There have always been poets who performed. Blake sang his Songs of Innocence and Experience to parties of friends.
Adrian MitchellStadium rock and commercial rock are the opposite of what poetry needs. An audience of around 200 is ideal for poetry.
Adrian MitchellThe maiden Olympics had more to protest about than mere war, though. Central to its ethos was a rejection of two establishments the political one, certainly, but also that of the wider poetry world itself. It changed poetry for ever in the UK, ... It led to readings all over the country. You suddenly got more women reading and publishing poems, as well as gay guys and poets from all over the world. Until that time, published poetry had been very university-based white, male, middle-class. We were trying to break poetry out of its academic confines.
Adrian Mitchell