WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:00.630 align:middle line:90% Hi. 00:00:00.630 --> 00:00:01.440 align:middle line:90% Hi. 00:00:01.440 --> 00:00:03.135 align:middle line:90% Hi. 00:00:03.135 --> 00:00:04.740 align:middle line:90% Golly, hot [INAUDIBLE]. 00:00:04.740 --> 00:00:06.240 align:middle line:90% I got stage fright. 00:00:06.240 --> 00:00:06.750 align:middle line:90% No, I want-- 00:00:06.750 --> 00:00:07.950 align:middle line:90% Me too. 00:00:07.950 --> 00:00:09.750 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:00:09.750 --> 00:00:12.390 align:middle line:90% Could you find a male-- 00:00:12.390 --> 00:00:15.030 align:middle line:84% of the white male you described, did you 00:00:15.030 --> 00:00:17.595 align:middle line:84% find any that were sensitive and came out 00:00:17.595 --> 00:00:22.980 align:middle line:84% for what seemed to them very threatening 00:00:22.980 --> 00:00:27.480 align:middle line:90% writing at the time? 00:00:27.480 --> 00:00:29.265 align:middle line:84% Do you mean male poets or male critics? 00:00:29.265 --> 00:00:31.810 align:middle line:84% Well, let's start with the critics. 00:00:31.810 --> 00:00:35.220 align:middle line:84% Well, first of all, I will say you can be a woman 00:00:35.220 --> 00:00:37.350 align:middle line:90% and be misogynist, sadly. 00:00:37.350 --> 00:00:41.160 align:middle line:84% So a lot of those little snippets 00:00:41.160 --> 00:00:45.330 align:middle line:84% from reviews that I read were written by women, not just 00:00:45.330 --> 00:00:45.960 align:middle line:90% Helen Vendler. 00:00:45.960 --> 00:00:46.995 align:middle line:90% I just like to-- 00:00:46.995 --> 00:00:52.080 align:middle line:84% it's easy to get in a fight with Helen Vendler for me. 00:00:52.080 --> 00:00:53.640 align:middle line:90% So I think-- 00:00:53.640 --> 00:00:55.270 align:middle line:90% I mean, it's really interesting. 00:00:55.270 --> 00:00:57.070 align:middle line:84% I was talking to my dad this morning, 00:00:57.070 --> 00:00:59.610 align:middle line:84% and he told me something I never knew, 00:00:59.610 --> 00:01:03.480 align:middle line:84% which was that he took a class with Rosenthal 00:01:03.480 --> 00:01:07.260 align:middle line:90% in the '60s at NYU. 00:01:07.260 --> 00:01:10.860 align:middle line:84% And I asked my father like, did Rosenthal 00:01:10.860 --> 00:01:12.315 align:middle line:90% ever mention Allen Ginsberg? 00:01:12.315 --> 00:01:14.210 align:middle line:84% And he was like, no, of course not. 00:01:14.210 --> 00:01:18.010 align:middle line:84% Like that was completely not on the radar. 00:01:18.010 --> 00:01:21.000 align:middle line:84% I mean, I looked at Rosenthal's anthology, 00:01:21.000 --> 00:01:26.070 align:middle line:84% which was really like the exemplary anthology 00:01:26.070 --> 00:01:27.030 align:middle line:90% of its time. 00:01:27.030 --> 00:01:29.462 align:middle line:84% There's a two-part volume-- one of British poets, 00:01:29.462 --> 00:01:30.420 align:middle line:90% one of American poets-- 00:01:30.420 --> 00:01:31.480 align:middle line:90% and I forget the exact-- 00:01:31.480 --> 00:01:33.120 align:middle line:90% I think there were 29 poets. 00:01:33.120 --> 00:01:36.090 align:middle line:84% Five of them were women; all of them were white. 00:01:36.090 --> 00:01:38.130 align:middle line:90% I think it was just not-- 00:01:38.130 --> 00:01:40.660 align:middle line:84% I'm not making any excuses for that. 00:01:40.660 --> 00:01:47.580 align:middle line:84% I think that it has really taken and is still really a struggle. 00:01:47.580 --> 00:01:55.410 align:middle line:84% I think that America had an idea of who a poet was, 00:01:55.410 --> 00:01:57.030 align:middle line:90% and it was Robert Lowell. 00:01:57.030 --> 00:01:58.455 align:middle line:90% It wasn't really anybody else. 00:01:58.455 --> 00:02:01.980 align:middle line:90% 00:02:01.980 --> 00:02:03.650 align:middle line:90% There's a lot-- 00:02:03.650 --> 00:02:07.010 align:middle line:84% I mean, this lecture could've been many times longer. 00:02:07.010 --> 00:02:08.990 align:middle line:84% There are fascinating relationships 00:02:08.990 --> 00:02:12.890 align:middle line:84% between Lowell and Sexton and Plath and Snodgrass. 00:02:12.890 --> 00:02:14.030 align:middle line:90% They taught each other. 00:02:14.030 --> 00:02:15.270 align:middle line:90% They influenced each other. 00:02:15.270 --> 00:02:17.360 align:middle line:84% The power dynamics between them-- 00:02:17.360 --> 00:02:19.730 align:middle line:84% Snodgrass was very supportive of Sexton 00:02:19.730 --> 00:02:23.270 align:middle line:84% until he was very not supportive of Sexton. 00:02:23.270 --> 00:02:28.520 align:middle line:84% Lowell was reading Snodgrass's work and Sexton's work 00:02:28.520 --> 00:02:30.830 align:middle line:84% when he was writing Life Studies. 00:02:30.830 --> 00:02:31.940 align:middle line:90% It's not so clear. 00:02:31.940 --> 00:02:35.750 align:middle line:84% Like, first came Lowell and then came everyone else. 00:02:35.750 --> 00:02:41.270 align:middle line:84% So it's a fascinating field to look into. 00:02:41.270 --> 00:02:41.930 align:middle line:90% Who else? 00:02:41.930 --> 00:02:45.858 align:middle line:90% 00:02:45.858 --> 00:02:47.595 align:middle line:90% Hi, Susan. 