[Mark McDonnell]

Hi Julie,

I'm back, ha! Thanks for your kind words and for being so gracious in accepting some of my points. That’s rare. I probably said most of what I had to say about the Anders Carlson-Wee and Michael Dickman poems in threads discussing them at the time. The former is more pertinent to this current debacle because it concerns a poet speaking through rather than about someone from a different racial background so I’ll say a bit more about it. I still think the criticism of Carlson-Wee's poem was unnecessary in the level of its vitriol and more importantly that the apology by The Nation was not only a bad decision but in its wording one of the more stupid and craven things I've heard poetry editors say. The poet's own apology was understandable, if disappointing. He just wanted to get a mob off his back. But the editors words, "As poetry editors, we hold ourselves responsible for the ways in which the work we select is received" still make me rub my eyes in disbelief. I also wonder about this statement: "We are sorry for the pain we have caused to the many communities affected by this poem". Really? Whole communities were affected and caused pain by this little poem? Where is the evidence of that? Roxanne Gay’s criticism that “Framing blackness as monolithic is racist. It is lazy” looks quite ironic in the light of this statement. I think the editors are the ones guilty of this by assuming that if a bunch of people on Twitter (both black and white btw) claim offense then that must mean that all black people (or disabled people – the poem was also accused of “ableism”) would be equally pained and offended. To me, this seems more a case of “framing blackness as monolithic” than anything the poem does. I think to read the poem and conclude, as Gay seems to, that the poet thinks all black people talk like this and/or are homeless is to read it in very bad faith. Here it is (with its now permanently appended apology)

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.the.../how-to/tnamp/

I’m afraid I actually quite liked the poem. I think it’s a pretty effective little persona poem or character sketch that does a lot in a short space. Nothing about the voice seemed inauthentic to me and nothing about the representation of the character felt stereotyped or derogatory. The speaker comes across as intelligent, justifiably cynical and yet compassionate towards the unseen listener of the poem’s dramatic monologue. Most of the criticism seemed to be that the poet had dared to use AAVE at all. Roxanne Gay initially tweeted “Don’t use AAVE. Don’t even try it. Know your lane.” Some, including Gay, also claimed their objection was that the poem used AAVE incorrectly. But I couldn’t find one critic, including Gay, who backed these claims up with actual linguistic evidence. Prominent black linguist John McWhorter, who has since popped up on this thread, seemed to think the poem’s use of AAVE was authentic enough.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/ar...nglish/566867/


I don’t think Carlson-Wee’s poem is amazing, but I think it passes all four of your factors in “determining whether getting out of one's lane is acceptable” and I would be confident in saying why (don't worry, I'm not going to -- unless you ask):

1. Goodwill vs. Selfishness. Does the artist's main motive in attempting this representation seem to be that of promoting deeper or broader understanding? Or does the artist seem to be more motivated by a desire to exploit a trendy or exotically novel theme for profit (monetary, political, or notoriety/publicity-wise)?

2. Enough Respect to Do One's Homework. Has the artist done the proper research to make sure that the depiction does not mis-represent any aspects of the other culture, gender, etc.? Or is the artist simply relying on readymade clichés and unexamined stereotypes?

3. The Fairness of Any Implied Broader Implications. Are the strengths and flaws of these fictional characters--and yes, all fictional characters must be flawed in order to have any verisimilitude or interest--likely to be taken as applying to others with the same cultural or gender traits? And if so, is that a fair implication?

4. Quality of the Resulting Work. Obviously it's much easier to look kindly on a depiction if it is part of something excellent.

Of course, all of these factors are up for debate and the last one is particularly subjective. But the likelihood of someone like an Ishiguro emerging in the future, someone successfully and brilliantly “getting out of their lane”, will be slim if the price for failure is to be public humiliation, forced self-abasement and begging for forgiveness. Why would any well-meaning writer ever bother trying? Autobiography and lived experience will be the only acceptable forms of imaginative fiction. Ok, I’m slippery sloping…am i?

The idea that “people in privileged groups should not try to speak for people who have traditionally not had the experience of speaking for themselves, but who may be perfectly capable of speaking for themselves now” just seems like an unworkable edict to me. Carlson-Wee was largely attempting to speak for, and about the issues facing, homeless people, not black people. He chose to write in a voice suggesting his persona was black, presumably because in the US you are seven times more likely to experience homelessness if you are black. Homeless people are a group who still don’t have much opportunity to speak for themselves, aren't they? How do we know that the poet had not experienced homelessness himself or that someone close to him or in his family had? Did anyone bother to ask? Who, under the edicts of these literary rules, would be more capable and justified to write about black homelessness – a white man who had experienced homelessness or a black writer who had not? Would skin colour still be the deciding factor? What if a white poet had a black close friend who had experienced homelessness but had no aptitude for writing? Would it really be wrong for his poet friend to try to give voice to their experience? The idea of making taboo the poetic instinct of empathising with suffering seems wrong to me on an emotional level and fraught with logical inconsistencies on a practical level. People should be free to write about what they want.

The argument is, I suppose, that if privileged white people are writing about this stuff then marginalised voices don’t get heard. I understand this but it would be more persuasive if the vast majority, or even many, of the poems written by white people were of this type. But as you were saying earlier to conny, they aren’t. You characterise poems addressing race written by white people as just one of many tired tropes:

And I am rather tired of hearing certain patterns and tropes presented by White male poets. Just as, presumably, you (and I) are also tired of certain patterns and tropes presented by trying-to-be-woke-and-not-always-succeeding White feminists like me.

