the poetry exercise's logical conclusion: new book of poems consists of exercises for readers to write poems!

Catherine Daly's TO DELITE AND INSTRUCT is written toward a post-Zukofskian objectivism. The book is also absolutely perfect for course adoption in graduate programs which focus on creative writing pedagogy as well as creative writing workshops.

Daly has led writing workshops for more than a decade, without focusing on exercise “chestnuts” that “yield” a poem. The book includes “the opposite” of Bernadette Mayer’s infamous exercises, as well as mimeo worksheets turned into poetry writing exercises for the reader of 2D&I. The word hoard at the back, all the words again, sorted according to indo-european root, demonstrates that constraint from children’s exercises travels a poetic terrain beyond BASIC.

TO DELITE AND INSTRUCT asks the purpose and worth of the poetry exercise or experiment. It investigates pedagogy of reading, speaking, hearing, and writing. Beginning with poems containing definitions, problems, and a word box, that is, beginning with limiting statements, centered on poems relating to mimeo workbooks from the 1960s, ending with a word hoard of the words in the book with indo-european roots sorted according to those roots, TO DELITE AND INSTRUCT is a thoroughgoing poetry exercise with a self-limiting vocabulary, poetry written in answer to peculiar perception problems presented devoid of information and forming an exercise in perception: a book of poems.

The book is available through blue lion books at café press.
http://www.cafepress.com/bluelionbooks66.78877749

For more information, contact Catherine Daly at c.a.b.daly at gmail dot com.

Book Details:

• Paperback: 276 pages
• Binding: Perfect-Bound
• Publisher: blue lion books (October 2006)
• ISBN: 9525645088