I only knew Jacques Debrot as a grad student and teacher (a good one), so I was surprised at the strong reactions my mention of him produced: delight (I think) from Kasey, horror (I think) from David. I remember towards the end of our tutorial Jacques rather reluctantly admitted that he was a poet and pointed me to some of…
Author: Timothy Yu
Scourge of Silliman Chris Lott writes: I’ve always been a believer in the part of poetry that demands study and thinking. This is one of the aspects of poetry, regardless of school, that I find so appealing. There is a scholarly part to it that must be wedded to the spontaneity that is the bread and butter of a poet.…
Oppressed Virgos, unite!
Senator Boxcar.
I love you guys. Empathic beams (with a whiff of sex) from Josh, Kasey with a rousing defense of Shelley. I can actually vividly remember the quaver that began to develop in my voice as I read the poem to that group, which seemed glorious halfway through, something like pure joy in the sound–but then it started to seem so…
I didn’t say it was a bad thing that we all sounded like vulnerable teenagers.
Poetry’s social gesture: HELLO I AM HERE.
I think Jim’s audblogs all make us sound like vulnerable teenage versions of ourselves.
David: I didn’t mean to suggest that the “avant-world” is workshop-free–it’s obviously developed its own set of institutions–or free of the mysticisms of “I get it.” But in my own college experience, at least, the workshop and the avant-garde were opposed: workshop was all Bishop and Lowell and “Strike to the terrible crystals,” and I read Stein and Olson and…
Here’s something to marinate on: By attemping to model artistic production on social struggle, the avant-garde ends up producing artworks that restrict possiblities of social exploration and connection. Oops! A fine pickle. (Pickles, waffles, donuts, muffins: I guess I’m hungry.) I imagine you could make a perfectly plausible argument, in the abstract, for what David’s saying. But my own experience…