Even though this might not be the most inspired of blog entries itself, I feel as though a few things need to be said about this topic, if just to clarify some of the most common tips on writing we read every day.
We all know the contrast between the common misconception of the artist’s work – ‘you need to be inspired’; ‘it just comes to you’ – and the general advice on how to become a published writer – ‘don’t wait for inspiration’; ‘just do it’.
Of course, the latter is sound advice. We are long beyond the Romantics and the conception of the individual genius to whom inspiration just happens to come. It has never been true in history, no matter how talented the individual might be. Indeed, they, too, had to achieve an education, went through years of learning, writing, re-writing, editing, getting feedback, etc. They didn’t wait for inspiration – they just worked. They just wrote. They got shit done.
This does raise the question of where inspiration comes from. Or even more fundamentally, it raises the question what inspiration even is.
I suppose the type of inspiration which non-artists expect writers to have is synonymous with the ‘Eureka-feeling’, the feeling of enjoying a nice cup of tea or a bath and suddenly having a lightning strike your brain. You suddenly have the perfect idea, and from then on, it’s just about writing it down.
The thing is, this just doesn’t happen. The Eureka-feeling never strikes those who haven’t put in any effort. It’s a by-product of hard work. From my own academic and creative experience, I know that I put a lot of research and thinking into a project, and then, through conscious and subconscious musings about the project, I might be struck with a small Eureka-moment in form of the perfect formulation for a specific sentence, paragraph or argument. I don’t know of anyone who just ‘happened’ to get the same feeling without trying.
Of course, this might just be me, but, as I said, I don’t know any examples of the contrary. It shows us that the work comes first, and the Eureka-moment later. But what is inspiration, then? Possibly not much more than the amount of work and time you put into your creativity.
If you’re writing creatively, rather than academically, the need for work still applies. But it takes on a different form. You read material on how to write (improving your writing concretely), and you read novels, poems, short stories etc. from other writers (inspiring you with their writing and ideas). At the same time, you are musing – consciously and subconsciously – about your own writing, leading you one day to the desired feeling of Eureka. That’s why accomplished writers seem to have a never-ending stream of good ideas: they’re constantly thinking about their writing, consciously and subconsciously; everything they do goes into their writing, and, consequently, the Eureka-moments stack up.
In other words, inspiration is nothing more or less than the work you put in which will lead to the final product of your creative effort. This is probably why we always advise novice writers to read. Not only because, to be a writer, you start out as a reader, and certainly not because we advise them to copy & paste ideas, but just because it’s work which will ‘inspire’ them in some way.
Of course, the precise way it inspires you can take on many different forms. In poetry it’s easy to see: so many discoveries and developments have taken place throughout the course of literary history that to assume a person can become great without a huge amount of effort is about as likely to succeed as placing a child in front of a piano and hoping for it to become the next Lang Lang without training. Poets become good because they work at their craft, not because they have some mystical, otherworldly power.
In fiction, the same applies. You might not read much because of time constraints, but just reading good, published sentences, well-structured plots, well-constructed worlds etc. will necessarily influence you in beneficial ways.
And, as artists, we can take inspiration from elsewhere as well. It’s no secret that we are all inspired by a great deal – music we hear (just google for ‘best inspiration music for artists/ writers/’ – whatever), paintings we see, conversations we overhear (or hopefully lead ourselves), or life events which we deem worthy to be put into a novel. Everything is – or can become – inspiration.
Hell, I discovered recently that I can even find an ugly, run-down and abandoned industrial building inspiring. The blog post itself is creative and might very well ‘inspire’ me to write about it in another form – a poem, a short story – by using the sentiments I came up with in the report. Indeed, this is the reason I started my blog in the first place: not to spread my work, but to inspire myself and to help others be inspired (also part of the reason why there are more guides and tips on here than examples of my own writing).
In summary? The advice, ‘don’t wait for inspiration’ is excellent for anyone serious about wanting to become an artist. But it is only half of the message. It doesn’t just mean that you should get off your butt and start writing, but it also means that you can easily take all aspects of your day to day life and use them as inspiration for your art. In short, the advice ‘inspires’ you to do two things: start writing, and start living consciously.
A Brief Note on Talent
You’re probably wondering by now – and quite rightly so – what I think about talent. It’s true: some people seem to slave away the way I described above, and still don’t manage to achieve anything. Others seem to work a lot less and still come up with great pieces of art. So yes, I do agree that talent has a major part to play in the creation of something beautiful. The problem is: it’s almost impossible to quantify.
Consider this: most people don’t work effectively. They may deceive themselves into thinking that they are working five hours straight on their novel, but in many cases, they are working at around 5% efficiency. Others might put in fewer hours but work at closer to 50% efficiency. Discipline is a separate skill to work at, I’m afraid.
