A Modest Proposal for Poets

There seems to be a trend and maybe it will hit the tipping point and something good will happen for the poets out there bouncing from one adjunct position to another, getting by without job security or health insurance. First there was this plea to the Poetry Foundation for a financial commitments to poets.  Last week guest author Charles Coe posted this open letter to poetry presenters suggesting that poets have a right to expect financial compensation when they share their work. Now comes a proposal from poet Joe Weil, which he posted on facebook. He agreed to let me share it here and urged me to let it be known that he's interested in improvements that might take his proposal from idea to reality: 

I want to start an alliance of non-tenured poets. I'd need a lawyer to handle the incorporation pro bono (there are poet/lawyers) and I'd need members. It would work as follows: dues would be 20 bucks a month. Three quarters of that would go to reading series who agree to host only ANTP members for at least half their reading season. They could use our funding only on ANTP members. The rest of the funds would be invested into a retirement home. If a member became tenured, they could remain in the alliance by agreeing to pay extra dues of 40 dollars a month. Otherwise, they would withdraw as a member in good standing. At a thousand members strong such a union would be a powerful force for the following:

1. Fostering a funding system outside the power structures which have shown themselves to be closer to the 1 percent than to any true spirit of egalitarianism.
2. Assuring that poets could travel and read with at least a modicum of dignity and remuneration for their troubles.
3. Setting an example for America that cooperative actions by-passing the corparia are still possible.
4. Letting the Academy know, especially the NEA and the Poetry Foundation that they have fallen down on the job and have failed miserably to fund anything but their cronies.

Criteria for being admitted in ANTP:

1. Either a book or chap book published by a press during the past six years or

2. A resume showing one has featured in at least ten readings over the last three years.

3. A day job, or a non-tenured teaching position or retirement status with proof of regular support of readings, and at least six features over the years.

4. In liue of a book or chap book, publication in at least four literary magazines over the last three years, and at least ten featured readings.

ANTP will promote ANTP readings where possible, and defend our right to assure the union prospers as an agency of independent funding for those who otherwise would receive little to no honorarium for their troubles.

Let me know if you're interested. I would not be president. I would nominate someone with administrative and labor experience as president and seek a pro-bono lawyer willing to handle us. Let me know if anyone out there has these qualifications and would be willing to take on the responsibility. THis is a good idea. It will probably be ruined by poet's tendencies to kiss up and enforce elitist structures, but I just thought I'd put it out there. I was asked to go to AWP. I refused. I reufsed for political reasons. I don't like what I am seeing in poetry, and I want all readings and series to be funded-- if not by the big shots, than by a poet's union.

What do you think? Please share your ideas in the comment field.

--sdh

Comments

[Surazeus]

I think that would work if every poet who joins and contributes dues gets a chance to go on a reading that is equally funded with all other readings. I can see how it could be abused so that a small group gets lots of well-funded readings and all the others never get to go on one. That could be avoided if a system was established that ensured equal opportunity for every member to benefit.

[Troy Camplin]

Poetry is a part of the gift economy. One has to wonder what would happen to poetry if it were brought into the market economy like this. I'm hardly saying that it wouldn't be a good thing -- but all such changes have unforeseen and unintended consequences. Still, it's the kind of bottom-up solution that might actually benefit poets. But they will no longer be purely in the gift economy.

[Marissa Despain]

This sounds to me like a version of the Screen Actors Guild and it makes a lot of sense. If poetry were part of the gift economy, why do some poets get paid a lot (those who give readings at, say, the 92nd Street Y in NYC) and others get nothing? A poetry reading is entertainment and entertainers should be paid for their work. It should also be that publications with certain #s of subscribers must pay above an established minimum,and readings sponsored by certain well-endowed institutions should do likewise. I'm assuming that by being a non-tenured poet one could be outside of academia entirely, working at some other kind of job to support his or her poetry writing.

[Nin Andrews]

I think this is a great idea. And I'm very interested in your political reasoning about AWP. I think there should be some options to AWP. Some celebrations perhaps that one might enjoy rather than merely survive, if that. For imaginative people, how sheeplike we become.

[amy glynn]

Count. Me. In. Seriously. Something like this -- and yes, it is a lot like SAG -- would do more than simply shore up the poor schlubs who operate outside the ivory tower (I chose not to pursue teaching creative writing for the simple reason that I was 20 when i received my mfa and knew little except that I was not yet experienced enough to teach anything. Ironically, now that I'd be good at it I am a less attractive candidate than the hordes of 24 year olds who are free to relocate to pocatello and work for peanuts as an adjunct.)

It would actually make a step toward re-establishing the legitimacy of this thing we call avocation. Remember avocation? William Carlos Williams. Wallace Steven. AR Ammons. any number of our Really Important writers had DAY JOBS. Had expertise in fields that were not poetry. Were fed by those other inputs and not stuck in the self-referential Charibdis of the MFA program where before you know it you are 28 and still only able to write poems about writing poems.

There are some amazing writers who teach. Some of them are even really gifted teachers and they should be doing it. The rest of us should not be delegitimized by the fact that we pay the bills by being paralegals, EMTs, cardiologists, middle school math teachers, cab drivers, sales executives, pharmacologists, project managers or software engineers. Having a guild structure would really be helpful, in a lot of ways.

Caution: I have to disagree with the above poster on dues paying being a guarantee of paid reading appearances. Please believe me when I say that a large percentage, possibly a majority percentage, of SAG, the Screenwriters Guild, and related entities have NO SUCH GUARANTEE. That would be like saying anyone with homeowners' insurance can expect a funded bathroom renovation. SAG members still audition, and get turned down or ignored. There are a bazillion people writing poems and not every single one of us has the inherent right to demand an audience. It could, however, ensure you a minimum honorarium for the readings you do, and that would be an amazing step up from what most of us deal with

[amy glynn]

PS Charles Coe -- Ask anyone who knows me about my "suck-up" factor. I would *love* to talk to you about heading this effort and, as I have cultivated other skill sets than teaching creative writing, I think I have a sense of what it would take to do it.

I just presented a multidisciplinary panel on poetry and ecology last night, at a public library, for a 250 person audience. I organized it myself (the librarian was incredibly helpful and enthusiastic, but it was my idea and i chose the panelists and designed the program) and even so, I walked in last night with no idea whether I was being paid. We just hadn't talked about it, because no one wanted to seem venal or focused on this as a commercial enterprise, and ta-da. I was given an honorarium, and was happy to receive it. But it shouldn't have been in question and it was so because everyone felt so sheepish about bringing it up. If we had a structure wherein that was a foregone conclusion, it would be very helpful not only for poets but for venues who host readings. It would make things clear and simple.

Needless to say, I am unable to work for free. :-) but I'm not joking. email me.