Canons To The Right

For many of the past 20 years, I have been an unpaid poetry activist (organiser, editor, anthologist), working to develop an alternative community of internationally-linked poets. Alternative to what? At any rate, the "revolution" has failed to materialise. Most poets, young and old, are so embedded in the mainstream marketing-based structures of publishing they do not either recognise any alternatives, or do not feel the need for one. The others, those restless atomised few, are either too aggressively individualised, or damaged, to form productive alliances. Herding cats, indeed.

Let us stop for a moment and ask ourselves, as a thought experiment, what the poet might wish for, might dream of - I avoid saying "in their career" - because the English tend to want to promote the idea of the modest, amateur poet (masking, sometimes, self-promoting careerism behind the scenes). Well, a poet might want, in this order: to write a good poem; to get the poem published in a good magazine; to have that poem, and others like it, collected and published by a good press; to receive some good reviews; to maybe be listed for, or win, a prize; and, either before, or after death, to be respected, or at least enjoyed, by either their peers, or poetry readers, or both. Now, all but the most hardened Dadaist would at least grant that this trajectory might accurately model the desires of most poets (I have yet to meet any who do not want to be published, or read).

These poets, who want these things, then enter into situations with other poets, and persons, to achieve these ends. However, here is where something very significant happens, which most poets do not accept. At the point where they enter into the world of publication, two roads diverge. One of those roads is marked The Canon; the other is marked Oblivion. Canons are problematic, and disputed, and there are currently at least three: Mainstream, Innovative, and Outlaw. These three canons are all represented by serious publishers of real merit. However, only a poet published by a Mainstream, large press, has any chance of avoiding "oblivion".

What is oblivion, as a literary term, and why does it matter? I am borrowing this use of oblivion loosely from Ian Hamilton - it that suggests that most poets, after death, become basically extinct - their work forks no lightning, and is lost to future readers. The poems, simply put, disappear, from the book of living verse - forgotten, unread, and worst of all, never quoted or paid homage to, in style or content, by other poets. I can give many examples of such poets, but one will do: Terrence Tiller, the 1940s British poet and BBC producer. Probably less than 20 people alive today know his work, or name. Unless his work was ever dramatically revived and championed, he will disappear, entirely.

Now, the generally-accepted position (which is basically a capitalist one) suggests that the forgotten are bad poets, the remembered are good poets. This in turn plays into the idea of the market deciding value. The problem with this position, is that it almost entirely positions evaluation into the hands of the editors for large publishers, and larger poetry imprints.

The mistake that most poets make, is that they think that, even if they publish with a small, well-meaning press, they have a chance, at perhaps winning a prize, or being reviewed in the TLS or The New York Times, say, of being "discovered". Far from it. The "tap on the shoulder" system of quiet approval and promotion, among the ranks of some contemporary-canonical poets in the US, and UK, occurs prior to publication - during, and before, the editorial process. That is, the business of criticism is often now the business of editorial approval, or rejection.

It is not quite but almost true, that to have a collection published by a small, or marginal press, in the UK (or Canada) is the same as having no book out at all - in terms of entering into a dialogue with The Living Canon of great contemporary poets and critics.

The sad truth is, almost all the ground for canonization is laid during the lifetime of the poet - as in the church, with future Saints. We do not know who the "major" poets of our time will be, exactly, but we can rest assured they are currently being published, somewhere in the Anglo-American world, by larger presses. If one looks at the mid-century greats, or even the early Moderns, they were mainly Faber, or other large-press, poets. There will always be small, pleasing surprises (the recent rediscovery of Lynette Roberts is one instance) but the for the main part, if you find yourself out while alive, your work is mainly out forever. That's a long time.

Why is this so? Well, the large presses have marketing budgets, and the clout to distribute the work to bookstores, and critics, in major cities, around the world. It really is almost as simple as that - get published by a large press, and your work will be sold and reviewed in many more places than if you are published by a small press, when it may happen you get no reviews, or very few. The tragedy, here, is that there are many good - very good - poets who fall outside the ambit of this market-driven system.

They have few options. They can a) try to enter the market system; b) oppose it; c) publish and be damned. Most choose some mix of b and c. And, they publish, and are damned - to recognition among their small group of peers, maybe. This leaves the so-called "mainstream" poets to become top dogs.

This would not be a problem, if reviews, critics, and the public recognised this state of affairs as being roughly as robust and problematic as politics, or business (where the ruthless often rise at the expense of the meek). The terrible irony - the one I often write about - is that, instead, a big lie is told. The lie is this - the best poets are published by the big presses, because they are "the best". No, they are good poets, and simply either a) "the luckiest" or b) the best-connected, or a combination of the two. In short, to become a "name" poet is perhaps as difficult as to become a "movie star". Well, not quite.