00:02:47.595 --> 00:02:51.972 align:middle line:90% 00:02:51.972 --> 00:02:53.180 align:middle line:90% Did you like the intro that-- 00:02:53.180 --> 00:02:53.680 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:02:53.680 --> 00:02:57.110 align:middle line:90% Oh, I love the intro. 00:02:57.110 --> 00:02:59.650 align:middle line:84% And I love Renee's intro too the other day. 00:02:59.650 --> 00:03:01.990 align:middle line:84% We made it seem like I didn't like Renee's intro. 00:03:01.990 --> 00:03:04.510 align:middle line:84% I never said I didn't like introductions. 00:03:04.510 --> 00:03:05.320 align:middle line:90% No. 00:03:05.320 --> 00:03:06.780 align:middle line:90% This was awesome. 00:03:06.780 --> 00:03:09.060 align:middle line:90% And one of the things-- 00:03:09.060 --> 00:03:09.727 align:middle line:90% It wasn't funny. 00:03:09.727 --> 00:03:11.810 align:middle line:84% That's what I didn't like about your introduction. 00:03:11.810 --> 00:03:13.970 align:middle line:84% You got every body vetting for me to be funny. 00:03:13.970 --> 00:03:15.460 align:middle line:90% Yeah, she's funnier. 00:03:15.460 --> 00:03:19.630 align:middle line:84% She was like-- this was not a GNAT-- a non-GNAT. 00:03:19.630 --> 00:03:20.560 align:middle line:90% This is academic. 00:03:20.560 --> 00:03:21.070 align:middle line:90% I know. 00:03:21.070 --> 00:03:22.720 align:middle line:84% But what was great about it is I have 00:03:22.720 --> 00:03:24.860 align:middle line:84% a lot of really smart stuff written down 00:03:24.860 --> 00:03:28.510 align:middle line:84% that now I'll repeat and hopefully credit you. 00:03:28.510 --> 00:03:30.390 align:middle line:90% Don't bother. 00:03:30.390 --> 00:03:32.950 align:middle line:84% So the question I have is, you talked 00:03:32.950 --> 00:03:37.450 align:middle line:84% about thinking about confessional poetry as being, 00:03:37.450 --> 00:03:40.420 align:middle line:84% quote, "witness to a shared moment of cultural breakdown." 00:03:40.420 --> 00:03:41.020 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:03:41.020 --> 00:03:43.975 align:middle line:84% And that seems to me like the way-- 00:03:43.975 --> 00:03:49.828 align:middle line:84% or is that part of what's that disobedience about-- 00:03:49.828 --> 00:03:54.910 align:middle line:84% I'm not a big Robert Lowell fan, but For the Union Dead to me 00:03:54.910 --> 00:03:57.910 align:middle line:84% is one of the most amazing poems of the 20th Century 00:03:57.910 --> 00:04:04.510 align:middle line:84% because it situates the self in this complex web of race 00:04:04.510 --> 00:04:09.940 align:middle line:84% relations and a post-World War II moment 00:04:09.940 --> 00:04:12.140 align:middle line:90% in a kind of amazing way. 00:04:12.140 --> 00:04:17.860 align:middle line:84% And I think that's where I see the personal sort of being 00:04:17.860 --> 00:04:19.959 align:middle line:90% in line with disobedience. 00:04:19.959 --> 00:04:22.089 align:middle line:84% Is that what you were thinking as well? 00:04:22.089 --> 00:04:25.450 align:middle line:84% And maybe you can talk about other both confessional and 00:04:25.450 --> 00:04:27.200 align:middle line:90% disobedient poems for us. 00:04:27.200 --> 00:04:27.700 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:04:27.700 --> 00:04:32.830 align:middle line:84% I mean, I've spent some time with Robert Lowell recently, 00:04:32.830 --> 00:04:34.720 align:middle line:90% and it's been complicated. 00:04:34.720 --> 00:04:36.190 align:middle line:84% I was never interested in Lowell. 00:04:36.190 --> 00:04:40.400 align:middle line:84% I just couldn't hear it, and I couldn't appreciate it. 00:04:40.400 --> 00:04:43.750 align:middle line:84% And his personal complaints seemed like-- 00:04:43.750 --> 00:04:45.670 align:middle line:90% I didn't identify with them. 00:04:45.670 --> 00:04:47.800 align:middle line:90% They didn't move me. 00:04:47.800 --> 00:04:54.640 align:middle line:84% I've come to have more empathy for him and certainly to feel-- 00:04:54.640 --> 00:04:56.920 align:middle line:84% it's just so fascinating to me to think 00:04:56.920 --> 00:05:00.250 align:middle line:90% about the ways in which-- 00:05:00.250 --> 00:05:03.430 align:middle line:84% he absolutely was disobedient, and he absolutely 00:05:03.430 --> 00:05:04.460 align:middle line:90% was taking a big risk. 00:05:04.460 --> 00:05:11.800 align:middle line:84% I mean, he was a conscientious objector, but he-- 00:05:11.800 --> 00:05:15.255 align:middle line:84% a lot of the break that Rosenthal is noticing, 00:05:15.255 --> 00:05:16.630 align:middle line:84% which I didn't really talk about, 00:05:16.630 --> 00:05:20.680 align:middle line:84% is formal, which is interesting because Lowell was much more 00:05:20.680 --> 00:05:23.650 align:middle line:84% formal than the poets who really came right before him. 00:05:23.650 --> 00:05:26.560 align:middle line:84% So it was weird because he was going backwards and forwards. 00:05:26.560 --> 00:05:28.810 align:middle line:84% And it's only in the poems at the end of Life Studies 00:05:28.810 --> 00:05:31.600 align:middle line:90% that really do this thing. 00:05:31.600 --> 00:05:35.660 align:middle line:84% But I'm losing the train of your question. 00:05:35.660 --> 00:05:37.660 align:middle line:84% And my thought, I jumped off somewhere. 00:05:37.660 --> 00:05:43.540 align:middle line:84% I think that it's confusing to me because, on the one hand, 00:05:43.540 --> 00:05:50.350 align:middle line:84% I embrace and admire Lowell for the ways in which he broke 00:05:50.350 --> 00:05:54.940 align:middle line:84% from tradition and sort of gave up this mantle of power 00:05:54.940 --> 00:05:58.510 align:middle line:84% that he certainly had, although he didn't really give it up. 00:05:58.510 --> 00:06:03.730 align:middle line:84% But in another way, I think it really pisses me off 00:06:03.730 --> 00:06:05.890 align:middle line:84% to think about the fact that it was only 00:06:05.890 --> 00:06:12.130 align:middle line:84% when somebody like Lowell was disobedient 00:06:12.130 --> 00:06:14.510 align:middle line:90% that anybody noticed or cared. 00:06:14.510 --> 00:06:18.910 align:middle line:84% And so, like I said, I think other people who were not 00:06:18.910 --> 00:06:21.610 align:middle line:84% Lowell were doing-- like Ginsberg is just the easiest 00:06:21.610 --> 00:06:22.360 align:middle line:90% example-- 00:06:22.360 --> 00:06:26.620 align:middle line:84% were doing wacky, crazy, disobedient, revolutionary, 00:06:26.620 --> 00:06:27.430 align:middle line:90% subversive things. 00:06:27.430 --> 00:06:31.450 align:middle line:84% And it didn't concern anyone because it didn't seem like-- 00:06:31.450 --> 00:06:34.552 align:middle line:90% 00:06:34.552 --> 00:06:39.850 align:middle line:84% it didn't seem like it was going to threaten America or poetry. 00:06:39.850 --> 00:06:41.950 align:middle line:84% Ginsberg could do whatever the hell he wanted. 00:06:41.950 --> 00:06:45.670 align:middle line:84% No one was worried about his soul or his spirit. 00:06:45.670 --> 00:06:47.410 align:middle line:90% Or Sexton or Plath. 00:06:47.410 --> 00:06:51.700 align:middle line:84% So I think-- and then in terms of disobedient poets, 00:06:51.700 --> 00:06:57.340 align:middle line:84% the poets I list at the end, it's just so interesting to me 00:06:57.340 --> 00:07:02.510 align:middle line:84% to think about why Alice Notley or Anne Carson are really 00:07:02.510 --> 00:07:03.010 align:middle line:90% never-- 00:07:03.010 --> 00:07:04.990 align:middle line:84% I've never heard them called confessional. 00:07:04.990 --> 00:07:06.430 align:middle line:90% But why not? 00:07:06.430 --> 00:07:07.810 align:middle line:90% They write about themselves. 00:07:07.810 --> 00:07:12.190 align:middle line:84% They include personal information in their poems. 00:07:12.190 --> 00:07:13.300 align:middle line:90% They're subversive. 00:07:13.300 --> 00:07:14.890 align:middle line:90% They're formally disruptive. 00:07:14.890 --> 00:07:16.970 align:middle line:90% They do all these things. 00:07:16.970 --> 00:07:25.400 align:middle line:84% And so-- yeah, that's why I guess 00:07:25.400 --> 00:07:28.130 align:middle line:84% I have this fantasy of another category. 00:07:28.130 --> 00:07:31.760 align:middle line:84% I mean, I feel like I spent a year trying 00:07:31.760 --> 00:07:33.770 align:middle line:84% to think about and write about and teach 00:07:33.770 --> 00:07:36.980 align:middle line:84% about confessional poetry in order to reclaim it 00:07:36.980 --> 00:07:39.498 align:middle line:84% or in order to like, here's why I don't 00:07:39.498 --> 00:07:40.790 align:middle line:90% mind being called confessional. 00:07:40.790 --> 00:07:44.270 align:middle line:84% And ultimately, I think it was the Catholic thing that I 00:07:44.270 --> 00:07:49.760 align:middle line:84% finally realized and the misogyny that I was like, 00:07:49.760 --> 00:07:51.350 align:middle line:84% this is not even the right question. 00:07:51.350 --> 00:07:54.050 align:middle line:84% The question is not do I reclaim or reject. 00:07:54.050 --> 00:07:58.430 align:middle line:84% The question is much more subtle and diverse than that, 00:07:58.430 --> 00:08:03.780 align:middle line:84% which is how do we make these categories? 00:08:03.780 --> 00:08:06.020 align:middle line:90% What are they useful for? 00:08:06.020 --> 00:08:08.570 align:middle line:90% And ultimately-- not-- nothing-- 00:08:08.570 --> 00:08:10.040 align:middle line:90% I mean, they're useful. 00:08:10.040 --> 00:08:10.800 align:middle line:90% I'm not useful. 00:08:10.800 --> 00:08:11.640 align:middle line:90% I don't know. 00:08:11.640 --> 00:08:12.530 align:middle line:90% I'm just bleh. 00:08:12.530 --> 00:08:13.445 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:08:13.445 --> 00:08:16.640 align:middle line:90% I'm diffusing. 00:08:16.640 --> 00:08:17.372 align:middle line:90% OK. 00:08:17.372 --> 00:08:18.080 align:middle line:90% Right behind you. 00:08:18.080 --> 00:08:18.788 align:middle line:90% Oh, you have an-- 00:08:18.788 --> 00:08:20.240 align:middle line:90% OK, yes, Sam and then Brett. 