
Les jugements sur la poésie ont plus de valeur que la poésie.” (“Judgments on poetry are more valuable than poetry.”) -Comte de Lautréamont
“It is easy to treat poetry as if it were engaged in the language-game of giving information and thus to assume that what is important about a poem is what it tells us about the external world.” -Veronica Forrest-Thomson
“The ambiguity of poetic language answers to the ambiguity of human life as a whole, and therein lies its unique value. All interpretations of poetic language only interpret what the poetry has already interpreted.” -Hans-Georg Gadamer
Nou kyk, lees bogenoemde aanhalings by ‘n artikel raak en kyk of jy sal kan verbykliek … Nodeloos om te sê, ek kon nie. En spyt was ek beslis nie, want Brian Henry se artikel “Criticism’s crisis” op die webtuiste The Best American Poetry is een van die insiggewendste beskouings oor die onderwerp van literêre kritiek wat ek nog teëgekom het.
Neem nou byvoorbeeld Henry se openingsparagraaf: “Poetry criticism seems to be in a perpetual state of crisis. It’s not just that critics cannot agree on which poets or kinds of poetry are the best, but that poetry critics often have no common ground. They do not share the same aesthetic values, they cannot agree on common approaches. […] Part of the issue is that people interested in poetry and poetry criticism often talk/write more about criticism than about poetry.”
Wat ek persoonlik baie interessant gevind het, is die gedeelte waar hy Peter Szondi aanhaal: “Texts present themselves as individuals, not as specimens. We must try to interpret them at first in accord with the concrete process whose results they are, and not in accord with an abstract rule, which itself cannot be established without an understanding of individual passages and works. In other words, each text-e.g., a book of poetry-establishes the ground upon which it should be assessed.” (Uit: “On Textual Understanding“.)
‘n Verdere probleem is uiteraard dat ‘n gedig ‘n taalkonstruksie is en dat die kritikus “rational, normative language” moet gebruik om op ‘n teks met “associative, disruptive language” kommentaar te lewer.
Gaan lees gerus die volledige artikel hier. Kyk veral na die einde van Brian Henry se betoog waar hy begin skryf oor die kwessie van styl en die ook die simbiose tussen die “hoe” en die “wat” van ‘n gedig … Fassinerend, inderdaad.
As leestoegif plaas ek die openingsgedig uit Martina Klopper se bundel Nadoodse ondersoek onder aan die Nuuswekker. Dit het hoeka die kritiese leser in die oog.
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Sedert gister het daar drie bydraes bygekom op die webblad. Roel Richelieu van Londersele het by Wisselkaarten ‘n nuwe stuk geplaas oor sportverse, terwyl Hennie Meyer en Lewies Botha elkeen met ‘n konkrete vers vorendag kom.
Lekker lees. (Of is dit nou kyk?)
Mooi bly.
LE
Patologie
I
Jy benodig die volgende:
‘n skalpel, skaal en liniaal.
Hier is my liggaam
op die praalbed van papier,
dis jóú taak om die oorsaak
van my dood te bepaal.
Vir die eksterne ondersoek:
tel alle wonde en sere,
meet elke tattoo –
dis letters en grepe,
die merke van ‘n lewe
op my vel agtergelaat.
Gebruik die en masse-tegniek
vir interne disseksie:
weeg elke woord,
sny “hart” en “brein”
in dik stukke fillet –
vind metafore vir “moord”.
Hoeveel weeg ‘n gedig?
Jou verslag sal bepaal:
lywig of te lig.
(c) Martina Klopper (uit: Nadoodse ondersoek, 2010: Human & Rousseau)