tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-829168697372726752.post2417947412045093613..comments2024-02-10T03:45:25.354-05:00Comments on Blogalicious: The Last LineDiane Lockwardhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07614479152159652577noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-829168697372726752.post-76043158767605066332013-02-01T09:05:30.100-05:002013-02-01T09:05:30.100-05:00This does sometimes happen for me, that is, the la...This does sometimes happen for me, that is, the last line arrives early. However, I invariably later kill it or move it. I sometimes discover that the ending is really somewhere in the middle or up a few lines from the bottom of the poem. Other times, it remains elusive, still unwritten.Diane Lockwardhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07614479152159652577noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-829168697372726752.post-79100614474694288022013-02-01T09:03:55.755-05:002013-02-01T09:03:55.755-05:00Beautifully articulated, Michael. Yes, for a lyric...Beautifully articulated, Michael. Yes, for a lyric poet the surprises emerge out of images and figures and language. Interesting what you say about the novelist looking for surprises in the way his character develops--kind of like watching a child grow. Novelist as parent?Diane Lockwardhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07614479152159652577noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-829168697372726752.post-4858819009058674232013-01-31T22:18:20.819-05:002013-01-31T22:18:20.819-05:00True. But...and...it's not uncommon for the fi...True. But...and...it's not uncommon for the final line to arrive very early in the writing, long before the poem is finished. Sometimes the poet knows it's the end, sometimes she doesn't figure it out for twenty or thirty revisions--or more. <br /><br />Fine post. Looking forward to more. Peace and all good things for you in writing and in life.<br /><br />Sincerely,<br />Diane D.M. SOLIShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13753807150268735755noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-829168697372726752.post-74556812707648594602013-01-31T10:03:07.794-05:002013-01-31T10:03:07.794-05:00I’m a poet and not a novelist and have that same n...I’m a poet and not a novelist and have that same need to be surprised by where a poem goes. The act of writing the poem is a discovery, it’s working out a mystery that I solve only when I get the last line, which, just as you, may take a long time. Every poem I wrote when I already knew where it would end turned out to be an utter failure. <br /><br />But one of my closest friends is primarily a novelist and I think the idea of discovery is very different in our processes. Novelists deal with character development, narrative flow, time, plot structure, etc. Poets – at least lyric poets – are not dealing with these. A poet thinks his way to connections through various tropes, images, phonetics, making connections without being bound by time or narrative structure or plot. It’s a different kind of thinking. I believe the primary discovery for a novelist is how a character responds to the plot. The plot may be fixed or slightly shift, but it is the character charted through time in response to the plot that is the discovery for the novelist. So the plot, that is, where the book is going, may be known all along, but how the characters will respond is what he needs to learn as he goes. <br />Michael T. Younghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11989610716056926730noreply@blogger.com