"Culture is ordinary"

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
(Click Reply to see the original typography, or if that doesn't work, go here:
http://jacketmagazine.com/06/pryn-kins.html )

J.H. Prynne

Rich in Vitamin C

Under her brow the snowy wing-case
delivers truly the surprise
of days which slide under sunlight
past loose glass in the door
into the reflection of honour spre ...[text shortened]... d yes the
quiet turn of your page is the day
tilting so, faded in the light.

I like the lyricism and some of the dramatically juxtaposed imagery. Parts are brilliant, lyrically:

...of days which slide under sunlight
past loose glass in the door...

...your pause like an apple pip,
the baltic loved one who sleeps....

...each folded
cry of the finch's wit, this flush
scattered over our slant of the
day rocked in water, you say
this much. ...

...And yes the
quiet turn of your page is the day
tilting so, faded in the light.

____________________________________

But as a whole I do not like it. It leaves me with the sense that it ought to be about three poems. I agree with Bly’s theory of association in poetry, but the associations here are just too many to follow the movement from external to internal, from conscious conceptualization to unconscious archetypes. And, despite the above examples, the lyrical use of language and the rhythm just don’t seem to me to be robust enough to carry the heavy load.

Compare Bly’s “Snowbanks North of the House”:

Those great sweeps of snow that stop suddenly six feet from the house...
Thoughts that go so far.
The boy gets out of high school and reads no more books;
The son stops calling home.
The mother puts down her rolling pin and makes no more bread.
And the wife looks at her husband one night at a party, and loves him no more.
The energy leaves the wine, and the minister falls leaving the church.
It will not come closer—
The one inside moves back, and the hands touch nothing, and are safe.

The father grieves for his son, and will not leave the room where the coffin stands.
He turns away from his wife, and she sleeps alone.

And the sea lifts and falls all night, the moon goes on through the unattached heavens alone.
The toe of the shoe pivots
In the dust...
And the man in the black coat turns, and goes back down the hill.
No one knows why he came, or why he turned away, and did not climb the hill.

—Robert Bly, from The Man in the Black Coat Turns (Note: Since I can’t produce the indentations, I just left the long lines stand.)

Or, for a more sustained social/political commentary, Bly’s “The Tooth Mother Naked At Last”. There the driving rhythms sustain the violently juxtaposed images.

Or, W.S. Merwin’s “Air” (from The Moving Target), in which each stanza holds its own packet of obscure images, which I think allows the slower rhythm to carry a sustained lyrical mood, so to speak:

Naturally it is night.
Under the overturned lute with its
One string I am going my way
Which has a strange sound.

This way the dust, that way the dust.
I listen to both sides
But I keep right on.
I remember the leaves sitting in judgment
And then winter.

I remember the rain with its bundle of roads.
The rain taking all its roads.
Nowhere.

Young as I am, old as I am,

I forget tomorrow, the blind man.
I forget the life among the buried windows.
The eyes in the curtains.
The wall
Growing through the immortelles.
I forget silence
The owner of the smile.

This must be what I wanted to be doing,
Walking at night between the two deserts,
Singing.

_________________________________

The first stanza of this poem metaphorically signals the “mystical” or introspective nature of the poem, as surely as “once upon a time” signals a fairy-tale or myth. Images of a life journey recollected, remembering, forgetting, but keeping right on—with an ending affirmation that keeps it from suggesting unrelieved world-weariness. As Nemesio said with regard to music, the tension is released. But the metaphors are nevertheless left to touch the reader’s (conscious or unconscious) mind, without having some overt “meaning” disclosed.

I think these are better poems than Prynne’s. I think both the lyricism and the dramatic movement across images are more intense, and contained within a recognizable “package” so to speak (even if Bly’s “release of tension” is just a pointing to the mystery...). Merwin could have taken just the quotes I pulled from Prynne’s poem and tweaked just them into a short, intense, complete lyric poem that would be memorable (I suspect you could too); of course, it would not say all that Prynne seems to want to say.

Then again, there is good—even great—poetry that I do not prefer. I prefer Merwin to Bly (and even Snyder) generally; I prefer Plath to Doc Williams; Yeats far over Frost; on most days I would rather read the worst of Dylan Thomas than the best of Eliot. That just gives a hint of my personal tastes.

The post that was quoted here has been removed

I guess I just don't see it that way, but then again I am pretty indifferent to what is and is not
corporately appropriated. I'm still as riveted by Pachelbel's Canon in D as I was when I
first heard it in a General Electric light bulb commercial when I was five or six. I was still slack-
jawed by the awesome sight of the Colosseum. I was still struck by the majesty of the
House of Parliament in London. I'm sure I can think of other examples if you disbelieve me.

