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by HappySweeney 1038 days ago
If everyone is a poet, then nobody is a poet.
2 comments

What does this even mean. It's as if you just shoved possible words together.
It means that poetry is a use of language that is exceptional in some way. If everyone can do it then it's no longer exceptional and the word loses its meaning.
Again, so easy to say. But there's no evidence that this is true.

Art and media have only increased in quantity over the years. When I consume some part of it, my enjoyment isn't any less. I still experience bliss and joy and get meaning from art in all the proportions I always have. And given how much people still deeply care about it all, so does everyone else.

The assertion that more of poetry means poetry becomes worthless hasn't got anything going for it.

Much has been said about how music has become a commodity. People today are much less likely to listen to the same album over and over, instead quickly moving on to some other song out of the endless offer on streaming services. Quantity has definitely changed consumption.

Moreover, in literature there has been a perception that the sheer amount of things on offer today has led to reduced interest in longer works, they become seen as more challenging than before. Dickens' doorstop novels were written as popular entertainment but today few have time for them.

The evidence is inherent and ontological. Just as much as everyone cannot, by definition, be an outlier to the norm.
It means that amazing poetry becomes nothing special. You cannot make a name for yourself as a poet because everyone can push a few buttons and get work as good or better than your own.
Poets making a living and poetry producing meaning are two different problems. Every poet can be destitute (many great ones have been), and people can still get meaning from their work. Or others' work. Or the work of other things.
>many great ones have been

And my point is that there will be no more great ones, because the field of comparison will be flat.

If everyone is a poet, then everyone is a poet.
If you repeat the same word, it doesn't count as a rhyme ;-)