“Fetching the Bolt Cutters”: Traditional and Experimental Forms of Poetry. Jane Huffman, Instructor

IOWA SUMMER WRITING FESTIVAL 

Fall 2023–Winter 2024 

“Fetching the Bolt Cutters”: Traditional and Experimental Forms of Poetry (Five-Week Workshop) 

Jane Huffman, Instructor 

Dates/Time 

Saturdays on Zoom, January 6–February 3, 2024  

Fee: $650 

Course Description 

In this course, we will radically expand and explore the definition of “formal poetry” by studying and practicing “given” (or “received”) poetic forms and invented (or “nonce”) poetic forms alike. Form is a tremendous tool and teacher. For centuries, poets have experimented with its capabilities and limitations to convey complex themes and ideas. By offering structures to work with and against, form is incredibly generative for the poet facing the blank page. 

As you respond to weekly writing assignments that I will design, you will practice employing “formal” craft elements to varying degrees, to varying effects, and with varying intentions. These include line and stanza length, repetition, rhyme (perfect, slant, and otherwise), meter, syllable count, white space, enjambment, and other tools of poem-making.  

You will also explore, through reading and writing, how different poetic forms function semantically, sonically, and rhythmically; how they resonate visually on the page, emotionally in readers, and culturally in context; and how working in formal traditions (and pushing back against these traditions) connects us with diverse poetic lineages while pushing the field into new directions.  

We’ll start by studying and writing in “old” forms made “new,” such as imaginative interpretations of the “sonnet” (Terrence Hayes, Diane Seuss, Wanda Coleman, Olena Kalytiak Davis, Dorothy Chan, Jen Bervin). These poets, and many others, will be our guides as we imagine how to adapt other received forms, among them sestinas, pantoum, ghazals, haiku, tanka, odes, and aubades. 

Next, we’ll explore the universe of invented, or “nonce” forms, such as the “bop” (Afaa Michael Weaver, Matsuo Basho, Seema Yasmin, Sonia Sanchez), the “golden shovel” (Terrence Hayes, Kim Addonizio, francine j. harris, Percival Everett), the “duplex” (Jericho Brown), and many more.  

Each week, we'll begin class with a discussion of reading assignments and how we might apply the poems’ lessons to our own work. Expect these conversations to be lively, fun, and generative. Then we’ll engage in a workshop session designed around Liz Lerman’s “Critical Response Process,” an approachable, friendly, and productive workshop model that emphasizes writer participation and requires no previous workshop experience. 

Every poet will have the opportunity to share work in most of our class sessions. Throughout the course, you will receive substantial oral and written feedback from your peers as well as the instructor.  

In the latter part of the course, I'll meet with each poet for a 30-minute individual conference. 

This course welcomes all writers; instruction and assignments will accommodate beginners and experienced poets alike. 

 
Takeaways: 

Instructor 

Jane Huffman’s debut poetry collection, Public Abstract, was the winner of the 2023 American Poetry Review/Honickman first book prize. Jane has her MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and is a PhD student in creative writing at the University of Denver. Her poems have been published in The New Yorker, Poetry Magazine, The Nation, and elsewhere, and she was the recipient of a 2019 Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg fellowship from the Poetry Foundation. She is founder and editor-in-chief of Guesthouse, an online literary journal. 

Registration & Fees 

The fee for this course is $650. Payment in full is required to register. 

Registrations are accepted on a first-come, first-served basis. 

Class size is limited to 10. 

Note: Your credit card payment will be processed by an external provider and will appear on your credit card statement as “UI Writing—Magid Center.” 

Refund & Cancellation Policy 

If you need to cancel your enrollment, please let us know as soon as possible. We can only offer full refunds if you cancel one week prior to the start of class. After that, before the start-date of class, we can offer a 50% refund. We cannot refund day-of cancellations, and we cannot refund or partially refund registration fees once the class has begun. 

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