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Poets, rock stars, filmmakers, activists, novelists, and historians lend their voices to this landmark collection about the daily grind.
From the White Stripes’s “The Big Three Killed My Baby” to Eminem’s “Lose Yourself,” from the folk anthems of Bob Dylan and Woody Guthrie to the poems of Walt Whitman and Amiri Baraka, from the stories of Willa Cather and Bret Lott to the rabble-rousing work of Michael Moore—this transcendent volume touches upon all aspects of working-class life.
From the White Stripes’s “The Big Three Killed My Baby” to Eminem’s “Lose Yourself,” from the folk anthems of Bob Dylan and Woody Guthrie to the poems of Walt Whitman and Amiri Baraka, from the stories of Willa Cather and Bret Lott to the rabble-rousing work of Michael Moore—this transcendent volume touches upon all aspects of working-class life.
Price: $22.00
Pages: 470
Publisher: Coffee House Press
Imprint: Coffee House Press
Publication Date:
19 October 2010
Trim Size: 9.25 X 6.50 in
ISBN: 9781566892483
Format: Paperback
BISACs:
Praise for Working Words
“A labor of love. . . . A powerful, eclectic assortment.” —Detroit Free Press
“Unabashedly political. Tea-partiers beware. Working Words delivers more than 500 pages of unadulterated and unabridged working-class word art.” —Detroit Metro Times
“A mammoth, high-voltage anthology of American poems, songs, memoirs, and fiction about work and working-class lives.” —Booklist
“The poems, songs, and stories are meant not just to celebrate the written form but also to speak to the importance of how creative writing contributes to the lives of the poor and working class.” —Labor Studies Journal
“A labor of love. . . . A powerful, eclectic assortment.” —Detroit Free Press
“Unabashedly political. Tea-partiers beware. Working Words delivers more than 500 pages of unadulterated and unabridged working-class word art.” —Detroit Metro Times
“A mammoth, high-voltage anthology of American poems, songs, memoirs, and fiction about work and working-class lives.” —Booklist
“The poems, songs, and stories are meant not just to celebrate the written form but also to speak to the importance of how creative writing contributes to the lives of the poor and working class.” —Labor Studies Journal
M. L. Liebler is a poet, literary arts activist, and community organizer who has read and performed his work internationally. A teacher at Wayne State University, he is also the founding director of both the National Writer’s Voice Project in Detroit and Springfed Arts: Metro Detroit Writers Literary Arts Organization. He was selected as Best Detroit Poet by the Detroit Free Press and Metro Times, and his many awards include a Paterson Poetry Prize for Literary Excellence and the Barnes & Noble Writers for Writers Award, an honor shared with Maxine Hong Kingston and Junot Díaz.
I. Labor Poems & Songs
Maggie Anderson, "Spitting in the Leaves" and "Closed Mill"
Antler, "Factory" (excerpt) and "Written After Learning Slaves in Ancient Greece and Rome Had 115 Holidays a Year"
Amiri Baraka, "A Poem Some People Will Have to Understand"
Jan Beatty, "My Father Teaches Me to Dream," "Poetry Workshop at the Homeless Shelter," and "Mad River -- A Waitresses’ Instructions on Tipping or Get the Cash Up and Don’t Waste My Time"
