[New-Poetry] 100 Poets You Should Know

[Jason Quackenbush]

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'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.

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.


Bob Grumman wrote:
> It would be interesting to compare this list to one of the most 
> visible living American poets of 1950. The best ten on that list, I 
> claim, would be at least two orders of magnitude better than the ten 
> best on James's list.  But they would not be superior to the best ten 
> contemporary poets, whoever they are.  (All I'm sure of is that none 
> is on James's list.)
>
> --Bob G.
>
> JforJames at aol.com wrote:
>> Certainly the list is subjective, an visibilty is based on one line 
>> of sight. The list is an invitation, for those so moved, to suggest 
>> and lobby for other choices, as you have. Also, 100 is an arbitrary 
>> round number. Could easily balloon to 105, 1120,,,
>>  
>>  I think my choices of Bob Holman and Patricia Smith are good ones 
>> for the performance vein of American poetry. Wakefield has 
>> flown under my radar; but Algarin makes sense to me. Berrigan, 
>> Eshleman, Rothenberg, Padgett, all good choices for the Jason 100.
>> Finnegan
>>  
>> In a message dated 11/22/2007 12:16:37 AM Eastern Standard Time, 
>> jfq at myuw.net writes:
>>
>>     It's an interesting point. The question I'd like to ask you is
>>     visible
>>     to whom? If you're talking about contemporary performance poetry,
>>     they
>>     don't get much more visible than Buddy Wakefield or Miguel
>>     Algarin. Tom
>>     Raworth, while not particularly visible on this side of the
>>     atlantic, is
>>     more visible in Great Britain than I think a number of the people on
>>     your list are. I'll withdraw the suggestion though and in his place
>>     offer Jim Carroll: the only living american poet of import to have
>>     penned a alternative rock anthem; one that still gets airplay on
>>     independent "underground" and alternative radio. Plus there was a
>>     movie
>>     about him, which is something you can't say about Jorie Graham,
>>     thank
>>     Christ. I didn't notice this was an american list. As for
>>     anthologies, I
>>     think it depends on whose anthologies you read. I don't know for
>>     sure,
>>     but I'd be willing to bet Clayton Eshleman and Jerome Rothenberg
>>     have
>>     more anthologies between them, both as editors and as poets and
>>     translators than a good portion of your list combined. Anselm
>>     Berrigan,
>>     aside from being brilliant and a blood heir to the New York
>>     School also
>>     is still the director of the Poetry Project at St. Mark's Place,
>>     which
>>     as far as I know is the longest running spoken word series on the
>>     east
>>     coast.
>>
>>     As for Ron Padgett, true, he's maybe not the most visible figure
>>     and is
>>     maybe an emotional choice. but nevertheless he's one of the few
>>     poets
>>     I've ever memorized, and I think I probably own more anthologies
>>     that
>>     he's in than I do anthologies that Maya Angelou is in. But then,
>>     I don't
>>     generally buy THOSE kind of anthologies. So yeah, I guess he can
>>     go too.
>>     Still, i think he's a poet everyone should know.
>>
>>     Nothing in that drawer
>>
>>  
>>
>>
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> Check out AOL Money & Finance's list of the hottest products 
>> <http://money.aol.com/special/hot-products-2007?NCID=aoltop00030000000001> 
>> and top money wasters 
>> <http://money.aol.com/top5/general/ways-you-are-wasting-money?NCID=aoltop00030000000002> 
>> of 2007.
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> New-Poetry mailing list
>> New-Poetry at wiz.cath.vt.edu
>> http://wiz.cath.vt.edu/mailman/listinfo/new-poetry
>>   
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
> New-Poetry mailing list
> New-Poetry at wiz.cath.vt.edu
> http://wiz.cath.vt.edu/mailman/listinfo/new-poetry
>