Thanks for your comments, Martin. The cathedral is in Laon in eastern
France, and the poem from which that section is an extract is based on the
war diaries of Ernst Junger, who commanded the German forces occupying the
city. "Dragons" is Welsh rather than English. "Home Counties Expressionism"
is a neat phrase, and has some truth in it. As for that "hate us" is there
any other people in the world with such a peculiar attitude to themselves as
the English? Other races may have an inferiority complex, but surely only we
English can manage to feel superior towards ourselves. Example: we spend
eight months of the year wearing anoraks, as a result of which "anorak" has
become one of our most damning terms of abuse. And rural France is filling
up with middle-class English living out their dream of being carefree
Latins. I can understand everyone else hating us, but I do think it's time
we gave _ourselves_ a break, if only for the sake of our sanity.
Best wishes
Matthew
-----Original Message-----
From: Martin J. Walker <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Date: 25 July 2001 21:31
Subject: Re: Poetryetc Featured Poet Matthew Francis (new series #2)
>I very much like the rhythmic snap of "Late June", combination of syllabics
>(6 a line) & a tendency to 2 dactyls in the 6-syllable long words at the
end
>of the quatrains. What is described leaves me fairly clammy (oh suburbia,
>lang, lang ist's her, I lived in North Cheam), but that's maybe also the
>point. A poem like "Museum of the Forest" reminds me somewhat of early
Peter
>Redgrove, though the tone is at once wryer and more wide-eyed. "Interior
>Designers..." is a little too pointed. "Dragons" strikes me as an "English"
>rewriting of a Kenneth Koch poem, without the joie de vivre (so, English!
>brrr! I hate us.)) Droll (folderol, I'm a troll). I loved some of the play
>in "from _Blizzard_" ~ especially in 8 & 9 (stanzas 3 & 4 ~ or are these
>sonnets? I say yes.) The rhythms have a pleasing varied tripping character.
>Then "those hoarse, white memories you can't unscream" is a line I will
>never forget ~ in fact I've always known it, between the lines of poems by
>Paul Zech & Albert Ehrenstein."Some bastard starts to play a bass guitar"
is
>straight out of German Expressionism. So this little collection very much
>suggests to me Home Counties Expressionism. After several rereadings I was
>most moved by _The Cathedral_, and oh! I wish I could write like that,
>England or no England. I'd love to go to the cathedral ~ where is it? Hope
>it's in Wales. "courteous love" is great. And who are "the muttering
>guards"? A touch of mystery. I've sort of gone from the bottom to the top
>here. At first I felt resistance, then I began to savour the very
individual
>fashioning.
>Martin
>
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