On 7/10/07, Mark Weiss <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> At 07:08 AM 7/10/2007, you wrote:
> >Much to agree with below.
> >
> >For me, the main effect has been on the editing process. It is far
> >easier to edit on the computer - to shift things around, to map out
> >the white-space. I wonder if the visibility of white-space started
> >with the introduction of a mechanical means of production?
>
> Not uncommon in the middle ages for poems to be written in continuous
> flow, like prose. Vellum was very expensive, poetry meant tobe read
> aloud anyway to usually illiterate audiences.
>
> > It's
> >easier now to structure the poem - longer editing processes because
> >it's easier and enables procrastination - but also easier to place the
> >words on the page, the poem as sculpture. I think this only starts
> >with type-writer.
>
> Nope, off by a couple of centuries.
I don't recall in my critical reading - which I admit may not as wide
as yours - where white-space was important in the production of a poem
in medeival ages. Or anywhere in between up until the 20th century.
I'd be interested in seeing, saying, Keat's Hyperion in it's original
printed context. Looking at coleridge's "In Xanadu" at the British
Museum, there's little to suggest there - and he was writing with a
quill pen - any indication about white-space thinking.
> >Also, there is now less of a gap between a poet producing a poem and
> >seeing it in print; compare and contrast the means of production for
> >Chaucer with Eliot with Prynne. I wonder how he writes his stuff? By
> >hand? I'd have to say Cris Cheek as a modern exemplar.
>
>
> Imagine writing with a quill pen.
Yes, I see your point. I have written with a quill pen, also normal
graphics pens, automatic pens etc. Most of the scriptor's energy goes
into the flow of the text, rather than the actual white-space on the
page. But to get from Chaucer to his readership, he'd have to go
through a scriptorium and other intermediaries, particularly for the
embellishments (unless you are claiming Chaucer or his contemporaries
did that as well), and I wonder how much attention *they* paid to the
white-space? Or, indeed, the original hand itself. I'd be interested
in hearing any comments you have on medeival production method.
Roger
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