{"id":759,"date":"2008-07-23T09:38:31","date_gmt":"2008-07-23T16:38:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2008\/07\/avenging-poetry\/"},"modified":"2008-07-23T19:55:27","modified_gmt":"2008-07-24T02:55:27","slug":"avenging-poetry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/2008\/07\/23\/avenging-poetry\/","title":{"rendered":"Avenging Poetry"},"content":{"rendered":"

from the Guardian UK<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

Lumley attacks ‘obscure’ new poetry<\/h1>\n


The actress has been lambasted as old and out of touch for her controversial views on modern verse<\/font>\u00a0

Amelia Hill , social affairs correspondent,\u00a0The Observer<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0

<\/font><\/p>\n

When Joanna Lumley agreed to pen an introduction to a collection of poems, she probably thought she was simply doing a favour for an unknown poet in need of a publicity boost. Instead, the Absolutely Fabulous star has caused controversy by publishing views on modern poetry that have offended some of Britain’s best-known writers.<\/p>\n

Rather than limiting her comments to the book in question, Lumley attacked contemporary poetry, dismissing ‘so much’ of it as maddeningly obscure and, at worst, self-indulgent. At the other extreme, she argued that less demanding poetry risked becoming humdrum and commonplace.<\/span><\/p>\n

The actress was a judge for the Booker Prize in 1985 and led readings of Sir John Betjeman’s poetry at the 1996 unveiling of a stone tablet to the late Poet Laureate at Poets’ Corner in Westminster Abbey.<\/span><\/p>\n

Lumley wrote the controversial introduction to Liz Cowley’s forthcoming book, A Red Dress and Other Poems. She went on to say: ‘It is a rare modern poem that achieves the balance between being challenging and accessible.’<\/p>\n

Lumley praises Cowley for preferring to call herself a writer than a poet: ‘Liz would never dream of describing herself as a “poet”. She even dislikes the very word “poetry” because she feels there is a divisive ring to it, as if the genre were up there on a rarefied pedestal.’<\/p>\n

<\/span>But her comments have drawn the wrath of many of Britain’s leading poets. Ian McMillan, presenter of BBC Radio 3’s The Verb, poet in residence at Barnsley football club and a contender for the next Poet Laureate, accused Lumley of being ill-informed. ‘I suspect that she hasn’t read very widely because she’s ignoring the fact that poetry in the 21st century is a broad church,’ he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

[ click to read full article at Guardian UK <\/a>]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

from the Guardian UK Lumley attacks ‘obscure’ new poetry The actress has been lambasted as old and out of touch for her controversial views on modern verse\u00a0Amelia Hill , social affairs correspondent,\u00a0The Observer\u00a0 When Joanna Lumley agreed to pen an introduction to a collection of poems, she probably thought she was simply doing a favour […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-759","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-literary-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/759","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=759"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/759\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}