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POETRYETC  2001

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Subject:

Re: please expand

From:

Mairead Byrne <[log in to unmask]>

Reply-To:

Poetryetc provides a venue for a dialogue relating to poetry and poetics <[log in to unmask]>

Date:

Sun, 8 Apr 2001 22:42:16 -0400

Content-Type:

TEXT/PLAIN

Parts/Attachments:

Parts/Attachments

TEXT/PLAIN (130 lines)

I also think of Virginia Woolf's long-shadowed temperature-lowering "I"
in A Room of One's Own and, by contrast, Toi Derricotte's or Ntozake Shange's
small dynamic "i" in Natural Birth and For Colored Girls, and so many
other examples.  While I sympathise with Erminia, to some extent, on "we"
as a placard or shield, I must admit that, having just been watching a
series of Civil Rights movies (Eyes on the Prize), "we" is essential.
Mairead

On Mon, 9 Apr 2001, Matthew Francis wrote:

> A marvellous insight, Mairead. I don't know that many poems about
> childbirth, but of course the Sylvia Plath poem _You're_ springs to mind. It
> seems to me that the pronouns actually mean different things from poem to
> poem - 'you' addressed to a real person is different from 'you' addressed to
> the reader of the poem, which is different again from 'you' (all right,
> 'thou') to a Grecian urn, or 'you' meaning 'one'. And sometimes these
> meanings can slide into each other over the course of the poem. Other
> deictic words like 'this' and 'here' can behave similarly. That's why I find
> the subject so fascinating, and get so annoyed by poems that use these words
> in a rigid, mechanical way.
>
> Best wishes
>
> Matthew
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Mairead Byrne <[log in to unmask]>
> To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: 08 April 2001 18:53
> Subject: Re: please expand
>
>
> >I agree with you, Matthew.  The poem I posted was about the unscalability
> >of we.  On the subject of "you" (!), one place I very much appreciate its
> >use is in poetry about childbirth where the child is addressed as "you"
> >and the pronoun is almost suspended in questionmarks, perhaps because
> >beeing "applied" for the first time.
> >Mairead
> >
> >On Sun, 8 Apr 2001, Matthew Francis wrote:
> >
> >> That's OK - as I had mentioned in passing that you had got my name wrong
> >> before, I assumed you must be doing it deliberately. I am not offended
> when
> >> people reverse my name by mistake, as happens quite often.
> >>
> >> To return - cautiously - to our previous discussion, it's clear now that
> you
> >> were not intending to be taken literally when you said that you hated the
> >> use of 'we' in poems generally. I was not sure whether you were or not.
> It
> >> seems to me that self-parody is not an inaccurate description of the
> >> hyperbole you used, which you have yourself subsequently described as a
> >> joke. You were parodying or exaggerating a position you actually hold,
> and
> >> perhaps it was a bit much to expect that others would be able to
> distinguish
> >> your real position from your joking one on so little evidence. I don't,
> I'm
> >> afraid, remember your former discussion of the subject.
> >>
> >> I was a bit puzzled, too, Candice, when you said we'd been through the
> >> question of pronouns exhaustively before. Are you sure it was on this
> list?
> >> I do remember a discussion of my own personal bete noire, poems that use
> >> 'you' supposedly to tell a real person a lot of things they must already
> >> know - as in _Birthday Letters_.  It was a long time ago, and may have
> been
> >> on britpo, which I belonged to at the time. Somebody came up with one of
> >> Hardy's great poems to *his* dead wife, and effectively silenced me on
> that
> >> one. I still think that most of the time the effect is unbearably
> pompous,
> >> and there are a lot of poets who seem to think anything is a poem
> provided
> >> it's in the present tense and addressed to a lover, or the past and
> >> addressed to a dead relative.
> >>
> >> If this is becoming a bore, I had better stop. For me, as I've said, it's
> >> crucial - the question of pronouns, like the question of form, is one
> that I
> >> have to settle for myself all over again every time I write a poem. And
> >> while I accept that 'we' can also be a symptom of self-importance, I
> believe
> >> some poets successfully claim the right to speak for others. I could
> quote
> >> lots of examples, but the one that sticks in my mind is the end of
> >> _Briggflatts_:
> >>
> >>                 Night, float us.
> >>                 Offshore wind, shout.
> >>                 Ask the sea
> >>                 what's lost, what's left,
> >>                 what horn sunk,
> >>                 what crown adrift.
> >>
> >>                 Where we are who knows
> >>                 of kings who sup
> >>                 while day fails? Who
> >>                 swinging his axe
> >>                 to fell kings, guesses
> >>                 where we go?
> >>
> >> Best wishes
> >>
> >> Matthew
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From: Clitennestra Giordan <[log in to unmask]>
> >> To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
> >> Date: 08 April 2001 17:01
> >> Subject: Re: please expand
> >>
> >>
> >> >Dear Matthew,
> >> >
> >> >I was not aware that I was using your surname.
> >> >I am sorry if it sounded rude. I was simply confused.
> >> >Have my sincere apologies.
> >> >So, Matthew, please, excuse me again.
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >erminia
> >> >
> >>
> >
>

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