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  • desert places
    Jul 30 11:02 PM
    Reply
    Who is your favorite famous (or not so famous) poet? Just curious. A few of mine are Bukowski, Frost, Byron, Blake, Donne, Dickinson, Stevens...

  • Cynewulf
    July 30
    Reply

    Favourites? Too many....

    I like a lot of poets, if I had to narrow it down to a few: Blake, for his breadth of vision, Donne, for his contribution to psychological penetration, MacNeice for his dry apposite humour, Hopkins, for his alliteration, inscape & sprung rhythm, Arnold, for his insight into the human condition & of course top of the list:

    William Shakespeare, just for being English & being born not far from where I was.

  • desert places
    July 30
    Reply

    Ew...

    I hate Shakespeare...but you have superb reasons for liking him you narcissistic man you. lol. Blake indeed for his vision. Good reasoning for Donne. dry apposite humor is always good. I love alliteration...and I have never heard of inscape or sprung rhythm...care to elaborate? insight to the human condition is always great, but i revisit mr. wallace stevens for his cynicism on the subject. lol.

  • arafura
    July 30
    Reply
    Pretty eclectic mix for me. Shakespeare because he's the wellspring, Bukowski, Lawson, Kipling, Blake and Holland.

  • Capitaine Rouge
    July 31
    Reply
    Edgar Allen Poe. I can't think of any more at the moment!

  • Just Rob
    July 31
    Reply
    Bly, Ferlinghetti, Walt, Rich, Sexton, Allen, Patti, Coleridge....

  • Calanthe
    July 31
    Reply
    I have favourite poems, more than poets: I can adore one poem by a poet, and detest the next. Amongst the poems I most enjoy are Kubla Khan, parts of Paradise Lost, Spring Offensive (by Wilfred Owen), The Ballad of Reading Gaol, The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock, and parts of The Waste Land. If that seems to be a lot, I think it's because they display a (reasonably) diverse selection, and so each represents something the others lack.

  • desert places
    July 31
    Reply
    Edgar Allen Poe is also one of my faves, CaptainRedd. And Walt Whitman, I think someone brought him up. I forgot to mention those two genius's. I also like Colerdige's Kubla Khan, Christabel is beautiful and dark, as well, and of course The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is a masterpiece. I totally forget to mention Eliot for his The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock. Good lookin out Calanthe. That's the only TS Eliot poem I've gotten around to reading all the way. I started The Strawmen (i think its called that) and I know I better be ready to dedicate a while to the Wastelands. But The Love Song is an irrefutable work of art.

  • desert places
    July 31
    Reply

    Regarding Shakespeare...

    It is undeniable that Shakespeare is a good poet...he has a wide breadth of work, he was obviously very creative and intelligent....and he is well-versed in the inner workings unique to poetry and drama. I respect him as a man with talent....but with soul....I am not so sure. I don't feel his soul in his poetry like I do in Blake, or Poe, or Byron, or Frost...etc....Shakespeare is kind of like a painter with great technique and lots of practice (ie Bob Ross who's motto seems to be "Let's paint a highly complex and intricate landscape in 20 minutes!")....but he's no Salvador Dali, Edvard Munch, Alex Grey, ....etc....Does anyone catch my drift here? Disagreements? Agreements?

    • Cynewulf
      August 7
      Reply

      Soul Man

      To understand the poetry of Shakespeare you have to read the plays, there is poetry in the soliloquys in Hamlet & other later plays. Shakespeare was a poet who couldn't make a living from poetry alone so wrote plays.

      As he was writing Hamlet his son, Hamnet died, probably by being bitten by a rabid dog.

      Tell me there is no 'soul' in the poetry of the plays. It is all soul! The agonies of Hamlet & his sheer wondering about the existence of humanity & the role we play in the cosmos is all soul (& the soul of a father pining for an only son).

      Shakespeare's technique was not the best & he got away with some odd rhymes (I know because I know how he spoke, did you know most words in the Midlands of his time with the dipthong 'ea' were pronounced as if they were the 'a' in the word late? He would have pronounced meat as mayte, feat as fayte, beat as bayte etc. Water would have been wear-ta, tooth as tuth) he may have not been polished but:

      HE WAS ALL FUCKING SOUL!!!!!


  • Bob 42
    August 5
    Reply

    Consider the courage...

    of Shakespeare to write what he did,when he was alive.
    Elizabethan England, late 1500`s thru early 1600`s.
    Religious persecution was rampant, rulers were mad.
    Yet love ruled the heart like it never had.

  • desert places
    August 6
    Reply

    True, Bob 42.

    The man had some balls. I have no doubt about that. Quite a bit of indirect criticism intricately, and ever so subtly weaved, within his work. Especially regarding the institutions of royalty and love, if I remember right. So you certainly have me on that, regarding the irrevocably fascinating poet/playwright.
    PS: I hope no one has any qualms about my comparison of Shakespeare to Bob Ross....it's just comparison....

  • Bob 42
    August 6
    Reply

    WILL in the WORLD

    HOW SHAKESPEARE
    BECAME SHAKESPEARE by
    Stephan Greenblatt

    I was intrigued by this biography;
    you may enjoy it as well.....Bob 42

  • desert places
    August 6
    Reply
    Thanks Bob 42. I am taking a Shakespeare class in the fall, perhaps I will check that out...
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