Douglas
Ramona Koval of ABC radio tells this great story about
how an Australian friend of hers attended a reading
in Ireland, featuring leading Irish poets and John Kinsella
reading from Szyzgy.
After John had finished his swaying fast paced Szyzgy
reading, she went to buy a drink and the barmaid
said to her, "Ah, that John Kinsella, you can't blame
a fella for trying."
True story!
Hugh
----- Original Message -----
From: "Douglas Barbour" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, September 13, 2003 12:14 AM
Subject: Re: and it goes without saying that Skanky Possum rocks
> Ah but Hugh
> >
> >Boffinesque is a pejorative term, I use to describe
> >wrong-headed poetry especially the over-theorised
> >under-readable type of thing. Forgive me, but Szyzgy
> >by John Kinsella could be an example of the genre,
> >and so too the prose of Speed Factory... Not targeting
> >our glorious founder particularly, just trying to explain
> >my critical term.
>
> John K, who has shown he has the talent & craft to try almost any kind of
> poetry, also shows, in something like Syzygy, or Erratum/Framed, that he
> knows how to play that game too. But saying that doesnt mean that such
> poems don't work. I think they both do, & do that sort of things much
> better than many do.
>
> Which is not to say (because I already have) that some LangPo doesn't bore
> me silly...
>
> I'd often rather read what I think of as language-oriented poetry -- which
> may just be damn good contemporary poetry -- by such Australian poets,
just
> to mention some you'd know, as Robert Adamson, John Tranter, & some
younger
> poets there too, like many who appeared in Calyx.
>
> But then, it always comes down to what we LIKE, doesn't it...?
>
> Doug
>
> Douglas Barbour
> Department of English
> University of Alberta
> Edmonton Alberta Canada T6G 2E5
> (h) [780] 436 3320 (b) [780] 492 0521
> http://www.ualberta.ca/~dbarbour/dbhome.htm
>
> Let me repeat what history teaches. History teaches.
>
> Gertrude Stein
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