Are Poets Born Not Made?

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

No MystyrMystyry? I love his stuff.

And thanks for the nod, Shadows, though I'm not sure its warranted.

[ShadowsCool]

No MystyrMystyry? I love his stuff.

And thanks for the nod, Shadows, though I'm not sure its warranted.

Good point. I hope no one thinks I'm kissing butt here LOL. Just my assessment and humble opinion.

Thanks!

[stlukesguild]

But I stand by my statement that much of what is considered good poetry, or even great poetry is rather dull and tepid.

And that's but a personal opinion that may say more about you that the poets you question. Let's look at this "canon". Ultimately the "canon" is some abstract ideal not some simple list made up by this critic or that university. The "canon" is something that is ever-changing and fluid. Essentially, it is constructed of the writers whose work has survived and continues to resonate with an audience. You seemingly assume that this audience is made up solely of dry academics. Even if it were true that academics were the sole arbiters of what survives, you cannot argue that all academics are dry (hell, a great deal are quite passionate about literature that they have invested so much time and effort into studying). Nor can you find a clear consensus of agreement by such academics.

But the canon is not constructed solely upon the opinions of academia; it is also the product of subsequent generations of writers. A critic like Samuel Johnson was able to dismiss Lawrence Sterne, but writers such as Lewis Carroll, James Joyce, J.L. Borges etc... counter this. You also must consider the opinions of what Virginia Woolf called the "common reader"... the well-read passionate reader. Tolkein and Bram Stoker and Arthur Conan Doyle and Alexander Dumas survive more upon the opinions of common readers than critics.

Ultimately, if a work of literature has survived for a great period of time there is probably a reason for its survival. This does not mean that we MUST like every book that is deemed a classic... but it does mean that there are obviously more than a few among those who have invested a good deal of time and effort into reading that feel the work is of real merit and to suggest that all those readers are of of some lock-step mentality (unable to think for themselves) and merely glom onto whatever academia has deemed to be a "classic" is unrealistic... if not insulting.

Another thing, they refer to it as Dead White Men for a reason.

The primary reason is a misguided notion that we can effect social change by rewriting history... even the history of the arts. There aren't more women in the history of art and literature because men in power are hiding their existence from us. They simply aren't there because women were rarely afforded the education or the opportunity to even consider a career in the arts. Why aren't there more Blacks in the history of Western Literature? Is that really a serious question. Why not ask why there aren't more Germans in the history of Asian art. My God! It's an obvious conspiracy! And why aren't there more Jewish writers included in the history of Middle-Eastern literature? It must be antisemitism! Let's use the grey matter a bit here. What percentage of the population of Europe was black? Until recently how many Blacks were afforded an education in the United States? Over the last century just how great has the Black contribution to literature been? I don't think anyone in their right mind would even begin to suggest that it in any way approaches the Black contribution to music... which is in no way denied in academia.

This is combined with a warped notion that art is or should be a democratic... or even an egalitarian endeavor, when the reality is that art has always been elitist. Yes... all cultures produce human beings of exemplary intelligence in the same proportion... but not all cultures have produced achievements in the arts and culture at the same level. The Germans and Austrians have produced more great music than any other culture in history. The Italian Renaissance resulted in far more painting and sculpture of real genius than any other European culture. Much of this has to do with access to education, financial support, the access to the time and materials. Much of this has to do with the simple reality that life isn't fair.

As for "queer" voices. Again I must say... "Really?" "Really?" No major homosexuals in the arts... locked out by entrenched beliefs, eh? All except for Michelangelo, Leonardo, Caravaggio, Donatello, Sappho, Oscar Wilde, Marcel Proust, Walt Whitman, Rimbaud, Verlaine, Hart Crane, Tennessee Williams, Herman Melville, Allen Ginsberg, etc... One could certainly go on for quite some time.

The fact is that there isn't so much a resistance to women-writers, Hispanic-writers, Jewish-writers, homosexual-writers, etc... Rather there is a resistance to politicizing the arts in an attempt to enforce some notion of egalitarianism: so many Black writers, so many Jewish writers, etc...

But yes, I prefer something along the lines of Bukowski, William S. Burroughs, or Kerouac. I'd rather read Henry Rollins pathetic "poetry" then most of what is considered fine and good by most.

