Procrustean Beds and Archimedean Points: Study of a Class A Assclown.
By: Mike Gries

I live in an 18 by 30 feet basement studio that is filled with a shotgun blast of books, VCR tapes, empty VCR tape boxes, cds left out of their cases, an unplugged computer, unopened mail, week old newspapers, unused free weights, a dozen pair of shoes, and a distressing array of tchotchkes. I also have a bunch of old notebooks, journals, and “to-do” lists - which I create, spill coffee on, and then forget. The lists are eventually found when I’m picking up the apartment, and I then consolidate them into a master “to-do” list, which luckily, is paralyzing in its length. So I don’t have to worry about tackling it at all. What I do instead, is promptly spill coffee on it, fold it in two, and bury it under the week old newspaper that contains an article I really have to get around to reading.

My apartment is a study in entropy. And its tendency to move from a state of semi-order to a higgily-piggily level of disorder is ultimately good for my mental health, because once it gets really chaotic I’m compelled to give fix it up a bit. This, in turn, allows me, subconsciously, to feel that I have done something productive for the day by moving a few things around. (Which consciously I know is a laugh.)

In one of these spasms of ordering the crap in my apartment, I decided to find out what was on the umpteen unlabeled computer disks I had lying about in drawers, in cubby holes, and under my bed. Part of what I found on the floppies was some of the papers I handed in during college.

Ho – ly crap.

Man was I ever a bad writer. I mean, I’m no good now, but back then . . . I just shuddered thinking about it. I'm speaking literally, here. A cold, ugly, little shudder just crept down my back.

How bad? Well you be the judge. Below you will find select snippets of shit that was actually printed out, stapled, and then handed over for review. (This reminds me, I really should draft an apology note or two to the professors who worked their asses off for the luxury of reading this tripe.) Also, keep in mind, I dumped the worst of it back in college. What I found on these floppies is the relative good stuff.

So, as you read through the rest of my essays on the site, please keep in mind that although I may be a terrible hack, at least I’m a hack. Considering how I used to write, this is a major accomplishment.

At the time Samuel Taylor Coleridge began writing such early masterworks as “The Eolian Harp”, and “This Lime-Tree Bower My Prison”, the artistic world was seeing much more than the entry of another maestro into the realm of the poetic elite. Coleridge, was blazing the trail for his Romantic counterparts as he created through his poetry a new standard of excellence. His work helped redefine the poet’s Archimedean point. More than he could have known, Coleridge, in his early Romantic lyrics, was creating a sort of Ars Poetica which presented through form and format, structure and style, what relationship he believed should exist between the poet and his subject, the subject and the work . . .

. . . The poem no longer existed as one experience positioned in a linear progression of existence, but became something complete within itself. Compounding this effect is the fact that the GRL ends where it begins, and not only is the poem complete, but it is unified – an hermeneutic circle.

Structure and Form in Coleridge’s Greater Romantic Lyrics

At the time Samuel Taylor Coleridge began writing such early masterworks as “The Eolian Harp”, and “This Lime-Tree Bower My Prison”, the artistic world was seeing much more than the entry of another maestro into the realm of the poetic elite. Coleridge, was blazing the trail for his Romantic counterparts as he created through his poetry a new standard of excellence. His work helped redefine the poet’s archemedian point. More than he could have known, Coleridge, in his early Romantic lyrics, was creating a sort of Ars Poetica which presented through form and format, structure and style, what relationship he believed should exist between the poet and his subject, the subject and the work. Certainly, Coleridge’s influence on the artistic world has been established through the entire cannon of his work, but special consideration need be placed on his early Romantic lyrics where his influence in shifting the poetical paradigm can first and most strongly be measured.

However, chapter four signals more than the oncoming of a bildungsroman. In its fruition, Sons and Lovers will become a kunstlerroman. The beginning of chapter four introduces the child that is the father to the artist, Paul Morel.
If one endeavors to offer a definition for the term “modern novel,” one might find him or herself limited to the one fact that a modern novel innovates. This definition is limited, even bordering on the tautological, but as far as it goes, correct.
The label romanticism, like many literary terms, is a Procrustean generalization that does not account for the substantial differences found in the works of writers who held nature to be their muse. The romantic writers held different views on, among other things, the viewing of nature, what one could see in nature, and what was the essence and responsibility of a great writer. However, Procrustean beds do serve a purpose. They allow one to create a model which pushes back some detail in order to illuminating other elements. From there, with “ceteris paribus” conditions intact, an individual may develop a solid understanding of one difference in the respective paradigms of two similar writers.

The last paper I got back at The College of the Holy Cross was a 20 page paper on the Romantic poets. I still remember, verbatim, what my professor wrote on it:

“Wow. One of the worst things I’ve seen in my 15 years at Holy Cross. What a way to go out. D+.”

Once I got it back, I was so pissed at him that I walked outside, threw the paper in the air, and let the wind scatter the pages over the green in front of Fenwick Hall. Looking back, I still can’t believe how unfair he was. He should have given me the F.