Footnoting poems etc: what do you think?

[busker]

Kynaston started an interesting discussion on when and where to link vs explain in the title directly
To this, Tiger wrote:

This might be an interesting topic for the discussion forum. Spoilers, Links, Footnotes etc. I've found they can be a simple credit where it's due, and other times a roundabout way of adding an explanation or context to poem that is not found in the text proper.. I think, as KL said, it can be both at the same time. I've had poems questioned for gathering context from outside the text. Always been curious about everyone's thoughts.

Take Eliot's poetry, which is always full of footnotes.
Allusions upon allusions, allusions upon allusions.

At least in Eliot's time, English poetry was read by the upper classes who had the same Oxbridge education and a common cultural lexicon. 
The old Oxonians had the Classics, Dante, and the Bible. And some, like Eliot, a bit more. So a lot of allusions were inside references, sometimes inside jokes. Dang, even Asterix, which in the English translation of one of the comics, had Brutus angrily suggesting 'brute force' (et tu?)

Today, we partake of culture more widely. Not just Cavafy, who was known to the erudite English speaker even back in the day, but also Amos Tutuola, Chinua Achebe, hillbilly music, blues, all the way, to quote John Cleese, Venezuelan beaver cheese. How much does the writer assume the reader knows?
Mercedes, as a Kiwi, threw in a lot of Maori words in her poetry and you could make out what they meant from the context....most of the time.
But allusions work only when the reader and the writer are on the same page. Otherwise, it's like the guy in Dilbert complaining about his co workers who don't know the capital of Elbonia.
So where to footnote, and where to explain?

My view - allusions that the reader is not familiar with will probably not work. But that's okay. As long as there is a reasonable number of people in the world for whom the allusion works, it's okay for it to be there in a poem, morally speaking. And I prefer footnotes, as they're less in your face.

Thoughts?

[Kynaston Levitt]

Just a quick note, as I have only now seen this and I must sleep, but I think there is a difference between a poem that references many obscure and idiosyncratic things, and a poem that is inspired by or referencing just one thing. The single internet link to one thing, I believe, could be artfully incorporated into the title or (obviously) within the poem itself. Elliott's poems were packed with references. Obscure and personal references (not "fairly standard cultural references" as you have suggested the Nasadiya Sukta is). If I were to write a poem with a single "fairly standard cultural reference", I think, I would hope, I could confidently do it without a footnote. Or link to Wikipedia. It would work on the concept of "levels". If you can't enjoy a poem without knowing something outside what is said in the poem, then it fails on the first level. If you know a little more and can get the subtext or references, then that's a bonus extra level of complexity.

[Tiger the Lion]

Mercedes, as a Kiwi, threw in a lot of Maori words in her poetry and you could make out what they meant from the context....most of the time.

I loved Mercedes poetry. If you haven't heard her read, trust me it's a treat. But I do wonder if that Kiwi thing can be quite an advantage when cleverly exploited. An example from Mercedes...

"Now she’s buried, wrapped
in a pink silk chemise of mine,
under the pohutukawa near the tui’s nest
and a blackbird is singing
her tangihanga."

This struggling Westerner might have wrote...


Now she’s buried, wrapped
in a pink silk chemise of mine,
under the red maple near the blue jay’s nest
and a blackbird is singing
her funeral song.

Not quite as sexy, is it??

Now, having said that, Mercedes is a thoughtful poet. Each aboriginal word delivered metaphor or symbolism and rarely stood as mere decoration.

It's funny because in my part of the world a similar approach would be hailed as cultural appropriation and quickly cancelled. The natives have their own poetry and it's lovely.

Sorry if I got sidetracked. Carry on.

[TranquillityBase]

I don't have a problem with footnotes, or their equivalent in digital formats.  Both for informational and entertainment purposes, they have their place.  KL mentioned Beckett's Whoroscope in another thread.  The editors are sometimes right.  Whoroscope without notes would be pretty hard to digest.  Ditto the poems of David Jones.  And there are a number of poets (Pound, for example) where they would be a positive addition.

