Posted on 04/25/2005 11:39:50 PM PDT by DameAutour
NEW HAVEN, Conn. - Southern Connecticut State University barred a student from a poetry class after his professor said a poem he submitted contained veiled threats to sexually assault her and her 3-year-old daughter.
The student, Edward Bolles, said his poem entitled "Professor White," was meant to be a satirical piece about globalization. In it, a Mexican student named Juan has a sexual encounter with the daughter of his white professor.
Bolles' professor, Kelly Ritter, found the poem "disturbing," according to an April 8 campus police report, and said she believed the poem was a threat. University officials prohibited Bolles, who is Mexican, from attending his poetry class while he was investigated.
Bolles, a 36-year-old married father of two, said he and Ritter have had political disagreements in class. Bolles, a conservative, said he has disagreed with some of the liberal political themes in Ritter's poetry selections.
The same is true of the Bolles' poetic character, who pledges to "turn the tables" on his professor and has a tryst with her college-age daughter. While Bolles' acknowledges that Ritter inspired the poem, he said it was not a threat and said he did not know she had a daughter.
"I think she flatters herself," Bolles said Monday. "This poem is about a lot more than a cranky teacher. It's about anti-globalization."
Ritter, 36, did not return telephone messages seeking comment.
Bolles said the poem's interracial affair symbolizes white America's feeling that Mexicans are corrupting their culture. The encounter is not violent, and the professor's daughter brings Juan home to meet her disapproving mother.
"I came in using a different set of reasoning as context to look at the craft of poetry, and she was put off by it," Bolles said.
The poem ends with the professor trying to get Juan kicked out of school by calling one of his poems racist.
Bolles began publicly protesting the university's decision Monday, wearing a "Save Professor White" shirt and handing out fliers on campus. After that protest began and university officials received calls from The Associated Press Monday, Bolles received a hand-delivered, one-sentence letter from the administration:
"As a result of the investigation, I wish to inform you that no formal disciplinary charges will be filed on behalf of the university and you are permitted to return to your English 202, Section 1, course, Introduction to Poetry," Christopher Piscitelli, director of judicial affairs, wrote.
University spokesman Patrick Dilger said the matter was handled like any other. He said students are often held out of classes when a professor raises these types of concerns.
In her police report, Ritter asked the university to require Bolles to get a psychiatric evaluation. The school did not require that, Dilger said.
Bolles is set to return to class Wednesday, though he doesn't know how he will be received. He said he would not apologize and is concerned with how he will make up the two weeks of missed classes.
So upstanding conservative student, who's purpose is supposedly to just make a political point, is saying here: "The poem is about my professor, and I didn't know she had a three year old daughter (and didn't bother to think about who my professor's daughter might actually be, what her circumstances were, whether she was a minor, or a rape victim, or terminally ill, etc, etc.)."
That's strike one. He's a moron.
From the so-called poem:
Juan thought of this challenge and how next he can smart her. “She wants me to hate Gringos,” thought clever Juan Diego, “But tables will turn, Señora tan ciega!”
By well made chance , Juan Diego found out, That in the same dorm and down just one door, A beautiful girl, with a squishy round snout, Slept every day. He could hear her snore. One night she walked by, her blue eyes funned out. She bumped into Juan, just a night shirt she wore. “My name is Snow, my mother is White” Juan's brown eyes widened, his pants grew tight.
It seems to be custom, here in the States, That after a girl loves a boy for just one night, She brings him to dinner, though her mother hates The sight of new boys with smiles so bright. So Juan was invited to the White estate. He rang the door bell and held Snowy tight. White opened the door and there was a great swap. As one face lit up, the other face dropped.
And that's strike two. Writing like a street thug, he threatens to "turn the tables on the professor" by, in the vernacular, screwing her daughter.
Someone delivers a poem like that to me, and I could care less about his politics. I'd take him out back and thrash him about the head and shoulders.
Reminds me of the jailhouse tallent show in the OLD Saturday Night Live.
LMAO...that's awesome!!!
