> I owe you a big apology: "Wow! Poets - eat your hearts out!" was meant to
> be
> my heart too - but I can see I entirely got that wrong. Sorry.
>
> However, I'm not sorry about raising the 'good/bad' poetry debate here.
Dear Rupert,
This is very sweet of you and I think we should all now kiss and make up -
metaphorically speaking of course. These hiccups happen. I have them all
the time so I think you're allowed the odd one now and again. But this is
much appreciated.
And not for one moment should you apologise for the good/bad poetry debate,
in fact you get a gold star from bringing that up. That's something that
needs talking about. In fact I think Peter agreed with you on this point
whereas I don't so it's a debate that doesn't have clearly defined enemies
or allies which makes it much more meaty.
I've certainly been persuaded by some of the arguments that good/bad is far
too loaded with moral rectitude and in that sense I can actually find myself
agreeing with your statement. But if we're saying that there is no
difference whatsoever in the standard (the electricity?) of writing between,
let's say, my hospice patients (some of whom became close personal friends
before departing for the Pearly Gates) and, let's say, John Donne or
Marianne Moore then I absolutely 100 per cent disagree. If I'd thought any
of my hospice patients had come anywhere near these writers I'd have gone
out my way to try and get their stuff published or publish them myself.
But they didn't. I published them 'in house' at the hospice for their
friends and families. I still have all the publications. They are amongst
my most treasured possessions but that's because of my memories not because
their writing was worth preserving for posterity - to be honest quite a lot
of it was atrocious by anyone's standards.
Tweet-tweet,
Geraldine
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