ENG 372: American Poetry 20th Century & Beyond

North Carolina State University Spring 2024

M & W 10:15-11:30pm G126 Tompkins Hall

“It is a test [that] genuine poetry can communicate before it is understood.” — T. S. Eliot

Professor Meg Day Email: [email protected]

Office Hours: W 12-2pm & by appointment (i.p. or Zoom) Office: Tompkins 261
Email hours: I am available via email M-F & you can expect a response within 24 hours. I am sporadically
on email over the weekends & will respond to weekend emails by the end of business on Monday.

Course Description
Poetry in the first half of the twentieth century was transformed by modernism. These poetic revolutions
emphasized the fundamental importance of vision and style, and they transformed the language, form, and
structure of poetry, greatly extending its territory. In this course, we will start by building a shared vocabulary
around modernism in order to understand the new poems, ideals, experience and visions that were pioneered in
the early decades of the twentieth century. After WWII, poets sought yet again to “make it new” by breaking with
modernist aesthetics or by hybridizing them in new ways. A key focus will be what “work” the poetry wants to do:
what aspirations does it have to change readers &, indeed, society itself? We will examine change in poetics over
time, looking at the influence of movements such as Imagism, Modernism, the Objectivists, Black Mountain
poetics, the New York School, & other schools, situating poetry in key contexts both literary and cultural.

GEP Information: Fulfills 3 hrs. Humanities GEP. This course will help you to:
• understand and engage in the human experience through the interpretation of literature
• become aware of the act of interpretation itself as a critical form of knowing in the study of literature; and
• make scholarly arguments about literature using reasons and ways of supporting those reasons that are
appropriate to the field of study

Required Texts
The Penguin Anthology of Twentieth Century American Poetry edited by Rita Dove ISBN 978-0143121480

Course Outcomes
We aim to investigate how poets encounter the world by studying and, to whatever extent we can, embodying their
work. The byproducts of this immersion will improve your thinking, reading, speaking, and writing skills. Written
work for this class includes a single paper—analytic, argumentative, creative, and built over the course of the
semester—in addition to quizzes, a midterm, and a comprehensive final exam.

In short, students will become familiar with some of the key formal properties of twentieth-century/contemporary
American poetry; key traditions and contexts of twentieth-century/contemporary American poetry; develop close
reading skills; develop critical thinking skills; and develop critical writing (essay skills).

Course Requirements
Attendance & Participation: Regular, consistent attendance is crucial to your success. Feel free to speak with me in
advance if you know you will be missing a class or some portion of it. The most important part of creating
community is showing up. This class will run as a seminar-praxis combo and its success will depend largely on
your commitment to working together in a supportive, energetic, and enthusiastic manner; you are expected to
attend every class meeting prepared to interrogate & discuss the creative & critical work assigned.
Individual Conferences: I strongly encourage you to meet with me individually at least once this semester to speak
about your work. I have weekly office hours in Tompkins & am available via Zoom at the unusual hours
(including very early or very late) that fit your schedule. The more we speak about your work & what you hope to
make happen on the page, the better I can support you in moving forward in your learning.

Textual Engagements:
Each week you’ll have the opportunity to engage with our texts in a variety of ways. You will complete at least 10
Engagements over the course of the 15-week semester & turn them in via hard copy in class; part of your
participation in our discussion should be gesturing toward how you engaged with the texts & what you learned.
You may choose from the following options:
• Close Reading – Choose a single poem from the assigned readings & perform a close reading of the text.
A close reading is a method of literary analysis which focuses on the specific details of a text in order to
understand its deeper meanings through interpretation. This will include writing about the way the poem
is built as much as what it says. Have fun with it! Tell me what you know & notice when you read it!
(minimum 1 pg single spaced)
• A Moment in Time – Choose a single poem from the assigned readings & look up when it was
made/published. Do some light research on what was happening in the country & the world during that
time that might be culturally or sociohistorically relevant to the poem. Make connections between the
poem’s content, its poet, & the news stories of the day.
(minimum 1 pg single spaced)
• GraphioVisual Response – Choose a single poem from the assigned reading & create a graphic or visual
response. You can draw, paint, design, photograph, collage, build, film, or otherwise engage visual or
graphic approaches to representing the nuances of the text. Keep in mind that direct, literal interpretations
sometimes reduce a poem unnecessarily; keep in mind a poem’s power may be in that it says one thing,
but means another.
(graphic object + 200 word commentary articulating your decisions)
• Playlist – Choose a single poem or a poet from our assigned reading & create a playlist to track the vibes
or follow the narrative moves.
(playlist + 300 word commentary describing your choices)
• Creative Response – So moved by a poem you want to make one of your own? Choose a single poem &
make your own in response. You can also respond in other genres: flash fiction, flash memoir, anything
you like. Keep it to a page!
(response poem + 300 word discussion of your moves)
• Wild Card – Create your own method of engagement & clear it with me before you embark! Maybe you
want to choose a poem or poet & design a textile or an outfit, create a circuitboard, plan a menu,
redecorate a room, make a short animation. Whatever you bring to the table is on the table!
(your idea + 300 word commentary describing the what & why of your response)
You may not repeat any of these options more than 2 times.

