watch video on distinctions between “Dickinsonian” and “Whitmanian” proto-modernism

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来自 University of Pennsylvania 的课程

Modern & Contemporary American Poetry (“ModPo”)

170 个评分

University of Pennsylvania

Modern & Contemporary American Poetry (“ModPo”)

170 个评分

ModPo is a fast-paced introduction to modern and contemporary U.S. poetry, with an emphasis on experimental verse, from Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman to the present. Participants (who need no prior experience with poetry) will learn how to read poems that are supposedly "difficult." We encounter and discuss the poems one at a time. It's much easier than it seems! Join us and try it! Yes, the next live, interactive 10-week session of ModPo will begin on September 8, 2018, and will conclude on November 19, 2018. Al Filreis will be in touch with you by email before the September 8 start of the course with all the information you'll need to participate. If you have questions, you can email the ModPo team at modpo@writing.upenn.edu. During the 10 weeks of the course, you will be guided through poems, video discussions of each poem, and community discussions of each poem. And (unique among open online courses) we offer weekly, interactive live webcasts. Our famed TAs also offer office hours throughout the week. We help arrange meet-ups and in-site study groups. If you are curious about the ModPo team, type "ModPo YouTube introduction" into Google or your favorite search engine, and watch the 20-minute introductory video. You will get an overview of the course and will meet the brilliant TAs, who will be encountering the poems with you all the way to the end. If you use Facebook, join the always-thriving ModPo group: from inside Facebook, search for "Modern & Contemporary American Poetry" and then request to be added as a member. If you have any questions about ModPo, you can post a question to the FB group and you'll receive an almost instant reply. We tweet all year long at @ModPoPenn and you can also find ModPo colleagues using the hashtag #ModPoLive. ModPo is hosted by—and is housed at—the Kelly Writers House at 3805 Locust Walk on the campus of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia USA. All ModPo'ers are welcome to visit the Writers House when they are in our area. Our discussions are filmed there. Our live webcasts take place in the famed "Arts Cafe" of the House. To find out what's going on at the Writers House any time, just dial 215-746-POEM.

从本节课中

chapter 1.2 (week 2)—Whitmanians & Dickinsonians

<p><b>Week 2 of ModPo 2018 runs from Sunday, September 16 at 9 AM through Sunday, September 23 at 9 AM. </b>For those doing ModPo on their own or in small groups, the week 2 materials are open and available all year.</p><p>During this week, the second half of chapter 1, we will read the work of two poets writing in the Whitmanian mode and three poets writing in the Dickinsonian mode. We will encounter our Whitmanians, William Carlos Williams and Allen Ginsberg, again later in the course—Williams as a modernist and Ginsberg as a Beat poet. The Whitman/Williams/Ginsberg connection is a strong one; Ginsberg wrote directly in response to both Whitman and Williams and saw the lineage as crucial to the development of his approach. Our Dickinsonians are more disparate in their response to Dickinson’s writing. Of the three—Lorine Niedecker, Cid Corman, and Rae Armantrout—only the last could be said to be a direct poetic descendant of Emily Dickinson's aesthetic. </p><p><b>ASSIGNMENTS:</b> During this week, there are two quizzes due and a writing assignment. Writing assignment #1 is open for submission between 9 AM on 9/17/18 and 9 AM on 9/23/18; after that, peer reviews will be submitted any time between 9 AM on 9/24/18 and 9 AM on 9/30/18. There is also a live webcast on Thursday, September 20, at noon (Philadelphia time).</p>

watch video on William Carlos Williams’s “Smell!”15:14

watch video on William Carlos Williams's "Danse Russe"19:33

watch video on Allen Ginsberg's "A Supermarket in California"15:40

watch video on Lorine Niedecker's "Grandfather Advised Me"13:54

watch video on Lorine Niedecker's "You are my friend"12:03

watch video on Lorine Niedecker's "Foreclosure"8:07

watch video on Cid Corman's "It isnt for want"14:28

watch video on Rae Armantrout's "The Way"21:40

watch video on distinctions between “Dickinsonian” and “Whitmanian” proto-modernism11:36

与讲师见面

Al Filreis
Kelly Professor, Dir. Center for Programs in Contemporary Writing, Faculty Dir. Kelly Writers House

-So we've talked about some, some, roughly speaking, some Whitmanians and

some Dickensonians. It's a false binarism; both poets are

important--they're foundational--but we've, we've sort of roughly divided at

least temporarily some of these poets into two, and I'm really curious to know what

your responses are to these two different kinds of strategies.

