As a graduate student, I took lectures with Geoffrey Hill on Christian poetry, which were amazingly passionate, with an enormous depth of knowledge. He'd come to class in browns but wearing bright pink woolen socks. One day in class he had a fever, and that day's lecture was particularly incandescent. I never doubted his authority, or his ear, but his poems just seemed like too much work for the payoff, considering I can read Shakespeare, Herbert, Donne or Jonson with no trouble at all, and when I meet a difficulty, the text itself provides incentive to struggle through it. Great man, though, no doubt.
I first came to admire him as a critic, albeit after a difficult year with his lectures at Oxford, and then to increasingly love the poetry. By the end of the series at Oxford I was convinced he was the last serious poet to write in English. He used to insist that he followed Milton in writing 'simple, sensuous and passionate' lyrical poet. This is a fair way of characterising about one fifth of the verse. Another two fifths are cryptic, allusive but profoundly rewarding. And the remainder are cryptic, allusive but ultimately fail to cohere. I only met him once, after a talk he gave at Keble on the thinking of R L Nettleship, of all people. I wish I had been a bit braver for the time he was in Oxford...
Well, thank you for the push. Milton is simple, sensuous, and passionate—I will look for those first. It's enough to know they are there, thank you. Far too many piss poor poets sneak by cloaked in difficulty. And difficulty always demands the reader put his money down in advance. I'm afraid I'm with Larkin on that—cash paying customers of poetry and all. I look forward to this series of lectures, thanks!
Thank you for posting this. It is most interesting to read the views of an academic such as yourself. Another world to mine. Though it is a shame that you do not appreciate poetry of the last quarter century and would condemn it all landfill. I wrote the following several year ago in response to unchivalrous remarks made by Geoffrey Hill to a certain lady in which he likened some of Carol Anne Duffy’s poetry to teenagers text-speak.
Look again, noble Knight,
do you really see the “wild-eyed poppies
that raddle across the tawny farms”,
from your ivory tower, your cow-crossed spire?
Two fingers to yew, to Agincourt, to foolscap trees.
But see, the ash turns its silver underbelly
to the muffled voices from the clouds
and to the whispering shards of rain
before the wind out the Hill carries in the dark drifting.
“wild-eyed poppies” etc is a quote from his “Apology for the Revival of Christian Architecture in England”. cow-crossed spire and foolscap trees allude to Oxford, dusty libraries etc.
(but I do really like some of his less ‘difficult’ work)
As a graduate student, I took lectures with Geoffrey Hill on Christian poetry, which were amazingly passionate, with an enormous depth of knowledge. He'd come to class in browns but wearing bright pink woolen socks. One day in class he had a fever, and that day's lecture was particularly incandescent. I never doubted his authority, or his ear, but his poems just seemed like too much work for the payoff, considering I can read Shakespeare, Herbert, Donne or Jonson with no trouble at all, and when I meet a difficulty, the text itself provides incentive to struggle through it. Great man, though, no doubt.
I first came to admire him as a critic, albeit after a difficult year with his lectures at Oxford, and then to increasingly love the poetry. By the end of the series at Oxford I was convinced he was the last serious poet to write in English. He used to insist that he followed Milton in writing 'simple, sensuous and passionate' lyrical poet. This is a fair way of characterising about one fifth of the verse. Another two fifths are cryptic, allusive but profoundly rewarding. And the remainder are cryptic, allusive but ultimately fail to cohere. I only met him once, after a talk he gave at Keble on the thinking of R L Nettleship, of all people. I wish I had been a bit braver for the time he was in Oxford...
Well, thank you for the push. Milton is simple, sensuous, and passionate—I will look for those first. It's enough to know they are there, thank you. Far too many piss poor poets sneak by cloaked in difficulty. And difficulty always demands the reader put his money down in advance. I'm afraid I'm with Larkin on that—cash paying customers of poetry and all. I look forward to this series of lectures, thanks!
I’ll put some of the good stuff up on Substack as we go along too!
Thank you for posting this. It is most interesting to read the views of an academic such as yourself. Another world to mine. Though it is a shame that you do not appreciate poetry of the last quarter century and would condemn it all landfill. I wrote the following several year ago in response to unchivalrous remarks made by Geoffrey Hill to a certain lady in which he likened some of Carol Anne Duffy’s poetry to teenagers text-speak.
Look again, noble Knight,
do you really see the “wild-eyed poppies
that raddle across the tawny farms”,
from your ivory tower, your cow-crossed spire?
Two fingers to yew, to Agincourt, to foolscap trees.
But see, the ash turns its silver underbelly
to the muffled voices from the clouds
and to the whispering shards of rain
before the wind out the Hill carries in the dark drifting.
“wild-eyed poppies” etc is a quote from his “Apology for the Revival of Christian Architecture in England”. cow-crossed spire and foolscap trees allude to Oxford, dusty libraries etc.
(but I do really like some of his less ‘difficult’ work)
pressed send before proofreading. Should be "he didn't appreciate" not "you do not"
Thank you Nick; the fourth lecture in this series contains Hill comment on Duffy - they aren't actually as bad as they seem