The truth is, you could try your whole life to be so published and feted, and never become so, no matter how good a writer you might be.Why does this matter? Colleagues and friends often tell me to "wait in line" or "forget it" - as if a) it was possible to queue for such canonical positioning - it isn't; and b) as if poetry was simply a hobby or bad habit, to be dropped when it becomes bad for one.

Friends, poetry is very important. I happen to think it is the greatest form of art, or close to that. I have spent more than 20 years, learning my craft, writing, studying it, teaching, sharing, promoting it. Consider my fate - not rare in this field - I am nearly as close to canonical oblivion today as the moment I was born. There are maybe 10-20 people in the world, whose opinion can change things. I go on, but find it extremely dispiriting, to see my work, and that of most of my peers, and friends, being disseminated in forms that, simply put, receive no proper respect - that have no authority, or opportunity, to reach, or move, that high severe place where judgement is made, and some poems live, and most, forever, perish.

If an alternative series of serious awards and recognitions could be established, that might help - but in the end, public opinion, and the established academic institutions (and libraries) attend to the mainstream organs of publication and review. It is hard to invent an alternative to The New York Times. Blogs cannot do this, as hard as they try. Only hundreds of very serious people, working together, could do this, and, as I observed at the beginning of this brief essay, poets, the most atomised of persons at the best of times, have not imagined their vocation as communal - because the writing of poems is so very private, so much of the time. However, so long as poets think of themselves as isolated, they will struggle towards goals of public recognition that are, simply put, impossible for them to reach. That way is madness.

Open Field

CNQ (Canadian Notes and Queries) ran a balanced, if at times robustly critical, review of Open Field this summer last (2007), written by James Pollock. He noted the energy of the editor, and also the surprising, and somewhat disappointing fact that Americans seem almost entirely disinterested in Canadian poets (as this was the first poetry anthology of Canadians published in America for 40 years or more). Pollock singled out a half dozen poets who he felt deserved their place in the book, including, I am pleased to say, myself.

He writes: "I also enjoyed the poems of Todd Swift very much, most of them skillful and moving lyrics in the stoical English tradition of Auden and Larkin .... I am especially attracted to his witty homage to Wallace Stevens. .... How could one not be charmed by such a display of metaphorical inventiveness, particularly if one shares Swift's love for Wallace Stevens (and who doesn't?). Of all the best poets in Open Field, Swift is the one I was least familiar with, and I am grateful to Queyras for bringing him to my admiring attention." The other poets he singles out include George Elliott Clarke and Karen Solie.

As for his question, who doesn't like Wallace Stevens - well, I'd bet the editor of Picador's poetry imprint, for one. You know, Michael Donaghy wrote about his dislike of "poems about poetry" - and surely Stevens' oeuvre consists mainly of that topic. Indeed, Stevens has never been much in favour over here in the UK, for reasons I am currently researching. Mainly, many British critics have mistrusted his "flamboyant" interest in language, often as ornament, his interest in aesthetics (and poetics and theory), and his obvious French influences. From the 1950s on, a sort of bluff indifference, even hatred, of anything too "rhetorical" or self-reflexive has marked the mainstream British approach to poetry - meaning that poet-critics like Mark Ford, who study and appreciate Stevens and Ashbery, tend to be in something of a minority (however enthusiastic) in England.

As Edmund Wilson observed, in Axel's Castle, the English poetic tradition has not favoured a too-intensive emphasis on theoretical musings - most of the poets in the English tradition are rather empirical, even pragmatic. I'd suggest the divide here, often described as mainstream versus experimental is rather more often simply between those interested in theory, or poems-about-poetry, and those who are not. Stevens, of course, is seen as a dandy - and is therefore also not entirely appreciated by the more severe avant-garde practitioners in the UK - his sense of humour, for one, is often seen as too whimsical.

Therefore, followers of the Stevens line, in Britain, such as myself, tend to get very short shrift indeed - seen as too deeply into theory for a no-nonsense Worsdworthian poet (like, say, Heaney) - but far too decadent to be one of the Prynne school. A shame really. Sadly, third parties in the UK don't do that well. Stevens is in such a party. Meanwhile, Pollock ends his review with something of an apt lament: "just and clear-eyed critics of Canadian poetry have their job cut out for them. And we desperately need their services." He could have even cut out the "Canadian" part, or inserted the word "British". Clear-eyed most criticism of poetry ain't.

