Literature is currently in disarray. It is because, I think, people, even truthful types, generally pursue literature to escape facts 바카라 but facts are more important in literature than they are in life. Let me give you an example: A team wins a basketball game (or cricket match) despite the fact that it played badly. In life, the fact the team played badly is instantly forgotten in the celebration of the victory. In fiction, however, the reader naturally demands to know how it was possible that the team played badly 바카라 and won.
The fact is not forgotten. The fact is urged, by plausibility, to be understood. The reader cannot be satisfied: fiction is not luck, but fiction, which is not life, is forced to explain luck, and sounds hopefully artificial when it does 바카라 like those tales of historical fiction where the fiction murders the history and the history, in an act of revenge, murders the fiction. It doesn바카라t take a Plato to see that Fiction is Bad History. And no one reads poetry. So what are we to do?
My facts are these: I am the editor of Blog Scarriet (2009바카라present), the 바카라scary바카라 version of Blog Harriet, and the Poetry Foundation website. Scarriet grew out of Alan Cordle바카라s Foetry.com. Mr. Cordle, a university librarian, noticed poetry contests were unfairly awarding prizes to friends of judges.
Scarriet practices more general and historical criticism, but likes to simply promote poetry, as well.
The following is from the sixth in a series Scarriet recently began: Great Poems Scarriet Found On Facebook.
Inevitably, Scarriet would find a fine haiku to present in this series. And now a reckoning must occur. Daipayan Nair has seduced us with this haiku first published in the June issue of haikuKATHA, 22:
long phone call바카라
the smell of burnt rice
from the kitchen
Scarriet is infamous for abusing 바카라The Red Wheelbarrow바카라바카라and the Modernist era바카라s occasionally fraudulent aesthetics.
If Scarriet is now discovered calling a haiku a 바카라great poem,바카라 the charge of hypocrisy will come crashing down around us at once.
Haiku was the first kind of poetry I wrote as a school exercise in New York City, having just turned 11. (6th grade, P.S. 145 elementary school W. 104th St, Manhattan) I바카라ll never forget the rules (which are hardly followed). 5-7-5. Three lines of five, seven, and five syllables.
Is this all poetry is? A piece of writing with rules?
This is easy (and delightful), my 11-year-old-self thought. I recall thinking I had joined the ranks of the haiku masters with my first efforts. I was arrogant even then, even as a terribly shy 11-years-old.
There are two ways to look at this.
One, I was a fool to think at 11 I was writhing good haiku.
Two, only fools believe there are masters who write masterful haiku. 5-7-5 has no clothes. A democratic art form has no place for elitism.
The arrogant child at P.S. 145 was correct.
But my haiku arrogance was a democratic arrogance, not an elitist one.
Inevitably, there will be these two things: Poetry and Criticism.
The latter (Criticism) is where democratic arrogance and elitist arrogance fight it out.
Poetry cannot be arrogant. Poetry is a kind of anti-arrogance. The poem obeys rules, or tacitly, humbly, breaks one or two of them. One can see why the 바카라humble바카라 haiku would rank high on the all-important anti-arrogance scale.
A person writing haiku-length Criticism would be met with disdain.
Criticism is arrogant:
바카라Ha ha ha! What a ridiculous rule!바카라 (Democratic)
바카라Look how exquisitely the poet has bent (but not quite broken) this time-honored rule! Without question he deserves the title of master!바카라 (Elitist)
Swarms of literary gnats are attracted to what we have termed above elitist criticism, while the lone, haughty, maverick tends to choose democratic criticism. There is a political lesson here somewhere.
We mentioned above the 바카라humble바카라 haiku.
Criticism, merely on account of its length, can never be as 바카라humble바카라 as the haiku.
The more words I write, the less humble I will appear.
Length, as Poe made it clear in his 바카라Philosophy of Composition,바카라 is the foremost physical reality of the poem.
The ultimate humility is silence, all the way up to the highest arrogance바카라the novel, poem or lecture continuing (or seeming to be capable of continuing) forever.