Papers: We will regularly respond in writing to many of the texts and ideas we encounter together. You will turn in
one paper in this course, but we will build it slowly over the course of the semester to support your learning.
Please make the time to invest in your written work. Outline your ideas, use supporting evidence, & proofread
your work. Proofreading is the practice of checking written work for grammatical or mechanical errors. I am not
your proofreader. I will mark some errors on your pages, as examples of things to work on, but it is your
responsibility to seek help & mastery in identifying & correcting, among others, things like run-on sentences or
verb-tense inconsistencies. I highly recommend that everyone take advantage of one-on-one appointments in The
Undergraduate Writing Center (UWC), and I am certainly happy to meet with you as well. The UWC has some
good resources available for "lower order concerns" (i.e., grammar), and there are abundant resources available on
the internet.

While we will ultimately be more interested in the content you produce (the risks you take, the questions you ask,
the forms you create, etc.), it's important to remember that work that contains grammatical errors is not A level
work. It's equally important to remember that an absence of grammatical errors does not automatically indicate A
level work either. My colleague often uses this analogy: When you're interviewing for a job, you want to iron all the
wrinkles out of your shirt. Proofreading is like ironing. It doesn't guarantee you'll "get the job," but it certainly
helps. Another way to think about proofreading has to do with codeswitching: the code of grammatically correct
English may be arbitrary or problematic, but that doesn’t mean you don’t need to know it.

Midterm & Final Exams: This course will include a midterm & a final exam consisting of fill-in, multiple choice, &
short essay questions. These exams may be in-class or take-home, depending on our needs & may or may not be
open note. If you have testing accommodations, please make arrangements with me before the day of the exam.

Grading
I want your intellectual & creative self to thrive during this semester. Too often, I spend the majority of the course
trying to re-teach students how to invent, play, imagine, & take risks. Grades tend to be a big part of that
negotiation & students often feel they cannot tap into their best ideas because they are afraid of failure. Grades
tend to distract us from the important work of making & have little to do with your growth as a reader, writer,
thinker, & individual in the world. That said, I wish for this requirement to be as transparent as possible. If you
have any question about your grade at any time, please be in touch with me directly so I can support your learning.

Participation (arriving with your book, having done the readings, in-class writing, quizzes, discussion): 25%
Weekly Textual Engagements (10 total) 10%
Paper Brainstorm (pass/fail): 5%
Paper Thesis with supporting evidence (letter graded): 5%
Paper Draft (pass/fail): 5%
Paper Final (letter graded): 15%
Midterm Exam: 15%
Final Exam: 20%

In accordance with University policy, I will use the following grade scale:
A+ 100-97 A 96-94 A- 93-90
B+ 89-87 B 86-84 B- 83-80
C+ 79-77 C 76-74 C- 73-70
D+ 69-67 D 66-64 D- 63-60 F <59

