Overcoming the Barbarism of Modern English

This is the first of many posts explaining in brief the theory of poetry proposed and practiced by Gravitas Press. In my book Poetry Against the World I take up the question of poetry as a vocation-- what it means for a person to be called to a life dedicated to poetry as opposed to simply being interested in it-- and along the way I do a good deal to define the purposes and ideals of poetry itself. I hope on this blog to consider some of these same questions in a more general way.

To begin with, let's talk a bit about the barbarism of modern English. Why is modern English barbarous? That's a question with too many answers. Regardless of the reasons, this barbarism is a manifest fact that cannot be explained away. Anyone who listens to the lyrical rhythms of middle English will quickly become aware of it. One need not be a linguist or a philologist to hear the difference. Thus it is not surprising that modern poets who are seeking a more lyrical expression-- as opposed to poets who want their writing to sound like everyday speech-- sometimes draw inspiration from older forms of our language, or from Scotch and Irish dialects.

This could be greatly expanded, but for now I'll list only a few of the many reasons for our modern linguistic barbarism:

1. Excessive Egalitarianism: When educated people, song writers, politicians or other public speakers, feel they must avoid an elevated style as to not sound too far above the common man, the language quickly sinks into the mud. Ideally high and low culture ought to remain distinct, but also influence and correct each other. High culture corrects and purifies what is vulgar and simplistic in folk traditions, whereas the earthiness of low culture helps to balance the superficiality that develops among people with an excess of leisure.
2. Little Use of Word Endings: Word endings matter less in English than in many other languages. In itself this is not much of a problem. There are many techniques such as alliteration and assonance that do not rely on word endings. It is, however, a problem for us because so many of the well-known verse forms do involve end rhyme.
3. Abbreviation and Acronym: Obviously there is some utility in shortening words or reducing common phrases. It is not an evil in itself, but has been taken to incredible extremes in our age of mass marketing and digital communication. Some ways of shortening words actually make language more lyrical, as when a poet replaces a syllable with an apostraphe to preserve a steady rhythm. Excessive shortening of words and phrases in modern English not only makes the language clunky, it also creates a mindset in which language is reduced to a practical tool for exchanging knowledge. Clearly language is such a tool, but the universal presence of poetry in all civilizations should make it obvious that language also has an important esthetic quality that ought to be cultivated. (By the way, though I do not normally recommend him, Heidegger has some brilliant meditation on this subject in his later essays.)

Now that the problem is more or less outlined, I will tell you the solution Sean and I, the main authors for Gravitas Press as of now, have arrived at. To overcome modern linguistic barbarism there must be a living connection to older use of English. When I say living connection I emphatically do not mean scholarly knowledge, but mean honest enjoyment of older works and an openness to influence. That being said, merely attempting to imitate the past is not enough. What worked in the past worked because of the way English was used in the past. It will not work today, at least not in exactly the same way. It is not that I would refuse to write a sonnet. I would gladly write one. The problem is that the sonnet and other set forms have not been received as a tradition, they have not been truly handed down to us. Furthermore, many young writers today find that older forms do not fit language as they have come to understand it. The solution I have found is what I call "ordered free verse." By that I mean poetry that could be called free verse in the sense that it follows no defined and consistent pattern, but which echoes the tones, rhythms, and expressions of an older lyricism. Rather than trying to write as if I live in a period other than my own I can begin with the obvious fact that I am alive today and allow my own modern English to search out patterns that fit it's own peculiar qualities. Thus my poetry in general would be categorized as free verse, but much of it can be scanned intelligibly, and makes use of rhyme and alliteration. I cannot say whether this will eventually evolve into definite poetic forms such as we had in the past, but it definitely seems to be a way forward that neither takes the deformity of modern English as normal nor holds too rigidly to older forms.

Beyond purely literary concerns, there is also a broad philosophical background to all of this. Language changes for countless reasons, but many of the changes in modern English are a result of our changed way of viewing the world. It is not a coincidence that the attitude which supposes language is a purely mechanical means of transmitting knowledge appears at the same time as mechanistic and utilitarian philosophies. It is not a coincidence that the desire of poets to write according to the laws of everyday speech appears in an age distrustful of all aristocratic institutions. Thus the true poet must be philosophically, and beyond that even religiously, anti-modern. A mere love for the sound of language is not enough.

I hope that is of some interest to someone somewhere. Soon I will have several follow up posts outlining other problems Gravitas Press has set out to overcome. I believe my next posts will be on the forgotten role of the poet as historian, and on the pros and cons of scholarly studies for the would-be poet.