Should Miranda not have supported Roman’s work as the chair of the jury? Was it really, as Roman put it, like she had given the prize and then taken it away?
He may have deserved the prize anyway, so in that sense, it's too bad that the prize may have been tainted. I wouldn't say it was like she gave it and then took it away, because if that were true, then I'd say she never gave it in the first place, since the only thing she did that could be characterized as taking it away was giving it in the first place.
From an outside perspective (not considering his or her feelings), it was the wrong thing to do. Not only were they involved, but she helped him with his extensive revisions. Even if she could have put aside her feelings, she would still be judging something (and someone) that she helped shape.
Looked at from her perspective, it becomes an entirely different question. She wanted success for him. She loved him. She wanted to give him this gift. On the other hand, the gift also hurt him (or he thought it did). It may have destroyed their chance for a friendship (of course, most or all of the blame for that can be placed squarely on him). It may have hurt her reputation as a poet and teacher and judge (even though people didn't know about their relationship, it was enough that he was her student).
That last point brings up another issue -- if it were wrong for her jury to give her student the prize, wouldn't they have had a rule against it? Or were they reading the poetry without names attached? Even so, shouldn't they have had a rule that any member of the jury who recognized a writing had to recuse herself from judging that work? Or did the sponsors think everyone on the jury could be impartial?
I think there's an argument that it was OK for her to support his work. She wasn't the sole judge, after all, so presumably her assessment could have been overruled by other judges. It wasn't. The world of poetry is small. All those people know each other. They attend the same writing programs and conferences; anonymity would seem a terribly unrealistic goal. What she shouldn't have done, in my opinion, was disclose that she was on the jury; that move served absolutely no one, and probably hurt her more than anyone. We're told that her reputation was diminished after that.
It wasn't clear to me how much of a hand she had in his work that won the prize. My understanding was that she was responding to what he wrote and giving her opinion of what worked for her, but we're never told — are we? — what her exact contribution was. I didn't get the sense that she was actually constructing lines of poetry for him or anything that could be considered "cheating."
I thought that she was telling him what needed revised and what didn't, and possibly also told him why it needed revised. So, even though she wasn't suggesting how he should write, if he was rewriting only the parts she thought could use improvement, and especially if she was telling him what bothered her about it, then the final product would be something she would like a lot better than what he presented to her at first.
That's a good point about her being on a jury -- they wouldn't have given him the prize if the others hadn't agreed with her.
Remind me of the disclosure -- I remember something about that, but not the details. Was the jury secret from everyone unless the jury member told someone they were on the jury? If so, did she do it just so he would find out? If that's the case, it makes the comment of taking his prize away make more sense. With how concerned he is about fame and appearance, maybe he meant that the primary value of the prize was the prestige, and he thought that she took away the prestige of the prize by disclosing.
I wasn't clear on whether the collection submitted for the prize was the poems she had specifically helped him with when they were having their affair. I'm sure everyone in the contest had submitted poems that in some way were shaped by others (teachers, readers, lovers, etc.) Unless there's an allegation of plagiarism, that aspect doesn't really bother me. They are still his poems. It's interesting that we never actually see any of the verse — Roman's or anyone's — discussed in the book. It's all spoken of very generally. Maybe the author didn't want us to judge anything for ourselves, because that would thrown yet another dimension into the story.
I understood there to be kind of a tradition or unspoken agreement that the jurors' identities were secret, that it was bad form, but not necessarily against any "rule," to disclose your identity. I think it's understood that it's a jury of one's peers, i.e., other poets, and that the chances are extremely high that people will know the people whose work they're judging. Keeping identities secret before and after the judging is probably meant to dispel the potentially endless speculation of how someone voted.
Miranda disclosed that she was the jury chair in an interview in a poetry magazine that she knew Roman (and everyone else in the poetry world) would see. Her reputation was diminished by it, I thought, just because she picked her own student, assuming that there was favoritism at play. I didn't assume any plagiarism-type issues because I figured these were probably different poems from the ones he used to apply for fellowships. But who knows. It is interesting, isn't it, that we never see any of Roman's work? (We do get that few lines of Miranda's poem that she recites in class (an example, apparently, of something that is poetry).)
Since Roman later won a Pulitzer, we can probably assume his work did deserve the Detweiler, which makes it all the more sad that it damaged Miranda's career and destroyed whatever was left of their relationship.