The same can be said of the learning process. Some people just haven’t developed their learning capabilities, resulting in them spending hours doing the same mistakes over and over again, whereas others learn effectively, making it seem as though they develop quicker than others.
In other words, many cases of talent versus no talent might just be down to an inefficient use of the time you invest. Someone with a lot of talent who never works will not become a good writer. Someone with no talent who works a lot might also not become a good writer. But someone who puts in a lot of effective work and has some talent will at least become a decent writer.
Do you disagree? Something to add? Then please leave a comment! Otherwise, please do share it on the social media of your choice by clicking on one of the tender buttons below.
Thinking about this topic as the foundation for another post, I was wondering where to start. It could end up being annoyingly ‘academic’ – especially considering big names such as Roland Barthes (The Death of the Author) or Michel Foucault (What is an Author) dominate the discussion.
But I don’t want to bore you. Or myself for that matter. After all, this blog is not about academic debates; it’s about the arts. And much can be said about this topic for people who are seeking pure enjoyment without referring to critical theory.
To put it quite bluntly: when you’re looking at a work of art for pleasure, often the artist just doesn’t matter too much when trying to understand or enjoy it. It works the other way, as well: if you’re an artist, the artwork is often more than just a mirror of your personality. You’re a creator, after all.
So here I list several reasons why I believe this to be the case. It doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t appreciate the artist who created a piece you enjoy; if you’re an artist it certainly doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t put a piece of yourself in your darlings. But it does mean that you should separate the text from its author.
Reasons for viewers of the art
The personality of the artist might not be in the art
A work of art is a complicated construction, a product of many hours (days, months, years…) of intense effort in making something new and interesting. In the process, part of the personality of the artist may become part of the work of art – but never the whole personality. On top of that, sometimes the work might not include aspects of the artist’s personality at all, but be entirely fictional, based on something the artist made up or researched.
The more complicated the work of art, the more difficult it becomes to see exactly where the artist’s personality shines through. Art is often too complex to be just a reflection of its author, even if the personality is partly or wholly contained within.
Artists often work on a subconscious level
Many artists will tell you that, while they put a huge amount of effort into their work, much of it is done on a subconscious level. It might involve a memory they’re not entirely sure of, a belief they don’t consciously know they hold, or a form of technical finesse which flows into the art without awareness. For this reason, equating the artist’s intention with the finished work of art is not always possible.
Lives are complicated
If you think about your own life and realise how complicated it is, it doesn’t take much of a leap of faith to realise that the artist’s life is probably just as complicated. Therefore, to see some part of the text, painting or music as the same as an event in the artist’s life is futile; it might just be a coincidence.
Art is often selective; artists pick key details to bring their point/ feeling across – a single painting, an aria which lasts for five minutes, or a poem which contains 50 lines probably won’t contain the entire revelation of a complicated personality.
Of course, art can be complex, but lives are too complicated to be incorporated entirely in a single work of art.
Artists often put on masks
In many cases, especially in the literary arts, artists put on masks to explore a topic or feeling from a different point of view than their own. They seek to evoke the sensibility of the character they are speaking through, not to proclaim their own thoughts and emotions.
In such cases, any given interpretation of the art might be completely different to the one the artist has in mind, or it might explore a view contrary to the artist’s opinion – just based on the artist’s interest in the portrayed persona.
Reasons for the artist
You’re creating a work of art, not an opinion piece
So, you have a philosophical theory which will change the way we think forever? An idea which will improve our lives? Wonderful! Then write an essay. You might very well include it in your artwork, but if your aim is to convince people of something, you might want to write in a medium which is suitable to convince, rather than one which is often used to make people feel a certain way.
In the end, the only thing which matters is what people see in the work of art. They can’t read your mind and guess what arguments led you to your conclusion, and they usually approach art form a different angle than, for example, an essay.
The reverse is also true: if you include a whole range of arguments in the artwork, it probably feels more like an essay and will be treated accordingly. It doesn’t mean that your opinions don’t matter – but it does mean that if your artwork doesn’t include the entirety of an argument, your underlying ideas don’t matter to what you’ve put on the paper, canvas, or in the music. Only what your text actually says reaches the reader.
Your private life may be fascinating – but it doesn’t make the art good
You might have had the most fascinating life. The most tragic of love affairs. The most hilarious of comedic occurrences. Great! But if it isn’t presented in the work of art, it just isn’t relevant.
If you have someone read your poem, listen to your instrumental piece, or see your abstract painting, it just doesn’t matter what you experienced – only what the art says is contained within the art.
