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>From: Carrol Cox <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: Pound and the Occult (was not
>Date: Wed, Jan 29, 2003, 9:16 AM
>

> charles moyer wrote:
>>
>> >     Since we are on the subject of Modernism here is what I read in
>> yesterday's Cleveland Plain Dealer concerning our poet laureate's appearance
>> at John Carroll University tonight.
>>     "There's a waiting audience out there that was frightened away by
>> Modernist poetry in school.
>
> Randall Jarrell wrote a beautful little essay trashing this nonsense.
> Two core points in it if I remember correctly from about 40+ years ago.
> (1) All those complainers about modern poetry's complexity don't read
> any other poetry _either_. (2) In some Latin American cities you will
> find that the waiter in the hotel restaurant is a poet. What kind of
> poetry does he write? Surrealist poetry! Jarrell has some lovely sneer
> to the effect that because someone can't read The Wasteland he has given
> up on Shakespeare and Wordsworth, or something to that effect.
>
> :-)
>
> Delicately put, those who say they have been frightened away from poetry
> by the complexity of modern poetry are mostly fucking liars.
>
> Carrol

    But how about those who become poet lariats by pandering to them? They
are rewarded by getting to read on NPR's Garrison Keilor Show and in the
U.S. Congressgation. Alas old Randall. I still remember his "sad heart in
the super market".

Charles