Simplicity in Poetry

[milo]

1. Always identify your audience.
2. Always write to your audience.
3. Always.

I heartily disagree with this.
Just write a great poem, the audience is of no consequence .

[UselessBlueprint]

A lot of poems may seem to use more words than necessary, often able to summarized in a brief sentence or two (see Leanne's example). 

Leanne was, I'm sure, making the opposite point. But it's interesting that Byron's celebrated poem is not that great by modern standards: the only wow point is the enjambment at the end of L1.
I am disappointed that people on this thread are essentially saying the same thing, basically that 'complexity for the sake of complexity is pointless, and simplicity to the point of inanity is as bad'. Hard to argue with that.

So here's something you can argue with:

A poem should be a lesson in morality. It should educate the reader about sin, god, and the ways of the wicked. It should not contain profanities unless the poet really wants it to. And it should always be in Swahili.
If you disagree with the above, you're pathetic.

I should read more thoroughly before posting. Got lazy halfway through the thread. Only read her summary, not even the poem. Hah.

As far as your point goes, I disagree with all except the Swahili. I don't know enough Swahili to make a fair judgement there. Is it a language that lends itself nicely to poetry?

[Lizzie]

A lot of poems may seem to use more words than necessary, often able to summarized in a brief sentence or two (see Leanne's example). 

Glad you see you changed your mind about that one!

I might have had to break you.

---

1. Always identify your audience.
2. Always write to your audience.
3. Always.

I heartily disagree with this.
Just write a great poem, the audience is of no consequence .

Respectfully (please don't beat me ), isn't this the same as saying that your ultimate audience is yourself? I don't mean that in a bad way, it just sounds like you've identified your audience. If you're not writing for anyone else, you're writing for yourself. I think this is noble, but I'm far too egotistical to not want accolades from the masses (said 75% tongue in cheek)!

I feel like it's kind of a tree falling in the forest and no one hearing it situation -- how do you know it's a great poem if no one else reads it?

[milo]

A lot of poems may seem to use more words than necessary, often able to summarized in a brief sentence or two (see Leanne's example). 

Glad you see you changed your mind about that one!

I might have had to break you.

---

1. Always identify your audience.
2. Always write to your audience.
3. Always.

I heartily disagree with this.
Just write a great poem, the audience is of no consequence .

Respectfully (please don't beat me ), isn't this the same as saying that your ultimate audience is yourself? I don't mean that in a bad way, it just sounds like you've identified your audience. If you're not writing for anyone else, you're writing for yourself. I think this is noble, but I'm far too egotistical to not want accolades from the masses (said 75% tongue in cheek)!

I feel like it's kind of a tree falling in the forest and no one hearing it situation -- how do you know it's a great poem if no one else reads it?

I also heartily disagree with this. You write to create a poem. From there what happens, happens.
You would deliberately make a poem worse to pander to an audience?
Anyway, if you write a great poem the audience will find it.

[Achebe]

Anyway, if you write a great poem the audience will find it.

Yup - readers are not a monolith. There'll always be a segment that'll like your work if your work is good (defined as 'something that can't be done by just anybody').
If you try to cater to the lowest common denominator, you'll be up against ad jingles from the 70s.

[Lizzie]

I also heartily disagree with this. You write to create a poem. From there what happens, happens.
You would deliberately make a poem worse to pander to an audience?
Anyway, if you write a great poem the audience will find it.

Pander? No. Connect with? Yes. I write poetry because I want to connect with other people on an honest, soul-to-soul, authentic level. I'm not interested in just writing for myself because I don't want to exist in a vacuum. I'm also not interested in faking my work because then it wouldn't be fulfilling for me when someone connects to it.

I was trying to make a joke about the accolades, but the desire to write for others is real.

I understand what you're saying about the audience finding you. I think that there's also something to be said for writing in such a way that allows the readers you want to find you. I think that the relationship between the reader and the writer is a two way street -- they have a responsibility to read with interest, openness, patience, and attentiveness. Writers should write in such a way that allows the reader to see something of their truth and the truth of existence from the perspective of the writer. That's all I'm saying.

