. 148 pp. $12.

Loser

 

The Recusant. 2019. 574 pp autobiographical novel on teaching at an all black college in the south. 2019. Send $19.

The Recusant

 

Suburbanitica. 2018. 149 pp autobiographical novel with cartoons here and there on teaching at an all black college in the south. $12.

Suburbanitica

 

Ah, O'Neillians! 2018. 25 pp one-act irreverent play with a few cartoons. $6. View excerpt.

G. Tod Slone

 

P. Maudit: Lone Literary Sniper. 2017. 56 pp collection of highly critical P. Maudit cartoons. $9.

G. Tod Slone

Black Hole Abyss, Being Then Nothingness (56 pp, jam-packed), includes poems, dictums, and short essays. Send $9. View excerpts.

Black Hole Abyss

 

Transcendental Trinkets, a compilation of essays, poems, broadsides, cartoons, and journal notes all pertinent to Thoreau, Walden Pond, and Concord, where the editor lived for over a decade and incarcerated for a day. 89 jam-packed pages. Send $9 for a copy. View excerpts.

Transcendental Trinkets

 

Leaves of Democracy/Poems of Heresy (68 pp, jam-packed) and includes poems, dictums, and an essay challenging Whitman's 1855 "Preface." Send $9. View excerpts.

Poems of Heresy

 

Triumvirate of the Monkeys includes more critical poems and dictums by the editor and is 72 pp long... jam-packed. Send $9 for a copy.

Triumvirate of the Monkeys

 

OIL OF VITRIOL. Selected Poems. Petroglyph Press. 2009. 60-page chapbook of highly critical poems. $10.  For excerpts, read on...

Oil of Vitriol

 

Où c’qui faut pas/WHERE A POET OUGHT NOT. 2008. Gival Press. 170pp bilingual French/English... both versions written by the editor. Poems and several essays. $15. For excerpts, read on..

Where a Poet Ought Not

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Parrhesiastic Edge (ContraOstrich Press, 2004). Poems and "The Cold Passion for Truth Hunts in No Pack," a long essay written by the editor on democracy and literature and the case for parrhesiastic poetry, writing, and art. 64pp. $8. For the essay, read more...

Parrhesiastic Edge

 

Blackballed Albatros (ContraOstrich Press, 2001)

Blackballed Albatros

 

TOTAL CHAOS:  Behind the Scenes of a National Blue-Ribbon High School. 2001. People's Press. 315-page autobiographical novel. $12. For an excerpt, read on...

Total Chaos

 

No Lite

No Lite

 

 


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Testing the Waters of Democracy

The following organizations, alas, only represent a sample, as personally tested by the editor over the years. Each proved either indifferent or outright hostile towards the editor's exercise of Freedom of Expression. Because of that exercise, the editor was permanently banned from Sturgis Library, spent a day in a Concord jail cell, was trespassed for six months by Watertown Free Public Library, was banned from commenting on the Academy of American Poets web site forums, and lost jobs and job possibilities. Just the same, if I could do it all over again, I'd do it the same damn way! FREEEEEEEDOM!!!

 

American Library Association

Academy of American Poets

ACLU Massachusetts

Adjunct Advocate

Alehouse Press

Alternate Press Review

American Association of University Professors

American Public University System

Arts Foundation of Cape Cod

Barnstable County Human Rights Commission

Barnstable Town Council

Bass River Press

Bennett College

Boston Poetry Union

Briar Cliff Review

Cape Cod ART

Cape Cod Museum of Art

Cape Cod Times

Chronicle of Higher Education

City Lights Book Store

Clams Library System of Cape Cod

Comic Book Legal Defense Fund

Concord Cultural Council

Concord Festival of Authors

Concord Poetry Center

Concord Journal

Contemporary Poetry Review

Cultural Center of Cape Cod

Davenport University

Divide

Elmira College

Festival International de la Poésie de Trois-Rivières

Fine Arts Work Center of Provincetown

Fitchburg State University

Foetry

Georgia Review

Grambling State University

Inside Higher Ed

Martha's Vineyard Regional High School

Mashpee Public Library

Massachusetts Cultural Council

Massachusetts Poetry Festival

Mid-Cape Cultural Council

National Endowment for the Arts

National Coalition Against Censorship

New England First Amendment Center

New Pages

New York Quarterly

Pen New England

Poetry Foundation

Poets House

Poetry Society of America

Poets & Writers Magazine

Provincetown Arts

Pulitzer Prize

Pushcart Prize

Rattle

Robert Creeley Award

Stone Soup Poets

Sturgis Library

Suffolk University Poetry Center

Tufts University Experimental College

University of Massachusetts

Walden Pond State Reservation

Watertown Free Public Library

Writers-at-Large

 

Democracy in Peril—PC Ideology

Unsurprisingly, The American Dissident has been dismissed as sexist and racist by PC ideologues.   Read more...


Democracy in Peril—Islamization

In the New York Times, Washington Post, Time magazine, and other PC publications, the increasing foothold of Islam (Sharia law) in Europe, Canada, and even America is rarely if ever reported. Read more...

Jess Klein

 

Links

Examine links to sites purportedly devoted to Freedom of Speech. Check 'em out...