00:08:20.240 --> 00:08:22.340 align:middle line:90% Good. 00:08:22.340 --> 00:08:23.510 align:middle line:90% That was amazing, Rachel. 00:08:23.510 --> 00:08:24.710 align:middle line:90% Thanks, Sam. 00:08:24.710 --> 00:08:26.040 align:middle line:90% You had me in tears. 00:08:26.040 --> 00:08:27.500 align:middle line:90% Oh. 00:08:27.500 --> 00:08:32.570 align:middle line:84% But I'm still emotional about it, and I did have a question. 00:08:32.570 --> 00:08:35.507 align:middle line:84% Also thinking about what you just said, 00:08:35.507 --> 00:08:36.799 align:middle line:90% what is it that's confessional? 00:08:36.799 --> 00:08:39.830 align:middle line:84% Why are some poets not considered that? 00:08:39.830 --> 00:08:43.909 align:middle line:84% For the list that you read at the end and Ginsberg, 00:08:43.909 --> 00:08:48.410 align:middle line:84% I'm thinking that also in those poets, most of them 00:08:48.410 --> 00:08:50.870 align:middle line:90% have this tremendous musicality. 00:08:50.870 --> 00:08:55.190 align:middle line:84% And in the body, in the work, in the presentation, 00:08:55.190 --> 00:08:59.090 align:middle line:84% but also there's like a physicality in those poems 00:08:59.090 --> 00:09:03.860 align:middle line:84% that I don't necessarily find in the local 00:09:03.860 --> 00:09:10.280 align:middle line:84% or even in some of the more Protestant poets. 00:09:10.280 --> 00:09:11.780 align:middle line:84% [CHUCKLES] I don't really mean that. 00:09:11.780 --> 00:09:15.440 align:middle line:84% But had you thought about that or have 00:09:15.440 --> 00:09:16.620 align:middle line:90% any thoughts about that? 00:09:16.620 --> 00:09:17.120 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:09:17.120 --> 00:09:19.340 align:middle line:84% And there's so much stuff I didn't include, 00:09:19.340 --> 00:09:21.200 align:middle line:84% like there was a whole section, and I'm 00:09:21.200 --> 00:09:22.530 align:middle line:90% really interested in this. 00:09:22.530 --> 00:09:26.480 align:middle line:84% I highly recommend Maggie Nelson's book 00:09:26.480 --> 00:09:30.230 align:middle line:84% called Women, the New York School, and Other True 00:09:30.230 --> 00:09:32.230 align:middle line:90% Abstractions. 00:09:32.230 --> 00:09:34.370 align:middle line:90% It's a genius book. 00:09:34.370 --> 00:09:38.060 align:middle line:84% And largely because of reading that book 00:09:38.060 --> 00:09:42.170 align:middle line:84% but also talking to my friend David Powell-- 00:09:42.170 --> 00:09:44.840 align:middle line:84% I mean, really like hours of conversations-- like why isn't 00:09:44.840 --> 00:09:46.100 align:middle line:90% Frank O'Hara confessional? 00:09:46.100 --> 00:09:47.680 align:middle line:90% I don't understand. 00:09:47.680 --> 00:09:51.410 align:middle line:84% He writes about all these things. 00:09:51.410 --> 00:09:53.990 align:middle line:84% And one of the things I think-- there 00:09:53.990 --> 00:09:59.220 align:middle line:84% are reasons that I can say, not just critical gatekeeping 00:09:59.220 --> 00:09:59.720 align:middle line:90% or whatever. 00:09:59.720 --> 00:10:02.360 align:middle line:84% There are reasons that I think Gwendolyn Brooks isn't really 00:10:02.360 --> 00:10:03.440 align:middle line:90% a confessional poet. 00:10:03.440 --> 00:10:05.780 align:middle line:84% I think she's-- and Adrienne Rich too. 00:10:05.780 --> 00:10:07.910 align:middle line:84% I think they're really writing for a "we" 00:10:07.910 --> 00:10:13.268 align:middle line:84% and out of a "we" rather than an "I, you." 00:10:13.268 --> 00:10:14.810 align:middle line:84% And that's very simplistic, if that's 00:10:14.810 --> 00:10:16.560 align:middle line:90% a more subtle conversation. 00:10:16.560 --> 00:10:22.160 align:middle line:84% And I think that Frank O'Hara and James Schuyler and-- 00:10:22.160 --> 00:10:24.530 align:middle line:84% I'm forgetting so many people right now. 00:10:24.530 --> 00:10:29.720 align:middle line:84% They are writing in the tradition of dropping pearls, 00:10:29.720 --> 00:10:32.330 align:middle line:84% and they are writing to a coterie. 00:10:32.330 --> 00:10:34.100 align:middle line:84% They're writing to a friendly audience. 00:10:34.100 --> 00:10:37.580 align:middle line:84% They're not writing to some asshole workshop 00:10:37.580 --> 00:10:43.250 align:middle line:84% teacher who is trying to say horrible things about them. 00:10:43.250 --> 00:10:44.930 align:middle line:90% And there's a big difference. 00:10:44.930 --> 00:10:49.730 align:middle line:84% I think that a lot of the gay male 00:10:49.730 --> 00:10:52.790 align:middle line:84% poets and a lot of the poets at the New York School, 00:10:52.790 --> 00:10:55.220 align:middle line:84% there's this feeling which is so charming to us 00:10:55.220 --> 00:10:57.860 align:middle line:90% now of writing to a coterie-- 00:10:57.860 --> 00:11:00.710 align:middle line:84% writing a poem that only some people 00:11:00.710 --> 00:11:03.425 align:middle line:90% will understand all of it. 00:11:03.425 --> 00:11:07.723 align:middle line:84% It's a very coded type of poetry where certain people reading 00:11:07.723 --> 00:11:09.890 align:middle line:84% the poem are going to understand everything about it 00:11:09.890 --> 00:11:11.838 align:middle line:84% and other people reading the poem 00:11:11.838 --> 00:11:13.880 align:middle line:84% are not going to know what they're talking about. 