This is a great essay and touches on something I've often reflected on over the last couple decades: the distinction between English and American poets' use of form. You mention, and I think rightly, that English poets often write in a manner that nods to meter and rhyme (the Eliotic "ghost of meter") even in free verse poems while American poets either write in free verse or meter. In one respect this is the case. I was just reading Paterson's old anthology "New British Poetry," and I was a little disappointed that, despite the claims of the introduction, so few of the poems really gave much of a sense of any kind of meter. Not that there were not quite a few, but there were fewer than the introduction suggested. Strangely, the Michael Donaghy selection (American born; British death) contained very loose work with scarcely a trace of metrical pattern, whereas most of his work does exhibit something between the metrical and the free.
In any case, overall, I think your statement is just. The Irish poet Conor O'Callaghan once related the anecdote to me that an American poet asked if "the new formalism had come to Britain," and the one asked replied, "No, we just have the old formalism." Conor thought this a deprecation of English practice; I thought it a sign that free verse was just another technique in England, whereas in America it had long been a weird ideological "patriotic" principle for many.
On the American side of things, however, I think you are a little bit off in your observation. You are right that the vast, vast majority of American free verse poets betray not the slightest inkling of any of the practices of rhyme and meter in their work. As a rule, that's because they don't know how any of it works. I don't know how things stand in England, but for the majority of such American poets, the whole literary tradition prior to the twentieth century is a foreign land that has nothing to do with them. But I would suggest taking a second look at the poets who were first heralded under the "new formalist" label. If you look at their work, it is very rarely strictly metrical and very frequently their books blend metrical and free verse poems and also engage in what one of the new formalists called "semi-metrical" poems (Marilyn Taylor). A good number of the new formalists read English poets in the eighties and nineties and probably modeled their practice on what they saw occurring in the mainstream of English poetry at that time. Mary Jo Salter, Brad Leithauser, and others rarely write a wholly metrical poem. The obvious exception is Timothy Steele, but that is because he came to the new formalism out of the Wintersian tradition, whereas most of the other new formalists did not.
Thanks so much James! This is a wonderful comment, and you are quite right to discern that I don't know well that first generation of "new formalist" poets you mention. I am very interested by your sense that this movement (such as it is) started off, formally speaking, with more of a "British" approach to form and metre, which has been pursued -- I think you are saying -- by a few poets (like Salter & Leithauser, whom I look forward to exploring), though not perhaps by a very large number. Lots for me to follow up here, which is exactly what I was hoping for. Do you have any thoughts on Duncan -- where is his influence most felt (if anywhere) today?
As the other comment here indicates, Dana and Michael Donaghy are the crucial connection. Donaghy died right after the summer are first started spending time around the new formalists, but he was a mentor to many. Dana published a short book on British poetry that was exceptionally important. Regardless of whether any of the new formalists were looking to England though (aside from Dana and Michael and those who were following them, I can't be too sure), most of what was supposedly "new formalism" was only ever "semi-formal." I attribute that to those poets generally not being sure how far they wanted to go in the metrical direction and also to not being sure how much they were willing to be alienated from the mainstream.
When I would talk about attention to form, as a young poet, writers with whom I had nothing in common would consistently bring up Duncan. And though I know Thom Gunn liked Duncan's work, I don't think anything I came across in the anthologies was enough to interest me. Perhaps I'll revisit, but I don't know; from what I've seen, it's just not what I come to poetry for. Crane of course I've always appreciated, though with the usual Wintersian criticisms at the front of my mind.
I may need to reread Gioia’s book (Barrier of a Common Language, 2003, collected essays from the 80s and 90s). I was looking at Burgess’s Byrne recently and I see now I’d forgotten that Gioia included an essay on that novel in verse.
Several of the book’s essays (Burgess, Causley, Fenton, Gunn) are on Gioia’s site:
I confess I’m not the biggest fan of poems about poetry, so maybe that partly explains why I never took to Duncan. Looking him up in a couple of college textbooks/anthologies here, I found no trace, so I think you’re correct, that he’s not read or taught much, if he ever was.
Possibly Tracy K. Smith hits the visionary note you’re thinking of, at least she did a dozen years ago in her Life on Mars collection:
That's fair and makes sense -- Duncan does write a lot (even mainly) about poetry, which makes him both genuinely Pindaric, and also a modernist in a way that Lawrence (arguably) is not. Many thanks for the recommendation -- will follow up.
