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MJ I was just demonstrating how belittling written thought by idealising spoken thought is only an expression of preference, & Jon's broad statements went a bit beyond that. maybe I shouldn't have brought up that whole precept of linguistics, I was just trying to suggest that both written language & spoken language are still _language_. K S On 20/09/06, MJ Walker <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > I'm a bit late on this, but...agree with Mark about Hughes/Coleridge - > in fact Hughes is not playing in the same league as Coleridge, as he > knew very well, being one of Coleridge's best (if somewhat weird & > erratic) critics, see "The Snake in the Oak" in *Winter Pollen*. I would > only adjust Mark's "pretty well" to "superbly" (in the really great > poems), a term I would equally extend to Emily Dickinson, say, though > her work is more even in quality - just in case you had me down as a DWM > fancier. > I find this obsequious chanting of mantras like "words, whether spoken > or written, are arbitrary" really mystifying - can the perpetrator of > this diktat name anyone apart from Humpty Dumpty for whom this is true? > "Founded on personal whims, capricious" etc, or is there a speshul > So-Surean dikshonary in the meantime? In fact Saussure himself agreed > that linguistic signs are not "completely" arbitary, only "relatively" > so - and here I think the word "arbitrary" is being abused; "contingent > rather than necessary" would be more correct & avoid the confusion. > mj > > Kasper wrote: > > > Mark, you're right of course; that part of my reply was quite rash. > > objectively speaking all that is occuring is change, rather than > > improvement. it's just that as a witness of / participant in the > > change, I can't really help but see it as positive. :) > > > > KS > > > > On 20/09/06, Mark Weiss <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > > > >> I can agree with much of what you say without accepting the > >> Hughes/Coleridge thing, or for that matter the onwards and upwards > >> thing. Poetry changes, which is not the same as improves. Coleridge > >> stands up pretty well, and I'd rather read Christabel any day than > >> any or all of Hughes. > >> > > >