on 16/2/02 6:44 pm, grasshopper at [log in to unmask]
wrote:
Personally I use 'voice' to mean the way I could tell one poet's work from
another without their name being on it. Like recognising a voice on the
telephone. I think it's more than style, it's individuality. Sally-ee
> Dear Bob,
> I felt that you were perhaps confusing 'voice' and 'style'.
> I think every poem has its own particular voice, but overall, we
> can often recognise the style of an author.
> On another list we had a competition to write a poem on a topic. All the
> poems were posted up together, without the author's names. I found I could
> identfy most of the authors without any problem because I was familiar with
> their style.
> I find I write very few poems using (or pretending to use) the
> autobiographical 'I'. That seems to me to be a matter of the voice of each
> poem. I'm aware I must use language in a particular way over the range of my
> poems, and that must be a matter of style, -though I can't see what mine is.
> Kind regards,
> grasshopper
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Bob Cooper" <[log in to unmask]
> Sent: Saturday, February 16, 2002 6:18 PM
> Subject: Re: The poet's voice
>
>
>> Perhaps I'm writing this because I've been one of the lurkers on the edge
> of
>> this voice discussion - and I don't know if I know how to use the word
>> voice.
>>
>> Voice seems a simple word that gets really complex when it's used because
> it
>> sometimes sounds similar to the paperback self-analysis-therapy-language
>> about finding one's true self by following a particular philosophy or
>> psychological construct. (I'm not knocking the books! I'm just trying to
>> point out that they may not help a poet appreciate, or find a useful
>> language to describe, a poet's voice). The search for a distinct voice
> (and
>> style) can seem so essential and intense that some may feel excluded
>> (because they, and I, don't see always see writing poems in those terms).
>> I'm also not happy to simplify the discussion down to the point that we
>> chose particular words - because poems aren't just words, they're
>> grammatical constructs, and spaces and shapes, and goodness knows what
> else!
>> And, if the voice has to be heard in a poem, it sort of needs all of them.
>>
>> I recognise, because of what I see when I look at my poems as well as when
> I
>> read them or hear them, that I've written in different voices when I've
>> lived in different places, met and worked alongside different poets, and
>> written about different things. In each place I've eventually been told I
>> have my own voice, which is distinct and recognisable as mine (But I've
> also
>> been told I write like so-an-so, which can sometimes surprise me, so I've
>> probably scurried home and started to read who I'm said to be like!). And
>> I've also had people I've kept in touch with from previous places
>> complaining because my voice has changed and they don't recognise, or
> like,
>> what's now going on!
>>
>> I'm not worried about using different voices. Even though I recognise
> those
>> poets like Dylan Thomas, and Frank O'Hara, had distinctive immediately
>> recognisable voices (and I sense there are links between their earlier and
>> later poems) I also recognise that James Wright's and RS Thomas's voices
>> (and styles) changed suddenly and never returned. I also like reading John
>> Berryman's poetry, where he writes with a successive variety of voices. So
> I
>> feel at ease with what's going on with me. I feel as if I need to
> experiment
>> and listen to what others are saying and wait until enough of my poems
> begin
>> to show links between each other before I feel happy with what I'm now
>> doing. Then I'll feel as if I'm getting into a new voice. At the moment,
>> living in yet another place, I feel as if I need to develop yet another
>> voice. (Because my last voice doesn't work here!)
>>
>> I also like (which surprises me) TS Eliot's distinctions between a poet's
>> different voices (perhaps the only thing he ever said that I like!). He
>> writes about 3 different voices: the poet talking to himself (or herself),
>> the poet addressing an audience (mega-big or as small as one), and the
> poet
>> inventing a character who speaks. I think everything's more complex than
>> that, though, these days. But I think he gives me permission to try other
>> voices (maybe 1st, 2nd, 3rd person, maybe louder, maybe softer, maybe
>> assertive, maybe reflective) and so extend my voice's range (so, I'm
>> grudgingly grateful to him for that!). And I think post-modernity is
> raising
>> lots of questions about self-identity - and I sense our culture is,
>> therefore, contributing to how we can use our poetry voices.
>>
>> Or am I now no longer talking about voice?
>>
>> Maybe not.
>>
>> Or maybe I still am if it's other people who recognise and get to know my
>> poetry voice... (I mean I recognise that I find it hard to recognise my
> own
>> speaking voice rattling away on other people's ansaphones etc! I don't
> know
>> how my speaking voice sounds! But they know what I sound like!) So, maybe
> I
>> don't want to know how to analyse my poetry voice, I just want to get to a
>> stage, once again, where I'm happy when I'm writing, when I'm writing a
> lot,
>> when I feel at ease with the words I'm using, and what comes after the
> last
>> line's writ (and re-writ) feels as if it's fresh and working OK.
>>
>> Bob
>>
>>
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