[R. S. Gwynn]

Every year or so the NYTBR puts a poet on the cover just so they'll feel virtuous about paying attention to poetry. Still, with so many of us really trying to write poems that reasonably intelligent people can understand and enjoy . . .

Geoffrey Hill?

[David Landrum]

Books and Culture called him "The best Christian poet you've never read." After actually reading him I can see why--his obscurity cuts him off from a wide audience--or a narrow audience! I do come across an occasional understandable poem in his works and when they are understandable I generally like them. But they're few and far between.

[Maryann Corbett]

Let us note that the review is by William Logan, who's known for holding to the position that criticism should be, well, critical. And I'd say he is that in this review, which you can read here.

[Tim Murphy]

I know three guys who take Hill very seriously, Logan, Clive Watkins, and Eric Ormsby. Mezey dismisses him as Geoffrey Molehill, and I find him unreadable.

[Henrietta kelly]

Explain "Christian poet" you are poet or you are not. anything else is a besides.


I hear drunk poets fair well ! better than well in fact, I might try it


edit in--


What I was trying to say, is be a poet first, you can’t put anything else first if you are committed---

And most of the best poets needs to be committed ;D


[This message has been edited by Henrietta kelly (edited January 20, 2008).]

[Kate Benedict]

This had me guffawing: "...his books are normally greeted by gouts of praise from critics and the bewilderment of readers who might have been happier with a tract on the mating rituals of the earwig."

Dense as Hills' poetry is, and oh-so-elevated, the quoted poems in the review are full of my personal bugaboos: the McPoemish "I think of..." and the not-much-better "I see in my mind's eye..." and the personifications of February and of an executioner's axe as "perhaps merciful." The axe mind you, or the "engine" which must be the axe, not the executioner. I rather liked the sound of "the snowdrop fettled on its hinge" but have serious worries about the sense it makes.

Another naked emperor; how long will he rule?

[Jennifer Reeser]

Thanks, Sam. This may be one of the most balanced pieces I've ever seen out of Mr. Logan. I could swear to having read a review years ago in which he wrote something to the effect that Hill's writing clearly reveals a man who despises his audience, and himself moreso, for needing to speak to them! I could be confused, naturally. But I haven't been good and inebriated since I was a teen...

[Maryann Corbett]

Jennifer, I found it, or something like it: It's "The Triumph of Geoffrey Hill," in Logan's The Undiscovered Country, page 160:

"A poem as self-consciously obscure as The Triumph of Love loathes the reader more than it loves him. It revels in its own maimed mute majesty."

and on the next page, "The great talent in postwar poetry has let his erudition become something close to hatred."

There are two other reviews of Hill in the book. They all sound as if Logan is plain angry at Hill for not being what he, Logan, believes he could be. In that regard, this latest one is similar, but it doesn't rail so much.

[David Landrum]

Originally posted by Henrietta kelly:
Explain "Christian poet" you are poet or you are not. anything else is a besides.

This tag is generally used to describe poets who write about theological and scriptural themes related to the Christian faith. You're right, it is rather nebulous. Here's a link to give you some names. It's quite a varied crew.
http://www.loc.gov/today/pr/1997/97-048.html

[Jennifer Reeser]

Wow, Maryann -- you're good.