To Susan McLean: Susan, you hit the nail smack on the head with
"Gail is the best living American satirical poet I know, male or female. It is a mystery to me that she isn't as well known and well loved as Wendy Cope is in the UK. I attribute that failure of recognition not to her gender, though (for Sam Gwynn is also not widely known and also excellent in that field) but to America's general disdain for humorous verse. Someone like Billy Collins is allowed to be funny and wildly popular because he writes in free verse, the only acceptable form of contemporary poetry to the vast majority of Americans who care about poetry."
I believe the same can be said of X.J. Kennedy, who had to publish his humorous verse in a separate volume, the recent PEEPING TOM'S CABIN. When humorous verse is formal, it is generally dismissed. Thank goodness we have LIGHT (even though they won't print the "f" word). I wonder what U.S. publishers would have done with Larkin's "This Be the Verse."
Now, on the subject of whether or not there is, as Tim Murphy says, a phenomenal eruption of terrific contemporary poetry by women, I'm beginning to think it has more to do with formal poetry than anything else. Just look at all the sonnets! I'll have to bring this up elsewhere. Meanwhile, Tim, it doesn't seem as though too many men (other than F. Osen and Quincy Lehr, who wanted to stay out of it) are finding your observation particularly approachable.
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