_______________
Call for Papers
_______________
A N G E L A K I
journal of the theoretical humanities
Special Issue 5.1
(for publication march/april 2000)
POETS ON THE VERGE OF A NERVOUS BREAKDOWN
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Edited by Anthony Mellors & Robert Smith
The deconstruction of nostalgia for transcendent identity is crucial
to international poetry working out from modernism. If, for
example, the work of Andrea Zanzotto, Allen Fisher, and Susan
Howe centres on locations saturated with national myths (the
Veneto, London, New England), this is not in order to romanticize
the poet's identity with the place or to envision universal truths
from a local microcosm. Rather, each of these poets takes the
immediate environment as a place crossed by divergent histories,
perceptions, and ecologies which are traced as partial evidence,
inviting readers both to attend to the difficulties of the text and to
pursue their own lines of inquiry. Even in the case of Zanzotto's
psychoanalysis of pastoral identity, no subject-position is evoked
which remains unquestionable.
However, although this kind of poetry has a wide and dedicated
audience, it is far removed from what most readers and literary
critics today regard as the appropriate form of contemporary verse.
Late modernism is post-modern in the sense that Lyotard makes of
the term: a critical reworking of the procedures of modernism. But
postmodernism has acquired another meaning, which has gained
general currency: the outright rejection of modernism as being
idealist, elitist, reactionary, inaccessible, and irrelevant. If
postmodernism means the breakdown of distinctions between high
and low forms of culture, late modernism's formal difficulty puts
it squarely in the high culture camp. Post-modernist poetry, on the
other hand, turns away from avant-garde experimentation. Instead,
it reestablishes the lyric voice, either through ironic parables of the
self or as the expression of multicultural identities. It endorses the
local, the particular, even the provincial, as the representation of
vital if marginalized communities, and it does so without the
modernists' desire to sublate the regional into a unified humanist
locus. Value is placed on the lucidity and directness with which the
poet communicates, allowing readers to identify with
representations of their own community or to empathize with
others. Poetry is a means - one among many - by which local
identities protect themselves from the homogenizing power of the
culture industry.
In this light, poetry which suspends identification looks as if it has
never managed to break free from the Coleridgean belief in a
clerisy of readers only able to grapple with the dialectics of the text
because highly attuned to the history and theory of poetic forms.
In a world where marginalized voices are fighting for recognition,
late modernism stands accused of evading its democratic
responsibilities. Far from inspiring readers to engage with
questions of identity and difference, these barely legible texts could
be said to encourage resignation and indifference in anyone except
those who are well educated and already disposed towards the
'difficult matter' of modern art. In contrast, postmodern poetry
claims humanist inclusivity without the rhetoric of aesthetic unity.
It aspires to what Simon Armitage and Robert Crawford call in
their recent Penguin anthology 'the democratic voice'.
This new poetic democracy is not without its theoretical and
institutional problems. Postmodernism argues for the irreducibility
of experience, its essential difference from community to
community. Yet in this context it requires that all experience be
rendered in an identifiable form. In Britain, for example, poetic
legitimacy is associated with a deeply ingrained suspicion of
'foreign' influences, so that even where regionalism is valued it
tends to be invoked as a populist defence against European
experimentalism and American excess. And it is not always clear
whether a poet's work is given as regional or radically marginal
because it engages with the linguistic and political pressures of
non-centralized identity, or simply because the poet has a tenuous
association with a marginal site. In _Devolving English
Literature_, Robert Crawford wants to affirm the virtues of
'provincial' writing against what he sees as a dominant and
exclusive metropolitan culture; yet his preferred exponents of
regional identity tend to be poets who, although having Welsh,
Irish, or Scottish family origins, are granted cultural legitimacy by
conforming to the only poetic 'voice' acceptable to metropolitan
publishing houses such as Faber: an ironic lyric style relatively
untroubled by the translatability of language or personal experience
and endorsing aptness of metaphor as the fundamental mark of
poetic value. Crawford's provincial/metropolitan opposition is itself
bogus in that it elides the problem of complicity: the notion of the
provincial is an invention of the metropolitan bourgeoisie, and its
use calls into question Crawford's ability to analyze the politics of
poetry beyond a centralist point of view. The position here is both
metropolitan and imperialist in that 'provincials' become the
subjects of sentimental regard as long as they communicate in the
accepted terms; otherwise, they are ignored or denounced. The
marginal is invited into the mainstream or preserved as marginal
value by the mainstream only when it gives up its attachment to
difference.
