Prose Poetry in Theory and Practice

Anne Caldwell is a freelance writer and a lecturer in creative writing for the Open University and has completed a PhD in prose poetry and creative writing at the University of Bolton in 2020. She is a member of the International Poetry Studies Institute (I.P.S.I.) International Prose Poetry Project and the author of four collections of poetry.Oz Hardwick is a European poet and academic, whose work has been widely published in international journals and anthologies. He has published nine full collections and chapbooks, including Learning to Have Lost (2018) which won the 2019 Rubery International Book Award for poetry. Oz is Professor of Creative Writing at Leeds Trinity University.

• Introduction Anne Caldwell and Oz Hardwick1 Protean Manifestations and Diverse Shapes: Defining and Understanding Strategies of the Contemporary Prose Poem Cassandra Atherton and Paul Hetherington 2 Prose Poetry and the Resistance to NarrativeOz Hardwick3 "In the Eye of the Beholder": Prose Poetry in Dialogue between Reader and Poet Hannah Stone 4 Nobody’s Storybook: Reading Russell Edson for the Wrong ReasonsNicholas Lauridsen5 "Borders on edges, where skin stops, or begins": The Prose Poem's Relationship with the Discourses of Fashion and Food, with Particular Reference to Charles Baudelaire, Gertrude Stein, and Harryette MullenSusie Campbell6 The Contemporary Vernacular: Exploring Intersections of Architecture and Prose PoetryAnne Caldwell7 "Image Machine": Gaspar Orozco’s Book of the Peony and the Prose Poem Sequence as Perceptual TrickHelen Tookey8 Writing the Prose Poem: An Insider’s Perspective on an Outsider ArtformIan Seed9 "A form of howling. A form of chanting. A form of looking out for each other": Poetics and Politics of the Contemporary Indian-English Prose PoemDivya Nadkarni10 Collaboration, Conversation, and Adaptation: The Prose Poetry Project and Renga AttitudeJen Webb11 Framing Catastrophe: The Ekphrastic Prose PoemPatrick Wright12 "An interlude suspended": Historical Biography through the Lens of Prose PoetryEdwin Stockdale13 Who are the Contemporary Symbolists? The Prose Poem and the Decorative-Subjective ApproachRuth Stacey14 One Foot; Many Places: The Prose Poem’s Art of Standing Still While TravellingJane Monson

"This stimulating and authoritative collection of essays forms a conversation between poet-academics from all over the world about the 'why' and 'how' of prose poetry, this 'chimera of literary forms.' Prose poetry is enticingly considered as a 'circling sphere...a galaxy in itself,' a 'spiral, meditative process,' and a 'quotidian epiphany.' The subversion and surprise of prose poems themselves vibrates through this critical discourse."- Dr Maggie Butt, Poet and Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Middlesex University