[oliver murray]

Richard,

De gustibus indeed. One would hardly object to inversions in Whitman – if one takes him one takes the whole kit and caboodle , the sensation of being carried away, as by a tornado or a flood tide, either inspired or inflated, but we are unlikely to find him a useful model for all sorts of reasons. It is probably pointless to try to justify (or otherwise) the past, particularly the very much past, use of inversions in otherwise successful poems as a guide to current practice. In my view there is a case to be made for NEVER using them, and also a case for their occasional use (my position, more or less) if done really well, but NO case to be made for their wholesale and unconsidered use. So far as I know most if not all of us contributing to this discussion are more or less agreed on that.

Mark,

Quote:

“This example very much proves my point: “

Which example? The one I gave? This seems to me a classic case of begging the question, Mark, as you haven’t justified that line at all. It proves the opposite, so far as I am concerned.

Quote:

“we need to get away from the knee-jerk response that all inversions, indeed all variations from the norm, are sinful perversions, not to be tolerated. There are good uses of inversion, just as there are bad uses, and we as readers need to discriminate between them.”

“Perversions” was perhaps an unfortunate phrase, in that you may have taken it literally and it has now given rise to your claim that inversions are thought “wicked” and “sinful” and accuse anyone who objects to them of intolerance and “knee-jerk reactions.” Quasi-religious terms like this are inappropriate for what is really a matter on which readers will make up their minds whatever you or I say. In general, even with the ordinary reader (or should that be non-reader nowadays?) Poetry goes through periods of artificiality and periodic readjustments to contemporary speech. Perhaps it needs more artificiality now, but not the tired inversions of the past. Regarding criticism of poems using inversions on the boards here, it is common for such pieces to contain other faults as well, an allover whiff of the fustian, so it would be difficult to give any sort of general absolution to their use.

Quote:

“If Hardy needs to secure his rhymes by twisting syntax, why aren't all of his poems like this?”

Who knows? Can we use his other poems to justify this one? In fact, what has Hardy got to do with this discussion at all? Is even Larkin’s poem, "At Grass" quoted above and written fifty-four years ago, particularly relevant to the use of inversion in the year 2005? It is very much to Larkin’s credit as a poet that we still think of him as contemporary, and I am sure nobody would object to his use of inversion here, but care must be taken in using the past as precedent. How far are you prepared to go?

[Alder Ellis]

Yes, Whitman is kind of like Milton, sui generis & not a useful model for others. Still, taken as a line of tetrameter,

When lilacs last in the dooryard bloomed

is such a strong, musical line, it would be hard to object to on "inversion" grounds in any poem, contemporary or ancient. (RPW did not present the title as an instance of inversion, but it serves my purpose.) Quality trumps fashion. It's when they show up in weak lines (i.e., usually) that inversions seem repugnantly "poetical" & perhaps a contributing cause of weakness & therefore to be eschewed.

Re. Oliver's very pertinent point: "Poetry goes through periods of artificiality and periodic readjustments to contemporary speech"

I wonder about this. One thinks of Wordsworth's "rebellion" against the artificiality of the Augustans, but then, much more drastically, Modernism's demolition of traditional form, poetic diction, poetic devices such as syntactical inversion, etc. One might think of Wordsworth as a "periodic readjustment" but Modernism seems like a much more violent break, & one that we are still living with almost a century later. Hardy is interesting in this regard in that, coming slightly before Modernism but subject to pretty much the same cultural dilemma, he chose a kind of "knowing anachronism," bravely carrying on the tradition in reduced circumstances, instead of turning against it as Modernism did. A certain poignancy in this. But it can't be emulated now insofar as one cannot honestly pretend that Modernism never happened.

Consider Modernism's defining moment, "The Waste Land": full of traditional forms, but strictly & devastatingly in the vein of parody. Traditional forms (including syntactical inversion) suddenly became available, not as robust means of expression, but as rich grounds for parody. A destructive though initially exhilarating move; & no doubt necessary.

So how do you get away with using something seriously that has been triumphantly made fun of? The "New Formalism" itself inevitably struggles with this, if not usually very consciously. How do you not sound naive? or, if not naive, exactly, then limited, private, parochial, "special" in the pejorative sense?

Who knows -- but if the answer were obvious, the struggle wouldn't be very interesting.

