Rena J. Mosteirin
LecturerLecturer in the Masters of Arts in Liberal Studies ProgramFulbright Writing Advisor and Interviewer
I wrote a novella called Nick Trail's Thumb that was selected by Lydia Davis for the Kore Press Short Fiction Award and published by Kore Press. I have a poetry chapbook called half-fabulous whales (Little Dipper, 2019) that is sold out but there's a digital version that you can print and fold and make your own chapbook here.
Moonbit (punctum books, 2019) is a hybrid work comprised of experimental poetry and a critical theory of the poetics and politics of computer code. It offers an extended intellectual and creative engagement with the affordances of computer software through multiple readings and re-writings of a singular text, the source code of the Apollo 11 Guidance Computer or the “AGC.” Moonbit re-marks and remixes the code that made space travel possible. Half of this book is erasure poetry that uses the AGC code as the source text, building on the premise that code can speak beyond its functional purpose.
Both half-fabulous whales and my contributions to Moonbit are erasure poetry. Herman Melville's great American novel Moby-Dick is the source text for half-fabulous whales. The Apollo Guidance Computer code, specifically the code that took Apollo 11 to the moon, is the source text for Moonbit. Erasure poetry is an experimental form developed by the French writers of the OULIPO, the Workshop for Potential Literature. As I am primarily an experimental poet, it may seem strange that I teach formal poetry. In order to make experimental poetry, we must cultivate an understanding of and appreciation for existing poetic forms.
I spent time at Robert Frost's old farm because of the generosity of the Anne L. Fitzpatrick Fellowship from The Frost Place in Franconia, NH. Judith Volmer selected my work for the Liam Rector Poetry Prize. Eduardo Corral selected my work for publication in The Puritan. I edit Bloodroot Literary Magazine.
Selected Publications
Rena J. Mosteirin and James E. Dobson, Moonbit (punctum books, 2019)
half-fabulous whales (Little Dipper, 2019)
Nick Trail's Thumb (Kore Press, 2008) Winner of the Kore Press Short Fiction Award judged by Lydia Davis
Speaking engagements
Ditmas Lit December 18, 2019 Hinterlands. 739 Church Ave. Brooklyn, NY
Bennington Writers December 17, 2019 KGB Bar. 85 E. 4th Street. New York, NY
No Tokens Issue #8 Launch Party June 12, 2019 Books are Magic. 225 Smith Street. Brooklyn, NY
Poetry & Pie August 3, 2019 Sweetland Farm. Norwich, VT
“Moonbit: A Creative and Critical Reading of the Apollo 11 Guidance Computer Code” SIGCIS 2018: Stored in Memory. St. Louis, MO. October 2018.
“Moonbit.” HaPoP 2018: Fourth Symposium on the History and Philosophy of Programming. Oxford, UK. March 2018.
Anthologized Work
Lunation: A Good Fat Anthology of 114 Women Poets (Senile Monk Press, 2019) Published poem “Do Not Be Afraid”
The Waiting Room Reader II (Fort Lee: Cavankerry Press/UPNE, 2013) Published poem “First the Fan”
{code} poems (Barcelona: Impremta Badia, 2012) Published the source code for my sestina end-word generating tool, written in the programming language Python in sestina form.