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View Poll Results: The MR Literary Club January 2012 Vote | |||
The poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins | 3 | 27.27% | |
Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman | 4 | 36.36% | |
The poems of John Keats | 0 | 0% | |
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge | 2 | 18.18% | |
Beowulf: A New Verse Translation, translated by Seamus Heaney | 2 | 18.18% | |
Voters: 11. You may not vote on this poll |
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01-14-2012, 08:28 AM | #16 |
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Hope I bought the right one... how can I tell? 1892 deathbed edition?
Last edited by hpulley; 01-14-2012 at 08:31 AM. |
01-14-2012, 09:51 AM | #17 |
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Now, which sections are we reading, or all of them? Start with Inscriptions I guess.
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01-14-2012, 01:16 PM | #18 | ||
Nameless Being
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Quote:
Quote:
WT Sharpe did you have any subset of poems that you envisioned forming a core for discussion, or just the whole book? |
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01-14-2012, 01:28 PM | #19 |
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01-14-2012, 01:42 PM | #20 |
Nameless Being
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01-14-2012, 01:57 PM | #21 |
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Ah, that I'm not sure. When it was first nominated, I did a bit of searching on it and noticed how many different versions were available. I don't know which are still being published.
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01-14-2012, 05:21 PM | #22 | |
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Quote:
I'm trying to decide whether to read this e-book or p-book. Of course I'd prefer e-book, but I'd want it to be formatted just as the author intended for poetry. |
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01-14-2012, 05:55 PM | #23 | ||
Bah, humbug!
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Quote:
Quote:
Since this is my first time taking part in the Literary Book Club, when does the discussion start? |
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01-14-2012, 08:32 PM | #24 |
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I started by reading biographical information and discovered that Whitman was apparently influenced by Ralph Waldo Emerson's essay "The Poet". You can find more information and a further link to the essay here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Poet_(essay) |
01-15-2012, 12:48 AM | #25 |
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It starts on the first of the next month. However, this being poetry, I'm not sure I see a reason to wait so long to discuss. I was thinking of starting it earlier this month, within the next week, so that we can discuss as we're reading...
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01-15-2012, 08:48 AM | #26 |
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Given the length of this book, I can see it becoming an ongoing discussion for some time to come. I suspect I'm not the only one here who's reading other things on their readers in addition to Leaves of Grass. This is the kind of book that people can still be commenting on months from now, long after other books have been read and discussed. Poetry should never be rushed.
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01-16-2012, 05:21 PM | #27 |
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I found some more info on the various versions. I tried to find the text Tom recommended, but it's not available to buy on Sony. I know I could convert, but with poetry I didn't want the conversion to affect the formatting.
Maybe the rest of you already know, but the differences in versions can be very different. The first version Whitman published was around 100 pages while the final version he published was around 400, with the ones in between having various lengths between those two. All the versions are still available but most of the "published" ones are either the first version (1855) or the last version (1891 "deathbed"). Hamlet53, the version you have, the 150th anniversary edition, is of the first edition. I looked at it online to consider getting it. I went with the "deathbed" version but honestly, I'm not sure I picked the right one! It seems the deathbed version is what Whitman himself considered the complete "masterpiece" vision, while some literary critics see the first edition as the "truer" and "purer" version that started it all. Where it gets more confusing is that some of the more famous poems were apparently not in the first edition, and the poems that were in the first edition were revised and in places rewritten and reordered. If I had the inclination I would've read them both to see the difference, but that's too much for me I think, especially when one version is so long already. So I'll go with the deathbed version to get the complete picture of it all and hope that even with its "bloating", as some call it, it'll still be a worthy edition to read. A note - apparently if you're buying the ebook and it doesn't specify which version, it's probably the short 1855 version. The version I bought (the Bantam Classics one) noted that most editions will publish the shorter one just because it's shorter. The version I have seems pretty well formatted, but there are no notes. I was disappointed, since the blurb in the ebook store said there would be. |
01-16-2012, 08:14 PM | #28 |
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I also bought the Bantam version, from Kobo. I figured that way I could read it in odd moments on the Kobo app. Same experience with notes; it said it had them, but it doesn't.
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01-16-2012, 10:56 PM | #29 |
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I know this has been brought up already, but is there any chance of settling on a key group of poems to discuss? Poetry takes time and I can't manage all of this in two weeks--not and appreciate it, at any rate. Moreover, the intro to the deathbed edition I'm reading says the quality of poems is uneven. I'm all for dipping into it, but at the same time I'd like to ensure I read the best/most important early. Help, please!
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01-17-2012, 04:26 AM | #30 |
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I was rather dismayed by the length and the variations in quality of this collection. I'm uncertain as to how to approach it and I couldn't see myself finishing it in the near future.
So why not start with one of Whitman's more famous and beautiful poems such as, for example, "When Lilacs Last in the Door-yard Bloom’d"—the elegy on Abraham Lincoln. This is an acknowledged masterpiece and has so much complexity of tone and meaning that it could provide a very profitable experience. I offer this purely as a personal suggestion and it is certainly not meant to usurp the authority and decisions of whoever decides to lead the discussion. Last edited by fantasyfan; 01-17-2012 at 06:24 AM. |
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