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I wandered lonely as a clown...No! NO! BOLLOCKS!

  
 
Eloi Tsabaoth
19:03 / 26.11.02
I cannot write poetry. I have tried before, and it always comes out as clumsy college student crap or something remarkably like Pam Ayres:

My biro pen is leaking and has badly stained my shirt
And it's my favourite white one, the one that shows the dirt.

However, I don't consider myself a bad prose writer. In particular I love wordplay. Why then, can't I write poetry? Am I simply out of practice? Is it a totally separate skill? Is there a part of my soul missing? or am I a bad writer in all ways (difficult to judge, seeing as few people here have read anything by me). Discuss.
 
 
Kit-Cat Club
19:55 / 26.11.02
Euterpe! Lend thy wan disciple aid,
Lest from his brow the inspiration fade -
For poetry's a rare, elusive art
And flatters, like the local blowsy tart,
But to deceive - and so divine afflatus
Can undergo an unforeseen hiatus:
And leave the poet cursing as, again,
The last ink splutters from his scratchy pen.
O Metaphor, o Simile, art thou
Deserting me? O be not strangers now!
O Onomatopoeia, lend thy note
To warble through this half-starved songbird's throat!
Alliteration, be once more my friend
And with me windy, wordy wanderings wend!
Or else I'll damn you all to blackest Hell
And soothe my cursed soul with doggerel.



I think poetry is very hard, Biz, and you can be the greatest technician ever and still write bad poetry. Plenty of great writers can only write good prose or good poetry - in fact it's very rare to find anyone who can do both (Donne?). It's often a matter of luck as well - it's hard to sit down with the intention of writing a good poem and actually do so. Look at mine - I meant to write a sardonic, sub-Byronic thing, and what do I end up with? McGonagall...
 
 
The Apple-Picker
22:32 / 26.11.02
I consider myself somewhat of an optimist, and so I do believe that almost anyone can write poetry. As Klesmer says, genius first begins in discipline. (Daniel Deronda is presently my favorite book of all time, and were it not great for a variety of reasons, it would be great just for Klesmer's thoughts on art.)

I believe that if one wants to write poetry, or good poetry, or even great poetry that it's not just going to happen from having read a few poems in class and then fucking around every once and a while with a little trial. Yeah, some people are born with a gift and it all just flows naturally from the first moment their cherubic little hands can close around a pencil. Other people are born with a gift and they have to hone it. And for some people, it just never clicks (and, perhaps unfairly, I almost always believe that's because they didn't want it enough). But you aren't going to know which one you are until you invest. And I don't really believe that I've met a writer whom I didn't think could also be a poet if he really wanted to be.

Also, as I mentioned in the bad lyrics planet thread--premature and unqualified praise is a horrible thing that can stunt any poet's growth; a good balanced critique is what aspiring poets need. Man, god bless my teachers--they were swell--but good grades and unqualified praise really held back my progress.

I truly believe that it's in me to be good. And so I study. I read poetry. I read textbooks on poetry (alright, so I've only read part of one so far--but I'm really busy; I will read plenty, though; trust me). And I write some poetry, too. Then I seek out poets that I respect who will work with me and guide me.

If you want to be a poet, don't wait for the ability to come to you. Go out and get it. Also, a negative attitude like that ("I cannot write poetry") will do nothing but defeat you. I know I'm probably sounding like some sick motivational speaker in all this, but I do believe that there are very few things a thoughtful, passionate, driven, and dedicated person can't acheive.

Mindset is a really important thing. I don't believe in writer's block. I believe that I'm going to write plenty of shite in my lifetime, but that's the price you pay while learning and when trying to find the right idea. I *do* believe a person can just sit down and write a wowza of a poem--though rarely in that first draft.

The only thing that can stop me is myself. And I'm not gonna.

I'm going to be a poet. I'm going to be a good poet. And I'm going to be the poorest motherfucker you ever knew.
 
 
The Apple-Picker
22:38 / 26.11.02
Also, I believe that studying poetry has really improved my prose in fiction. I find it hard to believe that studying poetry could do anything but improve a writer's skill overall.

Let me go look for the reading list that no poet should be without! I will post it here.
 
 
The Apple-Picker
22:49 / 26.11.02
Here are four books that a friend of mine recommends for all aspiring poets:

Brooks and Warren, Understanding Poetry

John Ciardi, How Does A Poem Mean?

