Doctor Recommended

J to the M, Yiggity Yo

This is John Milton talkin' to you live from the Bronco Bowl, where we're partying like its 1667. The Millers wife is getting down and dirty, so much so that we've had to stop playing Nude Twister and Crab Limbo due to too much baby making.

Err, none of you read Paradise Lost or the Canterbury Tales, did you?

Well you might have run across another classic epic, Beowulf, sometime in your career as a human, including the translation from Seamus Heaney. Mr. Heaney made the news once more, not for winning another Nobel Prize (or a Swanson Prize), but for his endorsement of rap, specifically Eminem:

"There is this guy Eminem. He has created a sense of what is possible. He has sent a voltage around a generation. He has done this not just through his subversive attitude, but also his verbal energy."

And he's not the only member of academia to gush figgity fat phrases:

Professor Paul Muldoon, professor of poetry at Oxford University, said that Heaney's comments were "perfectly reasonable".

"One thing I would say about Eminem and rappers in general is that despite the fact that the subject matter is sometimes more than near the knuckle, they do valourise the word in a way that lyricists generally don't," he said. "In general, the language is perhaps more important than the music in the rap genre."

The Poetry Society, formed in London in 1909, was equally gushing. "Eminem harnesses the power of word and language and that's what a poet would do," it said. "That's why the society is not surprised that Seamus Heaney would speak favourably."

The society's support for the rapper has increased following feedback from children entering its annual schools-based performance poetry competition. "Many of them have been absolutely inspired by Eminem," it said.

All I have to say:

May I have your attention please?
May I have your attention please?
Will the real Blog Meister please stand up?
I repeat, will the real Blog Meister please stand up?
We're gonna have a problem here…

Posted by Tim at July 2, 2003 05:07 PM | TrackBack