On “On ‘Having’ a Poem”

Abstract

In recent essay, On 'Having' Poem, Professor B. F. Skinner advances fresh interpretation of how poet creates poem. The proposition which he seeks to establish that the poet does not originate the poem. What he produces can be explained by studying, at least principle, the sort of experiences he has had and the factors which influenced him his biological and social growth. Having poem sense similar to having baby. Like the mother, the poet only place where the poem formed. It quite possible that the poet not the real author of his product. But the arguments which Professor Skinner employs to validate this claim are not, my opinion, quite convincing. In what follows, I shall present an analysis of the main argument of his essay and then evaluate it critically. The points which I shall emphasize are: ( i ) the events of having baby and of having poem are genetically different; (2) it reasonable to argue that the poet creative factor the construction of the poem. There sense, Professor Skinner writes, in which having poem like having baby, and that sense I am labor; I am having lecture.1 The question arises: does the poet originate something writing poem for which he deserves credit? Or, is his behavior merely the product of his genetic and environmental histories?2 Skinner answers the latter question affirmatively. He interprets this context as possess. Thus having baby similar to possessing one. But what does the mother contribute to possess the baby, to claim it as hers? She does not give the baby its color, strength, intelligence, or some other qualities it may have, nor does she give it its biological make-up. These are inherited from her parents and the parents of her husband. The mother, then, makes no positive contribution3 the creation of her baby. She only locus, an occasion for its existence. Accordingly, she responsible for tending and nourishing it, but she not responsible for its design or flesh. The poet, like the mother, an occasion, a place which certain genetic and environmental causes come together to have common effect,4 but with difference: