Date: Mon, 14 Oct 2002 00:46:25 +0100 (BST)
From: =?iso-8859-1?q?Scott=20Hamilton?= <s_h_hamilton-AT-yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: AUT: Fwd: Amiri Baraka poem



It's important to understand what Baraka is trying to
do in his poetry. As far as I know he revolted against
the dandyish, ostensibly apolitical New York poetry of
the 50s and 60s (O'Hara, Koch, Ashbery) by changing
his name (it was Le Roi Jones) and also his style. He
moved away from the ideal of the 'well-made poem'
toward a rougher, more expansive style heavily
influenced by the jazz played by the likes of John
Coltrane. 

Baraka went so far as to argue that jazz rhythms
represented a new way of thinking, a revolt of the
black consciousness against the rigidities of
'Cartesian thought'. Make no mistake though, there is
a great deal of form in the poem posted - consider the
repitition of 'Who', the frequent half rhymes,  and
the alliterated bs. 

Do I like the poem? No. But it is boring to plant a
discussion on this level. Better, by far, to ask the
question: why is this poem aesthetically unsuccessful?
In order to answer such a question we must understand
the sociological position of a man like Baraka, who is
trying to create a new literary tradition, perhaps a
new cultural tradition, on the bones of his arse.
Baraka has to build his road as he travels it. The
symbolic touchstones and aesthetic standards which
exist in a much older literary tradition simply do not
exist for him. 

Baraka's situation perhaps mirrors that of indigenous
Maori NZ writers. Last year I watched a play by a
Maori writer called Witi Ihimaera, a play about the
life of a (fictional) Maori woman born 160 years ago
on the day of the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi,
which is the agreement between Maori and Europeans
which provides the constitutional foundation of the
New Zealand state. 

Ihimaera's play was tremendously strained by the
effort of trying to bring a mass of historical
experiences into the 'canon' - into the consciousness
of Europeans and urban Maori unfamiliar with some of
the past. At almost every point in the play, longish
exegesis was necessary to make the action and imagery
in the narrative comprehensible to part of the
audience. It was only when the narrative reached the
great Maori protest movement of the 70s and 80s that
the author could relax. Ihimaera also had to deal with
a sizeable contingent of Maori from the distant rural
region of New Zealand where his play was mostly set.
These were not the normal 'literary types' and they
had, I believe, very different particular expectations
of the play. For them, it had a functional and
documentary value. Ihimaera had to acquaint these
people with the conventions of literary 'high culture'
and the New Zealand literary tradition. 

Was Ihimaera's play aesthetically successful? In my
opinion, it was not. But its failure counted more than
the small successes that can be enjoyed in more
established literary traditions.  The contradictory
social location of Ihimaera's play harked to the glory
early days of modern New Zealand literature, when the
pressures faced by a very fledgling intelligentsia
drove it to bold thinking and writing. 

Cheers
Scott






 --- Nate Holdren <nateholdren-AT-hotmail.com> wrote: >
Hey all-
> I'm with Thomas on this one. I think the poem sucks.
> I'm not a poetry expert 
> by any means, but I know what I like and what I
> don't Also, it's political 
> content is crap in my opinion.
> 
> Chris your points about the importance of style and
> not falling into a 
> language ugly, awkward, and ossified are well made
> (as opposed to the snide 
> remarks about Negri). The EZLN stuff is really
> important and innovative this 
> way (Plus it tends to have a content I support much
> more than Baraka.) Have 
> you ever read the interview w/ Marcos where he talks
> about the literature 
> that influenced him? (I've got an acquaintance who
> claims a lot of the EZLN 
> rhetoric is influenced by/patterned after the
> language of Las Casas, I don't 
> know much about that, but this again supports the
> claims of the importance 
> of style.)
> I think I can agree w/ everything you have to say
> about speaking multiple 
> vernaculars (which I will admit in my limited
> experiences Negri isn't so hot 
> at) while still holding Baraka low on my list of
> laudables.
> It's particularly interesting to me Chris that
> you're so vehemently 
> anti-Nietzschean (sp?) given that N was engaged in
> and influential in 
> matters stylistic, both in his own work and in
> subsequent work, both marxist 
> and otherwise.
> 
> best,
> Nate
> 
> 
> 
> >From: asc <satellitecrash-AT-yahoo.com>
> >Reply-To: aut-op-sy-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
> >To: aut-op-sy-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu
> >Subject: Re: AUT: Fwd: Amiri Baraka poem
> >Date: Fri, 11 Oct 2002 12:14:54 -0700 (PDT)
> >
> >Thomas and autopsy,
> >I claim ignorance on poetry, i have no idea what
> makes
> >a good poem...
> >
> >this poem is no doubt a little to heavy on
> conspiracy
> >theory, but i thought it had it's bright spots...
> from
> >a comrade who knows nothing about poetry...
> >love and rage,
> >-Sean
> >
> >--- Thomas Seay <entheogens-AT-yahoo.com> wrote:
> > > Why don't leninist poets learn to condense their
> > > verse
> > > into haiku or, at least, a sonnet?  Send a copy
> of
> > > "Rhyme's Reason" to that man.
> > >
> > > I dont favor him getting the boot but that's a
> > > pretty
> > > mediocre poem...at best.  If he had started
> > > screaming
> > > "Moloch! Moloch!" towards the end of the poem, I
> > > might
> > > have been more impressed.
> > >
> > > -Thomas
> > > --- asc <satellitecrash-AT-yahoo.com> wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > > This is a poem read at a festival earlier
> this
> > > > month
> > > > > by Amiri Baraka. He
> > > > > is currently being asked to resign from his
> post
> > > > as
> > > >
> > >
> > > ====> > > Unlike its unruly city counterpart, the suburban
> > > body has been wholly domesticated and one can
> say
> > > that the suburbs consitute a huge petting zoo,
> with
> > > the residents' bodies providing the stock of
> furry
> > > mammals.  -JG Ballard "Project for a Glossary 
> of
> > > the Twentieth Century"
> > >
> > >
> __________________________________________________
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> >
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> 
> 
> 
>
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