I was fortunate to attend the Proms last night in London at the Albert Hall, and hear the UK premiere of Symphony No. 4 "Los Angeles" by Arvo Pärt, European music's greatest living composer, conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen. First premiered in LA, it might be a curious theme for a spiritual recluse - that glitzy city and symbol - but the work manages to capture both the drama and subtlety of 21st century existence in a way that is profoundly meditative, yet moving - and, of course, cinematic. After the concert, I met the composer by chance at a London hotel where we were both dining. He immediately impressed me as being one of the most gentle, modest, and yes, spiritual persons I have ever met - as if Dostoyevsky had emerged from the depths. He was also humorous and we spoke of poetry and music. His eyes glimmered with amusement and kindness the whole time, and interest - extraordinarily bereft of egotism. I have much to learn from such a master. For those yet to have heard his work, do seek it out.
When you open your mouth to speak, are you smart? A funny question from a great song, but also, a good one, when it comes to poets, and poetry. We tend to have a very ambiguous view of intelligence in poetry, one that I'd say is dysfunctional. Basically, it goes like this: once you are safely dead, it no longer matters how smart you were. For instance, Auden was smarter than Yeats , but most would still say Yeats is the finer poet; Eliot is clearly highly intelligent, but how much of Larkin 's work required a high IQ? Meanwhile, poets while alive tend to be celebrated if they are deemed intelligent: Anne Carson, Geoffrey Hill , and Jorie Graham , are all, clearly, very intelligent people, aside from their work as poets. But who reads Marianne Moore now, or Robert Lowell , smart poets? Or, Pound ? How smart could Pound be with his madcap views? Less intelligent poets are often more popular. John Betjeman was not a very smart poet, per se. What do I mean by smart?
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