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Welcome to English 675 |
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Welcome to Writing and Reading Poetry! I'll be using this space for updates, comments, and reminders about class deadlines, as well as for a list of local poetry readings. All readings are free unless otherwise noted. Campus readings are in bold face. Because of the possibility of bad weather continuing into Monday, the due date for your portfolio is Tuesday, Dec. 18, at 7:00 pm. THANK YOU ALL FOR A TERRIFIC CLASS AND HAVE A GREAT BREAK! WEEK 15: "Lightning Round" revision workshop. EVERYONE will post a revision of a poem written for class during the past 14 weeks. During class, each of you will offer one example of strong writing and ask one question you have about the poem. We'll go around in a circle until everyone has received 10 comments. POSTING REQUIREMENT: The following students need to post one more response to a student's poem before the end of the semester: Andrea D., Andrea S., Heather, Amy. Final reading journal entries due Dec. 12. Watermark contact and url: <watermarkjournal@gmail.com> and <www.watermark.umb.edu> WEEK 14: Class field trip to Arrowsmith Press reading at Boston University, 871 Commonwealth Ave, Jacob Sleeper Auditorium, rm. 129. For directions, see "Assignments." If you'd like to help with the event, contact <catparnell@rcn.com>. WEEK 13: More on found poems: this one begins with a definition taken from a dictionary, then expands it. Assignment suggestion: write your own poem of definition. Emily Dickinson wrote many of them, if you're looking for further models. < http://www.slate.com/id/2175502/> Student evaluations will be written in class this week. For workshop:: Heather, Karen, Priscilla, Rachel, Andrea D., Jason. WEEK 12: Individual conferences this week; no class meeting. WEEK 11: Workshop this week: Valerie, Kevin, Andrea S., Amy, Paul. Easy way to find out if a student's workshop poem has been posted? Go to "Student Profiles" and click on the student's name for a complete list of his/her posted poems. Please bring in you readings journals this week. Sign up for conferences week 12 and 13 (if necessary). BOOK REVIEW DUE. More found poems: look in "Resources" for two approaches by Steven Cramer and Lloyd Schwartz. More on line breaks: This review of Dante's Paradiso discusses their importance: <http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/11/books/review/Longenbach-t.html?ref=review> WEEK 10: Workshop this week: Jason, Andrea D., Rachel, Priscilla, Karen, Heather. Don't forget to bring to class one example of good writing and one question regarding each poem under discussion. Please use the "Comments" section of the website to post any responses to last week's poems you didn't get to share during class. Find Lloyd Schwartz's sestina "Six Words" at <http://www.pshares.org/issues/article.cfm?prmArticleID=7655>. WEEK 9: Workshop this week: Valerie, Kevin, Andrea S., Amy, Paul. Please post your poems by Sunday 10/28. Here are the urls for links to Poetry and Tracie Morris: Two reviews of Garrison Keillor’s Good Poems from Poetry Magazine: http://www.poetrymagazine.org/magazine/0404/comment_146880.html http://www.poetrymagazine.org/magazine/0404/comment_146879.html Tracie Morris’s sound poetry: http://writing.upenn.edu/pennsound/x/Morris.html (9-13)
WEEK 8: Rhyme: go to "Resources" to read Robert Pinksy's article. Donald Hall's essay "Metallic Flowers"(mentioned below) is available through Google Books at: <http://books.google.com/books?id=hgARwarPQeIC&pg=PA15&lpg=PA15&dq=donald+hall+metallic&source=web&ots=ZXxDdfHhyh&sig=NOhwn2eDowD8LAcUZ-cgvY9hYDA#PPA15,M1> Workshop begins next week! Check "Assignments" to see when your poem is up for discussion. You may choose what you'd like us to discuss--a new poem, the week's suggested assignment, or a revision of an assignment you've done. When choosing a poem, select the one you're most interested in revising rather than one you think is done. Students whose poems will be discussed must post their work the week BEFORE their workshop date. See syllabus for workshop rules.
Here's a link to a brief interview with poet Tracy Smith: <http://www.startribune.com/books/story/1494139.html>
BOOK REVIEW ASSIGNMENT DEADLINE CHANGED TO 11/14. See "Assignments" for full description. Please let me know the title of the book you plan to review this week. WEEK 7: Individual conferences; no class meeting, See "Assignments" for date and time of your conference. All conferences are in my office, W-6-62. Bring all drafts of poems you've worked on so far this semester, plus any other work you'd like me to see. SHORT PAPER DUE 10/17--if your conference is earlier in the week, you can leave your paper in my mailbox 10/17. WEEK 6: For 10/10: don't forget your readings journal. I'll collect them this week and return them during your conference. For class, bring your list of words that includes five iambs, five trochees, five dactyls, and five anapests. We'll create some nonsense verse in meter to begin our discussion. A couplet by poet Robert Hass: Iowa, January In the long winter nights, a farmer's dreams are narrow. Over and over, he enters the furrow.
WEEK 5: For sites with poems by Donald Hall and Jane Kenyon, look in Resources. NB: Bring to class or send via e-mail a note re the poet, the place, and the date and time of the poetry reading you attended when you fulfill that course requirement. Baseball, continued: Here's a link to a poem by Kevin Young that uses the experience of seeing a baseball diamond from an airplane in an elegy. <http://www.slate.com/id/2174304/> WEEK 4: For Wednesday 9/26 please print out copies of Elizabeth Bishop's "In the Waiting Room." Watermark, the university's arts and literature journal, is accepting submissions now through November 9. FMI at the Watermark release party 9/26 2:30-4:00, Campus Center Terrace; the Watermark Open House after 4:00 pm; or at <watermarkjournal@gmail.com> WEEK 3: In and out of the ballpark: I've used that phrase to describe whether one's reading of a poem is reasonable. For instance, if a reader asserts that "Mother to Son" is about baseball, and a team's climb from the cellar to the top of the league, I'd beg the reader to defend that reading with quotes from the text. One could use images from James Welch's poem to argue that Moccasin Flat is a place you'd like to spend Christmas, or not. The poem offers both possibilities at once. Donald Hall's "Metallic Flowers," which reads Wordsworth's 'The Daffodils' in terms of economics while also discussing writers' conscious and unconscious intentions, is available in his collection of essays To Keep Moving. Here's another poem that uses baseball as a metaphor. Notice how Pastan imbues terms like "home," "sacrifice," and "season" with several meanings. BASEBALL Linda Pastan When you tried to tell me baseball was a metaphor for life: the long, dusty travail around the bases, for instance, to try to go home again; the sacrifice for which you win approval but not applause; the way the light closes down in the last days of the season— I didn’t believe you. It’s just a way of passing the time, I said. And you said: that’s it. Yes.
WEEK 2: Kudos to all on your first assignment. Thanks to those who have already begun responding to posted work. I'm eager to hear what you have to say, and hope to encourage conversation. I also enjoy your photos! As well as posting comments on the site, I'll return suggestions for revision on hard copies of your work during class Wednesday.
Fall 2007 Area Readings Friday, December 7, 8 pm Saturday, December 8, 3 pm (new time!) Saturday, December 8, 8 pm Monday, December 10, 1:30-4:30 pm Chord magazine realease party Meet authors and artists Campus Center catwalk 2nd fl. UMB Monday, December 10, 8 pm Tuesday, December 11, 7 pm Thursday, December 13, 9 pm
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