Each to their own :-) I was just replying to the guy's enquiry. Enjoy not
liking Eliot and pizza :-)
X
>From: Mark Weiss <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: Poetryetc provides a venue for a dialogue relating to poetry and
> poetics <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: Help! The grass is singing
>Date: Tue, 28 Mar 2006 18:54:22 -0500
>
>For some of us Eliot is too irrelevant to be in rebellion against or
>conversation with, for others not. I'm not crazy about pineapple
>pizza--hell, I think it's a crime against god and man--but I'm not in
>dialogue with it either.
>
>For the record, Chaucer appeared to like April, and sprigtime in general,
>which, aside from their other allures, would be easy to understand if one
>lived in a world without central heating. "Wan that April with his shoures
>soote/ the droght of March hath perced to the rote/ and bathed every veyne
>in swich licoor/ from which virtu engendred is the floor..." etc. (I take
>no responsibility for my spelling or Chaucer's) He probably got the idea
>from all them birds and flowers he talks about. There are endless poems and
>songs to spring before that, of course. Eliot is telling us that seeing all
>that fecundity reminds him that not only isn't he getting any but he
>doesn't care to get any. I may be oversimplifying.
>
>Mark
>
>
>At 04:12 PM 3/28/2006, you wrote:
>>All I can say in reply is that poets create in dialogue with each other,
>>even if you hate Eliot you are in dialogue through your rebelllion (I
>>don't want to start another arguement though!) :-) Whitman especially
>>consciously 'speaks' to people in the future. Readers are directly
>>addressed by Whitman in "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry" : Just as you feel when
>>you look on the river and sky, so I felt, / Just as any of you is one of a
>>living crowd, I was one of a crowd, / Just as you are refresh'd by the
>>gladness of the river and the bright flow, I was refresh'd." I'd say
>>Eliot was in dialogue with the past and the future when he drafted The
>>Wasteland. His work is his part of the ongoing dialogue. The 'April is the
>>cruellest month' goes right back through Tennyson to Chaucer and who knows
>>who gave Chaucer the idea. Some farmer whose crop died in the frost maybe.
>>I read in a book about literature and Freud's idea of 'the uncanny', (by
>>Nicholas Royle) that it is possible that The Wasteland is written from the
>>point of view of a buried corpse.... well, it is now if it wasn't then!
>>
>>Good luck with your essay, I'd be interested to read it and as for your
>>problems with it I'll quote another poet "the answer my friend, is blowing
>>in the wind".
>>
>>X
>>
>>p.s. (think of the heat generated by all your mown grass :-)
>>
>>X
>>
>>
>>
>>>From: Edmund Hardy <[log in to unmask]>
>>>Reply-To: Poetryetc provides a venue for a dialogue relating to poetry
>>>and
>>> poetics <[log in to unmask]>
>>>To: [log in to unmask]
>>>Subject: Re: Help! The grass is singing
>>>Date: Tue, 28 Mar 2006 19:23:15 +0000
>>>
>>>>Thought I'd throw in a few dots to follow if you're interested :-)
>>>
>>>Yes, Thanks for these dots - much appreciated
>>>
>>>Whitman is actually the co-subject with Reznikoff of my troubled troubled
>>>essay - the grass there is surely the anti-grass of Eliot's dryness -
>>>Eliot prays for renewal, but Whitman is sure of it, the cycle - in the
>>>Mahler, ewig, ewig...
>>>
>>>I'm really interested in writers who Create the grass as a style, but
>>>then Eliot came in & crashed down on me -
>>>
>>>Whitman hears a territory singing, but What The Thunder Said hears ...
>>>grass over the tumbled graves - the dead singing?
>>>
>>>The Carlyle is v. interesting that he says "grass" and not "grain of
>>>sand" - but grass & sand seem to conflate as ideas of "world flesh"
>>>
>>>My trouble is - if i pursue "grass" as a metaphor it will go everywhere
>>>and i'd e the hopeless & hapless mower -
>>>
>>>Edmund
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