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Date: Tue, 11 Nov 1997 17:06:33 +0000 (GMT) From: R I Caddel <[log in to unmask]> To: british n irish poets <[log in to unmask]> Subject: Re: Worzel Gummidge Reply-to: R I Caddel <[log in to unmask]> Ric wrote: > A word of caution: I've seen whole >lists brought to their knees (figuratively speaking) by the process of >group-discussion... The list`s natural posture is down on one knee. Genuflexion is its business; the telos of every discussion is the expression of unilateral or mutual admiration: it`s a Church, a Mission of missionaries preaching to missionaries; it`s a self-help group, a 12-step programme, and it is only right that we should be unable to engage in any serious disputation, for that way schism lies. Religious poetry is exactly what we should be talking about, and it is the only thing we will not talk about religiously. I understand Keston`s terse response to the query about HWWR - after all, no-one likes to be compared to Donald Davie - but he begs a number of questions with the claim that HWWR is "manifestly and overtly &c."...I`d need to look at it again, I remember use of a number of religious terms, overtly and covertly in puns, and blue apparitions etc. Enough to make it a dominant? I don`t know, but, please, Keston, don`t leave it at that. Just the idea that that sequence "is concerned with" - how we arrive at that identification - is interesting and, I think, important. I was reading the exchange between Prynne and Drew Milne, published a few parataxes ago, earlier in the week and as he provides a serious of thoroughly convincing caveats about irony, he also registers/applauds the directness of parts of "Still Life In Blue" - how did he come to accept some bits as sincere, some as ironic..? Because he knows the author isn`t a bastard? Are the elements of a religious lexis motivated enough (by what? by whom?) to demonstrate (whose?) concern in HWWR? robin %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%