It’s always great when something inspires you profoundly, but don’t assume that the weight of your experience automatically makes your art good; you still need to present the end-product well. Which, in the end, sadly means that your personal life doesn’t matter to the viewer of your art (unless the art is a biography, I suppose).
Your intentions may be fascinating – but they don’t make the art good, either
This is, essentially, the same point as the previous one. You might have noble intentions with your work, a brilliant idea, an intoxicating experience you wish to transmute to your reader. Great!
But your intentions and ideas must be contained within the art. If your art only works with additional explanations to outline the intentions, it has failed as art. Only what the viewer can see, read, or hear directly is important; everything else can only add minutely to the understanding of what’s being seen. Nothing that can be written about art should be more interesting than looking at the art.
Art is creative and thus involves creation
Use your imagination – you are more than the sum of your life experiences. There is little in this world which is more complicated than human existence, and we are capable of learning new things, reading and listening to others, and combining this input in creative works to synthesise something new which touches the viewer in some way.
Therefore, you are not limited to your immediate experience. Artists have written about things not immediately personal forever. It does mean that you must go through the pesky process of creating something good, of course, which is self-contained and capable of evoking the emotions when you’re not present and the viewer knows absolutely nothing about you.
Perhaps the title of this post is unfair: the artist matters a great deal! Without the artist, there is no work of art, plain and simple. You are capable of combining the whole range of all parts of your identity and transforming it into something which moves others in some way – take pride in that! But don’t be a helicopter artist; allow your audience to live on their own, develop, and dare to speak even when you’re not there.
Closing words
Inspiration is a great thing, and it is fascinating to see where an artist comes from, but it doesn’t provide us with immediate information on how to interpret or understand the text. The artist might be exploring the same themes he or she experienced in life, but they are not to be taken to be the same thing.
If you are viewing art and equate x from the art with y from the artist, you are doing both an injustice – a lot more work and effort might very well have gone and probably did go into the construction of the piece you are witnessing. Therefore, most ‘I’s in a poem are not just the poet, not all depictions of suffering in a painting are identical to the artist’s experience, and not all tortured moments of tension within music are based on the personal suffering of the composer. They’re probably related, yes – but they might also be more than the pure expression of the artist’s personality. The artist isn’t his or her art, and the art isn’t the artist – both can be so much more than merely a part of each other! Because the artist can give the audience more room to tickle out those differences is precisely why he or she does matter.
Do you agree or disagree? Is there anything else I didn’t think about which should be added to the post? Then please leave me a comment and we can start a dialogue. Otherwise, please share it on social media by clicking on one of the tender buttons below.
Silvertown is, without a doubt, one of London’s strangest districts. Walking through East Silvertown, you still feel the working-class roots bubbling beneath the surface of an otherwise increasingly gentrified capital, always with the odd odour from the Tate & Lyle sugar factory penetrating your nostrils, even though the area’s industry is becoming more dominated by the comparatively new City Airport.
Other parts have been gentrified more successfully, for better or worse. Bordering on Canning Town to the north, the area around the Royal Docks greets the wanderer with a modern construction, consisting of the ExCel exhibition centre and the gorgeous Emirates Air Line, which can give you some of the most beautiful views over London you will ever see for little more than a tube fair. But only if you don’t dare to look further to the East.
For the view is dominated by the Millennium Mills, towering above all other buildings and putting them in its shadow. An uncanny silence surrounds the immediate area; apart from the occasional sound of a seagull or a plane approaching the airport, you will hear absolutely nothing. Not even reptiles make this almost soviet-looking ruin their home.
And yet a strange aura surrounds the rotting concrete walls and the frontage. Humans are drawn to it as though by a spell of sorts – and, consequently, it has been used many times in popular culture. TV show Ashes to Ashes frequently used the façade; it featured in The Last of England; Jean-Michel Jarre even had the building painted white to use it at his event Destination Docklands. Although you may not recognise its infusing grey, chances are you’ve seen it before, from the comfort of your own home, and without the dangers presented by the asbestos pervading the area.
Of course, so-called ruin gazing has been a phrase used for quite some time in cultural criticism – the act of imagining the end of one’s own culture by comparing it to the decline of an ancient empire (often Rome or Babylon). Enjoying looking at the last remains of a dead civilisation has been the inspiration for some of the most wonderful art.
But something about the Millennium Mills feels different. These are not the ruins of an ancient empire. The building is hardly one hundred years old; it only shut its gates after the closure of the Royal Docks in 1981. This is a recent ruin, and there are undeniably many people alive who still remember its active period when hundreds of tons of flour would be produced in it on a daily basis – produced by the hands of thousands of real people.
