In this week's Chronicle of Higher Education, David Alpaugh, himself a poet, counts up "The New Math of Poetry" in astounding ways.
"Were a conscientious anthologist of this year's poetry to spend just 10 minutes evaluating each published poem," he says, "he or she would need to work 16,666 hours, which means it would take eight years to assess the eligible poetry for a 2010 anthology." That's how much poetry is being written--how many poets are writing! "If the current rate of growth continues," he maintains, "an anthologist trying to do that in 2100 will spend 141 years reading what promises to be that year's minimum of 1,760,750 published poems."
The grand democracy of the digital age has begotten a world in which everyone can be a writer--or a photographer. It'll cost you little more than time to mount your homemade video on You-Tube, or to create a blog to feature your favorite poets or to publish your own homespun novel. Don't like Best American Short Stories this year?--fine, simply create your own. You can.
Is this incredible sea-change a good thing? In some ways, it's absolutely wonderful. Today, no distinguished ruling tribunal determines what is thoughtful or epoch-making, what is good poetry; today, really, there are no rules--and, more significantly, there are no rulers.
What's incredibly sweet about this new world is that today we're all poets. What's awful about it is the same darn thing. If there are no gate-keepers, who will keep the gate? The answer, of course: no one. Today's literary world is, literally, a free-for-all.
These little shapes dancing out before me now, cured and nurtured into what I consider meaning, make me a writer, just as they would you. We're in a brand new world, where every kid with a guitar and an internet connection can be a musician--and where, therefore, it's becoming more and more difficult to determine really who is.
Take it or leave it--it's where we are today, bobbing along smack dab in the massive flow of the information age that has already devastated the music industry and print journalism, put real photographers out of work, and altered the landscape in publishing forever.
Just remember, it's not costing me a thing to say this either. I'm part of it. So are you. We're all in this together, and who knows where it'll go? No one.
Fascinating. Scary too, somewhat--but really, really fascinating.
"Were a conscientious anthologist of this year's poetry to spend just 10 minutes evaluating each published poem," he says, "he or she would need to work 16,666 hours, which means it would take eight years to assess the eligible poetry for a 2010 anthology." That's how much poetry is being written--how many poets are writing! "If the current rate of growth continues," he maintains, "an anthologist trying to do that in 2100 will spend 141 years reading what promises to be that year's minimum of 1,760,750 published poems."
The grand democracy of the digital age has begotten a world in which everyone can be a writer--or a photographer. It'll cost you little more than time to mount your homemade video on You-Tube, or to create a blog to feature your favorite poets or to publish your own homespun novel. Don't like Best American Short Stories this year?--fine, simply create your own. You can.
Is this incredible sea-change a good thing? In some ways, it's absolutely wonderful. Today, no distinguished ruling tribunal determines what is thoughtful or epoch-making, what is good poetry; today, really, there are no rules--and, more significantly, there are no rulers.
What's incredibly sweet about this new world is that today we're all poets. What's awful about it is the same darn thing. If there are no gate-keepers, who will keep the gate? The answer, of course: no one. Today's literary world is, literally, a free-for-all.
These little shapes dancing out before me now, cured and nurtured into what I consider meaning, make me a writer, just as they would you. We're in a brand new world, where every kid with a guitar and an internet connection can be a musician--and where, therefore, it's becoming more and more difficult to determine really who is.
Take it or leave it--it's where we are today, bobbing along smack dab in the massive flow of the information age that has already devastated the music industry and print journalism, put real photographers out of work, and altered the landscape in publishing forever.
Just remember, it's not costing me a thing to say this either. I'm part of it. So are you. We're all in this together, and who knows where it'll go? No one.
Fascinating. Scary too, somewhat--but really, really fascinating.
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