Registration now open for Fear of Poetry class starting May 19
The Rehoboth Beach Writers’ Guild is kicking off its summer creative writing classes with a poetry class designed to inspire and motivate those who may love poetry but have never written it, those who do write poetry but have had little instruction in writing it, and those who don’t like or even understand poetry, but want to see what it’s all about.
Fear of Poetry is a five-week class taught by Gail Comorat and Ethan Joella, two working, publishing and award-winning poets. Classes will be held Monday mornings from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., May 19, June 2, 9, 16 and 23. Fear of Poetry is, as the course description says, “not your mother’s poetry class,” featuring ancient poets and long, rhymed stanzas. Instead, using example poems and exercises from contemporary writers, the course will guide participants toward writing about the memories they can’t seem to shake but can’t seem to write.
“This is an especially important class for me to teach," says Comorat, who, along with Joella, teaches numerous RBWG poetry classes. Five years ago. Comorat did not consider herself a poet - she was working on a novel - and did not understand poetry at all. But she took a course much like Fear of Poetry and became hooked.
She has since gone on to win numerous awards including a fellowship from the Delaware Division of the Arts in 2011, and she has published poetry in numerous literary journals. Now, back to writing fiction, she says that the years spent writing poetry taught her how to better write a novel. “I get to the heart of a scene more quickly, and describe things more exactly and more economically.”
The cost for the five-week class, which will be held in Henlopen Acres (address provided upon registration), is $225 for RBWG members and $250 for nonmembers. To register, email contactus@rehobothbeachwritersguild.com. For information about Comorat and Joella or to inquire about other writers' guild classes being offered this summer starting in June, go to www.rehobothbeachwritersguild.com.
