[ross hamilton hill]

'either or' Erik, that's what I said. You said you have YouTubes, then you are already either, that's all I'm saying.
I am talking about trends, about change, not laying down rules. To me photos have replaced paintings, film has replaced plays, live streaming is replacing novels but these are trends not that the theatre is dead, or painting is dead or novels are dead.
Computer games are now the major art form in the world, interactive, global, instant, already 3D, this is a trend, just as this poetry forum is a trend. Such an international instantly interactive forum simply didn't exist before the internet and before cheap and easy access to the web.
Here pedagogues are already discussing whether it is necessary to teach kids to write with pen and paper. That it would make more sense to teach them English via a keyboard. This may sound far fetched but it isn't, every kid here has an iPod or a mobile phone. People don't use longhand anymore. And so on. All about trends, nothing more. And I also repeat, it is speculation, what I see happening, I don't lay down the law, I am not a judge.

[Jennifer Reeser]

This is fun, of course. Remember, though, what Oscar Wilde said with such truth -- you're in trouble when everyone nominates you, because it means you are derivative: "Oh, he writes just like Richard Wilbur!" You are also in trouble when nobody approves you, for reasons which are self-evident. Or ought to be.

The likeliest for the canon are the mixed-review writers. The ones which get an equal chorus of "Hear! Hear!" and "You are crazy" at their nominations

J

[Roger Slater]

The question isn't mass appeal, since poetry does not now and is unlikely in the future to have mass appeal. But if Eratosphere exists in the future, or something very much like it, what post-1945 poets will we still be crowing about in 2045?

(Aside to Ross, who I hope will not want to debate the point, but for the record, I think Bob Dylan is a great singer. But really, no point in arguing. You won't change my mind, and I have no desire to try to change yours).

[ross hamilton hill]

Roger I saw Dylan when he was so strung out he had to be helped onto the stage, shaking and so thin you could see the light come through his cheeks, ( In Melbourne he wet his pants on stage) his drug addiction was frightening.
But when he started singing I was in awe, wonderful, so powerful and his delivery was exact and the music was superb.
I was just making the point that he is not a singer renowned for his voice, nor are Johnny Cash or Mick jagger. Dylan has said that singers like himself or Jaques Briel say, are adored for the truth of their singing, Tom Waits and Lou Reed are other examples.

[ross hamilton hill]

Double posted sorry I keep doing this lately.

[Roger Slater]

Johnny Cash is one of the great singers of all time, and he is indeed widely and enthusiastically renowned for his voice. His last several albums, the American Song series and the awesome Unearthed recordings, contain magnificent covers of some of the greatest songs ever written (mostly by others, not himself).

PS-- Don't confuse Joaquin Phoenix's desecration of Cash's singing in "Walk the Line" with the real thing.

[Pedro Poitevin]

Fame is fickle. You never know.

Pedro.

[Michael Juster]

Just sent my draft into the Claremont Review of Books. Assuming they like it, it should run in early April & then you can see what I said on this subject.

[Michael F]

LOL, Julie, at your head lice.

I have a habit of mis-hearing lyrics, too. I was in an unequal relationship once with a very sweet guy who was a fan of Anita Baker. I picked up a bit by aural osmosis – alas, not quite right. As we were walking down the street one sunny afternoon, I started singing the refrain to “Just Because”, Baker's ardent ballad. My (utterly sincere) version went: “I love you just enough”. He stopped dead in the street, corrected me, and we both laughed hard.

The relationship ended soon thereafter.

[Erik Olson]

It can't mean that much and I don't kid myself, but it is nice at least that James Fenton ranked well, just below Auden on that list. He, John Fuller and Derek Mahon rank highly on mine though Fuller and Mahon were too old to rank on this one.