Hi, Kasper--
Being perplexed isn't all that bad now, is it?
I work more from intuition and serendipity and
instinct than from planning and reasoning. So,
whether the word "sonnet" appears in a title
is worked out on a case by case basis.
In any case, I'm much less interested in "defining"
the word "sonnet" than in other things, such
as sound, rhythm (not meter), syntax, diction,
tone, etc. etc. etc.
Hal, (more) forthcoming now due to increasing
perplexity about your perplexity
Today's Special
The Sonnet Project
http://www.xpressed.org/hsonnet.pdf
Halvard Johnson
================
[log in to unmask]
http://home.earthlink.net/~halvard/index.html
http://entropyandme.blogspot.com
http://imageswithoutwords.blogspot.com
http://www.hamiltonstone.org
http://home.earthlink.net/~halvard/vidalocabooks.html
On Oct 15, 2007, at 8:01 AM, kasper salonen wrote:
> my critical blabbering can be considered torture, I guess!
>
> I was just wondering *why* & *how* you define it more broadly, but
> you've not been very forthcoming with your interpretation. you don't
> have to be, if you'd rather I & someone else kept being perplexed at
> the 'sonnet'-title you give many of your poems.
>
> KS
>
> On 14/10/2007, Halvard Johnson <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>> That pretty much sums it up, Kasper. I define "sonnet" more
>> broadly (okay, much more broadly) than you do.
>>
>> I also define "torture" much more broadly than Bush does,
>> not that I'm paralleling you to Bush in any way.
>>
>> Hal
>>
>> "If you can't annoy somebody, what's
>> the point in writing?"
>> --Kingsley Amis
>>
>> Halvard Johnson
>> ================
>> [log in to unmask]
>> http://home.earthlink.net/~halvard/index.html
>> http://entropyandme.blogspot.com
>> http://imageswithoutwords.blogspot.com
>> http://www.hamiltonstone.org
>> http://home.earthlink.net/~halvard/vidalocabooks.html
>>
>>
>> On Oct 14, 2007, at 11:11 AM, kasper salonen wrote:
>>
>>> well the problem I have with sonnets, if it can be called a problem,
>>> is that I generally don't consider the form to be much at all
>>> without
>>> its structure. I mean, originally I believe a sonnet was intended
>>> fairly strictly as a love poem, even an ode-like addressal
>>> (Petrarch's
>>> Laura &c.); that seems to have fallen away entirely as a
>>> requirement.
>>> I used to write a lot of sonnets, none of them about love; the only
>>> thing that made them sonnets, to me, was the (optional) ABAB & the
>>> iambic pentameter. looking back, they were all quite introspective &
>>> yet broad, descriptions & propsals for connections (links between
>>> forest, heaven, home, monastery, that sort of thing); but that came
>>> pretty much along with the form, which almost requires some form of
>>> deep thought for the iambic punching to be worth anything.
>>>
>>> but take away the structure, as Hal has done, and I see little or
>>> nothing to indicate or even remind me of the form. Hal you say
>>> it's a
>>> "broad, deep river"; you clearly have strong personal reasons for
>>> believing that, but I don't see it personally -- I wouldn't mind
>>> being
>>> talked into it. I've always considered the sonnet to be a very
>>> shallow
>>> poetic form, one of those "form justifies content" (meaning that a
>>> sonnet was good as long as the rhymes & metre were in place) sort of
>>> deals which drove me away from metric poetry in the first place.
>>>
>>> some early sonnets were quite provocative in ways, mentioning
>>> kings &
>>> priests & laymen in contexts in which they weren't supposed to
>>> appear;
>>> so maybe by calling an anti-Bush poem a 'sonnet' means to bring out
>>> some mode of ancient commentary?
>>> as to the way sonnets 'move and behave', as Joanna put it, I would
>>> attribute ALL movement & behaviour to be confined within the cage of
>>> its structure. without the cage, it can go anywhere & thus escape
>>> classification.
