{ASSD} What is a poem
cmsix
actually constitutes a poem. I tried a few Google searches to see if I could
get an idea but they were worse than useless.
I know that some of you write poems and I'd like to know what you think
makes a poem a poem.
cmsix
oosh
news:oOU29.10698$nc.8...@newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net:
> I know that some of you write poems and I'd like to know what you
> think makes a poem a poem.
This is such a tough question, one that I've asked myself many times.
In poetry, words are more carefully chosen and have to work much harder
than in prose. Also, the pattern of their arrangement adds to what is said.
O.
cmsix
is a poem and another isn't
cmsix
.
"oosh" <oo...@gmx.NOSPAM.net> wrote in message
news:Xns925FD6D3D4...@217.32.252.50...
oosh
news:5RW29.10871$nc.8...@newsread1.prod.itd.earthlink.net:
> But can a poem be defined. Are there rules that can be used to say one
> work is a poem and another isn't
On at least one occasion, I've written something that I thought was prose,
and have afterwards been prompted to reclassify it as a poem. The only sure
thing is that, as a result of this reclassification, the work is read by
far fewer people. I could point to at least two of my pieces that seem to
defy classification as either prose or poetry.
So I should be interested to learn of these rules, if anyone has a copy.
O.
Katie McN
On Sat, 3 Aug 2002 23:23:02 +0000 (UTC) I noticed your interesting
post:
Hehehe. I think we are going to have quite a few examples of poems on
September 7 when we see the postings for the Sapphic Festival. No doubt
it will still be hard to say what a poem is. I guess it's like the
famous definition of porn and many other things, "I can't say what it
is, but know it when I see it."
--
It's Me Katie McN
Read My Stories at:
www.asstr.org/~Katie_McN/
den...@tanstaafl.zipcon.net.invalid
held forth, saying:
>So I should be interested to learn of these rules, if anyone has a copy.
We could ask DrSpin...
--
-denny- (curmudgeon)
"There are two tragedies in life.
One is to lose your heart's desire. The other is to gain it."
-- G.B. Shaw
oosh
news:07kpkusoo83uqaqm7...@4ax.com:
> Hehehe. I think we are going to have quite a few examples of poems on
> September 7 when we see the postings for the Sapphic Festival. No
> doubt it will still be hard to say what a poem is. I guess it's like
> the famous definition of porn and many other things, "I can't say what
> it is, but know it when I see it."
Yes, we know it when we see it. One interesting approach to hard-to-define
terms is to provide a list of Y separate characteristics said to denote a
poem (or whatever). It's a poem if it scores more than X out of Y. I gladly
pass this one on to the taxonomists.
O.
mat twassel
>
>Yes, we know it when we see it. One interesting approach to hard-to-define
>terms is to provide a list of Y separate characteristics said to denote a
>poem (or whatever). It's a poem if it scores more than X out of Y. I gladly
>pass this one on to the taxonomists.
In grade school we learned that if it rhymes it's a poem. In junior high we
learned that poetry is charged language -- STOP being just one example. In high
school we learned that if the line breaks matter, then it's probably a poem.
(Not that it can't be a poem if line breaks don't matter, but those are usually
called prose poems.)
--Mat Twassel
Mat's Erotic Calendar at http://calendar.atEros.com
Jeff Zephyr
Poems have rhythm. Prose may sometimes be lyrical, but on average
it fails to sustain it over many lines -- and if it does, it is
poetry.
Rhymes are one way to create the rhythm, but there are other ways.
Can a poem still be a poem if it has no pattern to it at all?
--
Jeff
Web site at http://www.asstr.org/~jeffzephyr/
For FTP, ftp://ftp.asstr.org/pub/Authors/jeffzephyr/
There is nothing more important than petting the cat.
Kelli Halliburton
> it fails to sustain it over many lines -- and if it does, it is
> poetry.
>
> Rhymes are one way to create the rhythm, but there are other ways.
> Can a poem still be a poem if it has no pattern to it at all?
