Poetry is where it's at - there's no doubt about it. Forget plot, narrative and all the other stuff. The big deal about poetry is that it's clear that the reader - you - are getting something from another human being. First hand. No flannel. It's communication on a personal level. Perhaps this was what Kelman meant when he tossed detectives and wizards into the mix. Perhaps this is something all writers should be striving towards - to put a bit of the personal into their writing - a bit of poetry. Even writers who use plot, narrative and all the other stuff.
I agree with him.
Clarity is not something most people associate with poetry, indeed it’s something that a great many avoid preferring ambiguity to stating things plainly. To my mind the great thing about poetry is that it requires the involvement of the reader to a far greater extent than prose and several times in my novels I’ve included lines from poems, in fact my last novel ends on a poem.
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