That's well and fine. Some people prefer Pink Floyd and Aerosmith to Mozart and Bach... but how likely is it that Pink Floyd and Aerosmith will survive another 200 years? It's more that a good guess that Mozart and Bach will still be recognized as classics

I think we need more poetry that disturbs people, that wakes people up. It has to be at least a little exciting. Not more boring middle-class and upper-class white people droning on about the same subjects.

How does it wake you up? Any half-literate buffoon can string together a stream of profanity, sexually graphic imagery, and the sad ramblings of an alcoholic. Shock value is cheap. The real excitement comes in shaking up our perceptions of those same boring subjects and our notions of the use of language. Seriously, considering what I have read over the years I can't even begin to fathom what you mean when you speak of writers harping on over the same "boring, middle-class, white subject matter. Please do inform me as to just what these are?

[miyako73]

Poetry, at least to me, is an acquired taste. In my case, I want it raw. I prefer sashimi over the trendy california roll. Besides, dildoes are too artificial and mechanical and made of plastic or silicone.

This is my favorite poet before he went to Amherst to study literature:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaBX7_g5KMQ

This is him already a student at Amherst. The raw before, it seems, has been cooked.

http://vimeo.com/6902718

His earliest works are even better:

the zoo

My words, indifferent as a gray tortoise,
remind me of an old woman
smoking tobacco by the window.

My words are as invisible
as the old kitchen rag
I use to wipe the grease off the cages.

My words are clumsy
as a frog saturated with mud
wishing to hibernate.

My words have the deliberate solitude of lizards,
their tongues unfold like a royal carpet
straining to hear the inward music
of distant saxophones.

I come in and find abundant thick hairs,
droppings, and tangerine peels,
a familiar scent fills my nostrils.

My words have escaped.
I’m too tired or too wound up
to go after them.

THE IRREVERSIBLE WORD

In endless seas of words I struggle,
barnacles of distraction
cling idle to my boat.

Me alone with my images
like fish riding on the water
or coral reefs deep below the surface.

I pull on the oars,
but why do I struggle if I know
I will never reach the shore?

My poem still incomplete, I am a bird
knowing I will never reach the sun's round perfection.
Why then do I struggle
trying to weave these threads of words?

Beyond, beyond, always beyond
sailing to the horizon,
no boundaries on the sea nor in the sunlit sky.
My journey is always beginning,
that in itself keeps me content.

If one day I reach the shore
or fly like a phoenix to meet the source of light
or make my poem complete
and weave my words into a cloak of patterns
and go back to the Irreversible Word
from which all words came forth,
then I'd be silent
for fear of staining
the delicate silk of its totality.

In the meantime here I come!
pulling on the oars,
and there's plenty of songs
to keep me going.


I just hope he finds his voice back. I'll wait for it. I want to fall in love with his words again like before.

[MorpheusSandman]

Some people prefer Pink Floyd and Aerosmith to Mozart and Bach... but how likely is it that Pink Floyd and Aerosmith will survive another 200 years?

I know this wasn't addressed to me, but:

Aerosmith has almost no chance. Floyd, on the other hand, has a better than average chance, if only because they seem to keep finding passionate, devoted fans with each new generation. But, really, The Beatles and Dylan would be a better comparison to Mozart and Bach, as I believe both of them will survive another 200 years (and, personally, I'd take both over Bach, though not Mozart... preferences, preferences).

Poetry, at least to me, is an acquired taste. In my case, I want it raw. I prefer sashimi over the trendy california roll.

Which is just fine, but all we ask is that you recognize that this IS personal taste and not some objective comment on the quality of "fully cooked" poetry.

[Delta40]

That was a well written and very patient post St Lukes but I think The Beatles might last 200 years

[MorpheusSandman]

It's always, at best, a semi-educated guess about what will enter the canon long-term, but we should probably realize that SOME things from each century will get there. I'd say The Beatles and Dylan are our best guess as far as last century's pop music goes.

But, is it just me, or does the classical music canon seem to change much faster than the others? Stravinsky, Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Bartok, Strauss, et al. from the last century are already canonical...

[stlukesguild]

miyako73- born poets fvck me up awake, made poets fvck me up asleep. Boredom is what separates the two.

MorpheusSandman- So you get to arbitrarily decide based on subjective reaction of what is 'exciting' and 'boring' whether a poet was born or made? So, if I think your poetry is boring, then I get to call you a 'made poet'?

Well... actually it would seem that if her poetry is boring then we simply must assume that she's not a born poet... and as poetry is something either one was born with or not... then it seems obvious that she's simply not a born poet and thus never has the least chance of becoming a poet... regardless of effort, education, etc...

