WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.240 align:middle line:84% These workshops you mentioned, many of us are told, 00:00:03.240 --> 00:00:06.060 align:middle line:84% you know cut out the adverbs, cut out the adjectives. 00:00:06.060 --> 00:00:08.220 align:middle line:84% And in reading a number of your poems, 00:00:08.220 --> 00:00:11.730 align:middle line:84% I've noticed you very quietly sneak in a lot of adjectives. 00:00:11.730 --> 00:00:15.822 align:middle line:84% How aware are when you're writing that the adjectives are 00:00:15.822 --> 00:00:16.530 align:middle line:90% getting in there? 00:00:16.530 --> 00:00:17.260 align:middle line:90% Right. 00:00:17.260 --> 00:00:18.630 align:middle line:90% I'm surprised anyone noticed. 00:00:18.630 --> 00:00:20.070 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:20.070 --> 00:00:21.510 align:middle line:90% It's very, very astute of you. 00:00:21.510 --> 00:00:25.410 align:middle line:84% [LAUGHTER] I'll have to sneak them in a little more sneakily. 00:00:25.410 --> 00:00:28.770 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:00:28.770 --> 00:00:30.760 align:middle line:90% Well, they I think they need-- 00:00:30.760 --> 00:00:37.920 align:middle line:84% modifiers need to be deployed very consciously. 00:00:37.920 --> 00:00:42.180 align:middle line:84% I tried in a workshop often to get my students 00:00:42.180 --> 00:00:46.170 align:middle line:84% to write without modifiers in the beginning. 00:00:46.170 --> 00:00:50.070 align:middle line:84% It's very difficult to write without simile or metaphor 00:00:50.070 --> 00:00:52.680 align:middle line:90% modifiers. 00:00:52.680 --> 00:00:54.930 align:middle line:84% In the style sort of of William Carlos Williams, 00:00:54.930 --> 00:00:56.400 align:middle line:84% say in his poem "Nantucket," which 00:00:56.400 --> 00:00:58.245 align:middle line:90% is a poem of just pure nouns. 00:00:58.245 --> 00:01:01.890 align:middle line:90% 00:01:01.890 --> 00:01:02.760 align:middle line:90% I try to-- 00:01:02.760 --> 00:01:06.330 align:middle line:84% I think there's the things of the world-- 00:01:06.330 --> 00:01:12.840 align:middle line:84% the cup, for example, has an expressive power. 00:01:12.840 --> 00:01:17.400 align:middle line:84% And without your modifying it, without saying it's a warm, 00:01:17.400 --> 00:01:21.390 align:middle line:84% purple, something cup-- welcoming cup-- 00:01:21.390 --> 00:01:25.620 align:middle line:90% cup is really self-sufficient. 00:01:25.620 --> 00:01:27.810 align:middle line:84% I think Charles Simic is wonderful with that, 00:01:27.810 --> 00:01:31.860 align:middle line:84% taking a word like broom, or a word like apple, 00:01:31.860 --> 00:01:35.460 align:middle line:84% or store of window, or street lamp, 00:01:35.460 --> 00:01:38.460 align:middle line:84% and letting it alone unchaperoned. 00:01:38.460 --> 00:01:46.710 align:middle line:84% And so then, I think a easy mistake 00:01:46.710 --> 00:01:51.480 align:middle line:84% is to crowd your nouns with modifiers so that you 00:01:51.480 --> 00:01:54.090 align:middle line:90% can't see the noun anymore. 00:01:54.090 --> 00:01:56.970 align:middle line:84% Chekhov talks about this in writing short stories. 00:01:56.970 --> 00:01:58.890 align:middle line:84% Chekhov says, if I say -- if I write, 00:01:58.890 --> 00:02:02.490 align:middle line:84% a man walked into a park and sat down on the lawn, 00:02:02.490 --> 00:02:04.170 align:middle line:90% you can see that immediately. 00:02:04.170 --> 00:02:08.287 align:middle line:84% It's just as if I said to you, a sliced orange on a plate. 00:02:08.287 --> 00:02:09.120 align:middle line:90% You see what I mean? 00:02:09.120 --> 00:02:10.525 align:middle line:90% You can't help but see it. 00:02:10.525 --> 00:02:12.150 align:middle line:84% There's a power in just [SNAPS FINGERS] 00:02:12.150 --> 00:02:13.380 align:middle line:90% being able to evoke that. 00:02:13.380 --> 00:02:14.080 align:middle line:90% 00:02:14.080 --> 00:02:19.530 align:middle line:84% But Chekhov says, if I say a balding middle-aged man wearing 00:02:19.530 --> 00:02:26.340 align:middle line:84% a shabby gray overcoat slowly shuffled through the park 00:02:26.340 --> 00:02:26.850 align:middle line:90% gates-- 00:02:26.850 --> 00:02:31.740 align:middle line:84% and you stop seeing it anymore, because you just have language. 00:02:31.740 --> 00:02:34.690 align:middle line:84% The language is there and the thing isn't there anymore. 00:02:34.690 --> 00:02:37.120 align:middle line:84% Now Seamus Heaney said that when he was a young man, 00:02:37.120 --> 00:02:39.490 align:middle line:84% he wanted to write poems like stained glass-- 00:02:39.490 --> 00:02:42.570 align:middle line:84% really impressive and flashy and colorful. 00:02:42.570 --> 00:02:45.840 align:middle line:84% And after a while, he wanted to write poems like glass 00:02:45.840 --> 00:02:49.650 align:middle line:90% and just to see the thing. 00:02:49.650 --> 00:02:56.032 align:middle line:84% But I think my way of going about it, I think, is to -- 00:02:56.032 --> 00:03:01.260 align:middle line:84% is to again begin with a simple vocabulary, simple palette, 00:03:01.260 --> 00:03:02.670 align:middle line:90% simple diction-- 00:03:02.670 --> 00:03:07.020 align:middle line:84% with a respect for the fact that the word bird, and cup, 00:03:07.020 --> 00:03:10.870 align:middle line:84% and window, and tree can get along very well without you, 00:03:10.870 --> 00:03:12.780 align:middle line:90% thank you very much, right? 00:03:12.780 --> 00:03:15.630 align:middle line:84% But having established a simple vocabulary, 00:03:15.630 --> 00:03:19.200 align:middle line:84% you then open the opportunity for this kind of stealth stuff 00:03:19.200 --> 00:03:22.740 align:middle line:84% you're talking about, where you can then 00:03:22.740 --> 00:03:29.260 align:middle line:84% put in a kind of outrageous adjective. 00:03:29.260 --> 00:03:32.800 align:middle line:84% But if you just start by throwing modifiers 00:03:32.800 --> 00:03:39.190 align:middle line:84% at the reader, it becomes a kind of confusing assault of effect. 00:03:39.190 --> 00:03:43.000 align:middle line:90%