By Rebecca Mullins
Oct. 10, 2013. Molly Peacock is closing out this semester’s Visiting Writers Series at Appalachian State University. This is your last chance for a Visiting Writers Series event this year until February.
On Thursday, Oct. 10, Peacock will give a poetry workshop from 3:30-4:45 p.m. in the Table Rock Room of Plemmons Student Union on Appalachian State’s campus. The workshop, “Snap Sonnets,” will focus on what Kathryn Kirkpatrick, an ASU English professor and practicing poet, called, “the turn in the sonnet.” This turn is the point at which the original topic is tweaked, changed, or resolved in the later half of the sonnet.
Later that evening, Peacock will read from her works at 7:30 p.m. in the same room.
Molly Peacock is an accomplished poet, memoirist and author that has taken the United States and the United Kingdom by storm. Born in Buffalo, New York and married to James Joyce scholar Michael Groden, she currently resides in Toronto with her husband and keeps her dual American-Canadian citizenship.
Her latest work, “The Paper Garden: An Artist Begins Her Life’s Work at 72,” straddles the line between biography, historical novel and personal memoir. Woven throughout it’s pages are connections between the main character, Mary Delane, and the author’s own experiences. This book looks into Delane’s life as she created a new art form, the Flora Delanica, and through the use of her pen, Peacock has created one as well.
In addition to this breathtaking work, she has completed six delightful books of poetry, a personal memoir and one other book, “How to Read a Poem & Start a Poetry Circle.”
“She’s one of the most interesting poets writing today because she combines a really contemporary voice and perspective with enormous mastery of poetic form,” said Kathryn Kirkpatrick, professor at ASU.
Her poetry follows the guidelines of older styles yet incorporates present-day problems and vocabulary for a finished product that can understood and enjoyed equally by both the poet and the layman. Her workshop and reading are for anyone seeking an artistic night to bring some flare to their lives.
“You can come away from the poetry experience nurtured, clarified and purged,” remarked Kirkpatrick.
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