Re: Culture Uniting... (cont. 4)

[cbcox@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Carrol Cox)]

{I have not seen my last post (3) posted yet; if it continues not to appear
I will repeat it later. CBC}
                            ...London and the Paris Commune]]
(which represented Anarchy for Arnold, and to which he opposed Culture).
Arnold was very clear on who was "we" and who was "they."

    _As Culture_ Blake as well as the others is part of Bourgeois
culture (I'm not denying the extent to which his poems are on our
side in various ways). And here I wish to turn to Jon's query (in a
message I either failed to kepp or put in a directory where I
can't find it) concerning Marxist poets; did we have any? And he
mentioned Neruda. I don't know much about Neruda, and I have not
read as much of Brecht as I ought toh ave, but may I suggest that a
Norteamericano *might* have mentioned Guthrie, particularly as Guthrie
offers a powerful perspective from which to criticize not only Shelley
(who is, I admit, admirable) but even the "Internationale."

    In zeroing in on Guthrie, Shelley, and "Culture," let's star with
the title of an old labor song, "Which Side Are You On?" For analytic
and historical purposes that may be translated as "Who is we?" It is
on this point that Guthrie is simply supreme among writers in English.
(And, I will later suggest, it is from this perspective that Shelley
and the Internationale are defective.)
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    Take what is perhaps his greatest song, "Deportee." It begins:

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