Poetry Mystique

The contemporary creative writing class in fiction, non-fiction, or poetry, AKA the "workshop," evolved in MFA programs introduced to U.S. universities after World War II, and today the majority of accomplished, successful literary novelists, short fiction writers and poets were influenced by the workshop process. But the poetry "workshop" in which the poem under discussion is reviewed and discussed by students and poet-teachers remains controversial to some readers and a mystery to others. This may be the first book exploring the craft of poetry that combines observations and analyses of the poet-teacher together with her students' own accounts of their initial creative impetus and their revision processes.