(no subject)

[proximoception]

I wrote about Ashbery, not for the recent long papers but in a shorter one a couple weeks ago, and specifically his expressions of ambivalence to Bloom's recent kingmaking of him in the Self-Portrait volume (kings, under Bloom, being sort of lampreys on the necks of deader kings--glowing lampreys on glowing kings who are lampreys themselves, but few get past the lamprey part). The evidence was overwhelming--I ran out of space after briefly discussing just the first four poems. All four poems involve protesting a Steinian counteraesthetic--when examined closely more like one of Shelley's--against the Miltonic-Romantic sublime, depicted as just not being worth it. Bloom himself is ambiguously presented as something of a scam artist in "Worsening Situation"--which elsewhere seems to attack Perloff, to my great satisfaction:

One day a man called while I was out
And left this message: "You got the whole thing wrong
From start to finish. Luckily, there's still time
To correct the situation, but you must act fast.
See me at your earliest convenience. And please
Tell no one of this. Much besides your life depends on it."
I thought nothing of it at the time. Lately
I´ve been looking at old-fashioned plaids, fingering
Starched white collars, wondering whether there’s a way
To get them really white again.

This is very funny but unfair. Bloom saw Ashbery as having particularly captured the voice of Stevens' "Le Monocle de Mon Oncle," giving as an example a stanza from it that didn't sound like Ashbery to me at all. I've been rereading the poem today (magnificent, lovely) and I have to say, bits of several of its other stanzas are clearly papier-mached onto his brain stem:

The mules that angels ride come slowly down
The blazing passes, from beyond the sun.
Descensions of their tinkling bells arrive.
These muleteers are dainty of their way.
Meantime, centurions guffaw and beat
Their shrilling tankards on the table-boards.

De-archaicize and demetrify it slightly and it's pretty much the arch-Ashbery moment. Bloom reigns as the sharpest--he must have noticed the attacks too. I wonder if they amused him.

All of which is very interesting in Ashbery but doesn't make me feel like I need him. Often when I read him I'm very moved, but I'm not sure the motion amounts to anything but recognizing that this is where the glow is being wasted right now. If you actually have Shelley and Stevens, which we always will, what's the great appeal? Other than helping to prove Bloom right about the poets. Does a point arrive when the lamprey spiral tapers away?

Comments

[grashupfer.livejournal.com]

This is where the hyper-focus of Bloom's theory starts to get in the way. For me anyway. That question about Shelley and Stevens. The earthquakes of thought caused by Ashbery's poems are different from the earthquakes of Stevens are different again from the tremors of Dickinson - all with different economies and all treasures for me. Not that it isn't a load of fun to talk about over several rounds of drinks.

[proximoception.livejournal.com]

Bloom is either to be raged against (see mid-'70s Ashbery) or acceded to wholly--seems like that's just how it is. I do feel like there's more to Ashbery that I don't know or am forgetting, esp. in the later books.

How would you feel about getting some people together and forming a recommendation journal? With entries either copying out poems and passages or listing favorites, particularly writing out names of the poems that jump out of them when they read through collections. I don't have time to run through Collected Workses anymore, because of the Fundamental English Grad Student Irony, and am definitely interested in others' tastes, esp. where they might help me get a better grasp of people I still find somewhat offputting--Ashbery, Merrill, Gluck for instances.

[grashupfer.livejournal.com]

Yes, I'd love that. Once I have my computer up and running again in a few days, we should build that space.

[grashupfer.livejournal.com]

Also - re: amusing Ashbery and what I might call bitchy poetry politics

https://po.missouri.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0812&L=JM-L&T=0&F=&S=&P=215

Then, scroll down this next link for Ashbery's response:

http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/the_tls/article5278554.ece

[proximoception.livejournal.com]

Ha! Makes me feel like throwing all my grievances out. Imagine letting that rankle for fifty years.

Ashbery's last words were priceless. Elegant version of "Bitch, the prize won me."