Access Statement & ADA Notice

If you are disabled, welcome! You join a long lineage of Deaf & disabled poets & writers that includes dis-kin such
as Homer, John Milton, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Jorge Luis Borges, Virginia Woolf, James Joyce, Flannery
O’Connor, Audre Lorde, and Octavia Butler. The Americans with Disabilities Act was built for you. It requires
that reasonable accommodations be provided for students with physical, sensory, cognitive, systemic, learning, and
psychiatric disabilities. If you will need accommodations in the class, please notify me and the Disability Resource
Office at Holmes Hall, Suite 304, 2751 Cates Avenue, Campus Box 7509, 919-515-7653. For more information on
NC State’s policy on working with students with disabilities, please see the Academic Accommodations for
Students with Disabilities Regulation (REG02.20.01) https://policies.ncsu.edu/regulation/reg-02-20-01/. Please
communicate with me how I can make the course suit your needs.

Plagiarism
The work you submit for this class must be your own, written by you for this class, & not for any other class past
or present. Plagiarism—the willful copying/presenting of another person’s work as if it were your own—and other
forms of cheating are not only unacceptable but also illegal. The English program’s standard penalty for plagiarism
is a failing grade for the assignment and possibly the course. If you have any doubts as to what constitutes
plagiarism, please refer to The Code of Conduct (NCSU POL11.35.1) https://policies.ncsu.edu/policy/pol-11-35-
01 or come talk with me. Work done for this class may not be submitted for credit in other courses.
COVID-19 & Masks
Your health & wellbeing is a priority. If you feel unwell, are experiencing symptoms, or have tested positive for
COVID-19, please do not attend F2F courses unless cleared from quarantine. Please be in touch so we can
accommodate you as needed.

Masks are extremely effective in reducing the spread of COVID-19 and are especially so when everyone in an
indoor space is wearing them. State, city, and NC State policies on masking may change during the semester in
response to variants and community spread; rules will be updated at the Protect the Pack website. Regardless of
campus requirements, my personal decision is to wear an KN-95 mask to protect myself as well as all of you
with whom I come in contact, whose personal health concerns and living situations I cannot possibly
know. Unless NC State implements a mask mandate, the decision to mask or not is entirely up to you. My
motivation for masking is simple: I want to do what I can to ensure that all of us remain healthy and are able to
meet face-to-face during the entire semester.

NC State Rules & Regulations

Students are responsible for reviewing the NC State University Policies, Rules, and Regulations (PRRs) which
pertain to their course rights and responsibilities, including those referenced both below and above in this syllabus:
Equal Opportunity and Non-Discrimination Policy Statement https://policies.ncsu.edu/policy/pol-04-25-05 with
additional references at https://oied.ncsu.edu/divweb/policies/
Code of Student Conduct https://policies.ncsu.edu/policy/pol-11-35-01.

ChatGP and AI Guidelines

As an English professor, and as an artist & writer by trade, I care greatly about the role AI plays in both our
thinking and our making. For the purposes of our class, I do not welcome interference of AI or ChatGP in
your written work. Please refrain from using these tools when drafting. Please cite any AI/ChatGP sources that
have supported your thinking. Details on how to source your AI usage are explained here:
https://provost.unc.edu/student-generative-ai-usage-guidance/

Use of generative AI in your coursework is based on the following principles:

1. AI should help you think. Not think for you.

Use these tools to give you ideas, perform research (in compliance with point 2 below), and analyze
problems. Do not use them to do your work for you, e.g., do not enter an assignment question into
ChatGPT and copy & paste the response as your answer.

2. Engage with AI Responsibly and Ethically

Engage with AI technologies responsibly, critically evaluating AI-generated outputs and considering
potential biases, limitations, and ethical implications in your analysis and discussions. Utilize AI
technologies ethically, respecting privacy, confidentiality, and intellectual property rights. Ensure that the
data used for AI applications is obtained and shared responsibly and in compliance with relevant
regulations.
COURSE SCHEDULE

Week 1
Monday, January 8: Welcome!
• Introductions / Discussion of course requirements
• Read together: Kahn’s “The Seminar”
• Read together: Rita Dove’s Introduction (pg xxix-xxxii)
• Read together: Rita Dove’s Introductions Epilogue (pg l-lii)
• Buy your book!
Wednesday, January 10: Modernist Beginnings, Part I
• Read: finish reading Kahn’s “The Seminar”
• Read: Frost “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”
• Read: cummings “r-p-o-p-h-e-s-s-a-g-r”
• Read: Millay “First Fig”
• Read T.S. Eliot “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”

