Quote:Is there basis today, without multiple distractions (such as popular music, TV, movies, Internet) for the long patience in building up the literary language and solid profoundity and depth CAS had?
This is an interesting question, because CAS was in fact unusually precocious, and he developed his poetic gifts very quickly. I have read that one common denominator in cases of precocious genius is that, as children, the geniuses in question were exposed primarily to
adult company, and had comparatively little exposure to their peers in age (siblings excepted). This pattern certainly fits CAS's early life.
So, it seems that not only are pop culture and technological diversions a distraction that would interfere with literary genius, but, in our overly-social climate, so is socialization by child peers, rather than primarily by adults.
As for literary journals, I know that many of the most "prestigious", which are affiliated with colleges or universities, receive such a large number of poems for potential publication that MFA students, or even upper-class English majors, act as "gatekeepers" and do the bulk of the first readings. CAS today would be lucky even to have his work read by an actual editor before rejection, let alone to have his poems accepted. A perusal of the
Poet's Market shows that even journals that I would consider to be relatively non-descript routinely receive between 5,000 and 10,000 submissions, annually, of which they'll accept maybe one or two percent. Gresham's Law is more alive than ever, in the field of contemporary poetry.