The aspects of Forache that I could relate to with my poem were the political and personal poetry of witnesses. Forache said that the political poetry of witness focuses on “public partisanship that is considered divisive” and personal with “love and emotional loss.” (Forache “Witness”). My poem seemed to be a mix of both the political and personal because there was some sort of a connection between the woman and the witness, because she knew her background. However, it could also be political because of the witness devising a plan to show the woman’s background and give her a choice.
Sam Hamill does a great job seeing the victims and not the witnesses. He has helped teach men and women in prisons among other places. He says that witnesses, “can’t bear much reality” (Hamill “Necessity”) therefore they just stay frozen to the spot when they see events. This is very relative to my poem, because the witness and the people below just stood and watched, or cheered the woman to jump off. This also relates to my poem because he says that “writing creates emotion in the audience, the writer’s responsibility is enormous” (Hamill “Necessity”). This helps prove my thesis because of the poetry of witnesses have a purpose in their writing.
Sam views poetry from the point of the pain that the person goes through from the poet side. Forache viewed it from the witness side. However, they are alike because they sympathize with the writers in poetry.
I agree with the parts about how poetry of witnesses can be trying to accomplish different things with being a personal or political witness. However, I disagree with how they can’t be both. I could see how the political witness could still be connected to the event or the person involved. The witness could just be taking a political standpoint. I agree with Hamill about people can not bear much reality. That is why watching the news is about as much as people can handle of war or natural disasters.
To learn more about Sam Hamill's life, try this website: http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/733
I agree with your idea that a there could be a personal and political witness. I think there could definitely be a lot of personal and political ideas in poetry of witness. And I think that you use some good evidence from your poem to backup this idea.
ReplyDeleteStephanie
ReplyDeleteI really agree with the idea that there is a important connection between the woman and the witness, i also found that Sam hill pays more detail attention into the victim and not the witness
Stephanie,
ReplyDeleteI think you did a great job summarizing how the two writers have similar but different views of poetry of witness at the same time. I also agree with you that poetry of witness can be both political and personal. They poem I chose was "Charlie Howard's Descent" and I feel the writer addressed both issues very well. I also agreed with you that Hamill focuses more on the victim, while Forche focuses more on the witness. Good thoughts; you explained them well.
Awesome job describing the similarities between the two writers! I too believe that there can be both political and personal within a poetry of witness. I do believe though that one is going to stand out more than the other causing the reader to only concentrate on that one. But very good points made in this post!
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