Can a poem
be a poem
if it has no
pattern to it?
It's a question
for the ages
and the sages
to think through it.
There is blank verse
and there's free verse --
one has rhythm,
one has none.
And yet somehow
both are poems.
How are poems
therefore done?
I would claim that
poets aim at
rhythm hidden
in the free verse.
And the patterns
in the poems
make the poems'
readers see verse.
NormDePloom
--
Norm DePloom
Send email to:
MyStories at normdeploom dot com
Campus Crusade for Cthulhu
Carpe noctem.
;-})>
cmsix
probably caused by Joyce Kilmer spinning in his grave.
cmsix
"NormDePloom" <SeeM...@InMessage.com> wrote in message
news:fEj39.251504$Wt3.247162@rwcrnsc53...
Tesseract
> On Sat, 3 Aug 2002 23:23:02 +0000 (UTC), oosh <oo...@gmx.NOSPAM.net>
> held forth, saying:
>
> >So I should be interested to learn of these rules, if anyone has a copy.
>
> We could ask DrSpin...
Poetry is that which poets write, and decide to call poetry, as
opposed to, say, a shopping list.
A poet is someone who writes poetry.
Yes, it is circular, but, as with all artistic definitions, you can't
really get much better since the arts are constantly changing.
Tesseract
NormDePloom
news:b3e529bf.02080...@posting.google.com...
| den...@TANSTAAFL.zipcon.net.invalid wrote in message
news:<fmapkuotlahr998u2...@4ax.com>...
| > On Sat, 3 Aug 2002 23:23:02 +0000 (UTC), oosh <oo...@gmx.NOSPAM.net>
| > held forth, saying:
| >
| > >So I should be interested to learn of these rules, if anyone has a
copy.
| >
| > We could ask DrSpin...
|
| Poetry is that which poets write, and decide to call poetry, as
| opposed to, say, a shopping list.
|
I have seen poems that were considerably less interesting than the average
shopping list.
Katie McN
On Mon, 05 Aug 2002 00:49:26 GMT I noticed your interesting post:
>That slight eccentricity in the earth's orbit that you just felt was
>probably caused by Joyce Kilmer spinning in his grave.
>
Serves him right for trying to pass as a woman.
cmsix
"Katie McN" <kati...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:19vrku8cs00vkc5lk...@4ax.com...
>
> Serves him right for trying to pass as a woman.
>
also wrote a wonderful sonnet to his mother dedicating his book to her. He
didn't use his first name, Alfred.
cmsix
Bradley Stoke
If you wrote this poem, then you are clearly the most talented writer
I have ever read on this newsgroup. If you didn't, then I must
compliment you on a selection of verse which explained what a poem is
better than I've ever seen before.
Thank you for sharing it with us,
Bradley Stoke
--
For More : http://www.asstr.org/~Bradley_Stoke
Tesseract
> "Tesseract" <hyperte...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> news:b3e529bf.02080...@posting.google.com...
> | den...@TANSTAAFL.zipcon.net.invalid wrote in message
> news:<fmapkuotlahr998u2...@4ax.com>...
> | > On Sat, 3 Aug 2002 23:23:02 +0000 (UTC), oosh <oo...@gmx.NOSPAM.net>
> | > held forth, saying:
> | >
> | > >So I should be interested to learn of these rules, if anyone has a
> copy.
> | >
> | > We could ask DrSpin...
> |
> | Poetry is that which poets write, and decide to call poetry, as
> | opposed to, say, a shopping list.
> |
>
> I have seen poems that were considerably less interesting than the average
> shopping list.
Now you're trying to define good art versus bad art. Political careers
have been destroyed on this question. Are you sure you want to risk
it?
Tesseract
Katie McN
On Mon, 05 Aug 2002 04:29:53 GMT I noticed your interesting post:
If he was from Texas he could have solved his identity problem by going
by the name of AJ Killmer which I feel has a more masculine ring. Course
then he'd probably have written adventure stories and sagas of the old
west instead of incest poetry, but who knows. ;-)
cmsix
> If he was from Texas he could have solved his identity problem by going
> by the name of AJ Killmer which I feel has a more masculine ring.
