The Collected Poems of Frank O'Hara, A Rant (Part 2 of 2)

This me at my most infuriated. (Again)

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Frank O'Hara
• Printing
• Donald Allen
• Collected Works

[MrGregallyn]

Is Don Allen's The Collected Poems of Frank O'Hara really such a burden to your life? You nitpick the editor's note, chronology, tables of contents (really?), titles in all caps, and the fact that the poems carry over from page to page. Wow. Why does any of this matter? Do any of these features actually impede your ability to read or understand O'Hara's work in any way?

[arantingmanutic]

@MrGregallyn If it didn't matter (even a little bit) I wouldn't have done the video. I gave other examples of expansive collections that actually were put together in an accessible and aesthetically enjoyable format. O'hara is no better or worse than the other poets mentioned in this video but why is his work just jumbled together with editorial laziness? O'hara's career is undeserving of such a boring and lazy treatment.

[arantingmanutic]

@MrGregallyn I understand that your argument is O'hara's work doesn't change because of the way it is presented to the reader. However this isn't a matter of O'hara's work as much as the lack of respect for a widely read American Poet that frankly deserves better. We as readers deserve better too, why should Whalen, Creeley, Berrigan, Ginsberg, have very accessible editions but not O'hara? Ultimately presentation can lead to reader frustration depending on how shoddy the job.

[aforalice]

Organising this addition based on where the poems appeared in other volumes would be largely pointless since editions such as lunch poems and meditations on an emergency overlap on many poems and also the vast majority of the collected poems have never appeared in print before anyway. Also the reason more than one poem appears on a page sometimes is probably because the whole thing would be another inch think if they didn't! But otherwise you make a lot of valid points.

[arantingmanutic]

@aforalice honestly, i understand where you're coming from, it's quite possible that the editor was limited by the content. however, that isn't an excuse for putting together such an ugly book. O'hara deserves better. . This is one of the only collected works I've seen done like this and it just doesn't work well. Am I grateful so many of O'hara's poems were published? Certainly. But that doesn't give a free pass to Donald Allen's unimaginative layout.

[Nyx916]

I loved this. I agree with everything there, I hate when they pull that shit on you and it makes it harder, rather than being nice and simple and accessible.

[arantingmanutic]

@Nyx916 Yeah. The irony is that University of California Press does do a really good job with Creeley but they screwed up O'Hara so bad. I honestly blame Donald Allen for putting together such a sloppy edition. Hopefully somebody will put together a better edition in the future.

Also, thanks for the comment. First comment ever! More vids will come i'm just kind of tied up as to what I want to talk about next.

[veranka3]

I like the O'Hara poems running one after the other in the collection instead of having each poem being separated on its own page. It fits perfectly with O'Hara's aesthetic, which was informal and had a casual, run-on quality to it. It also makes it read more like consecutive diary entries, which is what his "I do this, I do that" style of poems were aiming at. It's a matter of preference which some people will like and others won't, but I don't think you can just declare it indisputably "bad."

[jonolikesbuster]

This isn't informative, it's crude and pedantic. Just because you have opinions doesn't mean they're worth sharing.

[mercop14]

Great video. I'm reading some O'Hara now. I agree with what you said about GIngsberg. He did lose it during the 80s and 90s aside from an occasional fine poem.