For late modernists, on the other hand, difference cannot be
translated, only approximated. The poem is a construction which
makes the reader aware that every translation is an appropriation.
It could be argued, however, that the implied reader of this poetry
is just as 'metropolitan' as Crawford's democrat. But, while the
two positions are not as clear cut as our description suggests, they
do represent fundamentally opposed views of poetry's function in
modern society. For what we are calling late modernism, poetry
can only become a radical force by resisting consumer culture and
its appeal to the 'short attention span' of its audience; for
postmodernism, poetry can only prevent itself from being
marginalized or completely ignored by competing with more
marketable forms of cultural production. While the former
continues to be reviled by the mainstream publishing houses and
literary organs as too rarefied to be of popular interest, the latter
is itself beginning to fall foul of market pressures. The current
hoo-haa over Oxford University Press's axing of its poetry list
shows that the mainstream is somewhat more marginal than its
proponents have imagined.
Even so, poetry is flourishing as never before through public
readings, small publishers and magazines, and via the Internet.
Although these networks might be said merely to affirm poetry's
marginalized status in an era of global markets, they nevertheless
lay claim to the cultural value of independent means of production.
(A modern irony being that small-press material has frequently out-
sold 'major' publications.) And, if these networks originate from
local or marginal groupings, they are anything but narrow in their
reach. They have inaugurated a new internationalism in poetry
which goes some way to confound the old coteries and critical
demarcations. The use of new technology has revitalized traditional
media by lowering production costs and has created alternative
forms of distribution. Australia, for example, has become a new
poetic centre. Through magazines such as John Kinsella's _Salt_,
James Taylor's _Boxkite_, and (on the Internet) John Tranter's
_Jacket_, it has increased international recognition for Australian
writing while creating strong links with poets in France, Britain
and the United States.
The aim of this issue of _Angelaki_ is to collect a wide range of
critical essays addressing the current state of international poetry.
We invite contributions addressing the general questions raised
above, and we hope to encourage debate about the history and
ideology of modern poetic forms and institutions. Far from being
taken as read (which is unlikely considering the partisan nature of
the subject), the remarks made here should be seen as the
springboard for argument and clearer definition. The issue will also
include new poetry.
* * *
Submission Information
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
_Angelaki_ is a peer-reviewed journal.
ABSTRACTS of 1000 words by APRIL 30 1999.
Abstracts to be sent to the below material address, or e-mailed
to: [log in to unmask]
If e-mailing, please ensure that you put 'Angelaki 5.1' in the
subject line.
FINAL MATERIAL (full essays) for peer review by JUNE 30,
1999.
Essays must be sent in duplicate (double-spaced, paginated) to:
Dr Anthony Mellors
59 Orchard Drive
Durham DH1 1LA
UNITED KINGDOM
* * *
About ANGELAKI
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
_Angelaki: journal of the theoretical humanities_ is
a print journal published three times a year by Carfax
Publishing Limited. The journal publishes two theme
issues and one general issue per volume. ISSN: 0969-725X.
_Angelaki_ was selected Best New Journal in the 1996
Council of Editors of Learned Journals Awards.
For further details of the journal and contents
listings please visit:
http://www.carfax.co.uk/ang-ad.htm
"Since its inception in 1993, the journal _Angelaki_ has
established itself as a leading forum of theoretical reflection,
providing a practical refutation of all those who would celebrate
'the end of theory.' Whether it is focused on thematic issues of
the most varied nature, introducing thinkers to English-language
readers, or treating a variety of problems in open issues,
_Angelaki_ challenges the complacency of the self-evident.
Required reading for the next millennium."
Samuel Weber
Please distribute this call
Gerard Greenway
managing editor
A N G E L A K I
journal of the theoretical humanities
Carfax Publishing Limited
http://www.carfax.co.uk/ang-ad.htm
44 Abbey Road E [log in to unmask]
Oxford OX2 0AE F +44 (0)1865 791372
United Kingdom T +44 (0)1865 793891
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
|
