Carol Ann Duffy's new poem Last Post

[Paulclem]

Hi,

Carol Ann Duffy is the current Poet Laureate in the UK. Her new poem has just been published today in The Times.

What do you think of it?

http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/poetry/article6733286.ece

[JBI]

Hi,

Carol Ann Duffy is the current Poet Laureate in the UK. Her new poem has just been published today in The Times.

What do you think of it?

http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/poetry/article6733286.ece

kind of mediocre, and a little to obvious, though occasion poetry is rarely any good, so it is no surprise - I think it offers less than Wilfred Owen's work, whom it is indebted to, in more lines. I'm sorry, but it feels like a high school kid could have penned that.

[Paulclem]

Hi JBI. Thanks for responding. Don't be sorry = if I don't want to hear then I shouldn't ask. I just wondered what about the poem made it so bad.

I think the poem is good, and it also does a number of interesting things. The conundrum of a how a poet - not even born when WW2 began, let alone WW1 - writes about war not experiened is addressed by basing it around Wilfred Owen's poem, and quoting directly from it. I think this is a perfectly valid way to approach a war poem .

It also approaches war from a different angle - not the bloody loss of life and horror, nor the heroic attitude you also find. It adresses war by avoiding it - a naive approach for the time perhaps, but one that reflects our own modern attitudes to war. We can't envisage such huge losses today - and it seems to reflect this by approaching the war by circumventing it.

[prendrelemick]

I heard her read this on the radio. Her voice is flat and dull and did nothing for it.

I think it has some thoughts and phrases that are above high school standard though. The idea of releasing the men from history, has interesting conotations bareing in mind what has happened since .
The poem marks the death of the last two veterans of that war, after long and fulfilled lives.
The idea of wanting to wind back the lives of those cut off from their futures and possibilities, is one that Henry Allingham and Harry Patch would recognise. The poet can give up his posthumous fame and get on with his life too.
Not a bad effort from Ms Duffy I think.

[JBI]

Hi JBI. Thanks for responding. Don't be sorry = if I don't want to hear then I shouldn't ask. I just wondered what about the poem made it so bad.

I think the poem is good, and it also does a number of interesting things. The conundrum of a how a poet - not even born when WW2 began, let alone WW1 - writes about war not experiened is addressed by basing it around Wilfred Owen's poem, and quoting directly from it. I think this is a perfectly valid way to approach a war poem .

It also approaches war from a different angle - not the bloody loss of life and horror, nor the heroic attitude you also find. It adresses war by avoiding it - a naive approach for the time perhaps, but one that reflects our own modern attitudes to war. We can't envisage such huge losses today - and it seems to reflect this by approaching the war by circumventing it.

It's got that flat, quintissential Duffy sort of beat to it, which makes it seem almost childish:

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If poetry could tell it backwards, true, begin
that moment shrapnel scythed you to the stinking mud . . .
but you get up, amazed, watch bled bad blood
run upwards from the slime into its wounds;

The poet here is essentially, unmistakably just rehashing Dolce et Decorum Est:



As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering,11 choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,


And then it progresses, essentially reworking into a dumbed down, less profound idiom Owen's images and themes.


You walk away; drop your gun (fixed bayonet)
like all your mates do too —
Harry, Tommy, Wilfred, Edward, Bert —
and light a cigarette.
There’s coffee in the square,
warm French bread
and all those thousands dead

This bit here doesn't really have much - it is really one idea stretched over half a dozen lines - she is questioning the justice of the war, and perhaps playing off of the notion of survivor's guilt a bit. It seems rude to me, in a sense, given the position and history of the British Empire, but the audacity seems clear - she is blaming, or at least in part, blaming those who survived for the glory of the war - not a new, or profound thought, and not that well delivered either - the sound of the poem is nothing special, the images pretty simple, almost rude - I mean, "all those thousands dead"? is that a deliberate provocation? Where does she, being a British citizen, get the audacity to put a line like that in there?



