I think it's at least as relevant to topic as the delights of
Istanbul. And it was necessary to say it, Tim, because remarks about
the shortcomings of what you call mainstream inevitably imply the
existence of a non-mainstream free from such problems. And much
remarks were made.
As to the other matter, that mainstream has a different philosophy of
writing because of its adherence to "subject" and "transparency", I
think that's only diagrammatically true. I mean it's true in principle
as a dichotomisation which is part of the definition of modernism,
more in criticism than in poems, and it's true at the (fortunately
quite few) far extremes. But there are so many exceptions and ifs and
buts that I don't think it can be used to maintain the existence of a
total divide in English language poetry. It's not, for instance, true
of Alice Oswald, or Pauline Stainer, it's not consistently true of Don
Paterson or Roy Fisher or even Seamus Heaney (whose "subject" can
phase into "occasion"). But it surely is true of Thomas A.
ClarkBritish. And I keep seeing the work of younger poets who just
can't be defined by these categories -- Sasha Aurora Ahkat, Zoe
Skoulding, Nathan Thompson...
Well I'm in favour of poets flexing their muscles and refusing to sit
still and being willing to do the opposite of what they're supposed to
be doing, including tackling subject and transparency and rhyme as it
suits them. When is there going to be a revival of narrative poems in
ballad metre -- "It was a dark and stormy night..." etc. ? What
happened to sestinas?
PR
On 9 Sep 2010, at 18:29, Tim Allen wrote:
On 9 Sep 2010, at 11:00, Peter Riley wrote:
> But I repeat that the avant-garde is just as much riddled with acts
> of pre-endorsement or programming. And i wasn't thinking of the
> plodders, but rather of "bright young things" seduced into a kind of
> automatism, partly by their own second-hand dogmatic theorising.
Peter, sometimes you are not helpful. I might well agree with your
statement above with regard to some people, but it has nothing
whatsoever to do with the particular problem of mainstream approach to
subject. It seems to me you are only saying it to try to even things
out, to show how fair you are being. I know you have a problem with
much of what calls itself avant garde, so do I, but I was not just
talking in this case about 'pre-endorsement or programming' - in an
earlier exchange on the thread with Robert I talked in this way about
models and templates and family resemblances - yes, but my point about
the mainstream approach to/use of subject goes beyond those things -
as both you and Mark picked up on, so why then diffuse the issue with
this thing about the avant 'bright young things'?
If you want to talk about the current problems with the bright young
things of avant poetry then do so, but don't mix the issues. Mind you,
your statement above could have been said by Adam Fieled, whose
article still titles this thread. Back to square 1. Thanks.
Tim A.
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