The Best American Poetry 1988

The Best American Poetry 1988, the first volume in The Best American Poetry series, was edited by David Lehman and by guest editor John Ashbery, who chose one of his own poems among the group of 75.

Although Lehman would later use his forewords as a kind of "state of poetry" review of the previous year, in this first volume he concentrated on the nature of this anthology, with most of the foreword given over to explaining the mechanics of the process (see The Best American Poetry series for those comments).

There seem to be plenty of creative writing programs, so it appears there will be an audience for the series, Lehman wrote, and with poetry appearing in so many different publications, an annual anthology could help readers find poetry in one place.

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