You lean against a wall,
your several million lives still possible
and crammed with love, work, children, talent, English beer, good food.
You see the poet tuck away his pocket-book and smile.
If poetry could truly tell it backwards,
then it would


Now this bit is perhaps the only real "original" in a sense idea in the poem, but it too is rude, self centered, and quite offensive (and poorly delivered - the term chopped up prose, which I usually hate, applies here).

Again, she seems to be blaming the victors for living and glorifying the people who didn't - but no - she does one better - she glorifies the poet, and glorifies herself for glorifying the poet - in this case, it can be assumed, Wilfred Owen, and perhaps a few others.

Where does someone get the nerve to right that - she is as much a pawn in the British system, servicing the institution than any of the others - they just had the bad luck to be born in a bad time - but no, she gets the last say, as poet right, to take a stab at them for remembering and surviving - for coming home, and rebuilding. It's as if Ms. Duffy feels her power of poet is the ability to to somehow see beyond everything, yet at the same time, glorify herself, as that clearly is her objective here - from the first line - "In all my dreams..." she makes it as if she is the centre of attention, and thereby centers her voice, infused with an appropriation of Owen, as one of reason and vision - it is narcissitic and insensitive - it's like me writing an essay entitled "Why I am the smartest since I can see, where others can't, that war veterans are living glorified at the expense of their comrades, and because they survived whereas others didn't, in a meaningless conflict, and therefore we honor them for killing rather than being killed like the good poet Wilfred Owen." Could I get away with that? Duffy is trying to, though in far more words.


It's this sense that she sees herself as a war poet, when she misses the most important factor - a war in which she is involved. I hear she just released some poems on Afghanistan, which makes one ask two questions a) what the hell does she know about Afghanistan, and 2) where the hell does she come off - she, for no apparent logical reason, as there are much better living British poets, got appointed to an institutionalized position, which feeds her publicity at the expense of selling her soul to the British government, milks that position, and then has the nerve to write critical poems on issues she knows nothing about, or events she never experienced.

She is not Wilfred Owen, and did not fight in the First World War - how then does she get this position of "visionary" speaking from the Trenches which occupy her dreams - a bit self centered if you ask me - pure arrogance. This one even tops Sylvia Plath's Daddy for the audacity award, I think.

[kelby_lake]

It felt arrogant to me as well. I hate it when poets try to feign omniscience on a topic, unless they can do so in beautiful words.

And the 'Dulce-No Decorum-No' bit. Wilfred Owen already said that, we know what it means. What is moving in one poem just looks trite in another.

'If poetry could tell it backwards'. What on earth does that mean?! Poetry can tell it however it wants to.

All in all, cliche and pretentious. I could have written something better- well, anyone could.

[Paulclem]

Plenty to go at there then. I'll respond later.

:wave::wave::wave:

[kelby_lake]

http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?p=757170#post757170

[Paulclem]

from the first line - "In all my dreams..." she makes it as if she is the centre of attention, and thereby centers her voice, infused with an appropriation of Owen

I think this is cenral to the poem. I disagree that she is appropriating Owen. Owen is there at the centre of the poem. He is the poet with the pocket book towards the end.

Owen is the witness and victim of this war and I think Duffy places him at the centre of the poem to address the problem of how a modern poet can write about war. She can't - directly, and so she refes to Owen. I think this deflects the arrogance charge. She defers to Owen, and it is to him that she ascribes the thought about poetry telling it backwards - it is referring to Owen again - the poet.

I think Duffy's use of the lines from Dulce est..

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning

Is her way into the poem - how she connects to Wilfred Owen. How else could she do it than through a dream or daydream.


There’s coffee in the square,
warm French bread,
and all those thousands dead
Are shaking dried mudfrom their hair
And queueing up for home. Freshly alive.

