ENGL 300-01, Intermediate Poetry, Fall 2011

Abstract

This course is intended to give students an opportunity to further refine & define creative writing ideas & skills learned in either an introductory poetry class or an introductory fiction class. Beginning in the crucial current, we will then “go back” to employ, study, & question the more traditional forms of poetry. Students will choose a topic & then, using devices of revision and reinvention, students will learn to work with & against not only inherited forms but forms of their own so that they can begin to make more potent choices according to the needs of subject & context. In addition to studying & discussing as much as possible from the required texts, students will write. The majority of writing will generate from reading & from exercises & techniques plied in class & further honed in weekly assignments. This class also serves as an introduction to poetics in preparation for more advanced, theoretical work at the senior level.