So how does The Best American Poetry function as an anthology? Though poetry anthologies have been a staple of American publishing since the late 18th century, The Best American Poetry is an odd iteration of the genre. It is not a textbook in the style of the well-known Norton anthologies familiar to so many English majors, nor is it a standalone anthology intervening in a historical canon. As a yearly compendium of “the best” poems, it operates much like an annual literary prize—Lehman calls its publication each September “an annual rite of autumn”—with guest editors serving as a rotating cast of judges. The award, shared by all 75 poets in each volume, is one’s ability to thereafter list in contributor bios their appearance in The Best American Poetry—a much-vaunted laurel. As Lehman says, the anthology works to “let the public know which poems have gotten the nod” from that edition’s popular editor. This professional esteem also flows vertically back to those editors, often begetting, among other forms of institutional prestige, more anthologies. Over half of the series’ guest editors have edited at least one other poetry anthology, many after their involvement with The Best American Poetry. It is an anthology project that breeds anthologists.
It is also an anthology project that breeds controversy. When critic Harold Bloom was invited by Lehman to select “the best of the best” American poems for the series’ 10th anniversary edition, Bloom refused to select any poems from the volume guest-edited by Adrienne Rich. Though Lehman positioned himself as a neutral facilitator of Bloom’s editorial decision, it is difficult to see his staging of his “maverick” critical comrade as anything other than an incitement against the political commitments of Rich’s “radical” iteration of the anthology. Rich’s anthology, says Bloom, is “of a badness not to be believed, because it follows the criteria now operative: what matters most are the race, gender, sexual orientation, ethnic origin, and political purpose of the would-be poet.” He cannot condone, he says, “the false generosity of any Affirmative Action in the judging of poetry.”
The response to The Best of The Best American Poetry was forceful. Rita Dove called Bloom a “frightened cultural fundamentalist.” Nikki Giovanni was more direct: “He is wrong. All racists are wrong.” Kevin Young was one of the few to acknowledge the sympathy Lehman shared with Bloom’s discriminations, noting “it does not take a theory of anxiety or Paul de Man to see that even ‘apolitical’ aestheticism is another form of ideology.” For his part, Lehman experienced the Bloom episode as less about racial politics than economics. Having “learned the publishing value of provocation,” Lehman found himself “relieved when my publisher informed me that the denunciations had helped sell books.”