Ode to the enduring potential of poetry

[warooa]

Heaven help us.

Dunno about Heaven, Nev . . . but our new President is Hal

[Vic Jefferies]

David wrote:
And a question for Vic. If people "simply rejected the nonsense that the literati and 'modern' poets tried to serve up as poetry", why is free verse the dominant form of poetry today? Why didn't it just die a rapid death because nobody could understand it? You can't judge free verse by its worst examples, any more than you can dismiss all bush verse as trite, jingoistic doggerel simply because some of it is exactly that. I write free verse, as do others on this site. If that automatically makes me a member of the 'literati' (whatever that means), then so be it, but I do resent the implication that because it's free verse it must be incomprehensible.

Of course there are many fine free verse poems, but I cannot think of one that has received anywhere near the acclaim that "The Man From Snowy River" has. Free verse may be the dominant form of published poetry today but perhaps that is the problem. As Stephen Whiteside said free verse took over in the 1920s and perhaps poetry's lack of popular appeal can be measured from that time. As you say David a great deal of it is incomprehensible and I think of little interest to the general public.

However, the point I was trying to make is that eventually another Lawson, Paterson or Kipling et al will emerge, it has been ever thus and it will be again. When that person does appear the people will know, as they always have, that here is someone with something important to say who is saying it the way they want to hear it.

While we have a number of very good poets writing today none of them are Lawsons, Patersons or Adam Linday Gordons.

Poetry is not dead, despite the best efforts of some of the modern free verse poets, it is merely in a slump awaiting the emergence of a new genius.

[David Campbell]

Okay, Vic, so let’s take up your question from earlier in this thread: “Where are our modern day Wilfred Owens, Rupert Brookes, Siegfried Sassoons and T.S. Eliots?”

I wonder what would happen if Eliot was alive today and started posting his poetry on this site. The Barry Hing article which opened this thread refers to Eliot’s The Waste Land (written in 1922), including it as part of the “most memorable” and “most meaningful” poetry from a century ago. Here’s the opening stanza from The Burial of the Dead, the first part of The Waste Land:

April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
Winter kept us warm, covering
Earth in forgetful snow, feeding
A little life with dried tubers.
Summer surprised us, coming over the Starnbergersee
With a shower of rain; we stopped in the colonnade,
And went on in sunlight, into the Hofgarten,
And drank coffee, and talked for an hour.
Bin gar keine Russin, stamm’ aus Litauen, echt deutsch.
And when we were children, staying at the arch-duke’s,
My cousin’s, he took me out on a sled,
And I was frightened. He said, Marie,
Marie, hold on tight. And down we went.
In the mountains, there you feel free.
I read, much of the night, and go south in the winter.

Would it be welcome on this site? Is it traditional rhyming verse or free verse? How many would regard it as great poetry? Would you, instead, be dismissing Eliot as one of the “literati” who is writing “nonsense” and killing off public interest in poetry?

In other words, if a modern-day Eliot emerged, would we instantly recognise him (or her)?

The full text of The Waste Land can be found at: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/176735

Cheers
David

[Maureen K Clifford]

Touche

Good point David

[Vic Jefferies]

David, T.S. Eliot's poetry would probably not be well received on this site because this site is rather specific.
However, I do think it would be recognised as great poetry and not incomprehensible. I do not think his work would have universal appeal for the general public and would not create the attention and demand that Paterson and Lawson's work did.
I do not expect the new genius to write on the same topics nor in the same style as the old masters but he/she will be universally accepted by the public, as they were, and will need no explanation and very probably no introduction.
I would hazard a guess and say just as Mark Twain is reported to still be the best selling author every year in the USA,
Lawson and Paterson are the best selling poets in this country each year.

[Neville Briggs]

I think Macdonalds will have to go down as the best and most enduring example of eating.
Everybody knows and loves it. None of that fancy organic healthee, low fatee , vegee, stuff so beloved of the pretentious epicurati.
Good old Maccas, best selling tucker of all time, easy to digest and we know what it is when we see it. Fat, sugar and salt, the food of the people.

What ?

[manfredvijars]

There are scores of limericks and ditties for mass consumption - no brainers even, no less than the plethora of fast food joints selling their own version of hamburgers. Good poetry, like good food will stand on its own. The 'literati' not unlike the 'epicurati' will push the boundaries and cobble their own niches while extolling (inflating even) the virtues of their own turf. Sometimes great techniques and pieces filter downwards - AND upwards.

As for me, I'm mostly a steak and salad bloke ... However i do try the exotic occasionally ...

[manfredvijars]

why does the arguement always become more important than the discussion that starts it. " Art " is not a contest, it's an expression, an interpretation, a gift. It can shine a light on insecurities common to us all. but it fails in defence of an individual's insecurities.
All poetry is as valid as the reader makes it....indeed, any collection of words can only be poetry in the eye of the reader. To say, "I've written a poem" doesn't mean you have.
The rays of life that shine through the prism of creativity must always fill the spectrum from beauty to horror.....if they fall in a sallow pool of nice and safe, art has failed, and if they are used as a spotlight to show but a sliver in ignorance or contempt of the whole, then we have failed.

I just liked this post by Matt and wanted to bring it forward for another read ...

[keats]

I have edited the original article slightly, by removing unnecessary words, so people like me can understand it. Thank me later.

BARRY NG THE AUSTRIAN JANUARY 10, 2014 12:00AM


ONE of the many lessons years ago. An assassination of poetry in daily life.

Indeed, this year's anniversary affords a robust linguistic chat forum as well as advertising.

Such an instruction is far from memorable, if some of the most meaningful poetry of the English-speaking world represents something of a full stop with its lament for the West.

Any of us can write and rhyme, conjure up puns, metaphors and witticisms, as well as SMS and tweet, but the result is usually sorrow and death

More specifically, the elegance of poetry, shows verse is always relevant and stays misconceived.

The significance of poetry to the generation of 1 were natural and logical, given that they were Victorians - educated on a literary and philosophic diet of Keats, of course.

And just as relevant for us is this poetic Revolution - or the Age of coincidence.

If anything, such a language as disappointment with nature

So why do we like the Victorians? neglect poetry so much? Partly it is because it seems too simple and the lowest common denominator, such as the language of the expletives.

In fact, what could be more demented you'll never know. hell.

And yet, at the other end, there is the bird crumb in a wood, and that has made all the difference".

Another problem with poetry is that it does not expect that.
If anything, verse demonstrates that immediate lesson.

But how can we reconnect? It may sound obvious, 434 lines long. Poetry should be read as it is intended, in pith.

Barry is a riter.

[manfredvijars]

Barry is a riter.

And Keats is a "Lefter"?? ...