Freelance Poets

My fiance tells me that there is no such thing as a "freelance poet."

How did we get on this topic? He is a writer/editor. In the past, he's had to deal with the public, including those who describe themselves as "freelance poets."

Since I've done my share of hanging out at poetry readings, I know pretentiousness and irrelevancy firsthand. Not to say that poetry itself is that way. Many of my dead mentors have been poets, including T.S. Eliot, Kerouac, and a number of Buddhist monks. Still, some of my favorite blowhard writer stereotypes come from hanging out in the poetry circuit.

So is there such a thing as a "freelance poet"? He says no. And because he says no, I say yes. Someone out there being hired as an independent contractor, writing poetry for a small magazine. It may not be the Saturday Evening Post, but it provides a coffee allowance.

Then again, maybe the term "freelance poet" is redundant. After all, how many poets are hired for that type of work. We don't call screenwriters, "freelance screenwriters", do we?

Is there such a thing as a "freelance poet"? What do you think?

Comments

[J.D.]

I've never heard anyone call themselves a freelance poet. Only a poet. So the phrase sounds strange. When I have participated in the ATHE conference, the ATHE people have always called me a "freelance playwright." I took that to mean someone outside the university system, who writes because she can't help herself.

I defer to the M-W 3rd International dictionary, which says:
Main Entry:free lance
Function:noun
Etymology:1free + lance

1 a : a knight or roving soldier available for hire by a state or commander : FREE COMPANION, CONDOTTIERE b : one who acts on his own responsibility without regard to party lines or deference to authority
2 : one who pursues a profession or occupation usually in the arts under no long-term contractual commitments to any one employer or company *the free lance works from his own studio, contacting his clients when necessary T is paid by the job, and the number and importance of his jobs depends largely on the reputation he has builtó Design*; especially : a writer who writes stories or articles for the open market with long-term commitments to no one publisher or periodical

[Laura's fiance]

The redundancy issue was indeed my reason for making fun of the person who described herself that way. And also, she wrote horrible poetry, so no one was going to publish her anyway, freelance or otherwise. My thinking at the time was that unless you were a poet laureate, you were a "freelance" poet, so unless you had the "laureate" on the end you were ipso facto "freelance."