Ask Nathan Anything: Quarantine Edition

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

do you have any thoughts on Simone Weil's death?  for instance, does it seem like something she choose in some way?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

do you have any thoughts on Simone Weil's death?  for instance, does it seem like something she choose in some way?

I'm strongly of the belief that Weil was anorexic, and moreover that, like Catherine of Siena, it actually was anorexia nervosa rather than the anorexia mirabilis that we associate with other famously religious women who starved themselves. (Towards the end of Catherine's life her confessor actually ordered her to start eating again, and she could not.) It could be argued that rushing headlong into abusing her body the way she did, seemingly making no effort to hold herself back, derived from a suicidal impulse, but I'm not comfortable saying that it was pure choice on her part, because towards the end she was clearly badly ill mentally as well as physically.

What are your favourite Greek tragedies? Do you have a preference between any of the three Athenian tragic poets?

I like Antigone and Bacchae best. My overall preference is for Sophocles; I like Euripides as well and am largely unfamiliar with Aeschylus, although I'm hostile to the Oresteia because I feel that it's unusually misogynistic even by Classical Athenian standards.

Do you believe that 2026 will see a hinoe uma-related plunge in birth rates like 1966 or have Japanese society and demographics changed enough from then for that to happen?

There'll probably be some decline (unfortunately, because I think the superstition surrounding hinoe uma is ridiculous and offensive even taken at face value--what exactly is the problem with having a "strong personality" due to being born in one of these years?!), but the birth rates have gotten so low already that I don't expect it to make as much difference as it did in 1966.

I'll answer my mini-backlog of questions from KaiserDave later today!

[Cassius]

Curious to know if you’ve ever read Richard Werner’s Princes of the Yen (given your interest in Japan), and if so what you thought of his thesis that the Japanese stock market crash and the ensuing lost decade(s) were essentially part of a long term plan orchestrated by the BoJ to remake the Japanese economy along Western lines?

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

do you have any thoughts on Simone Weil's death?  for instance, does it seem like something she choose in some way?

I'm strongly of the belief that Weil was anorexic, and moreover that, like Catherine of Siena, it actually was anorexia nervosa rather than the anorexia mirabilis that we associate with other famously religious women who starved themselves. (Towards the end of Catherine's life her confessor actually ordered her to start eating again, and she could not.) It could be argued that rushing headlong into abusing her body the way she did, seemingly making no effort to hold herself back, derived from a suicidal impulse, but I'm not comfortable saying that it was pure choice on her part, because towards the end she was clearly badly ill mentally as well as physically.

From what I've been reading it seems like Simone was too ill to digest much at the end, like it sounds Catherine was. I don't know much about anorexia mirabilis but couldn't it lead to that as well?  Looking at the wikipedia page, Catherine, Columba of Rieti, and Marie of Oignies all died in their early-to-mid thirties, as Simone did, and as Christ did.  Could be a coincidence due to prognosis of illness, but I can't help but think it may be due at some level to an attempt to emulate or join with Christ.
Simone's main reason for not eating that she gave  - to be in solidarity with those who could not - was genuine I believe. But it was a substitute for the fact she couldn't do more, so food was something in her control. Is that what you are thinking of in terms of anorexia nervosa?  Or do you think her not eating was related to body image issues?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

do you have any thoughts on Simone Weil's death?  for instance, does it seem like something she choose in some way?

I'm strongly of the belief that Weil was anorexic, and moreover that, like Catherine of Siena, it actually was anorexia nervosa rather than the anorexia mirabilis that we associate with other famously religious women who starved themselves. (Towards the end of Catherine's life her confessor actually ordered her to start eating again, and she could not.) It could be argued that rushing headlong into abusing her body the way she did, seemingly making no effort to hold herself back, derived from a suicidal impulse, but I'm not comfortable saying that it was pure choice on her part, because towards the end she was clearly badly ill mentally as well as physically.

