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Salt: Into The Hands of the People

An interesting post from Curiosa Hamiltona on Salt's Brave New World pronouncements. A lot of Salt's blog post sounds like the sort of thing I (and many other poetry activists) have been saying (and fighting for) for the last ten or more years (i.e., open up a space for more poets, more readers, and use the net do so). My six-year-old essay for Vallum, above, for instance, suggests the idea of a fragmented, diverse, and lifestyle-based audience for poets.

This poetry activisim, on my part, was never done to make money - maybe even to lose money - (I am not a "salesman"). I have shown conviction, by sticking to a long-time policy of supporting various kinds of poetries and poetics (Fusion Poetry), and encouraging free or easy access to poetry, via new media. However, when I say this, some radical critics call me a capitalist or worse (though I advocate mainly free distribution via the Internet) - but when Salt puts it into practice, they are somehow suddenly above reproach.

The idea that poetry is "for everyone" is good in principle, but trite pap when put into practice. Read Bernstein, among others, on this. There is a little thing called "taste" - and sadly, in Britain, most people without much experience of poetry express an interest in precisely the sort of neo-Georgian slice-of-life empirical rubbish that Salt poets and poetics used to question, and present a viable alternative to. The Salt "brand" is in danger of becoming meaningless - all things to all people.

Salt is right to note that the arrival of an under-40 generation of poets and performers using the Internet, stage tours, and other digital means, signals a relatively new wave of production, and consumption of poetry (one that has, in fact, been happening, since the late 90s). I am an administrator of the first, and one of the largest, Facebook poetry groups, for example, with over 2,400 active members. This wave of writing is simply not reviewed, or discussed, with any seriousness, in the British media, even in that section concerned with literary coverage - nor is it represented by most publishers of poetry in the UK - although Eggbox and other small presses are starting to do it.

If there is a poem or poet for every reader, how soon do we devolve down the lonely path to a private-language scenario, or a "that painting goes well with my walls" attitude. Poetry can be difficult. It is not meant to only please, or entertain, or appeal to, readers - but to confront, provoke, and challenge (as Salt's own back catalogue establishes).

Comments

George S said…
So what is this little thing called taste, Todd? Whose taste? Say more.
EYEWEAR said…
Hi George,

Thanks for the comment.

"Taste" is really a big subject, of course. I say things about it all time time at Eyewear.

My feeling is a certain rather traditional taste has been in the ascendancy in the UK for some time. One that seeks for craft in poetry, and perhaps too much slice-of-life - I sometimes write poems in this vein myself; as exampled by Armitage's response to Alex Turner's lyrics.

Anyway, I was thinking through Nathan's comments on the Salt blog posting, and I felt that the idea that poetry should be opened to all, while wonderful as an idea, could founder on the fact that most non-poetry readers have little active or engaged taste, but received and often simple expectations from a poem.
George S said…
I don't think that matters very much, Todd, not unless one is trying deliberately to write down to people (always a mistake, people are not to written down to.) Most poets are not trying to do that.

Pace Bernstein most poets are not major innovators either, but 'major'-ness is not in itself the whole story. Poets do not have to make decisions about 'writing for all'. They have to write what genuinely fascinates and compels them. That sounds simple but is devilish hard in practice.

Poetry is not an abstruse science. It is to do with the business of being human which is something we share with all other human beings, whose feelings and experiences are not trite.

It is however an art, which means it is difficult to do well, whether we are Schoenberg or an Arctic Monkey. There is no obligation on us to be either. Nor can we really have it every way at once, which is why I asked about taste, about what you meant by that, since it is a word with a specific history, and implies the aesthetic judgment of that part of society that considers itself the best. It certifies itself in most cases.

So which is that part of society? Whose taste are we supposed to be following. Bernstein's? Armitage's? Marilyn Hacker's? Alice Oswald's? John Ashbery's? Whose do you follow, or what blend of tastes? Are you more partial to Jacket than to Poetry (Chicago)? Etc.
EYEWEAR said…
Sounds a bit like Bourdieu's idea of tastes being determined by different classes, etc.

