This is dumb.

A few points:

0. Critiquing your argument is not in any way, shape or form support for what this author did.

1. If an author can expect to see 40-60+ rejections on their work as a matter of course, why is it also indicative of not being "[considerate] of the needs / aesthetics of the journals to which he's sending his work"? Either the writer needs to suck it up and face rejection or suck it up and be more selective but both can't be true when you start your piece by calling the author lazy for not submitting to more journals - after all, maybe he did pare the list down in the first place.

2. This isn't a sample size error unless there are a ton of places such writing could be submitted. There likely a non-random sampling error here, unless places were chosen in a sound, random manner.

But these are quibbles compare to the more important ethical questions here.

A. Would you have been so harsh in your criticism if the name on the poem was the author's true name? Both if the author used his real name, or if the author had actually been Asian? Why?

B. Are there any other poems that you found to be lacking in similar ways in this collection, or is this specific piece uniquely bad? If so, which ones?

C. Should journals and publicans be using a blinded system to judge which pieces for publication in situations where merit of the piece (rather than say personal perspective, experience, etc) is the most important criteria? Many symphonies and operas do this, and it has significantly increased the number of members from minority groups while maintaining/increasing the high standard of performance.

Poetry: the in-fighting is so bitter because the stakes are so low.

That poem seems totally over itself, which I'm sure most of us were shortly into it as well.
And if it adds anything to the transgression perpetrated here, it seems worth noting that Yi-Fen is a woman's name.

God. SO dumb. So a shitty poet lies about his ethnicity to publish a shitty poem - a poem that would otherwise get rejected.

But that poem is "good enough" to get published... IF that poet happens to be an Asian woman? What?

If this isn't the quintessential example of the inanity of identity politics - nothing is.

So the poem is mediocre if written by a white guy but not if it's written by an Asian? So standards are set lower then?

Meanwhile, women writers are submitting manuscripts under male names and, at least anecdotally, getting more frequent and more positive responses from publishers.

It seems everyone sees the greener grass.

Also, it seems really petty and unbecoming to label Hudson as "mediocre" - that's the same brush you are painting every other writer in BAP.

I'm interested to find out what Rich Smith's real name is. Or if Mr. Smith is indeed a Mr. Or a carbon-based life form.

Smith's critique of the quality of the poem and his long explication of why poems are rejected is all beside the point. Alexie thought the poem worthy of inclusion. So those hundreds of words were all wasted.

Likewise his critique of Hudson's submission efforts--number of journals, etc.--and his supposedly faulty understanding of statistics. Hudson made no statistical claims. He simply stated that after having his poem rejected 40 times, he decided to change submission strategies and use an Asian female pen name. He observed that this was successful and has been successful in the past. So all the discussion of statistics and submissions=wasted words as well.

The crux questions are, Was Hudson's poem rejected because he was perceived as a white male, then accepted when he was perceived as an Asian female? And if so, and given that many writers use pen names (including e.g. women using male names), is there something immoral about what he did? (A further question might be, Would it also have been immoral if he had used the name J'quon Brown, while making no explicit claims to any particular ethnicity?)

And to the extent Smith does address these questions, largely by excerpting Alexie's response, he's incoherent. "Alexie chose the poem...in part because he wanted to ensure that writers of color were well-represented in the book." Although angry when he learned the truth, "pulling the poem would imply that Alexie wasn't "consciously and deliberately" participating in something he called "racial nepotism" by paying special attention to people of color. Getting rid of the poem, he wrote, would "cast doubt on every poem [he'd] chosen for BAP," suggesting that he was only selecting poems based on the assumed identity of the poet...."

So although he's making a special effort to include writers of color, he isn't choosing poems based on the identity of the poet. It's unclear from Smith's exerpting of Alexie, but in his response Alexie is quite clear that he DID consciously and deliberately use racial nepotism--favoring "brown poets", as he puts it. (It is unclear why EITHER leaving Hudson's poem in or taking it out would have hidden this fact or placed more or less doubt on the other poems included. Alexie seems to feel that had he taken the poem out he could have used his literary power and influence to cover up the truth; by leaving it in he chose not to cover up.)

So despite all of Smith's verbiage Alexie himself is very clear that he favored 'brown poets' for the anthology. It is much less likely Hudson's poem would have been chosen under his real name. Smith asks whether Hudson used the pseudonym as a "desperate attempt to get published" or "in an effort to prove that it's easier for people of color to get published in the current literary climate than it is for white guys." Why can't it be both? In fact doesn't it have to be the first before it can be the second?

White Guys' Poems Matter !

I hate to be the one to break it to you all. But Saki... He wasn't Asian either.

James Tiptree, Jr. to the white courtesy phone. Mr. Tiptree to the white courtesy phone.

Alexie's disclosure that "approximately 99% of the poets are professors." Is very interesting in terms of this story. Because Getting in BAP can be a crucial component of a CV necessary to land (or keep) a teaching job, and that is one way a poet can get paid with benefits (perhaps leaves as well). It would be wrong to say Poetry Professorship Job = Getting in BAP, but there is something more in Alexie's statistic that needs unpacking.

But I now wonder, is Hudson a professor? Based on Alexie's numbers, it seems a safe guess. Or should I say was he a professor, because I can't imagine an MFA program keeping him under these circumstances.

Hudson works for the geneology dept of an Indiana public library, or some such thing (whatever that is, but definitely not a professorship). And the poem IS more interesting as seen through the eyes of an Asian American. Isn't it? I mean, read it a couple of times, and imagine several "versions" of the author as you're reading it (we all confront the writer in some manner as we're reading). This can't be my imagination. Or JUST my imagination. In a way, the author doesn't sound like an Asian American. I mean, the bitterness and alienation from self are there but expressed differently than we might expect from someone who is non-White (no surprise when one learns who wrote it).
I like the poem either way. Although the rhythm is a bit sticky for my taste.

@13 no way a university could terminate a professor in literature for use of a pen name, at least without instantly loosing a wrongful termination suit. I'm presuming he didn't include, you know, a fake head shot and bio in his submission.

Long story short: aspiring poet conducts statistically invalid experiment on whether there is bias in poem publishing based on the perceived race and/or gender of the poet. Results inconclusive.

How is it statistically invalid ? What p value do you require ?

@17, I would ask for no different than standard, say an α of 5%. But it's also unclear how many of these he's done, whether he's using proper controls, etc. Sample sizes of the target publishers need to be controlled, and I think you'd want which publishers get a poem under which name to be randomized, and probably double-blind (that is, for a given poem, he shouldn't know whether it will be submitted to a given publisher under his name or the false name).