Who’s afraid of poetry? Processing emotions into words
T.S. Eliot has once stated that poetry is “an escape from personality” rather than an expression of the poet’s one. His essay “Tradition and the Individual Talent” makes it quite clear and prompts the reader to wonder about poetry’s role in escapism.
Bearing in mind that this is not about reading poetry, but rather about making it, his statement has spurred responses and criticism from both the audience, critics and fellow poets like W.H. Auden.
Before disagreeing with Eliot, one must consider what ‘personality‘ stands for. A poet can have a very quiet and relaxed social life and this might be labelled as ‘personality‘ by some; if the same poet has a dramatic and poignant approach to poetry in order to bring out their inner emotions, then yes. It is an escape from personality, in favour of the inner self. But wait, Eliot made it even clearer: it’s an escape from emotions aswell. Suddenly, I can’t think of any other way to defend Eliot’s point of view and there’s no other way to turn his statement around. I cannot think of poetry as something unrelated to emotions, as it’s probably one of the most creative ways of channeling it. One can understand the difficulty of conveying a message through words, which usually need to rhyme or fit a certain structure and that is perhaps the part that has less to do with emotions, as it requires a very practical approach, but it does not mean that this process filters emotions in such way that nothing is left of the original and raw impulse coming from the inner self.
The way I see poetry, it involves emotions calling out to the poet. The poet needs to process this emotion in such way that the message is brought out in words. This is the most difficult task, as the poet needs to find the best combination possible to convey the message in order to cause a reaction similar to that the poet recognised in its most raw form, as an emotion. A further filtering takes place when poetry must be given a precise form, and that is often a need the poet might feel depending on their education and previous studies. Basically, emotions need to be put in touch with the physical world in order to be expressed through poetry and as in translating, something always gets lost in the process but it’s the poet’s job to minimise that. Having said that, if we connect the poem to the impulse of manipulating emotions in the form of words, in some cases we can see clear basic differences in results, but that mostly depends on the ability of the poet to express what they feel. However, I would hardly see this process as an escape from emotion, but rather as a poor rendering of primary emotions at the closest.
24 Comments on “Who’s afraid of poetry? Processing emotions into words”
Leave a Reply
Goodreads
I’ve always liked Kenneth Burke’s view of poetry as ‘equipment for living’, through which the poet inscribes an emotive state as ‘symbolic action’ or the ‘dancing of an attitude’—which is kind of where you ended up concluding yourself.
Yes, I think poems are a refined emotion put into words. It would be very odd to create and read a poem that’s been done out of pure automatism. However, by picking up the pen (or typing), the author is already answering a call from an inner emotion, whether it’s acknowledged or not!
I agree, but the idea of whether this ‘call’ is acknowledged or not puts into question to what extent the emotion of poetry is ‘refined’. More interesting, I think, is that emotional rebus which, rather than being refined or manipulated, emerges through the poetry itself, somehow repressed or palimpsestic, but still very much ‘there’.
I guess it’s a subjective thing and it depends on how the poet composes. But yes, I guess there’s many degrees of interpretations in poetry. You might be aware of what the initial emotion was, and see if the poet was true to that or not, or rather find other emotions the poet never even considered, but the reader could detect.
It’s a very complex process. The thing is, poetry is the most concise way to convey emotions in words, but it is also open to ambiguity! Which is not necessarily a bad thing!
Honestly, I have never read about anyone’s idea about poetry before. I write because I think better in rhymes and more often than not it brings me great joy to be able to express myself in a way that sounds appealing to my ears when I read it out loud. Great post.
Thank you! Well, I think the process of refining emotions and putting them into words is different depending on the way the poet articulates communication. Some people are good communicators, others find it quite difficult, then we must also take education into account. These things make it easier or more difficult for the poet to elaborate emotions. Thank you for your visit!!
Yes, that’s true. The level of education also matters a lot. It used to take me two hours to come up with a decent poem when i was 11 and now it takes between 10-15 minutes. The vocabulary plays a crucial role in writing a poem.
