Unfortunately only the simplest statements meet that gold standard for truth.
How about "Poetry is rhythmic language, or language set to measure, but
some poetry I really don't like because..."?
What you've accomplished is to use a definition usually applied to verse
which advances the cause of peace not one wit.
Groups form for several reasons. The three that apply here are I think that
a. One finds both irrelevant and abhorrent what another crowd is doing
b. One joins with others to protect a position of power
c. One joins with others to challenge a position of power.
No way to finesse these, Henry. You might better understand why there's a
battle if you come to understand why some of us value Williams.
At 03:36 PM 8/6/2000 EDT, Henry wrote:
>
>I've gotten interested lately in developing a minimalist theory of poetry.
>Though I've never been a great fan of his work, William Carlos Williams
>moved in that direction with his concept of "measure".
>
>The minimalist definition of poetry:
>Poetry is rhythmic language, or language set to measure. Period.
>
>I like this because it is both stripped-down and inclusive. What it might
>encourage is not the negation of taste or the dumbing-down of poetics,
>but the recognition that every stylistic or theoretical or art-political
>addition to it is exactly that: an add-on. To be evaluated on its own
>terms, and not by tendentious comparison to some rival add-on scheme.
>Each stylistic development from this basic definition would be seen as
>a choice, and the critic would be free to decide whether or not they
>think it "works" - on its own terms.
>
>I think such an approach might place some of the endless "position-taking"
>and slurs & flattery of various schools & trends in a slightly different
>light. They wouldn't be able to depend upon renderings of this or that
>theoretical sophism or basically meaningless calculations of
>popularity, trendiness, or other phantoms of literary hegemony.
>The rhetoric would have fewer stage-props.
>
>Is this a pipe-dream, or does the Emperor really have no clothes?
>In order for it to be effective, of course, it would probably require
>some sort of critical Instauration in its own right...
>
>But the basic idea is that there really is a SIMPLE definition of what
>poetry is. It short-circuits sophistic COMPLEX justifications.
>Not that complexity isn't FUN - but it stops being fun when it becomes
>tendentious.
>
>I was inspired in this direction by some readings in the philosophy of
>John Searle & William Alston, who moved toward a minimalist version of
>the correspondence theory of truth. Roughly: A proposition is true
>when what it states is actually the case. Ie: "Gold is malleable"
>is a true statement, because in reality, gold IS malleable. You might
>be surprised at how philosophically unpopular such a supposed truism
>has been for the last 30 years.
>
>It's only common sense! ;-)
>
>Henry
>
>"Do not compare - the living is beyond comparison." - O. Mandelstam
>
>
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
|