----- Original Message -----
From: "roger day" <[log in to unmask]>
To: "Poetryetc provides a venue for a dialogue relating to poetry and poetics"
<[log in to unmask]>
Sent: 04 February 2001 14:38
Subject: Re: Re: PK Page's poem selected to be read at the UN and on Mt.
> I guess oxygen tanks would be in order - there aren't many who've climbed to
the
> top of Everest without an assist like that. At the top, breathing heavily, into
a
> tape-recorder or satelite telephone, it all seems a tad pointless - one
slightly
> limp symbolic concoction dripped lifeless from another which has wedged itself
> into the Western Consciousness.
>
> I guess mounting an expedition like this - say, 30 people all told, including
> sherpas, relays etc, (?cost of about a 200-300K, US Dollars?) must say
something
> about the symbolic importance that some people place in poetry (regardless of
the
> particular quality). Or should I say a veil of respectability that poetry is
> supposed to give the UN's project in this instance ("Dialogue Among
Civilizations
> Through Poetry"?). It seems to me, that if one wanted to start a "dialogue
among
> civilisations", one might be better off using a -visual- medium, rather than
one
> demonstrating a one-world, global market sort of civilisation.
oops.
That last sentence should read "rather than coopting poetry into an event
demonstrating a one-world, global-market sort of civilisation."
Roger
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