It is a pain to use them, but I don't think a poem that needs them is any less a poem.

[busker]

@Tiger - it’s interesting that you mention the issue with cultural appropriation in Canada
For some reason, New Zealand is the only settler country where there’s been a cultural fusion of sorts. The All Blacks (rugby team) have adopted the Haka. Māori names of places and mountains are the norm, not the exception (and it helps that they are generally multi syllabled and musical). White NZ seems to have adopted Māori culture respectfully, or at least that’s what it looks like as an outsider.

The situation in Australia is quite dismal, not least because the natives here were massacred and that original sin coloured all future interaction, while in NZ there was a treaty.

@TqB - I second your point about Pound. I find him difficult to navigate.

---

And I recognise the poem.
It was about the death of her parrot

[Kynaston Levitt]

I don't have a problem with footnotes, or their equivalent in digital formats.  Both for informational and entertainment purposes, they have their place.  KL mentioned Beckett's Whoroscope in another thread.  The editors are sometimes right.  Whoroscope without notes would be pretty hard to digest.  Ditto the poems of David Jones.  And there are a number of poets (Pound, for example) where they would be a positive addition.

It is a pain to use them, but I don't think a poem that needs them is any less a poem.

Despite what I said in my previous comment regarding Whoroscope, the footnotes* to that poem aren't necessarily a bad idea—in fact, I'm going to make a bit of a U-turn and say, yeah footnotes, in general, aren't necessarily a bad thing. But, I still maintain that if the whole or the majority of the poem is referring to or alluding to or related to or inspired by—whatever way you like to put it—a single thing, then some effort should be made to incorporate that single referent into the title of the poem or the poem itself**. I suppose my question is, if you're committed to acknowledging the referent, why wouldn't you do it that way?




*When I talk about footnotes I'm not talking about individual words that may be foreign or obscure that may need translation or definition. I'm talking about concepts or events or other art works etc. outside of the poem but that the poem is alluding to.
**Of course, I don't think you have to do this, either. I'm just saying that between footnoting or incorporation, incorporation is preferrable. You could very well do neither.

NB: After having a less bleary eyed look at the edits made to Busker's poem, I've realized my particular objection is redundant in that case. Because now there are 2 "footnotes" and they have asterisks for line/phrase specification. And, apart from the ugliness of the asterisks, I can't see any problem with the footnotes accompanying that poem.

[rowens]

Nowadays, you can find books that have no footnotes, but there is an appendix with annotations made by the editor. There's a two-volume book from the 1950s or something that is simply annotations for the Complete Works of William Butler Yeats. It describes place names and folklore and mythology and biographical information.

Then there are Dictionaries and Encyclopedias of Books. I don't read Lord of the Rings or Stephen King or Terry Pratchett, but I have Encyclopedias of their Worlds, with maps and character biographies and the science and history and art of their cultures and geographies of the different planets and fictional towns and areas.

I don't have interest in narratives, I like items and lists of functions of people and other animals and entities and, at most, short anecdotes and folktales.

I like poems that unfold. I don't like to know. I fight understanding until it dawns on me anyway. Usually, something will happen in my life, and a line will flash back into my memory, and suddenly I'll know what it's about.

---

I use cultural appropriation, that in itself, as a poetic device. I got a spam email telling me that I was being monitored, that everything I say and what I look at and the look on my face when I pleasure myself has been recorded and will be exposed to the public if I don't send a certain amount of money. I responded that if I had that amount of money I'd pay to have all the gathered material on me broadcasted on the big screens in Time Square. You could as well turn the table on the Sociologists and tell them that their work isn't Poetic enough, and have them banned for that.

That part is in reference to Tiger-Lilly's Kiwi and Canada comments.

[Tiger the Lion]

Took me forever to track this down. A little context for y'all. (kind of off topic but it came up and I'm glad it did.)

https://soundcloud.com/justmercedes

[Kynaston Levitt]

Took me forever to track this down. A little context for y'all. (kind of off topic but it came up and I'm glad it did.)

https://soundcloud.com/justmercedes

Now, that's some proper poetry, right there. Well done for finding it.