This Third Factory essay by Steve Evans has been floating around for awhile but I've only recently read it. It's a muckraking essay on the corporatization of poetry--in particular, Dana Gioia and John Barr's attempt to move NEA and Poetry (remember those Ruth Lily benjamins?) rightward. The essay will also be out in the Baffler. I just wanted to point out my favorite part:

"There is great poetry being written in the academy,” John Barr told Kevin Larimer of Poets & Writers, “but we might get a broader experience base in poetry if people did things other than write and teach.” Need a concrete example? Here is Barr’s favorite: “Ernest Hemingway. In 1933 he took his first safari...he shot lions and went home and wrote about it.... I don’t know a lot of poets who do that.”


Well, doggone it. I'm gonna get my rifle and go on a safari and shoot me some zebras and then I'm gonna write a crown of sonnets about it!