HARDY FORUM ARCHIVE H01070 8/1/01 "AUGUST 2001 ANNOUNCEMENTS ============================================================= Date: Wed, 01 Aug 2001 16:56:02 -0500 From: Bill Morgan Subject: TTHA Poem of the Month for August Earlier today I posted Hardy's "The Last Signal," his commemorative poem for his friend William Barnes, as the TTHA Poem of the Month for July, 2001. This discussion will be the first in what I expect to be a series dedicated to Hardy's poetic tributes to his fellow writers. I invite your contributions to a month-long, on-line conversation about this elegy for his fellow Dorset poet. You can find the TTHA Poem of the Month Discussion by following the links from the main TTHA page at http://www.yale.edu/hardysoc/Welcome/welcomet.htm or by going directly to http://netforum.ilstu.edu/cgi-bin/netforum/ths/a/1/ Whichever route you take, when you arrive at the Poem of the Month site, you will encounter a program called NetForum which will give you the opportunity to read the poem as well as any comments it may have generated, compose a response, preview your response, edit it further if you wish, and then post it by using the button labeled Post the Message. (*DON'T use the Reset Message button*; you will lose your work.) If you are composing an intricate or long response, you may want to prepare your message in a word processing program, then copy it to your clipboard before pasting it into the message area of NetForum. And if you prefer, feel free to send me your contribution as an e-mail, and I will post it for you: wwmorgan@ilstu.edu. The discussions for February, 1998 through November 1999 have been "closed" and their contents edited and published in *The Hardy Review* [I:1 (July 1998) and 2:1 (Summer 1999)]. Likewise, the conversations from 1999 about the "Emma" poems are currently in press as the second of the TTHA Occasional Series, and those concerning "Channel Firing," "Satires of Circumstance in 15 Glimpses," "After the Visit," "To Meet, or Otherwise," and "A Singer Asleep" have been published in *The Hardy Review*, III (Summer 2000). All of these publications are available and may be ordered using a form available at the main TTHA page. The discussions of "Nature's Questioning," "The Mother Mourns," "The Subalterns," "The Lacking Sense," "In a Wood," "To Outer Nature," "June Leaves and Autumn," "Wagtail and Baby," "On a Midsummer Eve," "Afterwards," "Shut Out That Moon," "The Last Chrysanthemum," "The Year's Awakening," "The Night of the Dance" "The Dark-Eyed Gentleman," "She At His Funeral," "Her Confession," "Tess's Lament," "The Pine-Planters," "The Pink Frock," "The Beauty," "I Rose and Went to Rou'tor Town," "An Upbraiding," "The Chapel-Organist," "A Sunday-Morning Tragedy," and "A Trampwoman's Tragedy" (January 2000 through July 2001), however, are still open, and your contributions are invited. Welcome to the August 2001 TTHA Poem of the Month Discussion. cheers, Bill Morgan ========== Date: Wed, 01 Aug 2001 23:30:38 -0400 From: Rosemarie Morgan Subject: Re: TTHA Poem of the Month for August Dear Bill-- I'm frustrated by the fact that in my POTM visit tonight I was beset by demons on my own computer which kept smacking me with error messages so in the end I had to quit. But I did want to say, (and maybe you could post this for me?) that after reading Bob's comment on "A Trampwoman's Tragedy" and the hyperbolical stresses conveyed by the use of exclamation marks-- exclamation marks which Bob feels to be "melodramatic" (if I recall correctly) -- that I feel these emphases to be entirely appropriate. Why? because from Stanza I onwards in the journey "we beat afoot" one helluva tense melodrama is being played out and if Spielberg were to make a movie of this we would have settings of unbearable intensity: Stanza 1-- HEAT: "sun-blaze burning on our backs" II-- BEAT: "twenty miles" more of endless tramping III -- ENVIRONMENTAL STRESS: Gale force winds, river-crossings, stinging insects Surely then the language of these people would be thick with the curses of exhaustion not to mention the illbegotten sayings and doings of the fatigued and inebriated ---- later regretted. This is what we do-- this is how it is when we are pushed to the limit of physical and emotional endurance. Hence, to say "O deadly day!" aghast and with expressive feeling (exclamation mark) seems to me tonally apt although nowadays I suppose four-letter words would suffice to demonstrate the pressure (put on speaker and reader alike). This is a homicidal situation after all! (exclamation mark). Feelings are running very high. By stanza IX the knife is drawn and Johnny is dead. Surely an exclamation mark or two is the least a poet-linguist will do under the (leading) circumstances? Cheers, Rosemarie ========= Date: Sat, 25 Aug 2001 14:01:19 -0700 From: Betty Cortus Subject: Server Problems Dear Friends, Our ISP has been experiencing difficulties since early morning on Friday Aug. 24. If you have tried to reach the list, or John or myself privately, would you please resend your message. I apologise for the inconvenience. Betty cortus hardycor@mailhost2.csusm.edu ==========