Of course the very notion of a "born artist" in any genre is naive... if not sophomoric. All art forms involve a language... and all languages must be learned. Certainly, studies of the human brain have proven that certain individuals are more predisposed toward rapidly mastering a given set of skills or knowledge than another... but to rise to the level of true mastery in any art form a degree of discipline... study and practice is involved.

The idea that one might become "too learned"... "too well practiced" etc... is simply moronic... and in all likelihood based in a degree of envy... and/or laziness. The idea that the well-informed or scholarly artist is more likely to follow some lock-step mentality while the intuitive "natural" artist is willing to break the rules is little more than Romantic claptrap... and surely not supported by the examples of cultural history. Was Cervantes illiterate? It seems to me that he was more than well versed in the traditional Romances that his novel parodied. Was Michelangelo just naturally talented? from what I recall, he had one of the most intense formal training and education possible.

Silas Thorne- MorpheusSandman is making a criticism of people that write poetry in a particular way, saying that they consider themselves 'geniuses,' by using Clive James' views on Ezra Pound.

More like I'm criticizing people that choose to dismiss/ignore the poetic tradition while (ironically) being allowed to do so because of that tradition... What I'm really criticizing is the anti-intellectual attitude (which I think is born out of xenophobia and laziness, more than anything) that poets are just these divinely inspired creatures that don't need to work at or learn their craft.

Exactly!

paradoxical- I didn't say the cannon was necessarily wrong, just too conservative and slow to acknowledge what is new... I stand by my statement that much of what is considered good poetry, or even great poetry is rather dull and tepid.

Canons have ALWAYS been slow, though. It's not as if those in the 17th Century considered Shakespeare as the greatest writer ever in the English language. He owes much of that reputation to the 19th Century and, especially, the German intellectuals. So criticizing the canon for being slow is bizarre to me, because all canons are formed via a "consensus" of what emerges out of criticism over a long period of time.

The notion of "the canon" or the "classics" is based upon something which has survived for a reasonable period of time and garnered the continued admiration or consensus of those who have invested the most into the study of a given art form. The idea of a "contemporary classic" or the "contemporary canon" is an oxymoron. This is not to say that none of the literature of here and now has any worth... nor that none of it will eventually rise to the status of a "classic"... but how is this process too conservative? Of what value is gushing over every best-seller and proclaiming equal to Shakespeare?

I think we need more poetry that disturbs people, that wakes people up.

Hey, I dig Burroughs, but it seems like what you're hankering for is some kind of sensationalist shock. It's been done and, quite frankly, I feel more "awakened" by Blake than I do by Bukowski (whom I don't like) or Burroughs (whom I do).

I quite agree.

ShadowsCool- The fact that some people think certain poetry is inferior to their own, speaks of presumptuous righteousness on their part.

Some people might just be right.

We all are different writers with different skill sets.

This is merely cultural relativism... the notion that there is no good nor bad art... merely "different" art. No artist of any real ability believes this to be true even of his or her own work.

I never went to writing school, nor did I finish college. Does that mean I suck because I don't write like the Harvard grads? Or that my style is more narrative and not modern enough?

No... it doesn't inherently mean that your work sucks or is less modern than the Harvard grads.

If I comment on their poetry but they don't even acknowledge me as a writer, then why should I care about their writing?

I'm confused here. Where do you get the idea that the poets championed as part of the "canon" or admired by academia are all graduates of some elite university or college? I suspect this is more about envy than about anything else.

This is why I wrote what I wrote before (A Certain Snobbery in Poetry). Some people come off high on their rocker! And it stinks to high heaven!

Again... this seems to be more about an inferiority complex than a response to some real prejudice directed toward those lacking certain formal credentials.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Another thing, they refer to it as Dead White Men for a reason.

The primary reason is a misguided notion that we can effect social change by rewriting history... even the history of the arts. There aren't more women in the history of art and literature because men in power are hiding their existence from us. They simply aren't there because women were rarely afforded the education or the opportunity to even consider a career in the arts. Why aren't there more Blacks in the history of Western Literature? Is that really a serious question. Why not ask why there aren't more Germans in the history of Asian art. My God! It's an obvious conspiracy! And why aren't there more Jewish writers included in the history of Middle-Eastern literature? It must be antisemitism! Let's use the grey matter a bit here. What percentage of the population of Europe was black? Until recently how many Blacks were afforded an education in the United States? Over the last century just how great has the Black contribution to literature been? I don't think anyone in their right mind would even begin to suggest that it in any way approaches the Black contribution to music... which is in no way denied in academia.