Ah, now I remember. My mistake was confusing the Detweiler and the Argent Fellowship. She helped him with the poetry he submitted for the fellowship, right? And he won the Detweiler at the end of the fellowship, so it was probably poetry he wrote after winning the fellowship. Which means she didn't help him with it.
The poem Miranda recited in class was "The Idea of Order at Key West," a 1954 poem by Wallace Stevens. There's a copyright notice for it at the front of the book. I looked it up online -- it's about 50 lines long, and it appears that she recited the whole thing, even though the whole thing isn't quoted in the book.
I don't know whether Miranda had a responsibility to recuse herself from judging Roman's work -- as Kim said, it's a small community, and she wasn't the only judge -- but I certainly think she tainted its merit for him and failed to recognize that.
I don't think this guy was a prize, period, but I think the real tragedy of this story is that for whatever reason he wanted success as a poet, his success was absolutely tainted by the fact that he was also valued as an attractive lay. Lucy really drove that point home in that final argument of their marriage: "Good lord, Roman! Don't you know that for a woman to praise your work is the only way to get you to notice her at all?"
Miranda compromised his success and put fatal self-doubt in his ability by giving him that prize and also admitting that getting to see him again played even a tiny part in her decision. I can't cut her slack for being a woman in love and him being a man acting a bit like a louse -- I think if the genders were flipped in this story, it would just be more apparent.
I see where you're coming from, cl, and I agree, as I said earlier, that Miranda was wrong to disclose her role as juror, but I don't think there's any evidence that Roman's success was "absolutely tainted" anywhere but in his own mind. The book doesn't mention an outcry of any kind from any other quarter. And he continued to have a smashingly successful career, with a Pulitzer and a full-time job in academia working as a poet, which I don't see how someone with "fatal self-doubt" could accomplish. So I don't think Miranda compromised his success at all. She compromised her own reputation, which we're told was "diminished" after that. I understand that Miranda's actions weren't cool, but it seems that even Roman eventually recognized them as the momentary weakness of someone acting, however misguidedly, out of love, not malice.
He may have deserved the prize anyway, so in that sense, it's too bad that the prize may have been tainted. I wouldn't say it was like she gave it and then took it away, because if that were true, then I'd say she never gave it in the first place, since the only thing she did that could be characterized as taking it away was giving it in the first place.
ReplyDeleteFrom an outside perspective (not considering his or her feelings), it was the wrong thing to do. Not only were they involved, but she helped him with his extensive revisions. Even if she could have put aside her feelings, she would still be judging something (and someone) that she helped shape.
Looked at from her perspective, it becomes an entirely different question. She wanted success for him. She loved him. She wanted to give him this gift. On the other hand, the gift also hurt him (or he thought it did). It may have destroyed their chance for a friendship (of course, most or all of the blame for that can be placed squarely on him). It may have hurt her reputation as a poet and teacher and judge (even though people didn't know about their relationship, it was enough that he was her student).
That last point brings up another issue -- if it were wrong for her jury to give her student the prize, wouldn't they have had a rule against it? Or were they reading the poetry without names attached? Even so, shouldn't they have had a rule that any member of the jury who recognized a writing had to recuse herself from judging that work? Or did the sponsors think everyone on the jury could be impartial?
I think there's an argument that it was OK for her to support his work. She wasn't the sole judge, after all, so presumably her assessment could have been overruled by other judges. It wasn't. The world of poetry is small. All those people know each other. They attend the same writing programs and conferences; anonymity would seem a terribly unrealistic goal. What she shouldn't have done, in my opinion, was disclose that she was on the jury; that move served absolutely no one, and probably hurt her more than anyone. We're told that her reputation was diminished after that.
ReplyDeleteIt wasn't clear to me how much of a hand she had in his work that won the prize. My understanding was that she was responding to what he wrote and giving her opinion of what worked for her, but we're never told — are we? — what her exact contribution was. I didn't get the sense that she was actually constructing lines of poetry for him or anything that could be considered "cheating."
I thought that she was telling him what needed revised and what didn't, and possibly also told him why it needed revised. So, even though she wasn't suggesting how he should write, if he was rewriting only the parts she thought could use improvement, and especially if she was telling him what bothered her about it, then the final product would be something she would like a lot better than what he presented to her at first.
