Document Type
Book
Publication Date
2001
Abstract
In the late 1970s and early eighties, when most American poets were writing autobiographical free-verse lyrics, a handful of mavericks flouted literary fashion. They used rhyme, meter, and regular form—both traditional and innovative—and tried narrative, satire, and light verse. In an essay entitled “Can Poetry Matter?” (1991) one of these poets, Dana Gioia, accused contemporary poets of writing mostly for each other. “The poetry boom has been a distressingly confined phenomenon,” he wrote. “Decades of public and private funding have created a large professional class for the production of teachers, graduate students, editors, publishers, and administrators. Based mostly in universities, these groups have gradually become the primary audience for contemporary verse” (2). As poets moved into the academy, Gioia argued, poetry lost relevance to the public at large. With their audience dwindling to a subculture of specialists, most poets became reluctant to write negative reviews. Readers hoping to find good new poetry among the volumes of mediocre work received little help from critics.
Recommended Citation
Linder, April. New Formalist Poets of the American West. Boise, ID: Boise State University, 2001. Digital. Western Writers Series, 149.