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User Name Thread Name Subject Posted
GUEST Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? (147* d) RE: Gunga Din. Racist or just of its time? 09 Feb 24


Well poems are not generally written for literature graduates, any more than Beethoven wrote his symphonies for professors of music. Mozart was delighted when he heard the ordinary people of Vienna whistling tunes from the Magic Flute in the streets. Scholars who pull poetry (or symphonies, or great paintings) to bits in order to analyse them certainly have their place, and I for one enjoy many of their erudite writings. Many of the rest of us are more than capable of appreciating the sentiment of the poems we read and of putting the poems in their historical contexts (could be a bit of a leveller, that last one, actually). When it comes to understanding works of art, poetry included, there are many layers of appreciation possible, and the literature scholars by no means enjoy a monopoly thereof.




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