Have you read The Necessary Angel: Essays on Reality and the Imagination by Stevens?
Have you read The Necessary Angel: Essays on Reality and the Imagination by Stevens?
I've always found it rather exciting to remember that there is a difference between what we experience and what we think it means.
No, I'm afraid I haven't. I have heard of it, and if I had reason to while I was in school I would have. I ought to someday.Originally Posted by MaryLupin
LET THERE BE LIGHT
"Love follows knowledge." – St. Catherine of Siena
My literature blog: http://ashesfromburntroses.blogspot.com/
I'm actually confused as to what we did wrong, or differently, in this thread as opposed to others, the ee cummings one in particular.
and somehow a dog
has taken itself & its tail considerably away
into the mountains or sea or sky, leaving
behind: me, wag.
- John Berryman
Logos
General Mod Note to All:
Please bear this in mind when posting poems:
http://www.online-literature.com/for...ad.php?t=17769
Il Penseroso
I'm actually confused as to what we did wrong, or differently, in this thread as opposed to others, the ee cummings one in particular.
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It is happening more and more lately, little discussion, and lots of copyrighted stuff being posted. I don't know how much more clear I can be in the above link I posted, but I'm just asking people to please think about what they're posting before they do so
Logos,
I apologize. I've been one to run with the crowd and figure if others are doing it it must be ok. Are we allowed to post the poems if there is discussion? I think we've got plenty to discuss here already.
back to the subject of the thread...
I always find Stevens' poems to be very helpful in the writing process. I'm one who sort of likes to be confused, and often after reading one of his poems it's helpful to sit and try to write something that may clarify a point to myself. He's also a very auditory poet, whose words ring like bells and clanging metal molded to his thoughts, which also often inspires me to write.
and somehow a dog
has taken itself & its tail considerably away
into the mountains or sea or sky, leaving
behind: me, wag.
- John Berryman
Thank you Logos, for this and the PM explaining this. But what should I now do? Delete the poems, snip them and post a link, or just tag a link to the bottom of each? Actually I believe a few of those may have been written prior to 1923. I can check. Just give me some guidence on how I should correct what I've done.Logos
General Mod Note to All:
Please bear this in mind when posting poems:
http://www.online-literature.com/for...ad.php?t=17769
Il Penseroso
I'm actually confused as to what we did wrong, or differently, in this thread as opposed to others, the ee cummings one in particular.
--
It is happening more and more lately, little discussion, and lots of copyrighted stuff being posted. I don't know how much more clear I can be in the above link I posted, but I'm just asking people to please think about what they're posting before they do so
LET THERE BE LIGHT
"Love follows knowledge." – St. Catherine of Siena
My literature blog: http://ashesfromburntroses.blogspot.com/
For poems published pre-1923 and in public domain, you can post them in entirety. For poems published post 1923, ideally you would post just a stanza or two (fair use, so yes, 'snip' what is already there.) If you have typed it out yourself you could mention the publication you got it from, or, post a link to the site that does have permission to post the authors' works in entirety.
[Like "The Official Web Site of Mark Twain", "The Walt Whitman Archive", or "The Bodleian Library, University of Oxford " that has holdings of author's manuscripts etc.]
Please don't get me wrong or think I'm trying to shut this downThis forum is dedicated to the discussion of "Poems, Poets, and Poetry: Discuss those who paint with words and the works that they create." and I'm very happy it is so busy lately and interest in poets not discussed before is arising
It is one of those things that come in small packages, like, mmm, ah yes, Diamonds!
Have you seen Harold Bloom's The Poems of Our Culture?
The Man With the Blue Guitar and Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird are two of my favorites. Along with, of course, Of Mere Being.
Last edited by firefangled; 08-06-2007 at 07:25 AM. Reason: spelling
I haven't read Poems of Our Climate for years yet I still distinctly remember the thud it made as it hit the wall against which I had thrown it. Now that is not to say I didn't relish some of what it had to say about Mr. Stevens but Bloom! Stars that man has an ego.
What I find amazing about Bloom is his never-ending desire to fight and his unstoppable (apparent) anxiety about how he will be misinterpreted by those who will write against him from the future. I think about how Bloom approaches Stevens in parallel with thinking about Stevens' ideas about the nature of reality and resemblance. What I always come up with is the most astonishing sense of irony as if Bloom had tried to climb into Stevens' trousers and found, much to his vexation, that they fit.
Well...enough of ire.
One thing I do remember clearly, that I also liked unreservedly, was the notion that Stevens was an undeclared Emersonian transcendentalist. What do you think about the veracity of this? And its conceptual reach?
I've always found it rather exciting to remember that there is a difference between what we experience and what we think it means.
I don't know that I have a favorite Stevens poem. It depends so much on how I am feeling and upon what I am thinking. I do keep coming back to Thirteen Ways though.
I've always found it rather exciting to remember that there is a difference between what we experience and what we think it means.
Here's one of my favorites:
The House Was Quiet And The World Was Calm
The house was quiet and the world was calm.
The reader became the book; and summer night
Was like the conscious being of the book.
The house was quiet and the world was calm.
The words were spoken as if there was no book,
Except that the reader leaned above the page,
Wanted to lean, wanted much to be
The scholar to whom his book is true, to whom
The summer night is like a perfection of thought.
The house was quiet because it had to be.
... ... ...
http://www.repeatafterus.com/title.php?i=4700
Edit: Uhm... i copied it from that link, but now as i read it... wouldnt that be "much most to be" in line 7?
Last edited by symphony; 04-16-2008 at 11:57 PM.
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...the smell of flowers through metal labyrinths.
That is a good one Symph. Thanks. I haven't read any Stevens lately. Time to start again.
LET THERE BE LIGHT
"Love follows knowledge." – St. Catherine of Siena
My literature blog: http://ashesfromburntroses.blogspot.com/
wally stevens is probably my favorite poet of all time. i was hooked after reading 13 ways of looking at a blackbird...."inflections or innuendos..." he had a beautiful mind.
The Emperor of Ice-cream-Cream is my favorite Stevens poem:http://www.everypoet.com/archive/poe..._ice_cream.htm
To me Stevens belongs in the second tier of the great American poets along with Robert Frost (although I prefer Frost), the first tier is ruled by the greatest of the greats, i-e Mr TS Eliot (American???) and Ezra Pound.
"The farther he goes the more good it does me. I don’t want philosophies, tracts, dogmas, creeds, ways out, truths, answers, nothing from the bargain basement. He is the most courageous, remorseless writer going and the more he grinds my nose in the sh1t the more I am grateful to him..."
-- Harold Pinter on Samuel Beckett
Funny you should mention that. I was just thinking about that poem, i wrote a tiny poem on that one very recently, and i was just pondering about how bad mine was.The Emperor of Ice-cream-Cream is my favorite Stevens poem
Eliot is a british poet born in america i believe.Mr TS Eliot (American???)
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...the smell of flowers through metal labyrinths.
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