It seems pretty obvious that reviewers should acknowledge friendships &
agendas which impinge on the review itself, but this doesn't seem to be
the norm. K. Prevallet's piece in Jacket doesn't address this directly,
but she characterizes reviewing as sort of a subgenre of poetry criticism,
in which friendship and appreciation comprise an acceptable gray area
for reviewing. She considers poetry criticism proper to be a different
animal, usually incompatible with personal connections.
I think it would be better to aim for "indie-crit" all down the line,
and not institutionalize this distinction between (friendly-buddy)
reviewing and professional poetry criticism. But Prevallet's remarks
are valuable for having acknowledged the reality of the situation:
that in the subculture of poetry, "friendship" and 'appreciation" often
go hand-in-hand.
What I also liked about her article was her critique of what PASSES for
true poetry criticism: the sort of recycling of critical truisms which
merely reinforces the position of established poets, who have become
adept at literary politics and sophistry within a fishbowl poetry culture.
She writes that poetry criticism needs to be synthetic: a general
cultural & political criticism, a general literary criticism, which
does not further isolate poetry within its own jargon, but looks
for ways to experience & evaluate it within the larger history
of this era & the present time. Makes sense to me....
- Henry
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