Ask the Poet Guy

[Epmd607]

Dear Epmd:

Though not a logician, at least not a professional one, Poet Guy finds the first of your two questions difficult to answer as it seems to be based on a false dichotomy. Surely many, perhaps most, readers involved in scholarship or those other ships have come to poetry-as-career through a love for, or at least interest in, poems and poetry in general. If so, one might be able to express the question in set-theoretic terms (though Poet Guy must here issue another caution--while he is no logician, he is an even worse mathematician):

If A = {The set of all poetry readers who read for pleasure, etc.} and B= {The set of all poetry readers who read for scholarship, etc.}, then the question is whether the relative complement of B in A is larger than the relative complement of A in B (i.e., Is A \ B > B \ A?).

Poet Guy finds himself exhausted after dredging his brain through such abstract concepts and, much as chicken breasts dredged in buttermilk and flour should be set aside for a bit before cooking, wishes to rest before continuing on to fry himself in the hot oil of decision.​

The second question posed by Epmd seems more a question of personal value than a general aesthetic, so Poet Guy will merely say that for himself it does not matter as he reads poems both for pleasure and for immense personal gain, having no desire to die each day for lack of what is found in them.

PG

I meant the spectrum, the inclination of the scholar, would either fall more toward scholarship or pleasure; the sixteen-year-old girl mightn't always read for scholarship, but sometimes, yes. "Tonight I must read the complete Wallace Stevens, I must know precisely what he did to apply it to my own work."

 

[vrosej10]

Dear PG
Who is the guy with the insane giggle that appears from the shadows now and then to throw a spanner in the works?

See now, I see your problem. You're actually psychotic and no one has told you this spanner man is invisible.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

See now, I see your problem. You're actually psychotic and no one has told you this spanner man is invisible.

Aha you obviously haven't been made aware of the deep dark corners that abound on Lit if you allow your feet to wander and slip off the brightly lit streets. Much goes on behind this screen the like of which would make your hair curl. If you think of this as a theatrical safety screen, protecting you from the fiery personalities and those of dubious mentality, when the orchestra has finished tuning their instruments you may catch the faint echo of a muffled titter. That is until someone catches him and locks him up

 

[vrosej10]

Aha you obviously haven't been made aware of the deep dark corners that abound on Lit if you allow your feet to wander and slip off the brightly lit streets. Much goes on behind this screen the like of which would make your hair curl. If you think of this as a theatrical safety screen, protecting you from the fiery personalities and those of dubious mentality, when the orchestra has finished tuning their instruments you may catch the faint echo of a muffled titter. That is until someone catches him and locks him up

Yeh I have met some of the wildlife on the site and locked horns with some of the worst fuckers. In other forums on this site I have met people that deranged people talking to their invisible friends would consider crazed. I thought your were being metaphoric and I was joking. It is very nice to hear from you UnderYourSpell. I was sick for a few months (newly diagnosed diabetic) and got out of touch with everyone.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

Yeh I have met some of the wildlife on the site and locked horns with some of the worst fuckers. In other forums on this site I have met people that deranged people talking to their invisible friends would consider crazed. I thought your were being metaphoric and I was joking. It is very nice to hear from you UnderYourSpell. I was sick for a few months (newly diagnosed diabetic) and got out of touch with everyone.

you speak as if invisible voices was a bad thing
I am glad you are feeling better m'dear and that you will continue to be so

 

[vrosej10]

you speak as if invisible voices was a bad thing
I am glad you are feeling better m'dear and that you will continue to be so

I reckon some of my best ideas come from the voices in my head ! This is coming from someone who is pretty much considered crazy by everyone who knows her well....

 

[Austin8]

I reckon some of my best ideas come from the voices in my head ! This is coming from someone who is pretty much considered crazy by everyone who knows her well....

Hey Vee

Just wanted to say, I miss you on the Vending Machine. Hope you have a nice Christmas. Hug.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

I reckon some of my best ideas come from the voices in my head ! This is coming from someone who is pretty much considered crazy by everyone who knows her well....

we march to a different drummer in fact we don't march at all but skip sideways regularly which was considered a fatal flaw in the WRAF!

 

[greenmountaineer]

Dear twelveoone:

While not particularly well acquainted with Mr. Ashbery's work, Poet Guy has found those poems by Ashbery that he has tried to read seem to function as an excellent soporific. He doubts this would please Mr. Ashbery, though in all frankness it is doubtful that that poet, one of the most honored in contemporary American letters, would care all that much, as this article quotes his desire "to produce a poem that the critic cannot even talk about."

