The Poetry Home Repair Manual: Practical Advice for Beginning Poets

by Kooser, Ted

• ISBN13: 9780803227699
• ISBN10: 0803227698
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2005-02-01
• Publisher: Univ of Nebraska Pr

Summary

Recently appointed as the new U. S. Poet Laureate, Ted Kooser has been writing and publishing poetry for more than forty years. In the pages ofThe Poetry Home Repair Manual, Kooser brings those decades of experience to bear. Here are tools and insights, the instructions (and warnings against instructions) that poetsaspiring or practicingcan use to hone their craft, perhaps into art. Using examples from his own rich literary oeuvre and from the work of a number of successful contemporary poets, the author schools us in the critical relationship between poet and reader, which is fundamental to what Kooser believes is poetry's ultimate purpose: to reach other people and touch their hearts. Much more than a guidebook to writing and revising poems, this manual has all the comforts and merits of a long and enlightening conversation with a wise and patient old frienda friend who is willing to share everything he's learned about the art he's spent a lifetime learning to execute so well.

Author Biography

Ted Kooser, the 13th Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, is a visiting professor in the English department of the University of Nebraska–Lincoln and a retired insurance executive. He is the author of ten collections of poetry, most recently the Pulitzer Prize-winning Delights & Shadows. His prose book, Local Wonders: Seasons in the Bohemian Alps, won numerous awards, including the Barnes and Noble Discover Award for nonfiction finalist, and is available in a Bison Books edition.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	ix
About This Book	xi
A Poet's Job Description	1	(18)
Writing for Others	19	(6)
First Impressions	25	(10)
Don't Worry about the Rules	35	(10)
Rhyming, Ham Cubes, Prose Poems	45	(10)
Writing about Feelings	55	(10)
Can You Read Your Poem through Your Poem?	65	(8)
Writing from Memory	73	(20)
Working with Detail	93	(18)
Controlling Effects through Careful Choices	111	(14)
Fine-Tuning Metaphors and Similes	125	(22)
Relax and Wait	147	(12)
Source References and Acknowledgments	159