RITTERK1@southernct.edu
That is an awesome poem!!! :o)
Just goes to prove all that edjumacation don't do squat! :oP
That's why writers have editors....we are creative, they are anal. :o) *g*
"Well, for one thing, its a bit of a stretch to call that poem "art". "
Not to get into a debate with you about what is and isn't art, but you need to read the "qualifications" of how to consider something art...one of which is the artists intentions...in this case, the artist truly intended for this to be a work of art (literary art in this case). Now, that being said...as someone else said "there is good art and bad art". :o)
"For another, the message (I'm going to fornicate with your daughter) is, well, disturbing, to put it mildly"
First off, he states that he didn't know she had a three year old daughter. The daughter in the poem was clearly "of age". Secondly, because a work of art is losely based on "real life" situations does not mean that it is a depiction of someone's inner desires. (omg..I'm sounding like a lib)
" I wouldn't exactly take a poem like that as "just good old political commentary" if it was delivered to me."
And by your qualifications of what is art, political cartoons are not art. Which is entirely not true. ;o)
Just some observations. You can call it bad art, and while I find it amusing I wouldn't put it up there with the Brownings, therefore by the standards which I measure art, it's the work of an amature...but amusing.
An important thing to remember when critiquing art....art is subjective ;o)
Works for me!!!! :o)
Whoa...that almost sounded like the argument frat boys use for date rape!!!
I was thinking along the same lines as you...a B...on a curve it'd probably be an A+ from what I see out there.
We're all sending our poems to Professor Ritter for grading.
Would you like to write a poem?
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1391122/posts#49
Yeah, yeah. Art is "subjective" and it's all in the eye of the beholder. I know the drill.
But when that "art" is a none too subtle threat to stalk and have sex with the daughter of the person on the receiving end of the "art", it starts to sound a little like a ransom note.
I strongly suspect that if some guy sent you some "art" threatening to stalk and (forgive me) screw your daughter, you wouldn't care a whit about his politics, and you wouldn't care a whit how artistically he delivered the threat.
bts
I read it. I have two teenage daughters. I saw this poem as a satirical (rather off colored, but satirical nonetheless) poem aimed at revealing something about someone’s character (the fact that they are a hypocritical “compassionate” liberal “tolerant” of so many views) that they didn’t want to see and it shocked them.
Had I received this, I probably would have questioned him, but I wouldn't have kicked him out of my class without giving him a chance to explain. Then again, I'm not a "tolerant" liberal either. ;o)
Would I have written this? No. I don't put overt sexual commentaries (fact, fiction or fantasized) into my writing. Have I written something scathing and biting aimed at a liberal professor? Absolutely! (and I still got an A on it...but, my professor was more able to appreciate art as a form of expression)
Poetry is Back: (By Ed Sanders)
Osgood brings a smile
reciting poetry from his files,
He brings news that you can use
in a way that will amuse.
Poetry is back.
Jessee Jackson promotes,
preaches and orates,
using woven words
to help his message be heard.
Poetry is back.
The cowboy poets from all over
gather in Elko annually
to recite a verse,
tip their hats and houdy.
Poetry is back.
The rappers rap,
the hip hoppers hip.
Poetry is back.
These strange bedfellows
use verse and rhyme,
to preach their politics
and enjoy a good time.
They save for society
and for all time,
poems with proper meter,
and rhymes that really rhyme.
All the while they work
and write and speak,
the properly "educated" poets
write poems that truly reek!
Without any attention
to meter or proper time,
they write and recite
poems that don't even rhyme.
They gaze over their upraised noses
to us rabble far below.
writing verse that makes no sense
except to their friends in the know.
Many of these self appointed poets
who can't even make a poem rhyme,
suckle from NEA grants, writing
poems that only whine.
If their work had to pass the
free market test they wouldn't eat.
But they live high in fine clothes,
as they suckle the government teat.
In spite of the professional poets
talent or their lack,
Cowboys, preachers, radio folk and musicians keep on...
And poetry is back.
Either you missed the point of the student's exercise in a big way, or the other 95% of us did.
http://www.edsanders.com/poetry/
I think Toast may have Freedom on a CD available now to help influence younger folks
I concur.
What really bugs you is that this fellow is being accused of making threats, a crime.
Just reminds you that the Nazis were leftists.
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