Lezama Lima
I was hugely into Lezama at one time; I know I'm supposed to think he's great. But I now realize that Lezama only takes me so far. I like the idea of being baroque like he is more than the actual reality. If I never work on Lezama, it will be fine. I can still die happy.
María Zambrano
I ought to like her because people in my circle generally think she's great. Me, not so much. What's even worse than María Zambrano is people who go on and on about her but without saying anything that contextualizes her in a meaningful way. Reading endless things about her that all say the same thing but never tackle problematic areas of her thought is sheer torture. I do have one article about her, and that is enough. The bottom line, I realized when I did a translation of her someone asked me to do, is that she just isn't a good writer; and her contribution to philosophy is very thin.
Robert Duncan
I've always felt ill at ease with one major dimension of his work: its self-congratulatory and self-canonizing impulse.
Minor Language Poets.
I like the language poets as a whole, but some of them are just all that good. Endless talking about "syntax" when you question, sometimes, whether they know what syntax really is. I was hugely into the whole group at one time, and some are superb writers like Susan Howe or Ron Silliman at his best, and I will defend them against dumb, ignorant attacks any time, but in retrospect there is not enough critical writing that separates the best achievements from the mediocrity of the lesser figures.
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Who are your writers you ought to like more than you actually do? I resent the group-think that makes everyone in a certain clique have to like the same writers. People I admire immensely are big fans of Lezama, Zambrano, Duncan, etc... I am not doubting their sincerity. I just don't have to go along unless I really am feeling it for myself. If you like what I dislike you are not wrong. What is wrong is spending years trying to like something that will never really convince you.
4 comments:
This is a great question. I will work on it.
Should like but do not: Wordsworth.
Do like but should not: Coleridge.
Should like but get bored: DeLillo, Padura, various other novelists but also specific novels, one I very sinfully do not like is Clarice Lispector, I also do not like Brazilian poesia concreta.
Loved as person but not always as writer: Duncan.
Like (I do not straight-out like many): Artaud, Mallarmé, Baudelaire, García Lorca, lots of poets, actually, Pizarnik, many more.
OK. The problem with Duncan is exactly what you say. There are things that are good about him but these are the essential problems.
I like Baroque but not neobaroque, even though one should like it.
I do not like poesia concreta, it is too gimmicky.
If it is postmodern it had better be good, because if not it is too gimmicky.
If it is metafiction, it had also better be good.
I don't like Unamuno or Ortega y Gasset or anyone else sanctimonious.
I like Ana Cristina César, Voltaire, Cervantes, Diderot. My favorite writer is James Baldwin. I guess I don't like the self-involved or the mushy, yet do not mind the maudit.
I don’t like Ortega or Gasset. I agree. And what’s the deal with Lispector? Also, poesía concreta is a bit dull.
Lispector, I became allergic because you were supposed to love her and I thought the whole deal was bourgeois playing with narrative voice. I also cannot stand Proust. I should perhaps try these people again, I am older now ... ?
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