Ramblings of a Tired Mind
Okay, I know you're all real damn sick of my lyric-posting, but this is a really good song. You have to read it through from beginning to end, though, or it's not half as powerful. :P
A farmer and a teacher, a hooker and a preacher ( Read more... )
A farmer and a teacher, a hooker and a preacher ( Read more... )
2- Poetry. yeah. Being as I am, a poetry major, I have some useful advice also on this topic.
I am obsessed with poetry, therefore I can't really relate to your distaste for the art. However, I also don't know what you have encountered and read of it. I don't believe that poetry has to challenge your fundamental world-view to be good. I think there is something in good poetry which strikes someone. It hits you almost physically. That is what makes it good, whether it completely alters your opinions on something or not. I will agree that there is a lot of crap that is written, there is a lot of angsty, "my boyfriend dumped me, life sucks" poetry out there. I think that those poems can be good and cathartic for the person writing them, and that perhaps if they come back to them at a later date they can work something from them, when they are less goverened by emotion (this all stems partially from Wordsworth's Preface to the Lyrical Ballads, poetry being the overflow of powerful emotions/feelings recollected in tranquility.) At any rate, if you pick up the Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry, you will be sure to find at least one worthwhile poem in there. And while I know your interest lies in fiction writing, I think poetry is crucial for the understanding of fiction. You have to remember, poetry was going on before the novel ever emerged as an art form. And while the art of telling stories is as old as time as self as far as humanity is concerned, those stories appeared in epic poems and such centuries before the novel. And prose that is compressed to the tightness of poetry is usually the finest prose.
As far as literary criticism goes, I will admit that there is a lot of valueless criticism going on in academia. But that doens't mean that there isn't stuff of extreme importance and value. Also, as one who has literary aspirations, I think you would be the one to recognize that literary criticism is part of what keeps literature alive. A lot of these people will be your audience. And you will want the attention and care they give to literary work. The understanding they will bring to it for others is invaluable.
Btw - am I wrong, but I also believe that I've heard you yourself say that you're planning an entire novel based on symbolism? the mother/maiden/crone idea. normally myself as well as Vladimir Nabokov would agree with you that planning out literary works based on symbolism is stupid and will result in a trashy literary piece. I know this because I tried it, and it turned out horrible. If such a task is to be attempted, it must be undertaken with great care and precision. The writer must be perfectly attentive and clear-headed. As far as the rest, if the writer isn't attentive to diction or syntax, the writing will be a piece of shit. So much depends on not only the ideas, but how a work is written. And if the writing is inaccesible, no one will read it.
at any rate, there are some thoughts. see you later. :-)
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Also, I didn't mean to say that the only good poetry is poetry that fundamentally shakes your worldview. My issue was with people who say something is "deep" without meaning it, or meaning it only superficially (now there's an oxymoron for you.) For example, someone who reads a piece of poetry about existence or whatever, and says it's deep, but can't tell you what they mean by that or why it's deep. "It just is." This kind of thing drives me up the wall.
"And you will want the attention and care they give to literary work. The understanding they will bring to it for others is invaluable."
I feel this is writing for the wrong audience. I hope to write so that what I write can be enjoyed by anyone with the capability to read English. In general I am not interested in orchestrating some elaborately Byzantine piece of writing that requires an interpreter to make itself enjoyed and understood.
Symbolism: Yes. I am working on something that involves symbolism, I think I mentioned this. But as I work more on this story and flesh out the idea, I realize that the symbolism is more something aimed at myself--i.e. a touchstone I use as a one-word reference for certain characters. It's not so much that I am attempting to write the story of the Maiden/Mother/Crone triplicty, it is more that those archetypes make themselves known in some form through three characters who are linked. I use the symbolism that comes with each of these archetypes to help define the character, but just because I use the symbolism of the Crone to help flesh out Catala doesn't mean she's a nasty old hag guarding the Pair Dadeni.
Hope this made sense--this seems like an argument we could probably continue indefinitely.
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