Spreading the Word: Editors on Poetry

by Stephen Corey (Editor), Warren Slesinger (Editor)

Essays. Poetics. Compiled by Stephen Corey and Warren Slesinger. In these essays, the editors of twenty literary magazines discuss the philosophy and practice of selecting poems. Written especially for this collection, each of the essays combines practical information with insightful commentary on the nature of writing and editing and contains an exemplary poem by a contemporary poet. Of interest to those who consider sending out their poems for publication as well as students, teachers, and poets in search of a reliable source of information for creative writing courses. Editors from the following magazines contributed to the revised edition: Alaska Quarterly Review, The American Poetry Review, The Arttioch Review, The Beloit Poetry Journal, The Carolina Quarterly, Chelsea, Crab Orchard Review, The Georgia Review, Hiram Poetry Review, The Iowa Review, The Kenyon Review, The Laurel Review, Lesbian Review, Manoa: A Pacific Journal of International Writing, Many Mountains Moving, New Letters,

Genres: Poetry, Essays, School

146 pages, Paperback

First published March 29, 2001

Reviews

[R. Henrichs · Rating 4 out of 5]

A bit dated, but a good book for any poet to have on their shelf.

[Eric · Rating 2 out of 5]

Though I'm giving it the same stars, I think this book was put together a lot better than The Whole Story, which is kind of the sister to this edition. The Whole Story (as you can see in my previous review) dealt with fiction, whereas this deals with poetry. They were put together by the same publishing company, only this is a revised and expanded edition to a collection put out in 1990. The editors here had so much more insight, were better writers, and what they had to say wasn't completely the same as it was in The Whole Story. They each went into their journals a bit, gave you the poem, and then focused on a few things they saw working for the poem. The Whole Story constantly spoiled the ending and a lot of the pages were throwaway. Here we had a good amount of honesty, editors expressing how they didn't like a piece at first, or that this wasn't the best piece they've seen but was placed to give you a better idea of something that would catch their eye, or, that that piece was just interesting. I liked this. It made the literary journal world not seem so small and showed there is room for all different types of work.

[Lauren · Rating 3 out of 5]

A collection of essays by editors from various poetry journals/reviews were they talked about their criteria for editing and publishing poetry and a poem they felt was exemplary of those criteria. I liked how the editors stated their "requirements" for picking out a poem and then proceeded to share a poem they thought match those best (a poem they enjoyed). I loved how directly after the poem the editor analyzed it for the reader. There was a wonderful variation of journals, Manoa Pacific Ocean of International Writing and a Lesbian poetry review journal are so vastly different, it was refreshing to experiences such a range of poetry.

[Shelley Ottem]

Love this book, it led me to a poem "The White" by Suzanne Paola.