Thanks, Roger.
At 09:45 AM 4/16/2005, you wrote:
>I got all of them Mark,
>
>Roger
>
>
>----- Original Message ----- From: "Mark Weiss" <[log in to unmask]>
>To: <[log in to unmask]>
>Sent: Saturday, April 16, 2005 2:24 PM
>Subject: Re: Shakespeare, Olson &c
>
>
>For reasons that escape me, fairly often messages I send to poetryetc make
>it into the archive but not into other listmembers' computers. Makes one
>feel occasionally marginalized in discussion. Case in point, a message
>sent last night: "Ron's there with the obvious , for a change. Olson's
>master's thesis Lear and Moby Dick (published in two parts in the first two
>issues of the magazine Twice a Year in 1938) became his first book, Call
>Me Ishmael (City Lights, 1947, and several reprints, and Johns Hopkins,
>1997). He also wrote about Shakespeare's late verse, not surprisingly
>finding it a lot like his own. Someone will have to help me with the name
>of the essay, all of my things being entombed in storage.
>
>No reason you should know this, Alison, but Ron certainly does. Would have
>been nice if he'd mentioned his sources."
>
>Since then I came up with the name of the essay (also sent this to the
>list): "Quantity in Verse, and Shakespeare's Late Plays."
>
>Someone let me know if this comes through.
>
>Mark
>
>
>
>At 05:51 AM 4/16/2005, you wrote:
>>Well, Olson goes on about Shakespeare quite a bit in *Call Me Ishmael*. I
>>hadn't thought of looking at his poetry in that light, though. (I haven't
>>looked at Silliman yet.) As far as Shakespeare books are concerned, the
>>one that I've read in recent years that really got me humming was Michael
>>D. Bristol's *Big-time Shakespeare*, covering an awful lot of topics,
>>from The Stationers Company to *The Sandman*, Bakhtin to Branagh, early
>>modern Christmas to *Calvin & Hobbes*.
>>What version of Shakes is this NEA going to disseminate? Mrs Grundy's? I
>>only ask because one's heard a lot about school board censorship etc in
>>the States. I'm a little sceptical about Shakes "generating" anything -
>>can't see much evidence of that in contemporary Britain, perhaps I'm
>>missing something. I dare say a few fundamentalist freaks have read
>>Shakespeare - *their* way. - Interesting that Creeley, at least during
>>his youth, couldn't get started (I'm broken-hearted) with Shakes at all,
>>at least according to his early correspondence with Olson. - Shakespeare
>>a Lutheran? I thought Purgatory was a no-no under the protestant
>>dispensation, and everyone is always going on about the Shakespeares'
>>Catholic connections.
>>Robin, no doubt, will clear this up.
>>mj
>>
>>Alison Croggon wrote:
>>
>>>Ron Silliman (http://ronsilliman.blogspot.com/) has a most interesting
>>>meditation on the NEA program to bring Shakespeare to the American masses
>>>and its possibly unpredictable effects, given that two American writers
>>>deeply influenced by WS are Melville and Olson. Dang it, he's right...
>>>Though I hadn't made the Olson connection - Silliman's idea of soliloquy
>>>rather than "dramatic monologue" in Olson (maybe in a lot of modern poetry)
>>>seems particularly apt.
>>>
>>>"So much of Olson reads as tho it were written to be shouted out over a
>>>heath, or else to be whispered to an audience, a stage whisper capable of
>>>reaching hundreds of ears at once. It is not so much dramatic monolog tho
>>>Maximus is a persona as it is soliloquy. Olsonšs sense of how a sentence
>>>interacts with the line something I suspect an entire generation or two
>>>has internalized so deeply we donšt even recognize it has always struck me
>>>as coming right out of Shakespeare, far more than from Melville or Pound.
>>>This feel for the materiality of the relationship between the two is
>>>apparent, right there on the surface, in Olson, & through his influence it
>>>radiates outward. I can hear echoes in Creeley, in Duncan or Levertov, in
>>>OšHara & Whalen & even in Ginsberg. And it ripples again, just a little more
>>>faintly, through every one of us influenced by any of them.
>>>
>>>"So the idea of all these people reading, seeing, hearing Shakespeare is, I
>>>suspect, much more of a wild card than the NEAšs leaders may comprehend.
>>>Because where it wonšt lead is back to is either the homogenous retro-utopia
>>>of so many a Congressmanšs dream nor to the same ol š stuff the School of
>>>Quietude has been shoveling. Inseminating Shakespeare into the American
>>>literary landscape is far more apt to generate a bunch of wild men & wyrd
>>>sisters instead. As Olson himself most certainly was."
>>>
>>>I've been seeing a fair bit of WS lately (not only the stuff on my theatre
>>>blog, though I won't forget that Hamlet in the shop front, which was just
>>>wonderful...) Whenever I watch a good production - bad productions don't
>>>count - I come out so vitalised and stimulated. Oddly, only last week I
>>>watched the dvd of the RSC Macbeth Ron mentions, with Judi Dench and Ian
>>>McKellan. It also features one of my favourite actors, Bob Peck as Macduff.
>>>One of the darkest slants on Macbeth that you can imagine - Macduff comes
>>>out at the end having killed Macbeth, holding the daggers in the same way
>>>that Macbeth did from killing Duncan - and you realise that he's as crazy as
>>>Macbeth was. Now that's bleak; the world may seem to be righted, but you
>>>realise it isn't at all.
>>>
>>>Harold Bloom is erudite, of course, but I find him a bore on Shakespeare;
>>>well, I try to read him, but my attention peters out. Maybe it's too narrow
>>>a stream of water in all that rich delta of words. I like Kermode better;
>>>and Jan Kott is wonderful on WS in the mid-20C, and particularly its radical
>>>applications as a critique of power which was I think a big influence on the
>>>RSC. But now I'm really blithering.
>>>
>>>Interesting blog comments too - someone claims Shakespeare was a Lutheran,
>>>especially in Hamlet. Hmm. (Reminds me of the joke in Long Day's Journey
>>>into Night that Shakespeare was an Irish Catholic). Considering how Hamlet
>>>turns out, I wouldn't want WS as an advocate.
>>>
>>>Best
>>>
>>>A
>>>
>>>Alison Croggon
>>>
>>>Blog: http://theatrenotes.blogspot.com
>>>Editor, Masthead: http://masthead.net.au
>>>Home page: http://alisoncroggon.com
>>>
>
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