Scene4 Magazine | letters to the editor

Balazs Szabo is a great man and a great artist and a great example of how art flourishes when artists are free and people are free to experience their art. Thank you for portraying that and him.

George Draco

read Les Marcott's column

As usual, David Alpaugh articulates with absolutely unfailing accuracy the problems facing poetry in America. Someday, everyone writing PhDs about the history of American poetry will be referencing his beautifully-written essays.

Judith Offer

read David Alpaugh's article

Thanks, David, for your thoughtful article.

Allegra Silberstein

read David Alpaugh's article

Loved this article. Thought provoking and vigorous in its bite! I love the idea of a poetry revolution. Perhaps it will be the poets who help us navigate the complicated world in which we find ourselves. This isn't the first time that the end of poetry has been announced. I'm writing a biography about Ina Coolbrith, California's first poet laureate (and America's first state laureate). In the book is a scene (built on a newspaper article) where a group of California poets are discussing the state of poetry at the end of the 19th century. Writer Adeline Knapp says that all the great poems have already been written. "Our poets strive after the weird, the grotesque, the uncouth in their agonies at what they are wont to call their self-revelations, but which are rarely more than painful exposures of their cranial caverns." The rest of the group branded her a heretic, but she continued anyway. Referring to the revolution of free verse, she said, "Look over the field of modern poetry and say what sane man can tell what our poets are driving at. They talk about 'lewd stars' and 'mounting waves.' They tear the language from limb to limb in their efforts to express what is inexpressible, unexistent. They give us words, words, words, wrenched from their natural meanings, and arranged in all sorts of unnatural forms." She believed that prose would better serve the new century. Poet Edwin Markham countered, ""Poetry will exist so long as the world exists. Prose cannot express all that there is to be expressed. We need poetry to express that fleeting, elusive song of life that is as real as anything in life." He also said something else that I love: "Like some airy and invisible architect, [poetry] shapes character. The poet in his highest aspect may be considered a seer." Could that be the face of a new revolution? According to Alpaugh, we may soon find out.

Aleta George

read David Alpaugh's article

I love the trouble David Alpaugh is stirring up for the future of American poetry and how he frames this discussion with opera. I was pretty disturbed this past week when I started reading my copy of Poet & Writers magazine which is focused on MFA programs. And, yes, this is not a new subject about how too many people are being churned through these programs with degrees that for the most part are meaningless. Just for the record, the Steiny Road Poet does not have an MFA and has never seriously considered getting one. Supposedly these degrees are for people who want to teach or scale that rickety ladder of publishing success. This poet has done and led her share of poetry workshops on the inside and outside of universities to know they can be done anywhere and some have good value but at the end of a university program, what does the degree get -- a certified poet? What does this mean? However, what bothers me about Mr. Alpaugh's fine essay is what is missing. He has the older end of the poets' world covered but not the younger side which includes the controversial language poets led by such older poets as John Ashberry. Like the work of Gertrude Stein, too many people discount the work of language poets. Sure, there is a lot of so-called language poetry that is uninteresting, and this poet thinks that the MFA programs contribute to that, but just like any art form, the more you immerse yourself, the better you can judge the new stuff. So bring on the poetry theater -- there is no end of the world coming for poetry as long as we keep those sharp pencils moving.

Karren Alenier

read David Alpaugh's article

This is a wonderful look BACK at poetry lane. And the points made on mass production of poets is a common one these days. What is not accounted for is the POETRY REVOLUTION from the CULTURAL REVOLUTION (STILL GOING ON) that not only gave us the BEATS but women, blacks, gays, minorities -- those whose voices had been oppressed for so long they were like diamonds coming from the earth. These voices still vitalize the American scene. We should check out the work of MFA poets and separate the good ones from the mediocre, for having gone to writing college does not necessarily make one an awful poet. Rita Dove came out of Iowa. Not mentioned also is the way publishers curried poets in the mid century. Not so much today. This is a very interesting article and read with respect. Grace Cavalieri: Producer "The Poet and the Poem from the Library of Congress." (check out the stunning poets on our website.) Thanks!

Grace Cavalieri

read David Alpaugh's article
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A clarification: As I said above - "Going to a writing college does not
necessarily make one an awful poet."
QUITE THE OPPOSITE: "Rita Dove came out of Iowa." Some of our most important contributors to poetry have education from writing programs. In fairness, this should be said.

David Alpaugh's article sniffs at the heels of the Poetry Dilemma. Because the Poetry Machine in the United States has become so huge, it has become outrageously controlling. Only poets approved by the Poetry Machine receive any national coverage. The issue of actual quality in poetry is ignored or unknown.

Marvin R. Hiemstra

read David Alpaugh's article

Kudos and bravos to Ms Renaud on a wonderful review of this wonderful event. I was so happy that she took me along with her. Her writing is so expressive and the details are so rich that I felt as if I were carrying her luggage. There doesn't seem to be anything quite like that festival anywhere else in the world and if there is I'm sure she will be there and ought to be there. She has the perception and the words and the good humour to capture the width and breadth of this colossal kind of arts event. I hope to "travel" with her again.
Once more bravo and thank you.

Peter B. Wenzel

read Lissa Tyler Renaud's article

Szabo is an inspiration. Hope his dream of an artistic community in Hillsboro, NC is realized soon.

Skip Holmgren

read Les Marcott's column