Kent: Interesting. I suspected the blanket ignorance among the young, but I don't have that much contact with them. As to the Language poets, I have had my own issues with them, but I do know that several of them are deeply knowledgeable about earlier writing and conversant with a lot of what's going on in the UK and Ireland. For the most part they don't write about it, tho.

Re: the Rothenberg anthologies, we owe a tip of the hat to Jeffrey Robinson, who co-edited Rothenberg's Romantics volume. Jeffrey has lived in Glasgow for the past several years. He organized the recent jamboree there.

-----Original Message-----
From: Kent Johnson
Sent: Oct 20, 2016 11:53 AM
To: [log in to unmask]AC.UK
Subject: Re: Britain vs. U.S. Poetry war

I should mention one big exception to the disregard for "tradition" among LangPo figures (though like Palmer her relation to the group is complicated):

Susan Howe's work on Dickinson and other pre-20th century sources, most of them American.

The exception makes the rule, maybe.

Also, in further response to Peter's somewhat wholesale framing of American disregard, there is the extended anthology project begun by Rothenberg and Joris which brings forth a range of English writers--not least of the Romantic period--as precursors to the new. This is a singular case, granted, but its influence had been significant.

>>> Peter Riley <[log in to unmask]> 10/20/16 8:18 AM >>>
Curiously, I don't remember saying anything like that. I thought I was
talking about American poets' attitudes to British poetry,
conventional or innovative, which with exceptions I have found
consistently negative for the last 40 years. This was very noticeable
in the running of the Cambridge Conference of Contemporary Poetry for
instance. Our enthusiasm for the new American poetry knew no bounds
but was clearly not reciprocated.

I suggest we not start a discussion as to whether the "experimental"
can claim the "left field" as its own.


PR


On 20 Oct 2016, at 11:00, Tim Allen wrote:

Yes to that Jaime, but at least arguing over Shakespeare is harmless,
I think. For me I'd rather walk the dog but would gladly sit back and
be entertained by a TV programme about it.

Just want to remind you American folks that Peter's views are his
alone and that his negative opinions about some Brit left-field poetry
are just as forceful, only he kind of blames Americans for that too,
for tempting people like me away with your 'novelty'. I always found
much more to like in C20 American poetry than British until around
2000 when it somehow tipped the other way. My influences are mainly
French anyway.

Cheers

Tim