Thursday 9 September 2010

On Poetry and Popularity


"I am the world's last bona fide poet
I am proper and serious, original, true:
I can express myself much better than you!
...
but when I get on the bar to speak to you
nobody listens."

An esteemed figure

I often find myself on the wrong side of popular, often mean-spirited myths, unable to appreciate the humour of a barb because it's err... wrong. Caligula never made his horse into a senator, for instance. There is no erection in The Little Mermaid - that's the priest's knee. People don't slit their wrists to Leonard Cohen. And on a more general level, comic book readers aren't all reclusive single men. Most of the ones I know are married.

Then there's poetry, with its supposed deliberate impenetrability and distance from real life. Poetry readers, you see, are all poets, and they're only poets because they want to express themselves or play intellectual games, and that's why no one likes them, you see, because they're all so self-absorbed. Ironically, in its occasional coverage of the resurgence of poetry, the media does what it can to reinforce that myth. So do (see above quote) some poets. The line goes like this: "Poetry was boring and was inpenetrable, but now there's this young fella who, if you squint hard, is more like a white rapper or a comedian. You like rappers and comedians, don't you? So that means now you can like poetry. Just, you know, try to forget it's poetry."

And to be fair, there are people like me who back them up (see my last long post) by saying, "Yeah, you're right - it's not poetry."

And then there are another group who've got it all the other way round: "Poetry actually used to be accessible and meaningful. But then they dropped rhyming or invented modernism or started rapping, or something like that, and now it's all posturing."

There are various iterations in between too, all of which make the same mistake in assuming that something unfamiliar and misunderstood must be that way by design, and it has nothing to do with, say, your own lack of exposure and consequent distrust, or the absence of an instruction manual.

Poetry (or contemporary poetry)'s bad reputation is, in fact, a self-sustaining myth, viewed under any objective criteria. I say this with some certainty because I used to be in the gang that mocked it and know the mistakes I was making then. My generation were taught very little contemporary poetry up until the age of 16, so when I went on to study Bloodaxe's The New Poetry at A Level, I thought most of it was tedious. I mean, for a start, hardly any of it was written in regular meter, which I had been led to believe was the point. It was only when I read Glyn Maxwell's 'Love Made Yeah' that I found something I just, well, liked. I didn't know why. I just thought it was cool.

After that, I did start trying to write poems myself. But I was already writing fiction and songs, and taking A Level art, so it's not as if I'd just happened on this easy way of expressing myself. And I didn't start writing poetry with serious intent until I'd read a lot more and had come to realise that it's probably the most versatile, pure, open-to-anyone artform that exists today. My conversion to 'serious poet' away from all other ambitions makes absolutely no sense except on this basis - adulation came easy when I came up with half-baked songs or barely-competent drawings, and most of my creative writing degree was geared towards prose, while my improvement as a poet has gone virtually unnoticed by anyone outside of the poetry world.

What was wrong with me in the first place then? Why didn't I always like poetry? Well, partly because unlike fiction, film, pop and visual art, I wasn't surrounded by it as I was growing up. We acquire the skill to interpret all these (sometimes difficult) media at a young age, and take for granted that we know how to approach them when we're adults (when in fact, the idea of sitting for three hours in a dark room trying to follow the ring-couriering activities of hairy children from a non-existent world is theoretically torturous).

I had to be given ample chances to find something that rang true with me before I found my way into poetry. It only happened because I took A Level English. I'm not at all surprised that so many people still view it the way I did before then.

But there's another reason why poetry is miscast as an elite and decrepit villain, and that is really, I think, to do with its inherent virtues. I described it above as an 'open-to-anyone' artform, and by that I mean that it serves as the communication line between all that is weird, dark, secretive, different in humanity as well as the stuff it's 'OK' to talk about. There's no real demographic, no clearly defined sub-genres and that means that its readers find it hard to avoid being confronted with other people's thoughts - or rather, other people's ways of thinking - and the inherent challenges therein. Since it's not an obviously public art that operates according to etiquette, poetry is a world where individualistic tendencies thrive, rather than social ones. And I think the truth is that a lot of people find that quite threatening. Moreover, the forces in our lives that tell us what is popular are deterred from putting poetry in the 'hot' column because of its subsequent resistance to broad generalisations

It's interesting to read reviews - or to generally stay alive to people's views - and truly get a picture of how little consistency there is in what is thought to be too esoteric or obscure. There are areas of commonality in our culture, of course, but these are, by their nature, riddled with banality, all the more for being cynically exploited by anyone aiming for an immediate connection with people (think advertising). Outside of these shallow pools is where 99% of everything lies, but poetry is the only art that, for me, regularly admits that.

In a sense, this is why, to use Tim Clare's expression, I argued in favour of 'ring-fencing' the term 'poetry' so that populist poetry comes under a different heading. Populism shores up a person's private sense of stability by reinforcing what they already think they know, putting them in a room with a bunch of other people who think they know the same thing. My own experience of poetry - the poetry I turned to in favour of fiction, art and song-writing - is that it does the opposite. I mean, I see it essentially as an anti-tyrannical force, which is why, when I 'get on the bar to speak to you/nobody listens' - because certain kinds of tyranny are comforting, and certain kinds of freedom are 'difficult'.

All of this, of course, is not seeking to ignore the fact that there are plenty of poets whose work is accessible, or rhyming, or centered around 'normal' life, and who go down well with crowds, in themselves puncturing the myth of impenetrability. They just happen to come within a huge range of approaches, or 'ways of thinking' which only in its entirety reflects the breadth of human feeling.

10 comments:

Luke Wright said...

Jon, some points I'd like to make:

1) I am not of this opinion: "Poetry was boring and was inpenetrable, but now there's this young fella who, if you squint hard, is more like a white rapper or a comedian. You like rappers and comedians, don't you? So that means now you can like poetry. Just, you know, try to forget it's poetry."

Nor, do I dimiss as 'boring' anything that doesn't comform to my own narrow view" of what poetry should be, as you stated on Facebook this week. I don't know where you have got this from. Yes, I operate mainly within the world of live poetry, but I always try to bring a range of styles to the gigs I programme. Latitude, for example, showcases a wide variety of poets - from slam poets like MC Angel to the Faber New Poets like Tom Warner. I am passionate about bringing what you have described as 'bona fide' poetry, as well as what you deem otherwise, to new audiences. Something i am able to do with Latitude.

2. The portrait in the quoted poem is not you, though yes, your blog last week did inspire it. I am not having a go at elitism but rather what I thought was a case of sour grapes. Tim is supposed to be your friend and rather than congratulate him on getting a favourable mention on a website you turned it into an opportunity to put him (and me) down, suggesting that while 'bona fide' poets combine style and content Tim and I were interested only in the former.

To me that cast me as only 'half a poet,' which, yes, I did take offence at. I appreciate that I'll never be the type of poet that excites you. You say that to judge my work as poetry you would have to say that it is berry bad poetry. Then do that. I'm happy for you to label me 'a very bad poet' but I would appreciate the comments in a review of my published work (to my knowledge you haven't even seen me read my poems for over seven years, and I'm not sure you've read my pamphlet). But suggesting i shouldn't even be allowed to call myself a poet? Can't you see how that could be taken as patronising and pompous?

... Tbc

Luke Wright said...

[posted in multiple parts]

Jon, some points I'd like to make:

1) I am not of this opinion: "Poetry was boring and was inpenetrable, but now there's this young fella who, if you squint hard, is more like a white rapper or a comedian. You like rappers and comedians, don't you? So that means now you can like poetry. Just, you know, try to forget it's poetry."

Nor, do I dimiss as 'boring' anything that doesn't comform to my own narrow view" of what poetry should be, as you stated on Facebook this week. I don't know where you have got this from. Yes, I operate mainly within the world of live poetry, but I always try to bring a range of styles to the gigs I programme. Latitude, for example, showcases a wide variety of poets - from slam poets like MC Angel to the Faber New Poets like Tom Warner. I am passionate about bringing what you have described as 'bona fide' poetry, as well as what you deem otherwise, to new audiences. Something i am able to do with Latitude.

Luke Wright said...

cont.


. The portrait in the quoted poem is not you, though yes, your blog last week did inspire it. I am not having a go at elitism but rather what I thought was a case of sour grapes. Tim is supposed to be your friend and rather than congratulate him on getting a favourable mention on a website you turned it into an opportunity to put him (and me) down, suggesting that while 'bona fide' poets combine style and content Tim and I were interested only in the former.

To me that cast me as only 'half a poet,' which, yes, I did take offence at. I appreciate that I'll never be the type of poet that excites you. You say that to judge my work as poetry you would have to say that it is berry bad poetry. Then do that. I'm happy for you to label me 'a very bad poet' but I would appreciate the comments in a review of my published work (to my knowledge you haven't even seen me read my poems for over seven years, and I'm not sure you've read my pamphlet). But suggesting i shouldn't even be allowed to call myself a poet? Can't you see how that could be taken as patronising and pompous?

3. In this post you seem to be suggesting that as a populist poet I am simply telling people what they want to hear. Jon, I am not. I am always true to myself when I write. My poems are not focussed-grouped in any way. Often my aim is to entertain but I would never say something I don't think to do that. I try to avoid being lazy with my observations. I try to be original in the way I write. Essentially I write to create something I would enjoy reading. Yes, more often than not I write humorous poetry, but that shouldn't exclude from being able to call myself a poet.

