ArtsJournal: PostClassic:

"Ever since I've started writing in this blog about differences between Downtown and Uptown music, Uptown (or at least non-Downtown) bloggers and composers have been ridiculing me for using the term 'Downtown music.' Apparently they think that by pretending I'm the only one who still uses the term and making fun of me, they can make the Up-/Downtown distinction look quaint, old-fashioned, and discredited, and make me look like I'm living in the past and haven't caught up with the new realities. Meanwhile, Downtown composers, who know who they are and still use the term, write to thank me for carrying on the fight.

It is in the interest of whatever class is in power to discredit the idea that there is any distinction between them and the class they are oppressing."

I guess "uptown" would mean "school of quietude." Maybe Silliman's distinction is not quite as silly as some would think.

***

The New York Times might be able see through Jorie Graham, but it cannot acknowledge the existence of Clark Coolidge or Barbara Guest. We all know Graham is horribly overrated: a once half-way-decent Iowa-style poet who has evolved into an intellectually pretentious and long-winded celebrity poet. A mainstream reviewer like Orr is able to see this, to his credit.

I have tried my best with Graham, dutifully checking out her books from the library on repeated occasions. I can see in the early books that she was very good within the period style of that period. I see how she was able to attract some of the Ashberyians-of-the-right to her cause later on. At least by being "difficult" she avoids being clumped in with the Billy Collins school. By overreaching for an intellectual profundity that she can't really produce, she ultimately creates a kind of bathos.