David Lynch

[Charles Brown]

So what if Lynch is a Reaganite? What bearing does that have on 
whether he makes good movies? Pound was a fascist and he wrote some 
fine poetry. Stevens said in a letter that the only good thing 
happening in the world was that they were killing Communists in 
Korea, and he wrote some fine poetry too. And there are writers and 
artists with good politics who produce unbearable crap.

Doug

^^^^^^

CB: Sometimes I even think that most well known artists have bad politics. Afterall, the ruling ideas of an age are the ideas of its ruling classes , and artists have always had to eat.

But I want to ask , and I am not being snotty, what are the standards that make Pound's or Stevens' poetry good ? I know that's a whopper, but whoppers are allowed here, right ?  Let me not ask this totally naively. They have  accurate perceptions about human emotions and life in some way. They evoke emotions in some way.  But I still think of "politics" broadly as the many social issues, not narrowly as who controls the state. Doesn't a notion that extends examination of power relations to personal relations, the personal as political, extend a political test of some type to the areas of poetry and movies ?  ( and yea I probably asked this the last time this came up)  . I find it hard to separate Pound's aesthetic theory and opinions about Western civilization from his decision to become a fascist.