Postmodernism
For the last thirty years acres of print have been devoted to what the postmodern may signify and whether or not it is a good thing. This is an attempt to provide a general description and to attempt to differentiate between modernist and postmodern poetry. It's important to recognise that labels aren't particullarly useful and that boundaries often get blurred.
Modernism was characterised by a belief in technological progress (which would save us) and an interest in the new. This is seen by some as the culmination of the Enlightenment with its faith in knowledge and scientific discovery. At some stage in the second half of the twentieth century this confidence in progress was replaced by anxiety about population growth and environmental damage and the 'grand narrative' came to a grinding halt.
The cultural fall-out has been enormous, modernist work from this perspective is seen as elitist, obscure and far too serious for its own good. Postmodern artists have set about creating work that is deliberately playful, self-referential with a more ambiguous relationship to 'meaning'.
There are a number of ways to think about postmodernism:
- it doesn't exist other than as an invention of the academy and therefore can be ignored;
- it does exist as a by-product of post-industrial capitalism and is therefore a very bad thing and must be resisted;
- it is very real and pervasive and we must try and understand it;
- culturally it is much more 'democratic' than modernism and should therefore be celebrated.
All of these could be seen as valid although I would be more comfortable about the first if large corporations hadn't become so self-referential in their advertising. It does seem that we live in a postmodern world and we need to find ways to deal with that fact.
Postmodern poetry
The best way to describe postmodern poetry is by example. This is usually straighforward but can be complicated by the fact that some Americans seem intent to put late modernist work under the 'postmodern' umbrella, J H Prynne in particular seems to be described in this way. Prynne has made one of the most useful distinctions between modernist and postmodern poetry, the former being charaterised by "obscure and complex aspects relating to thought and ideas, to imagery and structure, to condensed or broken linkages, and to embedded reference to other texta or works" whereas postmodern "playfulness where meaning is allowed to skim across a surface in a deliberately arbitrary way".
If we are to use a suspicion of 'meaning' as a guiding feature of the postmodern then John Ashbery is a prime example. His brilliant early poem 'The Skater'contains an extended attack on the notion of meaning and providing explanation in poetry and the rest of his career has demonstrated a studied indifference to meaning in all its forms. Ashbery's use of language is also playful and his work has become increasingly self-referential. What makes Ashbery interesting however is that there's always signs of a late modernist struggling to get out.
These are the last eight lines of "A Worldly Country" which was published in 2007:
As I gazed at the quiet rubble, one thing
puzzled me: What had happened, and why?
One minute we were up to our necks in rebelliousness
and the next,peace had subdued the ranks of hellishness.So often it happens that the time we turned around in
soon becomes the shoal our pathetic skiff will run aground in.
And just as the waves are anchored to the bottom of the sea
we must reach the shallows before God cuts us free.
This doesn't seem very postmodern at all, it speaks of big themes (time, existence) in a serious way and even brings in'God' rather than 'a god'. It's not obviously ironic either.
Kenneth Goldsmith is an American poet who eschews the notion of creativity altogether and yet manages to produce works that are startling and profoundly subversive. "Soliloquy is a transcript of everything that Goldsmith said over seven days. It begins with this:
Good morning, how ya doin'? Yep. Wait a second, I have my ticket. OK. There you go. Thanks. See you soon. Oh oh oh, I thought you said have a good weekend. Oh, OK. Have a good week. See you later. How you doin'? Alright, alright. Two, please. You don't want to save that for four or is it OK? Do you have any newspapers lying around? I'll just have a coffee to start. Thanks. OK, babe. OK. How ya doin'? Uh huh. Regular. I'll take regular this time. Did you go all the way back to the gallery? You're sweating. That's good... it's good for you. Oh, thanks. Yeah, of course. Everybody knows that guy. He's sort of... sort of famous. I saw a bunch of these actually on the racks. At a coffee shop. They're out and in the world, which is pretty neat. That's cool and I like that. Very Cool. We've gotta get a poster. I don't know, I don't know. I was told by people there was a poster there. Yeah, I know. That's why you can't take publicity too seriously. Yeah, maybe other people do... they love publicity. So, have you been sleeping? No, don't worry... your life will change. Be assured, your life will change. Sure. Sure. So I'm told. Yeah. Oh yeah. Oh John, do you know what you want? I do. I'd like the uh, pancakes, uh short sounds good. A little more coffee and some water. Has Karin been out of the house? That's right you guys had an opening. Well, I heard it last Sunday. It's really nice that all the artists came over. Yeah. I thought that was really cool. I mean, we all came over at the same time. I thought that was very hip. Good move. That means you only have to tell the stories once. Bitter? You want some milk? How was your opening?
"Traffic" is a transcript on New York traffic reports over a 24 hour period. Here's the 2.41 report:
Well, looks like as you, uh, make your trip right now, uh, in Queens, the Grand Central's gonna start getting better. They're clearing that accident over by the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, all lanes are being reopened. But the LIE, something's going on through Queens Boulevard, because it is much slower than normal, jam-packed from the BQE heading over toward Woodhaven and toward Queens Boulevard, that we see on the WINS Jam Cam. Now the BQE is getting better going up toward the Kosciuszko Bridge. And in the Bronx things are getting a lot better on the Cross Bronx west to the GW Bridge. Only hot spot across the Hudson, the Holland Tunnel there's still delays back to Jersey. If you use the Whitestone Bridge, be prepared for a little bit of traffic on the way to the Bronx. You've got roadwork in place. The, uh, Throgs Neck Bridge very good out of Queens into the Bronx. And, uh, be aware on the Saw Mill still in Westchester, southbound side of the Saw Mill Parkway right by 287 in Elmsford, there's an overturned car. Emergency crews still remain on scene.
No-one could argue that this (as text) is in any way serious or profound. What Goldsmith has done does not require any kind of creative ability and it could be argued that the meaningless quality of the dross that surrounds our daily life is his point. He has produced similar work based on weather reports and sports reports. Along with similarities to Jasper Johns putting the American flag on a gallery wall (arguably one of the first postmodern acts), Goldsmith is forcing us to consider how much language there is in the world and how little of it is put to use. There is no 'message' in the text there is no meaning for the reader to discover.
Playfulness is an important element in Goldsmith's work, there's a recording on Penn Sound of "Kenneth Goldsmith Reads Ludwig Wittgenstein's Culture and Value in German, a Language He Neither Speaks Nor Understands" as well as Goldsmith singing extracts from Derrida, Jameson and Adorno.
Paul Muldoon produces work that is frequently described as postmodern, his work deploys a detached ironic voice and it could be said that he pays more attention to the form of a poem than its meaning. Muldoon has garnered critical acclaim even though he also has reputation for difficulty (especially with 'Madoc'). One of our cleverest and most technically accomplished poets, Muldoon does seem to insist on ramming these skills down the reader's throat but his work is always interesting even if it seems to be becoming increasingly 'slight'.