Well yes, that's one of the things I disagreed with Robert about - the
extent, or not, to which such a theory was tactically organised. As I
said, I remain skeptical about the extent of the mainstream's
theorizing. It depends of course on what we mean by theory, in this
situation, and what we mean by 'organise'. The mainstream is not just
the 'School of Quietude' either, it has different faces and
conflicting pushes behind it - look at the confused tangles Paterson
gets himself into, the poor man really doesn't know where he is at
times.
Of course I agree that any theorizing on the mainstream side is not on
a par with Bernstein et al, but, as I've pointed out before, this lack
of 'theory' is its strength, is its advantage - but, what shall we
call it? - behind the lack of 'theory' there lies a huge theory, long
standing, or a whole mix of theories, all long naturalised by use and
habit. It is not just a matter of being lazy, it is of never having
been given the opportunity to do otherwise, or alternatively doing
everything in ones power to avoid any such opportunity. It is safe. It
is successful. Why change? A problem with trying to talk about this is
that it can all sound over dramatic.
Did you see Dave Bircumshaw's little designation of Duffy, in another
tag, as being 'social realism lite'? Realism of different hues plays a
big part in mainstream poetics. Realism has all kinds of theoretical
bases - literary, philosophical, political etc., and by that I mean it
has theories about how certain shared cultural assumptions can be
manipulated by a poetry writing individual to produce what on its
terms are good poems - poems rooted in a reality while spiritually
transcending it through the elevation of the poet's 'thoughts' into an
aesthetic object, the poem. These people are not all twerps. They are
dedicated too. What am I trying to say?........... perhaps I am
saying that all of this cannot be just down to habit and laziness -
there are all sorts of shared cultural positions, ideas about
language, ideas about the use of literature, that form the basis of
their poetics - their theories about poetry in other words.
Tim A.
On 31 Aug 2010, at 12:50, Jeffrey Side wrote:
> Yes, Tim, but the “School of Quietude” (to borrow Silliman’s term
> for this) probably aren’t as organised “theoretically” as is being
> implied here. They may be conforming to an accepted linguistic
> paradigm i.e. “make sense and describe things excessively”, but is
> that really a theory on a par with, say, Bernstein’s et al? I don’t
> think so. It is more like a writing preference, based on habit and
> laziness.
>
> For all my dislike of Paterson and O’Brian’s poetry, I get the sense
> that the poems matter to them—however badly they’re written. I don’t
> get this sense with the theory-led poets, who seem more akin to
> worker bees producing indifferent and interchangeable texts.
>
>
>
>
>
> Original Message:
>
>> 'Non-theorised' poetry, in my experience, often has a theory: it
>> doesn't articulate it because it assumes that it is 'natural'.
>
> Yes exactly, or it pretends that it is, or convinces itself, or
> behaves as if etc.
>
> In mine and Andrew Duncan's 'Don't Start Me Talking' this issue crops
> up in my interview of Robert Sheppard where we disagreed about the
> extent and depth of this problem. Robert was saying that things had
> changed and that the mainstream had now 'come out' with its theories.
> I was skeptical about this and still am. If you take away the cloak of
> naturalism (oh I like that - it's mine - don't touch it) you expose
> yourself as just another type of poetry, as opposed to THE type - such
> a move would be tactical folly for the mainstream.
>
> What I think happens now is that they leave the theorizing in the
> background, in its correct place as part of a lit course etc, only to
> be brought out front house when really needed. In this way front house
> can carry on as always. If you look at some of the things Don Paterson
> and Sean O'Brian say, and the context/audience in/to which he says
> them, you can see this in action.
>
> Tim A.
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