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about the Book of VoicesThe Book of Voices is e-poets' living gallery of literature in text, spoken word, and multimedia; a literary collection lending context, a sense of place, and identity to aural poetry from artists throughout e-poets' community. It illustrates what we mean when we advocate "aural literacy": language and wisdom are no less valid when borne of breath instead of paper. We take pride in presenting distinctive, original performance work often found nowhere else. We support this literature in a durable way by keeping it online for reference, for study, and for the basic pleasure of poetry. The Book of Voices began its life as a way to share some of the recordings our poetry videoconferences held in Chicago. But such video communications have a way of encouraging travel. As the e-poets network has grown, artists near and far have come to us, or we've gone to them, and so this collection has taken on a life of its own. International traffic among us spans most of the English-language world and significant parts of the rest, from the USA, Canada, England, mainland Europe, and Australia. It's cosmopolitan, and we like it that way. Like literary anthropologists, we've gone on expeditions where the poetry lives, and have brought the voices of poets back home, to share with you on the web. We also make studio recordings just for the purpose of presenting the work here, independent of any videoconferences. This library of audio poetry enables e-poets' streaming "web radio" programs, to expand the presence of diverse performance poetry to homes and schools worldwide. The Book of Voices takes online poetry beyond the sound-byte threshold, encouraging readers to engage spoken word literature in a direct and personal way, and to understand the art in depth. We steer clear of vanity publishing, dropping names just so we get hits from search engines. We would rather showcase many good poems by a few strong poets, instead of presenting one mediocre poem from everybody in a given "scene." We present the work in a critically informed context which encourages study, advances cultural awareness, and embraces print and performance with ecumenical balance. Whether it's page or stage, town or gown, it's all one body of literature to us. Artists who are interested in participating in the Book of Voices project are encouraged to review submission guidelines in the e-poets network FAQ. - Kurt Heintz, founder, e-poets network
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