You can, you're, you're certainly welcome to state your preferences, in the crudest

way that you want to. Max, where are you at this point?

-Well, whereas I was initially on the Dickensonians side.

I think, with these poets, I'm more of the

Whitmanians. -Because?

-Persuasion... Because, I mean, frankly "In a Supermarket in California" was my

favorite of the bunch that we read this week, And, I think it's, it's more, if

anything, it's toeing the line a little bit better between... or balancing

better the sort of meta-poetics, the sort of "ars poetica" moments, and, and sort of

gestures to the outside world, ... to society...

-The social content .-Yeah.

-I prefer, I prefer that little bit of... Not a little bit...

I mean, there's a lot, obviously, here in Ginsberg...

-Are you implying though, that, that Niedecker and Armantrout

don't have social content? -No.

-I certainly, I certainly think that they do, ...

-But you like it to be more overt. -Yes.

I think there is a little bit more, criticism and, well... Well, now you're

making me question this! -That's okay.

That's what I'm supposed to do. -There is, there is definitely in, at

at least in, in Niedecker... there is plenty of mischief and,

and, and implicit critique as well, but I do find it more resonating...

better for me in Ginsberg. -Molly, do you think that our responses

to these two styles or approaches is gendered?

-Ooh...! -You didn't know I was going there...

-I didn't. I had something else prepared.

That's a question for Ann Maris. -I... I don't...

-That is to say, what, you know, the topic we were just talking about with Max,

which is their social content. -Maybe not in Corman, but in...

-Sure. -But in all the others.

There's social content, but it's worked a different way from Niedecker.

There is really a climate of lovely radical economic refusal, and a real

remaking of the way we think of life and work, there.

It's very radical. -Sure.

-But it's an inward turned poem. And Max prefers the...

-You know, Allen and Walt wandering around criticizing the suburbs.

Sorry I didn't mean to... -It's true.

-But, but so do I. -I, I don't think ...

-Okay. -So it's not gendered, in this sense.

-Yeah. I think it's almost an introverted and

extroverted type of issue. -Yes I think that "extensive" is a great

word for Whitman, and "intensive" is a great word for Dickinson.

Ally, your thought on the gendering? -Yeah.

Just [inaudible]. I think it's interesting, kind of taking

that frame and applying it to the Dickinsonian versus Whitmanian traditions.

Because one of the things that struck me, is that, with,

Ginsburg and William Carlos Williams, you feel more. You feel more almost the

pastiche [?] Or the, y-, you know, really, you see

obviously with Ginsburg, explicitly. Like, "I see you there", Whitman, but

also very much in smell. Whereas, with meeting Niedecker and a

bunch of these other ones, you can trace it back to a

Dickensonian, kind of precedent. But at the same time, it feels very much

more...you know...it feels more inherent to that specific

poetry... -I think you're saying, in part,

that the Whitmanian tradition is very locked into the tradition.

And that the so-called Dickensonian tradition really feels fresh, and makes

itself along the way. -Yeah, so, like, you know, in a gendered

sense, then, it's maybe a female role of kind of rejecting tradition.

Where as, you know the two, and Cid Corman doesn't fit neatly

into this, but, Williams and Ginsburg are both... kind of, you know,

toasting, this male tradition. -Interesting.

Anna where do you want to go with this? -I'm so really in for what Ally just said.

That was so interesting, ... -I mean for me I, I, I'm kind of more

with Max in that I responded more to Williams and...

...Ginsburg. -Ginsburg.

Just because, in terms what I like to read and what I respond to, is language and

love... I like the celebration, the

exhuberance of language, in both Williams and Ginsburg.

What I appreciate so much about Niedecker, and, and Armantrout, and, and Cid Corman,

is their way, is their ability to, to condense, I guess.

Where Ginsburg prefers to be a little, more, extensive and expansive.

I, I do appreciate the way that they've been able, to...

-Well it's good thing you like condensation, because that's

where we're going... -It is...

-...in this course, as we move into chapter 2.

Kristin, what do you want to do with any of this?

-I guess I'll come back to Armantrout, since she was the last one we just did.

But I, I really, really enjoy the way that she, uses.

...these images. And it's kind of, like, you know?

In "Supermarket in California", Allen Ginsburg says he's shopping for images.

Well, Armantrout is too. But I really like the way that she puts

them together. And that they're, they're.

It's like parataxis. Like, they're together, but they shouldn't be.

