your anti-o is just another o, dear
― it is to laugh, like so, ha! (Aimless), Tuesday, 7 September 2021 19:39 (two years ago) link
news for poets is really good
― treeship., Tuesday, 7 September 2021 20:02 (two years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ewBCtBG6BI
― What Does Blecch Mean to Me? (James Redd and the Blecchs), Tuesday, 7 September 2021 20:03 (two years ago) link
different strophes for different folks
― it is to laugh, like so, ha! (Aimless), Tuesday, 7 September 2021 20:27 (two years ago) link
Folkies obv. Where's your sense of internal rhyme??
― he ain't perfect but fuck me he's a rheillee (imago), Tuesday, 7 September 2021 20:31 (two years ago) link
Will also accept folkses or folksies
sometimes a rhyme is a bridge too far
― it is to laugh, like so, ha! (Aimless), Tuesday, 7 September 2021 20:54 (two years ago) link
I have had friends get tagged as “problematic” and have their words be misrepresented, yes.
― treeship., Tuesday, 7 September 2021 17:47 (three hours ago) bookmarkflaglink
Oh no, no thank you, dont fuckin drag me into this
― fix up luke shawp (darraghmac), Tuesday, 7 September 2021 21:39 (two years ago) link
I'd like to thank Aimless for bringing us together to reflect on how much of a dick move it is to 'dear' one of the few female posters left on ILX.
― Andrew Farrell, Tuesday, 7 September 2021 21:41 (two years ago) link
o dear!
― it is to laugh, like so, ha! (Aimless), Tuesday, 7 September 2021 21:44 (two years ago) link
the much-ballyhooed notion that women have been disproportionately driven from ilx by persistent chauvinism feels like a particularly pernicious canard imo. gabbneb doesn't even post nowadays!
― he ain't perfect but fuck me he's a rheillee (imago), Tuesday, 7 September 2021 21:51 (two years ago) link
The couple of poetry slams I've been to have had readings by minorities and women and people who are not employed in the literary culture sector. They were enthusiastically attended and the crowd in both performing and in attendance were younger than the audience attending more literary poetry in bookshops I have also attended.
Why are you typing this ignorant dismissal of it?
― xyzzzz__, Tuesday, September 7, 2021 4:46 AM (four hours ago) bookmarkflaglink
i don’t think the presence of women and minorities not employed by the literary cultural sector at slam poetry nights refutes the statement “the general population has no interest in what [poets] do.” if they were performing at slam poetry they are themselves poets and the statement applies to them. the general population has no interest in what poets or slam poets do. it’s funny to me that poetry ppl freak out at that obviously true statement
― flopson, Wednesday, 8 September 2021 02:15 (two years ago) link
Her mistake is thinking of it in terms of a general population and raw numbers, and then how this transitions to a conversation with each other. It needn't be that but it's the kind of thinking expressed in her tweet that turns that world into a private conversation.
― xyzzzz__, Wednesday, 8 September 2021 07:56 (two years ago) link
I don’t think she was just talking about numbers – she was also talking about a closed audience. I sort of compare it to comic books – another once-mighty artform that does piddling numbers to ageing audiences. Equally in comics there are creators who want to broaden the form and the audience, toxic fans who get defensive and nihilistic about the idea of diminishing returns, and fans who just appreciate the work while acknowledging its lesser impact.
― Chuck_Tatum, Wednesday, 8 September 2021 08:34 (two years ago) link
Poetry is just not comparable to me. It's much older and mass literacy is fairly recent but yeah it can intersect to create this sorta micro-culture in a way that's similar to other stuff in the way you describe.
― xyzzzz__, Wednesday, 8 September 2021 08:55 (two years ago) link
throwing this one out there: i can think of one form of poetry that is arguably the prevailing mode of cultural expression atm, at least in america
― he ain't perfect but fuck me he's a rheillee (imago), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 08:58 (two years ago) link
I sort of compare it to comic books – another once-mighty artform that does piddling numbers to ageing audiences.
comic books sold $274,308,460 retail in bookshops last year, up from $225mil in 2019, $165mil in 2018 and $96mil in 2013. Forty-six of the top 50 were for kids or YA, and eighty-seven of the top 100.