Daniel Berrigan, "Prayer from a Picket Line"
Laura Boss, "My Son Is Worried About Me"
Melba Joyce Boyd, "the league of defense" and "the year of no snow"
Michael Casey, "The Company Pool"
Hayan Charara, "Cement"
Andrei Codrescu, "Working for a Profit"
Allison Adele Hedge Coke, "Putting Up Beans" and "Off Season"
Wanda Coleman, "Drone" and "Accounts Payable"
David Connolly, "One Black Mark"
Carlos Cortez, "Requiem for 'Two Dago Reds'" and "Three Spirits"
Jayne Cortez, "I Got the Blue-Ooze 93"
Emily Dickinson, "White Heat"
Carlos Cumpian, "We Don’t Wanna Peso Much" and "Soon It’s Robots"
Diane diPrima, "Revolutionary Letter #19"
Sue Doro, "Assembly Room Women" and "Ours"
Sean Thomas Dougherty, "Tiny Griefs"
Bob Dylan, "Last Thoughts on Woody Guthrie," "Union Sundown," and "Lonesome Ballad of Hattie Carroll"
W.D. Ehrhart, "Visiting My Parents Grave" and "The Farmer"
Eminem, "Lose Yourself"
Anne Feeney, "Have You Been to Jail for Justice"
Cynthia Gallaher, "Lucky Man Café"
Edward Field, "Notes from a Slave Ship"
Vievee Francis, "Harder Options" and "Found in Juarez"
Stewart Francke, "The Auto Trade"
Maria Mazziotti Gillan, "Daddy, We Called You," "After School on Ordinary Days," "The Herald News Calls Paterson a 'Gritty City,'” "Growing Up Italian," and "Biancheria and My Mother"
Woody Guthrie, "1913 Massacre"
Frances E.W. Harper, "Bury Me in a Free Land"
Edward Hirsch, "The Sweatshop Poem" and "Second Story Warehouse"
Mikhail Horowitz, "The Last Wobbly" and "Jobs"
Murray Jackson, "For Phil Levine" and "Gifts"
X.J. Kennedy, "Talking Dust Bowl"
Aneb Kogostile, "A New Afrikan Reggae"
Al Kooper, "Comin’ Back in a Cadillac"
Dorianne Laux, "The Shipfitter’s Wife"
Li-Young Lee, "The Cleaving"
Philip Levine, "The Death of Mayokovsky," "Library Days," "Of Love & Disasters," and "Arrival & Departure"
M.L. Liebler, "On the Scrap" and "Making It Right"
Shirley Geok-lin Lim, "Riding into California"
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, "The Builders"
Thomas Lux, "The Deadhouse at the Workhouse" and "What I See When I Drive To Work"
Michael McClure, "Beginning with a Line by diPrima"
Ray McNiece, "Grandfather’s Breath"
Tony Medina, "Lazy Russ"
D. H. Melhem, "Grandfather: Frailty Is Not Your Story"
Gary Metras, "Anonymous Donation"
Joseph Millar, "Telephone Repairman" and "Ed’s Auto Repair"
Mark Nowak, "from $00/Line/Steel/Train"
Matthew Olzmann, "Cameron"
Richard Peabody, "The Forgivness Device" and "Carolina Summer"
Molly Peacock, "The Nice Party"
Jeff Poniewaz, "Factory Horn Exodus" and "Well Paid Slaves"
Minnie Bruce Pratt, "Day Off"
Dudley Randall, "Ancestors," "George," and "Old Witherington"
Kevin Rashid, "Groundskeeper Busted Reading in the Custodial Water Closet"
John R. Reed, "Tools"
Judith Roche, "What We Do to Live" and "Summer"
Trinidad Sanchez, Jr, "Work Work Work"
Edward Sanders, "America: A History" (excerpts)
Herbert Scott, "Bag Boy"
Vivian Shipley, "The Hard Way Was the Only Way You Knew"
Betsy Sholl, "Pink Slip"
Marc Kelly Smith, "Underdog" and "Pull the Next One Up"
Lamont B. Steptoe, "Day Worker" and "Seamstress"
Quincy Troupe, "Poem for My Brother Timmy"
