Australian Poetry—Where To?

[Stephen Whiteside]

I'm not sure I quite agree with Vic. I do agree that Lawson and Paterson would probably still be very successful if they were alive today, but I'm not sure they'd be able to replicate that success writing rhyming verse. Lawson would quite possibly be very successful writing for TV, or writing film scripts. After all, he was an extraordinary accomplished writer of prose. Paterson I'm not so sure about. He was really more of a journalist than a fiction writer, wasn't he (other than his poetry, of course). Again, I doubt if he'd capture the public imagination through verse the way he did back then. Perhaps he'd be a top foreign correspondent. Of course, I really have no idea at all - but it's fun to speculate.

New Formalism. I'm interested to hear you use that phrase, Tom. I have read a little about it. It seems to be catching on in the US, and will probably arrive here in the next few years. It probably will pose a threat to much of the free verse that is written these days (which, to be honest, faces the biggest threat from itself!), but will it lead to a return in popularity for rhyming verse? Or will it lead to something new again, and entirely different? Again, I really have no idea - but it's fun to speculate!

[Maureen K Clifford]

Well there you go Vic - that was a typo not a spello

Maureen I know that I used the wrong shear but do you know that you wrote:
Sweat on her brow, her lips were dry, she go and have another try.

I mean obviously it should have read she goed and have another try

Thanks Mate I have fixed it up proper

Stephen I could imagine Paterson as a latter day George Negus/Derryn Hinch type of a bloke where as Henry I suspect would be more like Ray Martin. The thing that fascinates me is the young kids who rap - love 'em or hate 'em a large % rap in rhyme, and a lot of it is straight off the cuff - it may not stand the test of time like the old Poets works have done but the rhythm and rhyme is definitely out there.

Cheers

Maureen

[Vic Jefferies]

No Stephen, the point I was trying to make was that in my opinion if Banjo and Henry were writing today they would produce contemporary poetry of such a high calibre it would make them as popular today as they were then. I think it was as much if not more their particular abilities as poets that made them popular rather than the particular subjects they wrote about. I cannot conceive of either of them being attracted to "tuneless" free verse.
I am sure that in Australia still today both Lawson and Paterson outsell all other published poets and are most certainly the most well known.

[Neville Briggs]

Maybe we're looking in the wrong place to assess modern popular poetry.
Perhaps we should be considering the impact of the advertising jingle. I've come across lots of people who can recognise immediately the words of a current advertising doggerel.

Henry Lawson did an ad for ( I think ) cough medicine. C.J. Dennis wrote a piece called The Australaise which was in essence a recruitment ad.
Even our President Manfred got published doing his bit for the Buderim Ginger ad.

Where does this observation take us. Don't know really. Just a passing thought.

[Stephen Whiteside]

The interesting thing, Neville, is that Dennis originally wrote 'The Australaise' as an ironic piece. As I recall, he was quite upset when it was used for recruitment purposes - especially with the Norman Lindsay illustration that accompanied it. This happens quite a lot. The Whitlams wrote an ironic song about Sydney - you gotta love this city for its body and not its brain - that was used in the advertising for the 2000 Olympics!

[warooa]

Hey Stephen . . . I can just picture Dr Whiteside grooving around the place to The Whitlams singing along to the lyrics . . .

"she eats all of the garden
and has an aversion to conviction
- she calls her dog 'the bear'
and walks me with him to the corner
in her pyjamas"

Ahhh . . . there really is no aphrodisiac like loneliness

[Stephen Whiteside]

Yeah, a few years ago I felt like I needed to discover a new band, and plucked one of their albums on spec from the rack at HMV. They're great, aren't they?

[Duncan Williams]

G'day Tom, i think you are quite jumping the gun here mate. as i well remember before the ABPA was inforced and the Tamworth bush poetry ever existed, the poets after Banjo Paterson and Henry Lawson's works were the like's of Colin Newsome and Keith Garvey as their books were distributed greatly in bookshops and school librarys throughout the north west area.
It wasn't until the Tamworth Poetry Reading Group started running the bush poetry performance compititions that we heard of Heuchan, Greg North, Murray Hartin ect.
They are doing a real good job at keeping the Australian Bush Poetry scene alive with there perfomance works but i don't disregard the writers before their time.


Duncan.

[r.magnay]

G'day Tom, remember you?...'course we remember you, glad to see you back mate.... I'm with you on the content of the poem too, Manfred makes some good points as well.....about the subject I mean..

[Irene]

Hi Tom
Great to see you back - have been wondering how you were getting on, and keeping a look out for you on the bushverse site - to no avail, I may add!!!
I have to agree with your sentiments also - don't understand the modern stuff, but have been wondering if I should learn a bit more about it - but that's as far as I get!!

Catchya
IRene