West Chester University Poetry Conference

The West Chester University Poetry Conference was an international poetry conference that was held annually from 1995 to 2019 at West Chester University, Pennsylvania, United States. It hosted various panel discussions and poetry craft workshops, which focused primarily on formal poetry, narrative poetry, New FormalismThompson, Nigel S. "Letter from West Chester ." The Times Literary Supplement. September 1999. and Expansive Poetry. It was the largest poetry-only conference in America and possibly the world"So You Want to Win a Nemerov?" 14 by 14. Issue 6. October 2008. as well as the only conference which focused on traditional craft.Timpane, John "Conference draws poets not for reading, but for crafting." The Philadelphia Inquirer. Sun, Jun. 6, 2010.

History The conference was founded in 1995 by West Chester professor Michael Peich and poet Dana Gioia with 85 poets and scholars in attendance.Hitchner, Earle "Verse That Sings in Many Styles." The Wall Street Journal. June 17, 2010 The original core faculty members included Annie Finch, R. S. Gwynn, Mark Jarman, Robert McDowell, and Timothy Steele. While some of these faculty still return regularly to teach, the faculty has expanded in recent years to include Kim Addonizio, Rhina Espaillat, B. H. Fairchild, Rachel Hadas, Molly Peacock, Mary Jo Salter, A. E. Stallings, and many other widely published New Formalists.

Starting in 1999, the conference's program began including an art song concert.

In 2003, Gioia stepped down as co-director of the conference in order to become chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts.

The 2010 conference was the 16th and last year with Peich as director before he retired and passed the position to Kim Bridgford. By this time, the conference attendance had increased to 300 poets and poetry scholars. That year's concert of art song featured Natalie Merchant, who sung the poetry of various poets of the past. On June 12, the last day of the conference, the Queen's Birthday Honours 2010 were announced, including British comic poet Wendy Cope's appointment as an Officer of the Order of the British Empire.Queen's Birthday Honours List 2010 . Saturday 12 June 2010Wendy Cope Interviewed at West Chester Poetry Conference

R. S. Gwynn was named Program Director in September, 2015. His innovations included the initiation of a "Great Debates" series, the first of which, "Poetry or Verse?" was conducted by the poets James Matthew Wilson and Robert Archambeau.

2019 was the last year the conference was held.

Awards given

Every year, the WCU Poetry Conference gives out three Iris N. Spencer Poetry Awards, the most notable one being the nationally-competitive Donald Justice Poetry Prize. The other two were given to recognize local regional undergraduate work in the Philadelphia metropolitan area of Pennsylvania until 2012, when they were expanded to become nationally-competitive prizes.

Keynote speakers

1995 — Richard Wilbur 1996 — Donald Justice 1997 — Anthony Hecht 1998 — Wendy Cope 1999 — X. J. Kennedy 2000 — Louis Simpson 2001 — Marilyn Nelson 2002 — Nina Cassian 2003 — William Jay Smith 2004 — Dana Gioia 2005 — Anne Stevenson 2006 — James Fenton 2007 — Kay Ryan 2008 — Richard Wilbur

2009 — Donald Hall 2010 — Rhina Espaillat 2011 — Robert Pinsky 2012 Christian Wiman 2013 Julia Alvarez 2014 Natasha Trethewey 2016 Sir Andrew Motion 2017 A.E. Stallings 2018 Timothy Steele 2019 David Yezzi 2020 NONE

West Chester University Poetry Conference

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