Chris Tysh, "This Is Not My Beautiful House: Five Uncanny Sites"
Diane Wakoski, "The Butcher’s Apron"
Barry Wallenstein, "Tony’s Dad"
Mary Ann Wehler, "1943"
Joe. E. Weil, "Ode to Elizabeth, NJ"
Roger Weingarten, "Father Hunger & Son"
Jack White, "The Big Three Killed My Baby"
Walt Whitman, "I Hear America Singing"
II. Short Fiction
Jeanne Bryner, "Turn the Radio to a Gospel Station"
Bonnie Jo Campbell, "Selling Manure" and "King Cole's American Salvage"
Willa Cather, "Paul’s Case"
Wanda Coleman, "The Friday Night Shift at the Taco House Blues (Wah-Wah)"
Stephen Crane, "Maggie"
Jim Daniels, "No Pets"
Kathleen Glynn, "Spring Today"
Bill Harris, "At The Movies"
Lolita Hernandez, "No Puedo Bailar"
Christopher T. Leland, "The Old West"
M.L. Liebler, "Swallowing Camels"
Colleen McElroy, "Sister Detroit"
Bret Lott, "Work"
John Sayles, "The 7/10 Split"
Larry Smith, "Outside the Millgate"
Clifford Odets, "I Can’t Sleep"
Jeff Vande Zande, "Layoff"
Xu Xi, "To Body To Chicken"
III. Non-Fiction, Histories & Memoirs
Rebecca Harding Davis, Excerpt from "Life in the Iron Mills"
Dorothy Day, Excerpts from "The Dorothy Day Reader"
Jennifer Gillan, "Navigating New Jeresy"
Woody Guthrie, from "Bound for Glory"
Ben Hamper, Excerpt from "Rivethead"
Thomas Lynch, Excerpt from "The Undertaking"
Michael Moore, "Horatio Alger Must Die"
Henry P. Rosemont, "Benjamin Franklin & The Philadelphia Typographical Strikers of 1786"
Al Young, Memoir Excerpt
Maggie Anderson, "Spitting in the Leaves" and "Closed Mill"
Antler, "Factory" (excerpt) and "Written After Learning Slaves in Ancient Greece and Rome Had 115 Holidays a Year"
Amiri Baraka, "A Poem Some People Will Have to Understand"
Jan Beatty, "My Father Teaches Me to Dream," "Poetry Workshop at the Homeless Shelter," and "Mad River -- A Waitresses’ Instructions on Tipping or Get the Cash Up and Don’t Waste My Time"
Daniel Berrigan, "Prayer from a Picket Line"
Laura Boss, "My Son Is Worried About Me"
Melba Joyce Boyd, "the league of defense" and "the year of no snow"
Michael Casey, "The Company Pool"
Hayan Charara, "Cement"
Andrei Codrescu, "Working for a Profit"
Allison Adele Hedge Coke, "Putting Up Beans" and "Off Season"
Wanda Coleman, "Drone" and "Accounts Payable"
David Connolly, "One Black Mark"
Carlos Cortez, "Requiem for 'Two Dago Reds'" and "Three Spirits"
Jayne Cortez, "I Got the Blue-Ooze 93"
Emily Dickinson, "White Heat"
Carlos Cumpian, "We Don’t Wanna Peso Much" and "Soon It’s Robots"
Diane diPrima, "Revolutionary Letter #19"
Sue Doro, "Assembly Room Women" and "Ours"
Sean Thomas Dougherty, "Tiny Griefs"
Bob Dylan, "Last Thoughts on Woody Guthrie," "Union Sundown," and "Lonesome Ballad of Hattie Carroll"
W.D. Ehrhart, "Visiting My Parents Grave" and "The Farmer"
Eminem, "Lose Yourself"
Anne Feeney, "Have You Been to Jail for Justice"
Cynthia Gallaher, "Lucky Man Café"
Edward Field, "Notes from a Slave Ship"
Vievee Francis, "Harder Options" and "Found in Juarez"
Stewart Francke, "The Auto Trade"
Maria Mazziotti Gillan, "Daddy, We Called You," "After School on Ordinary Days," "The Herald News Calls Paterson a 'Gritty City,'” "Growing Up Italian," and "Biancheria and My Mother"
Woody Guthrie, "1913 Massacre"
Frances E.W. Harper, "Bury Me in a Free Land"