Luke Wright said...

cont.

4. You seem worried that when the media writes about performance poetry they should be at pains to suggest that it is not the sort of stuff that might win poetry prizes. I really don't think this matters. You shouldn't underestimate the intelligence of the public. Reading the blog about Tim's show would not have confused anyone into thinking he was writing the same sort of stuff as Andrew Motion, unless they really didn't know the first thing about poetry and were not interested in changing that, in which case, does it matter? It would preposterous to expect every poetry book review in The Guardian to end with something along the lines of: "that said, if you were to read this stuff out in front of 1000 drunk teenagers at the Reading Festival I doubt it would go down as well." It's implicit and understood by anyone reading it. I think it works the same both ways. This is reason I felt your original blog was unnecessary and a bit upsetting coming from someone I have always liked and had time for.

5. Finally, you say here that no one from outside the poetry community has noticed your improvement as a poet these past few years. I feel the same about my work. One of the things I loved about having my book out was that it was reviewed as poetry, not as live entertainment. It was thrilling to have my writing engaged with critically as just that - writing. I know what it's like to know that you are improving and to have nobody seem to notice (my first Edinburgh show is still my best critical response and i wouldn't dream of performing many of those poems now). Those reviewers were not reveiwing poetry, they were reviewing a show. With the pamphlet it was nice to have people talking about the poetry. It was wonderful for me to have positive reviews from the likes of George Szirtes. Then you tell me I'm not even a proper poet. What am I then? Because I can tell you that if I wanted to be a stand-up comedian I could have pursued that path years ago and i'd probably have made a lot more money.

I genuinely don't want a beef over this. As I have said before, I always thought we were quite matey. And this takes up way too much time. If you want to use the old tags 'page poetry' and 'performance poetry', if that makes you feel better, then use them. Personally I am excited by work that blurs those boundaries and I consider myself to be a member (albeit a recent recruit) of that group. Snort derisively if you must, but that's my view.

Luke Wright said...

cont.

4. You seem worried that when the media writes about performance poetry they should be at pains to suggest that it is not the sort of stuff that might win poetry prizes. I really don't think this matters. You shouldn't underestimate the intelligence of the public. Reading the blog about Tim's show would not have confused anyone into thinking he was writing the same sort of stuff as Andrew Motion, unless they really didn't know the first thing about poetry and were not interested in changing that, in which case, does it matter? It would preposterous to expect every poetry book review in The Guardian to end with something along the lines of: "that said, if you were to read this stuff out in front of 1000 drunk teenagers at the Reading Festival I doubt it would go down as well." It's implicit and understood by anyone reading it. I think it works the same both ways. This is reason I felt your original blog was unnecessary and a bit upsetting coming from someone I have always liked and had time for.

Luke Wright said...

5. . Finally, you say here that no one from outside the poetry community has noticed your improvement as a poet these past few years. I feel the same about my work. One of the things I loved about having my book out was that it was reviewed as poetry, not as live entertainment. It was thrilling to have my writing engaged with critically as just that - writing. I know what it's like to know that you are improving and to have nobody seem to notice (my first Edinburgh show is still my best critical response and i wouldn't dream of performing many of those poems now). Those reviewers were not reveiwing poetry, they were reviewing a show. With the pamphlet it was nice to have people talking about the poetry. It was wonderful for me to have positive reviews from the likes of George Szirtes. Then you tell me I'm not even a proper poet. What am I then? Because I can tell you that if I wanted to be a stand-up comedian I could have pursued that path years ago and i'd probably have made a lot more money.

I genuinely don't want a beef over this. As I have said before, I always thought we were quite matey. And this takes up way too much time. If you want to use the old tags 'page poetry' and 'performance poetry', if that makes you feel better, then use them. Personally I am excited by work that blurs those boundaries and I consider myself to be a member (albeit a recent recruit) of that group. Snort derisively if you must, but that's my view.

Jon Stone said...

Hi Luke,

Thanks for taking the time to make these considered points. If I do them in order:

1) It's my fault for stating it in a confusing way but I didn't mean to imply that this was your opinion. I was trying to say that this is the line that's often taken by journalists when they cover a new poetry event. I understand why they do it - they're trying to make people leave their prejudices at the door - but it still reinforces the idea that we're only now coming out of some dark age.

The reference to you in the paragraph was only to say that I thought the lines I quoted at the top also seemed to reinforce that idea of self-absorbed 'proper' poets.

