At 4:51 PM -0500 30/11/03, Halvard Johnson wrote:
>But it also has a lot to do with education and PR, Alison (oops . . . almost
>said Scarlet, there).
Scarlet???
Yes, but that's money too, no? That's a very encouraging story about
Elliot Carter. The other word that has to go out of fashion is
"elitist". Artists don't make their work "difficult" or "obscure" in
order to deliberately baffle people, but I've often heard it said of
contemporary art. The perception becomes self fulfilling, as we've
all seen with poetry. I mean, all you have to do is _read_ the
stuff; but people are taught to read in a certain way (which assumes
that writing conveys an easily downloadable "meaning" which is
immediately paraphrasable) that is actually hostile to the multiple
modes of meaning poetry generates. And so many people take it that
poetry is being somehow hostile to them, when it frustrates the kinds
of readings they are used to making.
Best
A
--
Alison Croggon
Blog
http://alisoncroggon.blogspot.com
Editor, Masthead
http://au.geocities.com/masthead_2/
Home page
http://www.users.bigpond.com/acroggon/
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