Print

---

Anthony Lawrence wrote:
> the amazing sense of place that he's always been able to create.

yes, open Omeros at random and one is almost sure to
find a page crammed with detail: animals, vegetation,
tools, merchandise, glimpses of daily life, all of
which goes to build a convincing world for the reader

much the same can be said of Arthur Golding's Ovid, in
the context of which Zukofsky remarked "One should
distinguish, however, between a poet who writes
perfectly about one detail, and another who writes
perfectly about the same detail and a host of other
details covering a phase of civilization". [A Test of
Poetry, II.4]

and here we are pretty clearly in the territory of
the epic.  after all, epic simile is but one means
by which Homer's texts attain an inclusiveness

i am reminded also of Peter Ackroyd's review in
The Times of the first vol of Anthony Burgess'
autobiography: "Like his literary hero, James
Joyce, he has a proper respect for what the
world calls trivia" [hoping jacket blurbs are
reliable as citations]

:david