I like this part. It plays with a double image - the square is where many would have ended up - freshly dead but fot the poet's conceit, and I think this reminds us of it. The dscordand "hair" reminds us that this episode is untrue.

I'm not sure why you dislike the thousands dead line - at the big battles of the Somme etc thousands - tens of thousands were killed.

I also don't agree with the survivors guilt idea. None of these soldiers -
Harry, Tommy, Wilfred, Edward, Bert...a roll call of names from those times and not so popular these days, were killed, as was the poet Wilfred Owen.

Yes I do agree that it glorifies the poet - but not Duffy I think by making Owen central - she is glorifying him and the others.

I still think it is a good poem.

[Paulclem]

I heard her read this on the radio. Her voice is flat and dull and did nothing for it.

I agree with you on this prenderelmick. She doesn't come across well in interviews either, but I don't think it detracts from the poem.

[JBI]

Um, around 5.5 million on the Entente side, and 4.3 on the axis side, with over 7 and a half million others reported missing. A few thousand is an insult. 800000 people alone were killed in Passchendaele, and a Million odd people in Somme.

[Paulclem]

Kelby - someone likes her stuff. She makes her living as a poet, and has done for years.

It felt arrogant to me as well. I hate it when poets try to feign omniscience on a topic, unless they can do so in beautiful words.

I think the omniscience question is answered by her placing Owen at the centre of the poem. As for beautiful words - I'm not sure this is appropriate for a war commemoration poem. That really would be arrogant.

Those clumsy words in the poem

but you get up, amazed, watch bled bad blood

are ugly for that purpose - difficult to say - ugly grammar and phrasing -because the subjct is ugly. This is one of the things I like about Duffy's work - she doesn't confine herself to poetic forms - they are often restrictive for what she wants to say.

Your poem's good, but are you really challenging the poet Laureate?

[JBI]

Honestly Paulclem, are you Duffy, or her agent?

[Paulclem]

Um, around 5.5 million on the Entente side, and 4.3 on the axis side, with over 7 and a half million others reported missing. A few thousand is an insult. 800000 people alone were killed in Passchendaele, and a Million odd people in Somme.

All true JBI, but I think she's referring to a particular vision of a particular battle in this poem, Perhaps even the one where Owen was killed.

[Paulclem]

LOL
No JBI.I'm just a poor chap from England. But I would recommend this type of thread if you want to get into a poem.

Incidentally, where were you on the Ship of Death thread? It was very illuminating.

[meh!]

'If poetry could tell it backwards'. What on earth does that mean?! Poetry can tell it however it wants to.

On a practicaly level, if poetry could 'rewind' it, i'd imagine. For me, it also raised some ideas about the relationship of poetry to something like war. Trying to formulate a response to slaughter so vast, as wilfred did and she's trying to do now.


Um, around 5.5 million on the Entente side, and 4.3 on the axis side, with over 7 and a half million others reported missing. A few thousand is an insult. 800000 people alone were killed in Passchendaele, and a Million odd people in Somme.


It wouldn't have been millions if, 'You walk away; drop your gun (fixed bayonet)
like all your mates do too ' obviously.

Anyway, I liked it.

[JBI]

I think you may be misinterpreting that - that is a reference to the armistice, by my reading, not to desertion. I think the point is those who die, verses those who go on to live fulfilling lives.

[meh!]

But wilfred owen was killed in battle, which is why I read it that way.

Also, duffy is obviously aware that millions were killed - i don't find it insulting at all to say thousands. Even reading it your way.

[Paulclem]

One thing that Duffy brings is the new angle, even if it is a naive approach. This angle - that the slaughter doesn't happen and the soldiers go on to lead fulfilling lives hasn't been explored as far as I know. The poetry has dealt with heroism, sadness and horror before, but not this.

I say it is naive because there was a lot of support for the war at the time. One old soldier who died recently was asked if he would do it again, and he said he would because it was his duty. I think lots of people do think in this way still when under national pressure - such as terrorism, but it is quite different to back then.