Donald Hall, To Read A Poem

Laurence Perrine, Sound and Sense


There are lots more, to be sure, but these should keep anyone busy for awhile--I only own one right now (To Read a Poem), and I'm only half-way through (I'm reading too much poetry outside of the textbooks). Don't forget to read lots of poetry, mostly modern! I humbly suggest Billy Collins, Marge Piercy, and Sharon Olds for starters (as they are my favorites right now).

Yay! Love poetry! Love it! And it will treat you well, as it has treated me. That's my testimonial.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
09:46 / 27.11.02
Certainly, to say that all writers should be able to write poetry is a bit like saying all novelists should be able to write plays - it requires the insertion of the adjective "bad" in there at least onceto make sense.

Peter Samson wrote a good book (rather better than his poetry, ironically) called Writing Poetry, on Carcanet, I think, which has some useful stuff. One of the things he recommends is joining a writing group, at least once. This is actually a very good idea, if only because it requires the observer to understand the enormous necessity of both criticism and, more importantly, self-criticism in the creation of even tolerable poetry (this is why I never have the patience for it). Reading Poetry Review is also interesting, to see what is going on (or failing to) at present.

How much poetry do you read, Biz?
 
 
The Apple-Picker
14:05 / 27.11.02
Certainly, to say that all writers should be able to write poetry is a bit like saying all novelists should be able to write plays - it requires the insertion of the adjective "bad" in there at least onceto make sense.

I do believe that just about any writer can write poetry, good poetry, if he really wants to--if he works and studies hard enough--if he's not just dabbling. Perhaps that makes me naive or willfully ignorant, but it's one belief that I don't want to change.

(I also believe that any writer can write plays under those same circumstances. I only dabbled. My plays were poo.)
 
 
Tezcatlipoca
14:23 / 27.11.02
I have to disagree. I don’t think the ability to write good prose automatically grants you the ability to write good poetry, just as I don’t think an accomplished poet is necessarily going to be able to construct a decent novel. I could be – and probably will be – proven wrong, but to my mind the various disciplines involved in the two styles are just a little too incompatible. That’s not to suggest, of course, that some novels aren’t written in a poetic style, or vice-versa, but I’m still not convinced that you can use the same creative toolkit for poetry as you would for prose.
 
 
Persephone
16:26 / 27.11.02
I think that when you have the ability to do something, you tend to assume that everybody can do the same thing. It's kind of a funny way that people have of overlooking their own talents. A friend of mine could write stories --she worked hard on them; but even when she complained how hard it was, you could hear that this was a different thing for her than it was for me. I just *couldn't* do it, and I could never really make her understand. On the other hand, the other day Husb wanted to make an icon of an artist's palette and wanted me to draw it for him. "Just draw a kidney bean," I said. "I don't know how to draw a kidney bean." "Don't be stubborn. If you know what a kidney bean looks like, you can draw a kidney bean." "No, I don't know what a kidney bean looks like." "How can you not know what a kidney bean looks like?" And so it went on, for quite a while... but it finally penetrated that I am indeed married to a man who cannot draw a kidney bean.

Poetry's like that.
 
 
Alex's Grandma
07:42 / 11.03.04
Possibly someone might have made this point already, but poetry these days is a redundant art form. There hasn't really been anything since The Wasteland, has there ?

So balls to poetry. It's such an affected format.
 
 
autran
08:04 / 11.03.04
I think I read that Jim Thompson insisted his students write poetry as part of their creative writing course.
 
 
Topper
13:07 / 11.03.04
I'm with Tez on this one, the two disciplines are separate. Certainly there's a level of craft you could achieve through dogged persistance, but talent and natural ability makes you a poet. I think you can have talent as a novelist and not have it, or have less of it, for poems or playwriting.

I'm not familiar with Donne's prose, so I was thinking you'd have to go back to Shakespeare to find someone adept at both. There must be someone more recent I'm overlooking... Maybe Poe?

.
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
14:21 / 11.03.04
There hasn't really been anything since The Wasteland, has there ?

No. Nothing. No good poems at all. No Auden, MacNiece or Armitage (off the top of my head). No Four Quartets. Nope. Nothing.

Muppet.
 
 
Alex's Grandma
19:21 / 11.03.04
I've got a horrible feeling I know more about this than you do, geeezer. All those people you've mentioned are basically minor, in terms of their cultural significance, and also their talent. I could reel off a list of interesting poets post-Wasteland, but that's all they would be. You know " interesting. " I'd make an exception for Allen Ginsberg, but that's really it. And after all " Howl " is just The Wasteland re-shot through the eyes of a junkie - there's nothing wrong with that obviously, but that's what it is.
Looking forward to yer angry response. Cheers.
 
