Hi, I think there are no hard and fast rules, no example that has no
confutation or direct anti-thesis.  The thing is: how do audiences, not
experts or practitioners respond to your work?  There are different
audiences too, how do you mean to appeal to them?  Can you write pot boilers
and seriousness simultaneously?
all best wishes,
Paul Murphy

>From: "Merritt, Matt - Leic. Mercury"
><[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: The Pennine Poetry Works <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: Re ; Cliches( Matt)
>Date: Wed, 3 Sep 2003 13:47:07 +0100
>
>Hi Arthur,
>Thought you might be. I have friends in Hemsworth and Meltham and some of
>the expressions sounded familiar. I think your part of the world is still
>much richer in such language. Down here (I live near Leicester), we're just
>about being lapped by the rising tide of "Estuary English", and seem to be
>losing far too much of what was a distinctive if little-known dialect.
>Hope to post some poetry soon, but don't mind admitting I feel a bit
>intimidated by the high quality of much of what I have seen on here.
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: arthur seeley [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
>Sent: 03 September 2025 12:59
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: Re ; Cliches( Matt)
>
>
>THIS EMAIL HAS BEEN SWEPT FOR VIRUSES BY THE NORTHCLIFFE GROUP MAILSWEEPER
>SERVER.
>
>
>Hello Matt. Welcome to the List. I hail from West Yorkshire. Keighley to be
>exact. One of the few subscribers to the List who actually lives in the
>Pennines. Hope to read some of your poetry soon. Arthur.
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: Merritt, Matt - Leic.  <mailto:[log in to unmask]>
>Mercury
>To: [log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]>
>Sent: Wednesday, September 03, 2003 12:35 PM
>Subject: Re: Re ; Cliches
>
>I'm a newcomer to this board, but have followed the debates over the past
>few days with interest.
>There are plenty of excellent poets who have successfully used cliche in
>their work. Simon Armitage is one who springs immediately to mind.
>Surely a cliche, used in an inventive way (I think Armitage calls it
>"asking
>them to work a little harder"), can be just as arresting and fresh as any
>other phrase?
>Totally agree with Arthur, though. Such colloquialisms as he mentions are
>poetry in themselves. As a matter of interest, where do you hail from,
>Arthur?
>Regards,
>Matt
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: arthur seeley [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
>Sent: 03 September 2025 11:42
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re ; Cliches
>
>
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>
>I think Bob was as right as anyone can be on this one. We avoid cliche so
>that our poetry can be arresting and fresh.
>having said that I know that sometimes I have sweat for hours for this
>freshness, ( bit of an oxymoron buried there perhaps), only for some glib
>dismissal that the particular phrase was thought to be cliche. When
>challenged to say where they had last read the words no response was
>received. So I think we also need to be careful of too glib a dismissal of
>work. An image might well be inapt, clumsy, bemusing, tasteless, all these
>without being cliche, and all those are charges to be avoided also, I would
>think.
>I was brought up in a household that was redolent with phrases like," Tek
>this dahn to Billy Four-Bellies" ," ....a bigger liar than Tom Pepp", "
>It's
>black over Bob's mother's" ( if a storm was brewing), "Its raining iggs and
>swuthers out there.", "Its raining stair -rods." " You want to go see Amos
>Two-Thumbs with that back." ( Amos being the local healer),or if red after
>sun bathing one was said to have "a face like a smacked arse". " Mek us a
>pot o' tea. Ah'm fair clemmed."
>Oh, what a joy it was to be born into a world rich with poetry like that!!
>Truly a lost world, a lost time.
>Regards Arthur.
>

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