I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

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ex-khobar Andy
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I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by ex-khobar Andy »

There is a book out containing a collection of Cohen's unfinished or partial works. NYT had a review by William Logan, a poet himself and professor of creative writing at University of Florida. I quote the first two paragraphs below:
When a poet dies, his publishers often hurry into print whatever scraps lie stuffed in his desk drawers or overflow his wastebasket. This is the book business at its darkest and most human, but many balance sheets have been balanced by a posthumous work or two. Death is the moment when all eyes are upon the poet for the last time; beyond, for most harmless drudges, lies the abyss. Leonard Cohen, who died two years ago, wore many a fedora — poet, novelist, songwriter, a singer of sorts — but only the last trade, which he took up reluctantly, made him a star.

Cohen was never taken very seriously as a poet. He wasn’t much of a singer, either; but the gravelly renderings of his lyrics gradually attracted a mass audience that seemed more like a cult. Many found him a bit much, his heart-on-his-sleeve misery no more appealing than plunging your hands into boiling tar. Still, songs like “Suzanne,” “Bird on the Wire” and the rather preposterous hymn of praise “Hallelujah” have been so widely covered as to be nearly inescapable. At any moment of the day, “Suzanne” is probably playing in an elevator somewhere.
If you want to read the rest of it, you can find it here.

The rest of it is in the same vein as his second paragraph, and clearly Logan has a low opinion of Cohen. That's fine: there's no law that you have to like Cohen. But if I were asked to write a review of, for example, a prominent hip-hop artist such as Kanye West I wold refuse on the grounds that I don't like his music and, more importantly, I don't get it. Some people like it and can see past the misogyny of some of his lyrics. I can't even though I think I am smart enough to tell the difference between the actor and the lines he speaks. But my review, because I don't like or understand his stuff, would be unhelpful to those who do, and who might be wondering whether to spend the $$.

I think that NYT should, after reading Logan's review of Cohen's miscellany which quickly morphed into a review of Cohen and his fans, have junked it. Maybe my old grandma's advice - 'If you can't say something nice about someone who is dead, shut your mouth!" - is still valid.

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Long Run
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by Long Run »

That's a fair point in general, but when you are dealing with the Cohen fans who think it is only their great taste that separates them from the heathen masses who don't get him, maybe the article is well-earned. :nana (Though I am sorry our biggest Cohen fan has taken his Hallelujah ball and gone home).

Burning Petard
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by Burning Petard »

I read the view yesterday. I have the book on my shelf but have no cracked it. I was amazed at how tough this review was. It was refreshing to see such vitriol when the general tone of the NY Times book section is usually pretty bland. Personally, I am shocked by how the actual words of Hallelujah are ignored--it is a pretty big cut down of King David.

snailgate.

Big RR
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by Big RR »

I read the review and think it would have been much better if he just limited it to the part that discussed the book, and left his personal opinion of the man, his music, and his fans out of it. I think he makes some (apparently) valid points about the poems based on the parts he quotes, but these would have spoken much more loudly had he not diluted them with a discussion of Cohen's music, his voice, or his fans. It appears he resents the notoriety of Cohen, possibly while his works are condemned to obscurity? In any event, it may be worth picking up a copy of the book, if only to piss him off about its sales.

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Crackpot
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by Crackpot »

So I take William Logan is Lord Jim’s pen name.
Okay... There's all kinds of things wrong with what you just said.

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Lord Jim
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by Lord Jim »

left his personal opinion of the man, his music, and his fans out of it.
But his insights are so spot-on for all three.... :ok

Such songs now form the hoarse, moaning soundtrack to countless movies and television episodes. When a Cohen song rises from some awkward silence it’s a good bet the director has run out of ideas. The religiose sentimentality and painful growl, like a halibut with strep throat, have patched a lot of plot holes. He’ll give an emulsified version of everything the scriptwriter left unsaid.
Well, that sugar coats it a bit but he has the gist...
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Big RR
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by Big RR »

But his insights are so spot-on for all three.... :ok
I expected this from you. Is Logan your alter ego?

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Crackpot
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by Crackpot »

Beat you to it RR
Okay... There's all kinds of things wrong with what you just said.

