The line-by-line poetry of knitting
Poetry and knitting are more similar than they might at first appear, claims Judith Palmer, director of the Poetry Society.
“With poetry and with knitting, you work line by line, and if something goes wrong you have to unravel it,” Palmer said.
According to this article in The Guardian, more than 800 knitting enthusiasts are currently involved in knitting and crocheting individual letters to create the world’s first giant knitted poem as part of the Society’s centenary celebrations.
The Society ahs been ‘inundated’ with request from eager knitters keen to lend their needles to the project.
“It hasn’t been a matter of trying to persuade people to join in – we’re just trying to manage the huge number who are calling up all the time,” she said. “It’s just spread and spread: there must be 90 knitting blogs writing about it around the world.”
Well, I am adding my blog to those knitting blogs today. Apparently, my recent forays into knitting tea cosies has put me in the eminent company of such poets as Carol Ann Duffy, Jo Shapcott, Seamus Heaney and Emily Dickinson, who are/were all partial to a little knit one, purl one. Who’d have thought it?
Here is Emily Dickinson on the subject:
Autumn—overlooked my Knitting—
Dyes—said He—have I—
Could disparage a Flamingo—
Show Me them—said I—
Cochineal—I chose—for deeming
It resemble Thee—
And the little Border—Dusker—
For resembling Me—
I’m assuming that there are many flamingo-disparaging hues in the individual knitted and crocheted letters flooding into the Poetry Society offices right now. The Society will stitch them into a secret poem, the identity of which will be revealed at the beginning of October. Would Dickinson have approved?
Tagged with: Emily Dickinson • knitting • poetry • Poetry Society
August 19th, 2009 at 4:34 pm (#)
This is great!
Have you also seen the TED video on the beautiful math of coral, and how a crochet technique is the only way so far known that captures hyperbolic geometry? It’s an absolutely fascinating talk about a project where people are sing this math technique to crochet accurately represented coral reefs:
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/margaret_wertheim_crochets_the_coral_reef.html
And I LOOOOOVE what the speaker did with her crochet bracelet. I was inspired on multiple levels by this presentation. “So here, in wool, through a domestic feminine art, is the proof that the most famous postulate in mathematics is wrong.” I love it!
August 19th, 2009 at 4:42 pm (#)
Thank you, Eric. I can always rely on you to introduce me to amazing new things.