Preface - Electronic Poetry Center

From: Charlotte Pressler
Subject: Little Mary Sunshine
Ron Silliman’s question (why do so few women on this list post) tempts me to
delurk briefly.
I enjoy reading e-mail, including the poetics list – but this form of
communication, like any other, seems to have its strengths and limits.
E-mail seems to me to be a good way to ask specific questions and
communicate specific kinds of information rapidly and effectively (book lists,
the Freely Espousing communiques, calls for papers).
It’s also a good way to argue positions for the most part already formed. The
quick cut-and-thrust of single-screen messages, though, seems as though it
might hamper the reception of more tentative or exploratory postings.
People read their e-mail fairly quickly, and I don’t think many people save it
for later reading or download it to a printer. Disk space might be limited, too –
at least it is at UB. So, for the most part, once a message is scanned, however
it’s scanned, it’s gone. Not much opportunity for re-vision.
So, apart from its bulletin-board functions, e-mail seems to work best for
people who like to respond quickly and concisely to well-defined arguments.
I prefer to have a good bit of time to think over a written message, and to
publish it in a format that allows for re-reading. I’ve stung myself in the past by
offering too-rapid reactions; but I’ve also found that in sharp debate, reactive
responses come to dominate over exploratory ones. So I find it best to work
through my own often somewhat divergent responses to current topics either
off-list, or in work written for print publication, or in conversation with friends.
Possibly this is a gender difference; I’m not sure it’s entirely that. There’s also
the uneasy position of divergences that don’t quite attain to the sharp clarity of
an oppositional statement. I tend to diverge in just this way – should I call it
"radical opacity"? :-) So I tend to lurk on lists, including this one. Apart from
this post.