Masterclass: Poetry of Elegy
Book

Masterclass: Poetry of Elegy

Songs of loss
Tutor
  • Ruth Padel Headshot
    Ruth Padel
Date Friday March 22nd 2024, 11:00-13:00 GMT
Location Online

Like flowers on a grave, elegies are poems of lament for someone or something lost: a person, relationship, artefact or part of nature like a felled tree; a lost way of life or a lost stage in your own life. Like funerals, they embrace feelings of grief and loss, detailed memories, and maybe consolation: the idea that these memories live on.

Award-winning poet Ruth Padel leads a Masterclass on how one of the most important poetic forms can capture these intense human experiences. You will closely read a selection of elegies, pulling out poetic devices for your own writing. You will be guided through inspiring and generative writing exercises, coming away with ideas for writing and refining your own elegies to make them powerful and moving.

In advance of the Masterclass, bookers may wish to read Ruth Padel’s Top Ten Elegies in the Guardian and The Poetry School’s review of Emerald, elegizing her mother.


The Masterclass will be delivered via Zoom webinar, so you can take the session at your own pace, without the pressure of having your video or camera on. Sessions are also recorded so if you are unable to attend live, you will have access to the recording for a month afterwards.

Online: £40

Concessions: £20

As part of our effort to increase participation in the arts, half-price concessions are available for this course at checkout. There are a limited number of free subsidised places for those who cannot afford the concession price.

We are committed to making our Arvon at Home programme accessible to as many people as possible.

Across all of Arvon at Home

Masterclasses 

Online Writing Day

How I Write

Online Writing Weeks / Weekends

Subject to funding/permissions (please contact arvonathome@arvon.org for more details)

If you have any access issues that we have not covered here, please contact us on access@arvon.org

See here for more access information.

"These zoom opportunities are really helping to open my world and keep me inspired to write."
— Masterclass participant
"Arvon at Home creates a model to participate in inspirational tutoring for writers, at a distance. The feeling of attending to my writing life in an excellent fashion, and still having a half-day for my work and caring responsibilities at home, felt like a good balance."
— Masterclass participant
"It was an absolutely brilliant session and very very useful. And it made me realise how much I’ve missed this kind of workshop because of having children and family that I can’t leave. Now we’re all in the same boat the online stuff is truly transformative."
— Masterclass participant

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