[Lilith]

Some related questions for our Lariats and other Erats:

--To what extent can one maintain a commitment to formalism alongside an appreciation of free verse (as a writer and/or as a reader)? To what extent can a devotee of free verse appreciate formal poetry?

--Do writers of formal poetry tend to stick to formal poetry once they've mastered its challenges (meter, rhyme, etc.)? How many formalists today also write good free verse?

--Is it the poem or the poet who decides what form the writing takes?

--How likely are poets writing today to label themselves as writers who focus exclusively on either form or free verse?

--How deep and wide is the division between free verse and formal poetry in the contemporary literary/publishing scene?

I realize these are loaded questions, and I expect that asking them on these boards will most likely elicit a certain set of answers -- but I decided to pose them anyway and see what happens. They emerged after a recent heated discussion with a poet friend of mine. She is passionately devoted to free verse and tends to believe that formalism is "dead".... an attitude that is hardly new or novel, alas.... and one I certainly don't share. (Wouldn't be here if I did, would I?) We got to talking about New Formalism and divisons between different types of poetry and different types of poets, and I've been thinking about it ever since.

I look forward to your thoughts, opinions, rants, and answers, and I'm interested to see what kind of a discussion might come from all of this.

Lilith