[Janet Kenny]

AE said:
So how do you get away with using something seriously that has been triumphantly made fun of? The "New Formalism" itself inevitably struggles with this, if not usually very consciously. How do you not sound naive? or, if not naive, exactly, then limited, private, parochial, "special" in the pejorative sense?

AE,
I think the answer is obvious. Musicians (classical) suffer no pangs about drawing on all periods of creativity. Performers move effortlessly through various centuries and forms and composers too make use of anything within their experience, regardless of time, nationality or original purpose.

I find poets are amazingly inhibited and self conscious and too ready to complain about something that breaks some piece of early toilet training. I actually believe that a true poet is driven by need and that the rest is a technical exercise.

In other words I advocate a little less talk and a lot more writing and reading for most poets who emerge from the factory-farms of our various education systems.
best wishes,
Janet

[oliver murray]

Janet –

Do musicians (classical) “draw on” all periods?. Surely they simply perform music of different periods – they are not creative artists but performing ones. – It is true that performers move through all centuries and forms, or some of them do. We still wish to hear the great composers of the past performed , but we would not find much necessity for a contemporary composer who wrote in the style of Bach, even if he seemed almost as good. This is not to say that poets or composers of music cannot constantly seek inspiration in the past, but this does not mean tacking on antique mannerisms or “twiddley bits” to give a “graceful” air. Why should we, when we have the creative and brilliant originals? Musicians (jazz) certainly play music from the past (and the distant past for them was more or less the 1920s) but in a completely different style, and they do not improvise in the same way, harmonically or rhythmically. If they do it is simply regarded as “tourist” stuff to be performed in waistcoats and straw boaters. We don’t need “heritage centre” poetry. AE makes a very good point (among many) that we cannot behave as if modernism never existed and that it is difficult to use forms that have been extensively mocked.

[Janet Kenny]

Back later Oliver but composers like John Tavener and Australia's Ross Edwards manage to take what they need from whenever and don't crouch in fear of fashion.
And performers are channellers who often also compose or write. Many good playwrights were actors etc.
Jazz is there for those who live it and take from it as Stravinsky did.
The barriers are as great as our own intimacy with various forms and our need to use them.
Each one of us has arrived at this point via a different route and we make our own judgements.
IMHO

I have to do the dishes and it's nearly midnight but I didn't advocate twiddly bits or shallowness. I don't think that writing for expression through sound is necessarily that although many would disagree. Honest use of gestures that come naturally is all I advocate and some readers are too keen to judge the motives of those who experience poetry via sound. Originality takes many guises. An inversion for instance can be like a lunge of the heart. Expressive effects depend on the skill of the user I'm sure you'd agree.
Modern work will always sound of its time no matter what it tries to do. We are who we are and we live now. A pale imitation will be that whether it's imitating Marvell or Jorie Graham.
Janet
PS Oliver,
Cinderella has done the dishes and has missed her pumpkin (it's 12:39am)

There are various honest ways to treat the past in music--Prokofiev did it and Richard Strauss's Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme and Ravel did it beautifully without being arch or pompous or unspontaneous. because of recent poverty and marginalisation I'm not as up with things as I used to be. Jazz players tend to be rather old nowadays but I heard a superb Norwegian group of cool jazz artists (radio broadcast) and they were completely modern and sparse and beautiful and could easily call themselves classical. I can't remember their name alas.

I don't know quite how I would use older models in poetry except as a memory of what can be achieved. A sense of lightness or largeness. Structure that can embody content. So much modern poetry seems to add on structure or content rather than fuse them.

I'm not advocating imitation, but rather a use of their essence when it seems right. As for "extensively mocked". That never stopped me before I would have to feel a great deal of respect for the mockers and even then I might ignore them.
And now I must stagger to bed.
g'night.
Janet


[This message has been edited by Janet Kenny (edited June 09, 2005).]

[Jan D. Hodge]

I think I know whose woods these are,
But his house is in the village.

[Janet Kenny]

Jan,
I like that. What's it from?
Janet

[RCL]

Janet, read:

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;

Would you like this better?


Cheers,

------------------
Ralph

[Janet Kenny]

Ralph
I know whose woods these are, I think.
His house is in the village, but.

(Australian idiom tacks "but" instead of "though" onto the end of sentences.)
cheers indeed,
Janet

[Henry Quince]

Point nicely made, Jan! Janet, would I get a frosty retort if I were to say “Wake up”?