Are the Millennium Mills a reminder of the stampede that marks the end of industrialised Britain? Do they serve to reinforce the sense of the neighing end of times the West has been experiencing for centuries? Do they whisper the sounds of a forgotten age, provided we let ourselves slow down for a minute and take a deep breath? Perhaps the sentiment whimpered by the ruin is best captured by these lines from Lord Byron’s ‘Darkness’:
Morn came and went—and came, and brought no day,
And men forgot their passions in the dread
Of this their desolation; and all hearts
Were chill’d into a selfish prayer for light
The Millennium Mills teach us that not only perfect and pretty things can fascinate us and capture our attention. Why not seek beauty even in the unlikeliest of places?
Have you been to the Millennium Mills? Did your experience differ from mine? Then please leave a comment below. Otherwise, if you enjoyed reading this little piece, please share it on a social media platform of your choice by clicking on one of the tender buttons.
For further information, please visit designingbuildings.co.uk’s entry on the Millennium Mills. Otherwise, here’s a video showing the building from various angles.
Having a passion for a topic – any topic – is a wonderful thing. Indulging in the pleasures of your field gives you the opportunity to get lost in the excessive emotion you might feel, whether it be scenic, sonic, verbal, or in a combination of various perceptive elements.
People with a passion for dancing can spend hours watching ballet or dancing themselves; people who love reading can read for hours on end and completely forget about the time. For such people, making a top 10 list might very well feel like a sin.
To be honest, I feel a bit like that myself right now. And yet they are a wonderful way to share something you love; something which moves you, touches you, something you wish the world would enjoy to the same extent.
For that reason, I here present to you my 10 best moments from opera. Why moments, rather than arias? Well… because they’re not all arias! And how did I go about selecting them? On a purely subjective basis. I’m making no claim that these are ‘the best moments in the history of opera’; merely that they are my current favourites which I can indulge in time and again. They might very well change according to my daily mood, depending on what bloody earworm I have. They probably do. Nevertheless, without further ado, here it goes:
Final Scene from Salomé
Salomé is a strange opera. Composed by Richard Strauss, based on a German translation of the French play written by the Irish Oscar Wilde who usually wrote comedies in English, it’s not obvious that it would have succeeded. But succeed it did. In the final scene Salomé, driven mad by the voice of Jochanaan (John the Baptist) and the absence of peace she thought having him executed would bring her, kisses the lips of the decapitated head and declares her love for him (obviously something we all experience every day). A strangely beautiful and eerie scene, it leaves the audience confused and whirled in a tangle after a whole range of haunting compositions throughout the opera, bringing it to a perfect ending through Strauss’s equally strange and lovely music, with the tensions notably rising as Salomé moves through the aria and Herod finally gives the order to have her executed.
‘Flower Duet’ from Lakmé
Probably a bit of a lazy choice due to its undeniable popularity, the ‘Flower Duet’ from Léo Delibes’ Lakmé is nevertheless one of my favourites. Composed during the High Romanticism of 1883, this piece is used frequently in both films and advertisements, making it probably one of the most recognisable pieces of music of all time. And why shouldn’t it be? It’s absolutely gorgeous, heart-warming, moving, full of beautiful harmonies and a calm, serene rhythm. Within the opera’s plot, we are given a calm moment: Lakmé, the daughter of a Brahmin priest and her servant, are gathering some flowers by a river. Of course, it’s basically escapism performed by the characters who wish to drift along with the times, so not all is as idyllic as it seems. But here, they provide us with a moment of paradise.
‘Nessun Dorma’ from Turandot
Another obvious and popular choice, ‘Nessun Dorma’ from Giacomo Puccini’s Turandot brings a moment of peace and beauty to the dreadful sense of tension occurring in the opera. Calaf wishes to marry the deadly and beautiful Princess Turandot, who forces each potential suitor to answer three riddles: if he fails, he is executed; if he succeeds, she is forced to wed him. Calaf successfully solves them, but rather than forcing her to marry someone whom she hates, he gives her a way out: if she can find out his name by dawn, he will die. Calaf anticipates his victory, singing ‘Nessun Dorma’ – ‘Nobody shall sleep’, while the entire population of Peking is seeking to solve his riddle. Oh, and Pavarotti’s singing in this recording is perfect:
Probably a more unusual choice from a generally popular opera, ‘Possente Amor’ (Mighty Love) from Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto is fascinating for its break from an otherwise particularly dark and brooding tragedy. The disgustingly dashing Duke of Mantua, famed for abducting and having his way with as many girls as he sees fit, never seems to realise the fatality his actions might have on his victims, and in this aria it is no different: laden with major cords and an up-beat rhythm, one would hardly think that anything bad is going on at all… but considering Rigoletto’s laments and curses throughout the rest of the opera, we know exactly what is going on. Here another recording with Pavarotti (yes, again), finishing the aria off with a high D for six seconds!
