[Robert J. Clawson]

Dear Eratophiles,

Although I have managed somewhat well as a writer of poetry who "scores" in print, and have been asked to "teach" poetry from time to time, I seem to irritate quite a few people in cyberspace.

Recently on this site, after having been asked to post a poem -- a piece of which had drawn peripheral attention -- I had "Rinaldo" attack me for being, I think, feckless and out of touch. In his rather weirdly written piece, he assumed that I assumed that no one else had ever been on TV. Or that I had never held a drunk at gunpoint. Who could know? So, I wrote him off as crazy. Certainly not a "critic" of my work.

However, I checked in tonight and found this descriptive fragment from a respected "regular" describing a piece into which I thought I'd poured some intelligence and craft:

<<this trivial scrap of barely metrical clap-trap....>>

Now, this is relevant. The critic doesn't attack me, just the piece that he considers "barely metrical clap-trap."

So, I ask myself, "Is it trivial because I use grape-nuts? Is it trivial because in a poem that employs grape-nuts, I use death and entropy"?

Is it a "scrap" because it's only two balanced, yet offsetting, five-line stanzas? Is it "barely metrical" because its rhythm rides over an iambic tetrameter base that begins with the structure of one of the most famous lines in poetry? (I WILL cut "near" in line nine.)

Is it trivial because much of its diction has to do with entropy? Well, I don't find it trivial. I don't find it clap-trap. Nothing that this critic says effects me because, although he attacks the poem, not me, he doesn't DEMONSTRATE its triviality or its clap-trappedness. He's attacked the poem, but he hasn't convinced me. He's not been literate.

To me, neither of the two "critics" I cite are valuable.

In workshops we've got to learn to read our readers.

Bob



[This message has been edited by Robert J. Clawson (edited March 26, 2001).]

[Michael Juster]

Rinaldo is a newbie who is here in part because he has been a problem at other boards. I haven't chased down the other post, but it does disturb me that there has been an increase in ad hominem attacks and some real surliness in some comments that are not technically ad hominem. We have removed another poster from the board, forced another to take a break, and warned several others, but it does seem to me that we all should be trying harder to keep our tone more civil. I am actually a little more understanding about the wounded poets howling, but there is no reason to take a bad poem as a personal affront unless it is specifically written about you. You can always just ignore it, but if you are going to respond, critique the poem not the poet, and don't say anything you wouldn't say in an actual group setting. Anyway, Bob, that was my longwinded way of saying you're right. We hear howls about free speech when we edit or remove offensive posts, and we try to keep that kind of thing to a minimum, but quite frankly I don't think we will thrive if people keep abusing the anonymity of the Internet.

[Robert J. Clawson]

"but quite frankly I don't think we will thrive if people keep abusing the anonymity of the Internet."

Michael, I was addressing people perhaps less confident than I. I ignore ad hominem attacks as irrelevant, illogical. I get deeply curious, however, when someone calls my work "clap-trap" without pointing out its claptrappedness. A critic who raves isn't a critic, just a bombastic jerk. Criticism requires analysis, specific, pointed content: an argument.

Bob

[momdebomb]

Dear Bob,

This is the exact thing that the thread "what is a critique" is about.

I know exactly how you feel. Someone who commented on one of my threads had not one thing to say about the poem. He only wanted to complain that my introduction was "hardly a way to sell". Do you believe that?

Sharon P.

[Robert J. Clawson]

I'm pretty sure that was I.

If you wrote an apologetic disclaimer, I'm even more sure.

I hope it helped.

Bob

[Richard Wakefield]

I think that comments on poems are no less liable to various obscurities and outright errors than the poems themselves. In reading a poem, I assume that the poet has something to say and is asking for my opinion on how well it got said. Sometimes I have to guess what the poet meant, and if I guess wrong, then my commentary will go astray. When someone comments on one of my poems, I also sometimes have to guess, but I still try to assume that the commentor was motivated by the desire to help. It's often tough to hold myself to that, of course, when what I really want is for the whole world to collapse in awe. But if a criticism is obscure or seems wrong-headed, these forums give me the opportunity to ask for clarification. It helps me to think of our business here as a conversation. I always hope that all discussions of literature will be primarily conversational rather than merely judgmental, although that's an ideal not always realized. Like any conversation, our exchanges will have moments of impatience and irritation and, if we're lucky, of lucidity and revelation.
Richard

[Terese Coe]

What good is a poet without vulnerability? None, in my opinion. Therefore we all have to learn to turn our vulnerability on and off in order to receive critiques more objectively. Some of us don't do that as well as others, and I would think that all poets should know that out of some professional practice of empathy.

Yes, many of us do want our audiences to "collapse in awe," Richard, at least at times. Well said. And here, where we have an audience of alleged poets, we also hope for attempts at understanding the poems we post. Hence the existence of some degree of vulnerability.

Yet we're adults and have had to survive in a culture in which poets are not highly valued. We've all done this in an enormous variety of ways. We know the audience is not about to "collapse in awe" unless we're really on a roll and that is rare indeed. As poets, however, we could hope to empathize with the need for other poets to retain a degree of vulnerability in order to write anything that's not claptrap.

Richard, I would appreciate some elaboration on "how to read your readers." I've had to guess at the meaning.

Terese

[Robert J. Clawson]

Therese,

"I would appreciate some elaboration on "how to read your readers." I've had to guess at the meaning."

Although I introduced the phrase, I assume that you're addressing the question to Richard. If it's a typo, I'd be happy to explain what I meant.

Bob

[Terese Coe]

Bob

Yes, a typo. Sorry! Explain away!

Terese

[Robert J. Clawson]

"Yes, a typo. Sorry! Explain away!
Terese"

Terese, pardon me for "Therese."

In the piece that opens this thread, I specify two readers that would be of no help to me: one attacks me personally, one attacks the poem (but doesn't cite specific reasons, just calls it "unmetrical claptrap).

When I find a reader who seems to readily understand or empathize with a poem AND who cites reasons from the poem, I listen. When I discover that a reader laughs out loud at the poem at the point where I think I've written a funny line, I figure that's my reader. If someone takes something I meant to be funny or ironic dead seriously, that's not my reader.

If a reader understands my diction, my choices, that's my reader. If a reader clearly hasn't explored the possibilities of a "difficult" word...hasn't taken time to use the dictionary, explore the roots..that's not my reader. If I employ a specific bird, or other thing, of which the reader was ignorant,

Bob but has troubled to find out about it (dictionary, guide, whatever), that's my reader. If a reader calls me arcane because I write about something that reader hasn't seen on television, that's not my reader.

When a reader discussing my poem talks about its "layers," oh boy, that's my READER!

Now, if you can transfer this kind of thinking to what you're doing, I THINK you might be able to sense who your readers are.

I've had readers tell me that using brand names in poems is wrong. Not my reader. I've had readers tell me that the subject of child molestation doesn't belong in poetry. Not my reader. I've even had readers say that I shouldn't repeat a word in a poem. Not, definitely not, my reader.

I think you have to learn to recognize the readers who are expert at the craft, especially at things you're working on, such as meter, but watch out if they start sounding too dogmatic.

Enough to chew on?