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Sue U
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by Sue U »

At any moment of the day, “Suzanne” is probably playing in an elevator somewhere.
:lol: :lol: :lol:

Look, I don't care for Leonard Cohen myself, but if I could have a hit song that was still being played 50 years later -- even in elevators -- I'd consider that some kind of success.
Big RR wrote:It appears he resents the notoriety of Cohen, possibly while his works are condemned to obscurity? In any event, it may be worth picking up a copy of the book, if only to piss him off about its sales.
Perhaps William Logan = Clive James?

|
|
V

'The Book of my Enemy Has Been Remaindered'

The book of my enemy has been remaindered
And I am pleased.
In vast quantities it has been remaindered
Like a van-load of counterfeit that has been seized
And sits in piles in a police warehouse,
My enemy's much-prized effort sits in piles
In the kind of bookshop where remaindering occurs.
Great, square stacks of rejected books and, between them, aisles
One passes down reflecting on life's vanities,
Pausing to remember all those thoughtful reviews
Lavished to no avail upon one's enemy's book --
For behold, here is that book
Among these ranks and banks of duds,
These ponderous and seemingly irreducible cairns
Of complete stiffs.

The book of my enemy has been remaindered
And I rejoice.
It has gone with bowed head like a defeated legion
Beneath the yoke.
What avail him now his awards and prizes,
The praise expended upon his meticulous technique,
His individual new voice?
Knocked into the middle of next week
His brainchild now consorts with the bad buys
The sinker, clinkers, dogs and dregs,
The Edsels of the world of moveable type,
The bummers that no amount of hype could shift,
The unbudgeable turkeys.

Yea, his slim volume with its understated wrapper
Bathes in the blare of the brightly jacketed Hitler's War Machine,
His unmistakably individual new voice
Shares the same scrapyard with a forlorn skyscraper
Of The Kung-Fu Cookbook,
His honesty, proclaimed by himself and believed by others,
His renowned abhorrence of all posturing and pretense,
Is there with Pertwee's Promenades and Pierrots--
One Hundred Years of Seaside Entertainment,
And (oh, this above all) his sensibility,
His sensibility and its hair-like filaments,
His delicate, quivering sensibility is now as one
With Barbara Windsor's Book of Boobs,
A volume graced by the descriptive rubric
"My boobs will give everyone hours of fun".

Soon now a book of mine could be remaindered also,
Though not to the monumental extent
In which the chastisement of remaindering has been meted out
To the book of my enemy,
Since in the case of my own book it will be due
To a miscalculated print run, a marketing error--
Nothing to do with merit.
But just supposing that such an event should hold
Some slight element of sadness, it will be offset
By the memory of this sweet moment.
Chill the champagne and polish the crystal goblets!
The book of my enemy has been remaindered
And I am glad.

--Clive James
GAH!

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Long Run
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by Long Run »

Most appropriate quote Sue! :)

Big RR
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by Big RR »

Beat you to it RR
So you did; great minds...

sue-- :ok

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Lord Jim
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by Lord Jim »

Crackpot wrote:So I take William Logan is Lord Jim’s pen name.
Big RR wrote:
But his insights are so spot-on for all three.... :ok
I expected this from you. Is Logan your alter ego?

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Scooter
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by Scooter »

Never taken seriously as a poet? Cohen's work quickly rose to occupy a position of prominence in the Canadian literary canon, and has had lasting influence on literary movements from the 1960s onward. At some point he recognized that his poetry could reach a far larger audience if he set it to music, and there is no denying that as a songwriter he has produced a substantial body of work that was both critically acclaimed and commercially successful. I am about the last person who would have ever paid money to hear Cohen sing his compositions, but I would have thought that a literary critic/creative writing professor/poet might have been able to look past the absence of vocal ability, and be capable of seeing Cohen's genius as a lyricist and a composer.

Did he imagine that someone reading would be impressed by the literary references and academic language, or was he so eager to write a scathing review that he didn't realize that his criticism amounts to saying that any poetry that is not the equal of Dante or Goethe is garbage.
"If you don't have a seat at the table, you're on the menu."

