Gems

21 Ramadhan, 1441

Back in my teenage years I purchased a number of the 'Selected Poems' Penguin used to publish centred on various British and American poets as a way of furthering my literary education. One or two these paperbacks became very precious to me, and I read them over and over. Possibly the most precious of all was the Selected Poems of William Carlos Williams. I wish I could remember who edited it, but I mislaid or lost the edition some time ago and can't remember the editor at all, though I have vivid recall of the contents. Funnily enough it wasn't a book I particularly enjoyed on first reading (though I must add here that I never attempted a sequential reading.) I don't think I really 'got' Williams on a first reading, but I was persistent, determined in my way to figure out what I was missing and gradually I grasped what the poems had to offer. Indeed, I think I managed to develop at least a little understanding of the qualities of every poem selected.

I've been thinking of that little volume a lot in reading Volume I 1909 - 1939 of The Collected Poems of William Carlos Williams. Each time I've come across an 'old favourite' it's brought back something of that old appreciation and I've been struck by the excellence of the original selection which really picked the gems amongst his work. Frankly WCW's output varies considerably in terms of quality. When he gets it right and it all comes together it's shivers-down-the-spine time, but he can get it tediously wrong - as I think he himself was aware. And I must say I really don't care for his experiments in mixing prose and poetry. I can't think of a single prose segment that really worked for me over the 30 years covered in the volume.

I suppose it's because of the necessary disappointments and flat patches I've encountered working my way through this first volume that I've decided to put Volume II 1939 - 1962 on ice for a while. I've been itching for an extended period reading Ted Hughes for some time, and that time has arrived. Funnily enough I suspect I'll be up for a continued reading of WCW quite soon. For all his faults he's compulsively readable and the gems shine.