What children are writing about

[warooa]

Can of worms indeed, your thoughts on your free verse writing are insightful, David. And the link may save us from going over any old school "Holden versus Ford" sort of adversaries which are fairly self-defeating. I agree, it raises some very pertinent talking points in terms of where we are at. I think personally that the "Australian" content requirement has a bit of a jingoistic tone to it, but that's just me - someone who isn't overly impressed with the flag-waving "love it or leave it" types at all. But it is very vague and very open to a wide subjective sort of interpretation. If it was done away with I doubt we would be flooded by truck-loads of "foreign" poems to stir up the xenophobia that sits in some of us, but it would, I believe probably make hardly any difference at all. We'd still read great poems and we'd still read ones that just don't rock out boat - but occasionally we'd more than likely read something which previously didn't fit ABPA parameters.

Can of worms indeed . . . big mackerel down the wharf

[David Campbell]

It may well be a can of worms, Stephen and Marty, but it’s a debate worth having…not only because it might be alienating aspiring young writers, but because it can create problems for judges. I hope the awarded writers in the Ipswich bush poetry section won’t mind if I use their poems as discussion points.

Take, for example, Brenda and Kevin’s poems, which are both about catastrophic floods. Kevin’s “How Long Will We Cry?” clearly identifies the location…Queensland’s Lockyer Valley, with mention of Bundaberg and Brisbane. But Brenda’s “In the Wake of the Deluge” doesn’t. It’s presumably about the same disaster, but apart from passing references to the “Bridge of Death” and “twin cities” there’s nothing which clearly identifies the poem as particularly Australian to a judge unfamiliar with what happened. Does that make it less of a poem? Of course not. But a judge lacking local knowledge might argue that it could be set anywhere in the world and hence didn’t satisfy the bush poetry definition.

That’s the problem. What makes a poem identifiably Australian? Other awarded Ipswich poems have clear Australian references (swagman, stolen generation, stockman, convict, Anzac), but Susan Sommerland’s “The Property”, while very rural in its setting, is a universal lament about death.

So what makes a poem Australian? Here’s how another bush poet defined to me the things that should NOT be considered bush poetry, in fact we should “vigorously resist” them:

“Poetry about life in general, e.g. things that happen during our lifetimes, such as a loved one’s debilitating illness, our fathers fighting in wars, (where Australian is not mentioned or inferred) and daily problems – personal and mechanical.”

Confused? I am.

Cheers
David

[Neville Briggs]

I am confused too. If a theme is universal then isn't Australia part of the universe.

As I understand it, the first members of the ABPA declared what they thought bush poetry was. Now we are told what bush poetry must be. On whose authority did the leap go from is to ought ?
I've never been able to find an answer to that.

The experience of the youth poets at Ipswich may point to "bush poetry" fading into irrelevance.

[Maureen K Clifford]

In light of the fact that we are now more than ever before a multi cultural nation and that Australians come from such diverse backgrounds these days - perhaps the guideline to Australian poetry could be considered to be any poem written by a person who holds Australian citizenship. Is there really such a need to categorize it as such - Bush Poetry could equally as well pertain to writers from Africa or Patagonia or New Guinea. Australian Bush Poetry by virtue of its name could be considered a bit limiting. I'm not against it of course just trying to think outside the square. Do we have classifications in poetry circles such as New York Poetry or Patagonian Poetry? If we do I am unaware of them.

[Neville Briggs]

[Zondrae]

Thank you David, and everyone else.

I shall sit and think a bit about all the points. Next time I am having trouble with a rhyme or metre I may just throw my hands in the air and call it a free verse poem. (sorry I am being flippant about a serious subject). I have written two or three non rhyming poems, with funny layouts and it was the emotion or the actual phrasing that determined the form. So suppose I was on the right track at the time. But I find it difficult to 'not rhyme'. How do I get around that?

[Neville Briggs]

Why do you have to " get around " anything Zondrae.
Just be your own self. Clive James is a modern poet of great renown, he says that he is a staunch formalist, you can be a staunch formalist if you wish.

What I would suggest is that you have a go at different variety of the formal such as, villanelle, rhyming sestina perhaps, caesuras ( pauses in middle of lines ) enjambments ( wrap around from one line to the next ) the pantoum, sonnet, pastoral, elegy, ode, even blank verse. You can do all these without trying to grapple with free forms.

[Stephen Whiteside]

I don't know how you get around it, Zondrae. I suspect you can't.

But I can tell you, if it's any consolation, C. J. Dennis had exactly the same problem.

Here are the opening lines of a poem (?) he called "A Free Verse Review". I will only quote the opening few lines, because it is too long to transcribe in full. If you are interested, though, you will find the full version in "The C. J. Dennis Collection - from his 'forgotten' writings", edited by Garrie Hutchinson, Lothian Publishing 1987 (page 107).


A Free Verse Review

I love writing free verse because it
Is so easy.
You don't have to rhyme or
Trouble about metre.
It is just prose sawn up into
Unequal lengths. A lot of
People who write it are very
Proud of their efforts, but I am
Not. However, let
Us see what we can do
With a little review.
(That's all wrong, because it rhymes; but that's a habit not easily overcome, and we make up for it by being a little more erratic than usual concerning the length of the Lines.)
etc. etc.

[Heather]

Dare I say, there is some serious over-thinking going on. When I bounce my grand-daughter on my knee and chant "Ride a cock-horse to Banbury Cross" or tickle her hand with "round and round the garden", or "Humpty Dumpty" - it is fun. Small kids love rhyme because it's great fun and they love the sound of the rhymes. Rhymes are also a good way for small children to learn sounds. Stephen writes rhyming kids poems and they love them - because they are lots of fun.

Teenagers, are full of raging hormones and introspection as Stephen pointed out and just getting anything on paper - be it a poem or diary entry, is way of expressing what they are thinking and feeling at a time when a lot of thinking and feeling is going on. It's probably easier to do that without rhymes getting in the way.

Let the kids be kids.

Heather

[Neville Briggs]

Stephen, C.J. Dennis may have been satirical in that piece, but what you have there is the classic logical fallacy of the " straw man " argument. Dennis has presented a caricature of modernist free form, the easy bit is saying that something is ridiculous when you have made it to be ridiculous. Dennis is not actually dealing with the real thing at all. That sort of silliness just adds to the general ignorance.

Where does the idea come from that in free form one must avoid rhyming by being " erratic". In all my reading on versification I have never found that notion put forward. That sort of false idea also adds to the general ignorance.