Poet Guy here must come down solidly, if gingerly, on the side of people who prefer poems that they can talk about and, presumably, understand. He recognizes that this is a personal bias that not all readers (or writers) of poems share and accordingly leaves them to their own world of mystified enjoyment of the incomprehensible.

PG

I'm with you on this Poet Guy. As for the mystified enjoyment of the incomprehensible, that's sort of a Via Negativa thing with me, better without words, but in spite of myself, I can get into a mess with some scribble about it.

 

[twelveoone]

Dear twelveoone:

While not particularly well acquainted with Mr. Ashbery's work, Poet Guy has found those poems by Ashbery that he has tried to read seem to function as an excellent soporific. He doubts this would please Mr. Ashbery, though in all frankness it is doubtful that that poet, one of the most honored in contemporary American letters, would care all that much, as this article quotes his desire "to produce a poem that the critic cannot even talk about."

Poet Guy here must come down solidly, if gingerly, on the side of people who prefer poems that they can talk about and, presumably, understand. He recognizes that this is a personal bias that not all readers (or writers) of poems share and accordingly leaves them to their own world of mystified enjoyment of the incomprehensible.

PG

Thank you kind sir, I will buy the book, and throw away the prescription.

 

[_Apophis_]

Dear Pg,

For your own health and happiness, please begin reading all traffic signs. If you don't heed this advice, you will be ran over, flatten like road kill, smashed like a bug on the windshield of life.

 

[UnderYourSpell]

What a merry soul

 

[PoetGuy]

Dear Pg,

For your own health and happiness, please begin reading all traffic signs. If you don't heed this advice, you will be ran over, flatten like road kill, smashed like a bug on the windshield of life.

Dear _Apophis_:

Poet Guy thanks you for your cautionary advice, even though it seems to have little or nothing to do with poetry, though the use of the word "begin" perhaps puzzles him a bit as he wonders how you came to the conclusion that Poet Guy does not currently read all traffic signs.

Nevertheless, he is flattered that you care enough about his welfare to remind him of proper traffic practices, and wishes you and yours a most happy and safe new year.

PG

 

[bronzeage]

Dear Poet Guy,

Were they really the best minds of his generation? Were they judged on accomplishments or potential?

 

[butters]

Dear Poet Guy - why did you ignore my seasonal goodwishes to yourself? hmmn? answer that one, if you will.

yours sincerely

ha! bumhugs

 

[twelveoone]

Perhaps, in situations where they are used thoughtlessly or carelessly. A poet should always consider word choices for imagery and sound, and perhaps consider changing a phrase such as "like we were swimming in blood" to "as if we swam through blood" or "we thrashed through blood," all of which are, frankly, pretty clunky phrases. But should "ing" words simply be tossed out of poems willy-nilly? Eliot apparently didn't think so:Five "ing" words in seven lines--all participles, I think--that are used to great rhythmic and aural effect. The moral being, perhaps, make sure you understand why you are using a word, and that that word is the best word for your purpose.

PG

Ennui, we go to bland horizions

, breeding
, mixing
, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
, covering
, feeding
A little life with dried tubers.

Surely the poetry guy must have noticed something else, from Mr. Eliot here.
I prefer my Ipril's a little more drizzling

It was only a 'opeless fancy,
It passed like an Ipril dye,
But a look an' a word an' the dreams they stirred,
They 'ave stolen my 'eart awye!​

chipbuddy used to sing it to me when we were purging the B vocubulary

Season's greetings to you chip, PG

 

[butters]

Ennui, we go to bland horizions

, breeding
, mixing
, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
, covering
, feeding
A little life with dried tubers.

Surely the poetry guy must have noticed something else, from Mr. Eliot here.
I prefer my Ipril's a little more drizzling

It was only a 'opeless fancy,
It passed like an Ipril dye,
But a look an' a word an' the dreams they stirred,
They 'ave stolen my 'eart awye!​

chipbuddy used to sing it to me when we were purging the B vocubulary

Season's greetings to you chip, PG

gawd 'n bennet, luvvie, i fawts we 'ad us a dick bleedin' van dyke roit 'ere in this verrie fred!



'appy yuletide, guv'nor

 

[PoetGuy]

Dear Poet Guy,

Were they really the best minds of his generation? Were they judged on accomplishments or potential?

Dear bronzeage:

Your first question, it seems to Poet Guy, can be split into objective and subjective (i.e., subjective to Ginsberg himself) states. Clearly (at least to Poet Guy), those people Ginsberg is presumably speaking of, his friends and fellow Beats, are at best among what one might call the better minds of his generation. The whole question of who would qualify as a "best mind" seems highly subjective and likely to influenced by one's valuation of various kinds of human endeavor. Physicists, for example, might cite Richard Feynman (eight years older) or Murray Gell-Mann (three years younger) as the best minds of that generation.

