Personal Essay for Poets: Experiments in Hybrid Prose Forms

Poet and essayist Marianne Boruch writes, “Both poetry and the essay come from the same impulse—to think about something and, at the same time, see it closely, carefully, and enact it.” Imagine your poetry-self sitting down with your prose-self to talk through a piece of writing—a personal essay you’d like to create. Each brings its own unique way of thinking, its own language. They may even argue. The poetry-self spirals inward, dwelling in images, phrases, a moment in time, while the prose-self whirls outward, with sentences and connections propelling the reader forward. But what if they decided to collaborate? Just as the two superimposed, equilateral triangles create the powerful symbol of the Star of David, our poetry and prose can merge to engender the potent hybrid form of the lyric essay. 

In this three-session workshop, each meeting will focus on a different type of lyric essay: collage, braided, and collaborative. We’ll intertwine biblical stories with our own, borrow language from Jewish philosophers such as Emmanuel Levinas and Martin Buber, and even work in chavruta to write a dual-voice essay. The goal is to stretch, to surprise ourselves, to experiment with our voices and to explore territory outside of our poetry. Readings and prompts will be provided before each session, with the aim of creating rough drafts of each kind of lyric essay. 

Charlotte Friedman is a poet, author, translator, and teacher. Her poetry has been published, most recently, in journals such as The Branches: A Journal of Literature and Philosophy, Stoneboat Literary Journal and Quartet Journal. She is the author of a memoir, I Never Asked for a Blessing, and two chapbooks. Her translations of Mayan Ch’ol poetry (with Carol Rose Little) have appeared in World Literature Today, Asymptote, The Arkansas International and numerous other journals. Charlotte taught Introduction to Narrative Medicine at Barnard College, Columbia University for many years and facilitated workshops in hospitals in New York City and Jerusalem. She is the author of The Girl Pages: A Handbook of the Best Resources for Strong, Confident Creative Girls (Hyperion) and From Lightning’s Strike: Poems by Juana Karen Peñate, translated from Ch’ol by Carol Rose Little and Charlotte Friedman (Mayapple Press). Raised in Seattle, she lives in Princeton, New Jersey, and serves on Yetzirah’s Senior Partners Council and Lilith Magazine’s Board of Directors. She holds an MFA in Creative Nonfiction from Vermont College of Fine Arts and an MSc in Narrative Medicine from Columbia University. 

*Ticket Price: As we want our events to be accessible to all, our tickets are offered free of charge. Yet if you're able to donate—perhaps $18, or some multiple of 18, which in Jewish tradition signifies wishing long life and good luck to the recipient of the gift—all proceeds will go directly to supporting Yetzirah, making more events like this possible.

** If this fee is a hardship, Yetzirah offers a pay-what-you-can option for workshop participation. No one will be turned away for lack of funds, but please contact Program Coordinator Kyra Lisse at klisse@yetzirahpoets.org if you would like a sliding-scale ticket. 

Yetzirah is a nonprofit organization, and any gift you make is tax-deductible to the extent allowed by the law.