Reading & Writing Poetry: Audacity, Excess, Extravagance
Course Description
Summary
William Wordsworth said that “poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings.” Emily Dickinson said, “If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry.” Allen Ginsberg said: “Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy!” This is a poetry workshop about subverting expectations, breaking patterns, being drama queens, and generally doing too much. How do we write poems that crack through the haze of decorum? How do we say it like it is, but without being plain or cliche? How do you write a long poem that doesn’t put people to sleep? That is: how do we render emotional intensity in our craft, not just our content? That really is: how do poets break rules in a way that works?
In this workshop, we will study and write poems that make audacious moves, swing big, and go a little overboard, in search of the ways each of us might try shaking up our own poetic habits. We will discuss what it means to write with more daring, particularly when it comes to addressing difficult topics, and make connections to non-normative (read: feminine, queer/trans, neurodivergent, non-white, non-Western) modes of poetic expression. Assigned readings will include mostly-contemporary poetry (think Jennifer Chang, Dean Young, Brigit Pegeen Kelly, Justin Phillip Reed, Kim Hyesoon, Tommy Pico, Joshua Jennifer Espinoza, George Abraham, Danez Smith, Lucie Brock-Broido, Natalie Eilbert, Ross Gay) and some essays on aesthetics and craft. Students will write new work every week, have their poems workshopped several times over the course of the term, and revise their work into a final portfolio.
Learning Outcomes
- Explore what it would mean to write with more daring (or, conversely, to rein in your current level of chaos/excess)
- Closely examine your own writing habits and experiment with breaking the "rules" of poetry, subverting expectations, and embracing excess.
- Study a range of approaches to poetic craft (with a focus on contemporary lyric poems) and become sharper readers of form, technique, and effect
- Write regularly, emulating certain approaches and attending to the relationship between process and product
- Understand the effects of your poetic experiments on readers, revise poems based on feedback, and learn from your misfires and flops
- Practice developing and articulating your own creative vision; practice respecting and supporting the creative visions of others
Prerequisites
Interested students should submit four to six pages of creative work in poetry, via this form: by May 9. Students will be notified of acceptance into this class by May 13.
Corequisites
Students are required to attend all Literature Evenings and Poetry at Bennington events this term, commonly held at 7pm on most Wednesday evenings.