Comments on: More on Greatness: Art vs. Art History

By: Tim

Tim — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 22:38:54 +0000

Oh I think Stein is incredibly important historically. There are entire schools of poetry that seem to me spun off from her. And we learn about her in college lit classes, even though there aren’t very many people she does a whole lot for.

To put it in a Venn diagram myself, I think it would be two circles with 75% convergence — some historical significant poems aren’t artistically interesting, and vice versa, though it’s mostly overlap.

The Cantos would have been my third example. Proust would have been my second. Ulysses argues to be added, too, but I love it. I guess I’m diverging into fiction, there, but so be it.

By: Cafais

Cafais — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 15:11:17 +0000

I am certainly not a fan of Gertrude Stein either; however, this is where we get into a problem with generalities and taste: I do not find Stein artisically interesting AND I don’t really find her to be historically important. I think of her work as basically an experiment that didn’t really work. To support your position a bit, I would also point to Ezra Pound. I don’t think people read the Cantos much for pleasure these days (although they mostly layer upon layer of obscure historical references, they do however have moments of artistic flourish).

However, I still maintain that there are no truly historically significant poems that are not also artistically interesting. Put in logic terms, a Venn diagram, I think the set of historically significant poems is the little circle completely enclosed by the larger circle of artistically interesting poems. That is, all historically significant poems are artistically interesting, but not all artistically interesting poems are historically significant.

By: Tim

Tim — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 02:54:00 +0000

“Tender Buttons” is the first thing that comes to mind. Of course you’re going to argue with that, and I’d definitely see your point in doing so. It’s hard not to sacrifice reality by talking in generalities, so maybe the whole argument is moot.

By: Cafais

Cafais — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 14:45:44 +0000

I get what you are saying. However, I believe that any poem which is “historically important” is also “artistically interesting” – - both for scholars and the reading audience (which nowadays must be considered the community of poets since I do not believe there is a general audience for poetry anymore).

Tim (or anyone else), could I challenge you to actually identify a poem which is historically important, but not artistically interesting? I do not think such a poem exists.

By: Tim

Tim — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 23:49:39 +0000

I tend to agree with you if you take the broad view of “change” — creativity and originality are always going to be linked.

But the point was that historical significance is often conflated with the idea of greatness, though they’re not really the same thing. A poem can be historically important without being artistically interesting — great for scholars, but not necessarily great for a reading audience.