Notes on the Iowa Writers' Workshop and Poetic Forms

Overview of the Iowa Writers' Workshop and its Context

The Early Workshop: Idealization vs. Reality

  • Narrative Trope: The early workshop is often idealized in memoirs as a "golden era," a "Miranda's world," a "brave new world," or an "Edenic era." This narrative trope suggests a period of pristine creative exploration.
  • Double Use of Eden Trope (Justice): Donald Justice's use of the "Eden" trope highlights a tension between this idealized memory and the harsh realities.
  • Harsh Realities: For many, the experience was miserable due to:
    • Insulting Mentors: Poets like Berryman could be very insulting.
    • Poverty and Depression: Students often lived in poverty and suffered from depression.
    • Unrealistic Expectations: Most knew they would likely not become famous poets.
    • Competitiveness and Despair: The workshop environment fostered intense competitiveness, leading to despair and other common struggles for poets.
  • Idealization Tendency: There's a human tendency to idealize miserable past experiences, similar to how childhoods are sometimes romanticized, extending this to the workshop era.

Physical Infrastructure of the Early Workshop

  • Location: The early workshops were housed directly north of Memorial Union, in the "bizarre Gowdy Building."
  • Conditions: These were "enormously poorly climate controlled temporary housing" facilities for both administrative and pedagogical operations.
  • Transition: This arrangement continued until the English-Philosophy Building (EPB) was built around mid-to-late 1966. EPB is ironically described as "the ugliest building in Iowa" and the "only undoubted building" on campus.

Iowa's Cultural Identity and Poetic Transit

  • Iowa as a Neutral Ground: The Midwest, particularly Iowa, possessed a "very weak sense of cultural identity" compared to regions like the South, which had "traditional new critical orientations."
  • Florida-Iowa Transit: A "peculiar transit" of poets developed between Florida and Iowa in the late twentieth century, with no clear historical accounting for its origin.
  • South-Iowa Transit: More generally, there was a significant transit between the South (with its strong, traditional New Critical viewpoints) and Iowa, which, lacking a strong inherent poetic identity, became a melting pot.

The Post-Workshop Poetry Landscape

  • Shift in Recognition: Prior to the workshop's full development, there were poets whose work was widely known and recognized globally within the English-speaking world.
  • Academic Containment: After the workshop's rise, poetry became largely contained within academia. This led to a shrinking of poets' "larger public influences" while their "internal status" within academic circles gained "great moment."
  • Loss of Universal Knowledge: Consequently, there are "really no poets who everybody knows" in the same way as before the workshop era.

Key Figures and Their Contributions

Donald Justice: Poet, Teacher, Form, and Content

  • Challenging but Accessible Work: Justice's poems, though short, are challenging. They require significant class time for unpacking, including understanding references and formal elements. They cannot be simply read and appreciated without instruction.
  • Institutional Context: The brevity of his poems made them suitable for a class session, allowing professors to provide "close reading" and necessary knowledge, thus placing the lyric poem form within the institutional context of the creative writing program.
  • Evolution as a Poet: Justice developed from a "more conventional traditional solitary poet" to a "poet teacher" who was often "harassed by the students and institutions and parties and various rights sort of associations."
  • Academic Achievement: He was one of the first figures to earn a creative PhD from the University of Iowa, a degree less commonly offered today.
  • Role Stabilization: Justice stabilized his role not as a poet-scholar, but distinctly as a "poet teacher."
  • Poetic Style: Later described as the "serious, formally precise, new critically" figure, in contrast to others.

W.D. Snodgrass: Pulitzer, Confessionalism, Lowell's Influence

  • Early Prominence: Less known today, Snodgrass was identified early on as an important graduate, notably for winning the Pulitzer Prize (believed to be the first for a workshop poet).
  • Derivative Style: He was widely seen as derivative of Robert Lowell.
  • Confessional Poetry: His work was characterized by a "confessional poetic" style, often focusing on personal themes like his divorce and loss of contact with his daughter.
  • Workshop Dynamics: His early success and prize-winning status led to him being perceived as a "notch above the rest," illustrating the "cliquishness and the playing favorites" inherent in the workshop environment. His fame and significance later diminished.

Philip Levine: Working-Class Roots, Ethical Poetics

  • Ethically Grounded Poet: Levine is considered one of the "ethically grounded poets."
  • Background: He came from Jewish working-class origins in Detroit, which significantly influenced his poetic voice, emphasizing the "salt of the earth" and the "common man."
  • Hardship in Workshop: His memoirs of Berryman reveal he was often too poor to formally register for workshop sessions and therefore simply attended classes, a practice not possible today.

Marvin Bell: Iowa Institution, Counter-Cultural Voice

  • Lifelong Affiliation with UI: Bell spent his entire career at the University of Iowa, progressing from a graduate student (MFA) to a lecturer and instructor.
  • Iowa Poet Laureate: He became the first poet laureate of Iowa, establishing himself as an "Iowa institution."
  • Counter-Cultural Counterpart: Bell served as a "beat countercultural alternative to Donald Justice." While Justice represented formal precision and New Criticism, Bell was associated with "the beats and the counterculture and the kind of hippie bohemian scene," representing a diverging side within the poetry world.
  • Foreshadowed Split: His presence hints at a future "split" in the workshop and broader poetry world between a mainstream and a counter-cultural approach.

