Which contemporary poets do you read with pleasure?
A critic should answer that question with his reviews, and I hope I’ve answered it in mine.
Which contemporary critics?
I’ve recalled at length, in the interview at the end of All the Rage, my fondness for the criticism of Geoffrey Hill, Christopher Ricks, and George Steiner. Let me mention a few critics less well known. I think Michael Hofmann the most distinguished of the younger critics. I must declare an interest again, because he is my colleague at Florida; but his collection of essays, Behind the Lines, is thorough and original. James Fenton has written thoughtful left-handed pieces on poetry, most still uncollected; and Craig Raine is as cheerfully combative and learned as Jarrell. These critics have written mostly for British journals. Among younger American critics, Adam Kirsch and Christian Wiman are both worth attention and argument.
Are there any books of poetry published in the last few years that you would particularly recommend to readers?
Let one stand as an example—Gjertrud Schnackenberg’s luminous and insufficiently appreciated The Gilded Lapse of Time.
Can poets regain the common readers they once had? Will poetry ever exert itself again in American culture as it did a century ago? Does criticism have a role to play in this?
No, no, and alas no, but we can hope to keep the uncommon readers we have always had—the dispossessed, out-at-elbows readers, ones who would rather curl up with a book than watch football or play a computer game. Perhaps these readers will grow fewer and unhappier (which means that most poetry books will sell their five hundred or a thousand copies, just as they did when the country was much smaller). Surely the worst way to create readers is by praising everything under the skies—I’ve read many a review, perfectly convinced by the logic of its praise, only to laugh out loud when I came to the poems themselves. (The worst criticism can’t even lie convincingly.) Expecting poets to review their friends harshly (or even their enemies), expecting those who judge contests or awards to be impartial, is no doubt naive. The fault is no less despicable—or disappointing—for being human. When we have a criticism that does nothing but praise, readers know poetry critics are idiots.
Some argue that the poems of Sharon Olds or Billy Collins attract readers who will graduate, by slow and childlike steps, to a poetry more demanding. Perhaps there have been a few such readers, scarce as glass slippers. But readers satisfied by such poetry are not likely to look beyond it, and not likely to be satisfied when they do. Poetry must fall on prepared ground, and most readers have not read enough poetry to be prepared. A poetry like Robert Frost’s or Emily Dickinson’s, with a high level of craft and cunning as well as plain moral values (though not always simple values), is very rare. It measures our distance from Browning that we’ll never need a Sharon Olds or Billy Collins Society. Perhaps we’re the luckier for that. (Sometimes readers love very difficult poetry if it’s charged with enough mystery—or publicity.)
We aren’t going to regain the lost readers of the nineteenth century, those who didn’t know radio or television or the Internet, who were educated in French and Latin, who as children read Milton and Shakespeare and could bash out a decent verse themselves (one that scanned and rhymed effortlessly, if without originality). Those common readers of poetry are long in the grave, and they were readers differently trained and with different expectations from readers now (they expected moral virtues from poetry, or at least moral suasion). Even if we could have those old-fashioned readers again, would we want them? The embedded question is not, “What sort of poetry would gain those readers now?” but “What sort of poetry would attract more readers than we have?” The probable answer is an uncomfortable one—a poetry that catered to the sentimentalities of its audience. Criticism is likely to grate against such sentimentalities.
What do you think of the recent revival of performance poetry—the so-called poetry slams?
It costs little to be tolerant of such a goofy form of entertainment. I doubt any lasting poetry will emerge from it—I’m still waiting for lasting poetry to come from rock lyrics.
Do you think your criticism has hurt the reception of your poetry? Have your reviews cost you anything?
I certainly hope so. Why write criticism if it’s so trivial it doesn’t have a cost? I’ve been warned, often enough, that writing criticism is suicide (that would make a pleasant story by Borges); yet I can’t say my poetry has suffered in reviews, can’t say I’ve faced real disfavor. Because criticism rouses passions, because it has more currency (and is sometimes easier to understand), there are readers who think of me only as a critic. The poet mildly objects.
