I have just been on a really wonderful, week-long (started Monday evening, ended Friday evening) Arvon Online course on Poetry and Spirituality, all done by zoom. The tutors, poets Clare Shaw and Roy McFarlane, are great poets and so enthusiastic and encouraging and inspiring, and the other participants were extraordinary - each so different but all such gifted poets already, and such lovely people to spend a week with. I hope and expect to be reading the other students' poetry in published collections - I would be very sad if I didn't. I'd also really like to write publishable poems myself.
We made poems by typing lines into chat on zoom, we had 5 minute and 10 minute exercises to do, and to share, afternoons to work on our own poetry, and, over the four days, we had a tutorial each with the tutors. On the four evenings we listened to Clare and Roy read their work, shared our own favourite poems by others, went to an Arvon live guest reading, in this case a wonderful poet called Nadine Aisha Jassat, and finally, shared work we had made.
It was such an incredible, moving, worthwhile week and we cried and laughed so much. It showed me that it is possible, with very good organisation (thank you to Jill Penny and Kerensa Wilton the very kind and efficient administrators) and gifted tutors like Clare and Roy, to create a really safe space for creativity online. I have been to residential Arvon courses before, and really think I would not have become a published writer without them. For some of the other poets on the course, who are not able to travel to physical courses because of health, this online course enabled them to grow and collaborate creatively in ways they could not have done otherwise, and Online Arvon courses are cheaper than residential, and that is a big help as regards accessibility. There are also grants available to help people attend.
I found it really helpful for me as a writer to try something new, and I recommend Arvon online (or residential when they happen again) to other writers. I now want to continue to write Poetry, but also bring back to my other work the person I discovered myself to be through writing Poetry. I am sure that the new awareness that Poetry has brought me of who I am as a person, will now also affect my prose and picture book writing for children and adults. I am so grateful for the experience, and am looking forward to meeting up again with the poets I met and having regular zoom poetry evenings with them.
https://www.arvon.org/arvon-at-home/
Today (21st March) Clare Shaw, one of the lovely tutors for this week, will be on this radio 4 programme at 4.30 pm. She will be in her home valley of Calderdale, examining the role of art in helping us deal with flooding, and I can't wait to listen to her again!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000tcks
3 comments:
Good stuff, Anne - and NaPoWriMo is coming soon - a great way to keep writing poems!
Sounds amazing! There's something really nice about being able to connect with other writers through the internet - it can be a lonely business sometimes. I'm rediscovering blogs this current lockdown.
I loved Arvon and really miss going on their retreats (when I can afford them)! I've enjoyed a handful of the two-hour courses as part of the Arvon at Home festival but this week-long course sounds fantastic.
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