Everyone can't be from Texas. That's their burden to bear, not ours.
cmsix
I think that I shall never see
a poem lovely as a tree
Then the sawhead comes and mows it down
and it's up on my logtruck, I haul it to town.
Jeff Zephyr
That is pretty good.
Is it a definition? It is at least poetic justice ;-)
Kelli Halliburton
>
> Is it a definition? It is at least poetic justice ;-)
Thanks. I wrote it on the spur of the moment, which is not how I usually
write poetry.
cmsix
news:b1F39.107$Iw6.8...@newssvr16.news.prodigy.com...
> Thanks. I wrote it on the spur of the moment, which is not how I usually
> write poetry.
>
That's just not fair. You write poetry on the spur of the moment and I can
only muster wise cracks that way. Most of them aren't even funny.
I liked it too though.
cmsix
"Kelli Halliburton" <kell...@crosswinds.not> wrote in message
news:b1F39.107$Iw6.8...@newssvr16.news.prodigy.com...
Kelli Halliburton
news:20020809195835...@mb-mn.aol.com...
> Terzanelle and villanelle?
> I don't know either very well.
> If on them you base a need to fuss
> All your base are belong to us.
Bravo, Mr. Jordan!
While I agree that knowledge of arcane forms is valuable, I disagree as to
the degree.
Uther would have us all write poems that could double as prose. I suppose
that prose is a good standard for poetry that the author wishes to fall
easily from the lips of the reader. But what if that is not the author's
intent? What if the intent is to cause tension by manipulating the structure
of the text, forcing pauses, reversing word order? If poetry is the
evocative use of language, then what does it matter what form is used to
evoke? I suppose that Uther would consider e. e. cummings to be a
"second-rate" poet.
Which brings us to Elf. Elf would have us researching formal poetry schema.
The first thing that comes to mind when I think about this assertion, or
contention if you will, is Walt Whitman. Specifically, "When I Heard the
Learned Astronomer." It is possible to get so bogged down in the minutiae of
form that one loses sight of the simple beauty that is possible with poetry.
Tesseract
> On Fri, 09 Aug 2002 04:08:01 GMT, "David Formosa (aka ? the Platypus)"
> <dfor...@dformosa.zeta.org.au> wrote:
>
> >On Thu, 08 Aug 2002 16:56:24 -0000, Elf Sternberg <e...@drizzle.com>
> >wrote:
> >
> >[...]
> >
> >> If you can't tell the difference between a villanelle and a
> >> terzanelle, you shouldn't be writing poetry. (I confess, in one story I
> >> started out writing a terzanelle and ended up writing a villanelle, but
> >> all I had to do was re-write the introductory paragraph to fix that
> >> problem.) Poems are built, not written; they are *work*, and a sonnet
> >> should take as much effort as a thousand word story.
> >
> >Soi by this rule a lymaric is not a poam?
>
> Struck me that Elf was being a wee bit didactic and ivory-towerish. I
> rather suspect that a number of good--and acknowledged as good--poets
> have/have had no clue what either a villanelle or terzanelle would be.
>
> <note to self. some time when overburdened with extra moments, look
> those terms up at onelook.com>
>
> By that rule, many haiku wouldn't be poems. And many others would.
I looked.
villanelle
A 19-line poem of fixed form consisting of five tercets and a final
quatrain on two rhymes, with the first and third lines of the first
tercet repeated alternately as a refrain closing the succeeding
stanzas and joined as the final couplet of the quatrain.
(http://www.dictionary.com/cgi-bin/dict.pl?term=villanelle)
terzanelle
Sorry, no dictionaries indexed in the selected category contain the
word terzanelle.