There has been a certain baying after me on the Internet, I understand. I’m not sure such readers have the best objections to my reviews; but to reassure them perhaps I should say that, unlike Housman, I don’t store up witty sayings in a notebook, to use as occasion arises (though I might wish I did); that I don’t review books to call attention to myself (too much attention is likely to make me stop writing criticism altogether); that my harsher criticism isn’t motivated by envy, as far as I can tell (envy is what makes me write good reviews, not bad ones); and that I’m amused by readers who say so violently that I should be more mild. Readers who assume I don’t praise other poets, and who have failed to discover long essays of appreciation on Pound, Frost, Auden, Bishop, Wilbur, Hill, and others, have not read very deeply.
If criticism has cost my poetry something, it can be only a thing of limited value. I’m not trying to be high-minded—my poetry must make its own way. Poets are always complaining they haven’t received their due—that they deserved this prize, were cheated of that grant, that X got it first, or Y when he was younger. Most writers get more than their due.
Permissions
“The Bowl of Diogenes; or, The End of Criticism”: Poetry, February 2006.
“Out on the Lawn”: New Criterion, December 2003.
“Stouthearted Men”: New Criterion, June 2004.
“The Most Contemptible Moth: Lowell in Letters”: Virginia Quarterly Review, Fall 2005.
“Forward into the Past: Reading the New Critics”: Virginia Quarterly Review, Spring 2008. Foreword to Praising It New: The Best of the New Criticism, ed. Garrick Davis (Swallow Press/Ohio University Press, 2008).
“One If by Land”: New Criterion, December 2004.
“The Great American Desert”: New Criterion, June 2005.
“The State with the Prettiest Name”: Parnassus 28, nos. 1–2 (2005).
“Elizabeth Bishop Unfinished”: New Criterion, April 2006.
“Elizabeth Bishop’s Sullen Art”: New Criterion, March 1997.
“Jumping the Shark”: New Criterion, December 2005.
“Victoria’s Secret”: New Criterion, June 2006.
“Attack of the Anthologists” (Lehman): New York Times Book Review, April 16, 2006. Copyright 2006 by the New York Times Company. Reprinted by permission.
“Attack of the Anthologists” (Strand): Wall Street Journal, July 21, 2005.
“The Lost World of Lawrence Durrell”: TLS, July 28, 2006.
“Hart Crane Overboard”: New York Times Book Review, January 28, 2007. Copyright 2007 by the New York Times Company. Reprinted by permission.
“On Reviewing Hart Crane”: Poetry, October 2008. “Postscript”: Poetry, December 2008.
“The Endless Ocean of Derek Walcott”: New York Times Book Review, April 8, 2007. Copyright 2007 by the New York Times Company. Reprinted by permission.
“The Civil Power of Geoffrey Hill”: New York Times Book Review, January 20, 2008. Copyright 2008 by the New York Times Company. Reprinted by permission.
“God’s Chatter”: New Criterion, December 2006.
“Let’s Do It, Let’s Fall in Luff”: New Criterion, June 2007.
“Pynchon in the Poetic”: Southwest Review 83, no. 4 (1998).
“Back to the Future”: Virginia Quarterly Review, Summer 2007.
“The Worl
d Is Too Much with Us”: New Criterion, December 2007.
“Valentine’s Day Massacre”: New Criterion, June 2008.
“The Forgotten Masterpiece of John Townsend Trowbridge”: New Criterion, April 2008.
“Frost at Midnight”: Parnassus 30, nos. 1–2 (2008).
“Interview by Garrick Davis”: Contemporary Poetry Review (online) (2002).
Books Under Review
Verse Chronicle: Out on the Lawn
Billy Collins. Nine Horses. Random House, 2002.
Rosanna Warren. Departure. W. W. Norton, 2003.
Howard Nemerov. The Selected Poems of Howard Nemerov. Ed. Daniel Anderson. Swallow Press/Ohio University Press, 2003.
Sherod Santos. The Perishing. W. W. Norton, 2003.
Carolyn Forche. Blue Hour. HarperCollins, 2003.
James Fenton. The Love Bomb, and Other Musical Pieces. Faber and Faber, 2003.
Verse Chronicle: Stouthearted Men
George Oppen. Selected Poems. Ed. Robert Creeley. New Directions, 2003.
Franz Wright. Walking to Martha’s Vineyard. Alfred A. Knopf, 2003.
Tony Hoagland. What Narcissism Means to Me. Graywolf, 2003.
Spencer Reece. The Clerk’s Tale. Houghton Mifflin, 2004.
