David,
Surely if the "avant-garde" became coherent the they would by definition
become "mainstream" thereby making space for a "new avant-garde" leading to
a repeat of the present situation. Isn't this how Poetry progresses anyway?
Roger
----- Original Message -----
From: "david.bircumshaw" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, November 26, 2004 3:52 AM
Subject: Re: Performance Poetry
>I don't quite get your question, Alison, although I am very aware it might
>arise from the slack nature of my own statements. Let me
> try to clarify, within the pitiful poor space of an e-mail, what I mean.
> I'm sure I won't succeed, but here's an attempt. Schools,
> as in foci, of writing, do exist, one can identify with a certain
> congruence what we now call the Metaphysicals of the 17th century,
> although they wouldn't have called themselves that, but it's quire clear
> to see how Donne influenced Herbert, how Herbert influenced
> Vaughan, how Marvell took a middle line among it all, for example.
> Now that is not a call for conventionality, rather that the establishment
> of shared poetic vocabularies, with boundaries that can be
> happily broken, is necessary to making a tradition, a lineage. Tradition
> equals stick-pass-on, as JJ observed. A relay.
> The conventionality I am deploring is a socially based one, while I would
> say that the incoherent and fragmented state of the
> British avant-garde is a fine index to the impotence of political
> opposition in this country these days, as you have no choice
> between one form of conservatives and another anymore.
>
> Does this make any sense at all?
>
> Best
>
> Dave
>
>
> David Bircumshaw
>
> Spectare's Web, A Chide's Alphabet
> & Painting Without Numbers
>
> http://homepage.ntlworld.com/david.bircumshaw/
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Alison Croggon" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Friday, November 26, 2004 3:30 AM
> Subject: Re: Performance Poetry
>
>
> David
>
> You posit, on the one hand, a drive for conventionality, and on the other
> lament a lack of "coherency". Can you tell me how a demand for
> "coherency"
> is not a conventionalising discourse? Might not it be more interesting to
> look at the diversity of alternative British poetries and see there an
> enormous strength?
>
> Best
>
> A
>
> Alison Croggon
>
> Blog: http://theatrenotes.blogspot.com
> Editor, Masthead: http://masthead.net.au
> Home page: http://alisoncroggon.com
>
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