(http://onelook.com/?q=terzanelle&ls=a)
Tesseract
Elf Sternberg
den...@TANSTAAFL.zipcon.net.invalid writes:
>Struck me that Elf was being a wee bit didactic and ivory-towerish. I
>rather suspect that a number of good--and acknowledged as good--poets
>have/have had no clue what either a villanelle or terzanelle would be.
And I suspect that you'd be wrong about that. While you're
right in that I was being a touch ivory-towerish about things, on the
other claw I'm really very tired of people who think that what they spew
out of their minds raw and put on paper with funny line breaks qualifies
as poetry. Most of the poets I know who have published through
established poetry outlets know what a villanelle is, although for most
of them the extent of the knowledge is that "it's the form in which
Dylan Thomas's _Rage, Rage Against The Dying Of The Light_ is written."
A familiarity and regular practice with the forms and internals of
poetry are about as essential to being a good poet as, well, familiarity
and regular practice with the forms and internals of prose are essential
to being a good writer.
><note to self. some time when overburdened with extra moments, look
>those terms up at onelook.com>
A villanelle is a poem of five triplets and a quatrain. The
first line of the first triplet is the last line of the second triplet
and fourth; the last line of the first triplet is repeated as the last
of the third triplet and fifth triplets. Those two lines then make up
the last two lines of the quatrain.
A terzanelle is a little simpler. It's still five triplets and
a quatrain, but it is the second line of each triplet that is repeated
as the third line of the following triplet. The quatrain is built of a
new line, the first line of the first triplet, the second line of the
last triplet, and the last line of the first triplet.
They're fun. Difficult, but fun.
>By that rule, many haiku wouldn't be poems. And many others would.
Haiku, in Japanese, is work. It's small enough to be held in
one's head, but you don't write it down until you've worked it over
repeatedly. Also, one of the few things Americans appreciate about
haiku is that real haiku is not meant to be read so much as looked at,
with much of the haikuist's acclaim being for his calligraphy and his
choice and knowledge of kanji. When you've mastered the 30,000 forms of
traditional kanji, then maybe you can start on being a haiku artist.
Most of what Americans think is haiku is really senryu, a crass
and low-brow form of poetry. Most of the haiku we're exposed to hear is
on par with limericks.
Elf
--
Elf M. Sternberg, rational romantic mystical cynical idealist
http://www.drizzle.com/~elf
EAC Department of Corrective Phrenology
oosh
> ...While you're
> right in that I was being a touch ivory-towerish about things, on the
> other claw I'm really very tired of people who think that what they spew
> out of their minds raw and put on paper with funny line breaks qualifies
> as poetry. Most of the poets I know who have published through
> established poetry outlets know what a villanelle is, although for most
> of them the extent of the knowledge is that "it's the form in which
> Dylan Thomas's _Rage, Rage Against The Dying Of The Light_ is written."
How impressed should we be by the artistic credentials of "standard
outlets"?
You don't have to have a clever name for what you're doing in order to do
it. People invent names and classifications for what artists do. Expertise
in classification does not equal expertise in artistic creation.
Familiarity with C20 music would show you that the equivalent of those
crazy poets with their "raw spew" and "funny line breaks" were composers
whose idea of rigour and organization in art put all previous artistic
discipline into the shade. Stockhausen was a case in point. He started out
ultra-rigorous, and then went over to randomness - he discovered that it
sounded more or less the same.
O.
den...@tanstaafl.zipcon.net.invalid
wrote:
>>Struck me that Elf was being a wee bit didactic and ivory-towerish. I
>>rather suspect that a number of good--and acknowledged as good--poets
>>have/have had no clue what either a villanelle or terzanelle would be.
>
> And I suspect that you'd be wrong about that. While you're
>right in that I was being a touch ivory-towerish about things, on the
>other claw I'm really very tired of people who think that what they spew
>out of their minds raw and put on paper with funny line breaks qualifies
>as poetry. Most of the poets I know who have published through
>established poetry outlets know what a villanelle is, although for most
>of them the extent of the knowledge is that "it's the form in which
>Dylan Thomas's _Rage, Rage Against The Dying Of The Light_ is written."
