Poetry Across Borders with Linda Ehrlich – 4 sessions (via Zoom)

Let’s explore Japanese, Chinese, and Middle Eastern poetry from earlier centuries! This four-session workshop, on September 13, 20, 27 & October 4, 2021, from 7 – 8 pm, offers a chance to read, and even try your own hand at poetry from outside of familiar European traditions. The class will include a look at landscape painting and poetry from China, tanka, haiku, and zuihitsu (“follow the brush”) from Japan, and ghazals from the Persian/Urdu tradition. There will be a particular focus on women poets, and on the ties between poetry and the visual arts. For our final class, let’s look at contemporary Asian poets to appreciate their ties to tradition and their experimentation with form. Each class will include informational talks, break-out sessions, and readings. We’ll also have a class Blog for sharing your writing (for those who so desire). An optional group visit to the Asiatic Arboretum at the Duke Gardens is another possibility.

Leader: Currently a visiting faculty member at Duke in the History Department, Linda Ehrlich, Ph.D, has more than 25 years experience teaching and writing about world literature, cinema, and theatre. She has spent years in Japan and southern Europe, and has travelled extensively in other parts of Asia and the Middle East. She has a new collection of writings inspired by the Japanese Noh theatre (Yamamba’s Mountains). Her latest book is on The Films of Kore-Eda Hirokazu: An Elemental Cinema (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020). Learn more about Linda here.