Blog | Poetry as a form of Art
- 3 minsWhen Bob Dylan’s song lyrics won a Nobel prize for literature in 2016, it sparked all sorts of questions in the arts community: Could song lyrics even be classified as a form of literary art? What exactly defines a genre or an art form? And a question that may emerge from those with a more conservatively-inclined mindset of artistic tradition: How far can artistic license be pushed as a form of creative freedom before it begins to threaten the integrity of how art has traditionally been defined?
I think art to me is anything produced by a living, thinking, individual mind. In this vein, I mean that it should be something that is unique to the creator themselves- that the product would be different every time even if the same thoughts that were running through the creator’s brain during the time of creation could somehow be transferred to the brains of other people. Something original. Special. One-of-a-kind.
I do not think that art necessarily has to “make you feel things” or to incite any semblance of emotion from either the creator or the appreciator. Deeper purpose need not be a requirement either- both on the creation end or on the receiving end. While there is an abundance of socially accepted “art” created with a certain image or idea in mind, I do not think that we should be able to deem that something created out of scribbles or whispers or random words plucked out of thin air is not to be considered art.
At the end of the day, these criteria I have stated are simply how I view “art” as an individual person with an individual perspective, and are not applicable anywhere outside the confines of my mind. Who am I to tell someone else that their definition of art is wrong simply because it is different from mine? And in this lies what I think is the greatest beauty of art- the sheer subjectivity that lies in the nature of art itself.
Similarly, and possibly as expected, I hold similar opinions on poetry as a form of art. As with art, I think that poetry should be a changeable medium in which one can do whatever they want with; this is one of the reasons why I love poetry so much- the absolute freedom that one has in both the writing and the interpreting.
In the past, I have only ever read traditional forms of poetry with set structures and set rhythms, but I had the opportunity to see many more different types and forms of poetry. Now that I have been exposed to more structures and forms and even the lack of structure, I can see just how poetry in and of itself is a form of artistic freedom. In terms of personal aesthetic, I have noticed a general trend in the types of poetry I enjoy and hope to learn from. The poems that typically catch my eye and stick in my mind are not determined by subject matter, or inner meaning, but rather, are determined but the beautiful way in which they are written.
While I’ll always hold a special respect for those who choose to write in the beautiful forms of perfect meters, rhyme, and structure, I have also come to appreciate the works of those who choose to break through the preset constraints of the traditional genre to create their own rules and present their words in their free verse.
These are some of my favourite poems- I highly recommend giving them a read:
- Dulce et Decorum est by Wilfred Owen (the imagery in all of his poetry is beautiful and this is one of my favourites)
- Because I could not stop for death by Emily Dickinson
- Porphyria’s lover by Robert Browning (this is a genius play on a traditional trope)
- next to of course god america i by E.E. Cummings (the rules of poetry structure are completely redefined to make a point)
- The Same-Different poems by Hannah Sanghee Park
Amber Hsu
Senior studying English and Biochemistry at the UW