Wonderful meditation on photography. I think you’ve really gotten at some of the aspects of old photographs, which seem to have a magic about them that modern cellphone photos lack. Perhaps it has a lot to do with the vagaries of older technologies, or the tactile nature of handling a tiny snapshot, the writing on the back, sometimes bleeding through to the image.
And then there’s how almost all photographs from the 19th century are posed, shot in a studio, with the subjects wearing their best clothes, even cowboys and loggers would dress up, giving them a formality and gravity that contrasts strongly with today’s dominant “candid” ethos. Also, those studio portraits really represent the photographer’s point of view, whereas today it’s the subject who is often “acting” for the camera.
Does Smith’s book include any persona poems where the speaker is the photographer, the other half of the dialogue?
It doesn't. The only poem that's not in the voice of the subject is the last one, which is in her voice and she's talking to the people in the photos as a collective. Something I didn't really get into was the range of the voices, which you'd expect given the differences in the ages and genders of the people in them. There are also poems with multiple voices, where the different people in the images take turns talking to the reader. But there are others where only one of the people in the image speaks, and the reasons for that seem to vary from image to image. And every poem feels like a new revelation. I can't praise the book enough.
I suppose my interest in the photographer is like my interest in the crew who film documentaries. And just as it was said that Ginger Rogers could do everything her dancing partner Fred Astaire could do, but in heels and backwards, the next time you see some mountain climber in a documentary cheering for himself at the top, it’s worth considering that there was probably someone you didn’t see who also summited while carrying heavy camera gear.
Wonderful meditation on photography. I think you’ve really gotten at some of the aspects of old photographs, which seem to have a magic about them that modern cellphone photos lack. Perhaps it has a lot to do with the vagaries of older technologies, or the tactile nature of handling a tiny snapshot, the writing on the back, sometimes bleeding through to the image.
And then there’s how almost all photographs from the 19th century are posed, shot in a studio, with the subjects wearing their best clothes, even cowboys and loggers would dress up, giving them a formality and gravity that contrasts strongly with today’s dominant “candid” ethos. Also, those studio portraits really represent the photographer’s point of view, whereas today it’s the subject who is often “acting” for the camera.
Does Smith’s book include any persona poems where the speaker is the photographer, the other half of the dialogue?
It doesn't. The only poem that's not in the voice of the subject is the last one, which is in her voice and she's talking to the people in the photos as a collective. Something I didn't really get into was the range of the voices, which you'd expect given the differences in the ages and genders of the people in them. There are also poems with multiple voices, where the different people in the images take turns talking to the reader. But there are others where only one of the people in the image speaks, and the reasons for that seem to vary from image to image. And every poem feels like a new revelation. I can't praise the book enough.
I suppose my interest in the photographer is like my interest in the crew who film documentaries. And just as it was said that Ginger Rogers could do everything her dancing partner Fred Astaire could do, but in heels and backwards, the next time you see some mountain climber in a documentary cheering for himself at the top, it’s worth considering that there was probably someone you didn’t see who also summited while carrying heavy camera gear.