Those Saw Movies Just Will NOT Go Away
I am a little too pleased to see the same annoying argument about lyricism infecting the prosists of the world. Of course, I'm also fatigued at hearing the same lyric (as though it were some great monolith of the elite intelligentsia) v. narrative/pacing/humor(??)/whatever crap. Can we just say that great writing requires many of these "technologies" (because a novel with beautiful language and a shitty plot pisses me off as much as a great story horribly written? The same principle can easily be transmuted to poesy.) And, for humility's sake people, none of these things are particularly subversive (no, not even the lyric!)?
Though, I must echo Ms. Drane's sentiment, [w]hen and how did it become elitist to pay attention?
But then she goes for the jugg'lar by shouting "HEY NERUDA IS TOTALLY ACCESSIBLE AND LYRIC AT THE SAME TIME!!!" I mean, I dig, but she's playing into the very idea she decries - namely, that the cerebral, complicated, complex twistings and turnings of lyricism are undemocratic, as Neruda is very much a poster boy of Democratic (read: newspaper ready) poesy.* I understand she's coming from the prosist POV, so it's great that poetry even enters into the conversation, but the reason most great poets fly under the radar is because they're mentioned in theory alone. Why not Amy Gerstler instead, or someone else a little less ubiquitous (and also alive)?
See, there I go, punishing myself with my beside-the-point idealism when I could be relishing these silly little retorts on HuffPo. I think I just want to not have to pretend I also write prose in order to gain props from random people who have no business judging me on my artistic predilections. But, I have that dreadful novel, you know.
Though, I must echo Ms. Drane's sentiment, [w]hen and how did it become elitist to pay attention?
But then she goes for the jugg'lar by shouting "HEY NERUDA IS TOTALLY ACCESSIBLE AND LYRIC AT THE SAME TIME!!!" I mean, I dig, but she's playing into the very idea she decries - namely, that the cerebral, complicated, complex twistings and turnings of lyricism are undemocratic, as Neruda is very much a poster boy of Democratic (read: newspaper ready) poesy.* I understand she's coming from the prosist POV, so it's great that poetry even enters into the conversation, but the reason most great poets fly under the radar is because they're mentioned in theory alone. Why not Amy Gerstler instead, or someone else a little less ubiquitous (and also alive)?
See, there I go, punishing myself with my beside-the-point idealism when I could be relishing these silly little retorts on HuffPo. I think I just want to not have to pretend I also write prose in order to gain props from random people who have no business judging me on my artistic predilections. But, I have that dreadful novel, you know.
*Disclosure: I do actually like Neruda (in small doses) and find a lot of his poetry to be deceptive in its surficial simplicity (the best kind of simplicity.) But, I also often find him annoying and chauvinistic and generally over-rated, so there you go.
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