This is a great essay and touches on something I've often reflected on over the last couple decades: the distinction between English and American poets' use of form. You mention, and I think rightly, that English poets often write in a manner that nods to meter and rhyme (the Eliotic "ghost of meter") even in free verse poems while American poets either write in free verse or meter. In one respect this is the case. I was just reading Paterson's old anthology "New British Poetry," and I was a little disappointed that, despite the claims of the introduction, so few of the poems really gave much of a sense of any kind of meter. Not that there were not quite a few, but there were fewer than the introduction suggested. Strangely, the Michael Donaghy selection (American born; British death) contained very loose work with scarcely a trace of metrical pattern, whereas most of his work does exhibit something between the metrical and the free.
In any case, overall, I think your statement is just. The Irish poet Conor O'Callaghan once related the anecdote to me that an American poet asked if "the new formalism had come to Britain," and the one asked replied, "No, we just have the old formalism." Conor thought this a deprecation of English practice; I thought it a sign that free verse was just another technique in England, whereas in America it had long been a weird ideological "patriotic" principle for many.
On the American side of things, however, I think you are a little bit off in your observation. You are right that the vast, vast majority of American free verse poets betray not the slightest inkling of any of the practices of rhyme and meter in their work. As a rule, that's because they don't know how any of it works. I don't know how things stand in England, but for the majority of such American poets, the whole literary tradition prior to the twentieth century is a foreign land that has nothing to do with them. But I would suggest taking a second look at the poets who were first heralded under the "new formalist" label. If you look at their work, it is very rarely strictly metrical and very frequently their books blend metrical and free verse poems and also engage in what one of the new formalists called "semi-metrical" poems (Marilyn Taylor). A good number of the new formalists read English poets in the eighties and nineties and probably modeled their practice on what they saw occurring in the mainstream of English poetry at that time. Mary Jo Salter, Brad Leithauser, and others rarely write a wholly metrical poem. The obvious exception is Timothy Steele, but that is because he came to the new formalism out of the Wintersian tradition, whereas most of the other new formalists did not.
Dana Gioia too, and the unobtrusive meter of things like this:
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46412/in-chandler-country
Thanks so much James! This is a wonderful comment, and you are quite right to discern that I don't know well that first generation of "new formalist" poets you mention. I am very interested by your sense that this movement (such as it is) started off, formally speaking, with more of a "British" approach to form and metre, which has been pursued -- I think you are saying -- by a few poets (like Salter & Leithauser, whom I look forward to exploring), though not perhaps by a very large number. Lots for me to follow up here, which is exactly what I was hoping for. Do you have any thoughts on Duncan -- where is his influence most felt (if anywhere) today?
As the other comment here indicates, Dana and Michael Donaghy are the crucial connection. Donaghy died right after the summer are first started spending time around the new formalists, but he was a mentor to many. Dana published a short book on British poetry that was exceptionally important. Regardless of whether any of the new formalists were looking to England though (aside from Dana and Michael and those who were following them, I can't be too sure), most of what was supposedly "new formalism" was only ever "semi-formal." I attribute that to those poets generally not being sure how far they wanted to go in the metrical direction and also to not being sure how much they were willing to be alienated from the mainstream.
When I would talk about attention to form, as a young poet, writers with whom I had nothing in common would consistently bring up Duncan. And though I know Thom Gunn liked Duncan's work, I don't think anything I came across in the anthologies was enough to interest me. Perhaps I'll revisit, but I don't know; from what I've seen, it's just not what I come to poetry for. Crane of course I've always appreciated, though with the usual Wintersian criticisms at the front of my mind.
I may need to reread Gioia’s book (Barrier of a Common Language, 2003, collected essays from the 80s and 90s). I was looking at Burgess’s Byrne recently and I see now I’d forgotten that Gioia included an essay on that novel in verse.
Several of the book’s essays (Burgess, Causley, Fenton, Gunn) are on Gioia’s site:
https://danagioia.com/essays
What an interesting discussion. Thank you all very much for sharing this.
I confess I’m not the biggest fan of poems about poetry, so maybe that partly explains why I never took to Duncan. Looking him up in a couple of college textbooks/anthologies here, I found no trace, so I think you’re correct, that he’s not read or taught much, if he ever was.
Possibly Tracy K. Smith hits the visionary note you’re thinking of, at least she did a dozen years ago in her Life on Mars collection:
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/55518/the-universe-as-primal-scream
That's fair and makes sense -- Duncan does write a lot (even mainly) about poetry, which makes him both genuinely Pindaric, and also a modernist in a way that Lawrence (arguably) is not. Many thanks for the recommendation -- will follow up.