Collaborative poetry

Last updated

Collaborative or collective poetry is an alternative and creative technique for writing poetry by more than one person. The principal aim of collaborative poetry is to create poems with multiple collaborations from various authors. In a common example of collaborative poetry, there may be numerous authors working in conjunction with one another to try to form a unified voice that can still maintain their individual voices.

Contents

In recent times

One of the most famous examples of collaborative poetry-writing in modern times was the poem collection Ralentir Travaux [1] by Surrealist French poets André Breton, Paul Éluard and René Char. The poems were written collaboratively over the course of five days in 1930. The Surrealists had invented the art of Collage and collective creative 'games' such as the Exquisite corpse, where a collection of words or images are collectively assembled.

In the 1940s, American poet Charles Henri Ford invented what he called the "chain poem", where each poet writes a line and then forwards the poem to another person across the world by post. In his Process Note, Ford explained the method of the 'chain poem': "Thus, after the first line is written, the problem of each poet, in turn, is to provide a line which may both 'contradict' and carry forward the preceding line. The chain poet may attempt to include his unique style and make it intelligible to the poem as well; in which case the chain poem will have a logical and spontaneous growth." [2] In the 1970s, some feminist poets adopted the concept to discover their "collective feminine voice".

More recent experiments of collaborative poetry include the collaborative works of American poets Denise Duhamel and Maureen Seaton, who have been writing poetry together for 15 years and have published three collaborative books: Exquisite Politics (1997), Oyl (2000) and Little Novels (2002). [3] Duhamel described this collaboration saying, "Something magical happens when we write—we find this third voice, someone who is neither Maureen nor I, and our ego sort of fades into the background. The poem matters, not either one of us." [4]

In 2007, the "first definitive collection" of American collaborative poetry was published under the title Saints of Hysteria: A Half-Century of Collaborative American Poetry. [5] Edited by Denise Duhamel, Maureen Seaton and David Trinidad, the anthology included 140 poems by more than 200 authors, culled from various magazines, out-of-print collections, and previously unpublished material. [6]

Another recent experiment is the "Poem Factory", a collective poetry-writing project by an Arabic-language web magazine called Asda' (or Asdaa, Arabic: أصداء). [7] The project uses MediaWiki (the same software used by Wikipedia) to collaboratively write modern poetry in Arabic, which is then published in the magazine under a Creative Commons license. The stated aim of the "factory" is to "liberate poetry from the disease of ownership and its pathological offspring, such as fame obsession and copy rights, which have become characteristic of creative production". It also aims to "discover the collective inside us as poetic beings" and "to bypass the passivity of the reader towards an active contribution". [8] The first 'product' of Asdaa's Poem Factory was published on the magazine's website in January 2008. The poem, titled Shoes, was written by at least five people. [9]

In 1989, Ashira Morgenstern, a poet living in Jerusalem, began inviting colleagues to compose a set number of lines for suggested titles. [10] To explore and document serendipitous confluence, contributors do not see what anyone else has written until the lines are combined by the moderator according to a set, pre-established pattern. The order of line insertion is based simply on the date the contributing material is received. Except for changes in punctuation, not one word of the original separate poems is changed.

Another recent experiment in collaborative poetry writing is 'TAPESTRY POETRY' developed by Avril Meallem, a poet living in Israel and Shernaz Wadia, a poet living in India. Together, via email, they formulated the following guidelines for this innovative genre of collaborative poetry writing: Each poet composes a poem on a title chosen by one of them and without any discussion as to the theme of the poem. The poems are exchanged and then have to be woven into one seamless, flowing piece that can stand on its own. Being a collaborative effort the editing becomes a to and fro process until both writers are satisfied with the resulting 'Tapestry'. The basic rules are:

Since 2011, the English poet S.J. Fowler has fostered collaborations between over 500 poets in over 21 different countries, under the aegis of the Enemies project. These writing collaborations are presented in performances and have frequently also yielded collaborative book projects.

In education

Collaborative poetry-writing has been used at universities and schools as an activity for students to write poetry, with a social perspective that aims to encourage participants to discover ways in which they are connected. According to Maria Winfield, "collective poetry is an exercise designed to encourage students to work from a shared pattern in order to join their voices in a collective rhythm". [11]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Performance poetry</span> Poetry composed for live performance

Performance poetry is a broad term, encompassing a variety of styles and genres. In brief, it is poetry that is specifically composed for or during a performance before an audience. During the 1980s, the term came into popular usage to describe poetry written or composed for performance rather than print distribution, mostly open to improvisation.

Patrick Frank Friesen is a Canadian author born in Steinbach, Manitoba, primarily known for his poetry and stage plays beginning in the 1970s.

The Language poets are an avant-garde group or tendency in United States poetry that emerged in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The poets included: Bernadette Mayer, Leslie Scalapino, Stephen Rodefer, Bruce Andrews, Charles Bernstein, Ron Silliman, Barrett Watten, Lyn Hejinian, Tom Mandel, Bob Perelman, Rae Armantrout, Alan Davies, Carla Harryman, Clark Coolidge, Hannah Weiner, Susan Howe, James Sherry, and Tina Darragh.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rae Armantrout</span> American poet (born 1947)

Rae Armantrout is an American poet generally associated with the Language poets. She has published ten books of poetry and has also been featured in a number of major anthologies. Armantrout currently teaches at the University of California, San Diego, where she is Professor of Poetry and Poetics. Armantrout was awarded the 2009 National Book Critics Circle Award for her book Versed published by the Wesleyan University Press, which had also been nominated for the National Book Award. The book later received the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. She is the recipient of numerous awards for her poetry, including an award in poetry from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts in 2007 and a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2008.