Week 2
Monday, January 15: No Class
Wednesday, January 17: Modernist Beginnings, Part II
• In-class skills assessment
• Due in-class (hard copy): Textual Engagement #1

Week 3
Monday, January 22: Comp Exam #1 & Imagists
• Read: H.D. “Helen”
• Read: William Carlos Williams “The Red Wheelbarrow”
• Read: Pound “In a Station of the Metro”
• Due via Moodle by 11:59pm: Comp Exam #1
Wednesday, January 24
• Due in-class (hard copy): Textual Engagement #2

Week 4
Monday, January 29: Harlem Renaissance
• Read: Hughes “Harlem”
• Read: Cullen “Incident”
• Read: McKay “If We Must Die”
• Read: Toomer “November Cotton Flower”
Wednesday, January 31
• Due in-class (hard copy): Textual Engagement #3

Week 5
Monday, February 5: Black Mountain School
• Read: Olson “The Distances”
• Read: Levertov “The Poem Unwritten”
• Read: Creeley “I Know a Man”
• Read: Duncan “Often I Am Permitted to Return to a Meadow”
• Due in-class (hard copy): Textual Engagement #4
Wednesday, February 7: No class / Comp Exam #2
• Due via Moodle by 11:59pm: Comp Exam #2
Week 6
Monday, February 12: Beats
• Read: Ferlinghetti “Populist Manifesto”
• Read: Wakoski “The Mechanic”
Wednesday, February 14
• Due in-class (hard copy): Textual Engagement #5

Week 7
Monday, February 19: New York School
• Read: O’Hara “The Day Lady Died”
• Read: Ashbery “What Is Poetry”
• Read: Berrigan “A Final Sonnet”
Wednesday, February 21
• Due in-class (hard copy): Textual Engagement #6

Week 8
Monday, February 26: Black Arts Movement
• Read: Sanchez “poem at thirty”
• Read: Brooks “We Real Cool”
• Read: Baraka “Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note”
Wednesday, February 28: Midterm
• Due in-class (hard copy): Textual Engagement #7
• Due via Moodle by 11:59pm: Midterm

Week 9
Monday, March 4: Confessional
• Read: Sexton “Wanting to Die”
• Read: Berryman from “The Dream Songs”
• Read: Lowell “Skunk Hour”
Wednesday, March 6
• Due in-class (hard copy): Textual Engagement #8

Week 10
March 11-15: NC State Spring Break

Week 11
Monday, March 18
• Due in-class (hard copy): Brainstorm Worksheet
Wednesday, March 20
• Due via Moodle: Complex thesis + supporting arguments outline + Works Cited

Week 12
Monday, March 25: L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E
• Read: Palmer “I Do Not”
• Read: Hejinian from “My Life”
• Read: Silliman “Albany”
Wednesday, March 27
• Due in-class (hard copy): Textual Engagement #9
Week 13
Monday, April 1: Comp Exam #3
• Due: In-class Comp Exam #3
• Individual Conferences / In-class Paper Work Day
Wednesday, April 3
• Individual Conferences / In-class Paper Work Day

Week 14
Monday, April 8: Contemporary Forerunners
• Read: Li-Young Lee “The Gift”
• Read: Mary Oliver “The Summer Day”
• Read: Natasha Tretheway “Hot Combs”
• Read: Marie Howe “What the Living Do”
• Read: Naomi Shihab-Nye “The Traveling Onion”
• Read: Joy Harjo “My House is the Red Earth”
Wednesday, April 10
• Due in-class (hard copy): Textual Engagement #10

Week 15
Monday, April 15
• Due in-class: Hard copy of Working Draft for Peer Review
Wednesday, April 17
• Due via Moodle by 11:59pm: Final Draft of Paper

Week 16
Monday, April 22: Final Review

Final exam schedule TBD by the provost’s office.

PLEASE NOTE: Syllabus & Schedule are both subject to change at the professor’s discretion.
The professor will make every effort to provide students with reasonable advance notice of changes.