In my opinion, Trondstrom is a pure poet. The so-called "pure", first of all, he basically only writes poems and does not use other styles of writing. Second, he writes short poems, but there are no long poems, and he even seldom writes poems. Third, his creative volume is extremely small. By the time he was 70 years old in 2000, he had written 65,438+063 poems. He was only 23 when he published his first book of poetry. From the whole creative process of Trondstrom, he is a poet with a very high starting point. It may not be said that he has never surpassed his first work, but Seventeen Poems can be regarded as his masterpiece, and his later works are actually the expansion and decomposition of this collection of poems. In other words, "Seventeen Poems" determines the basic characteristics of Trondstrom's poetry, which can also be regarded as the embodiment of his poetry purity. Of course, what best reflects the purity of his poems is that he is a poet who only writes short poems. It seems coincidental that Simboska, the winner of Nobel Prize in Literature in 1996, was also a poet who won the prize for several short poems. The achievements of these two poets prove that perhaps short poems are authentic, because they combine the simplest words with the most powerful power.
In today's commodity-filled era, being a pure poet needs to overcome multiple pressures. It is a common phenomenon for contemporary poets to turn from poetic writing to non-poetic writing. The reasons for this turn may be complicated, but most of them are due to the consideration of the literary market, which potentially contains a reader-centered consciousness and expectations for best-selling works. However, Transtrom refused to give in to any external force and temptation. He never caters to readers, let alone awards, including Nobel Prize in Literature. He is a very pure poet. If these are external pressures, then a pure poet will inevitably bear internal pressures. As Baudelaire, the founder of modernist literature, said, "All great poets are destined to be critics". Because the complicated times require and even force poets to speak in a variety of ways, most contemporary poets write poems with one hand and comment by hand. Transtrom is not without this kind of pressure, but he is determined to be a "poetic ascetic". Therefore, he actively overcame the temptation to express himself in another style and compressed his critical consciousness. When it is really difficult to restrain himself, he will also present it in the form of poetry: