Get BOOK. Skip to content. The Poetry Home Repair Manual. Recently appointed as the new U. He describes a few simple rules, then tells the reader not to worry about them.
Part of the problem stems from the way poetry is often taught. He notes that too much of the poetry published today has to be explained or taught. And what if everybody wrote poems? Most of all, we should read poems. The topic made for one of the most heated and memorable class discussions of the term, even though Kooser did lose a few fans after that chapter.
If only because of the conversations that this book generated in my class, I will definitely be welcoming this book into Poetry Workshop again.
Jan 31, Poiema rated it it was amazing Shelves: poetry. Ted opened me up to modern poetry, enlarged my repertoire, and gave me new ways to look at poetry. By the time I finished my coffee, I knew I had to take this book home with me! Since then I have listened to Ted Kooser's poems on YouTube, and earmarked some of his other books for future enjoyment.
Ted's "down home" insights make poetry accessible. I had to laugh at his analogy of a poem being like a styrofoam tray containing ham cubes, shrink wrapped at the grocer's: "The sonnet is the tray and the poem is the ham. All too often the tray is in charge of how the poem winds up looking. A villanelle tray or a sestina tray will hold just so much ham, and if you don't put enough meat on it, the poem looks like there's too much air in the package.
It just doesn't have that sleek, shrink-wrapped feeling that you get when the form seems to extend from the meat itself. And if you put in more ham than the little tray can handle, the poem bulges and looks like it might pop open in your bag before you get home.
Writing poems in fixed forms can be difficult because you have to carefully count and sort and place the ham cubes till they fit precisely on the tray. When it works, you've got something that looks just fine and doesn't call too much attention to itself. Your reader says, 'Oh, look, ham cubes. I'd better get some for the soup. As a fellow Nebraskan, I really enjoyed making acquaintance via this book. I also greatly enjoyed the modern poems he used as examples and intend to search out more from Jane Kenyan, Frank Steele, Linda Pastan, and a few others.
And, if I ever decide to try my hand at writing poetry, this book will serve as an excellent guide! View 2 comments. Mar 10, Martta rated it really liked it Shelves: This was really informative and gave me a lot to think about. There were some things that just seem so obvious, but you don't really think about until he points it out. There was so much like useful stuff that I didn't want to forget that I just had to take notes. The language was super chill and easy to read, and the examples that Kooser provided really helped me understand what he was saying.
You can really see how much poetry means to him in the way he talks about it, and it was honestly very This was really informative and gave me a lot to think about. You can really see how much poetry means to him in the way he talks about it, and it was honestly very indearing and kind of inspiring to read. Essentially, read it Mar 09, Bill Keefe rated it it was amazing. My third book looking to the what and how of writing and reading poetry I guess it's actually my fourth but the first one sucked, so I already forgot it.
I am sure that I found this book thoroughly enjoyable, uplifting, interesting, readable, enlightening and educational. I know, Mr. Kooser, "educational" is such a dry, technical word, but this book educated me, in the best, warmest most personal way.
Koo My third book looking to the what and how of writing and reading poetry I guess it's actually my fourth but the first one sucked, so I already forgot it.
Kooser makes it clear that the poem starts with the true thought or emotion that leads you to write; form follows substance. Then he nudges you to look at your written thought as crafted poetry. No rights or wrongs but there is bad poetry, so some things are necessary, and many things need attention - the line, the movement or rhythm, the language, the images, they style and even the form.
Maxwell better dramatizes the the effect of putting pen to paper, his is a visual book. You hover at the precipice of a line break.
You can hear the emptiness in the white space before you move on. You gallop to different meters and stumble between stanzas as a line crosses the chasm. But Mr. Kooser walks you through everything with helpful and expert examples of his lessons in the contemporary poems he selects, poems that instruct and motivate. Through poems like "Hayfork," "Parents" and, "And I Raised My Hand in Return," he opens your eyes to the details of what makes a poem work - and what keeps it from not working. This is, after all, a book of "practical advice.
Read the book; you will see that Mr. Kooser pays an awful lot of attention to titles. Jan 18, Timons Esaias rated it it was amazing.
Poet Laureate Ted Kooser, as the "textbook" for my Fall poetry writing class twice now. I looked at a number of standard college texts on the subject which tend to cost over a hundred dollars for a trade paperback , and I found them to be exhaustive, exhausting, and likely to be intimidating to undergraduates. And therefore likely to be unread. Do contemporary poets write and sell form??
Mostly not. Is a knowledge of form required to write contemporary poetry? No, not really. It can be very useful, and I teach it, but I hold it for the last third of the term, once the students have learned enough to find prosody additive rather than obstructive. So why, pray tell, would you set up the textbook that way??
Since I use this to teach, I won't go on in detail. But Kooser takes a practical, calm approach to the subject, and gives the reader enough to get going, and a reminder for those who are struggling. My only quibble is that near the end he forgets that most poets will have to spend some time in the minor leagues before they break through to the most prestigious magazines.
He gives a bit of advice that amounts to "don't accept a contract in Major League Baseball unless it's a major-market franchise. Jan 04, Neil rated it really liked it. A short book. Well structured with short chapters. An easy going, friendly, conversational style: likeable imho. Wisely unambitious in the sense that Kooser doesn't make any attempt to be too comprehensive.
Instead he opts to focus on a dozen important considerations - he could, I imagine, write a sequel. I think he does a good job by supporting his thoughts with examples taken from his own and other poet's work. He spends time fully fleshing out each of the perspectives he has chosen as a topic A short book. He spends time fully fleshing out each of the perspectives he has chosen as a topic for each chapter.
I enjoyed this book and it gave me something to think about wrt my own writing. I was also reading the book he co-authored Writing Brave, Writing Free but quickly dropped that in order to focus on this book. I recommend it for the real amateur poetry writer, specifically those that follow in the style of Kooser et al; writing poetry "for the reader", writing that should be easily understood, writing by poets fully in charge of the words rather than letting the words run away with meaning, writing poetry with clear images, clear and controlled intentions, poetry that uses poetic mechanisms as devices to create powerful effects and not for their own sake.
Jul 27, Joe Haack rated it it was amazing. I borrowed this book from the local library, but I will likely buy it. What did CS Lewis say? This book, at bottom, is an apologetic for Kooser's own philosophy of poetry. One I'll bet you'll agree with: the writer should serve the reader, love them even. He quotes Seamus Heaney to this effect - "The aim of the poet and the poetry is finally to be of service, to ply the effort of the individual work into I borrowed this book from the local library, but I will likely buy it.
He quotes Seamus Heaney to this effect - "The aim of the poet and the poetry is finally to be of service, to ply the effort of the individual work into the larger work of the community as a whole. For instance: "If you can manage to do it, leave your poem alone till it begins to look as if somebody else might have written it A poem must be equipped to thrive by itself in a largely indifferent world. You can't be there with it, like its parent, offering explanations, saying to a confused reader, 'Yes, but here's what I meant!
Dec 07, Kate Vogl rated it it was amazing. Loving this line, I'm paraphrasing his quote from John Fowles: You don't get the audience from preaching and philosophizing, but from the baser tricks of the trade - from wooing the reader into the palm of your hand.
A great book for writing basics, whether in prose or in poetry. Good for me to see the poetry equivalent to the prose I've been teaching my students - and his added insights on controlling metaphors and similes.
In this world where we rush to crank out a novel in one month, good to Loving this line, I'm paraphrasing his quote from John Fowles: You don't get the audience from preaching and philosophizing, but from the baser tricks of the trade - from wooing the reader into the palm of your hand.
Liberating and emboldening the beginning writer are the goals of Ted Kooser and Steve Cox in this spirited book of practical wisdom that brings to bear decades of invaluable experience in writing, teaching, editing, and publishing. Chosen by Library Journal as one of the five best poetry picks for , Kindest Regards spans nearly five decades, featuring more than 50 pages of new writing and generous selections from 11 previous books. Buy from Publisher Excerpt 1: Flying at Night.
Buy from Publisher Excerpt 1 : At the Cancer This is a compilation of short imagistic poems that Ted sent as postcards to his friend, Jim Harrison, while Kooser was recovering from cancer treatment. A dramatized poetic narrative of the devastation unleashed on Nebraska Territory by the great blizzard of January 12, Buy from Publisher Excerpt 1 : Carrie.
Kooser's third full-sized collection of poems. This was the first of Kooser's books to receive national recognition, being favorably reviewed in Saturday Review and elsewhere.
0コメント