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Unread 12-16-2018, 10:45 PM
Susan McLean Susan McLean is offline
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Location: Iowa City, IA, USA
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Allen, I too think that there are weak parts in many of Millay's poems, and that the same is true for most great writers. However, it isn't really possible to "correct" poems that are never going to change, and not everyone would agree on what needs correcting anyway. So I agree with the idea that we have to accept writers (and their poems) as they are and not as we wish they were. Both the weaknesses and the strengths are part of who they are. Sometimes their weaknesses (psychologically or in terms of the choices they make) are tied to their strengths in ways that we can't fully know. That's why I prefer the question "What is the writer saying?" to "What is wrong with what the writer is saying and how she is saying it?" Neither question has a definitive answer, but I get further with the former one.

Susan
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