00:11:13.880 --> 00:11:16.430 align:middle line:84% And that's very different than this part 00:11:16.430 --> 00:11:19.880 align:middle line:84% of confessional poetry in which everyone 00:11:19.880 --> 00:11:22.880 align:middle line:84% is going to understand every single goddamn thing that's 00:11:22.880 --> 00:11:23.570 align:middle line:90% in the poem. 00:11:23.570 --> 00:11:29.750 align:middle line:84% It's that kind of shock and accessibility that I think 00:11:29.750 --> 00:11:36.920 align:middle line:84% is different certainly between Sexton and between O'Hara. 00:11:36.920 --> 00:11:41.360 align:middle line:84% But again, I actually don't find Plath to be very confessional 00:11:41.360 --> 00:11:42.170 align:middle line:90% most of the time. 00:11:42.170 --> 00:11:45.530 align:middle line:84% She's very performative rather than writing 00:11:45.530 --> 00:11:47.700 align:middle line:90% from direct lived experience. 00:11:47.700 --> 00:11:51.260 align:middle line:84% She's always like-- she's very mythic. 00:11:51.260 --> 00:11:54.860 align:middle line:84% And so I think she just got lumped in there, 00:11:54.860 --> 00:11:57.740 align:middle line:84% and we associate confessional poetry with her 00:11:57.740 --> 00:12:01.190 align:middle line:84% probably more than any other poet even though, to my mind, 00:12:01.190 --> 00:12:04.790 align:middle line:84% she's not a very confessional poet in a lot of these ways. 00:12:04.790 --> 00:12:08.060 align:middle line:84% I think that conflation has to do 00:12:08.060 --> 00:12:15.560 align:middle line:84% with a real anxiety about Plath and about femininity 00:12:15.560 --> 00:12:22.340 align:middle line:84% and particularly, I think, about female rage and ambition. 00:12:22.340 --> 00:12:24.470 align:middle line:84% Can you remind me what your question is? 00:12:24.470 --> 00:12:27.720 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:12:27.720 --> 00:12:28.220 align:middle line:90% What? 00:12:28.220 --> 00:12:29.990 align:middle line:90% I wasn't. 00:12:29.990 --> 00:12:32.210 align:middle line:90% Well, I love what you just said. 00:12:32.210 --> 00:12:37.940 align:middle line:84% I was thinking about Plath now, but I was also thinking about 00:12:37.940 --> 00:12:43.220 align:middle line:84% June Jordan and Audre Lorde-- the incredible physicality 00:12:43.220 --> 00:12:46.190 align:middle line:84% in their work that there's a bodily response to it, 00:12:46.190 --> 00:12:51.170 align:middle line:84% and Ginsberg as well, that I think is antithetical to some 00:12:51.170 --> 00:12:54.830 align:middle line:90% of the non-- 00:12:54.830 --> 00:12:58.550 align:middle line:84% it's not about the thinking head. 00:12:58.550 --> 00:13:01.000 align:middle line:90% It's about the body. 00:13:01.000 --> 00:13:01.510 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:13:01.510 --> 00:13:03.220 align:middle line:90% And I don't know-- 00:13:03.220 --> 00:13:08.080 align:middle line:84% I'm so interested in whether that quality, which I also-- it 00:13:08.080 --> 00:13:09.910 align:middle line:90% really draws me to poems. 00:13:09.910 --> 00:13:13.510 align:middle line:84% And depending on whether you like these kind of poems 00:13:13.510 --> 00:13:16.390 align:middle line:84% or not, you even think that-- you either think that that's 00:13:16.390 --> 00:13:26.110 align:middle line:84% manipulative and easy or you think it's brave and difficult. 00:13:26.110 --> 00:13:33.670 align:middle line:84% But whether that quality and my visceral response to it 00:13:33.670 --> 00:13:35.800 align:middle line:84% has to do with the content or has 00:13:35.800 --> 00:13:39.700 align:middle line:84% to do with the vulnerability of the speaker 00:13:39.700 --> 00:13:43.630 align:middle line:84% or has to do with that risk, I really 00:13:43.630 --> 00:13:47.500 align:middle line:84% want to reject the notion that shame 00:13:47.500 --> 00:13:50.140 align:middle line:84% is a necessary component of confessional poetry, 00:13:50.140 --> 00:13:51.880 align:middle line:90% although maybe it is. 00:13:51.880 --> 00:13:55.090 align:middle line:84% Because I think that that's why Allen Ginsberg is not 00:13:55.090 --> 00:13:59.410 align:middle line:84% really considered confessional because he's just not ashamed. 00:13:59.410 --> 00:14:04.000 align:middle line:84% And so I think there's a lot of work coming out 00:14:04.000 --> 00:14:07.010 align:middle line:84% right now, especially by writers of color, 00:14:07.010 --> 00:14:11.470 align:middle line:84% especially by LGBTQ writers, that are really pushing 00:14:11.470 --> 00:14:15.230 align:middle line:84% the boundaries of content and address, 00:14:15.230 --> 00:14:19.270 align:middle line:84% especially including sexual content that 00:14:19.270 --> 00:14:22.460 align:middle line:90% are resisting shame. 