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Any of these resonate? any that you hate?
Thirty-two Statements About Writing Poetry
by Marvin Bell
1. Every poet is an experimentalist.
2. Learning to write is a simple process: read something, then write something; read something else, then write something else. And show in your writing what you have read.
3. There is no one way to write and no right way to write.
4. The good stuff and the bad stuff are all part of the stuff. No good stuff without bad stuff.
5. Learn the rules, break the rules, make up new rules, break the new rules.
6. You do not learn from work like yours as much as you learn from work unlike yours.
7. Originality is a new amalgam of influences.
8. Try to write poems at least one person in the room will hate.
9. The I in the poem is not you but someone who knows a lot about you.
10. Autobiography rots.
11. A poem listens to itself as it goes.
12. It's not what one begins with that matters; it's the quality of attention paid to it thereafter.
13. Language is subjective and relative, but it also overlaps; get on with it.
14. Every free verse writer must reinvent free verse.
15. Prose is prose because of what it includes; poetry is poetry because of what it leaves out.
16. A short poem need not be small.
17. Rhyme and meter, too, can be experimental.
18. Poetry has content but is not strictly about its contents. A poem containing a tree may not be about a tree.
19. You need nothing more to write poems than bits of string and thread and some dust from under the bed.
20. At heart, poetic beauty is tautological: it defines its terms and exhausts them
1. The penalty for education is self-consciousness. But it is too late for ignorance.
22. What they say "there are no words for"--that's what poetry is for. Poetry uses words to go beyond words.
23. One does not learn by having a teacher do the work.
24. The dictionary is beautiful; for some poets, it's enough.
25. Writing poetry is its own reward and needs no certification. Poetry, like water, seeks its own level.
26. A finished poem is also the draft of a later poem.
27. A poet sees the differences between his or her poems but a reader sees the similarities.
28. Poetry is a manifestation of more important things. On the one hand, it's poetry! On the other, it's just poetry.
29. Viewed in perspective, Parnassus is a very short mountain.
30. A good workshop continually signals that we are all in this together, teacher too.
31. This Depression Era jingle could be about writing poetry: Use it up / wear it out / make it do / or do without.
32. Art is a way of life, not a career.
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Great Quotes - my favorites:
5. Learn the rules, break the rules, make up new rules, break the new rules.
15. Prose is prose because of what it includes; poetry is poetry because of what it leaves out.
23. One does not learn by having a teacher do the work.
Where did you find these? -
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Someone posted it on another poetry forum I frequent. I like #5 too. and #15 LOL. yes.
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A lot of this sounds like new age hooey to me.
WTF does 11 really mean?
And 32 is sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy. A really brilliant artist ought to be able to have it both ways. -
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I interpret it to mean -- let your muse (uh oh here we go) guide the poem.
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See, I interpret it to mean, "This is going to sound really heavy, pretend it makes sense."
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I think it means that it unfolds as its written. In other words, the poet sets out to write a particular something, but while writing, a different idea emerges and the poet goes with that. I agree the wording of that one is a bit daft.
(I guess I'm agreeing with Lisa, except that I think the "muse" is new-age neoclassical hooey.)
Bell talks about letting the mind go where it would not otherwise go as a key to poetry. Is that on the list?
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I think #22 comes pretty close to that.
I am loathe to really agree with most of these, simply because I don't think real instruction comes from aphorisms. -
how could she be "new age classical hooey" if she predates writing itself?
See: Robert Graves, "The White Goddess" -
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I reckon the way most modern-day muse enthusiasts use her is the new age neo-classical hooey - it kinda smacks of superstition, fitting in with the astrology, crystals, and vortices crowd. Me? I write when I have something to say (and hope it is something worth saying).
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I reckon some folk do not understand that the very word "poetry" transcends the idea of "writing" or of Understanding.
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Seriously, Lisa, that sounds like new-age hooey, too.
They are only words. They are the product of human attempt to communicate complex ideas. Not magical.
To say it is some mysterious external force diminishes the genius of great poets. It is insulting (and, yes, I realize that it is an insult many have foisted on themselves). It minimizes the seven years Robert Frost spent looking for a single word, or the work all of us must do to achhieve any semblance of poetry.
And, truthfully, in most people, it smacks of false-modesty, as well. -
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okay.
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alas, the idea of "I" is as illusory as a concept of a muse, or in more modern terms "agency". The "I" is a construct of language, the ancients would have said it came with the gift of language.
The question is what is the power beyond this form of imagining truth? Who imagines, why, to what purpose?
It cannot be I, for I does not exist.
Language is used to discover that which already was--sometimes it is startling to discover that which was is a lie, that which is about us is not about us at all, since we are not at all what we "believe" ourselves to be--
what then is it about? and who is it about? -
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I don't understand how the concept of "I" is a construct of language. The ego surely came before language didn't it? I mean it was the ego that made language necessary - to communicate my needs, right? "I am hungry" "I want sex" "I am tired". That seems pretty fundamental to me.
