Creeley was a kid at the time. I assume he learned how to read Shakespeare
eventually.
Francis Parkman is usually considered the best US narrative historian. His
life's work was the many-volume History of the French in North America,
which involves among other things the story of the French Jesuits, the
extermination of the Hurons by the Iroquois, and the 7 Years War. It's
amazing prose. For a part of his research Parkman walked the terrain that
the various armies had, and he conveys just how tough a slog it usually was.
To prepare for his work Parkman, then 24 and the scion of a very brahmin
Boston family, took a trip west with his cousin to learn about Indians, the
assumption being that one redskin is rather like another. Dumb idea, lots
of nasty racism, but an essential and incredible book. Easy transportation,
and roads, ended in Missouri. From there to the Black Hills he rode
horseback, living mostly among the Sioux. This was in I think 1844. He was
a very good observer. Highly recommended.
Mark
At 10:27 AM 4/16/2005, you wrote:
>To Charles Olson, April 8. 1953: "Bach & Bird & Williams ought to be
>enough for any "poet" - and he might do worse than not bothering to read
>anyone after Shakespeare, etc. Who I honestly , like they say, can't now
>read myself. § On this last - it is a constant damn embarrassment, that S/
>at least in the books I can get, the forms of them etc., is so slow on the
>page I get bugged, and don't make it. That, say, whereas Melville,
>Lawrence, Crane, Cervantes, Williams, yourself, Pound (in his prose),
>Parkman, Stendhal, and Homer - are all of a particular relevance,
>immediately & unavoidably clear to me, - S/ is not. I'd be an idiot to say
>he was, etc. I cannot get into his content, or dig it, enough, to move me
>to a proper study." (I quote from the selection of their correspondence in
>*Blast 3* as published by Black Sparrow.)
>He gets warmed up later in this air-clearing letter: "I don't think
>Rabelais is funny...I can't make Donne...I think James is a horrible old
>bore... [...] I hate Beethoven and get to hate Mozart...I think that Bird,
>Bach, and a few others are all the music one needs."
>Nothing like being brutally honest, huh? I've never managed to read
>Cervantes all through myself. Who the heck is Parkman?
>mj
>
>Mark Weiss wrote:
>
>>I'm trumped! What did he say abiut Shakespeare?
>>
>>Mark
>>
>>
>>At 09:53 AM 4/16/2005, you wrote:
>>
>>>I got it the first time, Mark - I read Alison's mail in the morning
>>>(Romance Time) & answered before noticing & clicking on yours, which of
>>>course made the point more learnedly. I was too keen on showing off my
>>>knowledge of Olson! - But perhaps you can tell us whether Creeley ever
>>>changed his feeling about Shakespeare?
>>>mj
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