Chokh Raj wrote:
> Pure Poetry
>
> I knew very well what I meant by these words, but I did not know that
> they would give rise to such echoes and reactions in the world of
> lovers of literature. I merely wanted to draw attention to a fact, not
> to enunciate a theory, still less to define a doctrine and hold as
> heretics all who did not share it. In my eyes all written works, all
> works of language, contain certain fragments or recognizable elements,
> endowed with properties which we are about to examine and which I
> shall provisionally call /poetic/. Every time words show a /certain
> deviation /from the most direct, that is, the most /insensible/
> expression of thought, every time these deviations foreshadow, as it
> were, a world of relationships distinct from the purely practical world,
>
Interesting selection, CR, as per usual. It put me first in mind of
a joke that McLuhan liked to repeat, that "dictionaries drive words out
of their senses," which condition is what I take Valery to mean by
"insensible." I wonder if that is what TSE gets at when he says that
poetry (from memory) doesn't work without meanings. It also reminds of
Auden's statement, that a poet is someone who likes to see words play
together, not an area of perception I think you'll find in the
Merriam-Webster. The one thing with which I'd take exception in the
Valery quote is the word "deviation," as I think that words playing
together exert more force on us in our day to day lives than we may be
award; but I suppose that still could exist within a "certain deviation."
Ken A
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