Controversial poet-colin leslie dean

Hello I found this poet on the net.

his approach to poetry is

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In this day and age a sense of poetry is lacking
The world is anathematised. The pleasure principle has
dulled peoples souls. They don't feel, they are not moved
by any aesthetic feeling . There is no passion. The one area
of most peoples lives, sex, lacks intensity lacks fire in other
words lacks poetry. Life is a mechanical routine of ritualised
habits and endless going over of old patterns- no spark no intensity
These evil flowers are meant to evoke feeling. If the feeling is that
of revulsion or that of elation, of abhorrence or that of glee then
these evil flowers have achieved thier result they have made you alive
feel in other words they have made you human again.

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There seems to be varied and mixed views regarding his poetry. His poetry is full of vivid images and starling language which take us to areas which may be regarded as taboo . His language is very melodious and hypnotic I was wondering what the views of a poetry forum might be in regard to his poetry-as I have found quite mixed views

you can download his poetry free from this site
gamahucherpress.yellowgum.com/gamahucher_press_catalogue.htm

Just...bad. Sorry. Just really really bad. The nicest thing I can find to say about it is that it reminds me of Allen Ginsberg, only in a parallel universe where Allen Ginsberg is right-wing and a bad poet.

dean is nothing like Allen Ginsberg by equating him with him says to me you have not even read any of deans work at all. Dean is as far from Ginsberg as your parallel universe. If you have read dean lets see some quote and a comment on it -if not your comments are just uniformed rhetoric from some one who has not read who he is critising

Trust me, dude, I read it. I wish I hadn't, but I read the first poem it gave. It read like angsty beat poetry, only with a different structure. And bad. It was completely unpoetic and unoriginal, it was about as subtle as a sledgehammer to the forehead (only without the sledgehammer's emotional impact), and it had exactly the same erotic qualities as a train wreck. As to the content: it was so far-right and misogynist that the best analogy I can think of is some hideous combination of Hemmingway and Pound, only with a complete lack of any literary worth. Dean shows a hillariously bad understanding of both the basic precepts of feminism and the actual content of The Female Eunuch not to mention some fairly twisted ideas of female sexuality. It's an obvious attempt to create controversy as a means of getting attention, rather than actually writing good verse.

This guy is the Ed Wood of poetry, only without Wood's sense of fun. That poem is to poetry as falling down the stairs and breaking your collar-bone is to ballet.

In conclusion: I didn't like it.

so lets see a quote from the poem -which one excatly and show how it is beat poetry-dean is as far from beat poetry as you paralle universe
and please if it is unoriginal show us in a quote the other work that is like deans

"I got it all/I am a hard nosed feminist/I pranced and preened/The toast of the the town/Flounced around the girl about the town" (I would continue, but it would result in my being IP banned.)

Compare to:

"I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked/.../angleheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,..."
(Allen Ginsberg, Howl)

Note the similar themes of an insane society, a society in crisis, alienation, despair and a slightly hysterical verse. The differences being Ginsberg's verse flows and is original, poetic and clever (the word 'connection' being used in the double sense of "cosmic understanding" and "drug dealer"). Dean's God-awful poetry, on the other hand, reads jerkily, makes no statement more sophisticated than "I don't like feminism", and is completely devoid of allusion, metaphor, double-meaning, artful prosody or any of those other reasons why people enjoy poetry.

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I got it all/I am a hard nosed feminist/I pranced and preened/The toast of the the town/Flounced around the girl about the town" (I would continue, but it would result in my being IP banned.)

Compare to:

"I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked/.../angleheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,..."
(Allen Ginsberg, Howl)

that aint no comparision deans is not about madness or of an insane society, a society in crisis, alienation, despair and a slightly hysterical verse.you could you miss the point of the whole poem with that comparision his is about arogance conciet pride and vanityYOU MISS THE complete point of dean with that inappripriate quote
all your post point to the fact you dont like deans content so you are now going to rubbish it that is the issue not whether it is good or bad poetry

and your selection of that type of verse in the poem is so telling cos further along there is great verse of pathos and lost love in a completly different poetic style you not quoting that type of poetrty shows you are just againist the content
the verse you quoted is juxtaposed with a more melodic pathos poetry to bring out in sharop contrast the different moods of the feminist-you not showing this shjows your bias against the content

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Originally Posted by pam

all your post point to the fact you dont like deans content so you are now going to rubbish it that is the issue not whether it is good or bad poetry

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I don't like it because it's awful.