[cvanshelton]

1. Always identify your audience.
2. Always write to your audience.
3. Always.

I heartily disagree with this.
Just write a great poem, the audience is of no consequence .

Then you have already identified your audience as yourself, and your opinion is the only one that matters. Pretty small world to live in, but if it works for you that's great.

---

A lot of poems may seem to use more words than necessary, often able to summarized in a brief sentence or two (see Leanne's example). 

Glad you see you changed your mind about that one!

I might have had to break you.

---

I heartily disagree with this.
Just write a great poem, the audience is of no consequence .

Respectfully (please don't beat me ), isn't this the same as saying that your ultimate audience is yourself? I don't mean that in a bad way, it just sounds like you've identified your audience. If you're not writing for anyone else, you're writing for yourself. I think this is noble, but I'm far too egotistical to not want accolades from the masses (said 75% tongue in cheek)!

I feel like it's kind of a tree falling in the forest and no one hearing it situation -- how do you know it's a great poem if no one else reads it?

I also heartily disagree with this. You write to create a poem. From there what happens, happens.
You would deliberately make a poem worse to pander to an audience?
Anyway, if you write a great poem the audience will find it.

Writing to a specific audience is not pandering, nor does it necessarily make a poem worse. There is no causal relationship there. Also, in writing, the formula of "if you build it, they will come" does not work. You have to do the work. You have to put your writing out there. The responsibility is on you to find your audience, not the other way around. But, one can only conclude from your previous responses, your audience seems to be yourself, so if that is the case, I suppose your audience did find you insofar as you have found yourself. Again, I don't have anything against that perspective as long as it works for you.

[QDeathstar]

Knowing your audience is important in some forms of writing, but for poetry it is hard to know your audience ahead of time... some of the best poems last long after the poet is dead... it's safe to say they didn't know their audience.

I think you need to know your subject, and have your words match your subject.... but trying to talk down to a specific audience seems implausible.

[ellajam]

1. Always identify your audience.
2. Always write to your audience.
3. Always.

This is the first post that has moved me to respond because for me that's just not the way I go about writing and the way it's stated as rules irks me. I write a poem because a thought comes to mind in what to me is an interesting combination of words. Thinking about it and playing with it becomes a poem. This does not make me indifferent to responses to the poem, I'm glad to have them at all and especially like when someone can suggest an improvement or sees something in it I didn't and I like interacting with people about the poem. So an audience is nice to have but that is not what makes me want to spend my time writing poems, it's the crafting of it I enjoy. It is not a diary even if there is no (or an unknown) audience.

1. Always identify your audience.
2. Always write to your audience.
3. Always.

I heartily disagree with this.
Just write a great poem, the audience is of no consequence .

Then you have already identified your audience as yourself, and your opinion is the only one that matters. Pretty small world to live in, but if it works for you that's great.

---

Glad you see you changed your mind about that one!

I might have had to break you.

---

Respectfully (please don't beat me ), isn't this the same as saying that your ultimate audience is yourself? I don't mean that in a bad way, it just sounds like you've identified your audience. If you're not writing for anyone else, you're writing for yourself. I think this is noble, but I'm far too egotistical to not want accolades from the masses (said 75% tongue in cheek)!

I feel like it's kind of a tree falling in the forest and no one hearing it situation -- how do you know it's a great poem if no one else reads it?

I also heartily disagree with this. You write to create a poem. From there what happens, happens.
You would deliberately make a poem worse to pander to an audience?
Anyway, if you write a great poem the audience will find it.

Writing to a specific audience is not pandering, nor does it necessarily make a poem worse. There is no causal relationship there. Also, in writing, the formula of "if you build it, they will come" does not work. You have to do the work. You have to put your writing out there. The responsibility is on you to find your audience, not the other way around. But, one can only conclude from your previous responses, your audience seems to be yourself, so if that is the case, I suppose your audience did find you insofar as you have found yourself. Again, I don't have anything against that perspective as long as it works for you.

