We critique the poetry, not the poet: care in the HE Workshop

Nissel, Joanna (2023) We critique the poetry, not the poet: care in the HE Workshop. Poetry and Care, University of Plymouth, Plymouth, United Kingdom. 07 - 08 Sep 2023.

Record type: Conference or Workshop Item (Paper)

Abstract

Contemporary poetry mentorship is characterised by a significant tension between a duty of care towards mentees and concerns over mentorship becoming too similar to therapy at the expense of literary excellence. This tension has only become more fraught in the twenty-first century, with many students working on incredibly personal, confessional and lyric material in the higher education classroom.

When working with sensitive —and possibly traumatic— material, the potential for emotional and psychological damage is significant. Given this, it is necessary to re-evaluate popular HE techniques for delivering critique. In this paper, I will interrogate the cultures around poetry mentorship that separate emotional and psychological wellbeing from literary growth, informed by interviews and surveys with contemporary poets and mentors. In doing so, I offer a new understanding of the poetry mentoring practice that refuses this binary way of thinking, thereby creating potentialities for a more supportive mentoring experience.

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