Paul Muldoon TLS

"Those who are able to make a living from art will always be in a small minority. The difference between either resisting ‘professionalisation’ or identifying as a ‘professional’ poet in a more fluid sense seems to be whether we experience this as an active or passive shift, as something either structurally imposed or conscientiously adopted. Whether the reflex is to bristle or brighten at the evolving language of these debates, a clearer focus on its practical effects will help us understand the new situation it creates. Alongside questions of pay, we might come to view poetry’s occupational turn as less a threat to creative integrity than a reflection of the need to widen its opportunities." JT Welsch The Poetry Review