OVERVIEW

In this advanced creative writing workshop, emphasis will be on reading and imitating many different kinds of poetry, understanding various trajectories and traditions within 20th century poetry, articulating and working from a sense of purpose, and experimenting with various methods of composing poetry.

Dichotomies that will be challenged over the course of the semester include individual/collective, sampling or collage/inventing, mono-lingual/poly-lingual, poetry/prose, documentary/imaginary. In other words, there are many different kinds of poetries. The kinds that I´m interested in making are not restrained by traditional and academic views about what a poem should be in terms of form or content. Some people call this stance "the experimental tradition." I think it is an intellectual, non-commercial, culture-based approach to the making, reading, and distribution of poetry.

GOALS

Our overall goal is to develop a supportive, critical, and inspiring community over the course of the semester. Our community will help us to sustain our writing practice, deepen our awareness of poetry, and to fully engage us in the passionate undertaking of making poems.

Individually, my goal for each of us is to develop and/or strengthen a writing practice that embraces taking risks in composing poems. I also want us to develop an ear for our work so that in revision, we can know what to change.

PROJECTS

1. weekly poems, typed, and weekly reading assignments (no late assignments accepted)
2. collection of poems due at mid-term (at least eight poems, revised and typed)
3. a final chapbook of poems--a self-publishing project
4. a final class reading/celebration which will be open to the public
5. participation in a group publishing project
6. two field trips to readings during the semester
7. a written report on one of the readings


BOOKS

The Best American Poetry 2002 edited by Robert Creeley and David Lehman
The Waste Land and Other Poems by T. S. Eliot
Muse & Drudge by Harryette Mullen
City at the Center magazine: $3 (purchase from me in class)

INTERNET RESOURCES

The Academy of American Poets at www.poets.org
The Electronic Poetry Center at www.bufalo.edu/epc

COURSE SCHEDULE


Week One: What is poetry? What do poets do? History of 20th Century American Poetry. The list poem. Whitman / Sabina

Week Two: List poem, continued. Giving and receiving feedback. Waldman / Ginsberg / Diaz-Crofts

Week Three: Haiku. Plain Speech. Basho / O'Hara / Williams

Week Four: What is publishing? Blues poems. Hughes / Brown / Johnson

Week Five: "Performance" Poetry. The Last Poets / Michael Smith, Baraka with The Roots

Week Six: Pantoum, sonnet, un-sonnet.

Week Six: Prose poems. Joy Harjo / Margratta Samuels

Week Seven: Field Trip

Week Eight: Collage / Sampling. T. S. Elliot

Week Nine: Collage / Sampling. Harryette Mullen

Week Ten: Field Trip

Week Eleven: Language Poetry. Stein / Hejinian

Week Twelve: Poem of a place. Victor Hernandez Cruz

Week Thirteen: Field Trip

Week Fourteen: Text and image. The Manifesto / Poetics. Vicuna / Magi

Week Fifteen: Reading / Celebration