Some Problems With Confessionalism

Topics discussed in this episode include:

-Autobiographical vs. Confessional 

-"Poetry As Confession" by M.L. Rosenthal

-"Life Studies" and "The Dolphin" by Robert Lowell

-"Genesis" by Delmore Schwartz

-"The Dream Songs" by John Berryman

-Other Confessional pioneers: Sylvia Plath, Anne Sexton, W.D. Snodgrass

-Functions of Confessionalism: Therapy and Social Awareness

-Alternatives to Confessionalism

-"The Sorrows of Young Werther" by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

-"Min Kamp" by Karl Ove Knausgard

-"Neo-Confessionalism: Whose Commodity Am I, Anyway?" by Virginia Konchan

-The Identitarian Turn 

The 8 Points:

1. Confessionalism is an exercise in self-absorption.
2. Confessionalism encourages self-absorption and idol worship in its readers.
3. Confessionalism, by privileging extremes of feeling, cultivates a culture of hyper-emotionalism.
4. Confessionalism airs details of the private lives of others without their consent.
5. Confessionalism restricts the possibilities and expectations of the lyric "I."
6. A culture of Confessionalism places unfair pressure on aspiring writers to expose and focus on their personal details for popularity and recognition.
7. Confessionalism, by privileging authenticity above all, makes craftsmanship an afterthought.
8. Confessionalism, by privileging the particular, makes universal insight an afterthought.