Of course I'm being a little facetious with that "dangerous" bit, but I've been in workshops where someone who seemed a little too invested in good prose writing criticized a poem for containing sentence fragments. Or sometimes you'll encounter someone in workshop who can't get a handle on the lack of regular punctuation in a poem. Those cases seem to be symptoms of taking 'prose rules', which even good prose writers take liberties with, and applying them too rigorously to poetic composition.
They both need to be taught a lesson.
ReplyDeleteOf course I'm being a little facetious with that "dangerous" bit, but I've been in workshops where someone who seemed a little too invested in good prose writing criticized a poem for containing sentence fragments. Or sometimes you'll encounter someone in workshop who can't get a handle on the lack of regular punctuation in a poem. Those cases seem to be symptoms of taking 'prose rules', which even good prose writers take liberties with, and applying them too rigorously to poetic composition.
ReplyDelete