St. John, David. Teaching Poetry Writing Workshopos for Undergraduates. Creative Writing in America.

"It is crucial that the students sense their teacher's excitement and involvement not only with their writing but also with his or her own writing as well. In addition, it seems to me important that the students understand that their teacher's knowledge and love of poetry and literature includes a wide range of literary periods, not simply that of contemporary poetry" (189). I feel St. John's statement can include all writing classes -- I feel that often I am a successful writing teacher simply because I love to write so much. I've had success as a multi-genre teacher -- in journalism, marketing, professional and technical writing, non-fiction, fiction, and even a bit in screenplays and poetry -- simply because I love to write it all, or at least read it, to some extent.

Last semester I began teaching a multi-genre class in "traditional" genres of creative writing: poetry, fiction, and screenlays. I was a bit unnerved because my experience goes less to poetry and screenplays as it does fiction, although I like all the genres. I even took a graduate-level poetry class at the same time I was teaching the undergraduate intro to creative writing one so that I felt better-versed in teaching the poetry genre. And while I am sufficient in the genre to teach an intro course, I don't feel I am the best poetry teacher because I don't write poetry as much as I do other genres, and am not exposed to as much poetry in different time periods.

St. John recommends exposing undergraduate students to Yeats, "whose intimate, conversational tone and persuasive formal integrity make him am odel one can fall back upon for years. A solid foundation in Yeats enables students to make increasingly successful forays into their own personal subject matter without sacrificing a sense of poetry's necessary music and composure" (190). He also points to Eliot because he "provides students with a sense of scope and ambition that young writers seem to need and toward which they gravitate ... the obvious antidote to the rarity and grandeur inspired by an overconsumption of Eliot is a straight draught of William Carlos Williams, whose particularity is, for many students, positively illuminating. The last of the majuor twentieth century poets I initially suggest is Wallace Stevens, whose elegant melodies and iambic influences hit close to home with many, though certainly not all, young writers" (190). I can't criticize St. John's choices because I imagine he knows far more about these poets than I do, but I'm thankful for the advice here, as now I can look up some of this poetry to offer to my own students.