In fact, the entire question is complicated by Ginsberg's profession. Poets often tend to produce good, even remarkable work early in their careers (think Rimbaud or Chatterton, for example). So do mathematicians, composers (Mozart), and pop stars. Visual artists often do not reach a level of maturity in creation until later in life--Jackson Pollock died the year after Howl was published, and Mark Rothko was some 23 years older than Ginsburg. Ginsburg's contemporaries in the art world--people like Roy Lichtenstein (three years older), Andy Warhol (two years younger), and Donald Judd (two years younger) would not create the works that make them famous for almost another ten years.

As to Ginsberg's subjective take on the "greatest minds of [his] generation," Poet Guy believes that Ginsberg probably believed his colleagues to be such, even though the intent of the poem (at least to Poet Guy) is clearly polemical. One tends to think of one's friends, and by extension oneself, as especially clever. Ginsberg probably did the same.

As to the second question ("Were they judged on accomplishments or potential?"), Poet Guy would state that, if one assumes minds are judged on concrete accomplishments, they clearly would be being judged on potential, as the more notable achievements of his fellow Beats came after the publication of Howl (e.g., On the Road is two years later, Naked Lunch is four years later). Such is how Poet Guy would objectively assess the question. How Ginsberg himself evaluated the question, having direct exposure to the minds in question, is anybody's guess.

On fourth and seven at his own 35, Poet Guy chooses to punt on this one.

PG

 

[PoetGuy]

Dear Poet Guy - why did you ignore my seasonal goodwishes to yourself? hmmn? answer that one, if you will.

yours sincerely

ha! bumhugs

Dear chipbutty:

Poet Guy assumes you do not want an exhaustive reconstruction of his reasons why he did not respond to that quite welcoming post. The simple answer is that it did not seem to require a reply--it certainly was not a question, and did not appear to require acknowledgement other than for reasons of social convention.

As you may have perhaps noticed, Poet Guy is a bit stiff on matters of social convention, and has perhaps committed a faux pas here, for which he duly apologizes. He would, accordingly and with great pleasure, exchange bumhugs with you, but alas cannot, due to reasons of physical distance.

Rest assured that he feels warmly about you and your bum, however, and hopes to be able to hug it in person some time in the near future.

PG

 

[bronzeage]

Dear bronzeage:

Your first question, it seems to Poet Guy, can be split into objective and subjective (i.e., subjective to Ginsberg himself) states. Clearly (at least to Poet Guy), those people Ginsberg is presumably speaking of, his friends and fellow Beats, are at best among what one might call the better minds of his generation. The whole question of who would qualify as a "best mind" seems highly subjective and likely to influenced by one's valuation of various kinds of human endeavor. Physicists, for example, might cite Richard Feynman (eight years older) or Murray Gell-Mann (three years younger) as the best minds of that generation.

In fact, the entire question is complicated by Ginsberg's profession. Poets often tend to produce good, even remarkable work early in their careers (think Rimbaud or Chatterton, for example). So do mathematicians, composers (Mozart), and pop stars. Visual artists often do not reach a level of maturity in creation until later in life--Jackson Pollock died the year after Howl was published, and Mark Rothko was some 23 years older than Ginsburg. Ginsburg's contemporaries in the art world--people like Roy Lichtenstein (three years older), Andy Warhol (two years younger), and Donald Judd (two years younger) would not create the works that make them famous for almost another ten years.

As to Ginsberg's subjective take on the "greatest minds of [his] generation," Poet Guy believes that Ginsberg probably believed his colleagues to be such, even though the intent of the poem (at least to Poet Guy) is clearly polemical. One tends to think of one's friends, and by extension oneself, as especially clever. Ginsberg probably did the same.

As to the second question ("Were they judged on accomplishments or potential?"), Poet Guy would state that, if one assumes minds are judged on concrete accomplishments, they clearly would be being judged on potential, as the more notable achievements of his fellow Beats came after the publication of Howl (e.g., On the Road is two years later, Naked Lunch is four years later). Such is how Poet Guy would objectively assess the question. How Ginsberg himself evaluated the question, having direct exposure to the minds in question, is anybody's guess.

On fourth and seven at his own 35, Poet Guy chooses to punt on this one.

PG

You know, somewhere in this country, a DVD of The Howling and a DVD of Howl have swapped cases, and Howl is about to be put in the player for a middle school girl's holiday sleepover, creating a new generation of angel headed hipsters, just in time for Christmas.

