Please register for this workshop on Eventbrite! This event will take place on Zoom. The link will be provided via email the day of the event.

Sign up today for an online writing workshop taught by poet LUCIA LOTEMPIO. Learn how to write through the rhetorical device persona form, discussing the ethics and implications of another's voice. Whether writing through the voice of intimate object or historical figure, explore what the form reveals about your own perspectives and emotions. The course will give instruction in writing poetry that utilizes persona as a means to achieve rich meaning with context. Beyond a traditional interpretation, the course aims to explore how using this device exposes more about the writer than the persona itself.

The workshop will include a brief lecture, reading and discussing of poems, an hour-long writing exercise with guided prompts, a brief period for feedback and comments, and a Q&A session. All you need to bring is something to write with—everything else will be provided. This is a beginners course! Prior experience writing poetry or in poetry workshops is a bonus, but not a requirement.

Here's a "syllabus" of books Lucia recommends reading if you want to learn more about the persona form, as well as a link to purchase Lucia's book (out in May 2020). No need to read or purchase these before the course!
https://bookshop.org/lists/writing-workshop-syllabus-lucia-lotempio

About the author:

LUCIA LOTEMPIO is the author of Hot with the Bad Things (Alice James Books 2020). You can find her poems in Passages North, The Journal, TYPO, Quarterly West, as part of the Academy of American Poets poem-a-day series, and elsewhere. With Suzannah Russ Spaar, she co-authored the chapbook Undone in Scarlet (Tammy 2019). Lucia has taught creative writing and composition for the University of Pittsburgh, developing courses that focus on the writing and reading of poetry. She teaches poetry writing courses for Pittsburgh Center for Arts and Media, and has mentored for The Adroit Journal Summer Writing Program. Lucia lives and writes in Pittsburgh.