ReplyDeleteThat's a good point about her being on a jury -- they wouldn't have given him the prize if the others hadn't agreed with her.
Remind me of the disclosure -- I remember something about that, but not the details. Was the jury secret from everyone unless the jury member told someone they were on the jury? If so, did she do it just so he would find out? If that's the case, it makes the comment of taking his prize away make more sense. With how concerned he is about fame and appearance, maybe he meant that the primary value of the prize was the prestige, and he thought that she took away the prestige of the prize by disclosing.
I wasn't clear on whether the collection submitted for the prize was the poems she had specifically helped him with when they were having their affair. I'm sure everyone in the contest had submitted poems that in some way were shaped by others (teachers, readers, lovers, etc.) Unless there's an allegation of plagiarism, that aspect doesn't really bother me. They are still his poems. It's interesting that we never actually see any of the verse — Roman's or anyone's — discussed in the book. It's all spoken of very generally. Maybe the author didn't want us to judge anything for ourselves, because that would thrown yet another dimension into the story.
ReplyDeleteI understood there to be kind of a tradition or unspoken agreement that the jurors' identities were secret, that it was bad form, but not necessarily against any "rule," to disclose your identity. I think it's understood that it's a jury of one's peers, i.e., other poets, and that the chances are extremely high that people will know the people whose work they're judging. Keeping identities secret before and after the judging is probably meant to dispel the potentially endless speculation of how someone voted.
Miranda disclosed that she was the jury chair in an interview in a poetry magazine that she knew Roman (and everyone else in the poetry world) would see. Her reputation was diminished by it, I thought, just because she picked her own student, assuming that there was favoritism at play. I didn't assume any plagiarism-type issues because I figured these were probably different poems from the ones he used to apply for fellowships. But who knows. It is interesting, isn't it, that we never see any of Roman's work? (We do get that few lines of Miranda's poem that she recites in class (an example, apparently, of something that is poetry).)
ReplyDeleteSince Roman later won a Pulitzer, we can probably assume his work did deserve the Detweiler, which makes it all the more sad that it damaged Miranda's career and destroyed whatever was left of their relationship.
Ah, now I remember. My mistake was confusing the Detweiler and the Argent Fellowship. She helped him with the poetry he submitted for the fellowship, right? And he won the Detweiler at the end of the fellowship, so it was probably poetry he wrote after winning the fellowship. Which means she didn't help him with it.
ReplyDeleteThe poem Miranda recited in class was "The Idea of Order at Key West," a 1954 poem by Wallace Stevens. There's a copyright notice for it at the front of the book. I looked it up online -- it's about 50 lines long, and it appears that she recited the whole thing, even though the whole thing isn't quoted in the book.
Oh, I misunderstood that, I guess.
ReplyDeleteI don't know whether Miranda had a responsibility to recuse herself from judging Roman's work -- as Kim said, it's a small community, and she wasn't the only judge -- but I certainly think she tainted its merit for him and failed to recognize that.
ReplyDeleteI don't think this guy was a prize, period, but I think the real tragedy of this story is that for whatever reason he wanted success as a poet, his success was absolutely tainted by the fact that he was also valued as an attractive lay. Lucy really drove that point home in that final argument of their marriage: "Good lord, Roman! Don't you know that for a woman to praise your work is the only way to get you to notice her at all?"
Miranda compromised his success and put fatal self-doubt in his ability by giving him that prize and also admitting that getting to see him again played even a tiny part in her decision. I can't cut her slack for being a woman in love and him being a man acting a bit like a louse -- I think if the genders were flipped in this story, it would just be more apparent.
I see where you're coming from, cl, and I agree, as I said earlier, that Miranda was wrong to disclose her role as juror, but I don't think there's any evidence that Roman's success was "absolutely tainted" anywhere but in his own mind. The book doesn't mention an outcry of any kind from any other quarter. And he continued to have a smashingly successful career, with a Pulitzer and a full-time job in academia working as a poet, which I don't see how someone with "fatal self-doubt" could accomplish. So I don't think Miranda compromised his success at all. She compromised her own reputation, which we're told was "diminished" after that. I understand that Miranda's actions weren't cool, but it seems that even Roman eventually recognized them as the momentary weakness of someone acting, however misguidedly, out of love, not malice.
ReplyDelete