Thanks all for these suggestions & research ideas.
W.T. - it's not all about fluff or anti-fluff (there's room in the poetry landscape for lots of different spaces & ways to share). And sorry, because 'vomit inducing' doesn't really give much away. I asked people to suggest something on the basis of several very vague general statements (apologies).
I think for me ‘vomit inducing’ means lots of different things in this context. I know lovely people who attend very formal poetry workshops and they sound like an appropriately interesting thing, and their work often improves, but it's 'steered' - often it improves at the cost of loss of unique voice (imo). Whether they like it or not, organisations have agendas, frequently money-related or status related or style related.
It’s the same in the visual arts. Courses/schools have 'house styles' (this is probably because of a half-lost tradition of atelier style teaching). And there's frequently an echo chamber/ 'find my tribe' approach to things, which is fair enough, but it risks narrowing ideas and approaches.
Ann - thank-you. I love the idea of a classrooms forum stuck in an infinite loop of supportive environments for short fiction.
The Poetry school I like the sound of, and I’ve friends who relay okay experiences, but it tends to be structured as a commitment over time, rather than a very short series or one-off. They are probably what I’ll go for, though. The Arvon and Ty Newydd strike me as formal, very ‘accepted hierarchy’ - the opposite of alt-narrative (I would like to be about alt-narratives, at least in theory). Coffee House poetry I haven’t heard of and I’ll look it up (thank-you).
Matt - yes, they do, and some of them sound very enticing. There are lots over social media too (they also sound enticing). And probably one of the most useful poetry events I’ve been to was the one you recommended (J.R Carpenter). But there are so many and it’s difficult to know
RCL- I agree, but the problem is it’s really hard to separate the marketing from the reality.
Kevin Rainbow - Yes, I deserved that. My echo chamber would be the nicest and most amazing echo chamber ever.
I will research, and see if I can locate possibly interesting things by looking at people's work online, too (there's frequently a kind of sharing page post-workshops, or poems are shared on social media, so that might give me a steer).
Sarah-Jane
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