Money and Amis

Martin Amis is a famous British novelist - maybe the most famous - and he thinks of himself as something of an Orwell, too - an essayist lucidly battling dogma and cant where he sees it. He is also a university lecturer, and his hourly rate has just been published, as £3000. That's just under 100 times more than most any other lecturer makes (it tends to be around £37). Obviously, the department was buying a brand, as well as a creative writing teacher - and the number of applicants went up by 50% when his position was announced. However, creative writing departments in the UK are dangerously close to making the same cheapening and trivialising mistakes the poetry community has already made of late - that is, in the process of seeking to popularise what they do, they have begun to use the marketing and PR techniques of the advertising and political spheres.

It is often said, sotto voce, that British Poetry needs a "Saatchi" - that is, a rich, spin doctor, to "sell it" to the public. Stuff and nonsense. All this branding and selling smacks of desperation, and sends the signal that creative writing departments are only relevant if, like at sexy London cocktail parties, you get to network with big names. Actually, the aim of such creative writing workshops, is to learn to write - and sometimes, the best workshop leaders are not the most famous, or the most over-paid. Amis is very aware of money's tasteless effects - others should be, too.

Scottish Genius

The Guardian has an interview, today, with the 88-year-old poetic genius, Edwin Morgan, Scotland's greatest living poet, who should have won the TS Eliot Prize for this year. His loss will, in time, be seen as both emblematic of the current climate in certain British poetry circles, and quite sad - but also deeply silly. Not only was he clearly the deserving winner, anyone with class would have decided it was a just and fitting bit of icing to a great cake of a career. Sadly, lesser minds, and more importantly, spirits, are currently bossing things about - without an ounce of Morgan's wit, open-minded playfulness, or international curiosity. In listing his influences, Sarah Crown the interviewer, notes that some names are less popular now - and then mentions Hart Crane. Only in the UK, where many in the new gang of poetry top dogs thinks anything even slightly modern, rhetorical, or American, is rubbish, would Hart Crane be so thought of - elsewhere, Crane is still beloved as one of the finest, and most thrilling, of 20th century poets.

What has happened, basically, is that Morgan (an engaging gay man with a great mind) represents the cosmopolitan wing of the British poetry world - a wing that has otherwise been mainly shut down by the so-called current mainstreamers - people who edit for Picador and Cape, say. The international poetry that gets in, almost under darkness, to Britain, gets in with the help of Salt, Bloodaxe, Carcanet, and a few other smaller presses. Even then, there is sometimes an overly sombre take on things - something Morgan, like Ashbery, in some ways a very similar figure for American writing (but far more influential over there) - avoids.

Basically, Morgan is open to the full play of poetry, word, and world - he has not morally, or aesthetically, edited his poetry before the ink flows, and he has no portentous, ego-driven agenda. Sadly, the force of Heaney's shadow has called forth a great many neo-emulators in Britain, men and women without Heaney's ability, or, for that matter, striking source material - therefore the countless dreary translations of classical poems of the last few years coming from London. This small group of influential neo-classical poets is trying to fight for the great seriousness of Poetry, but in the process, have managed to drive the life out of it. They've forgotten what Morgan always knew - a glad heart, and a big one - has more wax on which to burn a wick. Most poets in the UK are afraid to openly question this neo-classical crew, though some, deep down, feel alienated by its gruff, male, dour tone.

It's time to recall that, before poetry societies, and poetry prizes, there was poetry, full stop. Too much careerism means there are few fearless, clear, and direct poetry reviewers operating over here. Crown was right to feature Morgan now - it sends a good signal.

It's Broke, Fix It

The international money markets, and the world capitalist system, were thrown into turmoil this week, and it now seems an eccentric lone young French man, like someone out of an existential novel, had much to do with the problem. His $7 billion losses may have done more financial damage than any terrorist - or anarchist - could have dreamed of. This raises questions, some of which may not put the banking system in a good light - and one of the questions is, surely, what connection to reality does some of this "trading" bear? If it is possible for one person to concoct a virtual, imagined alter-ego, or series of identities, and therefore conduct business in this post-modern, post-identity fashion, has the economy become a cyborg, or cyber-untrustworthy? I imagine a poetics of money - or economics of poetry - can be derived from this - he was, after all, into derivatives. What is the difference between imagining one is a billionaire, and being one? No difference - all the difference. It depends on whether you are the trader, or the bank.

Poem by Sina Queyras

Eyewear thinks Sina Queyras (pictured above) is one of the most refreshing, innovative and provocative poets to appear in North American writing over the last few years, and is glad to welcome her here, today.