00:14:22.460 --> 00:14:26.410 align:middle line:84% And I think that it's very exciting to see that. 00:14:26.410 --> 00:14:29.740 align:middle line:90% 00:14:29.740 --> 00:14:32.620 align:middle line:84% In some ways, what is transgressive about that kind 00:14:32.620 --> 00:14:35.290 align:middle line:84% of poetry is that they're just-- they're like, no, no, 00:14:35.290 --> 00:14:36.805 align:middle line:90% not going-- 00:14:36.805 --> 00:14:37.810 align:middle line:90% I heard of shame. 00:14:37.810 --> 00:14:38.710 align:middle line:90% I know that's there. 00:14:38.710 --> 00:14:41.320 align:middle line:84% I know you want me to feel it, but I'm not going 00:14:41.320 --> 00:14:44.950 align:middle line:90% to write from that position. 00:14:44.950 --> 00:14:47.290 align:middle line:90% Tony had a question. 00:14:47.290 --> 00:14:49.420 align:middle line:84% We'll do Tony and then [? Leonora ?] 00:14:49.420 --> 00:14:52.960 align:middle line:84% and then we'll ask you questions individually. 00:14:52.960 --> 00:14:54.010 align:middle line:90% Love the thought. 00:14:54.010 --> 00:14:54.520 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:14:54.520 --> 00:14:56.080 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:14:56.080 --> 00:14:58.300 align:middle line:84% I was wondering if the thing of sense of shame, 00:14:58.300 --> 00:15:01.870 align:middle line:84% if it's not evolving of our patriarchal society 00:15:01.870 --> 00:15:05.560 align:middle line:84% to a more matriarchal society and that the shame isn't there 00:15:05.560 --> 00:15:08.620 align:middle line:84% anymore as it was when there was this great patriarchal 00:15:08.620 --> 00:15:09.400 align:middle line:90% situation. 00:15:09.400 --> 00:15:11.750 align:middle line:84% And that's one part of the question. 00:15:11.750 --> 00:15:15.970 align:middle line:84% The other I was curious about, [INAUDIBLE] Ted Hughes 00:15:15.970 --> 00:15:21.280 align:middle line:84% and his [? presumably ?] rewrite of Sylvia Plath. 00:15:21.280 --> 00:15:22.750 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:15:22.750 --> 00:15:25.630 align:middle line:84% And also all the flurry of the papers after that 00:15:25.630 --> 00:15:28.240 align:middle line:84% and access to them and so forth, which 00:15:28.240 --> 00:15:31.480 align:middle line:84% was controlled and very patriarchal. 00:15:31.480 --> 00:15:32.110 align:middle line:90% Yeah. 00:15:32.110 --> 00:15:37.630 align:middle line:84% So two things-- one, I have not encountered the world 00:15:37.630 --> 00:15:41.710 align:middle line:84% you are describing in which the patriarchy is even 00:15:41.710 --> 00:15:43.390 align:middle line:90% diminished at all. 00:15:43.390 --> 00:15:47.006 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:15:47.006 --> 00:15:53.080 align:middle line:84% I mean, I went back and I reread most of Adrienne Rich's prose, 00:15:53.080 --> 00:15:58.450 align:middle line:84% and I was like, nothing has changed. 00:15:58.450 --> 00:15:59.200 align:middle line:90% I don't know. 00:15:59.200 --> 00:16:00.880 align:middle line:90% I know things have changed. 00:16:00.880 --> 00:16:06.040 align:middle line:84% I know but I do not by any stretch of the imagination 00:16:06.040 --> 00:16:08.540 align:middle line:84% believe we live in that post-feminist age 00:16:08.540 --> 00:16:11.140 align:middle line:90% or post-patriarchy. 00:16:11.140 --> 00:16:12.130 align:middle line:90% I just don't see that. 00:16:12.130 --> 00:16:15.100 align:middle line:90% I mean, I-- sometimes I-- 00:16:15.100 --> 00:16:15.970 align:middle line:90% anyway. 00:16:15.970 --> 00:16:17.050 align:middle line:90% So that's one thing. 00:16:17.050 --> 00:16:18.800 align:middle line:90% I would like that to be true. 00:16:18.800 --> 00:16:23.965 align:middle line:84% It's not been my experience so far, and it's really-- 00:16:23.965 --> 00:16:27.345 align:middle line:84% my experience is one of tremendous privilege 00:16:27.345 --> 00:16:28.610 align:middle line:90% in so many ways. 00:16:28.610 --> 00:16:30.670 align:middle line:84% So for me to say it's not really so much been 00:16:30.670 --> 00:16:34.750 align:middle line:84% my experience in some ways is irrelevant, and in other ways 00:16:34.750 --> 00:16:36.980 align:middle line:90% it's pretty significant. 00:16:36.980 --> 00:16:41.620 align:middle line:84% The second thing is that I think there's over 200 books in print 00:16:41.620 --> 00:16:43.630 align:middle line:90% about Sylvia Plath. 00:16:43.630 --> 00:16:45.580 align:middle line:84% We are obsessed with Sylvia Plath, 00:16:45.580 --> 00:16:48.250 align:middle line:84% and I'm glad that people are obsessed with Sylvia Plath. 00:16:48.250 --> 00:16:51.340 align:middle line:84% When I got to graduate school, nobody 00:16:51.340 --> 00:16:52.990 align:middle line:84% admitted that they like Sylvia Plath 00:16:52.990 --> 00:16:54.282 align:middle line:90% or that they read Sylvia Plath. 