Overview
By developing and redrafting their poetry in response to group discussion and workshops, as well as through reading and experiment, the summer school will give students the chance to begin and revise individual poems, as well as to build up a body of work.
Seamus Heaney wrote that poetry involved both craft and technique. Craft is what you can learn from other verse, ‘the skill of making’, while technique is more instinctive and involves letting our mind ‘dilate and approach as a thought or a theme or a phrase’. The process also involves finding a voice – getting a sense of yourself into your own words.
This course allows students to consider and practice all these aspects of writing a poem. We’ll consider the very first shadowy idea for a poem and examine how careful thought, attention and observation might bring this into focus. We’ll look too at how a poem’s quality of expression creates ‘flow’ and movement, carrying the reader to the end of the poem.
Examining practices of craft, observed through set poems, we’ll also think about how learning and obeying rules like rhyme, metre, verbal patterns and word order can open a poem up beyond the poet’s original intentions. Set forms are a chance to experiment, to make unexpected connections and associations, and to take the poem in unexpected directions.
Over the course of a week we’ll see how poems can unfold in very different ways to successfully find their final shape. In response students will work to craft their own poems in a way that best reflects their unique voice and preoccupations. On the final day, there will be an opportunity for students to present their poetry.
Programme Structure
The course is six days long. The sessions will run from 9 am until 1.45 pm, with breaks for coffee and lunch. Each day will comprise sessions of close reading, followed by group discussion. The topic for discussion each day will lead into a writing exercise.The poems provided by the teacher each day will focus on different elements that students will practice in their own writing. We’ll read poems of close observation including ekphrasis, as well as poems that use – or avoid – rhyme and rhythm. We’ll discuss line length, and read poems in a variety of set forms, such as the sonnet, before moving to more experimental forms at the end of the week.The teacher will lead discussions, allowing students to unpick poetry’s effects through really close reading. The guided writing session gives students specific formal challenges, and they can kick off something new in response to their reading, or revise poems in different ways, building and developing their poems day by day. There will be time for independent writing and observing – so bring a notebook – and workshops built into the week to give you the opportunity to receive and give feedback on each other’s work.The detailed day-by-day programme will be available in March/April.
Lecturers
Leontia Flynn, Miriam McIlfatrick-Ksenofontov
Key information
Duration
- Full-time
- 6 days
Start dates & application deadlines
- StartingApplication deadline not specified.
Language
Credits
Delivered
Disciplines
Language Studies Creative Writing Literature View 3 other Short Courses in Literature in EstoniaAcademic requirements
We are not aware of any specific GRE, GMAT or GPA grading score requirements for this programme.
English requirements
We are not aware of any English requirements for this programme.
Other requirements
General requirements
This summer course is suitable for people interested in writing poetry, from relative beginners to more experienced writers.During the course you will be expected to attend workshops and seminars, submit your work for peer review and create a portfolio of your own writing.The course is limited to 15 participants.
Tuition Fee
-
International
400 EUR/fullTuition FeeBased on the tuition of 400 EUR for the full programme during 6 days.
- Early-Bird fee (until March 31) - 400€
- Regular (after March 31) - 450€
Living costs for Tallinn
The living costs include the total expenses per month, covering accommodation, public transportation, utilities (electricity, internet), books and groceries.