[New-Poetry] cummings, grammaticality

[Alexander Dickow]

Joseph,
Yes, I have read Cummings. Though not in any great
quantity. I'm inclined to believe you're probably
correct, but also that these terms
grammatical/ungrammatical might not be so useful after
all. How about sociolinguistic norms, ie of the white,
educated middle class? Grammatical or not, I'd say
Cummings successfully writes his way out of these, on
occasion. 
Of course, I don't know what those "norms" are either,
but that's an old problem, isn't it? But there's
something about what I call "language legislation"
that bothers me -- maybe that's because I've been
thoroughly soaked/steeped in the French tradition,
which happens to be terribly rife with it (see the
Academie Francaise, c17th century). 
Amicalement,
Alex


Joseph wrote:
Have you people read Cummings? He is entirely
grammatical. He makes
interesting, intentional substitutions of one part of
speech for 
another,
but none of his work would makes sense without
readers' innate 
understanding
of grammar. To say that Cummings is ungrammatical is
to misunderstand 
both
Cummings & grammar. Cummings, buy the way, was steeped
in the 
traditions of
Anglo-American poetry & in particular the very
exacting tradition of 
the
sonnet. To read Cummings without knowing this is to
completely miss 
what he
is about. I defy anyone to post a single sentence from
Cummings that is 
not
grammatical.

www.alexdickow.net/blog/
   
  les mots! ah quel désert à la fin
  merveilleux. -- Henri Droguet