This workshop will emphasize sound in poetry: pauses, silences, nonsense words, ordinary speech. After you finish this workshop, and without sacrificing sense, you will be able to incorporate into your poems effects ranging from sonic beauty to outright noise. The result will be a more audible and dynamic poem that will positively spring from the page. The daily sessions will consist of prompts, basic technical instruction, and critiques, so please bring copies of at least two poems of any sort to share with your peers. Together we’ll work on your old poems and inspire you to write new ones.
David Kirby’s collection The House on Boulevard St.: New and Selected Poems was a finalist for the National Book Award in 2007. Kirby is the author of Little Richard: The Birth of Rock ‘n’ Roll, which the Times Literary Supplement of London called “a hymn of praise to the emancipatory power of nonsense.” Kirby’s other collections of poetry include Get Up, Please (2016), A Wilderness of Monkeys (2014), The Biscuit Joint (2013), Talking About Movies With Jesus (2011), and The Ha-Ha (2003), short-listed for the Griffin Poetry Prize. He teaches at Florida State University, where he has won five university teaching awards and is the Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Professor of English. Kirby has won fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts, and recently the Florida Humanities Council presented him with a Lifetime Achievement Award in Writing. He is married to the poet and fiction writer Barbara Hamby, and his latest poetry collection is More Than This.
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