Poetry Writing: Theme and Variations - Softcover

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The organization of Poetry Writing is simple enough. Each chapter begins with a brief overview of the sort of poem you will be asked to write and a discussion of the model poem. Then there is a bridge section linking that poem with a student response. Important literary terms are often introduced in this section. These terms (also included in the glossary at the end) are discussed in conjunction with either the model poem or the student response, but they are rarely the chapter’s focus. One of Poetry Writing’s central assumptions is that, while it is important for you to learn some of the basic technical aspects of poetry, it is even more important that you write poems. My experience tells me that textbooks that linger over minutiae tend to turn students away from poetry. Therefore, you are generally asked to look at the rhetorical, rather than the formal, emphasis of the model poem: what it is saying rather than how. The final section of each chapter is entitled "Your Turn." This section explains the writing prompt in more detail and guides you towards a response of your own.

The chapters are arranged chronologically by the model poet’s year of birth. This is to help give you a sense of the development of American poetry in this century. The appendix, "A Brief Introduction to 20th-Century American Poetry," also provides information about the poets in the book; it attempts to place them in context and to indicate some of their most important publications and awards.