As for Satie and Warhol, I could go the rest of my life without hearing or seeing any more of
their work. I'm not suggesting that they weren't important or influential figures in their own
bizarre ways, but I find the works in their oeuvre that I've been witness to is nothing of
aesthetic interest.

Nemesio

The post that was quoted here has been removed

Originally posted by catfoodtim
Obvious and unhelpful to you, maybe, but bear in mind that when Williams proposed this, 'Cultural Studies' didn't exist. Bingo was something people did and wasn't viewed as a cultural activity. Now, and this is testament to Raymond Williams, the two definitions are synonymous. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, eh?

That's a fair comment. Yes, at some point in time, people didn't regard things like Bingo as
cultural phenomena. However, I don't agree that all things that people do is 'culture.' On the
fly, I'd say that culture is the manner in which a propinquity group does what it does. That is,
I don't consider 'work' to be a cultural element -- it's pretty much universal. However, I do
consider the view or views that a particular group of people have about work to be culture. Things
like eating, parenting, free time -- these are all universal elements of human civilization. However,
the views that people have about eating, parenting, and spending free time: these are cultural.

Art falls into this category, too.

You need to differentiate between 'mediocre' and 'ordinary' which are two very different things, culturally speaking. Would you describe Philip Larkin, Alan Bennett or Mike Leigh's celebration of the 'ordinary' as mediocre?

The way you couched this makes it sound like I was equivocal; I didn't use the word ordinary, nor did
I challenge the notion of ordinariness in your initial post. I didn't disagree with Williams' thesis:
Bingo is culture. So is opera. What I challenged was the notion that just because they're both culture
doesn't mean that they are both equally 'good.' Arnold's view of what is culture (as the best of what
society has to offer) is elitist; he's wrong: there's a lot of crap in culture, too.

I'm touched that you think I might have a broader cultural background, but I'm only very marginally
familiar with Larkin and Bennett's and Leigh's work are wholly unfamiliar to me (I think...). So I'm
rather unqualified to answer your question. That having been said, I would find the notion of
celebrating the ordinary to be odd; that would seem to me to be an attempt to make the ordinary
'extraordinary,' something which strikes me as bizarre. I mean, why should we celebrate ordinariness?

The only reason I can think of is to try to make our lives out to be something other than what they are:
ordinary. Well, that gets back the 50% of people are below average thing that I think we want to
pretend isn't true. I think only the extraordinary ought to be celebrated. If someone is dumb enough
to write a screenplay about my life and accomplishments, then I pray that no one is dumb enough to
watch it, or worse yet dumb enough to celebrate it. I like to think I'm above average in a number of
ways, but I'm sober enough in judgment to know that I'm hardly extraordinary.

Nemesio

Edit: An afterthought. I know a lady who is married to a functioning alcoholic who, despite
being young and hale, is chronically unemployed. She is a big fan of Jerry Springer. When I
asked her why on earth she watched the show, she responded in complete earnest, 'Because
their lives are so bad, they make be feel better about my own.' This is the sort of delusional
thinking that I think is poisonous. Rather than make an effort to improve her life, she spends
it trying to make it seem less crappy than it is. Now, I don't dispute that Jerry Springer is
a cultural phenomenon, but it's a dreadful one. But I sincerely believe that it has such popular
appeal precisely because of the reason that the aforementioned lady stated: it makes people
look pretty good by comparison. I think that's just tragic.

Originally posted by Nemesio
Originally posted by catfoodtim
[b]Obvious and unhelpful to you, maybe, but bear in mind that when Williams proposed this, 'Cultural Studies' didn't exist. Bingo was something people did and wasn't viewed as a cultural activity. Now, and this is testament to Raymond Williams, the two definitions are synonymous. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, eh?[ good by comparison. I think that's just tragic.

[/b]That having been said, I would find the notion of celebrating the ordinary to be odd; that would seem to me to be an attempt to make the ordinary 'extraordinary,' something which strikes me as bizarre. I mean, why should we celebrate ordinariness?

But sometimes the point is, by celebrating what is ordinarily passed by as “ordinary”, to challenge that very passing-by—to not let the extraordinary become ordinary out of habit or inattention.

______________________________________

This breath deeply drawn
into the chalice of the lungs:
how often have I forgotten
to feel just this
eucharistic bliss—

Or (far, far better than that quick attempt):

It is no night to drown in:
A full moon, river lapsing
Black beneath bland mirror-sheen,

The blue water-mists dropping
Scrim after scrim like fishnets
Though fishermen are sleeping,

The massive castle turrets
Doubling themselves in a glass
All stillness. Yet these shapes float ...

