Having studied with American poets Robert Fitzgerald and Elizabeth Bishop at Harvard, Gioia took to heart Bishop’s idea that “[o]ne did not interpret poetry, one experienced it [. . .] One did not need a sophisticated theory. One needed only intelligence, intuition, and a good dictionary” (Gioia, Dana. Studying with Miss Bishop: Memoirs from a Young Writer's Life, Paul Dry Books, 2021, p. 56). In part due to this point of view, Gioia, as he gained renown, became connected to New Formalism, a movement associated with Bishop and her poetic influence in the 1980s. This moniker was used to describe those poets moving away from confessional free verse back to traditional forms and techniques, such as meter, rhyme, and narrative structure. The term New Formalism, however, was then used to describe what was perceived as racist, sexist, reactionary, and neo-conservative work in the poetry world; in other words, the term was eventually seen as pejorative. Consequently, several New Formalist poets resented the label’s connotation since it denied the poets’ ethnicities and dedication to craft.

This back and forth ignited a hostile intellectual fight called the Poetry Wars.