About the instructor: Heather Hartley’s poetry collections include Adult Swim and Knock Knock, both published by Carnegie Mellon University Press. She was Paris Editor for Tin House magazine for over fifteen years. Her short fiction, poems, essays and interviews have appeared in or on PBS Newshour, The Guardian, The Literary Review and other venues. She teaches creative writing at the University of Kent’s (UK) Paris School of Arts and Culture and has also taught at the American University of Paris and the University of Texas El Paso MFA program. www.heatherhartleyink.com
Course description: Whether you’re new to poetry or have been writing poems for years, this class is designed to generate new material and share in an atmosphere of camaraderie and constructive feedback. The focus is on generating new poems through a series of guided writing exercises. With attention to craft, you will practice, develop, and fine tune your skills.
For writers of all levels.
As an underpinning to our writing exercises, we will discuss key literary techniques in poetry including imagery, metaphor, simile, assonance, alliteration and repetition, and work on incorporating these elements in your own poems.
Each class will begin with sharing one of your most recent poems based on work from class or an assignment from outside of class. On the first day, we will begin with a writing exercise. Then we will plunge into specific examples of poems based on the theme(s) and techniques of the day.
We’ll study how other poets have undertaken particular forms and then we’ll have a writing prompt based on the work we have just discussed. Whether following the rules or following your own path on the page, we will share our own unique and particular poetic explorations and departures and digressions in class.
Preparation: Please prepare a selection of four to six poems totaling up to eight pages to be sent by 15 May 2024 to admin.pww@wice-paris.org. Please include your masterclass workshop name with your materials.
Please read Paris in Our View, Poems Selected by Shakespeare and Company Bookshop, edited by Krista Halverson and David Delannet, illustrations by Matteo Pericoli, available at https://www.shakespeareandcompany.com/books/paris-in-our-view-poems-selected-by-shakespeare-and-company.
Other books we will look at (handouts provided) include excerpts from Charles Baudelaire’s Twenty Prose Poems translated by Michael Hamburger, City Lights Books; Lauren Elkin’s Flâneuse: Women Walk the City in Paris, New York, Tokyo, Venice, and London, Chatto & Windus; and Rainer Maria Rilke’s Letters to a Young Poet translated by M.D. Herter Norton, published by Norton.
Agent consultations: For an additional fee, you can register for one, or two, agent consultations. Available exclusively to participants who have enrolled in a masterclass. Space is limited. More information here on Oliver Munson, and more information here on Caroline Hardman.
Cancellation Policy:
- Full refund through 15 April 2024 minus 100€ admin fee
- Half refund through 30 April 2024 minus 100€ admin fee
- No refund after 30 April 2024
In the event of unforeseen circumstances, PWW reserves the right to replace an instructor.