—from “Lorelei” by Sylvia Plath, in The Colossus.

_______________________________________

In the face of life lived always vis-à-vis impending death, what is really ordinary? How much of ordinariness/extraordinariness derives from how we invest ourselves in the moment?

I cannot even read music; I know nothing of musicology. I also cannot listen to, say, Beethoven’s Ninth “casually”—it commands my undivided attention. Yet, I would not know a really good performance from a mediocre one.

I wonder if what you’re getting at is just the opposite of my opening point here: that of reducing what is truly extraordinary—e.g., this very moment now—to a kind of dull “ordinariness” by treating it sloppily? By passing it by casually? By, perhaps, not only accepting, but asserting mediocrity in the moment?

Well, maybe I’m getting at something like your Tich Nat Hahn’s mindfulness. Today I was washing dishes: I caught myself just “sluffing” through it to get it done, and I thought: “What really distinguishes this from high church liturgy?” (which I love). A strange thought. But I think it has at least something to do with the attention and passion that I put into hearing/participating in such a liturgy. Why should washing dishes be less a mystical activity? How much depends on what we put in, and how much on how what we receive moves us? I don’t know, really.

Or, why is doing the dishes not the same as when I do Tai Chi? If I just slop through the Tai Chi with inattention and gracelessness, what is the Tai Chi really doing for me? (After all, there is no audience for my performance.) None of this has to do with strain—only relaxed but aware attention.

It strikes me a bizarre that anyone would think breathing is “ordinary”. That thinking is “ordinary”. That my talking to you is “ordinary”. That the chiming of the clock in the corner just now is “ordinary”. (Although I know I am as guilty of mindlessness and passing-by as anyone.)

In the face of my impending death, this breath now, deeply drawn into the chalice... cannot be ordinary; even if the expression of that is mediocre.

Originally posted by Nemesio
So, they adopt Palynka's attitude, that there is no greatness. And that's rubbish.

Good to see you've failed completely to see my point.

Originally posted by Nemesio
Originally posted by Palynka
[b]That all sounds very good, but then there's always the issue of how to decide (and who will decide) what is 'good' art and what is not. Is there an objective way to label art? To call a spade, a spade, you need to know what a spade is!

There is a difference between what is 'good' art and art that I like. There ...[text shortened]... Van Gogh is better than Kincaid, that Shakespeare is better than Clancy.

Nemesio[/b]

You say those evaluations can be objective by such standards, but that amounts to little when the standard of measurement is subjective. And all examples you provided are of subjective standards.

Originally posted by Palynka
Good to see you've failed completely to see my point.

You're against giving a label of better or worse. I disagree with that
entirely. Whatever other point or points you were making don't interest
me since it rests on this foundation. I'm certainly not going to respond
to your one-sentence answers to my posts. If you want to debate that
point, then debate it. Be sure I'll largely ignore your pot-shots.

Nemesio

Originally posted by Nemesio
You're against giving a label of better or worse. I disagree with that
entirely. Whatever other point or points you were making don't interest
me since it rests on this foundation. I'm certainly not going to respond
to your one-sentence answers to my posts. If you want to debate that
point, then debate it. Be sure I'll largely ignore your pot-shots.

Nemesio

Succinctness is a sign of intelligence. You spent most of your post addressed to me hammering on the same one point. That needed just one sentence (the post you didn't quote) to reveal a fatal flaw (IMO).

I find repetition to be pointless. Is it my fault I write terse posts once in a while?

Originally posted by Palynka
You say those evaluations can be objective by such standards, but that amounts to little when the standard of measurement is subjective. And all examples you provided are of subjective standards.

Please note that I've not once used the word 'objective' in any of my
posts. I think such a term can be stretched to useless extremes. Like,
if you mean something like, if an alien came down from the sky and
observed us, could he tell the difference between good and bad art without
any other knowledge, then, yes there probably isn't a well-defined
objective standard (beyond things like mathematical ratios which can
be universally found, symmetries, and so forth, which are vague at
best). The alien might see in a different spectrum, hear different
frequency bandwidths, speak in a binary/boolean tongue. But how
useful is that?

I think that 'good' and 'bad' can be evaluated even without a set of
'absolutely objective' standard. The two poems quoted above by Vistesd
should suffice to provide evidence of that claim. If you don't think so --
if you think those two poems reveal an equal artistic contribution -- then
we probably don't have enough common ground to even talk about the
matter.

Nemesio

Originally posted by Nemesio
Please note that I've not once used the word 'objective' in any of my
posts. I think such a term can be stretched to useless extremes. Like,
if you mean something like, if an alien came down from the sky and
observed us, could he tell the difference between good and bad art without
any other knowledge, then, yes there probably isn't a well-defined
ob ...[text shortened]... probably don't have enough common ground to even talk about the
matter.

