Best American Poetry Doesn’t Suck?
September 16, 2004
Hmmm… if Kasey and one of his students are both in the Best American Poetry 2004 Anthology does this mean the post-avant literary elite will have to stop slagging it? Or will it still all suck except for those two poets– I mean poems since we know it’s all about the work, not the hip-factor associated with the poets, right?
Congrats to Kasey, though, since I happen to think that being included in the BAP is a real honor and in this case a well-deserved recognition.
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All me-stream all the time.
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September 20th, 2004 at 9:34 am
At the risk of wearing my cynicism on my sleeve, when hasn’t art and poetry been about socializing factors? From inlfated prices on paintings in service of laundering mob money to teen peer status for shunning Air Supply in favor of Marilyn Manson, the “who-you-are-in-relation-to-me” factor is primary. It’s similar to the difference between knowledge and education, spirituality and religion. These things are not inherently anti-thetical, but neither are they inherently co-indicative each of the other. Branding rules our lives as much in these issues of aesthetics as anywhere else.
Good to see cosmopo getting some action!
September 20th, 2004 at 10:18 am
I’m not so naive as to think that art and poetry aren’t also socio-political activities. But in this case I have a very specific example to consider, and a juicy one given how much crap the BAP series has received from the group of poets that Kasey and others make up on the net…
It’s kind of like the Poet Laureate discussion– is it something one bitches about only until one is asked? Or is it an honor one refuses on principle for what it stands for?
September 20th, 2004 at 11:49 am
All much cooler once you’re in it. Of course! Unless you’re one of those ‘I wouldn’t join any club that would have me as a member’ types.
Net poets got it rough, in the near future, I think. Establishing creds on a channel of communication where anyone can get published, having those creds ignored by ‘proper’ book publishers, turning that into an aesthetic in which the limitations of print are enumerated and shunned, then…aw, shoot, success. They get printed. How do you deal with that?
Bit like the old Whole Foods co-op in Austin Texas getting all kinds of crap from its customer base when it goes corporate…and that in spite of having a very progressive management and benefits structure for even its bottom tier employees. The fact of success already proves they aren’t cool any more. At some point, you really have to roll your eyes at that and chalk it up to that front-porch talk that goes on between the old boys back home about how one shouldn’t forget their roots. (read: one should be as unaccomplished as we are, so we don’t have to work any harder than we do.)
Anyway, yeah, people do say some pretty dumb stuff in their quest for whatever dream they’re pursuing, only to find that when that dream starts to come their way, they either turn down the honor, or retract. I’m probably saying some of that stuff right now.
Consistency is overrated.
Only I’m probably the only one who’s gonna buy that, if ever I am presented with the opportunity to retract.
Good to see you posting again, BTW.