Recently, I wrote a piece about how people can be hoodwinked into believing bad, even incomprehensible poetry is good. And that they can be made to feel less than smart for not recognizing this so-called quality, much less comprehending said poetry.
Grateful I came along when Randall Jarrell was poet in residence at UNCG there. Some of my most memorable education in literature! Just maybe you take two paths. Take one don’t like it and try the other! David “Downer”! Otherwise Happy Holidays!
My favorite incomprehensible poet is the late John Ashbery, much acclaimed, much awarded, much praised, and still utterly incomprehensible, quite deliberately.
Another excellent one, Richard. I was just writing (a poem! hopefully comprehensible!) about the poet Eloise Klein Healy, who expresses the inexpressible with elegant simplicity. She once said, critiquing a student's incomprehensible and lofty poem, "I need something to hang onto here. Just give me a shoe, or a bus, or something real." (I am paraphrasing here).
And of course, you have to admit that there is ambiguity in that the two paths were worn 'much the same'. I don't buy the self-determination line much myself but am quite happy for it to be an enigma.
Ambiguity, yes, but I think only adding to the idea of a hard choice. But..who knows? I just don't like some one saying "most everyone gets this poem wrong." Implying, except me!
Well.....Richard, I'm absolutely with you in general about both critics and incomprehensible bad poetry.
On the Road Less Travelled, I have something to add that you over there may not be aware of. Frost himself said that in part it was a 'joke', a tease about his dearest friend, the poet Edward Thomas, who was always undecided as to what path to take lest they miss something worth seeing on one or the other. Thomas in turn took this badly, thinking it referred to his indecision about enlisting to fight in the 1st World War, which he subsequently did, although aged thirty seven. Frost was both dismayed and proud, and was inevitably devasted at Thomas's death in 1917. There's so much to say about their time together in Gloucestershire, the sunject of my only novel, A Conscious Englishman.
I have to read your book! I knew about Frost in England and how he published is first book there and his meeting Pound and Yeats. But not that Thomas story!
Grateful I came along when Randall Jarrell was poet in residence at UNCG there. Some of my most memorable education in literature! Just maybe you take two paths. Take one don’t like it and try the other! David “Downer”! Otherwise Happy Holidays!
And to you, too!
My favorite incomprehensible poet is the late John Ashbery, much acclaimed, much awarded, much praised, and still utterly incomprehensible, quite deliberately.
Nancy, I did an earlier post about Ashbery! https://richardgoodman.substack.com/p/poetry-what-are-you-kidding
Happy Holidays!
Another excellent one, Richard. I was just writing (a poem! hopefully comprehensible!) about the poet Eloise Klein Healy, who expresses the inexpressible with elegant simplicity. She once said, critiquing a student's incomprehensible and lofty poem, "I need something to hang onto here. Just give me a shoe, or a bus, or something real." (I am paraphrasing here).
Love that...give me a show or a bus. Don't know Healy. I will look her up. Happy Holidays, SVA!
And of course, you have to admit that there is ambiguity in that the two paths were worn 'much the same'. I don't buy the self-determination line much myself but am quite happy for it to be an enigma.
Ambiguity, yes, but I think only adding to the idea of a hard choice. But..who knows? I just don't like some one saying "most everyone gets this poem wrong." Implying, except me!
Well.....Richard, I'm absolutely with you in general about both critics and incomprehensible bad poetry.
On the Road Less Travelled, I have something to add that you over there may not be aware of. Frost himself said that in part it was a 'joke', a tease about his dearest friend, the poet Edward Thomas, who was always undecided as to what path to take lest they miss something worth seeing on one or the other. Thomas in turn took this badly, thinking it referred to his indecision about enlisting to fight in the 1st World War, which he subsequently did, although aged thirty seven. Frost was both dismayed and proud, and was inevitably devasted at Thomas's death in 1917. There's so much to say about their time together in Gloucestershire, the sunject of my only novel, A Conscious Englishman.
All best wishes - aMargaret (Keeping)
I have to read your book! I knew about Frost in England and how he published is first book there and his meeting Pound and Yeats. But not that Thomas story!
Good grief, Mr. Orr! Leave Frost alone, please. I like my poetry unbesmirched. Thanks for calling out the critics who spoil our fun, Richard.
I try to do my part! Happy Holidays!