Resources
From Category: Essays on Writing
Daily s-Press
Dorothee Lang, editor of BluePrintReview, an English-language online literary journal based in Germany, began this blog in March 2010 to review new books of poetry and prose from small independent presses. The site looks beyond the usual university press prizewinners to showcase innovative writers and publishers.
Comstock Review: The Poet’s Handbook
Detailed guidance for poets from the Comstock Writers' Group. Make your poetry submissions look professional. See poetry as an editor sees it. All poets should read this before actively submitting to contests and journals.
Can Poetry Matter? an essay by Dana Gioia
Poetry is imprisoned in the cozy cells of academia and specialty publishers. Most people are oblivious to it. "The traditional machinery of transmission - the reliable reviewing, honest criticism, and selective anthologies - has broken down." It's time to unleash great poems again on the public. Here's how. Reprinted from The Atlantic Monthly.
Boston Comment
Hard-hitting essays on the state of contemporary poetry, by poet and critic Joan Houlihan. Among her targets: incoherent experimental poetry, free verse that sounds like prose, and famous names who are past their prime. She is also founding director of the Concord Poetry Center which offers conferences and workshops in Massachusetts.
Bad Poets, a short essay by Randall Jarrell
Mr. Jarrell (1914-1965) was a leading American poet and critic. These are his blunt yet compassionate reflections on judging badly written poetry.
Anatomy of a Poetry Contest
See how a judge weighs poems in this essay by Virgil Suarez. Mr. Suarez, an accomplished poet in his own right, has judged over a dozen contests. "It keeps me in touch with the poetry that is being written at the moment.... Nothing better to keep the blood pumping."
An Honest Answer by Ginger Andrews, reviewed by Dr. Joseph S. Salemi
Poet and classical scholar Joseph Salemi (see bio and poems) probes the limitations of contemporary free- verse confessional poetry.
An ABC of Translating Poetry, an essay by Willis Barnstone
Master poet Willis Barnstone explores the act of translation, "a friendship between poets...a mystical union between them based on love and art. As in ordinary religious mysticism, the problem of ineffability exists: how do you find words to say the unsayable?" Barnstone singles out for praise the translations of Mary Herbert, Hölderlin, Pasternak, Rilke, Valéry, Lowell, Moore, Pound, Quasimodo, and Bishop.
Advice from the Judge of the War Poetry Contest
Jendi Reiter judged the War Poetry Contest sponsored by Winning Writers from 2002-2011 (the contest is currently inactive). She shares her advice on reading thousands of war poems.
American Life in Poetry
Weekly column by former US poet laureate Ted Kooser presents contemporary American poems and a short discussion of the techniques that make them effective. This series is designed to be reprinted for free by newspapers and online periodicals (with attribution), in order to create a vigorous presence for poetry in our culture. You may also sign up for free weekly emails. Sponsored by The Poetry Foundation and the Library of Congress.
