Do Poets Get Better?

[sirenoftitan1]

Let's talk a minute about contemporary poets. Let's say I tell you to go check out Bill Knott (as I did in my last post). You go to the library, and see seven or eight of his books. How do you choose which one to decide

Comments

[marced4life]

Personally, I tend to grab a collected works so that I can see their progression over time. If one isn't available, I will choose both the earliest and latest so that I can get a sense of where they started and where they ended up and/or are currently going.

[lowhumcrush]

I second collected works.

Two things

[jwbaz]

1. A matter of personal connection. All artists should in theory grow, evolve, and change over time. However, that doesn't necessarily mean that you will enjoy the latter work more. For example, Jeffrey McDaniel. Many people would say that he gets better all the time and The Endarkenment is his finest collection. Personally, I prefer his older stuff; not that it's "better" or "worse" but I just find myself connecting to it on a more intense level. The complete opposite is true with other poets

[anonymous]

all my books of poetry can be downloaded FREE from this page:

http://stores.lulu.com/store.php?fAcctID=22392489

....

Bill Knott

[elliotharmon]

Haha, isn't Google Alerts great? There's no longer a line between talking about people and talking to them.

I do a lot of Googling to see which book gets the most talked about. That book kind of serves as an entry point, so I can know what people are talking about and go from there. Take Robert Hass: if you read only his last couple of books and didn't read Praise, a lot of what people say about him would seem really off.

[sirenoftitan1]

Ah, you are more organized than I.

And yes, this is the first time that a famous poet has ever commented on my LJ.