Charles Wright. Buffalo Yoga. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2004.
Philip Larkin. Collected Poems. Ed. Anthony Thwaite. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2004.
The Most Contemptible Moth: Lowell in Letters
Robert Lowell. The Letters of Robert Lowell. Ed. Saskia Hamilton. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2005.
Verse Chronicle: One If by Land
Gary Snyder. Danger on Peaks. Shoemaker and Hoard, 2004.
Rita Dove. American Smooth. W. W. Norton, 2004.
Derrek Hines, trans. Gilgamesh. Anchor, 2004.
Stephen Mitchell, trans. Gilgamesh: A New English Version. Free Press, 2004.
Derek Walcott. The Prodigal. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2004.
Czeslaw Milosz. Second Space. Ecco, 2004.
Verse Chronicle: The Great American Desert
John Ashbery . Where Shall I Wander. Ecco, 2005.
Dean Young. Elegy on Toy Piano. University of Pittsburgh Press, 2005.
Jorie Graham. Overlord. Ecco, 2005.
Kevin Young. Black Maria. Alfred A. Knopf, 2005.
Ted Kooser. Delights & Shadows. Copper Canyon, 2004.
——. Flying at Night: Poems 1965–1985. University of Pittsburgh Press, 2005.
——. The Poetry Home Repair Manual. University of Nebraska Press, 2005.
Richard Wilbur. Collected Poems, 1943–2004. Harcourt, 2004.
Elizabeth Bishop Unfinished
Elizabeth Bishop. Edgar Allan Poe & the Juke-Box: Uncollected Poems, Drafts, and Fragments. Ed. Alice Quinn. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006.
Elizabeth Bishop’s Sullen Art
Elizabeth Bishop. Exchanging Hats: Paintings. Ed. William Benton. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1996.
Verse Chronicle: Jumping the Shark
Kim Addonizio. What Is This Thing Called Love. W. W. Norton, 2004.
Billy Collins. The Trouble with Poetry, and Other Poems. Random House, 2005.
Kay Ryan. The Niagara River. Grove, 2005.
Mark Doty. School of the Arts. HarperCollins, 2005.
Jack Gilbert. Refusing Heaven. Alfred A. Knopf, 2005.
Geoffrey Hill. Scenes from Comus. Penguin (UK), 2005.
Verse Chronicle: Victoria’s Secret
Seamus Heaney. District and Circle. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006.
Louise Gluck. Averno. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006.
Don Paterson. Landing Light. Graywolf, 2005.
Tess Gallagher. Dear Ghosts,. Graywolf, 2006.
Anne Carson. Decreation. Alfred A. Knopf, 2005.
Geoffrey Hill. Without Title. Penguin (UK), 2006.
Attack of the Anthologists
The Oxford Book of American Poetry. Ed. David Lehman. Oxford University Press, 2006.
100 Great Poems of the Twentieth Century. Ed. Mark Strand. W. W. Norton, 2005.
The Lost World of Lawrence Durrell
Lawrence Durrell. Selected Poems. Ed. Peter Porter. Faber and Faber, 2006.
Hart Crane Overboard
Hart Crane. Complete Poems and Selected Letters. Ed. Langdon Hammer. Library of America, 2006.
The Endless Ocean of Derek Walcott
Derek Walcott. Selected Poems. Ed. Edward Baugh. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007.
The Civil Power of Geoffrey Hill
Geoffrey Hill. A Treatise of Civil Power. Yale University Press, 2007.
Verse Chronicle: God’s Chatter
Natasha Trethewey. Native Guard. Houghton Mifflin, 2006.
Mark Strand. Man and Camel. Alfred A. Knopf, 2006.
A. R. Ammons. Ommateum, with Doxology. W. W. Norton, 2006.
Louise Gluck. Firstborn. New American Library, 1968.
Franz Wright. God’s Silence. Alfred A. Knopf, 2006.
Paul Muldoon. Horse Latitudes. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006.
Verse Chronicle: Let’s Do It, Let’s Fall in Luff
John Ashbery. A Worldly Country. Ecco, 2007.
Frieda Hughes. Forty-Five. HarperCollins, 2006.
Cathy Park Hong. Dance Dance Revolution. W. W. Norton, 2007.