My bold. No, while maybe that is the only conclusion you can come to, that is not the only conclusion others can come to from this member's posts. There is a difference between writing a poem that only you can understand and writing regardless of an audience. Whether or not a wide audience finds a good poem does not make it more or less. Plenty of good art is not appreciated in its time or at all, that doesn't make the artist less skilled or the art less worthwhile.

For a wide audience, curing cancer would be nice.

[milo]

1. Always identify your audience.
2. Always write to your audience.
3. Always.

I heartily disagree with this.
Just write a great poem, the audience is of no consequence .

Then you have already identified your audience as yourself, and your opinion is the only one that matters. Pretty small world to live in, but if it works for you that's great.

---

Glad you see you changed your mind about that one!

I might have had to break you.

---

Respectfully (please don't beat me ), isn't this the same as saying that your ultimate audience is yourself? I don't mean that in a bad way, it just sounds like you've identified your audience. If you're not writing for anyone else, you're writing for yourself. I think this is noble, but I'm far too egotistical to not want accolades from the masses (said 75% tongue in cheek)!

I feel like it's kind of a tree falling in the forest and no one hearing it situation -- how do you know it's a great poem if no one else reads it?

I also heartily disagree with this. You write to create a poem. From there what happens, happens.
You would deliberately make a poem worse to pander to an audience?
Anyway, if you write a great poem the audience will find it.

Writing to a specific audience is not pandering, nor does it necessarily make a poem worse. There is no causal relationship there. Also, in writing, the formula of "if you build it, they will come" does not work. You have to do the work. You have to put your writing out there. The responsibility is on you to find your audience, not the other way around. But, one can only conclude from your previous responses, your audience seems to be yourself, so if that is the case, I suppose your audience did find you insofar as you have found yourself. Again, I don't have anything against that perspective as long as it works for you.

If you are writing different due to your audience, then you are pandering.
If you are not making your poem worse (you are writing the best poem regardless of your audience) then you are not actually writing for your audience at all.

I don't know how my personal actions would be relevant but no, I don't write for myself. I also don't write for an audience. I merely write to produce the best poem I can. I post them here to help to that effect. What happens after that doesn't really interest me that much.

[QDeathstar]

I write to tell a story.... Or to make a point.

[milo]

I write to tell a story.... Or to make a point.

The only real reason to write.

Thinking about this discussion I have concluded that all writing is done in solitude - hence, there is no audience. Good thing too, as it make for poor performance.

What I think the intended argument should be is that you write for your "consumer" as, like I said writing makes for poor performance. In that case, it is based on a rather naive and romantic belief that poetry has some kind of monetary value. It doesn't. Writing for an anticipated consumer is a fools errand. Best to write to tell a story or make a beautiful lyric.

[Todd]

I probably don't think too deeply about this.

I write because an idea or conceit captures my interest and I want to see if I can make it live. I would prefer the effort to be successful of course, but I really don't care about an assumed general audience. I just take for granted that someone will be my reader and if my choices limit that pool I'm perfectly comfortable with it.

[Lizzie]

I write to tell a story.... Or to make a point.

The only real reason to write.

Thinking about this discussion I have concluded that all writing is done in solitude - hence, there is no audience. Good thing too, as it make for poor performance.

What I think the intended argument should be is that you write for your "consumer" as, like I said writing makes for poor performance. In that case, it is based on a rather naive and romantic belief that poetry has some kind of monetary value. It doesn't. Writing for an anticipated consumer is a fools errand. Best to write to tell a story or make a beautiful lyric.