And 'Most of the poets I know...' makes 'a number of good...no
clue...villanelle or terzanelle....' wrong how? I said "a number" --
that certainly doesn't imply or suggest all or most; it suggests a
noticeable quantity. You don't address if those 'most' you know are
up on terzanelles. I find it interesting that when Tesseract checked
onelook.com (searches a LOT of online dictionaries) for terzanelle, he
got zero hits.
I grant you your point that good poetry usually requires a lot of
work; so does good writing of any kind. But note the 'usually' and
'good' qualifiers. But bad poetry is still poetry.
lisala
wrote:
> A familiarity and regular practice with the forms and internals of
> poetry are about as essential to being a good poet as, well, familiarity
> and regular practice with the forms and internals of prose are essential
> to being a good writer.
Granted, there are differences between prose and poetry, but they
aren't always that clear cut. For one thing, the "forms and internals"
are decidedly dependent on time and language. And your example of the
villanell? It wasn't always what it is now--Dylan's is a modern form of
villanelle, and is far less numerous than than the "original" form.
It's also metrically quite different.
And the distinction between prose and poetry isn't that easy to
make--particularly since in some languages poetry is defined
exclusively in terms of formal, elaborate, metrical schemes that are
not dependent on line length.
There are many who argue that Beowulf is prose. They say the same thing
about Wanderer and Seafarer.
It isn't. It's poetry. Then there are long standing traditions of
prose works with long interpolations of poetry in Hindu and Irish--the
works are considered poems though, not prose works.
The criteria for "familiarity and regular practice with the forms" is a
bit vague. I know for a fact that a number of published familiar poets
haven't a clue what formal structure they're using--they just wrote
what worked. They hear the words, they don't sit there and work out the
meter and scheme and verse structure. Sure, some do, but not all--not
even most. Take a look at the drafts of Shelley, Keats, and Wordsworth.
Look at Frost's drafts. Look at Wyatt from manuscript versus Wyatt in
Tottle's. Look at Hopkins' drafts, and read his endless struggles in
his letters as he tried to find a formal name for the meter and rhyme
schemes he heard in his head. Look at Denise Levertov, or Marilyn
Hacker--Hacker is one of the most likely to sit down and declare "today
I shall write in rannaigheacht mhor"--but then she ends up inventing
new forms.
There are those who do take a fierce analytical, structural, even rigid
approach to their composition. But not all of them. Poets often haven't
a clue about analysing there aret--they just know what they hear in the
heart, and in their head.
lisala
cmsix <cm...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> > Now, what is a poet?
A "maker," or if you're fond of Middle Scots, a "makar." Poet, from the
Greek Poiein, to make or shape. create.
Filidh "poet" in Irish; the root has to do with "seeing."
Scop Old English; cognate with Modern English "shape"
As Sidney puts it in his Defense of Poesy:
Only the poet, disdaining to be tied on any such subjugation, lifted up
with the vigor of his own invention doeth grow in effect into another
nature, in making things either better than nature brings forth, or
quite anew...gods, Cyclops etc. Nature's world is brazen, the poets
only deliver a golden.
Katie McN
On Sat, 10 Aug 2002 22:18:08 +0000 (UTC) I noticed your interesting
post:
>e...@drizzle.com (Elf Sternberg) wrote in news:1028997316.181899@yasure:
Academics tend to invent terms to classify just about every form of
artistic expression. The next step would be to hold seminars where the
one with the most tenure tells the others about the latest new-speak.
The final step would then be to say that anyone who didn't understand
the meaning of the terms was incapable of creating art in the related
fields.
I've been studying oil painting recently and find it interesting that
there appears to be a synthesis trend coming from those who are writing
books for classroom use. Unfortunately, none of the authors agree on the
number or enumeration of the points an artist *must* know in order to be
able to create an oil painting. All I can figure is that no one is
capable of creating an oil painting since it is not possible to follow
many almost unrelated sets of required knowledge. I guess the artistic
expressions that fill museums must be something other than oil painting
even though they look like paintings to me.