Edward Hirsch, "The Sweatshop Poem" and "Second Story Warehouse"
Mikhail Horowitz, "The Last Wobbly" and "Jobs"
Murray Jackson, "For Phil Levine" and "Gifts"
X.J. Kennedy, "Talking Dust Bowl"
Aneb Kogostile, "A New Afrikan Reggae"
Al Kooper, "Comin’ Back in a Cadillac"
Dorianne Laux, "The Shipfitter’s Wife"
Li-Young Lee, "The Cleaving"
Philip Levine, "The Death of Mayokovsky," "Library Days," "Of Love & Disasters," and "Arrival & Departure"
M.L. Liebler, "On the Scrap" and "Making It Right"
Shirley Geok-lin Lim, "Riding into California"
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, "The Builders"
Thomas Lux, "The Deadhouse at the Workhouse" and "What I See When I Drive To Work"
Michael McClure, "Beginning with a Line by diPrima"
Ray McNiece, "Grandfather’s Breath"
Tony Medina, "Lazy Russ"
D. H. Melhem, "Grandfather: Frailty Is Not Your Story"
Gary Metras, "Anonymous Donation"
Joseph Millar, "Telephone Repairman" and "Ed’s Auto Repair"
Mark Nowak, "from $00/Line/Steel/Train"
Matthew Olzmann, "Cameron"
Richard Peabody, "The Forgivness Device" and "Carolina Summer"
Molly Peacock, "The Nice Party"
Jeff Poniewaz, "Factory Horn Exodus" and "Well Paid Slaves"
Minnie Bruce Pratt, "Day Off"
Dudley Randall, "Ancestors," "George," and "Old Witherington"
Kevin Rashid, "Groundskeeper Busted Reading in the Custodial Water Closet"
John R. Reed, "Tools"
Judith Roche, "What We Do to Live" and "Summer"
Trinidad Sanchez, Jr, "Work Work Work"
Edward Sanders, "America: A History" (excerpts)
Herbert Scott, "Bag Boy"
Vivian Shipley, "The Hard Way Was the Only Way You Knew"
Betsy Sholl, "Pink Slip"
Marc Kelly Smith, "Underdog" and "Pull the Next One Up"
Lamont B. Steptoe, "Day Worker" and "Seamstress"
Quincy Troupe, "Poem for My Brother Timmy"
Chris Tysh, "This Is Not My Beautiful House: Five Uncanny Sites"
Diane Wakoski, "The Butcher’s Apron"
Barry Wallenstein, "Tony’s Dad"
Mary Ann Wehler, "1943"
Joe. E. Weil, "Ode to Elizabeth, NJ"
Roger Weingarten, "Father Hunger & Son"
Jack White, "The Big Three Killed My Baby"
Walt Whitman, "I Hear America Singing"
II. Short Fiction
Jeanne Bryner, "Turn the Radio to a Gospel Station"
Bonnie Jo Campbell, "Selling Manure" and "King Cole's American Salvage"
Willa Cather, "Paul’s Case"
Wanda Coleman, "The Friday Night Shift at the Taco House Blues (Wah-Wah)"
Stephen Crane, "Maggie"
Jim Daniels, "No Pets"
Kathleen Glynn, "Spring Today"
Bill Harris, "At The Movies"
Lolita Hernandez, "No Puedo Bailar"
Christopher T. Leland, "The Old West"
M.L. Liebler, "Swallowing Camels"
Colleen McElroy, "Sister Detroit"
Bret Lott, "Work"
John Sayles, "The 7/10 Split"
Larry Smith, "Outside the Millgate"
Clifford Odets, "I Can’t Sleep"
Jeff Vande Zande, "Layoff"
Xu Xi, "To Body To Chicken"
III. Non-Fiction, Histories & Memoirs
Rebecca Harding Davis, Excerpt from "Life in the Iron Mills"
Dorothy Day, Excerpts from "The Dorothy Day Reader"
Jennifer Gillan, "Navigating New Jeresy"
Woody Guthrie, from "Bound for Glory"
Ben Hamper, Excerpt from "Rivethead"
Thomas Lynch, Excerpt from "The Undertaking"
Michael Moore, "Horatio Alger Must Die"
Henry P. Rosemont, "Benjamin Franklin & The Philadelphia Typographical Strikers of 1786"
Al Young, Memoir Excerpt