She edited the key book, Open Field: Thirty Contemporary Canadian Poets (Persea, 2005), which is one of the first anthologies published in America in the last few decades to consider the new poetry now coming from Canada. She is is the author of Slip (ECW, 2001) and Teeth Marks (Nightwood, 2004).

Her third collection of poetry, Lemon Hound, won the Pat Lowther Award and a Lambda Literary Award. Expressway is due out from Coach House in spring 2009. She is currently writer in residence at the University of Calgary where she is working on several projects including Autobiography of Childhood, a novel.

11.

This happened before. Then we ran. And the cable

hooked us to a big Dish. We signed up for more. Golden

arches nosed up out of concrete and we were delighted.

Everyone bought a Ford or Chrysler. Roads appeared and

women disappeared down them. Millions were served.

Some of them waved. This happened before. Then again

maybe not. Anyhow once we walked to the television.

Once your little sister stood and changed the channel

from 2 to 3, one hand on the antennae. This really

happened. At the end of the line there was a person.

Whole lives ticked by on salaries. Everyone wore

polyester. Blouses with imprints of European landmarks

abounded. People dialed and the numbers rumbled like a

bank vault. Shag appeared in avocado green and harves

tgold penetrating every corner. Coffee tables thickened

over night. Lights morphed into plastic balls hung

from chains. Little girls rhymed couplets, index

finger poised, waiting for the plastic rotary to hit

zero. This really happened. Women clicking on manual

typewriters. Whole offices of scritch, scritch,

scritch and ping, ping, ping as the carriage released

and rolled up. How we embraced the correctable ribbon.

How we coveted white-out. Listen, once people sent

letters with words crossed out. This all happened.

People placed vinyl on turntables and lifted needles

jumping slightly when the scratch blared out of the

cross hatched speakers from Radio Shack or Sears.

Rumors of a Japanese take-over surfaced. There was

talk of importing fathers. Then again maybe I am

lying. Anyone knew it was true. Anyhow we didn't run.

We bought bigger cars and women embraced the MuMu.

Everything was arriving all at once. Lapels sharpened.

Soul music sweetened the air. People drove their cars

to Drive-ins and hung aluminum speakers on the side

windows. How we embraced the wire.

poem by Sina Queyras

World and Earth

Poet-critic Adam Kirsch has an interesting, if arguably somewhat simplistic, essay on the relationship between Heidegger and contemporary mainstream English-language poetry, in the January 2008 issue of Poetry. One of the essay's problems is that Kirsch tries to suggest that the early High Moderns (Yeats, Eliot, Stevens, for example) were "world" oriented, trying to impose a vision of mastery, remaking the order of things, while the "earth" poets, like "post-Catholic" Heaney (and I think the post may be a little overdetermined here) modestly, and ethically listen to things, and show the ordinary in an extraordinary light, unforcing nature's hand, but being midwife to its exposure and celebration.

The problem with this is that the so-called "metaphysical" approach of poets like Heaney, with its strong, neo-classical emphasis on an austere diction, and an ethos of silence and epiphanic apprehension, is deeply moral in precisely the ordering way of late Eliot - and the critical demands made by those poets who argue for such an earth-based (pace Kirsch) credo are not nearly as unassuming or modest as might be assumed. I also don't feel that all contemporary poetry can be easily subsumed into this dialectic. As Alain Badiou argues in his recent The Century, it was precisely the argument of Two Into One, that is, the refusal to agree as to the nature of dialectical synthesis, which leads to a celebration of power, reality, war and violence, in the 20th century. Kirsch's attempt to synthesise the various poetries into a neatly-defined twosome is admirable, perhaps, but perhaps incorrect. I think the quarrel that various poetics have with each other, language, decorum, tradition, and the world - let alone possibilities of enchantment in a disenchanted time (see Charles Taylor's new A Secular Age) is more complex, and unresolved.

But Kirsch is correct, I think, in noting that metaphysical issues are at stake. However, is it enough to want to notice (as Thomas Hardy did) such things, the small felicities of nature and the world, and inscribe them in words for others? Does poetry - does visionary writing - not have, potentially, more to do than that? The decline of the idea of the role of poet as visionary (after Dylan Thomas) - a tale of two Thomases - is part of this story, though Hughes and Heaney obviously are seeing things, too.

I am enjoying, and reading, his new book of criticism, The Modern Element. While Kirsch is an apologist for one dominant style of poetics, he is also a very insightful critic, and hugely enjoyable to read. Some of the essays in the new book have the wit, verve and apt quotations one associated with the great Poetry and the Age, by Jarrell - someone Kirsch has clearly closely attended to.