Absolutely! And the group who raised the original query should have known
this as well as I do, since they've done or are doing the course I did 5
years ago.
I too use the things myself. The impression I get though is that it doesn't
seem to be occurring to these people that it's ok, might even be fun, to try
these techniques and see where they take you. Somebody even pointed out that
you don't find brackets in Shakespeare or Keats ..... (I would love it if
someone could prove that wrong, by the way.)
I've passed on the gist of the examples you've given, including that url,
Roger. So thanks, everybody.
Doug's second post on this subject has just come in. Dammitt, these students
are supposed to know all this! For pete's sake, the set book for the course
is the Norton Postmodern American Poetry anthology!! And even if that's been
changed, it's a Masters course they're doing -- one would have thought
they'd have had enough sheer curiosity to go exploring.
No, to be fair, I suspect the perception is that you either write way-out
modernistic stuff *all the time*, or else standard workshop poetry. In the
latter, the use of brackets could maybe become an irritating stylisitc
quirk. I had a tutor once who objected to the use of exclamation-points; and
it could be something like that. But really, a bit of wider knowledge is
surely called for, and I have passed on these comments.
joanna
----- Original Message -----
From: "Douglas Barbour" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, November 10, 2006 3:35 PM
Subject: Re: Brackets in poetry
> Brackets have been there for a long time Joanna, certainly since the New
> American poetry found various uses for them, including the open kind....
>
> Sheila & I are using them a fair amount in Continuations, & I often use
> them in my own work....
>
> They can DO things....
>
> Doug
> On 10-Nov-06, at 5:38 AM, Joanna Boulter wrote:
>
>> Hi there everybody -- a friend has just told me that at a recent workshop
>> she attended it was suggested that brackets should not appear in poetry.
>> She says she's had "a quick look through various anthologies and can
>> confirm that they are rare, although not non-existent."
>>
>> Do petc members agree with this dictum, and if so, on what basis? I
>> myself have found quite a few examples in recent poetry, but in actual
>> collections rather than anthologies. Also, does the use of two dashes as
>> a framing device, in the same way as parentheses, come under the same
>> embargo? I suspect that one's quite common these days.
>>
>> best joanna
>>
> Douglas Barbour
> 11655 - 72 Avenue NW
> Edmonton Ab T6G 0B9
> (780) 436 3320
> http://www.ualberta.ca/~dbarbour/
>
> Latest book: Continuations (with Sheila E Murphy)
> http://www.uap.ualberta.ca/UAP.asp?LID=41&bookID=664
>
> You may allow me moments
> not monuments, I being
> content. It is little,
> but it is little enough.
>
> John Newlove
>
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