The Outlaw Poets of American Poetry (2 Viewers)

Dead poets tend to be easier to be around than living poets. To the extent possible, I avoid associating with poets, including myself. It's an ugly bred. Poetry, on the other hand, is sometimes okay. Elephand shit has it all beat, though.
 
However... sitting around a kitchen table drinking, smoking, talking, and laughing - you may never know you are amongst a poet. (The word is starting to bother me now that I've read it and said it so many times. It doesn't sound like a real word anymore). I suppose I'm fascinated by people when you get them loose and talking - and that's a huge muse. You start to go insane with the thoughts that come out you - no one is really a bad person.
 
POET

However... sitting around a kitchen table drinking, smoking, talking, and laughing - you may never know you are amongst a poet. (The word is starting to bother me now that I've read it and said it so many times. It doesn't sound like a real word anymore)

The poet Victor Valoff was not a very good poet. He had a local reputation,
was liked by the ladies and supported by his wife. He was continually
giving readings at local bookstores and he was often heard on the
Public Radio Station. He read in a loud and dramatic voice but the pitch
never varied. Victor was always at climax. That's what attracted the
ladies, I guess. Certain of his lines, if taken separately, seemed to have
power, but when all the lines were considered as a whole, you knew
that Victor was saying nothing, only saying it loudly.
But Vicki, like most ladies, being easily charmed by fools, insisted
upon hearing Valoff read. It was a hot Friday night in a Feminist-Lesbian-
Revolutionary bookshop. No admission. Valoff read for free.


Excerpt of a short story. © Charles Bukowski
 
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I believe I underlined that when I first read it in whichever book it appeared in... however, I have no idea how it pertains to sitting around a kitchen table drinking and laughing?
 
in most cases that I know, poetry is just as lousy as poets.

and with both, poetry And poets, the exceptions are true highlights to fill your life with.
 
As if poets weren't bad enough, the term OUTLAW POETS strikes me as totally dumb.
What do they do? Shoplifting, getting a ticket for parking on the wrong side, considering the ticket a poem and the officer a poet, drug dealing, murder?
Anything illegal?
Not saying they should, but writing in an unorthodox way makes none of them outlaw.
A marketing term, yes, I guess that's what it is.

I shouldn't care about it and drink a lot less coffee at this time of the day, it makes me too upset.
 
However... getting a parking ticket could be considered mundane. And didn't McCullers say "see what is invisible, and you will see what to write?". Isn't Buk so good, because he "saw as much color in a brick as he did in a rose"? Mundane = good stuff, yes?

I'm on no one's side here, I'm just on hydro.
 
OUTLAW POET.JPG
 
no. we're being nasty and petty, not hypocritical. all poets are nasty and petty to other poets. it's a rule.

if you want to cut it in the poetry game, you better get on board. unless, of course, you're an Outlaw Poet.
 
What does Outlaw mean here?

I got the impression that when they (S.A. Griffin) named it Outlaw Poetry they were referring to not following the rules of poetry.

Correct me since I am undoubtedly not right.....but is there a school of thought or style that has a certain way poetry is to be written. Therefore Bukowski, who is not included in this collection, was one of the writers to not follow the same old meatloaf way of writing poetry. I might not be wrong.
 
Don't many people here write? Don't many people here write poetry? Therefore, aren't many people here being hypocritical?

Lolita, it might appear so, but honestly, I often look in the mirror and want to gag. We're not all being hypocritical, necessarily. Some of us are just being honest. I can't stand the average poet. I am a poet. Many of my friends are poets. I like them as people, not as poets, although I might like their poems. It's a separating of the person from the role. The absolute upside down fuckedness of everything in sight forces us to become something we call a poet or artist or whatever. If the world were straight, we would all be shining angel children. I guess.
 
...is there a school of thought or style that has a certain way poetry is to be written.
Yeah. 75 years ago. Before any of the outlaw poets were born.

S.A. Griffin, since you mention him, never lived in a world that would be shocked or offended by the kind of poetry he writes. That trail was blazed a long time ago.

It's so funny and sad, calling yourself an outlaw when the wildest thing you do is drive 2 miles out of your way to buy fair trade coffee beans. Wear jeans with your blazer when you attend college alumni functions. Dress your babies in ironic t-shirts and buy them little sunglasses.

Everybody run! The outlaw poets are coming! Run for your lives!
 
my wife's parents call me an Inlaw Poet.



hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!


ummmm...
 
Lolita, it might appear so, but honestly, I often look in the mirror and want to gag. We're not all being hypocritical, necessarily. Some of us are just being honest. I can't stand the average poet. I am a poet. Many of my friends are poets. I like them as people, not as poets, although I might like their poems. It's a separating of the person from the role. The absolute upside down fuckedness of everything in sight forces us to become something we call a poet or artist or whatever. If the world were straight, we would all be shining angel children. I guess.

