I could not disagree more strongly I'm afraid. The history of literature is full of glorious parodies which serve very useful purposes. It takes real skill and a deep understanding of the original to write a good parody.
There may be many fine parodies. But do great poets parody lesser poets? I can't imagine Stevens stooping to parody another poet, for example...but he has been parodied (& parroted) by lesser poets.
And if one is secure in one's poetics (like Whitman) or cut off and unaffected by the literary fashions of the times (like Dickinson), I don't know that one would bother with parody. Yet both have been parodied from the ranks below.
In other words, one generally parodies up, so to speak, and not down.
The singing to the side makes sense. (Thanks for the etymological root.) And one can safely parody one's peers.
And don’t get me wrong, though some are satirically sharp tongued, most parodies are fun to read/hear. It’s just that they do seem to mark the maker more than the model.
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I could not disagree more strongly I'm afraid. The history of literature is full of glorious parodies which serve very useful purposes. It takes real skill and a deep understanding of the original to write a good parody.
There may be many fine parodies. But do great poets parody lesser poets? I can't imagine Stevens stooping to parody another poet, for example...but he has been parodied (& parroted) by lesser poets.
And if one is secure in one's poetics (like Whitman) or cut off and unaffected by the literary fashions of the times (like Dickinson), I don't know that one would bother with parody.
Yet both have been parodied from the ranks below.
In other words, one generally parodies up, so to speak, and not down.
Actually, if one follows the etymology of the word, one finds himself "singing to the side", rather than up or down, so to speak.
The singing to the side makes sense. (Thanks for the etymological root.) And one can safely parody one's peers.
And don’t get me wrong, though some are satirically sharp tongued, most parodies are fun to read/hear. It’s just that they do seem to mark the maker more than the model.
I have completely altered my opinion on this and I agree with you completely. Thankyou for the instruction.
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