I admit I've been unfair insofar as I've characterised you as someone with no time for different kinds of poetry. I thought I remembered you making a couple of comments to the effect that you felt most poetry was dull but I can't actually point to anything other than you saying that newspapers wanted to write about 'exciting' people.

2) Again, I'm partly to blame for not expressing myself clearly, but my post last week was an argument about semantics. It can't work at all if you take 'poet' as a term that has some kind of meritorious connotation. I mean, I suggested at the end that maybe subgenres would be a better alternative, and maybe even you guys can be the 'poets' and what I'm talking about can be something else. The idea was never to 'demote' you or call you a lesser variety of something.

But part of the reason why I argued in favour of some kind of delineation is because it feels like the media covers just your end of the scale and then pats itself on the back for noticing 'poetry' when one gets the impression they have no idea of even a tenth of what's actually going on in poetry.

Jon Stone said...

Now, I didn't use the term 'bona fide poet' first. It was the Guardian blogger. Why add on that 'bona fide' tag except to make some point about Tim having special credentials? Which, I'm sorry to say, I do find a bit rich when he actually combines music, poetry and comedy in one package. Can't you see that it would be similarly odd to describe him as a 'bona fide musician'? One can't deny that he writes songs but the term 'bona fide', to me, implies some sort of primacy - a poet taking a detour, rather than a performer who uses poetry as one of his tools.

In any case, I didn't mean to make too big a deal out of that - I said I had an incredulous reaction, but I have such reactions to things I read all the time. In this case, I was just using it as a springboard to talk about something that I thought was worth discussing.

Now, as to you being 'half a poet', the thing is, like I say, it's really about semantics. I just see you and Tim as operating according to a different set of critical values. I don't believe that you would work as hard as you do just to settle for being a 'very bad poet', or that hundreds of people would pay to see a 'very bad poet'. You're obviously good at doing what you do - it just conflicts in some ways with what I understood to be covered by the term 'poetry'.

And sure, maybe I just need to expand my definition. But when things operate according to different enough values, different terms are useful. You don't criticise a novel for a lack of musicality and you don't criticise a poetry book for being under 10,000 words, but at some point someone had to invent the term 'novel' and before that it probably would have come under the term 'poetry'.

I don't like the page/stage divide simply because I think there are too many people who cross the physicality of that. So I'm searching for something else that makes it easier to discuss different kinds of poetry, or different approaches.

As to congratulating Tim, I guess I just take for granted that people connected to you have got the mutual support thing worked out, and are able to make the right moves to get some media attention. I don't have a problem with that, but surely that's reward in itself.

Jon Stone said...

3) This is a good point, and I've gone against my better judgement in impliedly stringing you up as just a 'populist' poet. This was originally more of a feeling I had about Tim's work, and I've got mixed up in my attempts to make generalised, rather than specific points. I can understand you finding my remarks galling when it seems to misconstrue your efforts so widely.

Writing 'humorous poetry' would in no way exclude you or anyone else from being a poet, even if the definition were narrowed as I was suggesting.

4) As I said above, it's more that I feel the media satisfy themselves with covering a narrow range of poetry while shoring up the idea that poets who aren't out there doing Edinburgh shows either don't exist or are irrelevant.

I don't think people are stupid but most of them have no idea about what's on offer, or are basically being given the impression that your end of the range is all that's really happening (oh, and Seamus Heaney's new book). I really don't think it is understood by the average person reading Guardian reviews that there's so, so much more going on than your latest show, and solo shows by other Aisle 16 members, and maybe the TS Eliot shortlist. It's not that I think you should have *less* coverage - it just frustrates me that the handy catch-all term 'poetry' means that they can tick the box while completely ignoring most books, most readings, most shows, most poets completely.

Jon Stone said...

5) Again, I'm sorry that I completely misjudged your ambitions in this regard. But I do think you might consider how it could be said to be unfair that other poets (I'm not talking about myself - forget me) struggle to get anyone to give their pamphlets a look, while you're able to ensure the attention because of your live reputation.

I mean, there are some parallels between what you're describing and the Hollywood actor who turns to appearing in theatre, or the popstar who makes their 'serious' album. Of course they should be able to do that, but then they get in ahead of people who've been trying to earn that slice of the pie for years. I'm not saying you should hang your head in shame, but be aware that you might be crowding people out.

Blurring the boundaries is good, and one of the reasons I don't like the page/stage delineation. I think you're misunderstanding me if you think I want to snort derisively at anyone. But there are lots of people pushing the envelope out at the moment in terms of style, and it feels the lion's share of the pathetic amount of coverage the whole medium gets goes to people who can effectively double up as entertainers. You're getting poetry in the back door but then the door is closing again behind you in spite of your efforts.

I hope that makes things clearer. I really don't think the distance between us is all that great.