So why do we need to come along with a supposition that is contrary to reason and cannot, in any manner, be proven?
In fact paragraph four contradicts paragraph one. Is this circular reasoning designed to confuse me in the early morning, Lutefisk?
And you certainly can be you - because you may be all that exists and we are constructs of your "you-ness". All you can really be certain of is your own existence.
The idea of the muse originated among a people who tried to find external explanations for phenomena they were not equipped to understand yet. The sun was a chariot of fire ridden across the sky. The complex firings of the human brain that result in "inspiration" were given over to the external "muses". To cling to this flies in the face of centuries of scientific learning and observation.
It is what it is; and we are who we are. -
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"inspiration" were given over to the external "muses".
what is observed is what the mind processes -
the ego only wants.
http://lutescorner.blogspot.com/2008/07/alienation-of-subject-is-displaced-by.html
if you are curious. further links are available there.
See also, "The Origin of Consciousness in the B
Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind
It is not what it is, and we are not who we are. -
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You'll forgive me, but this all really sounds like an over-intellectualization of an internal process. The "I" exists without language - that is the simplest explanation (following Occam's Razor).
Occam's Razor should become a way of life for people - but, instead, they draw serpentine paths to something that is right in front of them.
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Wow, great quotes...a lot to think about.
#10...I disagree, don't most of us write from our own experience?
#24...I disagree here, too. I have a pretty decent vocabulary but I've read pieces that, to me, have come across as nothing more than lessons in obscure language/vocabulary. I don't mind going the dictionary, but sometimes it's too much. I think poetry should appeal to the groundlings as well as the box seaters.
#23...I think that is true for anything. You can learn only so much by watching, nothing can teach better than experience.
#27 rings true for me. I always think my poems are all over the place and I was stunned the first time someone said they recognized my style. I was flattered...particularly because it was from someone I admire.
#32...I couldn't agree more, though I do make a living ( feast or famine) with my art and craftwork. It is something that is in the blood, I pursue it even through times when I don't make a dime. -
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#32 - I think it is criminal. While we are growing up, we are told that we should find what we enjoy doing and that a living will come from that. Yet, it seems artists are exempt from that whole philosophy. So we find what we enjoy doing, and then we look for a way to pay the bills. Most of the time, that means we spend less time at what we enjoy - art.
But the purists want to say that the artist makes art because he/she must make art - that it is done for the pure joy of it, for the art, for truth (blah blah blah). A carpenter doesn't make cabinets without the expectation of making a buck.
I think art doesn't pay because we have allowed people to believe it doesn't pay. The "starving artist" has somehow become something to strive for -
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We all have to pay the bills and trade offs must be made, to be sure. I have chosen to live a more spartan existence in order to reduce my living expenses, I can do this because I only have myself to support...I don't need a lot of things to make me happy. Most times my
"bread and butter" pieces are what keeps me going.
When I sell something "big ticket" it goes in the cookie jar for hard times and purchasing of supplies. I relocated to an area where there are shows and street fairs within a couple hours drive, so I have selling opportunities almost every weekend if I choose. That's my experience, though.
As far as 'must' make art, I don't feel that way, I surely would not die without doing it...and have been through times when other things have been more important...well maybe not more important, but of a higher priority...but even in those times I always seem to have a project going.
Then there is also the enjoyment of other artists, that's a big part of my life(style). Not to mention the ability to see art in my surroundings..light, shadow, shape, rhythm...jeeze I sound like a pollyanna.
I agree with your last statements, the starving artist persona has been overly romanticised and even cultivated by many. I find nothing noble about peanut butter and ramen noodles...it's just sometimes a necessary evil.
on art not paying...I think it has been devalued in our society as whole, we've taken it out of our schools for the most part, which doesn't help.
Mass production also has also taken a big bite.
It also has been over analysed and put on such high pedestals (lol) we go for the trends, the newest thing and tend to follow the crowd. If we could just go for what we like and be damned with what anyone else thinks, we could learn to trust our own instincts and enjoy it more.
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On #10: I think writing from your experience is entirely different from writing autobiography. When I am writing , I call on my experience of love, pain, happiness, etc., but i don't tell the specific stories surrounding those feelings. I project my experience of those feelings onto a situation, a character, a story.
I think the best writers (particularly novelists) must eclipse their own experiences and find ways to re-organise the past into new tales. I suppose, for instance, John Irving's first couple of novels were largely autobiographical, but as you progress through his body of work, you notice elements woven into his books that have commonalities but are in a different context. For instance, he often writes characters with wrestling in their backgrounds. Irving was a decent college wrestler. In The World According to Garp, Garp was a wrestler, then a wrestling coach. In later novels, wrestling became less a part of the story, but it is there very often as background info. His first novel was set in Austria and it more or less shadowed his experiences there, but the story was still fiction. Austria appears in several of his novels.
