Allen Ginsberg continues from here.
AG: “Rut thuds the rim” is my favorite line in (Basil) Bunting for condensation. Has he (Tom Pickard) gone over that one?
Student (Randy Roark): In the Bunting class he did.
AG: Yeah, could I take a look at the Bunting? You got the Bunting?
Student (Randy Roark): Not with me.
AG: Oh. Well, remember, he’s got the axle squeeks, (the felloe, or felloe and axle are different parts of the wheel, or something?) on the country road. Then the whole line is “Rut thuds the rim.” And it really gets phanopoeia in the sense that you suddenly see the mud brown earth discolored iron-rim of a wheel, or wood-rim of a wheel on the road, rolling down the road. And there’s a rut and the rim of the wheel thuds, falling into the rut or banging against the rut.
Student: A rut?
AG: It’s four words – “Rut thuds the rim”- and you get…
Student: Right.
AG: … and it conjures up the road, the kind of vehicle, the weight of the vehicle …
Student (Randy Roark): The sound, too.
AG: … the sound, the mechanics … somehow the mechanics are there. “Rut thuds the rim.” The mechanics are there. It’s like that (Domenico) Scarlatti, where you have one ting ting dang. We have three or four brilliant sounds in a row that connect. Yeah?
Student: And they almost mirror each other.
AG: Yeah. Yes, they almost mirror each other.
Student: Some of the … some of the … Bunting, Tom played last session, Bunting was going on being sure that all your long accented syllables in the poem were open vowels, and that line is also …
AG: Right.
Student: … three accented..
AG: “Rut thud rim.”
Student: – “uh, ah, ih-ih”. Yeah, nice..
AG: What is a different between …
Student: …pronouncing the vowels.
AG: … an open and a closed vowel?
What is the difference between an open and a closed vowel? Do you know? Anybody?
Student (2): I could check the phonics book..it’s…
Student(3): I know it..
Student (2): …(with the mouth) open, I think.
Student (4): I know … I know what the difference is, but I don’t know if I can explain it.
AG: Well, the ones you can extend, sort of? – “Rut thuds the rim.” – if you were singing..
Student (Joel Lewis): Especially when you hear him read it.
AG: Yeah.
Student (Joel Lewis): He really, you know….
AG: I heard him read that line.
Student (Joel Lewis): …he rolls over the vowels.
AG: First he read that real well, because it really sounded – “Rut thuds the rim.” “Rut thuds the rim.” That’s a really interesting line. It’s like a mantra. “Rut thuds the rim.” “Rut thuds the rim.” That’s a pretty magical line. That’s a very specialized appreciation to appreciate a line like that, I think, though. To notice it. To notice what a solid piece of “thud” it is. What a solid “rut” and “rim” and “thud” and they’re all together. Too bad you’ve got to have the “the.”
Student (5): A lot like Mother Goose , too.
AG: Pardon me?
Student (5): A lot like Mother Goose, too.
AG: Like what?
Student (5): That kind of sound play.
AG (to Student): Can you remember a for instance?
Student (5): Uh?
AG: Yeah, there’s sound. There’s lots of sound play. But I mean practical, mechanical. For the realistic message.
Student (5): Yeah.
AG: It’s the naturalism of that. The realistic-ness of it. The mechanical accuracy of it is what’s so interesting.
So what that is is the rut, the rim of the wheel thuds against the rut. Or the ruts thud against the rim of the wheel is what he’s saying, except when he says “Too many words” he means you can cut “the,” “of” – you don’t need the word “wheel” because you’ve got the “rim” and you’ve had “wheel” somewhere else earlier. So you can cut “the” and keep the “rim”. You can cut the “of,” you can cut “the wheel” and keep “the thuds”. Against. You can cut the “against.” But you need the “the” -“Rut thuds the rim.” “Rut thuds rim.” Well, so what do you do about that?
Student: The “the” is …
AG: Why do you need the “the”? “Rut thuds the rim.” Why not “The rut thuds rim,” or “The rut thuds the rim.”?
Student: “The rut thuds the rim” is….
AG: “The rut thuds the rim.”
Student: The accent or the meter, right, is….
AG: Duh-duh-duh-duh.
Student: ..as I hear it: “The rut thuds the rim.”
AG: Yeah, but you could have duh-dah-duh-duh-dah.
Student: Yeah, you could.
Student (6): Yeah, you’d get three out of four syllables there that are really accented.
AG: “Rut thuds the rim.” Yes.
Student (6): But “the” is the only unaccented.
Student: Tom (Pickard), in a letter he got from Bunting he said “Beware of the word “the”.”
AG: Um-hmm. Yeah. Um-hmm.
Audio for the above can be heard here, beginning at approximately fifty-seven-and-a-quarter minutes in and concluding at approximately sixty-two minutes in