This is Denise Levertov in 1960:

I do not believe that a violent imitation of the horrors of our times is the concern of poetry. Horrors are taken for granted. Disorder is ordinary. People in general take more and more “in their stride” — the hides grow thicker. I long for poems of an inner harmony in utter contrast to the chaos in which they exist. Insofar as poetry has a social function it is to awaken sleepers by other means than shock…

It was a time filled with art that strove very hard to épater les bourgeois. You still see the desire today, and for sometimes good reason. The moment people start thinking they know what art should be doing or saying, it’s a good time to shake things up.

At the same time, as Levertov says, shock is more likely to leave calluses than epiphanies.

(h/t Maria Popova)