Grandma Moses probably didn't know the definition of any of the terms
these people use and probably didn't care. Jackson Pollock probably knew
the meaning of all of them and didn't care either for different reasons.
When the French Impressionists were creating works that are now
considered to be master pieces, many French academics and almost all of
the art critics found fault with what people like Monet, Pissaro,
Renoir, Degas, Cezanne, Gaugin, Cassatt and Van Gogh were doing. The
government of France declared this work to be non-art and refused to
allow it to be exhibited in state sponsored showings for over 12 years.
Last December, the US Public Broadcasting System had an excellent
presentation on how the Impressionists suffered at the hands of
academics and critics which I'm sure will shown again here in the
states.
I'm amazed that academics produce so few works of real creative merit
even though they know all the latest buzz words. Sorry I forgot about
academic journals and academic exhibitions so I guess by weight and
volume they are productive and so forth.
E.Z. Riter
"cmsix" <cm...@hotmail.com> wrote>
> I know that some of you write poems and I'd like to know what you think
> makes a poem a poem.
The answer is easy as the following story demonstrates:
There was a school teacher, a pretty young thing, trying to teach English to
a class of third graders. Specifically, she was working on the difference
between prose and poetry.
"Class," she said sweetly, "Mary had a little lamb is poetry.
'Mary had a little lamb, its fleece was white as snow,
And everywhere that Mary went, her lamb was sure to go.'
"Snow and go rhyme. That makes it poetry. Who can give us another example."
"I got one, teacher," Johnny said from the back of the room.
The teacher was reluctant to ask because little Johnny was the class sex
fiend who always tried to look up her dress, but she said brightly, "What it
is, Johnny?"
"Mary had a little pig.
It was a cunning little runt.
It put its nose up Mary's dress
And smelled her little... do you want prose or poetry?"
The teacher almost died, but she gasped out "poetry."
"I knew you'd say that," Johnny leered.
E.Z.
NightShade
wrote:
That begs the question - was it the same 'good' or the same 'bad'
poetry? Sounds like what you're saying is that the placement of
linebreaks won't improve bad poetry. No?
NightShade
If it wasn't for all the idiots,
We might actually have to deal with something that mattered.
NightShade
wrote:
<slash>
>
>I'm amazed that academics produce so few works of real creative merit
>even though they know all the latest buzz words. Sorry I forgot about
>academic journals and academic exhibitions so I guess by weight and
>volume they are productive and so forth.
You forget - "Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach."
lisala
<kati...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> Hi oosh <oo...@gmx.NOSPAM.net>,
>
> On Sat, 10 Aug 2002 22:18:08 +0000 (UTC) I noticed your interesting
> post:
<snip of Elf's post as quoted by Oosh>
Oosh asks, in response to Elf:
> >How impressed should we be by the artistic credentials of "standard
> >outlets"?
> >
> >You don't have to have a clever name for what you're doing in order to do
> >it. People invent names and classifications for what artists do. Expertise
> >in classification does not equal expertise in artistic creation.
<snip>
To which Katie responds, sounding as if maybe she missedOosh's point.:
> Academics tend to invent terms to classify just about every form of
> artistic expression. The next step would be to hold seminars where the
> one with the most tenure tells the others about the latest new-speak.
> The final step would then be to say that anyone who didn't understand
> the meaning of the terms was incapable of creating art in the related
> fields.
Oosh is making the point that knowing a "clever name" is not required
for artistic endeavor. And once most academics get tenure they stop
worrying about the latest new-speak; they no longer have to compete.
The ones who would be most likely to "say that anyone who didn't
understand the meaning of the terms" are the newly minted faculty on
the tenure track, and overly caffeinated graduate students.
