Line Dancing for Poets Masterclass
Poetry and the line – poetic lineation for the nation.
‘Poetic technique consists almost entirely of exploiting the expressive possibilities of lineation as a formal principle to communicate and intensify meaning.’ – Dana Gioia
In this poet’s opinion, too many poets use the line solely as a grammatical unit; for them, where to break the line depends only on ending the line on a natural pause, with an eye to a roughly consistent line length. In this masterclass, we’ll invigorate our poetic practice by exploring an array of approaches to the line. How does the line and its enjambment relate to thought patterns, to breath? How does the use of the line create suspense and surprise? How does our use of the line influence a poem’s pace and hence its tone?
In this masterclass, we’ll read discuss essays by, among others, Denise Levertov, Shara McCallum, and Charles Olson, and poems by D.A. Powell, Brigit Pegeen Kelly, Evie Shockley, and more to develop our appreciation of varying uses of the line and experiment with them in both old and new poems. In this way we’ll give old poems new life while subtly adjusting our composition practice.
To conclude, we’ll also consider use of prose in poetry, so the course to address how our poetics of the line affects our poetics of the sentence and prose. No country music is involved in this kind of line dancing (whew!?), just plenty of rich discussion about poetry and poetics and the opportunity to test these ideas in practice.
5 fortnightly sessions over 10 weeks, starting 23 September 2026. No live chats. Suitable for UK & International students.
Concessions & Accessibility
To apply for a concession rate, please send relevant documentation showing your eligibility for one of our concessions to [email protected]. Conditions of eligibility are detailed here. If you have any questions or wish to be added to the waiting list of a sold-out course, please email [email protected].
What to Expect
Please check the left hand side of this page for information on how this course works in practice, under the heading ‘Course Style‘. If you’re unsure as to what any of the terms there mean, or if this course is a good fit for you, please visit our What to Expect page which includes some further information on how our courses function.
Image credit: @biancasalgado
About Carrie Etter 
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American expatriate Carrie Etter has published five collections of poetry, most recently Grief’s Alphabet (Seren, 2024), a London Review Bookshop Poetry Book of the Year. Individual poems have appeared in Boston Review, The Iowa Review, The New Republic, The New Statesman, The Penguin Book of the Prose Poem, Poetry London, The Times Literary Supplement, and many other journals and anthologies internationally. She has taught for organisations such as The Poetry School and Arvon Foundation as well as Bath Spa and Bristol University, and her work has been supported by grants from the Society of Authors and Arts Council England. She lives in Bristol.
"Carrie obviously put a lot of work into preparing and structuring the course. Her feedback was excellent."
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