Evan Mantyk is the president and co-founder of the Society of Classical Poets. He teaches courses in literature and history at Fei Tian Academy of the Arts, in upstate New York. He previously worked as a news editor and reporter in New York City. Please describe your website and your duties as editor/writer. The Society of Classical Poets is dedicated to the proliferation of classical poetry. What does that mean? It means poetry usually with rhyme and/or meter. It also means poetry of good character that puts the reader first, not the poet. The government’s “Survey on National Participation in the Arts,” found, over the last twenty years or so, a sharp decline in the number of people who had read or listened to a poem within the last 12 months while other literary forms stayed static. This is not puzzling or surprising to me; these figures are the natural outcome of an artistic form that has lost its way and is dying. When ordinary non-poets and non-academics can’t recognize that the free verse in front of them is a poem and can’t make heads or tails of the meaning or why it’s worth caring about, then something is wrong. continue...