-And we have to kind of figure out what,

what the purpose of that is. -Interesting, because there's parataxis in

the Whitmanian list. -Mm-hm.

-You know, of all the items that Ginsburg finds in the supermarket.

-It's [inaudible] -But it's not...

-Yeah... -A crucial compositional process the way

it is in Armantrout. So in a way, you're saying, yeah there's

parataxis on both sides of this binarism. But it's on the Dickinsonian side that it

really gets worked out as a matter of form.

-How's that, does that sound right? -Yes.

-That's pretty good. That's a really good point. Dave?

-Briefly, about the gender issue, I think it's interesting that in the poems

that are written by men, there's seems to be an underlying theme of alienation.

And in the poems by women, there's a sense of control, to form.

In that sense, the sort of flip-flopping that gender role stereotypes.

But. -The poet controls what she can control,

right? And does it with power, Dickensonian classic.

One of the most powerful poets we have,

who controlled the environment of her brain and the immediate environment where as

when you go out into the social space you get all the frustrations of Ginsburg,

Ginsburg feels because as the extensive...

and "Type A-ish" that he is, he can't actually make much of a dent in a world that causes

alienation. -I also don't think there's any problem

in not taking sides. I think both of these different modes of

approaching poetry are fine. I feel like I would sometimes prefer a

beer with the Whitmanians, and sometimes a fine wine with the Dickinsonians.

-[Laugh]. -Nothing wrong with that.

-Hey, wasn't that little trope at the end

gendered in itself? The beer, the beer with the Whitmanians

-[Laugh]. -Which way does your point, your beer point

tonight Dave Poppler? Down to the tavern [Laugh].

-Who's playing? -Ann Maris, do you want to crack the gendered

question? -I mean, I think that all the poets show

confrontation with various culturally manufactured modes of being.

And so, Whitman and Ginsberg come from that with more of... their overt

expressions of sexuality as queer poets. Whitman was interrogating his suburban

role as a father. But I think that what's admirable in

Niedecker and Dickinson was that (well, I have to disagree a

little with Max)... I think they were, there is an implied and

very powerful social critique in place in their poems in that they're carving a new

space for women. And this...

what we'd maybe even triivialized before, poem-making from a female perspective, is

here given the legitimacy and the power, and the influence of a "trade" in the

Niedeckerian sense, and an "ocuppation" in the Dickinsonian sense,

bring it back to Armantrout. That little girl grew up into a woman, who

was able to bring all these voices together.

Make an identity for herself. -To bring together, and allow them to

stand... ...differently.

-Yes. -Yeah, that's terrific.

Emily, our resident genius. -[Laugh] Thanks...

I, I guess I'm still a little bit hung up on the way, and, how all these poems seem

to be poking and prodding, and putting pressure on the "I".

And that happened earlier, I suppose, in the last poems we read, in Dickinson and

Whitman. And I'm finding myself, like Max, becoming

more of a Whitmanian, I guess. I think because, ultimately,

I don't like the way that "I" was sort of questioned and dissected and eventually

destroyed. I, it seems so to me, that, that, that,

that destruction occurred, in the way, and Cid, Cid Corman was the most moving

for me, because it, posited an "I"... ...a complicated "I", but one nonetheless.

And sort of rejoiced in the... sort of copresence and coexistence of author, and

reader, rathar than trying to preference

one or the other. And I guess that means I'm more

comfortable with William Carlos William, and Whitmanian poets, because they celebrate

the I, the way it should be celebrated, rather than just constantly redefine it and

reconfigure it. -Terrific.

I, I don't really have much to add to those wonderful statements.

I just. I just want to remind all of us that the

poetry that we're studying in this course is really all about here, the presence.

It's about how, how the absence of the human being who created... whose hand created

these things... does not prevent the ongoing present.

But the ongoing present of these poems requires us to be there as well, to be

here in the Armantroutian sense of "inside the imagination", "inside the legacy...

that our human mothers gave us", you know, the

ability to imagine something that's not real.

Something that's not here. To be lost in it.

To lose the self, and find a new one. Or in the Cprmanian sense of feeling

myself here in the poem. Continuously again, and again, and again.

To go back to the Armatrout work. I mean, that "here" is the...

...the definition of the imagination. If you can, if you can point to an object

and say the word "this", then you're, you're fulfilling our referential need.

Or if you can say, "There is a bus, don't cross the street you'll be run over

otherwise. Then if you take the referent away and you

just say "this", then what's left is creativity, I guess for lack of a better

word, and presence. And that's what all these poets are trying

to discover.

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