What Did You Do To My Book?

I sat there this evening contemplating blackout poetry. See, I find it rather cool, and lovely, and unique.  So far, one of my favorite ‘authors’ is Tyler Knott Gregson.  I have his book, Chasers of the Light, and some of his blackout poetry is within the pages.  Obviously he had to take a book and black out the words to create his masterpiece, but I wonder, has he ever wondered about someone taking his poetry and blacking it out for their own blackout poetry?

Probably not.

I am not one to destroy a book for art, but at the same time, I have started marking over a book for poetry. I found a paperback copy of The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh, and I picked it because I liked the cover and couldn’t even get into the first pages of the book. I kind of wish I had a heavier book to do this in, but I haven’t found one I like yet. Hardback would be better.  But anyways, I’m marking the book and I have one poem done. And it’s pretty, though very beginner-ish.

I think I need to find a better pen than a sharpie….

But here I am marking a book and ‘destroying’ the words within for my own gain.  Would I feel so comfortable if I knew someone were taking my novel, my poetry, and marking it over?

Probably not. But art is art. Right?

Honestly, I’m not sure how I feel about the whole thing. I picked up an older discarded copy of C.S. Forester‘s Flying Colors (a Captain Hornblower novel) thinking that would be fun to mark the pages. But I just can’t seem to bear marking the book. It’s mixed feelings. Wanting to create, but not wanting to mar what might be a good book.

And while I love Tyler Knott Gregson’s poetry and how he uses scraps of paper, I cringe at the thought of taking a blank page out of the front of an antique or old book.

See, my first love over writing, is books. They should be cherished and loved like a woman, and you don’t just discard them or rip pages out of them and turn them into something new. The woman analogy still applies here.  So, I’m at a crossroads of creating. Do I destroy to create something new?

Or do I find alternative methods to creating these new styles of poetry?

Gads, what would Sir Walter Scott, William Shakespeare, and Emily Dickinson think of these new forms?

Kate