I believe that I attended the Nutcracker when I was about seven years' old. I don't remember it advertising sexual perversion. We did not ask. Tchaikovsky, to the best of , my previous knowledge, did not tell. He is dead and no longer available to babysit but, given your revelation, I would have rejected him as a babysitter for my children or as a teacher since, if he was lavender, he did not even knew what ought to go where. I knew that Hitler favored Wagner as a composer but I had not heard that Wagner "helped set the socio-political agenda for the Third Reich." If so, that is very bad news and he won't be modeling for babysitter either. Somehow, I doubt that, whatever Wagner's political views, he was secretly meeting with the Nazi High Command to map out the fine points of Nazi ideology. Speaking of hyperbole!
Anyone familiar with my efforts here knows that I am no fan of either anti-Semitism or anti-Catholicism (being Catholic myself) or xenophobia or border moonbattery for that matter. I had the privilege of being personally acquainted with the late Professor Leslie Hotson, a Shakespearian scholar at Harvard and his wife, the late Professor Mary Hotson, who served in a similar capacity at Radcliffe. One or the other was T. S. Eliot's first cousin and both were enthusiasts. Neither was anti-Semitic and, if somehow T. S. Eliot exhibited anti-Semitism, he should be viewed in the context of his times. I did find him then and now an annoyingly turgid excuse for a poet although those more familiar with his work than I suggest that he was quite responsibly conservative. Maybe. Maybe not. The turgid nature of his work impels me to not recommend him to my kids. Life is short and ought not to be wasted on The Wasteland or other such "work."
Ezra Pound!!!! His broadcasts were for Mussolini not for Hitler or Tojo. He was the victim of a little scheme in which his government appointed attorney pled him not guilty by reason of insanity for his treasonous broadcasts (think Axis Sally/Tokyo Rose only for Mussolini). He was "hospitalized" at St. Elizabeth's in Washington where the political prisoners were sent. Eventually, courtesy of a petition to President Eisenhower by Nobel Prize winners and Pulitzer Prize winners headed up by poet Robert Frost demanding that Pound be tried for treason or released, Ike ordered him released or caused him to be ordered released. Pound pronounced his experience as a victory for fascism since he had made the government fascist in its treatment of him and then he retired to his villa in Italy. Pound is also dead and not on my list of role models for babysitters and, like Tchaikovsky, Wagner, D. H. Lawrence, Whitman, Dostoevsky, Pinter, Albee, Ginsberg, and Eliot, not particularly necessary to my children's education or that of anyone else's children although they will have to decide that for their own respective children. Letting Pound go was one of Ike's rare bright moves. It suggested that Pound was not quite up to a mental standard (mens rea) capable of treason. Very nice touch.
I attack what needs attacking. I probably fail to fully attack what needs attacking much less practicing hyperbole. Sarcasm is in the eye of the beholder. Self-righteous???? If I am righteous, should I be "other-righteous????"
If you think Whitman is "needed for any coherent study of 19th century American verse" (assuming arguendo that study of any sort of 19th century American or other verse is necessary in any event), fine, inflict it on YOUR children. Leave what is necessary to the education of other people's children to the decisions of their parents individually. No one died and left you in charge of setting standards for mine or theirs. As to what constitutes "ignorance", you fail to impress me as a source of any definition.
What the author meant to say when the author wrote the precise opposite is the shoddy shopworn stock in trade of each and every presumptuous hack literature teacher. If you imagine otherwise, you should be more honest with yourself. You are apparently the victim of the "intellectual" incest of the professoriate even if only in their classrooms.
Transparent???? I certainly hope so. Was I supposed to be devious? What you see is what you get.
The Arkansas Antichrist gave a copy of Leaves of Grass to Monica. Fat lot of good that did her.
You are obviously making the mistake of imagining that, having experienced your opinions here, I would give a feather or a fig for them. I don't but I can keep this up as long as you can, if I choose to do so.
Hmmm. This raises an interesting conundrum, namely:
Much verse was written during Whitman's lifetime that wasn't written by Whitman. Who decided that Whitman's work was important?
The answer, of course, is 'the generation of poets that followed Whitman and drew on him as an influence.' Hence Whitman's influence is undeniable. All the "canonical" modernists at least knew who Whitman was and had read his work (whether they embraced or rejected his work is another question). But...who decides who the "canonical" modernists are?
The answer to that is unclear, except in the sense that Academia owns the canon. The influence of poetry (and hence the influence of Whitman) is as big as the culture, and clearly not limited to the relatively narrow confines of the academy. The question, then, is this: Does Academia's version of the canon accurately reflect the canonical poets' influence on the culture?
I personally suspect that the answer to this is a resounding no, on the face of it. However, the Academy's position as educators of succeeding generations guarantees that the answer has to be at least partly a yes. Academia teaches what it deems important, and so to the succeeding generation it is important...to a degree. The degree to which it is important depends on the efficiency with which it not only teaches, but inculcates values.
My university was only partly successful, in that I sat through several classes whose doctrinal bases I fundamentally rejected, and still reject. To this day I don't care to pick up a Joan Slonczewski novel...but then again, I had good courses on Chaucer and Shakespeare to fall back on, and I remember my classroom time with Marlene Barr much as John McCain remembers his time in Hanoi.
Still, it remains at least a little bit true that the authors we think are important are the authors our teachers tell us are important. Fore-warned is fore-armed, which is an aphorism to remember when you go to the library.
Today's a good day to read an author I've never read before. Thanks, guys.