literary analysis Archives

Prose Poetry: What’s the Point?

10/05/202102/24/2023
by Hannah Huff

LET’S INVESTIGATE PROSE POETRY – THAT OXYMORONIC, SLIGHTLY OBNOXIOUS LITERARY FORM

Prose poetry. It sounds like an oxymoron. Like jumbo shrimp. Or plastic silverware. Or a soothing Lithuanian folk song. But it does indeed exist, having been wrought into existence by the exceptional creativity or pure boredom of writers. But why? Why taint the dainty lines of poetry with the blocky bulk of prose? Let’s find out by looking at the form’s history, major works, essential characteristics, and a literary analysis of Robert Bly’s prose poem “Warning to the Reader.”

Literary Analysis

Netflix’s “Rust Valley Restorers” is Unexpectedly Poetic

10/02/201902/24/2023
by Hannah Huff

A POET’S ANALYSIS OF THE CAR RESTORATION REALITY SHOW SET IN TAPPEN, BC

A Classic Classic Car Show

Recently released on Netflix after originally airing on Canada’s History Channel, Rust Valley Restorers (August 2019) fits right into the ubiquitous car fixer-upper reality genre. It showcases a grungy old guy who owns lots of classic cars that need some serious restoring, but he’s running out of time and money to fix them all. So he opens a restoration shop — Rust Bros Restorations — to catalyze the automotive revivals and bring in money.

Discover Literature

Ekphrastic Poetry: When Art Kindles Literature

01/25/201902/24/2023
by Hannah Huff

MAGIC HAPPENS WHEN POETS RUMINATE ON MASTERPIECES

Ekphrastic poetry is right up there with the villanelle, the ghazal, the abecedarian, and other specific poetic forms that lead a highly intramural existence: poets know what they are, but rarely write them once they leave the MFA creative writing programs where they’re required to spit out such guided assignments. The problem is that in the real world, most readers don’t know what the hell those words mean, let alone the nuances of each form, and as a poet struggling to make even $5 off a poem — actually, make that even $1 — there’s no point in also struggling to write poems that have ground rules: we poets must have some small joy in our feats of creation.

But what a loss! All of those types of poetry, and the one we’re here to discuss today — ekphrastic poetry — can crack the shell on pithy nuts of insight that will never otherwise be opened through our usual, more organic modes of inspiration and composition. Thus, this blog post will hopefully educate readers on the joys of an unfamiliar type of poetry, and also rouse writers from their creative stupor — including myself.

Literary Analysis

Here’s Why These 5 Creative Book Titles Work

11/01/201802/24/2023
by Hannah Huff

A Brief Literary Analysis of Book Names that Resonate

Book titles beckon: from spines and covers, they yoo-hoo in froufrou fonts to prospective readers. Titles are oracles: they augur what unread pages contain. Titles identify: they turn paper piles into cohesive things, heaps into sheaves. Titles are thresholds: readers can’t enter texts without crossing the titular line. Titles frame: in minimal words, they explain what it all meant, why it was all so blue or golden or so on. Titles, though they precede, follow: texts gain names only once they’ve been written. Titles connote: they’re word clusters that conjure up paragraphs read while sick in bed on a cold winter day as the dog yipped in the yard and the world continued on in distant horns and smog. Titles can trick: bad texts sometimes bear creative book titles, and the best books can be rather brusque in their names. Above all, book titles promise: a story, a secret, a journey, a love, a moment.

Despite all this, even literary readers tend to grant a book’s title only a second’s thought before moving on to another text, or to the first page. Today, we’re going to pause and analyze, taking our time with 5 creative book titles that resonate with me for very different reasons.