My use of the muddied, blind and perjured term 'democratic' was in the sense of 'open' and opposed to such meanings as 'secretive, arbitrary, authoritarian'.I wrote of 'pressures' not 'conspiracy'.Here's a link to a possible breakdown off ACE (fuck it - I'll use their stupid acronym) funding for poetry 'bodies' 2012-18.It is quite clear that Apples & Snakes and the Poetry Society receive the largest support and I think it's likely that support will have an influence.On 17 October 2017 at 11:45, Jamie McKendrick <[log in to unmask]> wrote:As a postscript to Poetry Review, it's evident that the editorship has been a contested ground - the grandly titled 'Poetry Wars' of the 1970s as one example and I can think of two other more recent conflicts which were less ideological but probably bitter enough in their own way. I can see how focusing on these instances could lead to very different conclusions than the ones I was expressing. (In the 4th paragraph below, 'the doubts' which sounds like a stomach ailment should merely 'doubts'.Jamie
Sent from my iPadThis looks to me a strange map of poetry in the UK, David, though it may be one that others can comment on more constructively. In some fields it may be a good idea to follow the money, so why not in poetry? In this picture, it would appear that the Arts Council sits at the centre of the web and all these three 'institutions' are funded by it.So, if anything like a conspiracy to dumb down poetry exists, there would first have to be a policy on the part of the Arts Council for such an outcome and then a docile response from the editors of the two publishing ventures and the organisers of the other to put it into effect. Or even an unconscious impulse to conform.I'm at a huge disadvantage in commenting on the Arts Council because I have little idea about their priorities, but those here who have applied for funding will know the ground far better.I've known six editors of Poetry Review, one only very slightly, two fairly well, and I have the doubts whether anyone would have sought to influence their choices and style of editing (though I wouldn't discount it) but am pretty sure that none of them - irrespective of whether I like their taste or not and irrespective of whether I think they did a good job or not - would have allowed themselves to be so influenced. (Of course this leaves open the question of who is appointed by the Poetry Society and why.)Carcanet seems to me nothing if not catholic in its tastes, ranging from Sophie Hannah to Tom Raworth, so it doesn't particularly fit an exclusively 'highbrow' model though I can see that it seems to have a soft spot for academics. Whatever else you might say of the press, it looks as though it is shaped by the editor's tastes and those being ones he is quite articulate and forthright about if we judge from the editorials of PN Review. (Perhaps Michael Schmidt has now stepped down from one or other of these roles?)I'm afraid I've no idea at all about Apples and Snakes but it looks to be occupied, though not exclusively, with poetry in performance, a field that will have its own profiles and preferences.I can see how my response keeps employing that problematic and eighteenth-century word 'taste' and of course it should be examined more closely. I don't think any of these places are likely to be 'democratic' in any meaningful sense, but I'd be very dubious in the first two instances of any influences being successfully brought to bear.Best,Jamie
Sent from my iPadDavidSo although I don't think there is an 'official verse culture' as such I do think there are pressures of that nature.Ironically the populist and spoken word focused Apples and Snakes seems the most opaque and undemocratic of all three, as far as I can determine, please note that qualification.These are all too neat though. Poetry Review, with its links to the Poetry Society, is surely the most open and democratic of the three. Both it and Apples and Snakes are enormously dependent on grants.My three examples do fit with a suspicious ease into something like a threefold divide we could call it upper, middle, and lower; or elite, mainstream, performance; or the old highbrow, middlebrow, lowbrow.I'd suspect 'official verse culture' as made manifest at Carcanet, Poetry Review, and Apples & Snakes would be a very different beast.There is I think something like a policy at the Arts Council, which does seem to be linked to notions of accessibility and 'take-up' and it probably has degrees of influence on the two latter at least.On 16 October 2017 at 17:37, Jamie McKendrick <[log in to unmask]> wrote:Whether you dislike the Liverpool poets, or for that matter Kate Tempest, surely the point is that their audiences were and are not the 'mainstream' poetry audiences? Unless, like most others here, you want 'mainstream' merely to stand for whatever you don't happen to like.
Jamie
Sent from my iPad
> On 16 Oct 2017, at 16:08, David Lace <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> It’s easy to keep mainstream poetry audiences entertained though.
>
>
>
> ———————— Gerard Greenway———————
>
> Just a note on this, because their pulling power was pretty spectacular. I saw them in 85 and they played a venue with a capacity of 1500. Which audience they kept entertained for a couple of hours with a skilful mix of material. Alas Smith and Jones played the same venue around the same time - a major comedy act then on TV.
>
> Gerard