The Northwest SPokenword LAB along with the Richard Hugo House, Poets & Writers and the Washington Poets Association, is proud to announce a poetry workshop with Sam Hamill, the first he has ever conducted in Seattle, 12N-4P on Sunday, October 5, 2008, at the Richard Hugo House, 1634 11th Avenue, in Seattle.

Registration for the workshop is $125, non-refundable, non-transferable and can be done on-line at: this link. For more information, call 253.735.6328. Participants are to send no more than 5 pages of poetry, preferably when registering. (The deadline is September 10th.)

Workshop limited to 16 participants. Sam will read the poems in advance and lead the discussion the day of the workshop.

HIGHLY Recommended but not required reading: Denise Levertov's essays, "On the Function of the Line" and "Line-breaks, Stanza-spaces, and the Inner Voice" and "Technique and Tune-up" all from her New & Selected Essays (New Directions). The second essay is only a couple pages.

Also Recommended: The Art of Writing by Lu Chi (SH translation)

Bio:

Born in 1943 and a Port Townsend resident since 1974; Sam Hamill is the internationally acclaimed author of more than 40 books, including 15 volumes of poetry, 4 collections of essays, and dozens of volumes translated from classical Chinese, Japanese and other languages. Among his honors are a Wa Poets Ass'n lifetime achievement award in poetry, the Stanley Lindbergh Lifetime Achievement Award in Editing and two Wa Governor's Arts Awards. He was Editor at Copper Canyon Press for 32 years and is presently Director of Poets Against War.

This workshop will focus on the lyric mode and the personal voice in poetry, "engaged poetry," and will include an opportunity to address any and all concerns related to the writing, reading, and publication of poetry as well as some traditional workshop critiquing. This is a rare opportunity to spend an afternoon with a poet-editor-translator whose knowledge of and generosity toward other poets is renowned.

Sam would like up to 5 pages of work to preview from each participant. Poems can be sent to Paul Nelson, 908 i St. N.E. #4, Auburn, WA 98002-4146 and must be sent by September 10th!

Sam will also be the feature at the Red Sky Poetry Theater reunion, starting at 7PM that evening, also at the Richard Hugo House. On Sunday, December 7, Red Sky will have the 2nd in its reunion series, featuring Judith Roche and Charlie Burks, also at the Hugo House.

Clarice Keegan created a flyer in a .pdf format you can download here.

John Marshall's April 2000 P.I. article is linked here.