‘Isolde’s Liebestod’ from Tristan und Isolde
Ahh. Tristan und Isolde, one of my favourite operas by Richard Wagner. Does it feel too long at times, as though it’s dragging on? Quite possibly (four hours!). Is it quite humorous how gigantic the opera is, as though everything has to be as large as possible? Certainly. Is it frustrating how the bloody thing starts with a dissonant chord which is never resolved until this aria? Without a doubt. But it’s entirely worth it. This aria, in which Isolde has realised the death of her beloved Tristan, is so heart-wrenchingly depressing that it leaves me with tears in my eyes. Isolde is in a state of denial, swearing that she can still see Tristan smiling and breathing, while she claims to feel herself in a moment of ‘highest bliss’ – while everyone (including Isolde, her friends, the audience) knows that he is, in reality, as dead as a doornail. And yes, that bloody chord from the start is finally brought to a harmonic conclusion.
‘Der Höllen Rache’ from Die Zauberflöte
I must admit to my shame that I am not the biggest fan of Mozart’s operas. Yes, of course they’re beautiful with the gorgeous music you’d expect from a composer of his calibre, and I’d readily listen to any given number of his arias on any day of the week. But they’re often very long, lack a particular dramatic element, and just seem to be reeking of a world which is too good to be true. That’s probably the reason why I particularly value two arias from his operas – one of them being ‘Der Höllen Rache’ from Die Zauberflöte. The Queen of the Night swears to the gods that she will bring the ultimate form of vengeance down on her own daughter if she doesn’t work against Sarastro. The aria is perfect with several changes in mood and a brilliant range for interpretation (provided the singer is skilled enough to interpret this monstrously difficult piece). It is perfect musical drama, through and through. This recording with Diana Damrau is probably the best thing that ever happened since the invention of wine. Ten points for the reader who can point out in the comments the other aria I adore most from Mozart’s operas.
‘Che Gelida Manina’ from La Bohème
Okay, last Puccini and last Pavarotti, I promise. On the surface it looks like dreadful kitsch: Rodolfo, a poverty-ridden poet, falls in love with the young and beautiful Mimi, who is equally smitten. They struggle through life; Mimi has ‘consumption’ (tuberculosis) and dies in a scene which tears at the heartstrings of any listener. But kitsch aside, the music is so beautiful it makes me jealous. Perhaps it’s just precisely because the story is a simple love-at-first-sight plotline that it touches and moves most people… in this particular aria, Rodolfo has just met Mimi and immediately falls in love with her (of course!), so he sings of his longing in four and a half minutes of musical (and lyrical!) heaven.
‘Grand Inquisitor’ from Don Carlo
To bring the drama back here’s another gorgeous duet. Giuseppe Verdi’s Don Carlo is full of tragic and dramatic moments of tension, hardly ever leaving the audience with a moment’s rest. In this particularly dark moment, the Grand Inquisitor visits King Philippe II of Spain, who asks whether the church finds it acceptable for him to put his own son to death. The Inquisitor, ninety years old and as blind as a bat, sees no problem with it and demands, additionally, that the King has Posa killed – the only friend the king still has (or so he believes). The duet portrays perfectly the large tension in power between the church and the state, and is, accordingly, sung by two imposing sounding basses. A very memorable moment in the history of opera.
The piano bit in Turn of the Screw
Okay, calling this scene ‘the piano bit’ might seem less than professional, but since the opera isn’t as clearly divided into individual sections as older ones are, I’m not sure what else to call it. I believe it’s officially called ‘Variation XIII’ – but ‘piano bit’ is probably more memorable. Whatever, just go with it! Benjamin Britten’s haunting opera Turn of the Screw is absolutely brilliant. Based on Henry James’s ghost-ridden novella of the same name, the composer manages to bring out the uncanny and eerie tone of the source material so perfectly that it gives me goosebumps every time I hear it. And this particular scene, when Miles (the creepy kid) plays dissonant and uncomfortable scales on the piano while Flora (his sister) makes Mrs. Grose (the housekeeper) fall asleep so that she can leave the house, perfectly captures the mood of the entire opera… incredible music from an incredible opera. But you probably already knew I liked the opera from my review.