<snip>
> I'm amazed that academics produce so few works of real creative merit
> even though they know all the latest buzz words. Sorry I forgot about
> academic journals and academic exhibitions so I guess by weight and
> volume they are productive and so forth.
You need to read a bit more. Donald Hall, Charles Bukowski, Marilyn
Hacker, Charles Simic--all of them very well published, respected
poets, and all of them "academics" as well. Oh yeah--they also write
for academic journals, and they teach.
And yes, academics write books about primary texts too, and it is the
actions of academics teaching and writing about poets (and novelists,
and artists, and yes, pornographers) that expose the artists to a wider
audience.
And if you think writing a critical study is not "real creative work,"
well, you're daft.
lisala
<i_m_nig...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> You forget - "Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach."
That's just nasty. And yes, I do take it personally. I suspect a few
others here might as well--Oosh, or Selene, or Alexis, or Conjugate.
cmsix
insulted, or did I just leave out the punctuation?
>Maybe those who can write and those who can't make rules.
>cmsix
"NightShade" <i_m_nig...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:ocqclu8jomf3f1lj0...@4ax.com...
den...@tanstaafl.zipcon.net.invalid
wrote:
<snipped most of another post by she who posts too rarely.
Informative, scholarly, and well-said. go read it.>
>There are those who do take a fierce analytical, structural, even rigid
>approach to their composition. But not all of them. Poets often haven't
>a clue about analysing there aret--they just know what they hear in the
>heart, and in their head.
Yes.
Applause.
Alexis Siefert
>Date: 8/11/2002 11:20 AM Alaskan Standard Time
>Message-id: <110820021220360403%lis...@noucenewsguy.com>
Thank you, Lisala. Yes, I do.
Alexis
(gearing up for fall semester -- finished setting up my classroom this
afternoon. Ready for summer school students to arrive first thing tomorrow
morning).
~~~~~~
ftp://ftp.asstr.org/pub/Authors/Alexis_S/
http://www.asstr.org/~Alexis_S/
Celebrating the Events of ASSD/ASSM/ASSTR:
http://www.asstr.org/~Alexis_S/HIA_Events.htm
The Web's Best Illustrated Adult Fiction is at http://www.ruthiesclub.com/
See-El
> How impressed should we be by the artistic credentials of "standard
> outlets"?
>
> You don't have to have a clever name for what you're doing in order to do
> it. People invent names and classifications for what artists do. Expertise
> in classification does not equal expertise in artistic creation.
>
> Familiarity with C20 music would show you that the equivalent of those
> crazy poets with their "raw spew" and "funny line breaks" were composers
> whose idea of rigour and organization in art put all previous artistic
> discipline into the shade. Stockhausen was a case in point. He started out
> ultra-rigorous, and then went over to randomness - he discovered that it
> sounded more or less the same.
"Parade" magazine had a comment by a columnist that she didn't include
mathematical formulas and symbols because logic was more important than
specialized knowledge.
Discouraging creation or participation because someone lacks specialized
knowledge is something to be avoided; especially so in an amateur
setting. It may make someone feel more clever, but breeds nothing but
contempt by those amateurs attempting to have a bit of fun.
I think that knowing the rules is important so that you can know when to
break them, and familiarity with what has existed before is very
helpful, but no, poetry need not be rocket science, and more work need
not be done than a full length story to be an artistic creation.
They would probably encourage those to throw away their Bob Ross kits
and get a degree or two in the field before being calling them an
artist.
A poem is what the poet says it is.
See-El
See-El
>> You forget - "Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach."
>
> That's just nasty. And yes, I do take it personally. I suspect a few
> others here might as well--Oosh, or Selene, or Alexis, or Conjugate.
I think that it was meant to be humorous rather than personal and
should be taken or ignored as such.
A more complete line was posted here a couple of years ago:
Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach. Those who can't teach,
write criticism.
It went on to explain that critics drink a lot and have short
lifespans.
That one was perhaps more humorous.
