i normally haven't linked to reviews of my poetry, but there's a great review of the animalistic little chapbook i put out through Blood Pudding Press a couple years ago
here.read it, and then come back.
Wilson makes it pretty clear in the first three paragraphs that she's not really in the frame of mind to engage with or appreciate a Blood Pudding Press offering. i mean, i don't know what she thought she was getting into with Juliet Cook's outfit, but this is the kind of thing that her press does best: feral, oozing, ghastly, applique, parasitic, absurd, slime, and, most importantly, amusing. to this point, she hasn't really engaged with any of the actual writing at all; she's critiquing publishing ephemera.
i'm not entirely sure that she understands that the table of contents is supposed to be a table of contents, and nothing more. if she does get this, then why the section on the table of contents? who reviews a table of contents?
at this point, i gauge her reaction: "not impressed"..."ick"...searching for "artistry" and disappointed with my lack of a bio... and i have to ask myself, why exactly is she reading this book?
i really take umbrage to the fact that i would ever make fun of Kevin Federline. i would situate his personage within a context of heightened absurdity for the sake of achieving a juxtaposition (between my poem and the original Stafford poem i am partially appropriating) and thematically comparing the tough decision Stafford's narrator makes in his poem with the sort of surreal celebrity nonsense that my generation must grapple with in the media in order to get anything of substance, but i would never make fun of him. at least, not in a poem. i think a poem is a dreadful medium for insult and mockery, since no one reads poems.
after that, Wilson is pretty much dead on. i'm not sure what she means exactly when she says i am trying to be "poetic", with the poetic in parentheses like it is here, but whatever she is trying to say, i like it. i love how anything can be rendered into a vague sort of insult by putting it in parentheses. if i had really wanted to make fun of Kevin Federline, i would have put his name in parentheses, just like Wilson does here.
i don't want to get caught up in trying to justify the poem, but i think my linguistic choice is self-explanatory. just listen to the line I wrote and the line she implicitly suggests i should have used instead to avoid being "poetic" (lawl. i laugh at the goal.):
"most of what comes between me and she/is mud"
-OR-
"most of what comes between her and I/is mud"
i think the superior line is obvious, especially given the diction in the rest of the poem.
i hope all of this doesn't indicate that i dislike the review; i'm puzzled by the aim of some of it, but on the whole i enjoyed it. Wilson completely got what i think is the most integral part of the collection, which is an exploration of the self, especially as it is comprised and compromised by our own (in-)humanity. i really think the only thing we strongly disagree about is the aim of poetry in general, perhaps. she seems to be baffled by my "Poetry and play to no ends," as if poetry and play weren't of course the end in and of themselves. anyone who is trying to accomplish anything more revolutionary in the world would do well to wield a more tangible tool.
i like reviews because they give me a chance to talk about poems and poetry outside of the classroom, which i really love. as much as i love writing and reading poetry (and fiction and nonfiction and etc. for that matter) i really love discussing "the craft" (insult intended) even more, i think.
Comments (7)
I'm with you in that I don't think she was in the right mindset for it. I'm fairly certain you don't begin a review of an author's poetry by criticizing the publisher's name. And what was with correcting your grammar? The line read much better they way you wrote it.
I've heard many say that you shouldn't have to explain poetry, sometimes suggesting that it can mean different things to different people. I don't go along with that - because when I write, although there may be multiple meanings, or even truths that I am not aware of revealing, for the most part, there is something I am trying to get across, and if you get something opposite, it's not right (though it might not be your fault).
So, I just want to say, I really enjoyed this post, because if gave me a glimpse into what youre poetry is about, what you are trying to say, and how you approach it, there is no doubt, btw, that "what comes between me and she" is the better line. She's right that it is more poetic. It's supposed to be in a poem. I guess what she really meant was that it was phony, but isn't all measured language to some degree contrived? The trick is to be poetic and also to sound natural, which your version did (natural and grammatically correct are often mutually exclusive since conversational speech is so often gramatically incorrect).
Technically speaking wouldn't the grammatically correct version be "her and me" which would maintain the alliteration between me and mud, at least, but not the rhyme.
But don't change it. It came to you on the wind, and the wind is gone.
@andyglasser - yeah, grammatically correct isn't exactly what i was striving for, obviously. and i think you summed up the nature of my thoughts on the "contrived" accusation nicely. what i want to avoid is what Graham Greene called "a sentiment artfully assumed," an affectation that is wholly devoid of any real emotion or thought.
actually, i think "she and I" is probably the "most correct" iteration of that pairing, or at least the most prescribed, for whatever that''s worth, although i think "her and me" makes the most sense. if there's anything i've learned studying sentence rhetoric, it's that focusing on how something sounds or reads in terms of euphony, clarity, and purposse is much more important than how gramatically accurate the sentence is.
anyhow, even if for some reason i did want to change it, too late now; shit's in print!
i haven't read your book yet, though i have acquired it... and this review/disagreement or argument surrounding it makes that endeavor all the more interesting. she may not have been ready to read something from blood pudding press at all, but more importantly she wasn't quite as interested in reviewing a work as she was in promoting her own opinions about poetry. It reads a bit like a pitchfork review, and is very focused on herself more than the poems-- which is an achievement considering that she referenced lots of specifics... she seems intelligent and made some good points and observations, but the whole piece mostly seeps her poor attitude.
-a review of a review, by chris beard
@NameIsDenverMax - i love that you compared it to a review from pitchfork media. that was my thought exactly.
"if i had really wanted to make fun of Kevin Federline, i would have put his name in parentheses, just like Wilson does here"
Hahhaha!
I really like your response to the review, Kyle.
I'm not sure how I missed the review or your response initially. Too many chicks in the air or whatever that phrase is.
I'll link to your response on my response.
XO.
'but more importantly she wasn't quite as interested in reviewing a work as she was in promoting her own opinions about poetry.'
Good point, too!
I like chris's review of the review very much.
P.S. My hat in that photo is a ridiculous bell & whistle.