Peter,
  You're not wrong that many of us are too old for this, but even in my own 
prematurely advancing age, worsened by tobacco addiction, I retain the right 
to defend myself.

There's a great deal in your post I'd like to think about, but can I get rid 
of the last point first? I've already offered a qualified apology to Sean 
about connecting his "beady eyed" with Jews, but the fact you've never heard 
the connection doesn't make it false. Among the physical stereotypes for 
Jews it comes in about second after a hooked nose. Try a Google search with 
the two terms and you'll meet a wealth of odious material. Or rather don't 
try it, because it's such a dispiriting experience. In the context of 
describing an English Jew in a somewhat conspiratorial role it just rang an 
alarm bell. But I shouldn't have sounded it myself, as there was clearly no 
intention of the kind in Sean's remark, strange though it was.

You too seem to envision Hobsbaum's role as some kind of "social engineer", 
which I just find preposterous when we're dealing with such distinctive and 
talented writers as those from Belfast, and from Glasgow. The idea that he 
himself, and his conclusive impact on these writers should be one of 
"keeping poetry small-scale" is equally unconvincing to me. Which poet could 
possibly want poetry to be "small-scale"?

In the meantime Robin, who knows a great deal more about Hobsbaum than I do, 
has offered a lot more relevant information, so I'm greatly relieved to quit 
the stage for good on this matter.

I can see why you say that "What Prynne and Heaney wrote in itself proposes 
inimical and absolutely unreconcilable responses" and it may be true. My 
impression though is that neither Heaney nor Prynne are "aggressive" in the 
sense I think you mean, though the followers of both may well be. Your "we 
stick with our heroes" strikes a chord though. I've tried to wean myself 
from 'hero worship' but would have to admit that in the poetry world, for 
me, Heaney pretty closely fits the bill. I'm not especially liberal in my 
tastes, but I can see good reasons for respecting others' tastes even if I 
don't share them. Which is a way of leaving open that question whether these 
different ways of writing are indeed "inimical and absolutely 
unreconciliable". I'm just not sure. There's a lot of shared history, which 
is something I've been trying to argue and explore on that other thread. 
Just as an example, Prynne and Heaney both revere Wordsworth though they 
move off in opposite directions. Is it impossible to appreciate both 
directions? Forget liberal, for someone who does enjoy both is the enjoyment 
of one of them a betrayal of the other? Though I'm curious about Prynne's 
work I don't think I've yet enjoyed it very much, so I may well be proof of 
your proposition.

What's odd to me about the conflict that has just blown up is that, Heaney 
perhaps apart, I don't think my tastes are that radically different from 
David's, it's just we clearly, and quite often, dislike each other's way of 
talking about them. My feeling with you, Peter, is that our tastes really 
are radically different, but that doesn't entirely prevent an exchange of 
views. In fact I'm surprised how often I agree with your arguments.
I made my appeal to the list rules also in the light of that. I was finding 
it extremely and unnecessarily heavy-going to try to advance an argument 
when it was getting ambushed by negative remarks about the personalities of 
the writers involved, and this happens frequently enough on the list to make 
it worth addressing. So for me, Holbrooke's attacks on Plath and Thomas are 
neither here nor there. If anything they indicate precisely the kind of 
criticism I find worthless, and would think we could best avoid. Byron's 
sneer at Keats doesn't show him in an especially good light, revealing a 
kind of snobbery, though (as I said before) at least it's memorable.

That's now three posts in opposition to what I was arguing, and none in 
favour. I'm not even sure anyone has really heard what I was saying. Perhaps 
I've argued it clumsily. It isn't a question, as all three of you have now 
remarked, of whether we can find much worse behaviour elsewhere, but rather 
of how a list like this should conduct its discussions. I find the drone of 
resentment and malicious construction too frequent here and too much of an 
obstacle to any open debate, so perhaps this is just not the place for me. 
I'm quite ok with open conflict, but I find the aspersions, for instance, in 
David's post to me deliberately offensive, futile,  and irksome, and I'm 
quite sure that what started as a promising though certainly conflictual 
exchange has now ended in silly point-scoring, as has happened quite 
regularly. Of course by replying I also make myself responsible for that, 
but I was proposing a way to avoid it. The proposal itself seems to have 
merely spurred further fits of annoyance.

Jamie






-----Original Message----- 
From: Peter Riley
Sent: Thursday, December 19, 2013 10:18 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Fwd: In fairness

We are rather old to be doing this, all of us. I have noticed that
young British poets these days are increasingly willing to site
themselves neither here nor there, not to join in any hostilities, but
to view the entire ensemble as a possible field of action. The reason
we cannot do this is that however much we are willing to tolerate,
however liberal, we are still talking about the same dozen poets we
have always talked about and what they chose to write in itself
divides us. What Prynne and Heaney wrote in itself proposes inimical
and absolutely unreconcilable responses. We can pride ourselves in
"enjoying" both but the antagonism is there, in the poetry and in the
beliefs. There are a lot more poets even of the same generation, who
were more independent or less aggressive, but we stick with our heroes.

In this talk about Hobsbawm there is no definition offered,--  if he
pushed a certain line in poetry, exactly what it was, or what were at
least the broad principles of it. If that emerged we could begin to
talk about it. I myself might begin to see him as something other than
a capable social scientist who should have steered clear of poetry, if
I were offered some account of what his beliefs specifically about
poetry were. A lot of the resentment here is about scale, I think,
that Hobsbawm's insistence was not so much on a particular style, as
on keeping poetry small-scale (social/personal).

But it does not necessarily matter if we do not see eye to eye. We
don't have to, the field of poetry is not one which demands
quiescence, it is much happier seeing some action. We can keep our
heroes because they are personal. Sean's career and opinions, for
instance,  the whole story of them, constitute a phenomenon of late
20th Century poetry which can't be got rid of by mere disagreement.

As for ad hominem, we have seen nothing like the viciousness with
which this has been pursued on the past, such as D. Holbrooke on
Sylvia Plath and Dylan Thomas on whom he went to the trouble of
writing two books of personal attack (infantile, masturbatory,
neurotic etc.) or the attack on Keats (I think the word 'onanistic'
was preferred). But never in my long life have I seen any suggestion
that "beady-eyed" is anti-Semitic, it is a perfectly common English
term, about as anti-Semitic as "size 12 shoes" or "lives in Salford".
Although the general principle holds, it has to be admitted that there
is, in my experience anyway, some correlation between bad poetry and
unethical behaviour which we are sometimes entitled to point out,
without making it into a formula.

pr