Is It Academic?

More from Ken Edwards:

None of the poets I grew up with were taught at college how to write innovative poetry; the learning happened outside of the academy by and large, even if there were academic mentors around. Will exciting stuff happen as a result of the great explosion of creative writing courses in this country? I'm not holding my breath.

The irony, though, is that most of my poet peers now earn their crust in education, generally higher education. While I was assembling the new Reality Street website recently, I was struck by the fact that the vast majority of poets my press has published are described as teaching or having taught for a living. And the opportunities for paid readings, vanishingly few as they are for most of us, are largely provided by the academies.

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