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Here's the skinny on my first ever poetry writing workshop -- maybe my last if you're lucky! For some reason the words "poetry workshop" doesn't appear in my class title -- which started as a joke but somehow snowballed into the officialdom -- but that's what it is.
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Hello poets, prose-writers, playwrights, publishers, and those of other literary persuasions! Let's hear it for alliteration. Actually, let's hear it for our three BRAND-NEW WORKSHOPS, coming to The Poetry Project near you.
Fine Print:
The workshop fee is $300. This includes a one year Individual membership, as well as tuition for any and all workshops at the Poetry Project for the fall and spring. Reservations are required due to limited class space, and payment must be received in advance. Please send payment and reservations to:
The Poetry Project
St. Mark's Church
131 E. 10th St.
New York, NY 10003
This fall, our fearless leaders:
Poetry Workshop TONY TOWLE
TUESDAYS AT 7 PM: 10 Sessions Begin October 21st.
Towle writes, "It is assumed that participants will be serious, practicing poets. My critiques and suggestions will be made from the starting point of what the poet has already established, not advocating a total change of style. However, non-binding assignments will be suggested, perhaps on an individual basis, to expand the sensibility. Apollinaire, Keats, Stevens, Neruda, Max Jacob, Williams, and O'Hara are some of the writers who will be discussed, as well as more recent, lesser-known poets whose work will be talked about before their names are revealed. John Ashbery has written: "Tony Towle is one of the best-kept secrets of the New York School." His most recent books are The History of the Invitation: New & Selected Poems 1963-2000 and Memoir 1960-1963.
Genres & Games: A Poetry Workshop JOANNA FUHRMAN
FRIDAYS AT 7 PM: 10 Sessions Begin October 17th.
Fuhrman writes, "Our class will be a laboratory in which we explore and experiment with genres, styles and voices. The goal will be to develop the somewhat contradictory skills involved in poetry writing: the ability to let the imagination go crazy and to view work critically. The class will be comprised of three parts: assignments based on handouts, in-class writing games (often involving giant ski-ball dice), and supportive, constructive discussions of student work. Poets read will include: Maureen Owen, Wallace Stevens, Robert Creeley, Alice Notley, Tu Fu, John Ashbery, Elaine Equi, Rae Armantrout, David Shapiro, Jayne Cortez, Paul Violi and others." Joanna Fuhrman’s books include Freud in Brooklyn and Ugh Ugh Ocean.
Jai-Alai for Autocrats BRIAN KIM STEFANS
SATURDAYS AT 12 PM: 10 Sessions Begin October 18th.
Stefans writes, "This workshop will focus on the relationship between poems inspired by a sense of play - the way we appreciate words when they’re randomly, surprisingly conjoined - and work, which might be loosely described as poems that are subtly crafted, resistant to easy meanings, even ‘traditional.’ We’ll look at elements of prosody that extend beyond meter as it is generally understood - whether that be the counting of accents or the line by breath - into the use of literary masks, deviant syntaxes, Oulipian practices, writing in dialect (invented or not), and experiments with computers." Stefans’ books include Free Space Comix and Fashionable Noise: On Digital Poetics.