[New-Poetry] 100 Poets You Should Know

[Bob Grumman]

Jason Quackenbush wrote:
> I don't know about that. James agreed that Alice Notley probably 
> belongs on his list and I think you'd be hard pressed to find a better 
> living poet.
I don't know here work well enough to argue that.  I never had the 
impression she was doing anything special in it, though.

> I've been absorbed with "In The Pines" for the last week or so, and I 
> can't remember being this knocked out by a book of poetry by a living 
> poet. And I don't know that there are many achievements among living 
> poets that are more impressive than Silliman's The Alphabet.
>
He may be one of the few who'd be on my list of most important 100 
living American poets, Jason--but, I'm curious (and not trying to score 
points or something): what is special about The Alphabet?  People whose 
opinion I respect greatly admire it, but I dunno. . . .

> What I think would be interesting would not be a list of the most 
> visible poets, but something along the lines of what you suggested as 
> what a critic should know. Some sort of list of what the requirements 
> are for poetry literacy. I think that would be a much wider field that 
> would have to include ancient and non-english language poets as well, 
> but it might be an interesting criteria for a list of modern poets. 
> Who then should someone be familiar with in contemporary poetry in 
> order to be literate enough in poetry to be a critic of it? That I 
> think is a very interesting question.
Right--literate enough in poetry to be a first-rate /general /critic of 
it.  As opposed to someone like William Logan whom I consider a 
first-rate critic, but only of a very narrow slice of the general 
scene.  Which, whaddya know, brings us back to the need for a decent 
full list of the viable schools of current American Poetry that I keep 
asking for help making, and get just about none.

--Bob
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