Definitely! And the more words you know, the easier it is to translate thought into a poem. For me, however, rhyme is still the biggest hurdle!
Does he mean an escape from his own emotions? You’re right, poetry is an art of manipulating emotion into words, but perhaps Eliot means that it is not the poet’s emotions. A poet may use poetry to escape what he is actually feeling.
I’m not sure. See, I understand it may be an escape from emotions, but you are processing OTHER emotions in response to that, for sure.
So, basically it cannot be an escape from emotions in the end. I know it’s tricky following, but it makes sense,
I agree with your view of an emotion calling out to be processed in any form the poet considers best, provided that the words reproduce the original emotion in its full extend.
You’re right! I think the most difficult part is that of being happy with the final result of a poetry as it’s compared to the emotion which caused it. If others tell you what they felt and it sounds like the emotion you wanted to express, then that’s a great outcome! Thanks for sharing your view!
Creating poetry is escapism at its finest, at least for me.
What’s not? And being able to compensate for “personality” or channel emotions not otherwise expressed in daily living is absolutely part of it. For me so much comes out in my writing that apparently is not coming out in real life haha Very thought provoking essay- makes for nteresting morning coffee reading here.
Thank you! I’m glad it kept you company in the morning!
I absolutely agree with you. I’ve already spoken of writing as a therapy in this blog and it kind of relates to this topic aswell. Most things one writes in a novel must have a connection with the subconscious. But I tend to think of poetry as a more conscious process. Maybe I see the need of giving poems a structure as a sort of limiting thing, which ultimately detaches the final result from the original idea. I guess the more one is aware of how making poetry works, the more you get the best result because you adjust the filter that words and structure bring!
Oh gosh I wish I could be so left brain about it haha I never know what’s going to come out, or what kind of structure anything is or what it’s all about until it’s done!
The muse is funny that’s for sure!
Sounds great. It is also the approach I have in writing. I just let it out. The problem is, my over analysing and editing which happens afterwards. Although it is my wish to keep things the closest to what they are when they’re expressed at first!
Oh yes editing. Never ends right?
Exactly. But over-editing is the problem!!!
“Poetry is not turning loose of emotion, but an escape from emotion: it is not the expression of personality, but an escape from personality. But, of course, only those who have personality and emotions know what it means to want to escape from these things.” T. S. Eliot
I like this quote because it speaks to a sort of brutal self loathing. I included more of it above because I think the last sentence says a lot.
He is not loosening his emotions when he writes a poem, he is trying to get away from them, from himself, from the overwhelming presence…of what and who he is and what he feels- it’s too much sometimes…put it on a piece of paper and exorcise, not indulge, yourself somehow…at least that is how I understand what he is saying there – I could definitely be wrong.
But I think it is a sad statement to make. Then again, he strikes me as a sad person…
A thought provoking post!
Thank you Jessica. Yes, I think the statement is definitely open to interpretation. It is possible that he meant emotions are way too big to be summed up in poetry, but then what is poetry? A less charming result of what it should be, then!
This is an interesting post and discussion that ensued from it … I can freely subscribe to Pete’s observations as they resonate with me … I am also rarely aware from where, why or how compulsion to write originates. I always thought that Pablo Neruda described it best when he wrote:
‘And it was at that age … Poetry arrived
in search of me. I don’t know, I don’t know where
it came from, from winter or a river.
I don’t know how or when,
no they were not voices, they were not
words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent fires
or returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.’ (P. Neruda)
Great verses, Daniela. I think poetry or the need to write comes when you least expect it, when the soul looks for answers, where your dreams grow to such extent they’re hard to handle!
I wonder what Eliot’s vested interests were? What did he have to hide? The ‘I Tiresias’ section of The Waste Land’s Fire Sermon and the fractured relationships in The Game of Chess make me think that he would have loved the world to believe that personal emotion had no place in his poetry.
Well, the great things about poets and their work is that we keep discussing on their intentions for years, decades, centuries…
Since he belongs to Modernism, your theory on Eliot could well be right!