I think any poet worth reading isn't evidently a poet at all - just... you know, a person.
 
You're right. Any poet worth reading isn't considered a real poet by the powers that be.

I would rather be published by some barely surviving on a shoe-string small press nobody ever heard of than a university press. Not that I've had any offers to turn down from the academics.
 
To clarify, speaking only for myself, when I disparage poets, what I am criticising is not the creative person per se, but the self-serving, back-stabbing ego mania of the competitive poet who claws his/her way to the top of the dung hill. It's an ugly thing, and so ridiculous, because the larger world doesn't give a fig for poetry. It's the battle of the small pond. When I see it (in others, in myself), I am repulsed. My only desire is to write the best poems I can, and to get them in the hands of people who will appreciate them and hopefully draw some pleasure from them. Being recognized by the masses is monstrous and meaningless. Prizes, awards, prestigious publication have no attraction to me and seem counter productive. Being published by Bill Roberts means a hell of a lot more. That is true distinction.
 
It's an ugly thing, and so ridiculous, because the larger world doesn't give a fig for poetry. It's the battle of the small pond.

Everyone wants to be Yertle the Turtle?

I'm Yertle the Turtle
Oh marvelous me
For I am the ruler
Of all that I see
 
Rekrab, that was the Gettysburg address of what I've been trying to say for the past three days on here haha. Thank you. (Referring to your longer post on page 2).
 
Thanks, LG. My rant might sound like sour grapes, and at one time it probably was sour grapes ("the bigs won't publish me, well screw them! The small press rules...") but I don't think it's that now. I've seen "success" close up and it's not a bed of roses. The idea of having a book out from a big publisher and going on the road doing a hundred readings and signings to handfuls of people at bookshops and libraries -- what's the appeal of that? Besides, commercially published books just don't look as good to me as small press stuff. Even if you enjoyed that routine, think what all the adoration would do to your soul.
 
The idea of having a book out from a big publisher and going on the road doing a hundred readings and signings to handfuls of people at bookshops and libraries -- what's the appeal of that?
Right, well, for a poetry collection there is no appeal to that kind of promotion because there is no payoff. Selling out your edition of 500 or 1000 copies isn't going to net you enough to buy a decent suitcase.

I don't know any poets who could afford to do that kind of promotion anyway. They have jobs. I think the people on that circuit are retired professors or kept men (or women - I've heard that some of the ladies write poetry these days too...).

But a novel of some other kind of book that people actually buy - doing hundreds of readings and signings are going to make money for the writer. You know, theoretically.

Still, it's an increasingly unusual scenario, the book tour. Unless you are already an established "name" or you become famous by winning a reality TV show prize or doing something else newsworthy. You know, like fucking Tiger Woods or Lindsay Lohan. Or both of them at the same time and having the presence of mind to remember to take some cell phone video of the whole thing.
 
Once it's about money, it becomes disgusting.

EDIT: Mass-production money, I meant. There's a difference between "should I buy one mansion or two?" and "should I buy bread or water?"
 
Right. Okay.

That's the kind of thinking that keeps artists and writers poor and begging for scraps. You must do it only for the love of creating and for nothing else! Sure.

Maybe you live in Willy Wonka's candy factory and don't need money. I live on earth, and down here, creative people are kept on a string by that kind of bullshit idealism and the dangling-carrot of impossible hope of being one of the half dozen who are singled out to make ridiculous amounts of money while the rest starve.

There's no reason an artist shouldn't be able to make a living wage by creating art. But for that to happen people have to start thinking about the scary, evil boogeyman money. If they don't, they'll be forever on the fringes and infinitely disposable. Like they are now.

Why should artistic endeavors be relegated to a ghetto class of worthlessness when a garbage truck driver or a congressman can make a living? It's because of fucked up, starry-eyed bullshit like, "Once it's about money, it becomes disgusting." That kind of thinking only reinforces the world's view of artists as idiots and guarantees a life of unnecessary poverty.

Everything is about money. If it isn't, come here and work for me. I'll teach you how to do my job. You can do it for love and I'll keep the paychecks.
 
I wasn't even thinking about the money angle. Just going on tour -- with a book of poems or a novel -- sounds like hell to me. A lot of poets are "on tour" in their region, reading everywhere they can, three or four times a week. Some of them don't even have a book they're hussling -- they just want the glory of a small crowd listening to them. Or they really enjoy the company of other poets. Not knocking it, just saying that a little of that goes a long way for me, personally.
 
Once it's about money, it becomes disgusting.

EDIT: Mass-production money, I meant. There's a difference between "should I buy one mansion or two?" and "should I buy bread or water?"

What mjp said.

The difference is between selling out and earning money.