So, while all writing is somewhat autobiographical, most good writing uses "experience" not as the story, but as background, the stuff that makes it feel real.
Another way to look at it: how many times can a person write an autobiography?
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I'm afraid to read lists of what you should do to write poetry. Mainly because I'm sure I don't do a lot of what I'm supposed to do. Not that I consider myself a good poet. I'm not.
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Who is Marvin Bell?
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Laureates
Well apart from the fact that I am not actually sure where Iowa actually is (I am pretty sure it isn't a Commonwealth country) I do hope this Bell chap is better than Andrew (I have no fucking talent) Motion who is our present poet laureate.
There have been 18 Poet's Laureate since 1688:
1/ John Dryden (1668-88)
2/ Thomas Shadwell (1688-92)
3/ Nahum Tate (1692-1715)
4/ Nicholas Rowe (1715-18)
5/ Laurence Eusden (1718-30)
6/ Colley Cibber (1730-57)
7/ William Whitbread (1757-85)
8/ Thomas Warton (1785-90)
9/ Henry James Pye (1790-1813)
10/Robert Southey (1813-43)
11/William Wordsworth (1843-50)
12/Alfred Tennyson (1850-92)
13/Alfred Austin (1896-1913)
14/Robert Seymour Bridges (1913-30)
15/John Masefield (1930-67)
16/Cecil Day-Lewis (1968-72)
17/John Betjeman (1972-84)
18/Ted Hughes (1984-97) -
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Wow! That's almost as impressive a list as the Iowa one.
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I wish I knew more about Iowa - there's a Writing Fellowship I could apply for, to the University of Iowa - isn't it near Kansas, and gets tornadoes or something? or is it wheat? Or, hang on, corn-fed Iowa farm girls?
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The corn-fed farm girls sound interesting! Tell me more.
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I don't know, you'll have to ask Lisa
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Is Lisa corn-fed? How many fingers does she have? Does she have any webbing?
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Yeah, tell us more about corn fed farm girls...
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Isn't Kansas where Mary Poppins lives, or is it the wizard of Oz or Darth Vader or something. Maybe David Duck, I am not sure. What about the Corn-fed women? Are they good looking or are they inbred & have extra fingers & webbed feet?
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What's wrong with extra digits? (she asks, while twirling her cigerette between the small and smallest finger of her left hand.)
Henry VIII's second wife, Ann Boleyn, had six fingers on one hand - I'm not sure whether on both? - which meant her glove-maker was assured of better pay - but helped identify her as a witch, when the time came to move her right along and off the end of the conveyor belt... -
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Wackopedia
I bet she didn't really. You spend too much time on WiKi pedia. Which also claims that James the Third was born, Invented, Scotland in 1978.
It is not a very accurate encyclopaedia.
Still.....it is free -
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I didn't even know that was in Wikki - I learned that in school, studying the Scottish Play. My English teacher was a repository of esoteric gems such as that. I've always accepted it as truth. I'll have to look her up in Wiki now...
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Frog histoire
Was your English teacher French or something? Which version of the Scottish play was this? I can only remember Ladies Macbeth & Macduff, Hecate & the wyrd bloody sisters (there may have been a maid). I don't think Ann Boleyn is mentioned once!
I know Will had some poetic licence with the plays but he didn't go that far. OK Bohemia is landlocked (The Winters Tale) & they speak German in Vienna (Measure for Measure) but the French are still duplicitous bastards (Henry V). -
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No she wasn't French! She was a spinster Kiwi of mature years, but would digress from a subject at the drop of a hat. She was speaking of the King, and wandered off to Henry VIII, I don't remember the connection, then this gem about the sixth finger came out. I think, after she'd talked about how Greensleeves was written then...or something. God, it was more than 40 years ago...
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I have heard the story but was told it was propaganda.
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I had the same idea as pania about the extra digit. I assumed I had learned that information at school but maybe I got it from somewhere else.
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Duelling Rondos
It has never been proved....unless she came from Iowa & her parents were her brother & sister or something.
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It is mentioned in a footnote that she was reputed to have had six fingers on her left hand - and in the portrait on that page, it's actually hard to tell...but, maybe not, the King was keen to have the marriage declared the result of witchcraft, so it was most likely a lie.
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Exit the truth pusued by a bare faced lie
Der...What do you reckon. Voltaire had an artificial head though, I know that's true. -
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It wasn't Voltaire's head that the Knights Templar listened to, he came centuries later, didn't he?
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Once in the daytime
I dunno, I have heard of the Templar's talking head. Is it like this?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYbUCvz1LYE -
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Nope.
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How many fingers does David Byrne have?
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(trick question - Hmmm) eight?
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#25
my english teacher had a list of terms and give numbers to errors in the essays
we could then rewrite them -
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#33
Andrew Motion is rubbish
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Cvillelisa
Aug 6 10:18 AM
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