VICE: "We Got Two Poets to Review Lana Del Rey's New Poetry Collection"

[jazzsingrcultleadr 1,704]

A good friend of mine (and fellow Lana stan) wrote a fun piece for Vice asking some poets what they thought of some of Lana's poems.

 

"If Lana Del Rey were a Spice Girl, she’d be Literary Spice. In her ten-plus years in the public eye she’s made it pretty obvious that she reads books – or has at least heard of them. She is a bookshelf, as the meme goes, full of Nabokov and Bukowski and all of the other supposed red flags you should run from. She gets down to beat poetry. She’s been tearing around in her fucking nightgown, 24/7 Sylvia Plath. She sings the Body Electric. She is the Walt Whitman of the post-tumblr age, her internal metronome clicking to the clack of a 808 hi-hat."

 

Read it here.

[Chemtrail 2,808]

Is this the one that says some poets were up for doing this but declined after reading them?

[NamiraWilhelm 5,031]

‘She’s being exploited’ oof 

[Amadeus 11,293]

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I asked some professional poets, to find out. After some initial interest, several declined to comment once I’d sent them the actual poetry. 

 

 

 

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The technique Del Rey uses here of addressing the city as an estranged lover can be effective, but for me the poem leans too heavily on Del Rey’s stream of consciousness. There are a lot of ideas, some of them nice, but not enough crafting. 

 

i feel this a lot reading her poetry it's all very undercooked and sounds very ~drafty.. which idk i'm not a fan of. some of her lyrics have this issue as well but i mean music is fine it's not solely based on the lyrics there's great songs with lowkey bad lyrics from a lot of artists out there. poetry is less forgiveable.

 

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 I’m less taken with the masculine/feminine, hard/soft – “the ying to my yang/The toughness to my softness” feel a bit predictable and lazy from someone who has the capacity to give us something better. I’m also a little perturbed by her use of the idea of man as something eternal and steadfast (the sun or earth) and woman as the ephemeral (the flower). It feels very old fashioned and a little like Del Rey hasn’t fully thought through the gender ramifications of her imagery here. If I read this in the pages of a male poet’s collection I’d be raging.

 

drag her!

 

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Yes, it’s over the top, but surely it’s supposed to be over the top. It would seem to be a comment on the very idea of publishing and monetising what we’re reading.

 

honestly, i used to feel like that about lana, i used to think a lot of the stuff she says in her lyrics is very self-aware but these past few months made me think that she's actually not self-aware at all and takes herself (and her art) so damn serious and is very incapable of seeing herself as what she is and not try to convince everyone that she's this great artist, this underdog, this loser who just happened to get this careerstart with btd, all of this is very artpop-gaga thinking so high of herself as if she was the living reincarnated jesus slash  immanuel kant.

i think i used to overinterpret a lot of her over the top moments in her lyrics because i didn't want to think she's actually this delusional but i might .. actually think i'll have to see it for what it is if she continues to behave like this.

 

 

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 I rather liked the narrative in this piece, though I think there’s a tendency to ruminate on her own subject matter, which can undermine it at times. I felt strongly that it needed to decide whether it was a short story or a poem. I think it would do really well as either, as it’s got lots of strengths. It does well to relate a unique experience with some really nice details and to examine that experience’s significance to the individual experiencing it, but I want it to pick a lane.

 

this just proves my point which i've voiced over her poetry when she just started out: she's not as skilled as she thinks she is. the way she wrote them on a typewriter and like.. generally seemed to care more about the aesthetic of this all always rubbed me the way that we're going to get this pumped up balloon of pretentiousness without the actual substance of a writer and not just as in the content of the poems but also in the skill-full delivery of stories or images.

 

 

[genghis khan 5,079]

I don't have time right now to read the whole thing but i really like this piece so far. I like how they pick apart her influences and what devices she uses and it makes me happy to see since it's sort of rare to find people give lana the time of day for that sort of stuff.

 

I also agree with the point about a lot of lines, specifically the "they say i come from money but i didn't" are too self indulgent. It's one of my biggest problems with violet. Poetry is inheriently self-centred, but what makes allen ginsberg and walt whitman good poets is how universal the language begins to feel. Lines like "people always accuse me of being rich but im not i swear!!" and "im funny when i drink (btw i swear ive been sober for 7 years)" are just plain uninteresting at best.

They might be good topics for her to continue further on and delve into, but when she just puts lines in it like that it ruins the flow and makes violet harder to enjoy

[genghis khan 5,079]

6 minutes ago, Amadeus said:

 

 

this just proves my point which i've voiced over her poetry when she just started out: she's not as skilled as she thinks she is. the way she wrote them on a typewriter and like.. generally seemed to care more about the aesthetic of this all always rubbed me the way that we're going to get this pumped up balloon of pretentiousness without the actual substance of a writer and not just as in the content of the poems but also in the skill-full delivery of stories or images.

 

 

 

this reminds me of another comment i read somewhere on here. someone jabbing at how she acts like some bohemian rockstar who lives and dies for touring and making art, and yet most of her live shows are lazy 

[domandapiano 11,594]

It’s a good read! Both very critical and appreciative simultaneously. 

[Crimson and Clover 22,081]

i really like this article and i agree with it a lot - especially the yikesness of land of 1000 fires. idk who said it on here but it really is kinda on the border of being poetry and a stream of consciousness, which doesn't make it any less artistic or any less personal - they said some, especially LA and Sportcruiser, are more like the monologues of Ride and National Anthem, which i agree with. i loves it anyways

 

[Fetish 284]

Oh man, this is...something. Lana's obsessed with the idea and title of being a poet, not the work that goes into being one.

Like another user mentioned, it's the aesthetic she likes. It's the superficial layer of being a poet and what do you know, her poetry is very shallow thanks to this. I'm not against indulgent poetry but then you need to spend time crafting them to be enjoyable to read. Hers just read like she's bitching while trying to sound pretentious. No skill in word arrangement or harmony. I bet she has no idea what that even means lmao. I've read personal poetry that's made me very emotional and I rarely get moved by shit.

[The Greatest 8,803]

Those observations were so true. I like that they were so critical in a way because they’re not giving her the benefit of the doubt just because she’s a pop star. Like if you’re going to call yourself a poet you have to be judged as one 

[fessle 729]

I think they did a really great job dissecting it!

"Maybe that’s not the truth of the story, but sometimes a neat ending can undermine the thing – and sometimes allowing yourself to lift off a little from the facts can get you closer to the truth."

 

[SuperMegaStan 9,643]

it would be so much better if it was called like "a collection of thoughts, prose and poems - violet bent backwards over the grass"

[Doll Harlow 12,350]

They kind of made a point with "LA Who Am I To Love You?" It's one of those poems that sounds better with the audio rather than when you read it imo.

 

Overall, I really do like her poetry book but a lot of it is an acquired taste.