― bobo honkin' slobo babe (sic), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 09:23 (two years ago) link
yeah i might humbly submit that manga is taking over the world tbrr
― Tracer Hand, Wednesday, 8 September 2021 09:32 (two years ago) link
Was being a chauvinist thinking superhero comics - I wonder how much it is without manga, BD etc.
― Chuck_Tatum, Wednesday, 8 September 2021 10:21 (two years ago) link
so.. without the most popular examples of the artform.. probably not great!
― Tracer Hand, Wednesday, 8 September 2021 10:34 (two years ago) link
Americans Raina Telgemeier and Dav Pilkey are 13 of the top twenty (these figures are for North American publishers btw); one manga volume comes in at #18 (My Hero Academia book 1). Pilkey's ten Dog-Man books are 13% of all comics sold through bookstore channels, and the only non-Pilkey, non-Raina book in the top 10 is the 2020 Newbery Award winner.
(NB that both those authors probably sell a greater proportion of their work to libraries and through Scholastic directly than Bezos and bookstores.)
Manga sales are up over 50%, moving $77 million total. Seven MHA, two Demon Slayers, and Uzumaki were the top ten sellers.
― bobo honkin' slobo babe (sic), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 15:45 (two years ago) link
I hesitate to call Trump worship "poetry"
― a gentle push against my Wonder Bread face (DJP), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 16:00 (two years ago) link
The slam community may be larger, more diverse, and more accessible than the MFA/academic/publishing-based poetry community. But in my experience, there's little to no crossover between the two, beyond using the word "poetry".
― change display name (Jordan), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 16:15 (two years ago) link
not my experience at all but i've only really briefly inhabited any kind of poetry scene
― STOCK FIST-PUMPER BRAD (BradNelson), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 16:16 (two years ago) link
lot of publishing-based poets i know personally had/have at least one foot in the slam scene in their city
― STOCK FIST-PUMPER BRAD (BradNelson), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 16:18 (two years ago) link
Basically the editor is absolutely right, and it's hilarious if poets feel that the possibility of changing the world is somehow essential to being a poet, or that there's something wrong with creating art for a niche community.
Also I'm pretty sure that the poets who do break through to a mass audience would generally be considered 'bad' by poets who did MFAs in poetry.
― change display name (Jordan), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 16:19 (two years ago) link
My experience may not be typical either, but some friends have been running a reading series here for the past decade and brought in all kinds of notable poets, and I've gone to many many events (considering that I'm not really into poetry, lol). The slam scene is generally younger and a totally separate thing, but this is a midwestern university town and things are probably different in a larger city.
― change display name (Jordan), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 16:23 (two years ago) link
Ugh, thinking of a big success hated by myself and others, including Alfred, so can’t even type his name again right now. Of course I don’t have an MFA in poetry, far from it, but still.
― What Does Blecch Mean to Me? (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 16:26 (two years ago) link
Poetry's audience is mostly other poets and literary types, yes. This has been true for a long time. It's art, it's not for everyone, and the pressure for art to be "relevant" or "populist" is one that is driven by hegemonic market forces rather than art itself. Ubiquity does not equal profundity, tho it can, and similarly, obscurity does not equal mediocrity, tho it can.
These aren't difficult propositions. The issue that I see is that a lot of poets seem to want to assuage some sense of guilt by deluding themselves into thinking what they're doing is activism that has a profound effect on the world, when it very clearly is not. BUT! What poems do have an effect on are individual readers, and changing/altering the consciousness of an individual reader is a profound thing, whether that reader is a poet or not. The sooner poets get this into their heads, the better.
Here's an example from my own life, because it's what I know: a young person chose to read my last book for a class they were taking in college, and decided to write their term paper on it. They found my website, filled out a form, and sent me some really interesting questions about the book. I responded, and after a few weeks, they sent me an absolutely astonishing term paper. Of course it means little in the larger scheme of things, but that sequence of events shows me that poetry can have an effect on people and change them, and insofar as that is true, poetry changes the world every day.
