EUROPOE - exploring 20th and 21st century European poetry

Will be run next as a group course in 2023. Now available as an individual program, with details here www.stevenjfowler.com/courses

Taught by Steven J Fowler. For booking, via paypal, please click here

The character of European literature remains a hotbed of innovation – a constant remaking of what we know poetry to be. This ambitious course seeks to introduce the English-language poet, or anyone captivated by a wide understanding of what poetry is, to the European tradition in all its richness. Over the course of seven weeks, we will trace a line from the aftershocks of modernism, to the arrival of symbolism, futurism, surrealism, and more. We explore the constraints that emancipate in the OULIPO movement, the collaborative asemic poetry of the CoBrA group, the onset of conceptual poetry, the birth of Concrete Poetry, the emergence of Sound poetry, leading to the current movement of Performance Literature. We explore electronic poetry and digital literature, and vitally, we present what is happening now – with contemporary poets working in the 21st century.

We will also dip into the ‘grand’ post and pre-war literary poets across the continent, focusing in on their technique to inspire new works. From Mayakovsky to Akhmatova, Brodsky to Dragomoshchenko, Celan to Sachs, Brecht, Miłosz, Herbert, Szymborska to Różewicz, Ritsos to Elytis to Seferis, Popa to Jozsef, Salamun, Isou to Queneau, Cendrars, Pessoa. Müller, Ekelöf, Handke, Saariskoski. Alongside the dozens and dozens of contemporary poets, EUROPOE will situate the anglophone poet with roads into an often occluded European tradition that will hopefully last long into the future.

Attila Jozsef / Henri Chopin / Asger Jorn / Elsa Baroness von Freytag-Loringhoven

This course will emphasise method. Participants will be sent a succinct document of resources once a week for six weeks – ideas, examples, concepts, history, accompanied by exercises or prompts. Then, on a private blog-forum, responses and work can be posted, with comments and feedback from all involved. When the course finishes, an event and publication will consolidate that which everyone has produced.

Places on the course are limited. Email steven at yahoo.co.uk with any questions.

The course is taught be Steven J Fowler, director of the European Poetry Festival. His Maintenant series has interviewed over 100 contemporary European poets and his poetry has been translated into 18 European languages. He has performed at events and festivals in over 20 European countries and in 2019 he edited the EUROPOE anthology of contemporary European poetry with Kingston University Press.

Poems will be presented in English translation, and naturally with such a huge scope, this course covers just an unrepresentative snapshot of innovation in European poetry. EUROPOE follows sold out courses - The Writing Eye and Seen as Read