David Trinidad is an American poet.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ron Silliman</span> American poet

Ron Silliman is an American poet. He has written and edited over 30 books, and has had his poetry and criticism translated into 12 languages. He is often associated with language poetry. Between 1979 and 2004, Silliman wrote a single poem, The Alphabet. He has now begun writing a new poem, Universe, the first section of which appears to be called Revelator.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pete Brown</span> Performance poet, lyricist and singer (born 1940)

Peter Ronald Brown is an English performance poet, lyricist, and singer best known for his collaborations with Cream and Jack Bruce. Brown formed the bands Pete Brown & His Battered Ornaments and Pete Brown & Piblokto! and worked with Graham Bond and Phil Ryan. Brown also writes film scripts and formed a film production company.

Michael Rothenberg was an American poet, songwriter, editor, artist, and environmentalist. Born in Miami Beach, Florida, Rothenberg received his Bachelor of Arts in English at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He moved to California in 1976, where he began "Shelldance Orchid Gardens", an orchid and bromeliad nursery. In 2016, Rothenberg moved to Tallahassee, Florida where he was Florida State University Libraries Poet in Residence.

Tracie Morris is an American poet. She is also a performance artist, vocalist, voice consultant, creative non-fiction writer, critic, scholar, bandleader, actor and non-profit consultant. Morris is from Brooklyn, New York. Morris' experimental sound poetry is progressive and improvisational. She is a tenured professor at the Iowa Writers' Workshop.

Denise Duhamel is an American poet.

Denise Low is an American poet, honored as the second Kansas poet laureate (2007–2009). A professor at Haskell Indian Nations University, Low taught literature, creative writing and American Indian studies courses at the university. She was succeeded by Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg on July 1, 2009.

Rachel Zucker is an American poet born in New York City in 1971. She is the author of five collections of poetry, most recently, SoundMachine. She also co-edited the book Women Poets on Mentorship: Efforts and Affections with fellow poet, Arielle Greenberg.

Martine Bellen is an American poet, editor and librettist.

Maureen Owen is an American poet, editor, and biographer.

Diane Ward is a U.S. poet initially associated with the first wave of Language poetry in the 1970s and has actively published into the 21st century, maintaining a presence in various artistic communities for many decades. Born in Washington, DC where she attended the Corcoran School of Art, Ward currently lives in Santa Monica, California where she taught poetry in public schools to 1st through 5th graders for many years.

Steven J. Fowler or SJ Fowler is a contemporary English poet, writer and avant-garde artist, and the founder of European Poetry Festival.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ágnes Lehóczky</span> Hungarian poet, academic and translator (born 1976)

Ágnes Lehóczky is a Hungarian poet, academic and translator born in Budapest, 1976.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Heid E. Erdrich</span> Native American poet and author from Minnesota

Heid E. Erdrich is a poet, editor, and writer. Erdrich is Ojibwe enrolled at Turtle Mountain.

Maureen Seaton is an American LGBTQ poet, activist, and professor of English/Creative Writing at the University of Miami. She is the author of fourteen solo books of poetry, thirteen co-authored books of poetry, and her memoir, Sex Talks to Girls. Throughout her writing career, Seaton has often collaborated with fellow poets Denise Duhamel, Neil de la Flor, Kristine Snodgrass, and Samuel Ace.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">David Howard (poet)</span> New Zealand poet, writer and editor

David Howard is a New Zealand poet, writer and editor. His works have been widely published and translated into a variety of European languages. Howard was the co-founder of the literary magazine takahē in 1989 and the Canterbury Poets Collective in 1990. In New Zealand he held the Robert Burns Fellowship at the University of Otago in Dunedin in 2013, the Otago Wallace Residency, in Auckland in 2014, and the Ursula Bethell Residency in Christchurch, in 2016. In more recent years he has been the recipient of a number of UNESCO City of Literature Residencies.

References

  1. ↑ Ralentir Travaux was translated into English under the title Slow Under Construction, published by Exact Change Press, August 1990. ISBN   978-1-878972-01-9.
  2. ↑ "Galatea Resurrects #6 (A Poetry Engagement): SAINTS OF HYSTERIA, Ed. by DENISE DUHAMEL, MAUREEN SEATON & DAVID TRINIDAD".
  3. ↑ aapone (4 February 2014). "Poetry and Collaboration: Denise Duhamel & Maureen Seaton". Poetry and Collaboration: Denise Duhamel & Maureen Seaton.
  4. ↑ "Rock Salt Plum Journal and Review". www.rocksaltplum.com. Archived from the original on 2007-12-15.
  5. ↑ Soft Skull Press, Brooklyn. 2007. ISBN   1-933368-18-7.
  6. ↑ "Soft Skull: Saints of Hysteria by Edited by Denise Duhamel, Maureen Seaton, and David Trinidad". Archived from the original on 2008-03-19.
  7. ↑ "أصداء - الصفحة الرئيسية". Archived from the original on 2008-02-06.
  8. ↑ "أصداء - مصنع الشعر". Archived from the original on 2007-12-07.
  9. ↑ "أصداء - أحذية - شعر جمعي من إنتاج مصنع الشعر". Archived from the original on 2008-05-21.
  10. ↑ "Point and Circumference ~ Kippat Binah". www.pointandcircumference.com.
  11. ↑ "Search - Teaching Tolerance - Diversity, Equity and Justice". www.tolerance.org. Archived from the original on 2007-09-28. Retrieved 2007-06-01.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.