Write, and the world reads with you

[PrinceMyshkin]

Write, and the world reads with you;
read, and you read alone.

Sometimes, indeed, in order to avoid reading
about this multifarious world
in which things never stop happening,
I write. It is one way
to shut out the world.

[2ndblogger]

Write, and the world reads with you;
read, and you read alone.

Sometimes, indeed, in order to avoid reading
about this multifarious world
in which things never stop happening,
I write. It is one way
to shut out the world.


I absolutely agree..http://smiley3421.notlong.com

[firefangled]

Write, and the world reads with you;
read, and you read alone.

Sometimes, indeed, in order to avoid reading
about this multifarious world
in which things never stop happening,
I write. It is one way
to shut out the world.


Very interesting the reasons we write. As much as I gather from your poems that you depend heavily on the world for your inspiration, this poem seems strange coming from you. Having a bad day? I hope it gets better, if so.

[PrinceMyshkin]

Very interesting the reasons we write. As much as I gather from your poems that you depend heavily on the world for your inspiration, this poem seems strange coming from you. Having a bad day? I hope it gets better, if so.

Thanks for the sympathy, but no, not so much a bad day but a continuing dialectic with my motives and means for writing; and in this case, I was out of sorts with the issue of The NYer I'd brought with me to the cafe: three essays in a row that struck me as fillers... which seemed to leave me no other choice but to try to scrawl something into the notebook I always have with me when I'm there, since the Cafe often acts as a Pavlovian reflex re writing...

But I was yet to get to the very invigorating essay by James Wood on the "new atheists" vs the new anti-atheists, as he dubbed them: http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2009/08/31/090831crbo_books_wood

[firefangled]

Thanks for the sympathy, but no, not so much a bad day but a continuing dialectic with my motives and means for writing; and in this case, I was out of sorts with the issue of The NYer I'd brought with me to the cafe: three essays in a row that struck me as fillers... which seemed to leave me no other choice but to try to scrawl something into the notebook I always have with me when I'm there, since the Cafe often acts as a Pavlovian reflex re writing...

But I was yet to get to the very invigorating essay by James Wood on the "new atheists" vs the new anti-atheists, as he dubbed them: http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2009/08/31/090831crbo_books_wood

Unfortunately, I am limited to what I could read from your link. I'm not subscribed to the NY. Although I still read essays and occassionally books on this subject, the language needed to be used for discussion of theology, religion, faith, etc. has such baggage on all sides it seems to be getting to the point where discussion is pointless. In a way, the "problem" has seemed to disrupt cosmology and theology worldwide from arguing than it has led to common understanding.

In the end, we are all in the same flood waters, all part of the river at the same time we sit and watch it flow. This seems more like what your Snapshots, Brainscans, and are about. I've never interpreted your poems as blocking out the world, rather you seem to embrace it for what it is, even in your battles against some parts. And how else can we write without going insane? You could not write as you do without the world flowing through your notebook.

[PrinceMyshkin]

Unfortunately, I am limited to what I could read from your link. I'm not subscribed to the NY. Although I still read essays and occassionally books on this subject, the language needed to be used for discussion of theology, religion, faith, etc. has such baggage on all sides it seems to be getting to the point where discussion is pointless. In a way, the "problem" has seemed to disrupt cosmology and theology worldwide from arguing than it has led to common understanding.

In the end, we are all in the same flood waters, all part of the river at the same time we sit and watch it flow. This seems more like what your Snapshots, Brainscans, and are about. I've never interpreted your poems as blocking out the world, rather you seem to embrace it for what it is, even in your battles against some parts. And how else can we write without going insane? You could not write as you do without the world flowing through your notebook.

I propose the diametrical opposite to the notion that we must become insane in the process of writing. As to what is sanity, I forget which psychologist it was who wrote "It all depends on who pulls the definitional trigger." And perhaps, if Shelley were alive today he might have proposed his famous dictum thusly: "poets are the unacknowledged psychologists of the world..."

Of course here I am treading on Edmund Wilson's point in The Wound & the Bow. (And surely anyone who hopes to write robust, lucid English prose should read anything by Wilson or by Dwight MacDonald.)

[firefangled]

I propose the diametrical opposite to the notion that we must become insane in the process of writing.

You misunderstood my meaning. I did not say that we go insane in the process of writing. I've never believed in the artist going mad for his art. Some have gone mad in spite of their art, but that is not the same. Even the reclusive artist cannot portray the world and deny the world at the same time without going mad in the process.

[DanielBenoit]

I love how the aphoristic nature of this poem is able to avoid being bland or simply unpoetic. I love how most of your poems can be statements of truth, but also poems at the same time.

[PrinceMyshkin]

I love how the aphoristic nature of this poem is able to avoid being bland or simply unpoetic. I love how most of your poems can be statements of truth, but also poems at the same time.

What you cite are indeed aesthetic goals of mine. I'm at times aware that my poems might leave readers dangling but I'd rather do it that way than steer my boat safely back into harbour.