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"I
have been looking at what its critics would undoubtedly call the
workshop poem—what Carolyn Kizer once called "the good gray
poem" of the workshops—for twenty years, and I have to say I do not
know what it is, unless it is an early draft of a poem by a poet who is
still under forty. They have come in all sizes and shapes, struck every
known attitude and stance, showed unending ambition and promise, and yes,
they have all failed to one degree or another to be the equal of
"Sailing to Byzantium." But, then, so did all of W.B.Yeats's work
before he was forty fail to be the equal of "Sailing to
Byzantium."
—Roger Mitchell,
from "On Being Large and Containing Multitudes"
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Before retiring from full time teaching
at Indiana University—Bloomington, Roger Mitchell taught both
undergraduate and graduate courses in literature and creative writing
for the Department of English. He directed the Creative Writing Program
and for a time held the Ruth Lilly Chair of Poetry. Since retiring, he
has taught as a Visiting Professor at Colorado College in Colorado
Springs.
Not all his teaching has been in colleges and universities, however. He
has conducted writing workshops in a variety of locations and to all
levels of learners, from Poets-in-the-Schools programs in primary and
secondary schools to adult workshops at writers' conferences and in
prisons. Most recently, he has taught the summer writers' workshop for
the Old Forge Library in upstate New York, taught classes in poetry
writing for The Ragdale Foundation, The Poetry Center of Chicago, and
the Indiana University Writers' conference. He has also conducted
one-day workshops for a number of local writers' groups, such as Poetry
West in Colorado Springs and The Writers in Oak Park, Illinois.
Roger Mitchell is available for
short-term college and university appointments, writing workshops, and writers'
conferences.
Fees on request.
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