>From: "Roger Day" <[log in to unmask]>
>But the cab drivers and the libraries have one thing in common:
language.
>It might not be a common language, but it's language none the less.
>
Yes, this obviously was the point of the original quote. Any English
speaker can by virtue of speaking English create an utterance which will
be accepted as a poem, but only people with appropriate formal training
can create something which will be accepted as a symphony or a piano
performance or an aria.
But it needs to be added that this is true only in our culture in its
present state. There have been all kinds of cultures in which the
production even of a line of poetry requires just as much formal
knowledge and training as the production of music. In such cultures,
presenting any random though meaningful statement as a poem would be as
absurd as if I were to bang away at random on a piano and call it a
composition.
I don't see that this lack of formal standards in poetry has done us
much good.
______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
|