Nemesio

You were originally replying to my post that used the word 'objective' so whether you rephrased it to exclude it or not is immaterial. The key question here is, and I quote myself, if there is an objective way to label art.

I think that the two poems quoted do not prove any point. The second one is 'good' to certain people, but not to all, or even most. I certainly prefer the second one, but again this purely my own personal yardstick.

Whenever somebody recommends you a book or a film they find 'good' or 'great', one of the main things that you'll consider is not their arguments, but the source. Think about it. If you know the person has similar tastes to yours, you'll be bound to check it out even if the persons description is not particularly appealing to you. His seal of approval is more telling of the expected quality of the film/book than almost anything he might say about it.

Originally posted by Palynka
You were originally replying to my post that used the word 'objective' so whether you rephrased it to exclude it or not is immaterial. The key question here is, and I quote myself, if there is an objective way to label art.

I think that the two poems quoted do not prove any point. The second one is 'good' to certain people, but not to all, or even most. I ...[text shortened]... g of the expected quality of the film/book than almost anything he might say about it.

Look: you can think whatever you want. If you want to allow for the possibility that people could
consider 'crap' as 'brilliant,' it's to your detriment, not mine. It merely justifies the mediocre
artists and leaves less room in classrooms, galleries, stages, and concert halls for the stuff that
ought to be there.

When someone recommends something to me, I ask them why they thought it was good. My
tastes are particular enough that the 'source' isn't really material. If my source says, I know you'll
like it, it's because he knows what I like in film or books. Some of my recommenders will say,
'Gee, I hated that movie, but I think you'd like it.' It's not about a 'seal of approval' or any
such nonsense, but because the recommender in question does or does not know my standards,
interests, and so forth.

Nemesio

Originally posted by Nemesio
Look: you can think whatever you want. If you want to allow for the possibility that people could
consider 'crap' as 'brilliant,' it's to your detriment, not mine. It merely justifies the mediocre
artists and leaves less room in classrooms, galleries, stages, and concert halls for the stuff that
ought to be there.

When someone recommends something to ...[text shortened]... uestion does or does not know my standards,
interests, and so forth.

Nemesio

It's still the source that counts. In this case whether he knows what YOU like or not. It's dumbfounding that you cannot see that your post entails that the evaluation of at is as subjective as I'm defending it it. And I'm not talking about simply 'taste' here.

It merely justifies the mediocre artists and leaves less room in classrooms, galleries, stages, and concert halls for the stuff that
ought to be there.

Ah, a cultural fascist. And what exactly 'ought' to be there and who exactly decides this?

Originally posted by vistesd
I think these are better poems than Prynne’s. I think both the lyricism and the dramatic movement across images are more intense, and contained within a recognizable “package” so to speak (even if Bly’s “release of tension” is just a pointing to the mystery...). Merwin could have taken just the quotes I pulled from Prynne’s poem and tweaked just them into ...[text shortened]... le (I suspect you could too); of course, it would not say all that Prynne seems to want to say.

Would it be fair to say that you prefer work with a more concrete staging technique? The Bly is very strong (reminds me of Brecht) and above all human. Prynne's work all seems to be taking place at the level of language itself, leaving any human situation to be inferred.

I like Prynne when I'm in the mood for cold drugs, so to speak. (Which living English poets do you like? How about

Tom Raworth?

Listen Up
by TOM RAWORTH


Why should we listen to Hans Blix
and all those other foreign pr1cks:
the f^ggot French who swallow snails
and kiss the cheeks of other males:
the Germans with their Nazi past
and leather pants and cars that last
longer than ours: the ungrateful Chinks
we let make all our clothes; those finks
should back us in whatever task--
we shouldn't even have to ask:
and as for creepy munchkin Putin...
a slimy a$$hole-- no disputing!?
We saved those Russians from the reds--
they owe support. Those wimpish heads
of tiny states without the power
to have a radio in the shower
should fall in line behind George Bush
and join with him and Blair to push
the sword of truth through Saddam's guts
(no need for any ifs or buts)
we'll even do it without the backing
of UN cowards and their quacking--
remember how we thrashed the Nips
and fried them like potato chips?
God's on our side, he's white and Yankee
he'd drop the bombs, he'd drive a tank: we
know he's stronger than their Allah
as is our righteousness and valor!
We'll clip Mohammed's ears and pecker
And then move on to napalm Mecca.

[Had to edit to beat robomod. Move to free Culture Forum from moderation!]