European and Anglophone identities combine in experimental UK poetry

On The Best American Poetry blog, Leslie McGrath talks with Carrie Etter, an American expat poet living in England, about the relationships between American and British experimental poetry. When McGrath was managing editor of Drunken Boat and saw it as part of her duty to fortify herself with as much experimental literature as possible, she had difficulty finding British poetry until coming across Etter's anthology Infinite Difference: Other Poetries by UK Women. Now a contributing editor, McGrath will put together her own folio of experimental UK poetry through Drunken Boat this year. Describing Etter's work itself as "a must-read for those Americans interested in how poets writing the same language approach the page through the portal of the avant garde," McGrath is particularly interested in the cross-pollination that takes place between Americans and British writers and the role that the rest of Europe plays in influencing the contemporary British body of work.

Is there a healthy experimental poetry scene in the UK these days?  Do British experimental poets read American experimentalists? Experimental work from other countries?

While there is a lively "experimental" poetry scene in the UK, it doesn't receive the funding and critical support mainstream poetry does. You'll never see a truly experimental title shortlisted for a prize, for example.

I've found British experimental poets especially outward-looking in their reading of poets from a range of languages and cultures. I think British experimental poets have an awareness of themselves as both European and Anglophone poets, and that combination fuels some interesting projects and connections, i.e. VLAK, which is published in Prague, Melbourne, Amsterdam, London, and New York.