Oulipo Poetry (7-9PM EST)

Instructor: Robert Whitehead

In poetry-writing, one of the most difficult challenges to overcome is the effort to "make sense," to apply a personal logic and language to feelings that are often just out of reach. Oulipo—a French school of writers and mathematicians—reminds us that the prime directive of language is to push new, strange, and surprising insights, undoing the insistence of the self in favor of an exterior constraint. These constraints force the writer to follow choices that may not have been available without the influence of the constraint.

In this one-day class we will learn and practice Oulipo constraints to use as tools in our poetry editing arsenal. Come prepared with an original poem that you want to edit, and learn how to let these constraints guide your work and unlock new directions in your writing.