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Originally Posted by pam

and your selection of that type of verse in the poem is so telling cos further along there is great verse of pathos and lost love in a completly different poetic style

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Quote it, then. I've seen better pathos on license plates.

hey u say u read the poem all the way through so show us with a quote these lines of pathos and lost love in a diiferent style

I don't want to, because then I'd have to read it again. You show us that.

you prove you read it all the way through you are the one rubbishing dean-even with a incorrect comparision with ginsberg

Dude, if you like it, that's fine. I think it's awful. I did read it, but I'm not particularly interested in working too hard to prove it to tyranical strangers over the internet. Good day.

pam69ur--Just so you know that it's not an isolated opinion, I have read the entire "Female Eunuch" poem down to the very last line and I have to agree with cuppajoe that it's badly written. It just reads like a rather inept and very misogynistic rant without redeeming artistic value. I want to make absolutely clear, that while I'm not a fan of the poem's theme, I am not calling it bad poetry based upon that theme but based on the fact that the use of language is singularly uninspired. There are plenty of writers who have written misogynistic verse and used naughty language but done so with considerably more wit and art. I don't even find it that shocking or controversial. There's been a lot of amateur bawdy poetry written throughout history, and I really just can't see what makes this stand apart.

I think it is up to you to quote that part of the poem that you find artful and full of pathos and explain what you like about it, since you're the one seeing these qualities. I'm sure people would be willing to politely read your explanation of what moves you about this poetry and to take your point of view into account, but it's not at all fair to ask someone to quote lines to prove your point when that person doesn't agree with your point and thus can't possibly know what part you are alluding to.

you say without without redeeming artistic value and badly written
so lets see yoour aesthetic first hand lets see the criteria you are basing this assessment on
give us a few line from the complet styles showing us how they lack artistic value-u made the claim so back it up

is yoiur aesthetic classical moderniist post-modernist
can you appreciate dadist or futurist poetry do you think poetry ended with petrarach or shakspeare do you think based upon clasical principles the romantic or modersist poets are amerturish because their diction is simple and prose like can u appreacite the colloquial poetry of kipling or is he amerturish
lets se you easthetic principle you are judging dean upon

I think I see how this little game works:

"Dude, that poem sucked."
"Back it up. Let's see you quote the poem and show us what you find so offensive about it."
[does so]
"Ah, it's very telling that you quoted that line, because the very next segment of the poem contains the most beautiful description of love lost yet wrote down in any language."
"Uhh..."
"You must be biased against the content of Dean's work. I bet you haven't even read the poem."
"Uhh..."
"Man, forget you guys with your bourgoise, narrow-minded, classicist, facist literary criticisms. You just don't like good poetry!"
"Uhh..."

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Originally Posted by Petrarch

There are plenty of writers who have written misogynistic verse and used naughty language but done so with considerably more wit and art.

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John Wilmot, anybody?

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Originally Posted by pam69ur

you say without without redeeming artistic value and badly written
so lets see yoour aesthetic first hand lets see the criteria you are basing this assessment on
give us a few line from the complet styles showing us how they lack artistic value-u made the claim so back it up

is yoiur aesthetic classical moderniist post-modernist
can you appreciate dadist or futurist poetry do you think poetry ended with petrarach or shakspeare do you think based upon clasical principles the romantic or modersist poets are amerturish because their diction is simple and prose like can u appreacite the colloquial poetry of kipling or is he amerturish
lets se you easthetic principle you are judging dean upon