― Kind regards, Anus (the table is the table), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 16:30 (two years ago) link
Poetry is the language of imaginationPoetry is a form of positive creationDifficult, isn't it? The point? You're missin itYour face is in front of my hand so I'm dissin it
― Muswell Hillbilly Elegy (President Keyes), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 16:35 (two years ago) link
Amanda Gorman is the best-selling poet in the country -- OK, low bar, but her book really did sell well -- and quite obviously has a foot in slam world and a foot in traditional poetry world.
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 16:39 (two years ago) link
I don't wanna change the worldI don't want the world to change me
― Duke Detain (Neanderthal), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 16:47 (two years ago) link
-Ozzy Osbourne
I wouldn't say that Gorman has a foot in the traditional poetry world— she doesn't have any publications outside of a children's book and a book from a major publisher. The traditional poetry world is in small journals and presses operating on shoestring budgets, and has been for a long time. She's part of the commercial establishment, and her poetry is written to prop up that establishment.
― Kind regards, Anus (the table is the table), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 16:55 (two years ago) link
Great story a few posts back, table!
― What Does Blecch Mean to Me? (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 17:30 (two years ago) link
has a foot in slam world and a foot in traditional poetry world.
going back to an earlier analogy -- it would be like if John from Wolf Eyes was given a Guggenheim fellowship for music composition -- that's kinda how I see Gorman in re the "traditional poetry world"
― sarahell, Wednesday, 8 September 2021 17:35 (two years ago) link
Hint: his initials are not AD.
― What Does Blecch Mean to Me? (James Redd and the Blecchs), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 17:35 (two years ago) link
― Andrew Farrell, Tuesday, September 7, 2021 2:41 PM (yesterday)
thanks for speaking up, Andrew! that post of Aimless' was condescending as fuck, and part of me felt like going off, but honestly, I had work to do IRL and it wasn't worth my time. ... Probably why a lot of people (women esp.) stop posting here.
― sarahell, Wednesday, 8 September 2021 17:38 (two years ago) link
The traditional poetry world is in small journals and presses operating on shoestring budgets, and has been for a long time.
I consider the traditional poetry world to include the English classes Gorman took at Harvard, which would definitely classify what she does as part of their scope! Like, Jorie Graham would say her poems are poems, right? To me she's part of the traditional poetry world as much as small zero-budget presses but we don't have to use the same nomenclature, just saying what I meant by it.
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 17:47 (two years ago) link
Thank you for speaking up, sarah. I apologize for the offense given. I thought I was simply playing on the phrase 'oh dear', but apparently I accomplished something more sinister. Andrew's comment was that of a bystander imputing a reaction you had not expressed. Your comment means something.
― it is to laugh, like so, ha! (Aimless), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 17:50 (two years ago) link
it was obviously a pun
― he ain't perfect but fuck me he's a rheillee (imago), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 17:53 (two years ago) link
not to sarah
― it is to laugh, like so, ha! (Aimless), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 17:54 (two years ago) link
I didn't see the pun at all, and thought it was a shockingly sexist remark. Going back I can now see where the pun was meant to be, but it was very much not obvious. And the lack of women here is by no means a "canard".
― emil.y, Wednesday, 8 September 2021 17:58 (two years ago) link
thanks emil.y -- and I appreciate the apology Aimless.
― sarahell, Wednesday, 8 September 2021 18:17 (two years ago) link
maybe he should have thought about the optics of calling a woman 'dear' but I truly believe it was a good-faith pun gone awkward
― he ain't perfect but fuck me he's a rheillee (imago), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 18:21 (two years ago) link
and 'that's why all the women have left ilx!' as a response is laughable cmon
― he ain't perfect but fuck me he's a rheillee (imago), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 18:24 (two years ago) link
I laughed as I temp-banned you from ILAFL for your myopic post
― sarahell, Wednesday, 8 September 2021 18:30 (two years ago) link
Now do the rest of the site
― xyzzzz__, Wednesday, 8 September 2021 19:48 (two years ago) link
*cracks knuckles, stretches hamstrings*
― Ima Gardener (in orbit), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 20:42 (two years ago) link
so uh who is the big success poet who’s hated by everyone?
― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Wednesday, 8 September 2021 20:57 (two years ago) link