Questions of Possibility Contemporary Poetry and Poetic Form [Paperback]

Questions of Possibilityexamines the particular forms that contemporary American poets favor and those they neglect. The poets' choices reveal both their ambitions and their limitations, the new possibilities they discover and the traditions they find unimaginable.

By means of close attention to the sestina, ghazal, love sonnet, ballad, and heroic couplet, this study advances a new understanding of contemporary American poetry. Rather than pitting closed verse against open and traditional poetry against experimental, Questions of Possibilityexplores how poets associated with different movements inspire and inform each other's work. Discussing a range of authors, from Charles Bernstein, Derek Walcott, and Marilyn Hacker to Agha Shahid Ali, David Caplan treats these poets as contemporaries who share the language, not as partisans assigned to rival camps. The most interesting contemporary poetry crosses the boundaries that literary criticism draws, synthesizing diverse influences and establishing surprising affinities. In a series of lively readings, Caplan charts the diverse characteristics and accomplishments of modern poetry, from the gay and lesbian love sonnet to the currently popular sestina.

In his indispensable book,Questions of Possibility, David Caplan argues that 'the plurality of alternatives that contemporary poets encounter' has destabilized our sense of 'acceptable options'.
--Carmine Starnino,Lazy Bastardism: Essays & Reviews on Contemporary Poetry

Among the virtues of David Caplan'sQuestions of Possibilityis his concern to debunk the malignant view that aesthetic conservatism is politically retrograde, [and] offers a useful assessment of the delicate balance poets face when confronting volatile, disturbing, and otherwise complex subjects in the late twentieth century. -Jed Rasula,American Literary History

Caplan admirably steers a thoroughly personl#—