00:16:54.282 --> 00:16:58.060 align:middle line:84% It was like shh, like if you said that, I don't know, 00:16:58.060 --> 00:16:59.500 align:middle line:90% you're going to get thrown out. 00:16:59.500 --> 00:17:03.850 align:middle line:84% And now there's been this great resurgence of interest in her 00:17:03.850 --> 00:17:08.319 align:middle line:84% as a poet, not just in a myth, not just as a person, 00:17:08.319 --> 00:17:11.210 align:middle line:84% and not just about her suicide, which I think is great. 00:17:11.210 --> 00:17:13.390 align:middle line:84% The stuff about Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath, 00:17:13.390 --> 00:17:21.224 align:middle line:84% I read so much about that, and it's fascinating. 00:17:21.224 --> 00:17:22.599 align:middle line:84% Sometime I should ask [INAUDIBLE] 00:17:22.599 --> 00:17:28.010 align:middle line:84% to print a bibliography of the films and the books 00:17:28.010 --> 00:17:30.010 align:middle line:84% and the essays about that because you could just 00:17:30.010 --> 00:17:32.830 align:middle line:90% spend five years reading that. 00:17:32.830 --> 00:17:35.980 align:middle line:84% I ultimately-- to be honest, Plath 00:17:35.980 --> 00:17:39.130 align:middle line:84% was never a huge influence on me even though I had read her. 00:17:39.130 --> 00:17:44.800 align:middle line:84% And going back to her, I feel much closer to Anne Sexton 00:17:44.800 --> 00:17:47.290 align:middle line:90% than to Plath poetically. 00:17:47.290 --> 00:17:51.640 align:middle line:84% But other than to say that I did actually 00:17:51.640 --> 00:17:55.900 align:middle line:84% have nightmares about Ted Hughes, 00:17:55.900 --> 00:17:57.490 align:middle line:90% I don't know what to say. 00:17:57.490 --> 00:17:59.870 align:middle line:84% That is a fascinating relationship 00:17:59.870 --> 00:18:01.760 align:middle line:84% that I think sadly we will really 00:18:01.760 --> 00:18:04.730 align:middle line:90% never know what happened there. 00:18:04.730 --> 00:18:08.650 align:middle line:90% 00:18:08.650 --> 00:18:09.190 align:middle line:90% Hi. 00:18:09.190 --> 00:18:11.680 align:middle line:90% Hi. 00:18:11.680 --> 00:18:14.548 align:middle line:84% I don't know exactly what my question is, but I feel-- 00:18:14.548 --> 00:18:16.090 align:middle line:84% Good because I'm going to forget it-- 00:18:16.090 --> 00:18:19.660 align:middle line:90% [LAUGHTER] 00:18:19.660 --> 00:18:24.910 align:middle line:84% I was really struck by your introduction 00:18:24.910 --> 00:18:26.980 align:middle line:84% about the story about your mother 00:18:26.980 --> 00:18:30.100 align:middle line:90% and setting the stage for this. 00:18:30.100 --> 00:18:33.430 align:middle line:84% And if you don't mind, I would like to come back to that 00:18:33.430 --> 00:18:34.840 align:middle line:90% because I'm really interested. 00:18:34.840 --> 00:18:37.210 align:middle line:84% And maybe that goes into this other lecture 00:18:37.210 --> 00:18:40.070 align:middle line:90% you mentioned about ethics-- 00:18:40.070 --> 00:18:44.510 align:middle line:84% what happens around-- so confessional or not, 00:18:44.510 --> 00:18:49.300 align:middle line:84% however we want to call it-- when we are involving these 00:18:49.300 --> 00:18:52.510 align:middle line:90% people personal-- 00:18:52.510 --> 00:18:55.450 align:middle line:84% not personal, but we are potentially 00:18:55.450 --> 00:19:00.800 align:middle line:84% robbing them or hurting them or misrepresenting them. 00:19:00.800 --> 00:19:05.200 align:middle line:84% And I'm curious what your insights 00:19:05.200 --> 00:19:09.650 align:middle line:84% are on that since you've been writing about this topic. 00:19:09.650 --> 00:19:12.460 align:middle line:90% Yeah, I told Hannah in the car. 00:19:12.460 --> 00:19:15.340 align:middle line:84% I was like, someone's going to ask me, how you never 00:19:15.340 --> 00:19:17.710 align:middle line:90% go back to the beginning. 00:19:17.710 --> 00:19:20.770 align:middle line:84% Yeah, that's a profound question, 00:19:20.770 --> 00:19:22.480 align:middle line:84% and I'm really glad you asked it. 00:19:22.480 --> 00:19:26.200 align:middle line:84% It's not a simple answer, but I'll try a little bit. 00:19:26.200 --> 00:19:32.230 align:middle line:84% Yeah, I think I kept looking to confessional poetry, 00:19:32.230 --> 00:19:35.110 align:middle line:84% to the history, to the practitioners, to the poems, 00:19:35.110 --> 00:19:40.600 align:middle line:84% to the response, as I said, to make it OK for me to have 00:19:40.600 --> 00:19:42.130 align:middle line:90% been a poet who has done this. 00:19:42.130 --> 00:19:48.400 align:middle line:84% And ultimately, I did not get far with confessional poetry 00:19:48.400 --> 00:19:49.600 align:middle line:90% in that-- 00:19:49.600 --> 00:19:51.760 align:middle line:84% I got far with confessional poetry in the sense 00:19:51.760 --> 00:19:55.150 align:middle line:84% that I really believe that poetry 00:19:55.150 --> 00:19:59.920 align:middle line:84% is a place that one should be subversive and provocative and 00:19:59.920 --> 00:20:00.700 align:middle line:90% disruptive. 00:20:00.700 --> 00:20:03.910 align:middle line:90% That I feel really great about. 