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Whoa whoa whoa. Everybody's entitled to like whatever art they like. One does not necessarily have to have an "aesthetic" to decide that they don't like a piece of literature. It's clear you like this Dean guy - fine; but you asked for opinions, got them, and now are trying to force people to defend their opinion. Here: why don't you defend your poet? Why don't you quote the "vivid images" "startling, melodious, hypnotic language" ? Rather than try to pin the critics and question the basis of their dismissal, rise to the challenge and give the evidence your poet provides that makes him worthy of the praise you give him. cuppajoe's correct in his assessment as to the tactics you're using, so answer his criticism with evidence from the poem. He already made clear the basis of his judgment by comparing and contrasting a comparable poet.

hey i said dean was controversial and your comments suport it one says his content is controversial another say not
you contrast him him to wilmot who u say wrote with wit another says deans language is to naughty to print on this site yet wilmot uses some of the same language in his poems ie a "ramble in james park" u say that is ok cos wilmot wrote with wit -when is wit a licence to write naughty or do you prefere your filth to be a santistized by wit cant you face naughty in the flesh in her rawness nakeedness
or is because wilmot is now an accepted poet that you can print his naughty words on this site

go read swifts poem about his mistress bedroom there u will see poo stained underware and dirty urinals -and that aint wit but satire

all you are doing is really polluting creativity by calling a persons work of no artistic value- art is art and criricism is subjective based upon an arbitary aesthethitic wilmot would have been considered fiith and i bad poety in victorian england
wordworth was considered a bad poet by those brought up on pope and classical standards modernist poetry would have been consider rubbish by those brought up on wordsworth for it being to prose like dadist poetry would not have been considered as poetry at all

art canot be valued as good or bad and any one who does devalues art and condem themselves as philistines

thank you all for this demonstration of the controversy of dean and showing how art is polluted by arbitary aesthethics value judgments-take heart all you poets out there just write and forget what so called conissuers of literature have to say about your work for their expousing are just historical aberrations of their own arbitary aesthetic even shaksperar in his day had his critics and many erven say now a lot of his language in not understandable as he just coined it to meet the metre

Whaaaaaaaaaat?

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art canot be valued as good or bad and any one who does devalues art and condem themselves as philistines

For a poem that speaks about breaking away from the aesthetic mold and creating something innovatively poetic – there is nothing innovative about this piece. Just some guy spouting his personal hatred for aesthetics in poetry. I disagree with everything he said. I think aesthetics is the voice, and touch, and feeling, and breath of the words. It can be what gives the idea expressed in the poem life. Otherwise the words become lifeless – just like his poem you quoted. You say his poem contains vivid imagery. I say it’s filled with vagueness. What the heck is an “evil flower?” I think the “hypnotic” quality of his piece is that it leaves you in a state of confusion when you finish reading it.

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You say his poem contains vivid imagery. I say it’s filled with vagueness.

u cant even see the symbolisim and imagery-u miss the whole aesthetics

evil flower
flower = open female genitals
so evil flower is evil open flower-like female genitals
confusion or hypnotised by the melodies -like being drunk on good wine

I vote we all dumb it down a noch...whos with me?

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Originally Posted by pam69ur

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You say his poem contains vivid imagery. I say it’s filled with vagueness.

u cant even see the symbolisim and imagery-u miss the whole aesthetics

evil flower
flower = open female genitals
so evil flower is evil open flower-like female genitals
confusion or hypnotised by the melodies -like being drunk on good wine

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Oh! So he does believe in aesthetics:confused:

anti-poetry aesthetics did u not see the dissonances and abuse of language in some of the poems or were carried away with your own creativity along with the hypnotic melodies

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anti-poetry aesthetics did u not see the dissonances and abuse of language in some of the poems or were carried away with your own creativity along with the hypnotic melodies

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What?

