or maybe that should be weasels a-go-go following keston's nature notes.

i have been following with fascination the recent discussions inspired
by the invaders of Toad Hall in their metaphoric apotheosis. many, too
many strands of thought and connection have been suggested by the
debate, several times I have attempted to put fingers to keyboard to
attempt to formulate a response or viewpoint only to be defeated by the
polyverse of directions that John Temple's postings awaken.
 howsomehowever that be, I can perhaps isolate a few reactions:
a) regardless of any 'aery thinness' of linkage between John Dowland,
J.H.Prynne, Johnnie Keats & prodigal returning wildlife to 'Great
Expectations' I respond very warmly to the (implied) re-iteration of the
centrality of that text to the English-English & maybe English/British
LitTrad. 'beggar my neighbour' it is that reverberates throughout our
culture & history.
b) i also feel a kind of 'fear' at the 'language of the masters' at the
seeming will towards cultural omniscience that elements of the debate
seem to possess: the apparently effortless overviews, the ease with the
echoing labyrinths of quotes within quotes, leave a somewhat less
schooled person such as my sometimes good self tending towards a corner,
darkly & tremblingly. I write as one who works on an office production
line, where independent thought is not required, where conformity is the
key to success and incompetence is boss. & where men & women in grey
business suits come & observe without introduction or explanation to
those who are literally beneath their gaze.
c) that this language excludes the contingent, & sets up a mind-field
where the dialects of the secondary imagination, of writers like
J.H.Prynne (fine poet that he is), substitute their erudition and long
perspectives for the front-lines of verse. for it all to be known,
everything (and everyone) must be kept in place. no movement then nor no
ch-ch-changes in this statue-still.
d) somewhere the anguish of suffering in the world was mentioned. now
although I can feel 'something' at generalised images of the plights of
others, this 'something' is very much a response at a remove - altho'
say the monstrous death-toll in the recent Turkish quake does elicit a
certain sorrowful-feeling-withness from me the suffering of anyone
closer to me in the world hits me far, far more strongly. I would not
even like to feel so immediately for humanity in the semi-abstract - I
doubt if my sensibility or sanity could withstand such an impact. I can,
however, thro' the power of art, respond to the passion of Vallejo's
final poems, say, even tho' what I've seen of his prose at the time
seems bog-standard Thirties Red; or I can respond to the pathos and
'literary' heroism of the late Mandelstam; but these responses are
essentially imaginative, not 'out there real', if one allows the notion
of generalised awareness the status of the primary imagination then I
feel one is tottering towards the kind of position where, say, 'The Man
with the Blue Guitar' becomes a major poem.

ach, enough now, the strands are multiplying. but thanks to John Temple,
cris, Keston etc for this absorbing debate. the words are falling apart
in my mouth - I could curse the Education acts for ever opening it up.

      Deference

It is the early 1960's. In the coal-fire-light,
beshadowed, a child's thoughts run

to the Great Door of Toad Hall.
Estella and Miss Havisham are within.

The door will never answer.
Nor does the child see

the flat cap the sky drops
down upon his head

nor the slowly opening window
and a shotgun shouting:

'Go, weasel.'





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