 
Alex's Grandma
19:39 / 11.03.04
Oh yeah, and " muppet "

Where exactly do you get off on saying that type of thing to a total stranger ?

Who may well have been making ( deep breath here, flyboy, ) an... off... the... cuff... comment

You silly c***
 
 
Jack Fear
20:05 / 11.03.04
It's a bullshit argument, Alex. Really. People trot it out from time to time, but it's really just stupid and short-sighted and reactionary and, most of all, self-important.

It happens whenever an artform goes through a dry spell. Painting has been declared dead more times than Keith Richards; likewise the theater. But people keep painting and writing plays (and making poems), and then BOOM! the artform is alive and and well again.
Beware of making grandiose statements like "there's nothing left to say," because somebody's always going to come up with something new.

And you won't see it coming. By definition.
 
 
Alex's Grandma
06:36 / 12.03.04
" It's a bullshit argument "

Well possibly, possibly. But hasn't poetry just lost it's audience ? The likes of Byron, Keats, Shelley, and even as late as Larkin you could argue - these people were like rock stars in a way. You know, they mattered. Whereas these days, even if somebody WAS to come out with something amazing, ( Aidan Dun, for example, ) would there be anyone out there still paying attention ? It doesn't look like it, no. It's not so much a question of an art form's vitality, more something to do with whether it pulls in the crowds. At this stage in the game, a major new poet would be an exception, let's face it more than anything else. People still look at paintings, they still go to the theatre, but does anyone, honestly, still read poems ?
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
23:10 / 12.03.04
Way-ull....my immediate answer is "yes", although not as much or as many as I'd like. But you seem to have gotten your argument a bit confused. Your first position was that there was no poetry after The Wasteland, which is certainly a position, but now we are talking about the impact of poets. Part of that is presumably a sort of cultural critical mass, but if we go only by that we have to own that the only books worth reading are Harry Potter and the only television programmes worth watching involve footballers and their wives. Nought wrong with that, but we are apparently in an age of choice, and the choice to read poetry is one of those. So, that doesn't seem to be quite the full story. Also, the idea of a "major new poet" is a tricky one. If we think Larkin counts,then Hughes has to, and probably also Famous Seamus, who is still kicking. For that matter, Wendy Cope may not be the kind of poet we are looking for, but she is still indubitably available and out there. And that's before we look at poets like Satyamurti or Ashbery or Walcott, say, who are a bit further from home but still seem not to be entirely discardable.

If you mean "do as many people read Simon Armitage (for example) as read Keats?" then that's another question. The English-speaking world has changed to such an extent that the question is rather more complicated than I suspect we have explored.
 
 
Whisky Priestess
14:44 / 13.03.04
Alex, to be fair you may not want to dismiss everyone else's opinions totally out of hand, because it's actually pretty unlikely that you know more about English literature (in a strictly academic sense, at least) than Flyboy or indeed any of the people posting to this thread. That is, unless you too have a Master's degree in the subject from one of the best universities in the world?

Credentials aside, though, it's also a question of taste: Alex's individual position is that nothing and no-one matches up to The Waste Land, which is fair enough: but let's not forget that to many the fact that Pam Ayres is not dead yet means that a great poet still walks among us. And some sickos even pay money for the poetry of Andrew Motion. Different strokes ...
 
 
Alex's Grandma
15:05 / 13.03.04
Ok, to clarify my position, what I actually think about this, as opposed to just going through whatever nonsense seemed to be quite funny at the time, at the time...

I really don't like to do this, I won't be doing it again.

However.

To say The Wasteland was the last poem that actually mattered... was a bit flip, I guess. Also, deep down, I think Howl's a genuinely great piece of work.

But... With the exception of Howl, I'm still not sure if The Wasteland wasn't the last time that a book of poetry made any real difference to the culture in general, in terms of being taken that seriously. Hughes, Heaney, etc, have their audience obviously, but no real voice. D'you know what I mean ? They're " just poets, " too easily dismissed if you've a mind to do that, they just don't seem to have the undeniable, well... weight of say Byron or Shelley, Tennyson, whoever. You could possibly argue that this particular role as far as society goes, has been taken over by John Lennon, Kurt Cobain, etc, etc.

This is under-argued I know, but I've got to go out now. Hopefully anyway you see what I mean. And if not, well poetry's going to be what it's going to be, entirely regardless of what the bleeding bhell I think.
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
18:49 / 14.03.04
Okay then... Well, that's a very different position to "redundant art form... balls to poetry", etc. Apologies for the use of the term "muppet" as applying to yourself rather than your original statement.
 
  
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