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Originally Posted by pam69ur

hey i said dean was controversial and your comments suport it one says his content is controversial another say not
you contrast him him to wilmot who u say wrote with wit another says deans language is to naughty to print on this site yet wilmot uses some of the same language in his poems ie a "ramble in james park" u say that is ok cos wilmot wrote with wit -when is wit a licence to write naughty or do you prefere your filth to be a santistized by wit cant you face naughty in the flesh in her rawness nakeedness
or is because wilmot is now an accepted poet that you can print his naughty words on this site

go read swifts poem about his mistress bedroom there u will see poo stained underware and dirty urinals -and that aint wit but satire

all you are doing is really polluting creativity by calling a persons work of no artistic value- art is art and criricism is subjective based upon an arbitary aesthethitic wilmot would have been considered fiith and i bad poety in victorian england
wordworth was considered a bad poet by those brought up on pope and classical standards modernist poetry would have been consider rubbish by those brought up on wordsworth for it being to prose like dadist poetry would not have been considered as poetry at all

art canot be valued as good or bad and any one who does devalues art and condem themselves as philistines

thank you all for this demonstration of the controversy of dean and showing how art is polluted by arbitary aesthethics value judgments-take heart all you poets out there just write and forget what so called conissuers of literature have to say about your work for their expousing are just historical aberrations of their own arbitary aesthetic even shaksperar in his day had his critics and many erven say now a lot of his language in not understandable as he just coined it to meet the metre

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so um, mind speaking in english? with good spelling? and grammar?
plus that dean guy just sucks.

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Originally Posted by pam

thank you all for this demonstration of the controversy of dean...

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Controversy? I see no controversy. It's pretty much unanimous: we all think he's awful.

I googled Colin Leslie Dean just out of idle curiosity. Idle hands are the devil's workshop, or some such thing right? :p

I was curious what the big deal was regarding this person's work. I read partway through a dcoument that was supposed to be a presentation of Dean's "philosophy". I admit I am confused. What I read seemed more about "how to pick up girls" then any thing else....generously woven in with "erotic" poetry.

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A MORAL PHILOSOPHY:
A GUIDE BOOK FOR AR******Y; WHAT NIETZSCHE AND FOUCAULT DID NOT TELL US; A SURVIVAL MANUAL FOR THE HUMAN JUNGLE; PRACTICAL SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY FOR THE PREDATOR: THE EXPLOITER; THE CON ARTIST; THE CAD; THE BASTARD....
AN OPEN LETTER;
BY PREDATORS TO VICTIMS.

TO PULL A BIRD IS A COMPLICATED PROBLEM. A CONSTELLATION OF FACTORS MUST BE CORRECT AND IN THEIR RIGHT PLACE AT THE RIGHT TIME FOR THE PREDATOR TO FEED. WHAT FOLLOWS IS AN ACCOUNT OF SOME OF THESE FACTORS
Know your prey! Women are all predators. They are in search of prey to fulfil their needs and wants. If you want to prey on a predator then gratify these needs and wants.

Avoid those women predators who are gas bagging these two are probable out for a girls-night out and would be pissed off if they where intruded upon. So there she is the one who has been looking at you standing next to you. So now what? (Take note victims)

And be assured once you are in the good books with her friends if you break up with her you will probably score with them too. A fact of life is most friends in a group will have f**** each other overtime. This is because women predators tend to f*** within their groups than without. So if you can make fiends with your women predators’s girl-friends you are made. You have a harem. So don’t be despondent if she wants you as friend before she f**** you ,you will get to know her friends and you are set. (Take note victims)

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There was more....alot more. I simply didn't feel like reading it.

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Originally Posted by pam69ur

art is art and criricism is subjective based upon an arbitary aesthethitic

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I suppose much of what people enjoy is subjective, and if you enjoy Dean's work, good for you. However, something to consider is extending that courtesy to others. Just as other people's opinions are subjective, so are yours--thus you should consider other people's opinions respectfully and understand that no amount of bullying is going to change anybody's mind.

The poetry that was posted is mostly gone...I saw it late last night when I was lurking here before going to bed. I must say, the fact that a poem has swearing and sexual content, does not make it "erotic". Erotica means to me ( I guess this is purely subjective on my part, I am not a big reader of erotica, I prefer classics and mysteries)..ok, erotica means to me an artistic expression of sexuality, and should be earthy, yes, but also sensual. D.H. Lawrence wrote in such a way, Dean does not. The two poems that I saw were simply badly written with overabundant references to bodily secretions and genitalia.

I find these comments about deans poem interesting- it seems dean sure is a controversial poet. I find many of his poems full of vivid imagery like some classical Chinese poems. Interestingly I have seen dean referred to as Australia's leading erotic poet