----- Original Message -----
From: "Barry Alpert" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, January 01, 2008 10:42 AM
Subject: Re: Fw: Poems by others: John Yau, "Stuffing yourself into a
blizzard"
That's interesting. I would have never guessed. Isn't Objectivism
tarnished for you by its major presence for language poetry?
Barry Alpert
Besides the redoubtable Perloff, the L school has many academic
thesis-grinders who hitch their star to its wagon. Early langpo theoretical
statements (like the one that initiated those sillly equals signs, l=a=
etc.) insisted also that there is no distinction between poems and
theoretical writings. One aim of all this theorizing has been, as I said,
to put themselves at the apex of a Modernist tradition they portray as
monolithic, and as tending inexorably towards themselves. But there are
many modernisms, any number of possible "traditions." There's also a
paradox involved in claiming a *tradition of iconoclasm -- in a supposedly
avant-garde movement saying that tradition justifies it. A phrase like
"major presence," like the word "generative," is redolent of academic
pigeonholing, not creative appropriation. Even if the historical
inevitability of a style could be demonstrated, it wouldn't justify that
style aesthetically, or preclude others, or compel another poet to accept
it. The 20th-century American poet who sets, for me, the highest standard
is Robinson Jeffers. I also like E. A. Robinson. Both (like me) wrote
narrative poetry. I could say - as my friends at the now-defunct Story Line
Press did - that they comprise a modern narrative "tradition." But since no
academic cares about that tradition, it doesn't exist as such. I could
claim it as a "presence" in my work, but wouldn't it be pompous to do so;
instead Jeffers and E.A.R. are simply exemplars for me, influences. Along
with the "Doric" grace of Reznikoff, the warmth of Rakosi, the stylistic
Cubism and intense political consciousness of Oppen. Joe Duemer's implied
point is also well taken: "Objectivism" exists because Harriet Monroe wanted
a label and Louis Zukofsky was glad to give her one. I think Oppen's work
is important because it interests and stimulates me; Zukofsky's doesn't.
Styles change, despite the efforts of poets to prove that theirs is not
merely one style among others but historically necessary. And tastes
change, despite the efforts of theorists to conceal taste with theory.
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