Culinary List Form in the Experimental Poetry of 1960s Finland : Literary Menus and Recipes

Abstract

This chapter investigates the close relationship between the list form and experimental writing, and the poetic and literary usage of the form in the ideologically countercultural experimental setting of the 1960s. The focus is on Finnish literature of the decade and texts that utilize the culinary forms of recipe and menu, both of which are essentially based on listing. The texts examined, thus, combine two traditions: the history of food listings in literature, and the fondness for the list form in experimental and avant-garde traditions. The article begins by considering the recurring position of lists in the experimental writing of the 1960s. Lists are compared to other formal resources used in experimental writing, like found texts or constraints. Then, four examples, literary menus and recipes by Kari Aronpuro, Kalevi Lappalainen, Anselm Hollo, and M. A. Numminen are taken into closer reading.