I've managed to work my way back into heading up the poetry contest for HSF this year. I've been working on getting some of the details into place this week, and its a lot of fun. I get to browse poetry sites and look for examples of the forms I want to use.
I'm having the younger kids do sonnets again. (Brooks and Travis, didn't both of you judge the contest when I did it senior year? Do you remember "time is like the ocean. I think I need some sun tan lotion?") The theme is "Side by Side." The phrasing is an attempt to get a broader range of poems on friendship/companionship. I'm hoping we won't be overwhelmed by the equivalent of bad pop song lyrics.
I'm actually fairly excited about the senior high contest. I'm having them do a dramatic monologue in blank verse. I'm hoping that the distance of the poem's speaker from the author inspires their creativity and also tempers the impulse to write a moral lecture. (By the way, does anyone have suggestions for good examples of dramatic monologues in blank verse with relatively non-shocking subject matter. I've already got one by Browning and Tennyson.) The theme is "Between the Lines," which is basically what a dramatic monologue does. But the themes for both age levels are the same for the poetry and photography contests since they run concurrently. And so they have to be something that can work visually as well.
I'll let you know some of the highlights and the best lows when they start coming in.
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2 comments:
Nice! I remember Brooks was one of the judges and that sun tan lotion line was dynamite.
As for dramatic monologues. I know Eliot does this in some of his poetry (Prufrock, Magi, etc.) - Wallace Stevens also does it some more muted ways. Try looking up the term in the Princeton poetry dictionary, if you haven't already - it's invaluable for stuff like this.
I remember how guilt-laden they were, with the remarkable emphasis on not wasting time.
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