[kelby_lake]

One thing that Duffy brings is the new angle, even if it is a naive approach. This angle - that the slaughter doesn't happen and the soldiers go on to lead fulfilling lives hasn't been explored as far as I know. The poetry has dealt with heroism, sadness and horror before, but not this.

I say it is naive because there was a lot of support for the war at the time. One old soldier who died recently was asked if he would do it again, and he said he would because it was his duty. I think lots of people do think in this way still when under national pressure - such as terrorism, but it is quite different to back then.

I swear there has been that angle before. 'Atonement' is sort of like that anyway.

Anyhow, it rubs me up the wrong way, so to say. I doubt she knows a great deal about WW1 and yet she's making pretty bold statements.

I think she chose 'thousands' instead of 'millions' because it rhymes better.

And surely 'If poetry could tell it backwards...' is just a stupid way of phrasing: 'If poetry could undo it all...'

[meh!]

but poetry is a story here, it tells....

and you've no idea what she knows about WWI. When I was in school The unification of Germany through the the end of the second World War is all national curriculum. Everybody knows a fair bit about the World Wars.

[kelby_lake]

but poetry is a story here, it tells....

and you've no idea what she knows about WWI. When I was in school The unification of Germany through the the end of the second World War is all national curriculum. Everybody knows a fair bit about the World Wars.

Yes, but that's all factual. If Duffy had tried to make the poem very personal (concerning maybe a relative or the letter(s) of one, it would have worked much better, as it would show empathy. Not claiming to understand, but wanting to understand.

Perhaps she is mocking the naivete of what she has been told about war, but it doesn't sound like it.

I know 'a fair bit' about Italian unification and fascism but I don't write a poem on behalf of every Italian of that time.

[meh!]

I really think you're being unfair to her. Basically everyone in Britain has a personal relationship to someone who was killed in the war and everyone knows someone who was in the war. It's starting to die away these days but Duffy is still very much of the generation EDIT: of the children : EDIT of those who survived the war. I wasn't in any War but my grampa was and that kind of personal relationship can generate strong feelings about it.

Anyway, I think she was justified, whatever.

[Paulclem]

Yes, but that's all factual. If Duffy had tried to make the poem very personal (concerning maybe a relative or the letter(s) of one, it would have worked much better, as it would show empathy. Not claiming to understand, but wanting to understand.


I think she has made it personal - from one poet to another - Wilfred Owen is the poet in the poem. Also her brief as Poet Laureate demands a more universal view.

Also what's factual about turning back time? I think the empathy is there in the poet wishing they could do that.

[kelby_lake]

Yes, but that's all factual. If Duffy had tried to make the poem very personal (concerning maybe a relative or the letter(s) of one, it would have worked much better, as it would show empathy. Not claiming to understand, but wanting to understand.


I think she has made it personal - from one poet to another - Wilfred Owen is the poet in the poem. Also her brief as Poet Laureate demands a more universal view.

Also what's factual about turning back time? I think the empathy is there in the poet wishing they could do that.

I suppose. You kinda got to speak for the nation.
I guess I just don't consider her amongst the greats. She's okay, she's middling. I've read better amateur/less known poetry. Some of the stuff on here is better.

[Paulclem]

I'm interested to see what she brings to the post. She has a strong feminist angle, such as in her anthology The World's Wife, though I've only read a few of those. We needed somone different.

[prendrelemick]

I dont know why, but as I read the poem I'm reminded of the Wilfred Owen quote; "My subject is War and the pity of War. The poetry is in the pity."
I think pity is the subject here, as indicated by the Owen quote and the impotant wish make everything alright. After all what else can a poet of our time do but pity the waste of lives.

[JBI]

I'm interested to see what she brings to the post. She has a strong feminist angle, such as in her anthology The World's Wife, though I've only read a few of those. We needed somone different.

