Jon:

I'll look at Kern's book. Emerson was a huge influence on Cummings and
Frost, as was Thoreau. What's interesting to me is that even with those
similar influences (Pound, too), Cummings openly expressed disdain for
Frost's poetry, and Frost openly disapproved of free verse. Yet I see some
parallels in their poetry, which goes to the Eastern philosophies.

Kate

----- Original Message -----
From: "Jon & Anne Weidler" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, November 18, 2002 12:26 AM
Subject: Eastern questions


> It's wonderful that this list suddenly leapt alive.  It's equally
> wonderful that "eastern" issues prompted the leaping.  About Modernism
> and Orientalism in general, I've been reading Robert Kern's book on the
> subject (*Modernism, Orientalism, and the American Poem* it's cleverly
> titled.)  I find it valuable because Kern's reading sets up a way for
> incorporating non-Buddhist, non-Eastern-minded writers (like Cummings
> or Stevens for instance) into a "Zen-centric" perspective (to coin a
> phrase).  I've been thinking about some products of modern poetry as
> being kinds of advertisements before the fact for an American
> assimilation/appropriation/utilization of the so-called wisdom of the
> east.
>
> (Note please that Kern's book is mainly about Emerson, some 19th-cen.
> German philologists, Otto Jespersen, Fenollosa, Pound, and ultimately,
> Snyder.  It doesn't speak specifically to Cummings or Stevens, even if
> I implied that it did.  It's just helpful for locating modern American
> poetic practice in a history of western engagements with, primarily,
> the Chinese language.)
>
> Thanks for writing!
> -Jon Weidler
> Loyola University
>