lyric

105 deliberate use of the line

105 auditory devices: alliteration, assonance, consonance, repetition +- scattered rhymes

some type of rhythm

110 still appeals to the ear

ballad

96 quatrains and ballad tradition

most popular of fixed verse forms

96 ballad meter—lines alternate between tetrameter and trimeter

conclusions

poetry is sensory as well as sensible

senses involved: esp. sound and sight

sight: images (but also other senses)

sound: hearing poem with ear or mind

good poem as complete experience, snapshot of moment or scene or feeling

concepts of poetry

poetry always dying, always being reborn

intense concentration of verbal power

attempt to unify many powers into a single utterance

language as meaningful--shared yet intimate

definition of poetry

First, "poetry" is a big concept

"Epic poems" by Homer, Virgil, Milton

"Dramatic poetry" by Shakespeare

Reinforce earlier lesson:

Poetry is sensory--images appeal to senses

Two main aspects of poetry are sight and sound

Earlier class on subject

Sound

56 keep reading out loud

3 cycles > ritual, song, dance, childhood chants

83 rhythms of poetry x mere adornment

87 at least unconscious effect on reader

105 auditory devices: alliteration, assonance, consonance, repetition +- scattered rhymes

Poetry is not to be equated with prose. Avoid interpretation as "What is it trying to say?" It is what it is

48 first loyalty is to the art form

56 sound, shape, implication > whole

105 highly intuitive, as if anything is possible

Broad questions for discussion:

What are you learning so far about creative writing in general? 

What are you learning specifically about poetry? (either how to create it or its formal properties)

What are you learning about teaching creative writing, or leading discussions of it? Any suggestions?

Model assignments

 Question for chapter 7:

What are reasons for writing traditional verse?

ch. 7: From Lines to Stanza (pp. 94-104)

94 stanza cf. paragraph—unify, + set off by space

94-5 couplets > jingles, greeting cards, occasional verse [add: humorous verse as in Bert’s poem]

95 enjambment > internal rhymes?

96 triplets, tera rima

96 quatrains and ballad tradition

most popular of fixed verse forms

96 ballad meter—lines alternate between tetrameter and trimeter

97 rhyme royal ababbcc

98 sonnets

Elizabethan / English

Petrarchan / Italian

99 Rondeau

100 Pantoum (<Malaya)

101 Villanelle

103 since 1980s, new formalism

Question for chapter 8:

What did you learn about free verse? How did it challenge previous understanding of concept?

Robert Frost: writing free verse is "like playing tennis without a net."

ch. 8: Free-Verse Patterns (pp. 105-116)

105 line & stanza length varied

105 deliberate use of the line

105 auditory devices: alliteration, assonance, consonance, repetition +- scattered rhymes

some type of rhythm

105-6 assets and liabilities

105 highly intuitive, as if anything is possible

105 > prose in short lines

105 ?What effective?

106 typography, stanzas

106 + auditory < visual cues

108 nonrecurrent stanzas

109 combine several techniques

110 shaped verse > concrete poetry

110 still appeals to the ear

111 anaphora – repetition at beginning of two or more lines or sentences

111 syntactical rhythms

114 punctuation or not

115 prose poetry

ch. 9 (pp. 117-127)

117 arrangement of subject matter—sequence

117 contrasts and comparisons

118 youthful innocence, contrast adult realism (“Fern Hill”)

119 organization generated by content

120 reversal

121 dominant theme

121 editorial in verse

122 avoid sweeping social statements

Ø      personal experience & feelings

123 comic opera in 3 acts

124 image clusters as organizing principle

125 poets love repetition

125 refrain

125 multiple approaches

Other ways of describing "image clusters"

consistency of metaphor / imagery

extended metaphor

 Heidi Gerke poem from 2006

What consistency or continuity in imagery?

Why is this considered a standard of good poetry?

Final question: learning about poetry--

Compared to standard Literature course, how does creative writing change orientation and attitude?

Starting point: most students automatically distance themselves from poetry . . .

"I don't like poetry."

"If it has something to say, why doesn't it just say it?"

leftover notes from previous classes

Course update (from 2005)

What can be annoying about a workshop class:

Sometimes it works better than others. Compared to traditional instructor-leader courses, class chemistry and the day's dynamics may determine the success or failure of a particular meeting.  

Downsides: instructor can only do so much refocusing and driving of the course without changing the nature of the course.

Upsides:

"student-centered learning"

responsibility can be annoying but also liberating

can become a model for learning beyond classroom--a fair number of our students in creative writing classes create informal groups that meet in homes, at coffee shops, online to review each other's work.

All of you have become reasonably accustomed to the class organization and expectations.

Today we will have completed the first third of the course's three genres: poetry, fiction, drama.

We don't exactly finish any of these, but the course can get you on your feet for going further.

Discover how many self-motivated writers there are operating in and beyond our walls.

Publication possibilities:

Bayousphere and Marrow

1 line, images, sound, rhythm, density

4 a genre of the senses

> sensory pleasure of auditory sound & visual imagery

In other words, a poem should please the ear and "the mind's eye"

so that the reader is both hearing and seeing at once

imagery

59-60 figures of speech, metaphor

63 cliché as dying simile or metaphor 

68 image clusters (cf. extended metaphors)