This chapter draws on interviews of many poets, editors and other people associated with Carcanet and with the poetry scene in Britain. The overall objective was to understand how poetry has survived in a very tough marketplace in the past fifty years. Data extracted from these transcripts show three different groups connected with Carcanet Press (1) the Old Guard—those who belong to Michael Schmidt’s generation and were associated with the early Carcanet/PN; (2) the New Guard whose association with Carcanet/PN started after 1980; and (3) marginals who gravitate away from Schmidt either by choice or as a result of falling into disfavour. This chapter argues that Carcanet’s survival can largely be explained by the alliance between Old and New Guard. Without the New Guard, the older generation would probably have run out of favour with funders and academic institutions. Carcanet books would have known the same fate as the work of Donald Davie, C. H. Sisson and Brian Cox—neglected and frequently out of print. Eventually, the press itself may well have disappeared. Allied with the New Guard but still firmly in control, the Old Guard incorporated dissent to build a more resilient company, aligned with contemporary social trends. Moving away from traditionalism but still rooted in modernism, Carcanet reinvented itself as a firm open to diverse voices.