Waking from my dogged slumbers I find a really interesting thread, in
which the clash of judgments reveals the depth & firmness (I could also
say entrenched character) of different perspectives. As an expat Brit,
not particularly well read in recent poetry and indifferent to US
kudos/culture wars, I have registered Vendler's academic proficiency &
insight (of a special kind) into poetry (e.g. Shakespeare's sonnets) but
also her apparent blindness to any writing that did not conform to her
poetic agenda, if one may call it that - while pushing poets such as Amy
Clampitt whose work seemed almost unreadable to me, like a lot of verse,
because it is written with little attention to the (my) ear. But I am
going to try the new Muldoon, whose work I have found it hard to engage
with & thus hear - *Madoc*!- hitherto (which probably says more about my
poor intellectual & verbal grasp than about his poetry. It's tough being
dumb.)
mj
joe green wrote:
>There are worlds and worlds unaffected by Vendler.
>
--
A man may write of love, and not be in love, as well as of husbandrie, and not goe to plough: or of witches, and be none: or of holinesse, and be flat prophane. - Giles Fletcher the Elder.
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