That's interesting about punctured balloons, Douglas. My take on this is
slightly different, I'm not concerned about reception, and criticism is
something I delight in, it shows engagement after all, what bugs me is the
sense of being in a waste, in a literary culture that precludes difference,
where the concerns are not for poetry but perceptions of status. It saddens
me, and no simple account can describe it all: there are good poets out
there who are actually into the 'system' as well as hacks. But the balloons,
oh yes, that describes it exactly, not just my feeling about my own work but
also what happens to that of others, one can look at one culture or another
and find governing sets of conventions that condition what is accepted and
what is not. The story varies according to where it is told but the
deadening force of sameness operates throughout. This is the ground of my
despair. In England, for instance, it is largely the anecdotal, the
self-centred obsession with the commonplace, that broadcasts a message akin
to 'we are trivial and proud of it'. Largely I say because there is
something resembling an avant-garde, but even there yet another set of rules
obtain.
Anyhow, nuff said ....
Best
Dave
David Bircumshaw
Leicester, England
Home Page
A Chide's Alphabet
Painting Without Numbers
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/david.bircumshaw/index.htm
----- Original Message -----
From: "Douglas Clark" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, November 26, 2002 5:46 PM
Subject: Re: Numbers
JUst the negative reaction to the SElected and realising that
it had all been a waste of time. The previous books had received
as much notice as could have been hoped for but the mistake was
to ask to be judged. I shouldnt have written what I wrote just now.
But I have never had the same confidence in my writing since 1996.
Your balloon gets punctured. But I suppose at some time everybody
has to ask the question.
On Tue, 26 Nov 2002, Stuart Ross wrote:
> Douglas Clark writes:
>
> >it kept me going through the years until in 1975 I made
> >the mistake of publishing a Selected Poems which was an absolute
> >publishing disaster and I have hardly written a serious poem
> >since then.
>
> Hi there, Doug -- Your story's a sad one -- having the joy ripped out
> of your writing. I can't help but think there's an issue of
> perspective here, too -- that maybe you're having trouble viewing
> your own work in a fair way (does that make sense?). Obviously, many
> people have gotten much pleasure from the stuff you've produced since
> the 1970s. Of course, that doesn't necessary give *you* satisfaction.
>
> Right now, my publisher wants to issue a Selected of mine, which I
> really resisted for a long time. Then I agreed. And in the past few
> days I've been on the verge of cancelling it again. So your email
> struck me especially hard. If it's not too painful to dwell on, why
> do you think the publishing of a Selected Poems had such a profound
> negative effect on your writing? In my case, I don't see the need for
> a Selected -- I'm not established enough; my three previous books are
> still in print, if not in stores; I've never won an award; the masses
> aren't exactly clamouring for it. That's why I'm so ambivalent.
>
> Best,
>
> Stuart
> --
>
--
Douglas Clark, Bath, England mailto: [log in to unmask]
Lynx: Poetry from Bath .......... http://www.bath.ac.uk/~exxdgdc/lynx.html
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