- Prose poetry
:"This article refers to a poetic form. For the competitive speech event, see
Prose & Poetry ."TOCright
Prose poetry is usually considered a form of
poetry written inprose that breaks some of the normal rules associated with prose discourse, for heightened imagery or emotional effect.Characteristics
Arguments continue about whether prose poetry is actually a form of
poetry or a form ofprose , or a separate genre altogether. Most critics argue that prose poetry belongs in thegenre of poetry because of its use ofmetaphorical language and attention tolanguage .Other critics argue that prose poetry falls into the genre of
prose because prose poetry relies on prose's association withnarrative and its reliance on readers' expectation of an objective presentation oftruth in prose.Yet others argue that the prose poem gains its subversiveness through its fusion of poetic and prosaic elements.
History
.
At the time of the prose poem's emergence, French poetry was dominated by the
alexandrine , an extremely strict and demanding form that poets such asAloysius Bertrand andCharles Baudelaire rebelled against. Further proponents of the prose poem included other French poets such asArthur Rimbaud andStéphane Mallarmé .The prose poem continued to be written in France and found profound expression, in the mid-20th century, in the prose poems of
Francis Ponge .At the end of the 19th century, BritishDecadent movement poets such asOscar Wilde picked up the form because of its already subversive association. This actually hindered the dissemination of the form into English because many associated the Decadents with homosexuality, hence any form used by the Decadents was suspect. NotableModernist poetT. S. Eliot wrote vehemently against prose poems, though he did try his hand at one or two. He also added to the debate about what defines the genre, saying in his introduction toDjuna Barnes ' highly poeticized 1936 novel "Nightwood " that this work may not be classed as "poetic prose" as it did not have the rhythm or "musical pattern" of verse.In contrast, a couple of other Modernist authors wrote prose poetry consistently, including
Gertrude Stein andSherwood Anderson . In actuality, Anderson considered his work to be short fictions—in the current term, "flash fiction ." The distinction between flash fiction and prose poetry is at times very thin, almost indiscernible. "By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept " by Canadian author Elizabeth Smart, written in 1945, is a relatively isolated example of English-language poetic prose in the mid-20th century. Then, for a while, prose poems died out, at least in English—until the early 1960s and '70s, when American poets such asAllen Ginsberg ,Russell Edson ,Charles Simic ,Robert Bly andJames Wright experimented with the form. Edson, indeed, worked principally in this form, and helped give the prose poem its current reputation for surrealist wit. Similarly, Simic won the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry for his 1989 collection, "The World Doesn't End".At the same time, poets elsewhere were exploring the form in Spanish, Japanese and Russian.
Octavio Paz worked in this form in Spanish in his [http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0811206238| "Aguila o Sol?" (Eagle or Sun?)] . Spanish poetÁngel Crespo (1926-95) did his most notable work in the genre.Giannina Braschi , postmodern Spanish-language poet, wrote a trilogy of prose poems, "El imperio de los suenos" (Empire of Dreams, 1988). TranslatorDennis Keene presents the work of six Japanese prose poets in "The Modern Japanese Prose Poem: an Anthology of Six Poets". Similarly, Adrian Wanner and Caryl Emerson describe the form's growth in Russia in their critical work, "Russian Minimalism: from the Prose Poem to the Anti-story". The two best-known examples of this literary form in Russian areGogol 's "Dead Souls" andVenedikt Erofeev 's "Moscow-Petushki". InPoland ,Bolesław Prus (1847-1912), influenced by the French prose poets, had written a number ofpoetic micro-stories, including "Mold of the Earth " (1884), "" (1884) and "Shades" (1885).The form has gained popularity since the late 1980s, and literary journals that previously refused to acknowledge prose poetry's unique contributions to both poetry and prose have now conceded its worth and currently display prose poems next to sonnets and short stories. Journals have even begun to specialize, publishing solely prose poems/flash fiction in their pages (see external links below). Some contemporary writers who write prose poems or flash fiction include Michael Benedikt, Robert Bly,
Anne Carson , Kim Chinquee, Richard Garcia, Ray Gonzalez,Lyn Hejinian ,Louis Jenkins ,Campbell McGrath ,Sheila Murphy ,Naomi Shihab Nye ,Mary Oliver , David Shumate, James Tate, andJ. Marcus Weekley .It used to be said that prose poetry was impossible in English because the English language was not so strictly governed by rules as was the
French language . In thetwentieth century , when English prose became increasingly ruled by the iron laws of America'sStrunk and White , this may no longer have been the case.Rapturous, rhythmic, image-laden prose from previous centuries, such as that found in
Jeremy Taylor andThomas de Quincey , strikes 21st-century readers as having something of a poetic quality. Using figurative language to provoke thought, it invites a reader into unusual perspectives to question what is traditionally thought of, as in Richard Garcia's "Chickenhead."ee also
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Flash fiction
*Vignette (literature)
*"Double Room "
*"The English Mail-Coach "
*"Suspiria de Profundis "External links
* [http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/5787 Poetic Form: Prose Poem]
* [http://pw2.netcom.com/~pprater/prosepoetry.html Prose Poetry]
* [http://www.haibuntoday.com/ Haibun Today -- prose + poetry hybrid]
* [http://ogdenian.com/prose_poetry.html Ogdenian Prose Poetry]
* [http://ridercreations.com/CJ%27s/Prose%20Poetry.htm Is there really such a thing as "prose-poetry"?]
* [http://www.zafusy.com zafusy: contemporary poetry journal]
* [http://firewheel-editions.org Sentence: A Journal of Prose Poetics]
* [http://www.u.arizona.edu/~mschuldt/CUE.html CUE: A Journal of Prose Poetry]
* [http://www.quickfiction.orgQuick Fiction ]
* [http://www.quarteraftereight.org Quarter After Eight]
* [http://www.wildstrawberries.org Wild Strawberries]
* [http://www.madhattersreview.com Mad Hatters' Review]
* [http://webdelsol.com/Double_Room/issue_six/David_Shumate.htm William Stafford and David Shumate describe prose poetry]
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