George Starbuck: Workshop Director, Political Climate

  • Directorship: Starbuck replaced Paul Engle as the director of the workshop in the late 1960s, specifically from 1967 to 1970, during the "turbulent era of the sixties."
  • Legal Significance: He is noted in history not just as a poet, but for being cleared by the Supreme Court for refusing to take a loyalty oath during the late McCarthy years.

Understanding Poetic Forms and Devices

Basic Prosody: The Iambic Foot

  • Iamb: The only foot the student is required to remember is the iamb (da-DUM, as in "I AMB").
  • Iambic Pattern: This foot consists of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable, producing a recurring "da DUM" sound.
  • Prevalence: The iambic foot is "the most used foot in English language poetry."
  • Metrical Complexity: Much of the complicated rhythms and metrical complexities in English poetry arise from the relationship between the expected "straight iambs" on the page and the poet's deliberate "variations" from this baseline.
  • Other Feet: The anapestic foot is mentioned as another type of poetic foot.

Rhyme, Alliteration, and Assonance

  • Purpose: Knowing these terms is not essential for appreciating poetry but is crucial for effective discussion and analysis.
  • Rhyme: Occurs when words share the same ending sounds (e.g., "rhyme, dime, time, fine").
  • Alliteration: The repetition of initial consonant sounds in close proximity (e.g., "crazy cats" or "funny face").
  • Assonance: The repetition of similar vowel sounds within words (e.g., "loud sound, half laugh").

The Sonnet: Structure and Variations

  • Definition: A sonnet is defined as a poem consisting of 14 lines of iambic pentameter. While variations exist, this is its fundamental structure.
  • Iambic Pentameter: Each line comprises five iambic feet, totaling ten syllables, with an alternating unstressed/stressed pattern.
  • Reading Sonnets: When reading a sonnet, one should mentally keep the "perfect meter" (iambic pentameter) in mind. Any deviations from this meter are typically intentional and reveal the poet's deliberate choices and the "intentionality of the meter."
  • Common Versions:
    • Shakespearean Sonnet: A widely recognized form.
    • Petrarchan Sonnet: Features a

Overview of the Iowa Writers' Workshop and its Context

The Early Workshop: Idealization vs. Reality
  • Idealized "Golden Era": Memoirs often portray the early workshop as an "Edenic era" of creative exploration.
  • Harsh Realities: However, many experienced misery due to insulting mentors, poverty, depression, unrealistic expectations, and intense competitiveness. This idealization is a common human tendency.
Physical Infrastructure of the Early Workshop
  • Early Location: Housed in the "bizarre Gowdy Building," in "poorly climate controlled temporary housing."
  • Transition: Moved to the English-Philosophy Building (EPB), around mid-1966, described as "the ugliest building in Iowa."
Iowa's Cultural Identity and Poetic Transit
  • Neutral Ground: Iowa had a "very weak sense of cultural identity" compared to the South's traditional New Critical views.
  • Poetic Melting Pot: This led to a "peculiar transit" of poets, particularly from the South/Florida, making Iowa a diverse poetic hub.
The Post-Workshop Poetry Landscape
  • Shift to Academia: Poetry

's broad public recognition diminished, becoming largely contained within academia.

  • Reduced Influence: This reduced poets' "larger public influences" but heightened their "internal status," leading to a loss of universally known poets.

Key Figures and Their Contributions

Donald Justice: Poet, Teacher, Form, and Content
  • Key Characteristics: Challenging, formally precise poet-teacher; significant for his "close reading" friendly lyric poems and earning one of the first creative PhDs from UI.
W.D. Snodgrass: Pulitzer, Confessionalism, Lowell's Influence
  • Key Characteristics: Early Pulitzer winner, influential in "confessional poetic" style (personal themes), though seen as derivative of Robert Lowell.
Philip Levine: Working-Class Roots, Ethical Poetics
  • Key Characteristics: Ethically grounded poet, shaped by Jewish working-class Detroit roots, emphasizing the 'common man'; attended workshops informally due to poverty.
Marvin Bell: Iowa Institution, Counter-Cultural Voice
  • Key Characteristics: Lifelong UI affiliate; first Iowa Poet Laureate; served as a "beat countercultural alternative" to Donald Justice, foreshadowing poetic divergence.
George Starbuck: Workshop Director, Political Climate
  • Key Characteristics: Directed workshop (1967–1970); noteworthy for being cleared by Supreme Court after refusing a McCarthy-era loyalty oath.

Understanding Poetic Forms and Devices

Basic Prosody: The Iambic Foot
  • Iamb: An unstressed followed by a stressed syllable (da-DUM, as in "I AMB"), the "most used foot in English language poetry."
  • Metrical Complexity: Variations from rhythmic expectations create poetic complexity.
Rhyme, Alliteration, and Assonance
  • Purpose: Essential for discussing and analyzing poetry.
  • Rhyme: Same ending sounds (e.g., "time, fine").
  • Alliteration: Repetition of initial consonant sounds (e.g., "crazy cats").
  • Assonance: Repetition of similar vowel sounds (e.g., "loud sound").
The Sonnet: Structure and Variations
  • Definition: A 14-line poem in iambic pentameter.
  • Iambic Pentameter: Five iambic feet per line (10 syllables, unstressed/stressed).
  • Intentionality: Deviations from meter are deliberate and reveal poetic intent. Common forms: Shakespearean, Petrarchan.