Robert Graves (1895-1985)

I’ve been wondering which of Graves’ vast output I should read after ‘Flying Crooked’ and the problem was solved when this one was requested.

‘In Broken Images’ juxtaposes two ways of thinking and celebrates the value of starting any thought process from a position of honest confusion or ignorance, and working towards a better understanding of the issue without falling into the trap of thinking the process is from doubt to certainity. Rather it’s from honest doubt to informed honest doubt.

There are too many hes and not enough Is in the world at present. And the education system has a tendency to reward the hes.

The Irony of this poem is that Graves went on to become the most didactic of English critics. However, Graves the younger man wrote marvelous books of criticism. He later disowned them. But his essay on what is bad poetry, which begins ‘Poetic Unreason’ , is a mini masterpiece of the art of taking doubt seriously and following it to its logical conclusions. And then, having arrived a conclusion, having to start again.

This is taken from Carcanet’s ‘The complete poems in one volume’ edited by Beryl Graves and Dunstan Ward. There’s a fine shorter selected edited by Michael Longley.

Poetic Unreason is only avilable on the second hand book market.