Andrew to tutor Advanced Poetry Workshop

Peter Cowan Writers’ Centre (PCWC) is running a series of 10 Advanced Poetry Workshops throughout 2011.

Andrew is one of nine professional poets invited to be a facilitator for one of the workshops. Other facilitators include Shane McCauley, Lucy Dougan, Andrew Burke and Dennis Haskell.

The Advanced Poetry Workshops are a new initiative by PCWC aimed at assisting already accomplished poets to move to a new level of achievement.

Last year, applicants had to submit five recent poems to PCWC, to be assessed by Professor Andrew Taylor (who initiated the Workshops and is also one of the facilitators). Twelve poets were chosen from over 30 applicants to attend 10 sessions on the second Saturday of each month from February to November.

Andrew’s workshop will take place on Saturday 14th May and will cover “Alternative Poetic Forms”. The synopsis of his workshop reads:

TS Eliot claimed that one poet is superior to another primarily on the basis of his or her critical faculties. Writing in traditional poetic forms supports and strengthens our critical faculties by providing objective guidance and goals. It also enhances our creativity by prompting us to think in ways that are new to us. This workshop will focus primarily on the traditional Japanese poetic forms of haiku, gunsaku, tanka and choka, all of which are conducive to contemporary descriptive, reflective and imagist poetry.