[New-Poetry] Does Poetry Have A Social Function?

[Suzanne Baran]

Suzanne,
Beautifully written and well stated. I agree most with the sentiments about
Adrienne Rich.

--Suzanne Baran

On 1/3/07, Suzanne Burns <queenmouse at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> On 1/2/07, JforJames at aol.com <JforJames at aol.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> > So does poetry have a social function? If so, why? If not, why
> > not?
> >
>
>
> My first thought was to be a terrible wise-ass in reply "Well Jim,
> considering how many young swains use poetry as a way to get laid...."
> Seriously: do we not hear the clinking of ice in glasses as yonder poetry
> reading? :-)
>
> Then I read the discussion, and thought about it less sardonically.  I
> have to say I really loved Daisy Fried's contribution, especially her
> question (Im paraphrasing) "Why is it that poetry is expected to always do
> more than just be what it is?"
>
> Obviously there are plenty of poets who are deeply social in their
> consciousness, and the role theiy play in a community is a huge part of
> their vision (I'm thinking of Adrienne Rich and Denise Levertov here).  They
> want to change the world.  Are they less as poets because they aren't
> hermits on the mountaintop?  Does being a hermit on the mountaintop have to
> preclude changing the world?
>
> On the other hand, what about Emily Dickinson (everybody's favorite
> recluse)?  I don't see very much that I would call "social" in her work.
> Emily Bronte?  Robinson Jeffers? Han-Shan? They are all rather like looking
> at "social" through the wrong end of a telescope.
>
> So I guess my answer would be that poetry is about as social or
> anti-social as people are.  That's covers a pretty wide spectrum.
>
> Suzanne Burns
>
>
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-- 
"The reader, the thinker, the flaneur, are types of illuminati just as much
as the opium eater, the dreamer, the ecstatic. … Not to mention that most
terrible drug - ourselves - which we take in solitude."  - Walter Benjamin
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