Jeff Gundy's poem, How to Write the New Mennonite Poem, is one of the funniest pieces of poetry that I've read since Shel Silverstein and Jack Prelutzky were my favorite authors. Granted, one has to be familiar with the obscure genre of Mennonite poetry to get the clever observations, but it those who have some experience with Julia Kasdorf and others will find that it has that unbelievable accuracy that truly funny writing contains.
As was noted in class today, it begins as a recipe, calling for either Bibles, quilts, Fraktur, or the Martyr's Mirror. The instructional theme continues to the end, slowly moving from classic Mennonite images, to images common of liberal Mennonites, and finally to images of modern life that show the pupil/poet abandoning their roots. It seemed to be agreed in our discussion that Gundy intended to draw attention to how Mennonite poets were failing to represent their current lifestyles when they focus on objects common to earlier generations of Mennonites.
However, this is not what I saw at play in this piece. Gundy mentions (whether in vignettes or outright) guilt throughout the poem. I thought he was satirizing how modern Mennonite writers love to capitalize on their guilt from sacrificing traditions, but don't actually feel guilty. He isn't condemning of this phenomenon, but he is definitely making fun of the way this theme has become formulaic and pervasive in new Mennonite poetry.
What does anyone else think?
Josh, I agree with you about the last paragraph. I think Mennonites CAN play off their guilt, but don't always feel guilty about it. I wonder what this "guilt" comes from?---Kasdorf, too, writes about it; it is a reoccurring theme so far. Is it the desire to stay simple but the recognition that that is not always reached? It'd be interesting to discuss the issue of guilt in class.
ReplyDeleteJosh--Becca has picked up on what I also found to be a very interesting comment: "I thought he was satirizing how modern Mennonite writers love to capitalize on their guilt from sacrificing traditions, but don't actually feel guilty." So are you suggesting that Gundy shows that Mennonite guilt can just be a posture, part of the Mennonite "role" that the poet takes on as part of an "ethnic costume?
ReplyDeleteBecca--in response to your question, I'd suggest that Mennonite guilt comes from the internal recognition of one's failure to live up to impossibly high standards of virtue that are upheld in the Mennonite Community--with very little sense of humor about not violating them.
So, let's say it's potluck Sunday and you're supposed to bring your own tableware. But you forget. If you're a college student, you probably don't even notice, because people are always trying to get you to come to church and eat food and provide plates for you. But if you're a mother of children, and you don't bring your reusable tupperware plates and your picnic basket, you are a little better than a fallen woman. Such a lapse could be a an occasion for extreme guilt--or for faked guilt and apology for the sake of social acceptance--or, for the rebel, an occasion for a bit of rueful laughter when you send your entire family to the paper plate pile, reserved for guests. So, what is the most healthy response?
I'd say that most of the guilt is what Buddhist nun Pema Chodron would call "bourgeois guilt." That is, it's about really small things that indicate how "correct" you are on an internalized scale of Mennonite correctness.
But there's a lot more to be discussed about this and I'd love to hear from the class on this topic: does your generation feel a version of this guilt?