On Poets Editing Poets

This article in The Economist, written in response to this piece from The Telegraph, takes on the (apparently) touchy subject of whether a poet needs another poet to edit her work.

It begins, and then takes a strange gender-turn:

Don Paterson, an editor and a poet, claimed that “A non-poet can’t do a line-edit on a poem”; it is essential for an editor to be a poet, too. Michael Schmidt, the editor of Carcanet Press and PN Review, added that the job can be tricky when grappling with the work of someone from a different culture. “If you’re publishing a Zimbabwean poet or a poet from India or New Zealand, they’ll speak a language different from your own,” he said, adding, “This is an issue between genders as well.”

Both these points are slightly disquieting. If only poets can edit the work of another, does that mean that only poets fully comprehend the work? As a poetry reviewer, I often get asked if I write poems myself. Though such a question is slightly flattering, in its way, it is also rather strange. Film reviewers love films, but don’t often make them themselves; the same goes for theatre, dance and, to a lesser degree, fiction (as novelists often review the work of others). The impulse to write poetry and the ability to understand and appreciate it are separate things. But poetry has got something of a bad reputation. It is seen as something more difficult, or obscure, and so it is best understood (and enjoyed) by those who practice it. The fact that it can be engaged with on a critical level by those who wouldn’t begin to write in verse (or at all) is overlooked.

Mr Rahim goes on to say that “We don’t expect fiction editors to be novelists”, yet his article suggests—meaningfully and open-endedly—that poetry is very different from prose. There is the pervading sense that poetry, by being perhaps more emotionally engaging, touches our gender more vividly than other forms of writing—hence the argument about the sex of one’s editor.

Then, a bit later:

Mr Schmidt backed away somewhat from his point about gender in an e-mail. He observed that daring poetry often deals with taboo subjects, which can confound editors who don’t quite understand or empathise with the point of view. He writes that “Sujata Bhatt's poems about menstruation, sexual desire and gratification, are radical, and publishing such poets and poems has been tonic for editors and readers”, yet such work might have taxed the judgement of a more conventional male editor. “More often, however, you'll find an excellent rapport between a good poet and a good editor of whatever cultural or sexual persuasion.”

For Ms Flynn, however, the difference between a male or female editor is slightly more straightforward: “I work with a male editor. I can’t say what difference it would make. I would probably annoy a female one just as much.”

Read the rest after the jump.