>>>
>>> KS
>>>
>>> On 14/10/2007, Joanna Boulter <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>>> Yes I know, the exception rather than the rule, and a matter for
>>>> comment. It
>>>> might be interesting to look at a few of them, and see what
>>>> actually does
>>>> make them sonnets rather than thirteen-line poems. *If we can find
>>>> enough
>>>> examples that we can agree on as being true examples.
>>>>
>>>> But to my mind, a sonnet is more than just the number of its
>>>> lines, and I
>>>> suspect that this is what Kasper's feeling here, possibly Janet
>>>> too. I mean,
>>>> not all four-legged animals are dogs -- there are differentials
>>>> that mark
>>>> them out instantly from cats. Nor do the tailless Manx cat and the
>>>> boxer dog
>>>> with the docked tail cloud the issue there.
>>>>
>>>> I suspect it's something to do with the way they move and behave,
>>>> but would
>>>> be interested to see what others think.
>>>>
>>>> joanna
>>>>
>>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>>> From: "andrew burke" <[log in to unmask]>
>>>> To: <[log in to unmask]>
>>>> Sent: Sunday, October 14, 2007 12:21 PM
>>>> Subject: Re: Sonnets (Re: Sonnet for the Criminally Insane )
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> There have been 13 line sonnets in history, y'know ...
>>>>>
>>>>> Andrew
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On 14/10/2007, Joanna Boulter <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Good questions, Janet, especially that last para.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I have a habit of writing short poems which turn out to be 13-
>>>>>> liners. A
>>>>>> surprising number of people say "Why don't you add another line,
>>>>>> and then
>>>>>> it'll be a sonnet?" My answer is usually "It doesn't want to be
>>>>>> one --
>>>>>> and
>>>>>> yes, I did ask it!" However, the real reason I don't is more
>>>>>> likely that
>>>>>> I've said what I need to say in 13 lines and can see no point in
>>>>>> adding a
>>>>>> 14th for the sake of it.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Having said that, though, I can and do write sonnets.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> joanna
>>>>>>
>>>>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>>>>> From: "Janet Jackson" <[log in to unmask]>
>>>>>> To: <[log in to unmask]>
>>>>>> Sent: Sunday, October 14, 2007 2:52 AM
>>>>>> Subject: Sonnets (Re: Sonnet for the Criminally Insane )
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Mine are non-metrical, non-rhyming (for the most part)
>>>>>>>> sonnets. The sonnet's a broad, deep river with interesting
>>>>>>>> eddies at its margins.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> OK, Hal, please would you educate us?
>>>>>>> What makes a poem a sonnet, and not just a 14-line poem?
>>>>>>> That it presents an opinion?
>>>>>>> That the lines are longish and all about the same length?
>>>>>>> That if you really work at it you read it with five stresses
>>>>>>> per line?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I have a book somewhere that claims sonnets should have
>>>>>>> a "volta", a twist at about line 9, but I don't see that
>>>>>>> in this one.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I suspect Kasper is more interested in why you bother labelling
>>>>>>> it a sonnet, what your purpose is in doing that.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Janet
>>>>>>> ----------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>>>> --
>>>>>>> ------
>>>>>>> Janet Jackson <[log in to unmask]>
>>>>>>> www.myspace.com/poetjj
>>>>>>> www.proximity.webhop.net
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Allegedly, some kid poet came over to Robert Frost at some
>>>>>>> gathering
>>>>>>> and
>>>>>>> introduced himself by saying "I'm a poet." Frost replied
>>>>>>> "That's a
>>>>>>> praise word. I'd wait 'til someone else called me that."
>>>>>>> ----------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>>>> --
>>>>>>> ------
>>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> --
>>>>> Andrew
>>>>> http://hispirits.blogspot.com/
>>>>> http://www.inblogs.net/hispirits
>>>>> http://www.flickr.com/photos/aburke/
>>>>>
>>>>
>>
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