Ending of Götterdämmerung
Yes, I’m finishing with another Wagner. And one which is equally guilty of the sins I mentioned above regarding Tristan und Isolde. But I just can’t leave it out. The Ring-Cycle is an incredible colossus of four operas, altogether lasting roughly 16 hours if you listen to the thing in its entirety. Some sections feel rather slow (esp. in Rheingold and Siegfried), but you should never skip it because there are hidden gems spread throughout all four operas. And, when you’ve finally managed to survive this 16-hour madness of opera, you are rewarded with this finale. The end of the gods has come, Brunhilde, after having lamented the death of the last great hero Siegfried, embraces death herself, and the common people finally acknowledge and await a world without divine intervention. It’s magnificent with lovely harmonies, echoes of some of the opera’s most memorable tunes and rhythms, and represents the perfect finale to one of the greatest accomplishments in opera composition of all time. The moment I’m referring to in this link begins at 13:49, but you might as well listen to the thing in its entirety. It’s probably one of Gwyneth Jones’ most memorable roles as Brunhilde in the grand (and controversial through its communist undertones) production by Pierre Boulez.
Would you recommend other operatic moments which I didn’t mention? Do you think I should reconsider entirely? Then feel free to leave a comment below. If you enjoyed reading the list, please do share it on social media by clicking on one of the tender buttons below.
Flashy, fast-paced and noisy TV shows, films, video games and more dominate our daily intake of entertainment. Coupled with that is the quick exchange of ideas on social media such as Facebook and Twitter. Reading, by contrast, is a slow pastime; letting the sentences conjure up a vivid picture in your head can seem particularly cumbersome in comparison, making you feel as though you’re living in slow-motion.
Poetry is even worse. Whereas it is possible to skim prose, skip certain words or even paragraphs, the whole meaning of a poem can be distorted or lost completely when skipped over or taken in too quickly. But poetry surrounds us in our daily lives: whether it be at school or university, via nursery rhymes we teach our children, or even on the daily commute during cultural movements such as Poems on the Underground (provided you’re lucky enough to live in a wonderful city which does such things – beside the constant onslaught of smog).
The result of this clash? The problem is not that poetry is particularly difficult – although it can be – or that poetic language is becoming more archaic by the day – there are plenty of contemporary or nigh-contemporary poets – but that we are gradually, unstoppably, moving towards a society which just doesn’t know how to slow down and take its time to read a poem.
This is a great pity; I would argue that poetry can be enlightening, can teach us about ourselves, can help us feel and experience things otherwise inaccessible to us, and, above all, be fun. But for the reasons named above, I think it might be important to give a rough how-to of poem-reading – and to help you understand it, even if it can appear genuinely difficult.
First of all – why should you bother?
If you’re at school or university, quite simply because it is required of you – but that doesn’t mean you can’t make your own life easier and richer by giving it a fresh shot. For those who are already beyond that stage, it’s more difficult to make a convincing case, of course. You might very well do without poetry in your daily lives. But you might also suggest that you can do without music, films or prose. It’s not about requiring it: it’s about having an additional feed of experience, of joy, an additional pastime you can indulge in. And never forget the origin of many modern songs or film scripts – they themselves are rooted in poetry. Poetry, being the source, is often more passionate, well thought-out, well-structured, and basically more enjoyable than other pastimes, once you’ve gotten used to it. It requires patience, yes. But it is a patience worth persevering in for the sake of appreciating an additional form of art– and once you’ve overcome the initial hurdle it’s completely worth it. I promise. So let’s make ourselves slow down, take time to breathe, and enjoy the pleasures of poetry (unless you’re a poetry nerd from the start – then you’re probably good to go anyway)!
Read the poem aloud, and read slowly
While this might seem like an easy step, it’s surprising how many people just ignore it. Poetry is often written with the sound in mind; working with many sonic devices like rhyme or metre, a poem needs to be heard, rather than read. By reading it out aloud you start appreciating the technique of the poem, rather than treating it like any other piece of writing. In this step, don’t bother about meaning. Instead, try to hear the echoes in the sound or the regularities of the poem’s rhythm. Some pieces of poetry do away completely with sense and focus more on the sound of the rhythm; Edward Lear’s nonsense poetry or Gertrude Stein’s work fall into this category. Reading aloud is really an essential step and the first one to take when trying to get to grips with a difficult poem. If you’re as unfortunate as I am and have the voice of a turtle making love, you can also use YouTube to find recordings by actors or use Pennsound which contains a large database of poets reading their own work. The point is: listen!
Read it again, ignoring line endings to get the sense of the sentences
Some people with little experience with poetry tend to treat the line breaks as though they constitute an entire sentence in its own right. That is not the case, however. Rather, they indicate pauses or breaths to be taken in between the individual lines. It also provides an effect of emphasising the last word in the line. But it usually doesn’t indicate the end of a sentence, although, sometimes, the last word of a line coincides with the last line of the sentence. The idea in this step is to ignore entirely the existence of lines, but only to concentrate on the sentences to get the pure prosaic meaning of the poem. In an easy poem this is probably not necessary, but if it’s highly complex in its syntax or rhetoric then this can help understand the poem. Try to understand the gist and don’t pay attention to the way the poem is broken up.
