Beyond Meaning: The Unconscious Life of a Poem
A 6-week Poetry Writing Course with Anthony Anaxagorou
When: Six Tuesdays from January 6-February 10
18:30-20:30 (London Time)
Where: Online, via Zoom
Fee: £200
Price exclude Ticket Tailor fees
Course Description:
Over six weeks we will be exploring the very function of poetry, both as ancient and artistic expression and as a modern day utility. Together we will look to unpack what we mean when we ‘mean’, and how an over dependency on meaning can sometimes stunt and diminish the poem’s powers. We will work to build poems made from the material of our unconscious minds, from bits of debris from our past, the voices and smells of those we’ve never met but feel we know through what we’ve seen and heard.
This course is very much looking to push the boundaries of what a poem can be, how it can sound and what it can look like. We will be studying the letter, the essay, journalism and painting along with formal poems to see how we can borrow from those mediums and add to what we already do. Each session will be prefaced with a small amount of theory covering the ideas and prompts we’re going to explore, followed by a close-read of a poem then a writing exercise. There will also be a chance for participants to share work and receive feedback from the group if they wish.
These sessions are designed for all stages and invite participants to contribute and discuss their ideas in a safe, lively and curious space.
Biography:
Anthony Anaxagorou, FRSL, is a British-born Cypriot poet, fiction writer, essayist and publisher.
His third collection, Heritage Aesthetics published with Granta Poetry in 2022, won the RSL Ondaatje Prize 2023 and was shortlisted for the Anglo-Hellenic League’s Runciman Award. It was listed as one of New Statesman’s top books of 2022.
His second collection, After the Formalities published with Penned in the Margins, is a Poetry Book Society Recommendation and was shortlisted for the 2019 T.S. Eliot Prize along with the 2021 Ledbury Munthe Poetry Prize for Second Collections. It was also a Telegraph and Guardian poetry book of the year.
In 2020 he published How To Write It with Merky Books; a practical guide fused with tips and memoir looking at the politics of writing as well as the craft of poetry and fiction along with the wider publishing industry.
Anthony is artistic director of Out-Spoken, a monthly poetry and music night held at London’s Southbank Centre, and publisher of Out-Spoken Press. He is the editor-in-chief of Propel Magazine, an online literary journal featuring the work of poets yet to publish a first collection and the founder and curator of WriteBack, a quarterly literary series held at the British Library.
In 2019 he was made an honorary fellow at the University of Roehampton. In 2023 he was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
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