Writing What You Didn’t Expect to Write with Alicia Ostriker (via Zoom)

We will mix writing with conversations about why we write. Loosely based on our reading of selected poems, there will be a set of widely (and wildly) varied writing prompts, with a limited amount of time to write. The process is designed to short-circuit self-censorship, thereby producing the most exciting work, meaningful to yourself and others. We’ll end with a longer assignment, designed to follow a core insight to its full implications. There will be laughter in this class, and possibly tears. Most of all, the class will stimulate and surprise you, and inspire both your future writing and your future teaching.

Alicia Ostriker is a major American poet and critic. Author of 17 collections of poetry, she has been twice nominated for the National Book Award, and has twice received the National Jewish Book Award for Poetry, among other honors.  As a critic she is the author of the now-classic Stealing the Language: the Emergence of Women’s Poetry in America, and other books on poetry and on the Bible, most recently For the Love of God: the Bible as an Open Book. Her most recent collections of poems are Waiting for the Light and The Volcano and After: Selected and New Poems 2002-2019..Her poems have been translated into numerous languages including Hebrew and Arabic. She is currently the New York State Poet Laureate and a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets.