So Scott Griffin recently announced his sponsorship of a new poetry competition for high school students across Canada (read the G&M article on it here). Naturally enough, I'm in favour of it, particularly so because it emphasizes the performance of poetry and not simply the reading of it. When you are forced to think about how a poem (or any work of art) is communicating its meaning, you gain a better understanding of it (Ruth Padel's meditation on a Bruegel painting illustrates this point well). Beyond that, thinking about how to speak a poem (or any piece of literature) in such a way that you can actually keep an audience interested forces you to see the beauty of a poem, or its lack.
Despite what has been said in some critical/theoretical circles, there must be an inherent connection between beauty and art. Art cannot be anything (a mass-produced urinal comes to mind as a good example). The point of art is to force someone to reach out beyond themselves, so that they must grapple to return a little different from what they were before. Duchamps' "Fountain" does give a person an avenue to thinking about art/the world differently, but only if you're willing to make the first step towards that yourself. It doesn't grab you. Now, fair enough, shock and awe tactics can work much the same way as beauty for this. War art is particularly instructive for that (corpses mangled can be very effective to motivate change), but I think that the shock we receive from this sort of art depends upon our expectation and desire for beautiful art. When we find its lack, its exact opposite, presented in a forum for beauty, we become disgusted by the appraisal and attention given to such evil. because of this, shock and awe art only works when it is in the minority and presented against a backdrop of beautiful art.
Anyway, the point of this little digression is to go back to Mr. Griffin's initiative and say, "Thanks." I know my own only exposure to poetry in high school was a week-long look at Hallmark type poetry in a creative writing class, and when compared to the month we spent on how to write short stories, it becomes obvious how much poetry is avoided in the classroom. Even in my English Literature classes, it was avoided completely. Hopefully putting up some money for an intriguing contest can give kids a chance to experience oral poetry at its best and realize just how beautiful and fun it can be.
Despite what has been said in some critical/theoretical circles, there must be an inherent connection between beauty and art. Art cannot be anything (a mass-produced urinal comes to mind as a good example). The point of art is to force someone to reach out beyond themselves, so that they must grapple to return a little different from what they were before. Duchamps' "Fountain" does give a person an avenue to thinking about art/the world differently, but only if you're willing to make the first step towards that yourself. It doesn't grab you. Now, fair enough, shock and awe tactics can work much the same way as beauty for this. War art is particularly instructive for that (corpses mangled can be very effective to motivate change), but I think that the shock we receive from this sort of art depends upon our expectation and desire for beautiful art. When we find its lack, its exact opposite, presented in a forum for beauty, we become disgusted by the appraisal and attention given to such evil. because of this, shock and awe art only works when it is in the minority and presented against a backdrop of beautiful art.
Anyway, the point of this little digression is to go back to Mr. Griffin's initiative and say, "Thanks." I know my own only exposure to poetry in high school was a week-long look at Hallmark type poetry in a creative writing class, and when compared to the month we spent on how to write short stories, it becomes obvious how much poetry is avoided in the classroom. Even in my English Literature classes, it was avoided completely. Hopefully putting up some money for an intriguing contest can give kids a chance to experience oral poetry at its best and realize just how beautiful and fun it can be.
"When we find its lack, its exact opposite, presented in a forum for beauty, we become disgusted by the appraisal and attention given to such evil. because of this, shock and awe art only works when it is in the minority and presented against a backdrop of beautiful art."
ReplyDeletethe 1600s called. you suck.