Do people actually value the position there though? Up until a few months ago, I didn't even know Canada has one, and, strangely enough, all our poets so far have been good poets.

Lets be honest though, she doesn't particularly write good verse, by my reckoning - she isn't a serious poet, and, I would argue doesn't even take her poetry seriously - that is why she put out this verse, it's like Elizabeth Alexander writing an Inauguration poem for Obama - a mediocre period piece for a political moment, rather than for poetry.

There isn't much too Duffy, from what I've read about her - her Appeal, I guess, is that any idiot who can read can understand her poems - there isn't much too them, so perhaps that helps make her a choice Candidate, as, from what I know, the English aren't the most literary of people these days, but then again - At least the Highlanders can choose a good poet at any rate.

There were plenty of poets to choose from - this to me just looks like lowering the bar.

[Paulclem]

http://famouspoetsandpoems.com/poets/carol_ann_duffy/poems/8116

The above link goes to her poem Valentine.

Do people actually value the position there though?

I think they do. Certainly the Laureate is showcased on the news and in papers such as The Times.

Lets be honest though, she doesn't particularly write good verse,

If you mean in a particular poetic form, then no, I think she prefers the free verse style.

from what I know, the English aren't the most literary of people these days,

You'll have to let me in on your secret - I couldn't possibly guess wheher this is true or not.

Have a look at this poem. Again I like the angle:

http://www.stpetershigh.org.uk/DEPARTMENTS/ENGLISH_DEPT/PRUSH/KS5_Resources/Year13A2Resources/Anne_Hathaway_Duffy.html

[JBI]

The poem you posted is pretty damn cliché. The second best bed gag has been used so many damn times that it has grown old.

[Paulclem]

The poem you posted is pretty damn cliché. The second best bed gag has been used so many damn times that it has grown old.

I'm not aware of them being used. I still maintain that she is an interesting and innovative poet.

[wessexgirl]

I dont know why, but as I read the poem I'm reminded of the Wilfred Owen quote; "My subject is War and the pity of War. The poetry is in the pity."
I think pity is the subject here, as indicated by the Owen quote and the impotant wish make everything alright. After all what else can a poet of our time do but pity the waste of lives.


I thought the exact same thing Prendrelemick. I was listeneing to her reading it again tonight on Pick of the Week, and the same thought went through my mind.


You see the poet tuck away his pocket-book and smile.

If that poet is Owen, his work is done, or not. If his subject is war and the pity of war, he's not needed there.

I think JBI and Kelby, you're being overly harsh on Duffy. We had a similar thread when she was announced as Laureate, and you showed your disdain for her then. As the poet of the First World War, of course she is evoking Owen and all he stood for, and I see nothing wrong in that. To talk of her arrogance in the fact that she wasn't there is absurd. Imagination and empathy are part of the creative mind, or should be. After all, was Milton in the Garden of Eden, was Coleridge on the ship with the Ancient Mariner or in the halls of Xanadu, was Blake up the chimney with the Sweep etc, etc? And as you are such a fan of Eliot JBI, I heard Duffy mentioned today as the successor to Eliot.

Incidentally I love The World's Wife, very witty. To knock it just shows a lack of humour to my mind. I'll ask again, as I did before, who do you think was suitable for the post, and I mean in the real world, not someone the majority of the public have never heard of, but who may be critically analysed and lauded in the halls of academia?

[JBI]

The closest thing to Eliot's successor, by my reckoning, in a living poet, is Geoffrey Hill, who is the complete opposite poet of Duffy - the only thing Duffy and Eliot have in common is citizenship, and, ironically, Eliot wasn't even born into it.


As for the tuck away pocket book line - I think she was self-referential in that line, with a slight gesture to Owen, I am not sure if I wish to read it as her only referring to Owen, or referring to Owen at all, or any other war poet.