See-El
NightShade
There is not much I could say here that would not constitute swapping
one foot for the other. However, being of the sort who rushes in
where others fear to tread, it isn't an original quote and I intended
it lightly. I apologize if some took offense.
lisala
<See...@nym.alias.net> wrote:
> It went on to explain that critics drink a lot and have short
> lifespans.
Thanks for the explanation See-El
lisala
<i_m_nig...@Removethis.hotmail.com> wrote:
> However, being of the sort who rushes in
> where others fear to tread, it isn't an original quote and I intended
> it lightly. I apologize if some took offense.
Thanks Nightshade, for taking the time to post this.
Alexis Siefert
>Date: 8/12/2002 9:23 PM Alaskan Standard Time
>Message-id: <120820022223567024%lis...@noucenewsguy.com>
Oh, fine. If Lisala's going to be grown up about this, then so will I.
:-)
Alexis.
Selena Jardine
[snipping a bit]
Katie said:
> > I'm amazed that academics produce so few works of real creative merit
> > even though they know all the latest buzz words. Sorry I forgot about
> > academic journals and academic exhibitions so I guess by weight and
> > volume they are productive and so forth.
>
> You need to read a bit more. Donald Hall, Charles Bukowski, Marilyn
> Hacker, Charles Simic--all of them very well published, respected
> poets, and all of them "academics" as well. Oh yeah--they also write
> for academic journals, and they teach.
Let me add Billy Collins to that list. He's our current poet laureate
in the United States, and he's an "academic" as well.
> And yes, academics write books about primary texts too, and it is the
> actions of academics teaching and writing about poets (and novelists,
> and artists, and yes, pornographers) that expose the artists to a wider
> audience.
>
> And if you think writing a critical study is not "real creative work,"
> well, you're daft.
Those of you in different time zones? Sorry to wake you up with my
cheering.
This, of course, is an essential point. It's not that I want to say
that a critical study of a creative work is *more* important than the
creative work itself, but simply, as lisala said, that it is, itself,
a creative work. It is real writing that sharpens the whole craft --
or can, at its best. (It can also be, as Father Nat is so fond of
pointing out, pseudo-intellectual masturbation. I mean, let's admit
it.)
Selena
(Cheerleader Professor)
selena...@yahoo.com
oosh
news:b653f8ec.02081...@posting.google.com:
> (It can also be... pseudo-intellectual masturbation. I mean, let's admit
> it.)
Ego auctoritate mea et totius hae academiae admitto te, praeclarissima
Domina, ad gradum Masturbatricis in Litteris, et ad omnem delectationem
quae ei pertinet.
O (M Litt)
Selena Jardine
Placet.
Selena
selena...@yahoo.com
Uther Pendragon
> Uther would have us all write poems that could double as prose. I
> suppose that prose is a good standard for poetry that the author
> wishes to fall easily from the lips of the reader. But what if
> that is not the author's intent? What if the intent is to cause
> tension by manipulating the structure of the text, forcing
> pauses, reversing word order? If poetry is the evocative use of
> language, then what does it matter what form is used to evoke? I
> suppose that Uther would consider e. e. cummings to be a
> "second-rate" poet.
From *Sonnets Actualities*, by E. E. Cummings.
"When my love comes to see me, it's just a little like music, a
little more like curving colour (say orange) against silence or
darkness."
From "She Being Brand-New" by E. E. Cummings.
"She being brand-new and, you know, consequently a little stiff, I
was careful of her and (having thoroughly oiled the universal
joint, tested my gas, felt of her radiator, made sure her springs
were OK) I went right to it."
I had to add a little capitalization and punctuation. The second
piece is a run-on sentence, which I cut mostly because I was
copying this from a book.
The latter poem is a marvel, by the way. It is a description of
a test ride in a (rather old-fashioned by now) car. It is also
an erotic poem describing (MF 1st).
--
Uther Pendragon FAQs http://www.nyx.net/~anon584c
anon...@nyx.net fiqshn http://www.asstr.org/~Uther_Pendragon