Classical Chinese Poetry and its Influence on Contemporary American Poetry: A Re-Viewing

Instructor: Nicole W. Lee
Dates: January 23—February 27, 2025, 7:30 EST (6 sessions)
Times: Thursdays, 7:30-10:00PM EST (2.5 hours once a week)
Enrollment: 15 students
Enrollment Closes: January 22, 2025, 11:59PM PST

A century after Ezra Pound published Fenollosa’s essay on the Chinese ideogram – which would go on to influence Modernism – it’s widely accepted that much of what Pound understood of classical Chinese poetry was a mistranslation. How would contemporary American poetry be different if Pound had understood classical Chinese poetry on its own terms? What if, like the movie Everything, Everywhere All At Once, we lived in a multiverse where Pound had also published Ernest Fenollosa’s second essay on the sounds, rhythms, rhymes, and meters of classical Chinese poetry? How would we then understand classical Chinese poetry? How might we then understand contemporary American poetry? 

In this 6 week online course, we’re going to project ourselves into a multiverse and consider classical Chinese poetics through its own lens. Using the quatrain form jué jù 絕句 (“cut off” verse) as a frame, we will consider elements of classical Chinese poetics left out by Pound, as well as those that went on to influence contemporary American poetry, consciously or unconsciously.

The class will begin with a reconsideration of the transmission of history of classical Chinese poetics into English and an introduction to classical Chinese characters, language, philosophy, cosmology, poetics, and aesthetics. We will then examine jué jù on its own terms and consider its current and potential influence on contemporary American poetry through three craft elements: the image (visuo-sonics and “inanimation”), structure (bǐ xīng 比興 and qǐ chéng zhuǎn hé 起承转合), and the gap (xū 虛). Texts will possibly include poems from Wáng Wéi 王維, Dù Fǔ 杜甫, Lǐ Shāng Yǐn 李商隱, Lǐ Bái 李白, Lǐ Qīng Zhào 李清照, Victoria Chang, Harryette Mullen, Etel Adnan, Jenny Xie, Jake Skeets, Sherwin Bitsui, Bei Dao, Hala Alyan, Wendy Xu, Marilyn Chin, Arthur Sze, Aditi Machado, Brian Teare, Louise Glück, and Lyn Hejinian. Most weeks will feature a generative writing exercise designed to help students work towards the writing of a poem to workshop in the final week. 

Nicole W. Lee is a poet born in Sydney, Australia to Chinese (Teochew and Hakka) Malaysian parents. Her Pushcart Prize nominated poetry has been published in Agni, Crazyhorse (now swamp pink), Gulf Coast, Meanjin, and others, and has received support from Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Tin House Writers Workshops, Palm Beach Poetry Festival, AWP, and the Ian Potter Cultural Trust. Nicole is a graduate of the MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College and assistant poetry editor at Four Way Review. Her long poetic sequence “Deluge: A Chinese Almanac” is the winner of the 2024 Palette Poetry Previously Published Poem Prize and is currently being adapted for the screen. For more, visit nicolewlee.com.

This class is open to advanced poetry students who already have their own writing practice and workshop experience, and who are looking to further their poetics.

The lecture-based seminar class has a capacity of 15 students, as it will include a workshop towards the end of the class. Two full scholarships are available to folks where paying the enrollment fee is a financial burden.

If you are interested in scholarships, please fill out this short scholarship form. Scholarship applications are due by January 9, 2025 and participants will be notified by January 16.

Google Drive: Participants will receive all readings over Google Drive.

Zoom: All class sessions will be held on Zoom.

Vimeo: Recordings of the sessions over Zoom will also be found through a password-protected Vimeo link.

$349 USD