[R. S. Gwynn]

There's a hefty handful of poems I can still read with pleasure. I did read Iron John but couldn't discern anything that connected with my own life, even though my relationship with my father was often complicated. The idea of executives going out on (expensive?) retreats in the woods seemed ludicrous at the time, and more so now. I recall an account of Donald Hall's about a double date at Harvard. I can't recall who was with Hall, but Bly's companion for that distant evening was Adrienne Rich.

[Orwn Acra]

Like Etel Adnan, another poet who died a few days ago and also in her 90s, I thought he had been dead for a decade at least. Otherwise, there is no connection between the two, and one still sounds modern. I will look into his translations.

[Allen Tice]

I dunno, Sam, but “He held men-only seminars and weekend retreats, gatherings often in the woods with men around campfires thumping drums, making masks, hugging, dancing and reading poetry aloud” sounds a bit like a literary and over the top version of what I remember of a summer camp I went to, where there wasn’t any hugging or dancing, but a good deal of boy stuff, goofing, swimming, yelling and so forth, that was a lot of fun. I don’t remember any girls there. I went more than once. Now, “audacity,” there’s a word to think about carefully. I wanted to do a dissertation on that, but my advisor was adamantly opposed, the creep.

[Andrew Mandelbaum]

Bly's work with James Hillman and others was so much more than executives in the woods even if the mythopoetic movement that survives him needed some self-criticism and some adjustments. It was a beginning work and relied too much maybe on catharsis but he pulled up those below him that would help remedy his imbalances. Without him we would not know of the story teller Martin Shaw who is doing some of the most important writing of a generation in my opinion. I know many men who right now are grappling with severe trauma and brilliant hopes to be better people and finding great deal of worth in Iron John which was no hippy tale but a very old myth that Bly worked along with that much to say to a civilization of uninitiated male children who would better for an honest read of Bly's take, imperfect as it stands, than most of the crap they subsist on. I am one of (sometime) respectful critics in the movement but I always recognize his greatness and the woodpile he carried that dwarfs my own or any of his dismissers. Any interest in what has become of his trajectory outside of poetry might find the podcast my Ian Mackenzie of at the Mythic Masculine worth a listen. Not all of it is amazing but the Shaw, Jenkinson, Yunkaporta, and Eisler episodes are pretty great and Bly's influence in the group of men and women in that network is pretty impressive even if not always apparent. I know a fair few working class fellows that are sad at his passing and say they owe Iron John a debt.

[Julie Steiner]

Although I'm far less informed than Andrew M., I think Robert Bly started an important conversation about what it means to be male in a society that has for generations characterized emotion and vulnerability as shamefully un-masculine, thereby depriving half of the population of the tools they need for a happy, healthy life.

Did he get everything absolutely right? No. But neither do most people who leave the beaten path and blaze a new trail.

Yes, he sometimes resorted to misogyny and homophobia in his attempts to affirm masculinity, which is regrettable. But without the beginning he made, society would have made less progress by now toward expanding the rigid and limited ideals of manhood that have inadequately prepared so many boys and men for the sorts of challenges that physical strength can't overcome.

Groups like Reel Recovery might have no direct debt to the Iron John movement, but indirectly I think that movement's existence helped.

[Tim McGrath]

Of those who have poured their passions "into the golden vessel of great song," the loss today of Stephen Sondheim is felt far more keenly than the death of Robert Bly. Only one of them was a poet.

[Andrew Frisardi]

(Removed.)

[Andrew Mandelbaum]

Originally Posted by Tim McGrath

Of those who have poured their passions "into the golden vessel of great song," the loss today of Stephen Sondheim is felt far more keenly than the death of Robert Bly. Only one of them was a poet.

I think the call for ***** to post about a hierarchy of souls and loss was last week, Tim. Good to see you kept at the work of stringing this brilliant prose together even if you couldn't make the deadline. Keep up the excellent and always valued work.

[Andrew Mandelbaum]

Originally Posted by Orwn Acra

Like Etel Adnan, another poet who died a few days ago and also in her 90s, I thought he had been dead for a decade at least. Otherwise, there is no connection between the two, and one still sounds modern. I will look into his translations.

He had been in the grip of dementia for at least a decade.

[Andrew Mandelbaum]

Originally Posted by Julie Steiner

Although I'm far less informed than Andrew M., I think Robert Bly started an important conversation about what it means to be male in a society that has for generations characterized emotion and vulnerability as shamefully un-masculine, thereby depriving half of the population of the tools they need for a happy, healthy life.

Did he get everything absolutely right? No. But neither do most people who leave the beaten path and blaze a new trail.

Yes, he sometimes resorted to misogyny and homophobia in his attempts to affirm masculinity, which is regrettable. But without the beginning he made, society would have made less progress by now toward expanding the rigid and limited ideals of manhood that have inadequately prepared so many boys and men for the sorts of challenges that physical strength can't overcome.

Groups like Reel Recovery might have no direct debt to the Iron John movement, but indirectly I think that movement's existence helped.

I am more annoyed than informed but thanks for the cover, Julie. Ha. Your post mde me think of this piece:

https://therumpus.net/2016/05/reckon...-sea-of-grief/