Keith
Thanks for responding so thoroughly.
I am split here. I agree with nearly everything you say and when I
tentatively defended the Gioia article I knew I was probably speaking for
something that has an entirely different agenda to my own (in many
conversations and private letters I have taken the same line as you) and
yet... and yet...
It is that 'degree of truth' that interests me and it worries me that it is
not addressed. The degree of truth would contain, for me, Gioia's recognition
of the bureaucratic and establishment/career background to poetry production.
Poetry is not somehow immune to this any more than any other human activity.
Poetry production is a social activity subject to any number of what we might
call 'extra-poetic' inputs. When the extra-poetic includes such things as
peoples' jobs and movement within hierarchical structures then different
things are going to happen to the poetry than if it were in another
situation. This to me seems so obvious that it seems daft to have to say it.
This does not mean or imply that there is a direct connection between that
micro situation and poetry's macro situation but surely it is reasonable to
ask the question and then do some exploratory tracking. Isn't it a case of -
if we've got nothing to hide then.....
All the best
Tim A.
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
|