From: Natalie@yabbs
To: all@yabbs
Subject: Yeats
Date: Tue May 24 01:43:29 1994

I got this wonderful book of literary criticism.  It's called "Yeats" and 
it's written by Harold Bloom.  I was reading it at work andthere was a 
passage which made me laugh out loud.  So I though I'd share it with you 
all.

though the most famous lines against rhetoric since rimbaud's are by 
yeats, his vision of reality increasingly demanded a more flamboyant 
rhetorical procedure than his own statements could have sanctioned.  this 
is not unique in yeats; the most wearisome critical statements, from 
Wordsworth to the present day, are those against poetical diction and in 
favor of the rhythms of supposedly common speech.  These statements, 
wheher in wordsworth, pound, eliot, or in the host of little poundlings 
and elioticians (heheheheh...that's you Cat...), invariably turn out to 
have no relation whatsoever to any good poets actual performance.  
hatever the rhythms of Yeats became, they were never conversational.  If 
one wants that, one can go, I suppose, to auden, betjeman or larkin, but 
not to the high romantic, anglo-irish yeats.l

ok, i admit it.  it was the swipe at eliot and pound i liked.  But I agree 
100% w/ bloom.  And btw, he is VERY critical of mon cher yeats in this 
book too, so it's not 500 pages of him going on and on about how great he 
was.  well, imho he was really great, but hey, that's just me....

natalie