unlike the other silly question that was asked
hereabouts recently ("what is the greatest lyric
poem in English?") i don't think this one is worth
answering. formerly, there was an answer for every
age & every culture but now there are 500 & the
prevailing sense is that each poet decides for himself
which criteria to use. the odd thing is, though, that
when poets do argue they seem to think they are taking
one of two (or, occasionally, three) possible positions.
after an hour, if they are smart & somewhat lucky, they
will then discover that they don't even have definitions
in common for the words they've been using to describe
their positions... such is the state of intellectual
discourse at the end of the 20c.
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