Frederick Seidel. Ooga-Booga. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006.
Robert Lowell. Selected Poems: Expanded Edition. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006 [2007].
Henri Cole. Blackbird and Wolf. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007.
Pynchon in the Poetic
Thomas Pynchon. Mason & Dixon. Holt, 1997.
Back to the Future
Thomas Pynchon. Against the Day. Penguin, 2006.
Verse Chronicle: The World Is Too Much with Us
Les Murray. The Biplane Houses. Farrar, Straus, 2006.
Robert Pinsky. Gulf Music. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007.
Sandra McPherson. Expectation Days. University of Illinois Press, 2007.
Charles Wright. Littlefoot. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007.
Kathleen Jamie. Waterlight: Selected Poems. Graywolf, 2007.
Robert Hass. Time and Materials. Ecco, 2007.
Verse Chronicle: Valentine’s Day Massacre
Ted Kooser. Valentines, University of Nebraska Press, 2008.
Melissa Green. Fifty-Two. Arrowsmith, 2007.
Elizabeth Spires. The Wave-Maker. W. W. Norton, 2008.
Campbell McGrath. Seven Notebooks. Ecco, 2008.
Marie Howe. The Kingdom of Ordinary Times. W. W. Norton, 2008.
Jorie Graham. Sea Change. Ecco, 2008.
Frost at Midnight
Robert Frost. The Notebooks of Robert Frost. Ed. Robert Faggen. Harvard University Press, 2006.
Index of Authors Reviewed
Page numbers refer to the print edition but are hyperlinked to the appropriate location in the e-book.
Addonizio, Kim, 126
Ammons, A. R., 197
Anderson, Daniel (ed., Nemerov), 15
Ashbery, John, 77, 207
Baugh, Edward (ed., Walcott), 183
Benton, William (ed., Bishop), 122
Bishop, Elizabeth, 111, 122
Carson, Anne, 149
Cole, Henri, 218
Collins, Billy, 11, 128
Crane, Hart, 166, 172
Creeley, Robert (ed., Oppen), 25
Doty, Mark, 132
Dove, Rita, 66
Durrell, Lawrence, 161
Faggen, Robert (ed., Frost), 300
Fenton, James, 22
Forché, Carolyn, 20
Frost, Robert, 300
Gallagher, Tess, 147
Gilbert, Jack, 135
Glück, Louise, 142, 199
Graham, Jorie, 81, 283
Green, Melissa, 274
Hamilton, Saskia (ed., Lowell), 39
Hammer, Langdon (ed., Crane), 166
Hass, Robert, 269
Heaney, Seamus, 140
H
ill, Geoffrey, 137, 151, 188
Hines, Derrek (trans., Gilgamesh), 69
Hoagland, Tony, 30
Hong, Cathy Park, 212
Howe, Marie, 281
Hughes, Frieda, 209
Jamie, Kathleen, 267
Kooser, Ted, 85, 272
Larkin, Philip, 36
Lehman, David (ed., Oxford Anthology), 154
Lowell, Robert, 39, 216
McGrath, Campbell, 278
McPherson, Sandra, 262
Milosz, Czeslaw, 74
Mitchell, Stephen (trans., Gilgamesh), 72
Muldoon, Paul, 204
Murray, Les, 258
Nemerov, Howard, 15
Oppen, George, 25
Paterson, Don, 145
Pinsky, Robert, 260
Porter, Peter (ed., Durrell), 161
Pynchon, Thomas, 221, 234
Quinn, Alice (ed., Bishop), 111
Reece, Spencer, 32
Ryan, Kay, 130
Santos, Sherod, 17
Seidel, Frederick, 214
Snyder, Gary, 64
Spires, Elizabeth, 276
Strand, Mark, 159, 195
Thwaite, Anthony (ed., Larkin), 36
Trethewey, Natasha, 193
Trowbridge, John Townsend, 286
Walcott, Derek, 72, 183
Warren, Rosanna, 13
Wilbur, Richard, 88
Wright, Charles, 34, 264
Wright, Franz, 27, 202
Young, Dean, 79
Young, Kevin, 83
Biographical Note
William Logan has published eight volumes of poetry and five volumes of essays and reviews. The Undiscovered Country won the National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism. He lives in Gainesville, Florida, and Cambridge, England.
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