Good ol' Ron S has done some research for me (and you) again. Here's the
last para of a review of John Ashberry's selection for his last ten books:
'I concede that £12.95 is a steep price to pay for what many will consider
to be insurmountably baffling. But bafflement is part of the condition of
modern poetry, and if there's a modern poet you need on your shelves, and in
your head, it's Ashbery. As Geoffrey Hill - also an essential poet - once
said, public toilets have a duty to be accessible, poetry does not.'
I love the Hill quote. The rest of the review is interesting - read it at
http://books.guardian.co.uk/reviews/poetry/0,,2216060,00.html
Nicholas Lezard hails the later work of one of the truly essential poets,
John Ashbery
*Saturday November 24, 2007
The Guardian <http://www.guardian.co.uk/>*
*Notes from the Air: Selected Later Poems*, by John Ashbery (Carcanet,
£12.95)
My frustration is that some readers keep looking for meaning in poetry. Why
should a poem have to 'mean'?! A tree is, a rock is, a wedge-tail eagle is,
a poem is.
Andrew
http://hispirits.blogspot.com/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/aburke/
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