[New-Poetry] unprolificks and prolificks

[Alexander Dickow]

For a long time, bodies of work like those of
Mallarme, Hopkins and Roethke were a bit of an
inspiration for me, since they demonstrated that it
didn't take a large oeuvre to make an impact. I think
it's interesting, though, and slightly odd, how this
discussion tends to talk around issues of style
through the prism of rates of production. Comparing
Roethke to Dylan Thomas, for instance, or Ginsberg to
whoever. I'm not sure, for my part, that
numbers-of-poems-written has any necessary connection
to density of style or craft (as someone obliquely
affirmed when they stated something like, "craft and
speed of execution aren't mutually exclusive").
Mallarme, Hopkins and others would seem to suggest a
correlation, but who would the counter-examples be?
It would seem at least that a distinction should be
made between qualities of style and writing processes,
for the sake of intellectual rigor, even if such a
distinction may seem to break down.
Not to say I'm not interested in how process relates
to product. I'm of the "poems get written in part
before they get written down" camp, especially because
I have a frustratingly chronic tendancy to have my
best lines and ideas come to me as I'm trying to fall
asleep: which requires that I noisily rummage in my
nightstand for a penlight, pen and paper before the
tasty morsel slips away forever -- to my wife's
dismay....
Back to studying my latin, foax. Don't think I added
much to the discussion, but it was fun piping up....
Amicalement,
Alex


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