A message from Tom Daley and the Online School of Poetry

Tom asked me to forward this to anyone who might be interested. Worth checking out.

Dear Friends:
I have a favor to ask of you. Last fall I was invited by Boston-area jazz musician and poet, Jeff Robinson, to join the faculty of the Online School of Poetry, a new school he founded after taking a workshop with me. I am trying to get the word out about the school and especially about an online poetry writing workshop I will be leading starting April 2. SInce it’s online, it’s available to any prospective participant who has access to the internet (and a little cash!).
It’s been a real joy to lead workshops in the craft of poetry writing in the Boston area, and I am very excited to have the opportunity to broaden the range of people I can mentor by working online.

I would like your help in spreading the word about this workshop. If you’re willing, there are a couple of different ways in which you could help. You could let me know of places on the internet (online bulletin boards for artists and writers, blogs of friends) or in print in your area where I might send a listing for the workshop. And, more importantly, since word of mouth seems to be the best way to find new participants for this kind of course, you could pass this on to anyone who might be interested in writing. The wider you spread the net the better–I have had people join my workshops on the basis of this kind of e-mail who had never taken a writing course or written poetry in their life — and ended up writing terrific poems!
Thanks in advance for your help. Hope all is well with you.
regards,
Tom
Here’s the info on the workshop:

Online workshop: Eight Weeks Toward Building the Better Poem

Are you interested in improving your poetry writing techniques? Would you like to learn how to negotiate the complex world of getting your poetry published in journals? Build a community with other poets online?

The Online School of Poetry, whose faculty includes the renowned poets Quincy Troupe, Patricia Smith and Regie Gibson, is offering a poetry writing workshop led by poet and educator Tom Daley, “Eight Weeks Toward Building the Better Poem,” starting April 2, 2006. Through exercises, readings and critiques by the instructor and your fellow workshoppers, you will learn techniques for crafting better poetry. Each week you will be given an assignment in poetic forms and/or poetic techniques. We will be studying the modern sonnet as developed by practitioners such as Gwendolyn Brooks and John Berryman, the relatively new (and shorter) variant of the sestina called the tritina and crafting our own poems in these forms. Other exercises will deal with using anaphora (the repetition of words or phrases at the beginning, middle or end of a line), exploring the possibilities of metaphor, exploding clichés, writing dramatic monologues and writing about music, painting, sculpture, film and other works of art. You will have the opportunity to post two additional poems each week besides the exercise for critique by the instructor and your peers. In addition to critiquing your poetry, the instructor will offer suggestions for further reading based on your work and will make recommendations about strategies for getting your work published and/or performing your work. The class is open to novice poets and experienced hands alike.

Tuition for the course is $200. Go to http://onlineschoolofpoetry.org/TomDaleyWorkshop.html for more information about the course and how to register. The class is limited to twelve participants.

Tom Daley tutors beginning and experienced poets in person and by correspondence and teaches poetry writing at the Boston Center for Adult Education in Boston, Massachusetts. His work has been published in numerous journals, including Prairie Schooner, Poetry Ireland Review, 32 Poems, Salamander, Archipelago, Asheville Poetry Review and Del Sol Review. His manuscript, Shim, was a semi-finalist for the 2004 Bakeless Prize and a finalist for the 2005 Emily Dickinson First Book Prize offered by The Poetry Foundation. In 2004, Tom produced and performed in ?The Musician and the Muse,? a gala evening of performance poetry at the Cambridge Multicultural Arts Center. He graduated with highest honors in Creative Writing from the University of North Carolina, where he won the Charles and Fanny Fay Wood Academy of American Poets Prize.

He has conducted a performance poetry workshop at Stonehill College, a workshop, “Building an Audience for Your Poetry” at the University of Massachusetts Field Station on Nantucket and served as poet-in-residence at several private schools including Atlanta Girls’ School and The Asheville School in Asheville, NC.
Here is a testimonial from a participant in a recent workshop led by Tom Daley:
“The workshop has gotten me back on track with writing poetry and given me new confidence. Your assignments have been so interesting and provocative that they’ve put me back in the zone where I don’t question the value of writing, but just relish doing it and long for more time to do it. The background material and examples are incredibly useful and helped to tune up my ear. I was moved by getting [poems picked out for each participant from established writers] each time. That you would put in this effort made me feel worthy, and sent me reading those poems to look for connections to my own writing. That was a real gift from you. Your own critiques are thoughtful and often bring up points that others don’t see or raise. You focus a lot on the language. It’s by far the best workshop I’ve had. I appreciate the great effort you put into it.”

Tom’s a great writer and a nice guy. Recommended.