Dave- You arrived during the dog days when I was gone, so I'll add my welcome here - this is a great thread and I look forward to Ludlow. I esteem compression, too, there's little worse than a baggy poem. Before I'll read Darlington Falls, I want to read Cats of the Temple or The Mail From Anywhere and know that the writer's not going to waste my time.
That said, good verse novels offer rewards one doesn't find in short verse. Also: I've come to believe that if Pewtry (sorry, I have to use Amis's construction to keep a straight face) is to undergo anything resembling a renaissance, it'll be because someone writes a great, trashy, page-turning, pot-boiling verse novel that seduces lots of people into reading verse before they know it. Seth came closer than most, but Don Juan is still the one to beat.
No one's mentioned it - but it's interesting both because it pushes lots of narrative boundaries and is the work of an accomplished prose writer - Byrne, the last work by Anthony Burgess.
Frank
[This message has been edited by FOsen (edited August 22, 2004).]
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