>The term autonomy also arose as a negative.
. . .
>I wonder about the radical efficacy claimed for ever changning
>processual texts, such as Trevor Joyce hoped for, a sort of
>computerised "ultimate poem" (to use Emmmett Williams' term from the
>1950s).
Robert,
Thanks for raising these questions. I associate the first point with
myself also, since I characterised the 'mainstream' poem, at least in
Ireland, as an autonomous object opening select windows on the world
beyond it, through which a strictly controlled vista is made available,
often thereby lending the poem what I regard as a meretricious glamour -
I instanced Mahon and Boland specifically.
On the second point, since I was speaking without notes, I may have
misrepresented my position to some degree: I do not claim any "radical
efficacy" in principle for the sort of text I constructed in Syzygy, nor
do I regard it as in any way an "ultimate poem", though since I'm unaware
of Williams' use of the term, I may be misconstruing both him and you. I
chose to use a computer spreadsheet because it seemed by far the most
elegant way of implementing the 'bicameral' structure I wanted (I adopt
Ken Edwards' very appropriate term). That structure was, in turn, driven
by my specific concerns - I've been working in a certain direction for
over thirty years now, on and off, and this seemed a way to take things
further. I was interested in developing a form which could bear the
complexity of what I was trying to get down, without me having to get
outside the structure and 'explain' those thematics, inevitably
reductively, in discursive prose. I regard the structure as a specific,
though - I hope - suggestive, solution to a specific problem; I didn't
attempt to indicate why this form was necessary to me, but rather to
indicate how it operated. I didn't say why, because I don't fully know
why. The answer may become more apparent to me as I write past Syzygy.
Here's hoping.
But no claims to absolutes or ultimates, okay? I'd hate to get that
boring . . .
Cheers,
Trevor
*****************************************************************
Trevor Joyce
Apple Cork IS&T
Phone : +353-21-284405
EMail : [log in to unmask]
*****************************************************************
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
|