Wednesday, 8 May 2013

Miscellaneous lit quotes

I've been clearing out my mailbox (1000s of posts). Here are some lit-related fragments -

  • From "New Walk", issue 3
    Patrick McGuinness: The real issue for me is that the poetry reviewing culture is so poor - the only reviews you see are positive, exercises in approval and rubber-stamping

    Philip Morre: But you're hardly a noted practitioner of the scrutineering review yourself, are you?

    Patrick McGuinness: Since you ask, perhaps not, but I've written some reviews that were evaluative rather than just log-rolling, I think. I even sent a negative (commissioned) review to Poetry Review a couple of years ago, was thanked profusely by the editor for my honesty and told that it was exactly the sort of review she was after. A few months later it was dropped, and I was told by the same editor that it was for my own sake sake, that I might regret it, etc.
  • 2011 rates -
    New Yorker $460/36-line-poem
    Paris Review $75/poem
    Ploughshares $25/page
    Poetry $10/line
  • Burnett's edition includes "all of Larkin's poems whose texts are accessible." These texts, meticulously checked against primary sources, are offered under four rubrics:
    • the four volumes published in Larkin's lifetime "preserved as collections" (117 poems);
    • other poems published in the poet's lifetime but not included in any collection (36 poems in order of publication date);
    • poems not published in the poet's lifetime (403 poems in chronological order determined by the date on which Larkin stopped working on each poem);
    • and undated or approximately dated poems (10 poems).
  • "As the pseudonymous Harvey Porlock noted, 'Reading reviews of modern poetry is like attending prize-giving in a small, caring primary school: everyone has done terribly well, it's all absolutely marvellous'"
  • We fray into the future, rarely wrought/ Save in the tapestries of afterthought - Richard Wilbur

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