Milo, I do think that the quote in the original post is speaking to those interested in writing books and having them sell, yes. I do want to make it clear that that was not the point of my last comment about writing to connect with people. I know that poetry is not and should not be a get rich quick scheme (or get rich ever). I think it's unfair, though, to say that writing for an audience equates to being a money grubber. If I post my poetry on a blog, I won't get rich. If I submit to magazines and journals I won't get rich. Hell, even if I write a book I know I won't get rich! That's not my goal. I will probably just do a blog with poetry and some of my photography, but I want that work to be accessible and compelling to people.

Why do we post here? It's so that the poetry can be as beautiful as it can be, and that implies a viewer. Why change poems to be anything if there's no reader?

[milo]

I did not mean to insinuate anyone was a money grubber.
Still, I do not believe having an audience (more accurately a consumer) in mind in any way improves a poem? So what is the benefit? The goal needs to be to produce a better poem. Then, if you post it on your blog or submit to a journal or (and this is a best case scenario) post it here, if it is great your audience will find it. This brings me right round circle to my original point about knowing your audience being worthless and, perhaps even counterproductive. Certainly poor advice for a poet.

[cvanshelton]

I did not mean to insinuate anyone was a money grubber.
Still, I do not believe having an audience (more accurately a consumer) in mind in any way improves a poem?  So what is the benefit?  The goal needs to be to produce a better poem. Then, if you post it on your blog or submit to a journal or (and this is a best case scenario) post it here, if it is great your audience will find it. This brings me right round circle to my original point about knowing your audience being worthless and, perhaps even counterproductive. Certainly poor advice for a poet.

I am so confused. How does having an audience in mind become pandering? Pandering is selling out and usually a despicable thing. How does being thoughtful about your audience lead to writing a bad poem? How can you even use words like "good" and "bad" or "better" without having those values defined by someone outside your self? The very essence of writing a "good" or "bad" poem seems to intrinsically necessitate (a priori) influence outside yourself. So if you are writing to a standard that you did not just come up with outside of any influence whatsoever, you are writing to an audience. That audience is the set of those that share the same poetry value (whether they know it or not). The other thing that just stumps me is how it is in any way limiting for me if I want to write a poem for children (I define my audience), and that leads me to write in a certain voice or meter, to use certain imagery or rhymes or words. If I am writing to kids, I probably won't use the word "ontology". I don't see that as limiting, rather focusing. Please help me see the reason in that. I just can't get from A to B there.

I also don't understand the "your audience will find it" perspective. Maybe that is just me, and if it is, it is. I never found that to be the case with anything in life.

I get that I'm the new guy and inexperienced and don't know my way around here very well. I don't mean to cause more problems or be obtuse. I just don't understand. Maybe that is ok. Cheers!

---

I want that work to be accessible and compelling to people.

Why do we post here? It's so that the poetry can be as beautiful as it can be, and that implies a viewer. Why change poems to be anything if there's no reader?

This makes perfect reasonable sense to me.

[milo]

I did not mean to insinuate anyone was a money grubber.
Still, I do not believe having an audience (more accurately a consumer) in mind in any way improves a poem?  So what is the benefit?  The goal needs to be to produce a better poem. Then, if you post it on your blog or submit to a journal or (and this is a best case scenario) post it here, if it is great your audience will find it. This brings me right round circle to my original point about knowing your audience being worthless and, perhaps even counterproductive. Certainly poor advice for a poet.

I am so confused. How does having an audience in mind become pandering? Pandering is selling out and usually a despicable thing. How does being thoughtful about your audience lead to writing a bad poem? How can you even use words like "good" and "bad" or "better" without having those values defined by someone outside your self? The very essence of writing a "good" or "bad" poem seems to intrinsically necessitate (a priori) influence outside yourself. So if you are writing to a standard that you did not just come up with outside of any influence whatsoever, you are writing to an audience. That audience is the set of those that share the same poetry value (whether they know it or not). The other thing that just stumps me is how it is in any way limiting for me if I want to write a poem for children (I define my audience), and that leads me to write in a certain voice or meter, to use certain imagery or rhymes or words. If I am writing to kids, I probably won't use the word "ontology". I don't see that as limiting, rather focusing. Please help me see the reason in that. I just can't get from A to B there.

