Calling all creative writers! David Loffman plans to run a poetry workshop on 25^th August at Bosham House, nr Chichester, if enough people are interested.

David Loffman teaches English and creative writing at a Tertiary College in South West London and has been running poetry and creative writing workshops to a variety of groups for more than ten years.

The poetry workshop will focus on haiku, a Japanese poetic form made popular in the seventeenth century by Matsuo Basho. Japanese haiku are short seventeen syllable poems consisting of two contrasting ideas. They focus on details of everyday life and invite the reader to explore the connection between these ideas.

Traditionally, haiku are poems inspired by nature. However, haiku can often resonate beyond simple observations of nature. Basho was inspired to write by withdrawing from the literary and sophisticated society of Edo – present day Tokyo – and immersing himself in the natural world around him.

In the workshop, you’ll spend time considering your surroundings – observing and making notes on what you experience and feel about the setting. Then you’ll establish some simple guidelines concerning the form and structure of haiku poetry before drawing together what you’ve observed through haiku.

Here are some examples of haiku:

Haiku

a bee
staggers out
of the peony

Basho

 

Monday morning

traffic jam

slow steady rain

© Paul Mena

 

all night her call

through the bluebell woods -

Nightingale

© David Loffman

 

The poetry workshop will run from 14.00-16.00 on 25^th August, 2012 at Bosham House, Main Road, Bosham, Nr Chichester, PO18 8PJ. It costs £8 for members of The Hamblin Trust and £10 for non-members.

Does this sound like your kind of thing? Please give The Hamblin Trust a call on 01243 572109 to put your name down.