It's like any other well-worn theme: The love poem. The cancer poem. The implicitly self-congratulatory poem about the magic of poetry-writing. The immigrant grandmother hagiography poem. The "my mostly-comfortable pandemic experience" poem. The angry feminist poem (which is, alas, the bulk of my poetic output, most of which I will never show to anyone because it so rarely rises above self-therapy and cliché).

So, too, the "I'm a White man, and I have something to say about racism" poem.

I would suggest that of these tropes, the "I'm a White man, and I have something to say about racism" strain is probably the rarest (at least in liberal publications – places like The Society of Classical Poets have their own agendas). It perhaps seems more prevalent than it is because whenever it does happen there is a big old fuss. If a white poet speaks about race with anything other than the blandest show of performative allyship, if they show any sign of wrestling with feelings of ambivalence, or attempts at nuance, they are subject to accusations of racism and demands for apologies (see Dickman, Wee, Hoagland). The culture tells white people, rightly, that they must reckon with race, think deeply about it, but at the same time remain silent or tread very, very carefully and only say the prescribed things or risk public shaming. This is a pretty Kafkaesque trap and anti-art.

Also, the idea that poets of colour are necessarily marginalised seems debatable. I googled “best poetry books of the decade” and the very first hit was the massive, mainstream website “literaryhub”.

https://lithub.com/the-10-best-poetr...of-the-decade/

Their list for 2000 to 2019 comprises books by the following poets:

Ann Carson
Terence Hayes
Tracy K Smith
Natalie Diaz
Natasha Trethewey
Mary Szybist
Claudia Rankine
Robin Coste Lewis
Ocean Vuong
Danez Smith

Of these poets, seven of the ten are poets of colour (and seven are women). And of the list the ones that seem to me to have been the most celebrated (Hayes, Rankine and Vuong) are among these poets of colour. That’s without even mentioning Rupi Kaur, the best-selling poet since Homer, and Amanda Gorman who is no doubt set to overtake her.

Julie, I hope it’s clear that I’m pointing this out with no bitterness. I genuinely think it’s a good thing that these voices are being heard and celebrated and I'm not about to write a Bob Hickock style essay fretting about my whiteness being usurped. I honestly couldn't care less. I just think it’s disingenuous, and oddly defeatist given this evidence, to claim that POC voices aren’t getting heard in the poetry world on issues regarding race to the extent that it’s imperative to prescribe that white poets “don’t get to speak” about them.

Finally on this, and most subjectively I suppose, there is just something about the current appetite on social media for demands that people apologise for producing and publishing art that gives me a quite viscerally negative reaction. And there is something about the morally superior tone of these demands and the expectation that even the subsequent apology, rather than being individual and thoughtful, must contain no deviation from an approved script (“do better”, “I promise to do the work”, “the hurt and pain I have caused”, “take time to reflect deeply”) that makes me nervous. And it’s never enough. When Carlson-Wee issued his apology on social media he said the criticism had been “eye-opening” and the first reply chastised him for his use of this term, noting that it was a further instance of his “ableism”, presumably because it could be offensive to blind people. There’s no indication that this reply was from a parody account.

Erm…what else. The two writers you quote as evidence that most, or even a lot of, black people do see Gorman’s poem as “sacred”. Well, one of them is white and, as you point out yourself, both are from religious publications so I remain unconvinced.

Here:

I don't quite follow your gist about identity politics having zero impact on the lives of the poorest and most disadvantaged in society. Or do you mean that the "anti-art decisions" make no difference to these people's situations?

Yes, I meant what I consider to be "anti-art" decisions make no difference to ordinary people of colour. I just worded it badly and strangled my syntax. "Identity Politics" is a much-maligned term (especially by the right, which is part of the problem liberals have with criticising any aspect of it) but I realise that as a concept it is a broad church and has many positives and does much that is good.

As to John McWhorter’s take, unsurprisingly I agree with a lot of what he says about this. I came across him when I taught (very) basic linguistics to an A Level English class a couple of years ago. I’m no expert and was always just about two pages of the text book ahead of the students. But we had pictures on the wall of McWhorter, Chomsky, Pinker and David Crystal, all of whom were part of the curriculum (the students gave them all nicknames based on their appearance: in order, Smiley, Prof, Hairy and Santa). He seems very smart and a reasonable voice to me. I’m not sure I agree with Jim that he needs to “have the president’s ear”. This is a phenomenon whose trajectory in one way or another is going to be based on people looking into their own hearts with some clear minded honesty. I think it's something politics is best kept out of. After all, Trump claimed to be a big critic of Critical Race Theory (despite probably having no idea what it is) which is poison to anyone reasonably minded who might also express any misgivings about any of its ideas, as popularised by the likes of Robin DiAngelo for example. I also don’t think that this ideology has much to do with “the left” as I understand it and as someone who considers himself to be on the left (if that means things like high-taxation of the very wealthy, public ownership, equality of social opportunity, a strong safety net for the poorest in society) I don’t recognise much of that in the priorities of the people instigating these “cancel culture” spats.

Anyway, thanks again, Julie. It’s always a pleasure. Goodness, white people can talk can’t they?