And yeah, I want to have a mansion at each of my favourite locations.
Poverty sucks so much I never, ever want to experience it again.
Luxury is a great thing and my attitude makes me a selfish greedy pig.
FTW.
:eek:
 
There is a difference between selling out and making money. I'm not saying we should all starve. In fact, I made that clear.

Lolita Ginsoski said:
EDIT: Mass-production money, I meant. There's a difference between "should I buy one mansion or two?" and "should I buy bread or water?"
 
Not that it's very important, but if a fast food company spreads a five-liner of mine printed on the burger wraps around the globe, I'm earning mass-production-mass-money.

Of course that's theoretical wishfull thinking, but I'd have no silly problem with my silly contract and the money for me and my silly family.

Let's make it two lines. People are in a hurry.
 
I'd be personally disgusted with that happening. Different strokes for different folks.

However... Daniel Hayes. He was my high school English teacher. Bought a beautiful, new BMW with the royalties from his books, not to mention he lives on a lavish farm with said royalties. However, he still chooses to work at a shitty, inner-city school where paint is chipping from the walls and half his students are on probation. I like that.
 
All that said, if some university press or big publisher offered to print my collected poems, of course I would accept. I'd be insane not to. My rule is you always take the money when offered. I'm just not chasing it. I don't try to publish commercially, haven't since the mid-1990s, and I don't try to do poetry readings, but if I'm asked to read, I do it, and if I was offered a deal by a big publisher, I would take it. It would stress me out, having to live that life, but I would deal with it. I guess my point is that I don't see "making it" as a writer as attractive, it's not a thing I wish for. I like hiding out, being ignored, and I like what happens in the small press. It feels real and sane to me.

The odds of that happening, I realize, are very small.
 
There is a difference between selling out and making money. I'm not saying we should all starve. In fact, I made that clear.
Lolita Ginsoski said:
EDIT: Mass-production money, I meant. There's a difference between "should I buy one mansion or two?" and "should I buy bread or water?"
Hmm. Well, your EDIT didn't really make anything clear to me. It still sounds like the status quo. "one mansion or two?" is extreme wealth, but "should I buy bread or water?" sounds like poverty. All I'm saying that doing things or embracing ideas that contribute to your own poverty is shortsighted and idiotic.

I have to say though, I love the bit about the teacher with the "beautiful" new BMW with the "lavish" farm teaching the poor, deprived city kids. I wonder, does he park his "beautiful" new BMW near the school? Does he bring those kids on probation out to his "lavish" farm on the weekends? Someone call the pope, this guy needs to be made a saint. Get Will Smith on the phone. I think I just found his next shitty movie.

I don't know what he was supposed to illustrate - he seems to represent everything you are saying is vile: the expensive car and property that he purchased with the filthy wages of his sold out soul. What I seem to hear you saying is it's okay to do the things that you find "disgusting" as long as you're, you know, cool, and still down with the little people. Is that right?

Because I know you're not saying that this guy made all that money by accident, and that he never tried to be successful. You can't be naive enough to believe that. Can you?
 
To clarify, speaking only for myself, when I disparage poets, what I am criticising is not the creative person per se, but the self-serving, back-stabbing ego mania of the competitive poet who claws his/her way to the top of the dung hill. It's an ugly thing, and so ridiculous, because the larger world doesn't give a fig for poetry. It's the battle of the small pond. When I see it (in others, in myself), I am repulsed. My only desire is to write the best poems I can, and to get them in the hands of people who will appreciate them and hopefully draw some pleasure from them. Being recognized by the masses is monstrous and meaningless. Prizes, awards, prestigious publication have no attraction to me and seem counter productive. Being published by Bill Roberts means a hell of a lot more. That is true distinction.

Rekrab, that has to be one of the best examples of humility I have ever come across. The art will never die with people like you around.
 
But, to be honest, I don't trust myself in this regard. I think I'm full of shit and probably lying, and probably aching for fame and glory. The monster of ego is ferocious. What I said may have sounded good, but is it true? Damned if I know. I don't trust it. I do know that I'd rather be published by Bill than Harpers. That much is rock solid.
 
Yeah, both is better. From BOSP to Harpers. Harpers negotiating with Bill for reprint rights. Dream big.

On selling out, it tried that circa 1986-1996, and they weren't buying what I was selling. It's not that easy to sell your soul. A supply and demand thing. Lots of souls for sale, not much demand for them. You can work like a maniac at it and nothing happens but doors slammed in your face. Writers who successfully sell out are 1) talented (lots of that around), 2) hard workers to the point of obsession, 3) lucky and/or connected. Not that it's a worthy goal, but don't underestimate the difficulty of that path.
 
Rekrab, that has to be one of the best examples of humility I have ever come across. The art will never die with people like you around.

Don't be fooled by that humility, DJ. There's some sharp tooth and nail in his poetry. And I agree, as long as one holds Odin in his heart, Valhalla is alive and well.
 

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