Ugh

The New York Times seems to have a thing for the poet Frederick Seidel. He’s so edgy, so transgressive, so — what’s the word I’m looking for? Yes, rich. From a recent review, which dubs Seidel a “dark prince of American poetry”:

He writes often about motorcycles. Like his shoes, he has them custom-made. In one early poem, he asked: “What definition of beauty can exclude / The MV Agusta racing 500-3, / From the land of Donatello, with blatting megaphones?” His poems are life force and death wish. He’s the only living poet who could creditably be played by Nicolas Cage in a biopic.

Seidel is eighty-four.

This post is a partial explanation of why I usually skip Times book reviews.

A related post
Strunk and White and Seidel (Also with motorcycles)