{"id":294,"date":"2016-01-21T14:48:02","date_gmt":"2016-01-21T22:48:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/?p=294"},"modified":"2016-01-21T14:48:02","modified_gmt":"2016-01-21T22:48:02","slug":"whats-lit-got-to-do-with-it-why-we-should-all-read-poetry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/2016\/01\/21\/whats-lit-got-to-do-with-it-why-we-should-all-read-poetry\/","title":{"rendered":"What’s Lit Got to Do with It? Why We Should All Read Poetry"},"content":{"rendered":"

An Impassioned Examination and Plea<\/em> by Andrea MacPherson<\/a><\/p>\n

In the last year, I’ve read twenty-one poetry collections (most recently, Like a Beggar<\/em> by Ellen Bass<\/a>, all the way back to 1996<\/em> by Sara Peters<\/a>–read the complete list below). Likely this is more than some readers, less than others. Perhaps even twenty-one more than many people.<\/p>\n

And why? Because poetry has a bad reputation. We’re intimidated by it. We\u2019re unsure of its intentions. It’s the genre out behind the building in a black leather jacket, smoking. The gateway genre, trying to convince us to try the others. Poetry has been called too erudite, too difficult, too niche, too removed. Poetry is irrelevant to contemporary issues. Poetry is “fluff”.<\/p>\n

\"Leather<\/a> Photo Credit: badjonni<\/a> via Compfight<\/a> cc<\/a><\/p>\n

But all those claims, all that name-calling is wrong. And here’s why.<\/p>\n

We already know that reading literary fiction makes us better, more empathetic people<\/a>. Poetry does something similar for us: it stimulates emotion and memory, and makes us more self-reflective. Poetry is good for us.<\/p>\n

But the science behind poetry is only one reason to encourage us to read more of it<\/a>. There are other, loftier reasons. Poetry is pleasure. It makes us really look at language, and all the muscular acrobatics it’s capable of producing. In a snapshot, it takes us into another experience, another moment, another life. A good poem can capture a whole lifetime in a few short lines: \u201cWe look at the world once, in childhood. The rest is memory\u201d (Gluck<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Poems can be gritty, or dreamy; cerebral, or confessional. We can be transformed by the images we encounter in poems because we recognize ourselves–all our joys, tragedies, grief, and exhilaration–in the lines we find there.<\/p>\n

If a novel is a movie, and a short story is an episode, then a poem is a photograph. Fleeting, focused, and forever reminding us of what we’ve seen, who we’ve been.<\/p>\n

Poetry Collections:<\/strong>
\nLike a Beggar<\/em>, Ellen Bass
\nPoems 1962-2012<\/em>, Louise Gluck
\nRunning in Prospect Cemetery<\/em>, Susan Glickman
\nI see my love more clearly from a distance<\/em>, Nora Gould
\nThe Wrong Cat<\/em>, Lorna Crozier
\nArtificial Cherry<\/em>, Billeh Nickerson
\nThe Sewing Room<\/em>, Carla Funk
\nThe Aviary<\/em>, Miranda Pearson
\nThe Fire Extinguisher<\/em>, Miranda Pearson
\nHarbour<\/em>, Miranda Pearson
\nThe Sleep of Four Cities<\/em>, Jen Currin
\nNorth End Love Songs<\/em>, Katharena Vermette
\nFor Your Safety Please Hold On<\/em>, Kayla Czaga
\nThe Scarborough<\/em>, Michael Lista
\nStrike Sparks<\/em>, Sharon Olds
\nPluck<\/em>, Laisha Rosnau
\nChildren of Air India<\/em>, Renee Sarojini Saklikar
\nCome Cold River<\/em>, Karen Connelly
\nWood<\/em>, Jennica Harper
\nThe Forage House<\/em>, Tess Taylor
\n1996<\/em>, Sara Peters<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An Impassioned Examination and Plea by Andrea MacPherson In the last year, I’ve read twenty-one poetry collections (most recently, Like a Beggar by Ellen Bass, all the way back to 1996 by Sara Peters–read the complete list below). Likely this is more than some readers, less than others. Perhaps even twenty-one more than many people. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-294","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=294"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":299,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294\/revisions\/299"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=294"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=294"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=294"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}