No cringing here at all, Candice, rather sadly resonant awareness of what is
being said, and its perpetual unsaying by so many voices from so many angles
in our culture. It is not a politician's simplicities, nor a marketing
manager's, nor a journalist's not definitely that of literary 'theorist', at
which substantive I start howling, at the notion of 'theory' that requires
neither hypotheses nor demonstration nor disproof but the blurring of a few
rebarbative assertions with a smear of verbiage, for a career move. Come on
Zizek, come on De Mann. Let's party!
I have a lot of time for Doug Oliver, particularly what he seemed to be
finding in his later years, there is an article in 'fragmente' that shook me
when I saw it, after his death, as it seemed to be speaking what I feel so
well it was as if it were my own thoughts. I know some people think he went
off the track a bit towards the end, to my mind he was just starting to show
us the path.
The question of simplicity is crucial, without that naivety, that guileless
unknowingness, we are just empty and smart-arses. Not saying tho' that we
shd all be wide-eyed and vulnerable, of course critical intelligence
matters, in our lifedays as well as poetica, but to harmonise the twain....
My favourite Patrick White novel is 'A Solid Mandala'. I often remark on
this to the Waldo in my soul, on the lines of feel too, as well as think.
It's a wonderfully talkworthy subject, and one that could inspire volumes of
horror to all peace-loving genet son of genets, and thanks for extending it
out, Candice.
Best
Dave
----- Original Message -----
From: "Candice Ward" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, August 02, 2001 6:10 PM
Subject: Speak Up, Smartie [Was: A contrary opinion of the worth of Ms
Graham's recent poems]
> Did anyone else cringe in response to that "simple-hearted" in the Oliver
> quotation below? I have a deep suspicion of oppositions between poetry and
> you-name-it that cast the poet in an implied parallel position of mystic,
> shaman, pope--some sort of Overspeaker for truth in general or true
feeling
> in particular, someone with a unique access to the human heart in
everything
> but the physiological sense. And if we must have recourse to "heart" in
this
> metaphoric emotional sense, why need it be "simple"? Is the simple more
> truthful? Why not the "large," say, as in Nietzsche's "when your heart
flows
> broad and full like a river, a blessing and a danger to those living near:
> there is the origin of your virtue"?
>
> Here the "you-name-it" is "literary philosophy," by which is meant theory,
> presumably, given "such theorists are dangerous guides." Compared to whom?
> Well, not a who at all, it seems, but a what: "the poem." And "dangerous
> guides" to what or where? "Areas where the poem" evinces something
spiritual
> to "the simple-hearted." Who are these people, I wonder, and how does the
> poem come to be in the business of not only cardiac correction but also
> spirit infusion?
>
> By the same analogical token, "literary philosophy" would seem to be cast
as
> the bad cholesterol of the feeling heart, "dangerous" because it blocks
the
> metabolism of "spirit" apparently. But isn't "literary philosophy" a
pretty
> apt descriptor of some kinds of poetry, and "literary philosopher" a
> definition that could arguably apply to both Nietzsche and, say, Charles
> Olson?
>
>
>
> Alison, quoting Doug Oliver:
>
> > What does it mean to talk of spirituality in poetry when no religious
> > belief lies behind the inquiry? An unfashionable question... Literary
> > philosophy cannot escape scepticism or programmatic ambiguity about
> > spiritual issues because we are trapped in a web of language, doomed, it
> > seems, to disbelieve in the unity of self and of artistic forms: along
> > with that, goes a loss of spirit. Such theorists are dangerous guides
in
> > areas where the poem, on the other hand, can make evident to the
> > simple-hearted: "This happened - spirit entered language and
> > simultaneously I perceived such and such sights, spoke such and such
> > words."
>
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