From what I've been reading it seems like Simone was too ill to digest much at the end, like it sounds Catherine was. I don't know much about anorexia mirabilis but couldn't it lead to that as well?  Looking at the wikipedia page, Catherine, Columba of Rieti, and Marie of Oignies all died in their early-to-mid thirties, as Simone did, and as Christ did.  Could be a coincidence due to prognosis of illness, but I can't help but think it may be due at some level to an attempt to emulate or join with Christ.
Simone's main reason for not eating that she gave  - to be in solidarity with those who could not - was genuine I believe. But it was a substitute for the fact she couldn't do more, so food was something in her control. Is that what you are thinking of in terms of anorexia nervosa?  Or do you think her not eating was related to body image issues?

I refreshed my memory as to the definitions of nervosa and mirabilis and I was misremembering what the difference was. I absolutely think Weil was more motivated by spiritual concerns than what we'd today see as "body image issues"; I have read most of her body of work (and dressed up as her for Halloween once! Of course, I was a theology student at the time) and barely remember her devoting any writerly attention to her body at all, even in situations like her attempts to do heavy farm labor alluded to in Gravity and Grace where you'd think writing about her body would be pertinent. So in that sense you're correct to question my initial response; I was mistaken about my terms and I appreciate the correction.

I also think there's something to be said about the gendered pathologization of cases like hers and Catherine's. Almost nobody's mind goes to mental illness or eating disorders in discussions of male religious figures who were hard on their bodies in similar ways, like Simeon Stylites or for that matter Francis of Assisi. The fact that Weil is a major (arguably the major) female theologian of modern times probably has a lot to do with people's (including mine; this is something I've thought a lot about over the years!) fascination with this topic.

Curious to know if you’ve ever read Richard Werner’s Princes of the Yen (given your interest in Japan), and if so what you thought of his thesis that the Japanese stock market crash and the ensuing lost decade(s) were essentially part of a long term plan orchestrated by the BoJ to remake the Japanese economy along Western lines?

I'm not familiar with the book but I've heard the premise before. I don't buy it; it strikes me as "inscrutable orientals"-mongering to accuse the f**king Bank of Japan of all institutions of that kind of super-long-term thinking. Maybe MITI at its height could have launched such a scheme--but wouldn't have, because MITI's interests lay in continuing postwar developmentalism/dirigisme/whatever you want to call it for as long as possible.

I'll admit that the idea has a lot of explanatory power; it's just that I question its prima facie plausibility.

Opinion of

1. Rerum Novarum
2. Quadragesimo anno
3. Fratelli Tutti
?

All freedom encyclicals, although I think all three have their blind spots (too little Thomism in Rerum novarum, too much Thomism in Quadragesimo anno, and some "old pope yells at cloud"-iness about sociopolitical issues related to internet use in Fratelli tutti). I was lucky enough to get an embargoed copy of Fratelli tutti about twelve hours early because I write for a Catholic news and opinion website and I stayed up all night reading it. There need to be middlebrow popularizers for this tradition the way there are for theology of the body.

Opinion of Napoleon Bonaparte?

I have mixed feelings on him. He's the locus classicus for a historical figure the scope of whose legacy is such that he's hard to get a clear moral picture of. Continental political history also just isn't really my forte. What I will say is that I once got into a flame war on another website with a Norwegian communist who kept insisting that Napoleon was "far-right", which struck and still strikes me as completely absurd (although not as absurd as calling Julius Caesar far-right, which this person also did).

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

do you have any thoughts on Simone Weil's death?  for instance, does it seem like something she choose in some way?

I'm strongly of the belief that Weil was anorexic, and moreover that, like Catherine of Siena, it actually was anorexia nervosa rather than the anorexia mirabilis that we associate with other famously religious women who starved themselves. (Towards the end of Catherine's life her confessor actually ordered her to start eating again, and she could not.) It could be argued that rushing headlong into abusing her body the way she did, seemingly making no effort to hold herself back, derived from a suicidal impulse, but I'm not comfortable saying that it was pure choice on her part, because towards the end she was clearly badly ill mentally as well as physically.

From what I've been reading it seems like Simone was too ill to digest much at the end, like it sounds Catherine was. I don't know much about anorexia mirabilis but couldn't it lead to that as well?  Looking at the wikipedia page, Catherine, Columba of Rieti, and Marie of Oignies all died in their early-to-mid thirties, as Simone did, and as Christ did.  Could be a coincidence due to prognosis of illness, but I can't help but think it may be due at some level to an attempt to emulate or join with Christ.
Simone's main reason for not eating that she gave  - to be in solidarity with those who could not - was genuine I believe. But it was a substitute for the fact she couldn't do more, so food was something in her control. Is that what you are thinking of in terms of anorexia nervosa?  Or do you think her not eating was related to body image issues?

I refreshed my memory as to the definitions of nervosa and mirabilis and I was misremembering what the difference was. I absolutely think Weil was more motivated by spiritual concerns than what we'd today see as "body image issues"; I have read most of her body of work (and dressed up as her for Halloween once! Of course, I was a theology student at the time) and barely remember her devoting any writerly attention to her body at all, even in situations like her attempts to do heavy farm labor alluded to in Gravity and Grace where you'd think writing about her body would be pertinent. So in that sense you're correct to question my initial response; I was mistaken about my terms and I appreciate the correction.

I also think there's something to be said about the gendered pathologization of cases like hers and Catherine's. Almost nobody's mind goes to mental illness or eating disorders in discussions of male religious figures who were hard on their bodies in similar ways, like Simeon Stylites or for that matter Francis of Assisi. The fact that Weil is a major (arguably the major) female theologian of modern times probably has a lot to do with people's (including mine; this is something I've thought a lot about over the years!) fascination with this topic.

The terminology can be confusing since the DSM frames anorexia nervosa as about body image & esp. being thin, but the narrowness of that definition is only 40-50 yrs old and somewhat controversial given similar behaviors are done for different reasons cross-culturally.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

btw Delaware Libraries is doing a series of online presentations by authors of books about Weil. I happened to come across the one with Robert Zaresky and ordered his book; it's very good. these are the upcoming ones if you are interested:

Conversation with Sylvie Weil | At Home with André and Simone Weil
Monday, May 3 | 5:00 PM Eastern Time
Register here.
https://delawarelibraries.libcal.com/event/7577974

Conversation with The Rev. Eric O. Springsted | Simone Weil for the Twenty-First Century
Monday, May 17 | 5:00 PM Eastern Time
Register here.
https://delawarelibraries.libcal.com/event/7607949

[𝕭𝖆𝖕𝖙𝖎𝖘𝖙𝖆 𝕸𝖎𝖓𝖔𝖑𝖆]

Opinion of

1. Rerum Novarum
2. Quadragesimo anno
3. Fratelli Tutti
?

All freedom encyclicals, although I think all three have their blind spots (too little Thomism in Rerum novarum, too much Thomism in Quadragesimo anno, and some "old pope yells at cloud"-iness about sociopolitical issues related to internet use in Fratelli tutti). I was lucky enough to get an embargoed copy of Fratelli tutti about twelve hours early because I write for a Catholic news and opinion website and I stayed up all night reading it. There need to be middlebrow popularizers for this tradition the way there are for theology of the body.

Since I am currently reading Fratelli tutti I will say that I have noticed that too, but I didn't really take it as a blind spot because I feel like I am guilty of a certain kind of Internet use myself so that just struck on me.
I agree that there should be middlebrow popularizers of course!

[Wikipedia delenda est]

Since you were asked about Napoleon, opinion of Louis XIV? I feel like they're often held to a double standard.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Since you were asked about Napoleon, opinion of Louis XIV? I feel like they're often held to a double standard.

bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad LOL bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad

[Wikipedia delenda est]

This is what I'm talking about. Why is Louis XIV so awful but Napoleon is mixed? I don't like it when people brush off Napoleon's warmongering as necessary for the spread of liberalism or whatever. What he was was a conqueror who made himself Emperor of France and dominator of Europe. His incessant warring led to the deaths of millions of people. The enemies he fought against were the exact same enemies that the Ancien Regime of Louis XIV had battled. Only Louis was interested in acquiring defensible frontiers for France whereas Napoleon sought to take over the entire continent, making him far more deadly and dangerous.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Henry, no offense, but I don't really think you have the high ground when it comes to the evils of assessing early modern figures through disposition towards (proto)liberalism rather than on internationalist or human rights grounds.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

What do you think of ‘free verse’? I’ve always thought it’s just an excuse to write poorly, and it’s also surely an oxymoron; but that’s probably me being narrow minded.

I think there's some excellent free verse out there, but it has to be written by somebody who has a great ear for the natural rhythms of the language. Good poets do, but I agree with the common observation that mediocre poets just write highly emotional prose while pressing "enter" a bunch of times and call it a day. "Prufrock" is technically free verse but it still "feels like" poetry because each individual line is incredibly carefully constructed; often a few in a row will be metrical, and the last line of the poem ("Till human voices wake us, and we drown") is perfect iambic pentameter. Much of, for example, Mary Oliver's work was written with a similar concern for rhythm and balance. Conversely this poem, which is wildly popular among the sorts of consistent life ethic-oriented young Christian women who make up much of my social circle, is difficult to identify as poetry except by how it looks on the page. (I actually love this as writing and think about it all the time; but it's difficult to justify except as a prose poem, and I tend to think of it as one.)

What I hate about free verse is that it's so dominant in English poetry today that many poets have lost the ability to (or never learn to) write decent metrical poetry even if they want to. That awful poem that that guy wrote for the Trump inauguration is a great example of the kind of disaster that can befall them (and the language!) when they try. I have a friend in an MFA program who would like to use rhyme and meter but feels the need to avoid doing so because whenever she does her professors and the people in her workshops unload on it and accuse her of pastiche (at best) or unseriousness (at worst). So "free verse", which was developed precisely to, well, free poetic expression from the perceived constraints of meter, has become just as much of an ossified orthodoxy as the persnickety Victorian fixation on meter that it replaced. Like many such orthodoxies, it's impoverishing English poetry and at this point is probably best rebelled against. To that end I enjoy using very strict forms when I try my hand at poetry, like villanelles and triolets.

A lot of the people who would be very good metrical poets of the old school are in songwriting now. You look at a bunch of Leonard Cohen or even Florence Welch lyrics and you'll see an awful lot that could easily have been published in poetry collections fifty or a hundred years ago--indeed, many Leonard Cohen and Florence Welch lyrics have been published as poems. But by and large the only fans of their poetry are people who discovered them through their music, because so many Very Serious Poetry People are mired in free verse orthodoxy.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

indeed, many Leonard Cohen and Florence Welch lyrics have been published as poems. But by and large the only fans of their poetry are people who discovered them through their music, because so many Very Serious Poetry People are mired in free verse orthodoxy.

You'll be delighted to know that Cohen's poetry sells well.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

indeed, many Leonard Cohen and Florence Welch lyrics have been published as poems. But by and large the only fans of their poetry are people who discovered them through their music, because so many Very Serious Poetry People are mired in free verse orthodoxy.

You'll be delighted to know that Cohen's poetry sells well.

I am.

[Geoffrey Howe]

What do you think of ‘free verse’? I’ve always thought it’s just an excuse to write poorly, and it’s also surely an oxymoron; but that’s probably me being narrow minded.

I think there's some excellent free verse out there, but it has to be written by somebody who has a great ear for the natural rhythms of the language. Good poets do, but I agree with the common observation that mediocre poets just write highly emotional prose while pressing "enter" a bunch of times and call it a day. "Prufrock" is technically free verse but it still "feels like" poetry because each individual line is incredibly carefully constructed; often a few in a row will be metrical, and the last line of the poem ("Till human voices wake us, and we drown") is perfect iambic pentameter. Much of, for example, Mary Oliver's work was written with a similar concern for rhythm and balance. Conversely this poem, which is wildly popular among the sorts of consistent life ethic-oriented young Christian women who make up much of my social circle, is difficult to identify as poetry except by how it looks on the page. (I actually love this as writing and think about it all the time; but it's difficult to justify except as a prose poem, and I tend to think of it as one.)

What I hate about free verse is that it's so dominant in English poetry today that many poets have lost the ability to (or never learn to) write decent metrical poetry even if they want to. That awful poem that that guy wrote for the Trump inauguration is a great example of the kind of disaster that can befall them (and the language!) when they try. I have a friend in an MFA program who would like to use rhyme and meter but feels the need to avoid doing so because whenever she does her professors and the people in her workshops unload on it and accuse her of pastiche (at best) or unseriousness (at worst). So "free verse", which was developed precisely to, well, free poetic expression from the perceived constraints of meter, has become just as much of an ossified orthodoxy as the persnickety Victorian fixation on meter that it replaced. Like many such orthodoxies, it's impoverishing English poetry and at this point is probably best rebelled against. To that end I enjoy using very strict forms when I try my hand at poetry, like villanelles and triolets.

A lot of the people who would be very good metrical poets of the old school are in songwriting now. You look at a bunch of Leonard Cohen or even Florence Welch lyrics and you'll see an awful lot that could easily have been published in poetry collections fifty or a hundred years ago--indeed, many Leonard Cohen and Florence Welch lyrics have been published as poems. But by and large the only fans of their poetry are people who discovered them through their music, because so many Very Serious Poetry People are mired in free verse orthodoxy.

Thank you for this response. Yes I suppose 'free' verse written by a poet with a 'good ear' can be perfectly good; it's more the stuff that makes silly use of enjambement which gets my goat. For example much of the Poems on the Undergound series, e.g.

walk the spiral
                     up out of the pavement
          into your own reflection, into
transparency, into the space
     
                   where flat planes are curves
           and you are transposed
as you go higher into a thought

                        of flying, joining the game
           of brilliance and scattering
where fragments of poems

                         words, names fall like glory
          into the lightwells until
St Mary's Axe is brimming

Gherkin Music by Jo Shapcott


For me, most of the joy of poetry is the use of language through metre (whether strict or not), so much is lost when it is in prose. I suppose a limerick is the best example of this.
That's why I don't really see the point of reading, for example, classical works (Iliad, Aeneid, plays) in the Penguin Classics translations beyond simply learning the characters and the plot. There are some nice Victorian translations (e.g. E.D.A. Morshead).

Who do you think had the best 'ear'? Dryden/Pope etc. wrote very strict verse which can be a bit tiresome but I guess it requires a lot of talent to do so. I think the biscuit has to go to Tennyson - not just the Lady of Shallott, excellent as it is; but some of the lesser known early ones like Claribel. Actually A.E. Housman had an incredible 'ear', but it's all a little too mawkish.


(And that Trump inauguration poem I hadn't seen before, but it really is terrible.)

[Statilius the Epicurean]

As Pound said, poetry begins to atrophy when it gets too far from music. Too often free verse is an excuse to dispense with rhythm altogether.

[Statilius the Epicurean]

Thank you for this response. Yes I suppose 'free' verse written by a poet with a 'good ear' can be perfectly good; it's more the stuff that makes silly use of enjambement which gets my goat. For example much of the Poems on the Undergound series, e.g.

walk the spiral
                     up out of the pavement
          into your own reflection, into
transparency, into the space
    
                   where flat planes are curves
           and you are transposed
as you go higher into a thought

                        of flying, joining the game
           of brilliance and scattering
where fragments of poems

                         words, names fall like glory
          into the lightwells until
St Mary's Axe is brimming

Gherkin Music by Jo Shapcott

I actually quite like this. The enjambment is a nice bit of visual poetry so that the poem spirals in the same way as the Gherkin does. If I have one criticism it's the the self-consciousness of the line "fragments of poems" in a poem, but otherwise it's not that bad for what it is.

Anyway the best contemporary poetry I find in music too, especially hip hop and grime. I was sent this today with people laughing over it and expressing admiration for these crisp bars:

https://twitter.com/OwodunniShubby/status/1383578499269599241

"Got a thingamajig out I'm rejigging it quickly and I'm running all sorts of attachments
Big scope with a thermal sight and I'm up on a rooftop prone on a mattress"
is delicious poetry: not only rhythm, but wordplay, humour, imagery, rhyme both end and internal etc. suffused with energy in a direct manner.
 
Of course songwriters and the like in music have it much easier that it can all be put out and recited to a catchy beat. But that is what poetry for the written page should aspire to emulate in its own way because without this element poetry's appeal will never be popular.  

[Geoffrey Howe]

Thank you for this response. Yes I suppose 'free' verse written by a poet with a 'good ear' can be perfectly good; it's more the stuff that makes silly use of enjambement which gets my goat. For example much of the Poems on the Undergound series, e.g.

walk the spiral
                     up out of the pavement
          into your own reflection, into
transparency, into the space
    
                   where flat planes are curves
           and you are transposed
as you go higher into a thought

                        of flying, joining the game
           of brilliance and scattering
where fragments of poems

                         words, names fall like glory
          into the lightwells until
St Mary's Axe is brimming

Gherkin Music by Jo Shapcott

I actually quite like this. The enjambment is a nice bit of visual poetry so that the poem spirals in the same way as the Gherkin does. If I have one criticism it's the the self-consciousness of the line "fragments of poems" in a poem, but otherwise it's not that bad for what it is.
 

Can you explain to me what the poem is actually saying? (Needless to say I don't have the same admiration for it as you; maybe I can be persuaded though.)


Are you a fan of the Poems on the Underground series?

[Statilius the Epicurean]

Can you explain to me what the poem is actually saying? (Needless to say I don't have the same admiration for it as you; maybe I can be persuaded though.)


Are you a fan of the Poems on the Underground series?

I think I can guess that it's someone going up inside the Gherkin, or looking up it from the ground level. That's another problem with contemporary poetry, without rhythm it is difficult to write clearly without being prosaic, so retreating into allusion or obscurity is too often used as a crutch to avoid banality.

Anyway this is the Ask Nathan thread not the ask me one

[Geoffrey Howe]

Can you explain to me what the poem is actually saying? (Needless to say I don't have the same admiration for it as you; maybe I can be persuaded though.)


Are you a fan of the Poems on the Underground series?

I think I can guess that it's someone going up inside the Gherkin, or looking up it from the ground level. That's another problem with contemporary poetry, without rhythm it is difficult to write clearly without being prosaic, so retreating into allusion or obscurity is too often used as a crutch to avoid banality.

Anyway this is the Ask Nathan thread not the ask me one

You identify a serious problem both in contemporary poetry and my questioning 

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Poetry is about making words dance on the page. There are different ways of going about this - and the language the poem is written in has some impact here (e.g. it is relatively easy to write a good villanelle in Italian but bloody hard in English) - and all are quite legitimate, but that is the essence of it. If one loses sight of this in any direction, then the result is bad poetry.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Do you prefer emo to classic rock?

[bore]

As all of my countrymen know, good poetry is when words rhyme, the more they rhyme, the better the poem is.

But alas! the king and his nobles fought in vain,
And by an English billman the king was slain;
Then a mighty cheer from the English told Scotland’s power had fled,
And King James the Fourth of Scotland, alas! was dead!

Beautiful city of Edinburgh! the truth to express,
Your beauties are matchless I must confess,
And which no one dare gainsay,
But that you are the grandest city in Scotland at the present day!

Christmas time ought to be held most dear,
Much more so than the New Year,
Because that’s the time that Christ was born,
Therefore respect Christmas morn.

And of course the famous trilogy

Beautiful Railway Bridge of the Silvery Tay!
With your numerous arches and pillars in so grand array
And your central girders, which seem to the eye
To be almost towering to the sky.
The greatest wonder of the day,
And a great beautification to the River Tay,

Beautiful Railway Bridge of the Silv’ry Tay!
Alas! I am very sorry to say
That ninety lives have been taken away
On the last Sabbath day of 1879,
Which will be remember’d for a very long time.

Beautiful new railway bridge of the Silvery Tay,
With your strong brick piers and buttresses in so grand array,
And your thirteen central girders, which seem to my eye
Strong enough all windy storms to defy.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Do you prefer emo to classic rock?

Depends on the emo and depends on the classic rock, but at least some of the time yes. I'd much rather listen to Sunny Day Real Estate than, like, Foreigner.