Submitted with love & esteem to Monsieur Gabriel:
Monsigsnort Gabriel,
I do not think Poetryetc is a forum for extended dissertations. Thusly my
vague notion of "utterance" was sketched out sparingly. But this does not
mean I was not aiming toward a quality which does not get much critical
mileage these days. I circled around the notion of "public speech", which
addresses immediate concerns while remaining poetry - at the conjunction of
beauty & necessity. What I tried to say was that this currently-marginal
aspect of contemporary poetics might return in a return-of-repressed
fashion as an element of any "new" avant-garde. Poetry wheels around its
mislaid potentialities, now hither now thither. I'm not saying that
utterance in this sense is not a part of current poetry (witness the flap
over seemingly cardboard rhetorician Tom Paulin) - only that it's an
undervalued principle among the circles of would-be a-v watchers. & maybe
there's a better name for it (engagement? topicality? public address?)
Here's a question for both of us Criticks, then - where are the utterers (&
mutterers) of today & tomorrow? In Foreigne Landes & Tongues, perhaps?
Hizzoner Hank
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