A good friend of mine from many years ago asked me to contribute some prose to a song. A collaboration of sorts. He is and has been a musician since we first met, with goals and aspirations of making it one way or another.
I used to write more when I was younger; didn't we all. But I have found myself using words as a personal stretch into my mind that swirls with thoughts. You will likely even find this particular blog more vibrant than normal. Words are like pictures.
Like a poster intended to inspire, they do go hand in hand. However, there are poems that create a vision, and images that stir up poetic musings. That is the best part of photography. And the glory of poetry. They can completely be altered in meaning depending on the viewer.
I have a degree in English and had the luxury to study poetry for nearly 2 years of my degree, instead of just literature. Langston Hughes, Czeslaw Milosz, even Emily Dickenson. I always struggled personally whenever we had to figure out what the author meant. I found that up for complete personal interpretation. So how can you grade an interpretation? Dickenson didn't even want her poems published. Her sister did that after Emily's death.
I took my version of poetic and prosaic interpretation to the novels I had to dissect. One such was with Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment. I honed in on an unusual word that regularly popped up in the novel and showed it's connection to the story and the understory. I got a D, which is why I likely do not recall that particular word. And why I know that prof did not study words as I did. He studied works.
The same holds true for photography for me. Personal interpretation. All art is. Words are art. Images are art.
And the mind skews both to suit the mood or the meaning. Both as the creator and the interpretor. And the collaborator.
Friday, March 18, 2011
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