The Play Between Art and Desire: Wilde Boys Salon Gets Some NY Times Love

Alex Dimitrov's Wilde Boys Salon, already off and running, was featured in this here New York Times article:

THE WILDE BOYS first met in May 2009, called together by Mr. Dimitrov, who had just graduated from Sarah Lawrence’s master’s program in poetry. He had been reading David Lehman’s “Last Avant-Garde,” about the New York School poets of the 1950s and ’60s, and wondered why there wasn’t a contemporary school. “Not like a movement,” he said, “but why don’t we have cliques and groups?”

He was also new to New York City, living on the Lower East Side with a college friend. He longed for a community of writers, and sought to create his own by e-mailing a half-dozen aspiring poets his age — some he knew, some he didn’t — and suggesting they discuss their work at a cafe.

“I invited the cute gay poets right away,” Mr. Dimitrov said. “I sort of had a list of gays that I wanted to come, and some of them that I wanted to sleep with.”

Also on the list was Tom Healy, 50, a socially connected former gallery owner, who took a pause from the art world to become a poet. When he received Mr. Dimitrov’s e-mail, he immediately wrote back suggesting that they forgo the cafe in favor of his home — a Fifth Avenue apartment that he shares with his partner, Fred Hochberg, heir of the direct-mail doyenne Lillian Vernon and chairman of the Export-Import Bank of the United States. That turned out to mean catered appetizers and flowing drinks in a former four-bedroom apartment that had been converted into a one-bedroom residence, used frequently for entertaining. For the first meeting, Mr. Dimitrov sent around a handful of poems that he thought the small group might like to discuss. Gradually, attendance grew, but it wasn’t until a few months later that Mr. Healy nudged Mr. Dimitrov to invite famous poets.

The author and critic Daniel Mendelsohn came, then Timothy Liu, Mr. Bidart, Mr. Doty and — a wildly good get — John Ashbery. Interest in the salon surged, lesbians were invited, and other patrons offered their homes. Mr. Dimitrov saw that he could be selective about admission. Every invitation came with a stern reminder: “Please don’t bring a guest.”

Well! Ashbery-as-get! Huzzah!