Look up words you don’t understand
This one should also be a given, but many people don’t seem to do it. In an age where most of us have immediate access to computers, smartphones or tablets, it really shouldn’t be much of an effort just to type the word into google and voilà – there you have it. If you get a dictionary app or are at your desktop computer, it shouldn’t take more than 5-10 seconds per word – and, who would’ve thought, it helps you understand the poem. Of course, the more exotic the diction of a given poem, the more annoying it can get; if a poem has dozens of words unknown to you, you might wish to see if you can gather the meaning from the context, while googling the ones which seem essential but aren’t evident from the text. If there aren’t that many, then there’s really no excuse for laziness – or pride, for that matter.
Paraphrase the statements of the sentences in a way you understand
This point really helps to get to grips with the poem. Take each sentence on its own – or, if it’s an uncomfortably long sentence, take sections of it – and put it in other words. Just get to the basic, clear meaning of the sentence in isolation without any reference to the other sentences. Quite straight-forward, nothing much to say, and it works wonders. Of course, it doesn’t explain the purpose of the sentence within the wider poem, especially when it’s a particularly difficult one – such as Eliot’s The Waste Land or Pound’s Cantos. But in such cases, it’s questionable anyway to what extent one is meant to understand the whole thing as a comprehensive unit. This step might not tell you why a sentence is in the poem – but it certainly helps you understand the basic meaning.
Pay attention to recurring sounds
This mouse is listening attentively
This point is assisted by the ‘reading aloud’ of the poem. Quite simply, it involves paying attention to recurring sounds within the poem. The most obvious are end-rhymes, where the last word of a line rhymes with the last word of another. But it can also occur within the lines (‘internal’ rhyme), or even echoes of other sorts – such as ‘assonance’, which is when only the vowels rhyme, or ‘consonance’, where only the consonants rhyme. When you hear the echo of a sound in a poem, it is often (though not always!) because the poet is attempting to draw your attention to the connection between the two words, thus emphasising them and bringing them into proximity of one another. One example would be ‘The Burning Babe’ by Robert Southwell. He rhymes ‘good’ with ‘blood’ in reference to Christ, in a connection which, taken in isolation, can quite simply mean that Christ has good blood, without openly stating it. Subtleties like this enhance your understanding of the poem and require nothing but an attentive ear. And an appetite for cheese. I’m sure there’s a study somewhere which claims that eating cheese improves hearing…
Pay attention to the metre: are there irregularities?
To find out more about metre, please see my beginner’s guide. Simply put, the selection of a common metre – such as the iambic pentameter – helps set the basic mood or tone of a poem. Using more uncommon metres – such as the trochee – can mean that the poet is deliberately complicating the tone to create a certain effect, as you can read in my post. Most important, however, are irregularities within a regular metre, because they draw attention to specifics in the poem. Sometimes they are, of course, just there for the sake of avoiding the poem sounding dull and metronomic, and irregularities make it more interesting. The best poets, however, couple the interestingness (according to Microsoft Office that is a word!) with meaning, e.g., replacing the first iambic foot with a trochaic foot in an otherwise regularly iambic poem can draw attention to the first word, or indicate a stronger start within the poem. These observations are never conclusive due to the uncertain nature of prosody, but they can support a theory you might have developed by completing the points above. And, being a good, though new, student of poetry, you have of course followed my advice to the letter so far.
Note recurring themes
By this time, you have a pretty good grasp of the plain meaning of the sentences, have read aloud, you’ve paid attention to the sonic suggestions in the poem’s rhythms and echoes, and you know the meaning of each word. With that you can get a good sense of what the poem’s themes are – in other words, you can get close to ‘what the poem is actually about’. This might be quite simple and straight-forward, might even be indicated by the title, or it can be more submerged, hidden beneath uncertainties in the rhythm and only implied by the speaker of the poem. One example of such a cryptic theme would be Robert Frost’s ‘The Road Not Taken’: on the surface, it’s just about the speaker choosing between two paths. But when considered in light of the whole poem, it seems to be about the importance of making choices in general, and that taking the difficult, less-trodden path can make a great difference. So, by determining the theme you decide what to pay attention to when reading it again, and you use the poem itself to see how it explores that theme.
