Schedule of Events

Advance registration is required.

Registrants will be accepted on a first-come basis. You can e-mail Carol Henry to reserve a place in a workshop. Once they are filled, we will open a waiting list.

Please note that your registration will be confirmed only after your full payment is received.

To learn more about the workshops and to register, click here

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 1

9:30 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. Workshop with Terri Witek
Poetry and the Visual Arts
One of the most ancient forms of poetic practice is “ekphrasis,” in which, as John Hollander explains, poems talk back to “silent works of art.” But what happens when the works aren’t silent, are themselves composed of text, move, build a literal landscape, or face backwards? Poets in the workshop will choose from a series of challenges and try to crash/cross/question the boundaries between forms.
Scarborough Library, Shepherd University
$50 fee
2:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. Women’s Voices Readings with Deborah Ager, Amy Holman, and Terri Witek
Byrd Center for Legislative Studies Auditorium
Free and open to the public
3:15 p.m. – 5:45 p.m. Workshop with Amy Holman
From Bee-keeping to Surfing: Exploring Your Own New Poems
In this workshop, we will talk about how to generate ideas for new poems when we are in a rut, and specifically, how to take one's interests and curiosities in life and expand them to new places in poetry. We will read examples of poems that draw on biology, math, society, bee-keeping, hedge funds, surfing, and other subjects. We will try exercises to produce the beginnings of new poems, and talk a bit about when one should think about shaping a collection, whether the size of a chapbook or longer.
Scarborough Library, Shepherd University
$50 fee
8:00 p.m. Ed Hirsch reading at the auditorium of Byrd Center for Legislative Studies Auditorium
Free and open to the public

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 2

9:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m.Workshop with Michael Collier
Icon, Painting, Picture, Portrait, Headshot, Cameo: the Vicissitudes of Translation
Working from a literal rendering of a poem by the twentieth-century Greek poet C.P. Cavafy, we will try our hand at fashioning our own translation.  We will also look at five published, translated versions of the same poem after we have completed ours.  The exercise will give us first-hand experience with the difficulties translators face when making decisions regarding diction, syntax, lineation, and form, but it will also create a microclimate of the atmosphere we inhabit when working on our own poems, especially later drafts.
Materials will be sent to participants two weeks in advance of our meeting.
Scarborough Library, Shepherd University
$50 fee
11:45 a.m. – 12:45 p.m. Lunch
1:00 p.m. – 2:00 p.m.Lecture with Ed Hirsch
How to Read a Poem and Fall in Love with Poetry
Byrd Center for Legislative Studies Auditorium
Free and open to the public
2:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m.Q&A with Natasha Trethewey
Byrd Center for Legislative Studies Auditorium
Free and open to the public
3:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m. Individual Consultations with Peter Stitt, Amy Holman, and Deborah Ager
Scarborough Library, Shepherd University
$25 fee
4:30 p.m. - 5:30 p.m. Publishing panel (Deborah Ager, Peter Stitt)
Scarborough Library, Shepherd University
8:00 p.m.Readings by Michael Collier and Natasha Trethewey
Byrd Center for Legislative Studies Auditorium
Free and open to the public
Reception and book signing immediately following the reading
9:30 p.m.Open mic at Stone Soup
To sign up, please send Carol Henry an e-mail (carolh@hbp.com). The subject should read “Open mic”

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 3

10:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.

Yoga Class: Christa Mastrangelo Joyce
Yoga and Poetry — Energize your current writing practice with yoga Christa will guide you through a flowing and joyful practice meant to ignite your creative energy. Learn how the creative process can be enriched by a yoga practice. Class will culminate with writing exercises.
Mellow Moods 111 East German Street (upstairs).
$20 fee
 Limited to 18 participants


All proceeds from the workshops benefit Sotto Voce 2010

The organizers of the Sotto Voce Poetry Festival reserve the right to make changes to any aspect of the Festival as necessary.