Jeremy Paxman doesn't see that poetry is felt, not fathomed | George Szirtes

Jeremy Paxman, as chair of this year's Forward prize, has been doing his provocative best to institute what he calls an "inquisition" whereby poets would be required to explain themselves and, presumably, answer for their failure to be simpler. Poetry, he said, should "aim to engage with ordinary people much more". Let us imagine the inquisition then.

"Are you, or have you ever been, an incomprehensible poet?" asks the committee. The poet looks shiftily around, as Shostakovich did when arraigned by Stalin, for his artist's creative response to just criticism, but Paxo will have none of it. The People will have none of it. You have made your own gulag, Paxo thunders, now lie in it.