Attention Rebel Poets: George Elliot Clarke on Spoken versus Written Poetry

What the Spoken Word poet knows that the page-poet has forgotten is, POETRY is meant to be performed. In the Western tradition, it descends from Ancient Greek performances of sagas and plays. EVEN IF a Spoken Word poem LOOKS simple–TOO simple–the only way to know its real power is to read it aloud, for oneself. Eliot said, “No verse is ‘free’ for a poet who wants to do a good job.” I say, “No poem is ‘good’ UNLESS it can be read aloud.” - toronto poet laureate george elliot clarke

This quote sums up why spoken poetry is so powerful and often threatening to academic poets. There is a raw edge to performed poetry - a theatrical component that doesn't sit well with the aridity and extreme objectivity of the academically trained and lauded poet.

The interview that this quote comes from can be accessed here:

It is a thought provoking discussion, suitable reading for any outlaw poets out there...
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I am ANGRY - What a Crock

I have just come across this objectionable piece of bovine fecal material about the reason why less people read poetry these days. What a crock...

In an address to the Association of Writers & Writing Programs this February, the president of the Poetry Foundation, John Barr, described how the popular poet writing for the common reader essentially disappeared with the advent of Modernism. The 19th-century model of poets publishing in mainstream venues such as newspapers was replaced by the 20th-century model, in which the increasing fragmentation and difficulty of poetry required specialists to discern it, moving it into the college classroom. Today, to call a poem "accessible" is practically an insult, and promotional events like National Poetry Month are derided by many poetry diehards as the reduction of a complex and often deeply private art form to a public spectacle.

John Barr is completely wrong. Many are sick of this insipid, arid, anemic, wish-washy, dishwater served up in academia today.

I am offended as a common writer and reader. I deliberately steered away from post graduate training in poetry just because of people such as John Barr. I want to feel, and live and be a common, as opposed to a college, poet.

Rebels arise and condemn this academic led heresy...

Do such people know about slam poetry, outlaw poetry, the poetry of the streets.. I doubt it.

GIVE US BACK POETRY FOR THE COMMON READER.


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