Introduction

poetry, politics and tradition

Gary Day

pp. 1-22

in: Gary Day, Brian Docherty (eds), British poetry from the 1950s to the 1990s, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 1997

Abstract

The aim of this introduction is to place the following essays into a polemical context. My basic argument is that an exclusive concern with politics is threatening to impoverish our understanding of poetry. It has led to an ignorance of tradition and a corresponding blankness in the face of poetry as art. And, if criticism is so desensitised that it cannot recognise or respond to a poem as a poem, then what possible credence can be given to its political pronouncements? It is only by reconsidering what is meant by tradition that we can revitalise our sense of poetry which will, in turn, make us demand more of our politics than that it confuse posture with action or achievement.