question re 'the solar mass'
- Thread starter d gray
- Start date
thanks c - that's it. are you familiar with the poem and do you have any idea who he's talking about? he mentions a name that sounds something like 'veechy linux' and visiting someone in italy on 'all fools day' - he never was in italy, right? very strange and intriguing poem (to me).
yeah, i can't get enough of those audio discs. his 'all american burger' rap between poems is great on that one too.
HenryChinaski
Founding member
by the beard of the qwin-qwagular rock
LOL? trapan he said
LOL? trapan he said
you've struck it!!!
Solar Mass...Fincklestein!
Yours truly,
Irving J. Fincklestein,
watchmaker
It's a guess on my part, but it sounds to me that Bukowski came across some kind of a science article by accident, maybe in a magazine by happenstance in some dental office, the library, the bank or wherever, and simply fell in love with the sounds of the words"”considering that he was more a poet than astronomer... This, I'll call it, musical tendency of his I might attribute to the influence of listening to classical music on his art, the pure sound of the sibilant words to his ears beyond whatever the hell some of them actually meant. I think that's what the great poets do, because great poems have a way of being interesting to the ears as an end unto themselves when read aloud. (Another poet is E.E. Cummings)... There's another poem (sorry I forget which one) where he talks about "picking up his watch from Fincklestein's." Well, to me there's something enjoyable, odd and peculiar about working the relatively uncommon name of "Fincklestein" into a poem; but he mentions it more than once, it seems to me, out of sheer pleasure, and I think he just liked the particular sound of that name as it lodged inside the grey matter of his brain... he fell in love with it as he repeated it to himself, and it became part of the genesis of that poem and held it together... in addition to whatever else he happened to be saying there. Anything can set off a poet, and "Solar Mass" may be another example of his ability to make use of whatever sounds came his way, and this is how I view such unusual poems.
Yours truly,
Irving J. Fincklestein,
watchmaker
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the only good poet
One retreat after another without peace.
i think The Solar Mass is a bukowski example (and criticism?) of what has been called "sound poetry." (the sound is more important than the meaning.) buk cldn't allow himself to write or, more importantly, read it without irony, without distancing himself. he breaks off the poem with, "ow! i'm gonna have to stop reading this literary criticism, this academic verse, very destructive american hamburger..." he might have had his tongue firmly implanted in his cheek, but it was native to him, he was serious...at least, that's my belief.
he wld rather have been, "a swineherd at Amagerbro
and be understood by the swine than a poet
and misunderstood by people."
he wld rather have been, "a swineherd at Amagerbro
and be understood by the swine than a poet
and misunderstood by people."
Second take...
Listened to S M again, and hadn't in awhile before I first posted... Yes, the poem sounds like a satire on academic literary criticism, and Bukowski is using a mouthful of academic words he exchanged with another writer, or read, and perhaps working in a few science terms as well...I'm just guess here... He's taking those twenty-five cent, tongue-twister words and playing with the sound of them as his satire unfolds... This was the kind of highfalutin' exchanges B was evidently willing to engage in with some of his literary colleagues, at the same time he talks about avoiding these kinds of discussions"”perhaps a bit of a love/hate relationship with verse and those who like to analyze it along those academic lines. Just my "qwin-qwagular" take on it. ;-)
And yes, the Fincklestein poem is "The Weather Is Hot." Didn't quote it properly other than to recount his references to Fincklestein... Buk's love of word-play is something I think he enjoyed, and I think he'd worked in the ones he became enamored of whenever he could, like the true master he was. "”Fincklestein
Listened to S M again, and hadn't in awhile before I first posted... Yes, the poem sounds like a satire on academic literary criticism, and Bukowski is using a mouthful of academic words he exchanged with another writer, or read, and perhaps working in a few science terms as well...I'm just guess here... He's taking those twenty-five cent, tongue-twister words and playing with the sound of them as his satire unfolds... This was the kind of highfalutin' exchanges B was evidently willing to engage in with some of his literary colleagues, at the same time he talks about avoiding these kinds of discussions"”perhaps a bit of a love/hate relationship with verse and those who like to analyze it along those academic lines. Just my "qwin-qwagular" take on it. ;-)
And yes, the Fincklestein poem is "The Weather Is Hot." Didn't quote it properly other than to recount his references to Fincklestein... Buk's love of word-play is something I think he enjoyed, and I think he'd worked in the ones he became enamored of whenever he could, like the true master he was. "”Fincklestein
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the only good poet
One retreat after another without peace.
hi bukfan,
it's Soren Kierkegaard. is he well-known in his homeland? he was a figure of ridicule and scorn at the end of his life.
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Bukfan
"The law is wrong; I am right"
He is extremely well known! The internationally most famous danish filosopher and one of the founders of existensialism.
Yes, a satirist paper called "Corsaren" ridiculed him a lot. It had to do with his attack on the church for merely preaching christianity but not living it, which he saw as hypocrisy.
I used to live next to the cemetary where he is buried, so I've seen his gravesite many times...
Yes, a satirist paper called "Corsaren" ridiculed him a lot. It had to do with his attack on the church for merely preaching christianity but not living it, which he saw as hypocrisy.
I used to live next to the cemetary where he is buried, so I've seen his gravesite many times...
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i'll give it a shot. i'll italicize words i'm not sure of.
now let me attenuate veechy's linux greatness
for what man at a time could have said
spooks sparks spindles
stern strapsun
gold oosphore from the opine olphite
stithy
and this was before pound, olson, williams, john muir
plan planifolius planimpters
he once wrote to me
"by the beard of the quinquagular rock"
i rejoined him:
"you've struck it"
i visited him in italy on all fools day
and his mastery of the punctate polvilly
never left me in drear doubt
"trepan" he said
"ode wist aptare astrigals
it was the last i saw of him
veechy had him blaze on embrosures
cryptonyms drosometers
let the favos favour of him
bring through the rock
rubefacient
and give to
russel and the rutabaga
wow. my brain hurts after that.
now let me attenuate veechy's linux greatness
for what man at a time could have said
spooks sparks spindles
stern strapsun
gold oosphore from the opine olphite
stithy
and this was before pound, olson, williams, john muir
plan planifolius planimpters
he once wrote to me
"by the beard of the quinquagular rock"
i rejoined him:
"you've struck it"
i visited him in italy on all fools day
and his mastery of the punctate polvilly
never left me in drear doubt
"trepan" he said
"ode wist aptare astrigals
it was the last i saw of him
veechy had him blaze on embrosures
cryptonyms drosometers
let the favos favour of him
bring through the rock
rubefacient
and give to
russel and the rutabaga
wow. my brain hurts after that.