-- Author unknown

ex-khobar Andy
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by ex-khobar Andy »

Agree completely Scooter. I had heard of Leonard Cohen before the first album - can't say I was a great fan of his poetry at 18, but it did make me interested to hear the music. So he wasn't completely unknown in 1967 even over the pond in England. His 'Songs of Leonard Cohen' is one of the two albums from that time where I can recall where I was and who played it to me. (The other was Janis Joplin, 'Big Brother and the Holding Company.')

I am always suspicious of someone who is a professor of creative writing. It seems to me to be an excellent example of - if you can do it well, why don't you spend your time making gobs of money as an author instead of a decent salary as a prof. Because I am a scientist of sorts, some of the finest writing I have ever had the pleasure to read has been people such as Stephen Jay Gould or Richard Dawkins or Douglas Hofstadter or JD Bernal - nonoe of those guys ever had a moment's 'lesson' in creative writing beyond high school English ("that one's an adverb, now you know") but (a) they read great books and (b) they knew their subject. I don't think that JK Rowling or JRR Tolkein or Winston Churchill or Charlotte Bronte ever had a professor of creative writing. Writers like artists need an eye; you can't teach someone how to be an artist beyond the technicalities (blue + yellow => green; apply charcoal with your finger for a softer effect) but beyond that you're on your own.

I was interested enough to look up some of Logan's own poetry - just curious. Really - don't bother.

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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by BoSoxGal »

There are also a great many wonderful contemporary authors who did, in fact, study creative writing under a professor designated for such teaching, and who are usually modestly successful - at very least published - working authors. Stephen King springs instantly to mind; you might look up lists of authors who are graduates of MFA programs in writing - they abound, many critically acclaimed for their work.

I don’t support your general argument because there are many talented people in all fields who are no doubt able to make a living in their fields, but choose to teach as well, often because of love of pedagogy.
For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
~ Carl Sagan

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Scooter
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by Scooter »

I don't know squat about poetry; I studied as little of it as I could in school and haven't often had the urge to read any more since. But I would think that a critique of a poem would have to begin with discerning what the author is trying to convey, and then looking at all of the choices he/she made in structure, diction, meter, rhyme, pacing, etc. to see whether they contribute to or detract from the author's purpose.

Snarking about the predominance of one and two syllable words and an indecipherable rhyme scheme just makes him look petty.

Reminds me of an Italian lit prof my sister had in university, who would mock 20th century poetry as all being some variation of "I got out of bed this morning. I drank a glass of water. I ate a plate of spaghetti." I'm guessing Logan is of the same cloth.
"If you don't have a seat at the table, you're on the menu."

-- Author unknown

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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by MajGenl.Meade »

Long Run wrote:That's a fair point in general, but when you are dealing with the Cohen fans who think it is only their great taste that separates them from the heathen masses who don't get him, maybe the article is well-earned. :nana (Though I am sorry our biggest Cohen fan has taken his Hallelujah ball and gone home).
From the POV of scraping together the toe-nail clippings of any artist, even a genius such as Cohen, the article's about right. Any careful examination of his poetry and (individual lines of) prose finds clunkers almost as often as worthy entries. Rabid fans who worship even a battered altar might enjoy having small pieces of his posthumously published randomness to mull over; graduate students writing a thesis may need it. I certainly do not.

Thankfully, the heathen masses have not noted our great taste, else I fear we may be consumed.
For Christianity, by identifying truth with faith, must teach-and, properly understood, does teach-that any interference with the truth is immoral. A Christian with faith has nothing to fear from the facts

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Long Run
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Re: I don't think he liked Leonard Cohen very much.

Post by Long Run »

MajGenl.Meade wrote: From the POV of scraping together the toe-nail clippings of any artist, even a genius such as Cohen, the article's about right. Any careful examination of his poetry and (individual lines of) prose finds clunkers almost as often as worthy entries. Rabid fans who worship even a battered altar might enjoy having small pieces of his posthumously published randomness to mull over; graduate students writing a thesis may need it. I certainly do not.

Thankfully, the heathen masses have not noted our great taste, else I fear we may be consumed.

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