hello Henry

> I guess my problem with this approach is that it is poetry, not
> material circumstances, which seem contingent - or perhaps
> too easily malleable by critics who practice a kind of
> academic hero-worship by slotting their exemplar du jour
> (say, Prynne) with their concept du jour (say, phenomenological
> shrinkage) with their framing agon du jour (say, this ethical
> verge).  I see it as a sort of sophistry.

Interesting this to me, in the first place because until quite recently I
would have seen 'say, Prynne' in very much the same terms and do still
suspect that elements of the mediation that surrounds and articulation of
Prynne do qualify for inclusion in an intellectual ghetto of a very superior
and knowing kind. But and however, from my entirely non-academic viewpoint
(not even a degree, me) and most definitely 'of the bottom' social
actuality, I'm starting to see a Prynne who is addressing areas of
linguistic, psychological and social centrality in a way that no other
current British poet I know of is doing (that tantalising and infuriating
ambiguee Geoffrey Hill did, I think, in 'Mercian Hymns', touch on a
controlling metaphoric concept that could have done so, then promptly backed
away from it. Like a Pandora who didn't dare open the box. Being
'circumspect' and only wishing to 'sniff at myrhh'. A policeman's son is not
a happy one.)
In saying anything other than glancing words about Prynne here I am
immediately nervously wary, sniffing as I do not myrhh but a possibility of
guardian dogs of intellect-you-all kennels that might be let loose at any
sign of a trespass on language marked as higher intellectual property. But,
hell, I don't care. I look at things from the bottom-up not from above. If
Prynne's writing is any good then it does belong in an open debate which can
even visit my tower-block and street-corners.
My way into Prynne is to start reading him backwards - the recent letter to
Dr Andrew George in Keston's 'Quid' opens out, reveals for all to see, a
writer of a centrality and imperative of concern that is very other than the
figure of 'almost mystical unavailability' otherwise and elsewhere
blurbspoke. I would then go to 'Triodes', where there seems to be a poet who
is taking apart the language to a degree not touched in English since Shem
the Penman, and with a violence of feeling almost reminiscent of the Vallejo
of 'Trilce'. And most remarkably a poet who seems to face up the question of
revolutionary violence without rhetoric or linguistic self-destruction
(unlike MacDiarmid). An unexpected quality in a librarian of Gonville and a
question which even buckled great Cesar Himself in his last and Spanish
campaign. One has to be wary of proportion, and the little-fish-pool of
contemporary Britain, but Prynne is starting to look from the vantage of
this most definitely not a member of a smart set like a poet a truly
revolutionary proportions, as Candice has claimed him to be often in her
fascinatingly, very Melville-eyed, almost metaphysical and code-tapping
manner. I certainly can find the knowing superiority of the academic voice
that often flanks Prynne to be irritating and at this point reflect on what
a pity it is that this list, which as far as I know is the only open and
fully engaged place of discussion of these matters, does not have Andrew
Duncan in its ranks. Things really would get interesting then.
 Ach, anyhow, Henry, some thoughts, for what they might be worth, not from a
drawing-room, a lecture hall, or cocktail party, at oinksville, at the
street's rough and tender edge, under the dried out storm-centre of Lear's
castle, the frigid eastern heartlands of English reserve and Received
Standard, beneath which the channels of a 'backyard dialect' still run with
the words of Demos. Long live Murkier!

david bircumshaw


----- Original Message -----
From: Henry <[log in to unmask]>
To: K.M. Sutherland <[log in to unmask]>;
<[log in to unmask]>
Cc: brish <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, August 29, 2000 12:38 PM
Subject: re: verge & vergelessness


> I agree with you about the praxis part (who wouldn't); I also think poetry
> is an entity, a made thing; contra your last post, I am not interested in
> defining it in its "pure" state, as if material circumstances were merely
> contingent.  Rather, I was trying to pinpoint what this "verge" actually
> means - what reality is being characterized by the use of this term.
> In so doing I think I am at least trying to understand the circumstances
> (if not "material", then intellectual) within which poetry is apparently
> being located.
>
> My point was that it seems to me this "verge" is essentially an ethical
> concept, referring to a moral borderland which separates the "thinking
> person"/intellectual/moral agent/poet from a nexus of socio-economic
> relations (your global capitalism) which are inimical and seemingly
> beyond this person's control.  Philosophy (phenomenology etc.) is
> brought in to augment a kind of ethical stance toward this reality
> which is then translated into poetic terms.
>
> I guess my problem with this approach is that it is poetry, not
> material circumstances, which seem contingent - or perhaps
> too easily malleable by critics who practice a kind of
> academic hero-worship by slotting their exemplar du jour
> (say, Prynne) with their concept du jour (say, phenomenological
> shrinkage) with their framing agon du jour (say, this ethical
> verge).  I see it as a sort of sophistry.  There's no question
> that cultural criticism and history are absolutely relevant
> to poetics.  But maybe the sophistry could be lessened by an
> attention to differences between the praxis/product in itself
> (the poetry) and the intellectual grounds which motivate the poet's
> particular stance.  Instead I see particular "verge" exemplars
> set up like transparencies: there's the verge, and then there are
> the verge-poets, overlaid in a non-problematic way, idolized.
>
> I would rather question the assumptions of the "verge" concept
> while simultaneously situating "verge-poets" within the larger
> frame of poetry-at-large.
>
> Henry



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