Scarriet will, with Criticism (how few practice the true, arrogant, democratic, Criticism!) save its reputation (per the character Portia in the Merchant of Venice) by arguing how one haiku is infinitely better than another. The 바카라pound of flesh바카라 always contains 바카라blood;바카라 a poem is never just a poem바카라it is watered by all kinds of things; the poem living in a nearly infinite context. (The New Critics were wrong.)
Now for this Wheelbarrow:
바카라Depends바카라 is a term I doubt바카라for how do I, or any of us, or anything, 바카라depend바카라 on a series of objects (red wheelbarrow, white chickens)바카라these things obviously depend on other things much more than other things depend on them.
The radical wheelbarrow author바카라s implied triumph is that the reader of the 바카라Red Wheelbarrow바카라 depends on the poem (and its images) for the reading experience.
This rather easy reductionism is exactly like another Modernist joke (played around the same time and in the same elitist circles) in which the museum-goer 바카라depends바카라 on Duchamp바카라s toilet for their museum-exhibit experience. Reality (a toilet) comes into the museum바카라which is true for all 바카라fine art바카라 objects finding their way into a museum.
You want a 바카라rule,바카라 Mr. Aesthete? I바카라ll give you a 바카라rule!바카라 W.C. Williams and Duchamp are funny, as well as philosophical (the greatest philosophy is surprisingly funny just as the greatest poems tend to have 바카라punchlines바카라).
Modernism is a joke, but unfortunately a joke that is funny but once, it being so fundamental and profound. To persist in the Modernist trope is to quickly become unfunny바카라a humorless troll. Putting all our eggs in that (joke) basket, they are now broken. It is why Modernism (Post-Modernism etc) for the most part is hopelessly elitist, fragmented and ridiculous.
As for Daipayan Nair바카라s poem. We바카라ve seen Daipayan바카라s work on Facebook for about 10 years now and believe he is a genius바카라whether the world has made him one, or he is one, or the world would not like him to be one and has failed (that바카라s always a possibility) I am not certain.
Unlike the 바카라Red Wheelbarrow,바카라 we aren바카라t told that 바카라so much depends바카라 on a bunch of objects presented to us as static images.
As the German critic G.E. Lessing told the world in his Laocoon, poetry and painting are radically different. We don바카라t see anything (really) in poetry; we hear about things. Daipayan Nair goes all in on this, which is why I find his poem so wonderful:
long phone call바카라
the smell of burnt rice
from the kitchen
In human life, there is actually no vacation. We are always working. To be mature is to realize that work and human existence are the same.
Daipayan Nair바카라s (바카라long phone call!바카라) poem is brief.
But with all short poems, we sometimes forget the immense work it took to 바카라boil down바카라 the 바카라story바카라 so it is perfectly suggested in the briefest possible manner. (바카라Briefest possible바카라 is the science of poetry.)
Ezra Pound said he boiled down 바카라In The Station at the Metro바카라 (celebrated almost as much as the annoying wheelbarrow) from a longer piece of writing. Pound, the Modernist godfather, would later do the reverse in his Cantos바카라the second of two extremes which haunted the almost hellish landscape of the Modernist vision.
The boiling down is crucial. Which is why 바카라the smell of burnt rice바카라 is as funny as the 바카라long phone call.바카라
바카라from the kitchen바카라 almost seems unnecessary, and yet it gives the poem a sense of space. The long phone call occurs away from the kitchen; in fact, we are not sure if the 바카라smell바카라 has reached the cook yet, distracted by the 바카라long phone call바카라. For all we know, not only is the rice boiling down to a hideous crisp, a life-threatening fire is imminent.
Weighed in the balance, which is more exciting? Which more fully evinces genius?
Daipayan Nair바카라s poem?
Or the most famous Modernist poem of them all?
(Thomas Graves maintains a frugal existence by the sea with his family in Salem, Massachusetts. He is the author of Ben Mazer and the New Romanticism, Spuyten Duyvil Press, 2021. He edits the Scarriet Poetry and Culture website.)