00:20:03.910 --> 00:20:10.120 align:middle line:84% I do not feel that it's OK to hurt other people, 00:20:10.120 --> 00:20:14.800 align:middle line:84% and certainly this kind of poetry does. 00:20:14.800 --> 00:20:16.060 align:middle line:90% And you're absolutely right. 00:20:16.060 --> 00:20:19.420 align:middle line:84% Every time you not only misrepresent someone 00:20:19.420 --> 00:20:22.660 align:middle line:84% but just represent someone, you subjectify them. 00:20:22.660 --> 00:20:27.130 align:middle line:84% And so the lecture I didn't give, 00:20:27.130 --> 00:20:32.590 align:middle line:84% which is really very much about developing 00:20:32.590 --> 00:20:38.320 align:middle line:84% a set of ethical guidelines and the cheat sheet for that, 00:20:38.320 --> 00:20:41.260 align:middle line:84% is that I did come across some ethical guidelines that 00:20:41.260 --> 00:20:44.350 align:middle line:84% made sense to me, and it comes from a Greek notion 00:20:44.350 --> 00:20:45.550 align:middle line:90% of parrhesia. 00:20:45.550 --> 00:20:49.630 align:middle line:84% And you can look up Foucault and he gives a series of lectures 00:20:49.630 --> 00:20:51.190 align:middle line:90% on discourse and truth. 00:20:51.190 --> 00:20:55.510 align:middle line:84% And the concept of parrhesia very briefly 00:20:55.510 --> 00:20:58.990 align:middle line:84% is that the poet speaks in her own voice 00:20:58.990 --> 00:21:01.120 align:middle line:84% and takes responsibility for what 00:21:01.120 --> 00:21:05.830 align:middle line:84% she is saying and says everything without resorting 00:21:05.830 --> 00:21:08.240 align:middle line:90% to rhetorical modes. 00:21:08.240 --> 00:21:13.480 align:middle line:84% And when you employ parrhesia for it to work, 00:21:13.480 --> 00:21:16.870 align:middle line:84% for it to function as parrhesia, you only punch up. 00:21:16.870 --> 00:21:18.070 align:middle line:90% You never punch down. 00:21:18.070 --> 00:21:23.650 align:middle line:84% So the king or the tyrant or the leader cannot employ parrhesia. 00:21:23.650 --> 00:21:25.690 align:middle line:84% It's only something that someone of less power 00:21:25.690 --> 00:21:27.760 align:middle line:84% does to someone of more power, and it 00:21:27.760 --> 00:21:31.360 align:middle line:84% has to be in the service of the people. 00:21:31.360 --> 00:21:34.310 align:middle line:84% It's not in the service of the self. 00:21:34.310 --> 00:21:46.060 align:middle line:84% And so whether or not my book Mothers 00:21:46.060 --> 00:21:50.080 align:middle line:84% fulfills those ethical guidelines, I don't know. 00:21:50.080 --> 00:21:52.670 align:middle line:90% 00:21:52.670 --> 00:21:55.150 align:middle line:84% And, for example, whether or not the fact 00:21:55.150 --> 00:21:58.540 align:middle line:84% that I write and have written about my children, 00:21:58.540 --> 00:22:02.410 align:middle line:90% that's not punching up. 00:22:02.410 --> 00:22:04.810 align:middle line:84% I think it's a really, really complicated question. 00:22:04.810 --> 00:22:09.130 align:middle line:84% I think that writing these lectures has-- 00:22:09.130 --> 00:22:11.410 align:middle line:84% well, first of all, I've been writing poems again. 00:22:11.410 --> 00:22:15.070 align:middle line:84% But also I do think that this has 00:22:15.070 --> 00:22:19.690 align:middle line:84% been two years of trying to think through what happened 00:22:19.690 --> 00:22:21.040 align:middle line:90% between me and my mother. 00:22:21.040 --> 00:22:24.430 align:middle line:90% 00:22:24.430 --> 00:22:27.670 align:middle line:90% I feel functional. 00:22:27.670 --> 00:22:30.010 align:middle line:90% I don't feel absolved. 00:22:30.010 --> 00:22:32.620 align:middle line:84% And I don't think that it would be appropriate 00:22:32.620 --> 00:22:34.660 align:middle line:90% for me to seek absolution. 00:22:34.660 --> 00:22:38.290 align:middle line:84% And I think that coming to that place, 00:22:38.290 --> 00:22:40.930 align:middle line:84% I've only been able to do that through these lectures 00:22:40.930 --> 00:22:44.020 align:middle line:84% and through reading poems like "The Double Image" 00:22:44.020 --> 00:22:50.725 align:middle line:84% by Anne Sexton and looking back through-- 00:22:50.725 --> 00:22:54.190 align:middle line:90% I don't want to be Joyce. 00:22:54.190 --> 00:22:56.590 align:middle line:84% I don't want to be Anne Sexton's mother. 00:22:56.590 --> 00:23:00.580 align:middle line:84% But when I reread that poem-- and I strongly recommend it-- 00:23:00.580 --> 00:23:02.740 align:middle line:90% I was just sobbing by the end. 00:23:02.740 --> 00:23:05.050 align:middle line:84% I mean, there's something in that poem 00:23:05.050 --> 00:23:08.440 align:middle line:84% that is so deep about mother-daughter relationships. 00:23:08.440 --> 00:23:11.800 align:middle line:84% So like, should she not have written them? 00:23:11.800 --> 00:23:13.366 align:middle line:90% I don't know. 00:23:13.366 --> 00:23:16.230 align:middle line:90% That's the closest I can come. 00:23:16.230 --> 00:23:17.308 align:middle line:90%