Discover the Poet in you at Write! Canada 2010 — Martin

I hope you’re planning to come to Write! Canada — June 17 to 19th. There will lots of wonderful opportunities for you to learn and grow, and to connect with like-minded people who can help you develop your writing career.

For the first time, anywhere, I will be taking my popular workshop — The Essentials of Writing Poetry — and expanding it significantly into a real hands-on opportunity for you to write poetry, and to have it discussed by other participants. The following blurb comes directly from the Write! Canada website:

Principles of Writing Poetry…Well — D. S. Martin

Beauty is not merely in the eye of the beholder; quality in poetry is not merely a matter of taste. In this workshop you’ll learn to discern what is needed for well-written poetry, and how to apply these principles to significantly improve the quality of your own writing — both poetry and prose! You’ll be enabled to write your own poetry as part of the workshop, and be able to give and receive feedback with the class.

Together we will go through the principles of what makes poetry good, and you’ll be given plenty of opportunities to put these principles into practice. You are encouraged to bring a laptop computer (if you have one) in order to better facilitate the sharing of work as a group. You may want to write rough drafts for several poems ahead of time; do not, however, bring poems (for this purpose) which you would be unwilling to significantly revise because you consider them to be complete.

This class will be an interactive format. The instructor will lead the discussion of poems-in-progress, but all will be encouraged to share feedback.

Participants are encouraged to bring as many of the following items as possible along with them, as inspiration for potential poems:
1) A photo of a friend or family member in a place that has special memories
--------((bring several)
2) A picture of a painting that speaks to you
3) A selected scripture passage that resonates for you
--------(an entire Bible would help)
4) A favourite poem from a famous poet
5) A favourite non-fiction book
--------(preferably well marked up!)
6) A list of your favourite places
7) The name of someone you love, and a list of things he/she does well
8) Other items that would be of unique inspiration to you.
--------(All but #5 might be able to be saved to your laptop)

I hope to see you at Write! Canada, and have the opportunity to help you grow as a writer!

Check out my blog about Christian poetry: Kingdom Poets Become a follower, or leave a comment.

D.S. Martin is Music Critic for Christian Week. He is the award-winning author of the poetry collections Poiema (Wipf & Stock) and So The Moon Would Not Be Swallowed (Rubicon Press). They are both available at: www.dsmartin.ca