This is combined with a warped notion that art is or should be a democratic... or even an egalitarian endeavor, when the reality is that art has always been elitist. Yes... all cultures produce human beings of exemplary intelligence in the same proportion... but not all cultures have produced achievements in the arts and culture at the same level. The Germans and Austrians have produced more great music than any other culture in history. The Italian Renaissance resulted in far more painting and sculpture of real genius than any other European culture. Much of this has to do with access to education, financial support, the access to the time and materials. Much of this has to do with the simple reality that life isn't fair.

I think I'm going to copy and paste this so I remember to bring up these points next time complains about the lack of diversity in the canon, which I hear all the time, especially when it comes to education: "Why aren't there more black/women/Hispanic/etc writers in textbooks? That discrimination." No, it's because there've been more good white male writers (in the western canon, of course) than anything else. Just the way it is.

I never went to writing school, nor did I finish college. Does that mean I suck because I don't write like the Harvard grads?

Yeah, but you have to go both ways with this statement, right? The answer is obviously no, and I don't think any college grads would disagree. If the question was switched, "I went to writing school and completed my masters in creative writing. Does that mean I such because I write like a Harvard grad?" For this, too, obviously no (and I'm not entirely sure what writing is like from a Harvard grad--I'm assuming the assumption is it's akin to 200 year olds poetry or something). Yet there are a lot of people saying exactly that--learning about writing poetry in a formal setting diminishes the quality of that writer and his/her poetry, which is preposterous.

[ShadowsCool]

That was a well written and very patient post St Lukes but I think The Beatles might last 200 years

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

I think he pointedly didn't use the Beatles as an example because he would agree, the chances of their music lasting a very long time is definitely possible--he is a huge Beatles fan, if I'm not mistaken.

How he could put Pink Floyd and Aerosmirh in the same category is a huge faux pas, though. Aerosmith is horrible.

[ShadowsCool]

I think I need to add St. Lukes on the list of contributors.

As for the Beatles lasting 200 years, I'd put my money on it.

Top 10 Artist of the Rock era:

1. Beatles**
2. Dylan**
3. Presley*
4. Stones*
5. Hendrix
6. James Brown
7. Ray Charles
8. Bob Marley
9. Michael Jackson
10. Led Zeppelin

A list I kinda put together, determining many factors; like importance, impact and lasting impression on the industry.

* A 100 year impression
** 200 year impression

Top Poets of all time:

1. Shakespeare
2. Dante
3. Chaucer
4. William Wordsworth
5. John Keats
6. T.S. Eliot
7. John Milton
8. William Blake
9. W.B. Yeats
10. ?

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

I hope the Stones don't last that long, but they probably will.

I actually don't think Pink Floyd would be too unreasonable for the hundred year bracket. I saw plenty of Pink Floyd shirts when I student taught high school. There's something about their sound that appeals to youth.

Another band I think is going to stick around for a long, long time is Nirvana.

Oh, and, uhhhhh, no one is born a poet.

[ShadowsCool]

I hope the Stones don't last that long, but they probably will.

I actually don't think Pink Floyd would be too unreasonable for the hundred year bracket. I saw plenty of Pink Floyd shirts when I student taught high school. There's something about their sound that appeals to youth.

Another band I think is going to stick around for a long, long time is Nirvana.

Oh, and, uhhhhh, no one is born a poet.

Please don't get me wrong. I'd love to put Floyd in there. They to me belong in there. But this is a purely objective list determining many factors. I saw Floyd in concert many times and it was an experience of a lifetime. I also saw the Wall a couple of years ago and was blown away. So I'm a huge fan. Perhaps, people will realize how important they were.

As for Nirvana? I personally like em. But their niche didn't carry on too long. In the long wind of it, I don't think they will be remembered that long.

As for the Stones? I'm not a huge fan but all things considered, they do belong in there. Even though, I personally think they are a tad overrated.

As for the poet statement? I don't know about that. Aren't some athletes born to be great? Why should it be different with poets?

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

The only reason Nirvana has a chance is because of Kurt Cobain. Grunge is dead, true, but Nirvana isn't.

All athletes have to train and practice for their sport. No babies come out of the womb poll-vaulting . . . though that would be pretty ****ing awesome.