Ah yes, age gets to us all. Not knowing about Hoagy Carmichael or the
Globe really isn't The End Of Civilisation As We Know It. People can
quite happily rub along not knowing these facts. I'm happy that most
people under 40 haven't a clue about The Kinks or a few of the obscure
folk bands of the 60s/70s that I've forgotten about. Try an
experiment: go outside the front door, button-hole the nearest person
who looks under thirty and ask them about the Globe and Hoagy
Carmichael. I bet you a nice Sunday lunch at The Claude down the road,
that they'll look at you blankly.
I just pointed out my reactions. Now whether most poets should know
about the Globe - possibly. Not essential though. As for most poetry
readers, again, well, maybe they *should* but then I should know a lot
of things but I don't.
Now you could point out that it's pretty rich coming from me about
obscure references. However, in the context of the poem that Andrew
presented, those two references seemed to me in my humble opinion at
odds with the rest of the poem. And the point about Andrew's use of
The Globe is that you have to know the reference to make sense of the
thrust of the poem. It's a great idea, and I love the sharp sixpenny
turn of focus now that I've grokked the sense. Put it this way; that
sharp turn would be all the better if the reader was drawn immediately
with the turn. Up until that point, I've concentrated on the scene
before me; I've been drawn in to the richly described scene, all
references to obscure, minor buildings have been put to the back of my
head. I was left floundering at trying to work out what this Globe
thingy was. I had to pause, drag the globe reference from the back of
my dusty memory banks, realize the thing about the theatre and carry
on. Now, may be this is the reaction in the reader that Andrew wanted;
I don't know. I kind of assumed that he would have wanted the reader
to turn sharply with the observer in this case.
Roger
On Sat, Sep 27, 2008 at 3:50 AM, Jon Corelis <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>> Hoagy Carmichael might stump most people under 60.
>
> So. It has come to this.
>
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