 

Recent AD Blog Posts

Check out the blogs on Anita Walker (MCC), Gibor Basri (UCal), John Sexton (NYU), Keli Goff, Joan Houlihan (Concord Poetry Center), Hanna Pylvanien, Mark Gonzales, Becky Tuch, Lucy Loomis, Jon E. Travis, Mary Jo Bang, Betsy Newell, Stephen Burt, etc. Read about these characters here...

 

Unusually Critical Essays

The essays in this section help illustrate the raison d'être of The American Dissident. Each was written by a known author (e.g., Orwell, Emerson, Camus, Thoreau, Goytisolo, and Solzhenitsyn). The editor culled them from extensive readings over the decades. Such essays are rare. Read more...

 

Unusually Critical Poems

The poems in this section help illustrate like the essays above the raison d'être of The American Dissident. Each was written by a known author (Villon, Byron, Jeffers, Saro-Wiwa, Bukowski, Mandelstam, etc.). The editor culled them from extensive readings over the decades. Poems of a critical nature are very rare. The idea of a critical poem almost seems taboo. Read more...

 

Sixties Sellouts

During the Sixties, we'd call those who subverted their principles for money and power SELLOUTS. Unfortunately, the term became conveniently outmoded as the sellout phenomenon generalized over the years. Read more...

Student Comments

One of the most positive things regarding The American Dissident was Professor Dan Sklar's inviting me to speak to his creative writing students at Endicott College. Sklar is a rare, very rare bird in the academic nest. Read more...

 

Contributors to The AD

Without the generous support of contributors, The American Dissident would not be alive and kicking today. Both Dolores Granger and Russell Streur, especially, have been notable benefactors. Not one cultural council from the NEA to the Concord Cultural Council and Mid-Cape Cultural Council will accord the journal grant money. Examine some of the essays, poems, and reviews published in The American Dissident. Read more...

 

Issue #38 Front Cover

A Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, Alberto RIos, is depicted, as inspired by his statement on poetry and pirates. Unsurprisingly, student editors Sabine Galvis and Kim Rapanut at Arizona State University, where Rios teaches, did not respond, nor did RIos or any of the chancellors contacted. Silence has become quite golden in academe...

Alberto Rios

 

Issue #37 Front Cover

Issue #37 front cover features New York Quarterly staff, as well as poet Gary Goude and P. Maudit. The general criticism presented regards the establishment poetry modus operandi of unbridled self-congratulating and backslapping.

New York Quarterly

 

Issue #34 Front Cover

Issue #34 front cover features InsideHigherEd editors Scott Jaschik and Doug Lederman as Hon. Censors. Also featured is Trinity Washington University president Patricia McGuire, arguing in favor of censorship of the editor's comments regarding her IHE article. See to the left Inside Higher Ed for her actual email.

Issue #29 Front Cover

Issue #29 front cover features the massacred cartoonists of Charlie Hebdo, as well as Islam apologists Obama and would-be Hillarius the First. Tout est foutu means everything is fucked...

The American Dissident

 

Issue #26 Banned

Now, what in the last issue of The American Dissident would have made library director Kathleen Mahoney wish the issue to be censored and banned from the library system? Mahoney had agreed to subscribe, had me fill out a tax form, and send her a copy of the journal. Read more...

The American Dissident

 

Issue #22 Banned

In fact, issue #22 was presented to Lucy Loomis, director of Sturgis Library, as a free subscription offer. She rejected the offer. Months later she permanently banned me from Sturgis w/o due process for a speech crime (an open letter disseminated to the library directors of the Clams Library System of Cape Cod). See Sturgis Library on the list to the left for details.

Lucy Loomis

 

Caustic Cartoons by P. Maudit

P. Maudit cartoons are featured on The American Dissident blog and elsewhere on this website. Read more...

 

Reviews of The American Dissident

The editor has had to pound on doors to get The American Dissident reviewed. Library Journal and American Libraries Magazine (American Library Association) both, for example, simply refuse to review it. Read more...

 

The Editor Interviewed

The editor has had to pound on doors to get interviewed. Read more...

 

The Editor Criticized

Established-order proponents and apparatchiks, as well as most others, when criticized by the editor have dismissed The American Dissident almost always with ad hominem. Read more...

 

Literary Letters from Issue #29 & #23

Each issue of The American Dissident contains an ample selection of letters questioning and challenging free-speech scorning academics, literati, editors, cultural council apparatchiks, librarians, etc. Read more...

 

Parrhesiastic Writing

"The Cold Passion for Truth Hunts in No Pack" is a lengthy essay written by the editor on democracy and literature and the case for parrhesiastic poetry, writing, and art. Read more...

 

Caustically Critical Reviews

The editor is not an aficionado of backslapping and self-congratulating, pervasive, to say the least, in the literary milieu, both high and low brow.  Only a fool, "brilliant" or whatever, would run out to buy a book or literary journal because someone "brilliant" or whatever endorsed it with the usual suspect vocabulary "brilliant," "cutting edge," "great," "original" "one of the world's most significant," "one of the best," "stunningly beautiful," "innovative," etc., etc. Read more...