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Chaos, v. 1, issue 4, April 1945
Page 5
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LANDRY, THE "CRITIC" -- heh heh While rambling gayly -- well, rambling, anyway -- through the latest fapa mailing Willie and I were stopped dead in our optic tracks by the musing of one Pvt Hilton J Landry who devotes two single-spaced pages in YHOS to a "critique" (I'll explain the quote marks later) of SAPPHO. Friend Landry titles his offering "All that Glitters --" presumably all that glitters is not poetry. Particularly, if it appears in SAPPHO. A reasonably careful study of Landry's remarks, however, reveals that his "critique" is not a critique in any sense of the word. He merely presents a series of bald opinions -- and lets subjective analysis go hang. This is a pity. As editors of a magazine devoted to verse, Bill and I are interested in any thoughtful criticism of our contents. We welcome intelligent comments. We are even responsive to foolery of Mr. Landry's brand -- as witness this rejoinder. After digesting "All that Glitters" we turned to our sheaf of rejected poetry & manuscripts in search of any verse by Pvt Landry, and found none. Possibly he submits his stuff under a pseudonym. Anyway, we've tagged him as a frustrated poet. He suggests that we print something by "Hoosag Kadjeperooni" -- among other people -- and we wouldn't be extremely surprised to find that this Kadjeperooni person is really Pvt Landry. Anyway, if Hoosag send us something worthwhile we will print it -- and no questions asked. We play no favorites -- even use our own stuff, if necessary. In case anybody is interested we quote a few choices passages from "All that Glitters --" : "I do not mean to imply...that rhymed is superior to free verse, tho for my part I prefer the former." Well, he's frank about his preference. For our part, we will just as soon run good rhymed verse as good "free" verse. But our standards of "good" probably differ from those of Hilton's. There's more : "The whole magazine is afflicted with...feeble, amateurish...poetry." But, damitall, chums, that's just more opinion. Opinions are cheap. Any cretin can have opinions -- even if they aren't original. And still more : "That /SAPPHO/ has survived so far, is possibly due to the plaudits of the nescient poetry-perusers who are given esctatically to extolling poems because they don't know what the hell they're all about." Oh come, laddie...whether or not our faithful readers know anything about poetry has never inhibited their felicitation or execrations. Certainly the world be critic need have no knowledge of his subject in order to toss a brickbat -- as regards poetry. Your "critique" make this clear enough. Heigh ho! We could delve into this (fascinating?) point-counter-point for several more pages, if we had the pages -- and the inclination. We don't have either, though, and figure it best to close, Quot nomines, tot sententiae, Landry, and we're inclined to think that you should keep your opinions to yourself. --- George Ebey
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LANDRY, THE "CRITIC" -- heh heh While rambling gayly -- well, rambling, anyway -- through the latest fapa mailing Willie and I were stopped dead in our optic tracks by the musing of one Pvt Hilton J Landry who devotes two single-spaced pages in YHOS to a "critique" (I'll explain the quote marks later) of SAPPHO. Friend Landry titles his offering "All that Glitters --" presumably all that glitters is not poetry. Particularly, if it appears in SAPPHO. A reasonably careful study of Landry's remarks, however, reveals that his "critique" is not a critique in any sense of the word. He merely presents a series of bald opinions -- and lets subjective analysis go hang. This is a pity. As editors of a magazine devoted to verse, Bill and I are interested in any thoughtful criticism of our contents. We welcome intelligent comments. We are even responsive to foolery of Mr. Landry's brand -- as witness this rejoinder. After digesting "All that Glitters" we turned to our sheaf of rejected poetry & manuscripts in search of any verse by Pvt Landry, and found none. Possibly he submits his stuff under a pseudonym. Anyway, we've tagged him as a frustrated poet. He suggests that we print something by "Hoosag Kadjeperooni" -- among other people -- and we wouldn't be extremely surprised to find that this Kadjeperooni person is really Pvt Landry. Anyway, if Hoosag send us something worthwhile we will print it -- and no questions asked. We play no favorites -- even use our own stuff, if necessary. In case anybody is interested we quote a few choices passages from "All that Glitters --" : "I do not mean to imply...that rhymed is superior to free verse, tho for my part I prefer the former." Well, he's frank about his preference. For our part, we will just as soon run good rhymed verse as good "free" verse. But our standards of "good" probably differ from those of Hilton's. There's more : "The whole magazine is afflicted with...feeble, amateurish...poetry." But, damitall, chums, that's just more opinion. Opinions are cheap. Any cretin can have opinions -- even if they aren't original. And still more : "That /SAPPHO/ has survived so far, is possibly due to the plaudits of the nescient poetry-perusers who are given esctatically to extolling poems because they don't know what the hell they're all about." Oh come, laddie...whether or not our faithful readers know anything about poetry has never inhibited their felicitation or execrations. Certainly the world be critic need have no knowledge of his subject in order to toss a brickbat -- as regards poetry. Your "critique" make this clear enough. Heigh ho! We could delve into this (fascinating?) point-counter-point for several more pages, if we had the pages -- and the inclination. We don't have either, though, and figure it best to close, Quot nomines, tot sententiae, Landry, and we're inclined to think that you should keep your opinions to yourself. --- George Ebey
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