I also don't understand the "your audience will find it" perspective. Maybe that is just me, and if it is, it is. I never found that to be the case with anything in life.

I get that I'm the new guy and inexperienced and don't know my way around here very well. I don't mean to cause more problems or be obtuse. I just don't understand. Maybe that is ok. Cheers!

---

I want that work to be accessible and compelling to people.

Why do we post here? It's so that the poetry can be as beautiful as it can be, and that implies a viewer. Why change poems to be anything if there's no reader?

This makes perfect reasonable sense to me.

Writing a children's poem is not "knowing your audience" it is writing a type of poem - a children's poem. This includes all the criteria that goes with writing a children's poem.

the assumption is that by not knowing your audience you would simply write the best poem you could. If knowing your audience causes any deviation from this the poem is then inferior. If it doesn't then it was just a distraction. Since you would naturally already write to the best of your ability without knowing your audience, it can only ever produce a negative result. This is why it is terrible advice.

And finally, the concept that you are already writing for an audience no matter what excludes the advice from having any value as well - if you were already doing it unbeknownst to yourself how could knowing it produce any value whatsoever,

[cvanshelton]

I did not mean to insinuate anyone was a money grubber.
Still, I do not believe having an audience (more accurately a consumer) in mind in any way improves a poem?  So what is the benefit?  The goal needs to be to produce a better poem. Then, if you post it on your blog or submit to a journal or (and this is a best case scenario) post it here, if it is great your audience will find it. This brings me right round circle to my original point about knowing your audience being worthless and, perhaps even counterproductive. Certainly poor advice for a poet.

I am so confused. How does having an audience in mind become pandering? Pandering is selling out and usually a despicable thing. How does being thoughtful about your audience lead to writing a bad poem? How can you even use words like "good" and "bad" or "better" without having those values defined by someone outside your self? The very essence of writing a "good" or "bad" poem seems to intrinsically necessitate (a priori) influence outside yourself. So if you are writing to a standard that you did not just come up with outside of any influence whatsoever, you are writing to an audience. That audience is the set of those that share the same poetry value (whether they know it or not). The other thing that just stumps me is how it is in any way limiting for me if I want to write a poem for children (I define my audience), and that leads me to write in a certain voice or meter, to use certain imagery or rhymes or words. If I am writing to kids, I probably won't use the word "ontology". I don't see that as limiting, rather focusing. Please help me see the reason in that. I just can't get from A to B there.

I also don't understand the "your audience will find it" perspective. Maybe that is just me, and if it is, it is. I never found that to be the case with anything in life.

I get that I'm the new guy and inexperienced and don't know my way around here very well. I don't mean to cause more problems or be obtuse. I just don't understand. Maybe that is ok. Cheers!

---

I want that work to be accessible and compelling to people.

Why do we post here? It's so that the poetry can be as beautiful as it can be, and that implies a viewer. Why change poems to be anything if there's no reader?

This makes perfect reasonable sense to me.

Writing a children's poem is not "knowing your audience" it is writing a type of poem - a children's poem. This includes all the criteria that goes with writing a children's poem.

the assumption is that by not knowing your audience you would simply write the best poem you could. If knowing your audience causes any deviation from this the poem is then inferior. If it doesn't then it was just a distraction. Since you would naturally already write to the best of your ability without knowing your audience, it can only ever produce a negative result. This is why it is terrible advice.

And finally, the concept that you are already writing for an audience no matter what excludes the advice from having any value as well - if you were already doing it unbeknownst to yourself how could knowing it produce any value whatsoever,

What would change your mind about this?

