The Bibiliography of American Poetry told through the Pulitzer Prize is a little-appreciated piece of obsessiveness that I started compiling in the early 90s. Looking back, it was my first Derivative Works/ GoogObits-y type of work product in that it is a smart-alecky/ link-laden adventure of tangents. Here’s the introduction:
The Bibiliography of American Poetry told through the Pulitzer Prize is a list of every book of poetry that ever won the Pulitzer Prize. It is, by definition, an American list.
Since we at Juggernaut really only care about American Performance Poetry, the list is tilted to view these books through that bias. There is also an obvious Chicago bias to the list as well.
I liked making this list because it focuses on books. Instead of focusing on "superstar" poems, ripping them from their published contexts, I compiled this list by personally obtaining and seeing each of the books– most of them through the library. I was able to see the binding, the dedications, the order of poems, the signatures of the poets– all the things that make a book stand on its own two feet.
So by focusing on the books I was able to see certain patterns– who’s scratching whose back, which publishers keep winning no matter kind of crap they pump out, and what consistently gets ignored.
There’s a lot of good stuff here. Thanks for reading.