----- Original Message -----
From: "Douglas Barbour" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, April 08, 2009 11:30 AM
Subject: Re: Dead ends
> Well, fine, & if it works for you, Fred. I tend to live by Samuel R
> Delany's comment many years ago:
>
> 'Put in opposition to 'style,' there is no such thing as 'content'.'
>
> Which does not in any way deny the importance of that latter....
>
But your and Delany's credo DOES "deny the importance" of content, Doug. If
content is trivial vis-a-vis style, if it is an *epiphenomenon of style,
then content IS unimportant for poetry and one can avoid thinking about it.
Or relegate it to one's other reading in one's other roles - citizen,
progressive, etc. - and assume that it will filter in to one's work as a
poet. Which is what both "theory-driven" and "confession-driven" poets do.
(Trying to avoid "language" and "mainstream.")
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