[milo]

I am so confused. How does having an audience in mind become pandering? Pandering is selling out and usually a despicable thing. How does being thoughtful about your audience lead to writing a bad poem? How can you even use words like "good" and "bad" or "better" without having those values defined by someone outside your self? The very essence of writing a "good" or "bad" poem seems to intrinsically necessitate (a priori) influence outside yourself. So if you are writing to a standard that you did not just come up with outside of any influence whatsoever, you are writing to an audience. That audience is the set of those that share the same poetry value (whether they know it or not). The other thing that just stumps me is how it is in any way limiting for me if I want to write a poem for children (I define my audience), and that leads me to write in a certain voice or meter, to use certain imagery or rhymes or words. If I am writing to kids, I probably won't use the word "ontology". I don't see that as limiting, rather focusing. Please help me see the reason in that. I just can't get from A to B there.

I also don't understand the "your audience will find it" perspective. Maybe that is just me, and if it is, it is. I never found that to be the case with anything in life.

I get that I'm the new guy and inexperienced and don't know my way around here very well. I don't mean to cause more problems or be obtuse. I just don't understand. Maybe that is ok. Cheers!

---

This makes perfect reasonable sense to me.

Writing a children's poem is not "knowing your audience" it is writing a type of poem - a children's poem. This includes all the criteria that goes with writing a children's poem.

the assumption is that by not knowing your audience you would simply write the best poem you could. If knowing your audience causes any deviation from this the poem is then inferior. If it doesn't then it was just a distraction. Since you would naturally already write to the best of your ability without knowing your audience, it can only ever produce a negative result. This is why it is terrible advice.

And finally, the concept that you are already writing for an audience no matter what excludes the advice from having any value as well - if you were already doing it unbeknownst to yourself how could knowing it produce any value whatsoever,

What would change your mind about this?

A logical argument showing any benefit to "know your audience"

As I mentioned before, writers do not have actual audiences as writing makes for poor performance art so I am assuming we are talking about consumers.

[Lizzie]

There's another portion of her book that's called "The Dangers of Concentrating on Publication," and I think that this might connect with some of the things I'm hearing:

...the danger, I think, of connecting writing with publication is that you can end up focusing on writing in a way that will be acceptable and publishable. If you concentrate on publication possibilities when you're writing, I think you lose your focus on the writing itself. Instead of the process of writing -- the desire to shape our experience into language that can form a bridge between your life and that of others -- you concentrate on what is bland and acceptable. You become afraid to take any risks in your work.

When you're writing, you need to concentrate on the poem or story you are writing; you need to find the voice inside yourself that fits the poem or story and that is honest and true to the story. Publication is important. We all like to be published and to win prizes and awards. It validates us and our work, but in the end, it is the writing that matters. If it's any good, it will last long after no one remembers the names of any prize, no matter how prestigious.

I could paper ten rooms with rejection slips and contest letters informing me I didn't win, but I don't care about it as much as I did 20 years ago. I have to believe in what I'm doing with my work and where that works needs to go, even if no one else agrees. I know that I'm on a journey and that I have to follow wherever my instinct about writing leads me. I can't worry who likes what I'm doing and who doesn't. I hope that the readers of this book will learn much more quickly what it has taken me so many years to learn. Your instincts know more about what you need to write than anyone who exists outside of your skin."

Am I on the right track with this?

The italics are mine. I highlighted that bit because I think that relates back to the original post, accessible language being a more efficient vehicle to bridge the gap between writer and reader.

---

As I mentioned before, writers do not have actual audiences as writing makes for poor performance art so I am assuming we are talking about consumers.

I'm using these notions interchangeably. Perhaps that's where I'm getting confused. I go to poetry readings and what not, but I mostly read poems for myself in print so theatrical presentation was not what I had in mind. But, Shakespeare was a poet and his work is presented in theaters. Perhaps I should say reader?

---

Milo: Is your point about the children's writing that you can't know specifically who is going to be reading the poem, just that they would be children in general? What I hear you saying is that if you don't know the person who's going to be reading your poem, then you can't write for them personally but rather in a general style. Is that accurate?