[Paulclem]

I am not sure if I wish to read it as her only referring to Owen, or referring to Owen at all, or any other war poet.


If "the poet" in the poem is not Owen, then who is it that is standing with the soldiers in the square.

I think it is a secure assumption given that she begins with Dulce est lines and refers to it through the poem.

You lean against a wall,
your several million lives still possible
and crammed with love, work, children, talent, English beer, good food.
You see the poet tuck away his pocket-book and smile.

Surely that would be Owen smiling.

[JBI]

It's Duffy herself - she is transposing herself within the seen, by reading history backwards through poetry - I thought that was, at any rate, the basic tying in with the last lines.

[wessexgirl]

It's Owen, or possibly one of the many war poets, or all of them.

The poet tucks away his pocket book and smiles.

[Paulclem]

You walk away.

You walk away; drop your gun (fixed bayonet)
like all your mates do too-
Harry, Tommy, Wilfred, Edward, Bert-
and light a cigarette.


The you Duffy is addressing are the soldiers who then see the poet tuck away his pocket book

You lean against a wall,
your several million lives still possible
and crammed with love, work, children, talent, English beer, good food.
You see the poet tuck away his pocket-book and smile.

I don't read it the way are seeing it JBI. I think it's clearly Owen. As I think I said before, she connects in the dream lines from Dulce est at the beginning.

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

[Paulclem]

It's Owen, or possibly one of the many war poets, or all of them.

The poet tucks away his pocket book and smiles.

I agree Wessexgirl.

[kelby_lake]

I think JBI and Kelby, you're being overly harsh on Duffy. We had a similar thread when she was announced as Laureate, and you showed your disdain for her then. As the poet of the First World War, of course she is evoking Owen and all he stood for, and I see nothing wrong in that. To talk of her arrogance in the fact that she wasn't there is absurd. Imagination and empathy are part of the creative mind, or should be. After all, was Milton in the Garden of Eden, was Coleridge on the ship with the Ancient Mariner or in the halls of Xanadu, was Blake up the chimney with the Sweep etc, etc? And as you are such a fan of Eliot JBI, I heard Duffy mentioned today as the successor to Eliot.

Yes, but most of those places are made up (it sounds like Cluedo, a bit,hee hee. And I refrain from making an infantile joke about Blake, hee).

I am harsh because I don't get why she's supposed to be so brilliant. I guess not everyone can be Blakes or Spensers but...for me she just sort of blurs into 'modern poetry', deliberately trying to be obscure but without the beauty of phrasing. She has the obscurity there with Eliot but at least he had powerful images and was interestingly obscure.

To think we could have studied Shelley at school instead of Duffy...

[wessexgirl]

Yes, but most of those places are made up (it sounds like Cluedo, a bit,hee hee. And I refrain from making an infantile joke about Blake, hee).

I am harsh because I don't get why she's supposed to be so brilliant. I guess not everyone can be Blakes or Spensers but...for me she just sort of blurs into 'modern poetry', deliberately trying to be obscure but without the beauty of phrasing. She has the obscurity there with Eliot but at least he had powerful images and was interestingly obscure.

To think we could have studied Shelley at school instead of Duffy...

While I will defend Duffy on the whole, I would rather study Shelley too.

[Paulclem]

for me she just sort of blurs into 'modern poetry', deliberately trying to be obscure but without the beauty of phrasing.

I know what you mean. I think what Duffy does in avoiding the standard forms is to play with the free verse and use it for her purposes in the poems. For example that part of the line bled bad blood is awkward to say, and is certainly not musical. I think it expresses something else- perhaps the artificiality of the situation.

I suppose in the end it comes down to personal preferences.

I have enjoyed this thread - I would recommend doing similar if you want to improve your understanding of a poem. I always get a lot out of discussing poetry on top of reading it, and when yourself, Kelby, and JBI expressed your opinions it really focused my thinking.

[kelby_lake]

I like discussing poetry too.