> I see my tribe as that of rootless cosmopolitan intellectuals.
Just pondering on your phrase, Frederick, with interest, in that against the
package 'rootless + cosmopolitan+ intellectual' I would tend to see myself
as, erm, waaal:
'rootless' yes on the grounds of an abolished family, a childhood
disappeared under the bulldozer, and an inhabitation of that City which is
Every City
but no in that my voice, my accent, is stamped with what I am, am from
'cosmopolitan' only in my experience of Indian restaurants and in my dubious
knowlege of other languages but profoundly provincial not only in where I
live but also in that there is No True Centre anymore but its Myth is
Everywhere so all of us are always inalienably oinks (but rootless)
'intellectual' - well wish I were it summons a bespectacled figure I read
about in childhood but any modicum of self-examination tells me that I am
only self-reflexively cognitive for a pitifully small portion of my waking
time
just wondering, how do others see themselves on this
david b
----- Original Message -----
From: Frederick Pollack <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, February 22, 2001 2:34 PM
Subject: epic
> Wondering (again) if anyone ever looked up my two book-length narrative
> poems, The Adventure (1986) and Happiness (1998), both Story Line
> Press. Though the second was billed, against my wishes, as "A Novel in
> Verse," both tell coherent, non-"splintered" stories in, I think,
> authentically poetic, non-novelistic ways. I wouldn't claim that either
> is an epic, but I firmly believe a revival of epic is a real, and vital,
> possibility. Both my books were meant to contribute to that
> possibility. The "tale of the tribe" aspect is certainly open to
> reinterpretation; I see my tribe as that of rootless cosmopolitan
> intellectuals.
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