 

[PoetGuy]

Ennui, we go to bland horizions

, breeding
, mixing
, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
, covering
, feeding
A little life with dried tubers.

Surely the poetry guy must have noticed something else, from Mr. Eliot here.
I prefer my Ipril's a little more drizzling

It was only a 'opeless fancy,
It passed like an Ipril dye,
But a look an' a word an' the dreams they stirred,
They 'ave stolen my 'eart awye!​

chipbuddy used to sing it to me when we were purging the B vocubulary

Season's greetings to you chip, PG

Dear il miglior fabbro:

Perhaps Poet Guy is suffering from too much indulgence in the more psychotropic beverages that accompany the holiday season, but he fails to "get" quite what you are referring to, unless it be that he think of The Waste Land as a kind of twenties version of Daft Punk.

He pardons himself from further analysis, having now a sudden urge to watch My Fair Lady.

Happy year to newself.

PG

 

[bflagsst]

Dear bronzeage:

Your first question, it seems to Poet Guy, can be split into objective and subjective (i.e., subjective to Ginsberg himself) states. Clearly (at least to Poet Guy), those people Ginsberg is presumably speaking of, his friends and fellow Beats, are at best among what one might call the better minds of his generation. The whole question of who would qualify as a "best mind" seems highly subjective and likely to influenced by one's valuation of various kinds of human endeavor. Physicists, for example, might cite Richard Feynman (eight years older) or Murray Gell-Mann (three years younger) as the best minds of that generation.

In fact, the entire question is complicated by Ginsberg's profession. Poets often tend to produce good, even remarkable work early in their careers (think Rimbaud or Chatterton, for example). So do mathematicians, composers (Mozart), and pop stars. Visual artists often do not reach a level of maturity in creation until later in life--Jackson Pollock died the year after Howl was published, and Mark Rothko was some 23 years older than Ginsburg. Ginsburg's contemporaries in the art world--people like Roy Lichtenstein (three years older), Andy Warhol (two years younger), and Donald Judd (two years younger) would not create the works that make them famous for almost another ten years.

As to Ginsberg's subjective take on the "greatest minds of [his] generation," Poet Guy believes that Ginsberg probably believed his colleagues to be such, even though the intent of the poem (at least to Poet Guy) is clearly polemical. One tends to think of one's friends, and by extension oneself, as especially clever. Ginsberg probably did the same.

As to the second question ("Were they judged on accomplishments or potential?"), Poet Guy would state that, if one assumes minds are judged on concrete accomplishments, they clearly would be being judged on potential, as the more notable achievements of his fellow Beats came after the publication of Howl (e.g., On the Road is two years later, Naked Lunch is four years later). Such is how Poet Guy would objectively assess the question. How Ginsberg himself evaluated the question, having direct exposure to the minds in question, is anybody's guess.

On fourth and seven at his own 35, Poet Guy chooses to punt on this one.

PG

I always thought "best minds of my generation" referred to the others of his craft and similar age. The great minds having destroyed themselves probably just referred to his literary friends that never really accomplished anything in the realm of literature, people we wouldn't know by name had he mentioned them.

 

[bflagsst]

Ennui, we go to bland horizions

, breeding
, mixing
, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
, covering
, feeding
A little life with dried tubers.

Surely the poetry guy must have noticed something else, from Mr. Eliot here.
I prefer my Ipril's a little more drizzling

It was only a 'opeless fancy,
It passed like an Ipril dye,
But a look an' a word an' the dreams they stirred,
They 'ave stolen my 'eart awye!​

chipbuddy used to sing it to me when we were purging the B vocubulary

Season's greetings to you chip, PG

What that April with his showres soote
The droughte of March hath perced to the roote
And bathed ever viene in swich licour,
Of which vertu engendered is the flowr;
What Zephyrus eek with his sweete breeth
Inspired hath in every holt and heeth
the tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne
Hath the Ram his halve cour yronne,
And smale fowles maken melodye
That sleepen al the night with open ye-
Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgramages

 

[fridayam]

What that April with his showres soote
The droughte of March hath perced to the roote
And bathed ever viene in swich licour,
Of which vertu engendered is the flowr;
What Zephyrus eek with his sweete breeth
Inspired hath in every holt and heeth
the tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne
Hath the Ram his halve cour yronne,
And smale fowles maken melodye
That sleepen al the night with open ye-
Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgramages

I always love reading that, but it's even better saying it out loud

 

[vrosej10]

I always love reading that, but it's even better saying it out loud

That does sound pretty cool

I think all poetry by definition should sound delicious when said; should be fun to read out loud. I think budding poets especially either pay too much attention to sound (obvious, painful rhyming) or not enough and it winds up prose with line breaks.