Spring 2006 Courses

English 403: Senior Seminar in Contemporary Poetry (Burt)

W 7:00-10:00 pm, Old Main 011

What have American poets been doing since 1968? How have they reacted to one another, and to the cultural change that has occured in this country and elsewhere since that date? What do poets believe now, and what forms respond to those beliefs? What moves have created memorable poems, and why? We'll try to answer those questions by looking at some of the preeminent poets of the contemporary period, and at their potential successors, among them (probably) John Ashbery, Frank Bidart, Jorie Graham, Albert Goldbarth, Harryette Mullen, and Donald Revell. We'll also be reading and responding to a good deal of scholarship and criticism, some of it put forward by the poets themselves.

Though the course is a senior seminar, juniors and sophomores are welcome if they feel ready for such a course, and if there is room. It would be helpful if students had already taken English 135 (Intro to Poetry) or at least one creative writing course or at least one course at Macalester, such as Romantic Poets or Love/Sex/Desire in the Renaissance, focused at least in part on poetry.

Spring 2006 Course Listings