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On Fri, 15 Sep 2000, Jon Corelis wrote... > Now let me get this straight. If I post a poem to a poetry discussion >list and someone starts discussing it, I'm going to say "Hey who asked for >your opinion?"... Point taken. But I think in practice, it's helpful to have some idea of the state of the poem's development, and of how the poet regards it, before embarking on a criticism of it. Perhaps it shouldn't be, but I think it is. Partly, this is because members of this list have widely varying approaches to poetry, and different kinds of experience, expertise, and culture. One wants to feel that time spent studying a poem in order to comment on it has been worthwhile, that the criticism has a chance of being useful to the poet. We have a habit on this list of not responding to poems, and certainly not in detail. If participants want more detailed comments, I'm suggesting they should ask for them. My critical response to a poem posted might differ depending on whether: a) it was a draft that the poet was actively working on and expecting to change, b) already published, c) something that had been dashed off over lunch as a bit of fun. You can easily knock me down logically on this, and say that if the poem is great, it doesn't matter whether a), b) or c) obtains, or that if the line-break between lines 4 and 5 doesn't work, it's similarly irrelevant what stage the poem is at in the view of the poet. But I think I might be more likely to go to the trouble of mentioning the dodgy line-break if I thought the poet would be interested and perhaps re-consider it. Regards, -- Peter http://www.hphoward.demon.co.uk/poetry/ %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%