I don't believe one need follow any dominant group's "taste". I think there is too much taste /fashion in the poetry world(s).

I read Jacket, and Poetry, and many other diverse sources for poetry, online and in print.

My own poetics (I prefer this term to tastes) is more and more interested in complexity, artifice, and even flamboyance. I've been reading and enjoying, for example, Langley.

If you want me to narrow this down a little, read my posts on last year's Eliot Prize. I clearly explain there why I think Edwin Morgan (a genius, I think) was more deserving that the actual winner.
Anonymous said…
Yes we-ell... Nathan's post was very interestng and raised a few marvellous points - many of which were dealt with by Chris in his response - but I think he slightly misread some of Chris' points. Or, that is, he applied academic rigour to a sales pitch.

One upshot is that, with the divisions of high and low culture breaking down at the middle, we somehow forget that there are still the highest and lowest levels - and, more importantly, that this is as it should be. We do need our highbrows. (The problem is that we are in danger of forgetting that, as even intellectuals now think that to sound too intellectual might be somehow taken for snobbery.) To that extent I think Nathan and Chris were pulling at opposite ends of the stick, a bit...

I took "taste" in this context - I mean in Chris' post - to be "individual taste," eg something each reader should be able to trust in and to satisfy.

Todd, I think Chris' point is that, whatever "most" people express and interest in, Salt seems to be selling more poetry books the more they have the capacity to publish. This doesn't necessarily mean Salt is publishing "neo-Georgian slice-of-life empirical rubbish," or that their brand is becoming meaningless. If you look at their books, it's not neo-Georgian anything.

I also don't see how you can say "suddenly Salt is above reproach" - Nathan, for instance, just reproached them! Just doing something and being enthusiastic about it doesn't make you above reproach. Chris is certainly advocating a broad church etc etc, and he is passionate about selling poetry books. But he isn't trying to be an arbiter of taste or to set out some kind of critical manifesto. And he's happy to hear other people's points of view.

Clearly I have a vested interest in all this, as my Salt collection will be out in a matter of two weeks. And you seem to have a vested interest which I won't go into here, as you already have. I really don't understand the roots of that rift, nor do I think a public forum is the ideal place to go into it, but I think that differences regarding critical models of poetry probably don't lie at its core.

Actually, from a bookseller's point of view, it is perfectly viable and not "pap" to say that poetry is for everyone, just as one might say, for example, that books are, or that novels are. It's about finding the right novel, or the right book of poetry, for the reader. So although, from a high-end critical standpoint Chris may be fostering outmoded divisions (pace Nathan's post) with his "them & us" talk, from a bookseller's point of view I think there really is a split between high-culture aficionados and the general, something-unusual-for-my-sister's-birthday, reader. And according to Chris these are the people who are buying the books, and I think that's great. Now: to get the bookshops to notice so they start promoting the blighters!
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EYEWEAR said…
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Nathan Hamilton said…
Hello there, Ms. Baroque! And good evening to our host, Mr. Swift [all shake hands].

I did indeed apply academic rigour to a sales pitch -- I'll admit I was making my point in a slightly cheeky and wry comic way (as is my ludic wont). And rather obliquely -- I think in fact I was partly using Chris' post to talk about something else, when I read it through again...

Chris' reply was good and welcome, and did indeed clear up some of my somewhat willful misreadings. And we're definitely of a mind on the issue of needing a breed of critics but I still have a few reservations and uncertainties and other thoughts... and these overlap with with what both Todd and George are saying. And others. I'll bang on about them again at some point in the future and perhaps try and work it up into something properly. But great to be batting this stuff around is the main thing...

Anyway, interestingly, vis a vis your point that sounding too intellectual might be somehow taken for snobbery these days -- thinkings about this have kind of bled into continued threads and comments after my slightly prescriptive later post about Live Literature... I think we're very much on the same page here too... maybe have a look if you have a mo?

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