I don’t think poems written in English affect me at all, they either end up too moot in message to actually matter or too long and wordy to speak out, and the lyrics in songs feel repetitive and single dimensional, I can’t even remember the last time I heard a lyric and liked it for its message
I believe that has to do more with the genre and not the medium of expression, any language with a significant amount of speakers has good art, if you don’t like the mainstream then step out of it.
sounds like you’re bored of the music you’re listening to more than the language. probably you just need to listen to new genres and music from different anglophone countries
English is notoriously inconsistent in its rules. This is terrible for learning the language, but opens a lot of space for clever wordplay. If you read a bad poem, it’s a skill issue (for the author)
5 Million Ways To Kill A C.E.O. - The Coup
Have you been listening to enough of The Coup?
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Does the entirety of 2 (and the hybrids between them) art forms broadly considered fundamental to humanity and with a history spanning back before history suck in one language’s evolutionary path?
Um no. No it does not.
Maybe you could be more specific? What eras are you looking at? what artistic forms? what traditions?
What do you even relate to? Are you after stuff that is extremely technical? Things that are fun to sing? Nonsense that makes you laugh? Postmodern stuff playing with or subverting traditional forms? Are there particular particular emotions you’d like to see expressed? Or themes that interest you?
This actually kind of annoys me, I feel like it’s not really less reactionary than denigrating the entirety of any other language’s linguistic art. People on this instance are generally pretty good about pointing out reactionary tendencies but when the institutions being criticised come from european and especially anglo culture it often flies under the radar. Just because the political hegemony and appetites of the elites are hideous and cruel doesn’t make the artistic work of people within that culture meritless.
While it’s true that certain forms of art have origins in reactionary movements or propaganda, or represent frustrating elite tastes, or are overly commercial, or just not to your taste; describing entire categories as garbage based on a language or culture is throwing a huge volume of artistic work done by all sorts of people for all sorts of reasons.
This is an extremely difficult question to answer well without a positive example and some explanation of it.
I don’t think there’s such a thing as a natural language that is inherently bad for poetry, even if different languages might be better at different types of poetry (e.g. I think rhyming wasn’t considered very interesting in Latin because of the mostly-standardized endings)
Have you found the opposite to be true in other languages? I’m curious to know if this is something you attribute just to English, or a more general boredom with the artform.
I find German and french to be more inspired, Turkish (was studying agglutinative languages for a conlang), Korean and Japanese have a natural rhythm to it, but I haven’t looked at much others
Funnily enough, I do kind of like the new style of British rap that a lot of people mock, I think it’s workable
I bet it’s because English is your first language (is it?). All poetry is bad, but in languages you don’t know just doesn’t sound as cheesy
Nah poetry in my native language is great. English is just a very ugly anti poetic language imo
spoiler
Doomed lovers in a free fall
Together 'til they crash to the ground
I long for my sweet disappearer
As this avalanche of night
Slides down
Black haired angel by the bonfire
With alien eyes divine they flicker a moment
In the flames then follow the smoke
Into the sky
Follow the smoke into the sky
It’s like losing a limb
This agonizing goodbye
My dreams of her are violent
All swirled in red
Like the storm in Jupiter’s eye
All swirled in red
Like the storm in Jupiter’s eye
Palaces of Gold by Leon Rosselson
O Tell Me the Truth About Love (1937) by W.H. Auden
-–
Poem
O Tell Me the Truth About Love (1937)
(From ‘Twelve Songs’)
XII
Some say that love’s a little boy,
And some say it’s a bird,
Some say it makes the world go round,
And some say that’s absurd,
And when I asked the man next-door,
Who looked as if he knew,
His wife got very cross indeed,
And said it wouldn’t do.Does it look like a pair of pyjamas,
Or the ham in a temperance hotel?
Does its odour remind one of llamas,
Or has it a comforting smell?
Is it prickly to touch as a hedge is,
Or soft as eiderdown fluff?
Is it sharp or quite smooth at the edges?
O tell me the truth about love.Our history books refer to it
In cryptic little notes,
It’s quite a common topic on
The Transatlantic boats;
I’ve found the subject mentioned in
Accounts of suicides,
And even seen it scribbled on
The backs of railway-guides.Does it howl like a hungry Alsatian,
Or boom like a military band?
Could one give a first-rate imitation
On a saw or a Steinway Grand?
Is its singing at parties a riot?
Does it only like Classical stuff?
Will it stop when one wants to be quiet?
O tell me the truth about love.I looked inside the summer-house;
It wasn’t ever there:
I tried the Thames at Maidenhead,
And Brighton’s bracing air.
I don’t know what the blackbird sang,
Or what the tulip said;
But it wasn’t in the chicken-run,
Or underneath the bed.Can it pull extraordinary faces?
Is it usually sick on a swing?
Does it spend all its time at the races,
Or fiddling with pieces of string?
Has it views of its own about money?
Does it think Patriotism enough?
Are its stories vulgar but funny?
O tell me the truth about love.When it comes, will it come without warning
Just as I’m picking my nose?
Will it knock on my door in the morning,
Or tread in the bus on my toes?
Will it come like a change in the weather?
Will its greeting be courteous or rough?
Will it alter my life altogether?
O tell me the truth about love.It’s Almost Over | Auntie Boy
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