Don’t assume everything is allegorical
A rose is a rose
Many beginners tend to make the mistake of assuming that everything in every poem is allegorical – that is, to say that x in a poem actually means y. It’s tempting to do: it makes you sound as though you’re ‘getting behind’ what the poet was doing, and as though you’re analysing the poem properly. The fact that most poems deal in metaphors, allegories, similes etc. also makes this seem to be the case. But still: don’t assume you can equate x with y, just because it seems convenient to do. Sometimes a rose is just a rose. It can symbolise love, but it doesn’t have to. By reading a poem AS an allegory you’re forced to make assumptions which might just not be true. Always work with what the text, as a self-contained entity, gives you. That doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t search for internal metaphors and try to find out for yourself what they could mean – but it does mean that you shouldn’t jump to conclusions. You can’t read the mind of a dead poet – or of a living poet, for that matter. Be humble in your assertions and always see if you can prove what you are claiming via the text.
Realise that not all is supposed to have an underlying meaning; some things are there for the pleasure of the exploration
Related to the previous point, sometimes the poet might not have intended to do anything besides providing a vivid description of an object, a person, a landscape etc. In these cases, the allegory-error is particularly egregious. If you’re unsure, the poet may have been trying to write something beautiful, something to be appreciated – in short, art. Poems aren’t riddles; while intentions and more interesting truths can be found in them, they aren’t designed to be untangled, dissected, pulled through the mill, but to be enjoyed. If you’re unsure as to the ‘deeper meaning’ of a poem, why not just enjoy it for its own sake – for the sake of the images, the descriptions, the senses it evokes, the story it tells? There’s no harm in that. Unless you’re writing an essay. Then please, please try to make an argument based on more than the need to find an argument.
Be confident
Some poems are virtually impenetrable, others seem deceptively easy. In either case, you might be tempted to do away with it and just give up. But I’d urge you not to despair: easy poems might truly be easy, and difficult ones, if you follow these steps, can be understood, even if it requires patience or assistance from other sources. It’s perfectly alright to search the internet for background info – it’s not cheating to seek other readings of poems (although you need to be aware that these, too, are just opinions), and it’s certainly helpful to consider the circumstances of the poets you are reading. If you have a theory and you can prove it with the text, there’s no reason to assume you’re not right. And even if you’re wrong and in a discussion, somebody points this out to you (because we all discuss poems with our friends, obviously), this is the best way to learn more about the craft. Just be confident in forming your opinions and testing the waters – certainly a better pastime than shielding yourself from seeking the truth! Also, never forget to have fun with the poems: in most cases, they are meant to be entertaining.
Common complaint: Why don’t poets write clearer?
One common complaint many newbies of poetry have is that poets don’t write clearly. Why don’t they just bloody well say what they mean? This complaint is most common among school students who spend hours (or at least what to them seems like hours) trying to decipher what a poem is about. But it is based on a misconception: poetry isn’t a philosophical/ political essay; its purpose isn’t (at least usually) to convince you of a particular viewpoint or to communicate a proposition, but rather to give you an experience, enable you to feel something, which can be (but need not be) related to a proposition/ viewpoint. A poem is a work of art and should be treated as such; it is not about telling you the idea of a poet who came up with some profound ‘truth’ while sitting on the toilet. If the poet wanted to teach you about something concrete or convince you of his/ her opinion, he/ she would have written an essay or dissertation, not a form which is inescapably and indubitably a form of art.
Closing words
The beauty of these steps is that the more poetry you read and study in this way or otherwise, the quicker you get – and, at some point, you begin instinctively to hear the connections in sound, understand the rhythmical structure, and the way themes might or might not develop. And the better you get at it, the more joy you get out of reading poetry. So just give it a shot – have fun, for heaven’s sake! It won’t hurt too much. I promise. Don’t sue me if it does.
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The thing is, this just doesn’t happen. The Eureka-feeling never strikes those who haven’t put in any effort. It’s a by-product of hard work. From my own academic and creative experience, I know that I put a lot of research and thinking into a project, and then, through conscious and subconscious musings about the project, I might be struck with a small Eureka-moment in form of the perfect formulation for a specific sentence, paragraph or argument. I don’t know of anyone who just ‘happened’ to get the same feeling without trying.
You’re probably wondering by now – and quite rightly so – what I think about talent. It’s true: some people seem to slave away the way I described above, and still don’t manage to achieve anything. Others seem to work a lot less and still come up with great pieces of art. So yes, I do agree that talent has a major part to play in the creation of something beautiful. The problem is: it’s almost impossible to quantify.
Flashy, fast-paced and noisy TV shows, films, video games and more dominate our daily intake of entertainment. Coupled with that is the quick exchange of ideas on social media such as Facebook and Twitter. Reading, by contrast, is a slow pastime; letting the sentences conjure up a vivid picture in your head can seem particularly cumbersome in comparison, making you feel as though you’re living in slow-motion.
