English 491 Advanced Poetry Writing – Joy Passanante – Fall 2007

First Class / First Assignment

Please bring to the class on Wednesday, August 29, two poems (with enough copies for the entire class of 17, including me) by one of the U.S. Poets Laureate of the last 70 or so years. The course will focus, at least in part, on study of these poets. You will find a list of Poets Laureate on my 491class website at www.class.uidaho.edu/eng491jp/  or on the internet. Be ready to lead a class discussion about the poems you choose to distribute to the class. 

You are also to write a poem that class.  Here is Assignment #1: Write a poem that works through a pattern of repetition of any kind. Bring in some examples of other poems that do this successfully and hand them in with your own poem.

I have ordered three books for the course:

·         JAB, Mark Halliday,

·         University Of Chicago Press, ISBN-10: 0226313867

THE BEST AMERICAN POETRY 2007, Heather McHugh (Editor), David Lehman (Editor)

·         Scribner (September 11, 2007)

·         EARTHLY MEDITATIONS. Robert Wrigley

·         Penguin (Non-Classics), ISBN-10: 014303779X

Your additional texts for this course will be generated by you and me; you will also be bringing poems to class for study (and sometimes imitation). I will explain this plan in detail when we meet this evening.  We will have plenty of writing prompts, a great deal of writing and workshopping, and several conferences.  You should be prepared to make photo-copies of your work for workshops.