I am pleased to disclose that three of my poems--including the Billy Collins rant extensively workshopped here--kick off the recent second issue of Bill Carlson's Iambs and Trochees. Many other of OUR poets are represented there, but I'm not going to mention them because I want you to check the journal out.
Although we have added some formal-friendly e-journals in the past few years, the small number of likeminded print journals has dwindled. The only recent start up I know of is this one, and it's a well edited mix of the usual suspects and rising stars. I think we all need ventures like this one to survive, so check it out at www.iambsandtrochees.com. By the way, Bill is talented, prompt and polite--a joy to work with.

Well,I'm having trouble getting to the website, so you can email Bill at carwill@prodigy.net or write him at 6801 19th Ave 5H, Brooklyn NY 11204.

The I&A site is best reached via Internet Explorer.

Well, the link works if you don't attach a period to it:

www.iambsandtrochees.com

However, went to the site and Yargh! No way to turn off the murky "charming" piano music short of turning off my speakers.

Kevin

[quote]Originally posted by Michael Juster:

"Although we have added some formal-friendly e-journals in the past few years, the small number of likeminded print journals has dwindled."

Mike, of the couple thousand print journals out there, are you saying that most of them are seeking non-formal work? I've been under the impression that most first-rate literary journals are delighted to find good, formal work.

I don't question the "dwindling." That's economic. But I think that we have an edge at most good journals when we present formal work, especially if the piece demonstrates the confident use of, or the gentle bending of a received form.

Bob

Bob: I couldn't disagree more. Many of the top journals don't take formal verse at all, most others take it sparingly, and those who take it sparingly usually want the big name. It took me nearly a decade to break into a few "mainstream" places, and most everyone here who has had success in formal journals feels similarly, I would bet.

Just some statistics on what Mike
said:

"Poet's Market" lists, oh, I don't
know--about 1700 markets (magazines?)
for verse.

Each year, I go through the new edition
and count the number of markets that say something
like: "Absolutely no rhyme!" "We hate meter!"
"No goddamned rhyme." "You'd better be Yeats
himself or the second coming if you write
in meter or rhyme." Etc., etc. Some of them
are absolutely scathing.

This year it was up around 70 journals. And those
are just the ones that specifically come out
and admit they won't publish meter. Add in those
who won't admit it but almost never print
metrical work and then make your own estimate.

Yes, I know--"Poetry" and "Paris Review" may
print 2 metrical pieces per issue, but that's
still what--2 or 3 % ?

Probably true with rhyme... But you can slip blank verse past practically anyone. Most anti-form editors wouldn't know unrhymed iambic pentameter if it bit them on the assonance.

Len,

If you had to write a paragraph on why publications
say "no rhyme, no meter" etc, what would you write?
In order to say no (or yes) to something there
must be a reason they have in their minds.

There only thing I've ever thought of as to why
formal poetry is not wanted so much is because
when it goes off center it goes off center fast,
and makes crashing noises, and editors get tired of
the noise.

Also, are editors really interested in the art or
are they interested in subscriptions? Formalists
are fewer in number.

Is formalism simply seen as old-fashioned, something
from the 1800's?

TJ

Tom, I believe it is as Alicia says:
either ignorance (they wouldn't recommend
meter if it had a parking ticket on it) or
else the by now ancient prejudices that
spawned modernism: the 19th century was
being written off for its didacticism,
sentimentality, bombast, etc., and since (as Tim
Steele points out) these qualities were showing
up in metrical and rhymed poems, the modernists
thought it might be a good idea to throw out
all infants and bathing receptacles at once.

But what do meter and rhyme have to do with
sentimentality or didacticism? These are qualities
eminently available to free verse or prose.

What slightly puzzles me is the ferocity and
vehemence of those who hate meter and rhyme. I sense
that they want cutting-edge, "transgressive," avant garde,
corrosive, ugly, violent, stuff that makes people
respond--something I also suspect they think people
won't do to meter and rhyme. They think if the poem
isn't the equivalent of screaming vomit (a good title
for one of these sorts of journals?) it isn't "real"
or "authentic."
Sigh.