The Art and Practice of Poetry  In this course students will investigate the poetry and poetics of the 21st century and create their own collection of poems. We will read widely in contemporary poetry, with a focus on formal and structural possibilities and other technical aspects of poetic craft. Through the revision process, we will learn strategies for making poems that enlarge language and express our inner worlds. Each week students will share their own work with peers as we build a vocabulary for discussing poetry. We will produce an anthology of class work, and the final project will be a chapbook of finished pieces.

This course is an advanced workshop for students who have already done some work in poetry and are committed to the challenge of continued artistic development. Students will write a new poem each week, and revise at least eight of these for inclusion in a final chapbook project. Readings will include craft essays as well as several recent poetry collections by writers such as Hanif Abdurraqib and Natalie Diaz. Students must have completed (CRWR 0170 or CRWR 0175 and instructor approval).

Writing: Poetry, Fiction, NonFiction An introduction to the writing of poetry, short fiction, and nonfiction through analysis of writings by modern and contemporary poets and prose writers and regular discussion of student writing. Different instructors may choose to emphasize one literary form or another in a given semester. Workshops will focus on composition and revision, with particular attention to the basics of form and craft. This course is a prerequisite to CRWR 0380, CRWR 0385, CRWR 0370, and CRWR 0375. (This course is not a college writing course.)

Writing: Poetry, Fiction, NonFiction An introduction to the writing of poetry, short fiction, and nonfiction through analysis of writings by modern and contemporary poets and prose writers and regular discussion of student writing. Different instructors may choose to emphasize one literary form or another in a given semester. Workshops will focus on composition and revision, with particular attention to the basics of form and craft. This course is a prerequisite to ENAM 0370, ENAM 0375, ENAM 0380, and ENAM 0385.

Workshop: Poetry This course is an advanced workshop for students who have already done some work in poetry and are committed to the challenge of continued artistic development. Students will write a new poem each week, and revise at least eight of these for inclusion in a final chapbook project. Readings will include craft essays as well as several recent poetry collections by writers such as Hanif Abdurraqib and Natalie Diaz. (any 100-level CRWR course and Instructor Approval).

The Structure of Poetry  This course is a workshop for beginning students in the field of creative writing. Students will read a selection of poems each week and write their own poems, producing a portfolio of their work at the end of the term. There will be an emphasis on revision. Students will be introduced to a range of forms as well, including prose poems, epistles, the tanka, the long poem, and the sonnet.

The Poetics of Lullaby In his lecture on the art of Spanish lullaby, poet Federico García Lorca observed that, “In melody…history’s emotion finds refuge.” The situation of lullaby, as a transitional gesture between waking life and sleep, has made it a natural depository for human wishes, terrors, and fantasies across centuries and cultures. We will investigate the seemingly universal language of lullaby in its folk and literary traditions around the world. Learning will be both research-based and experiential. Readings and papers will include scholarship on individual songs and poems within their contexts, and field work will explore lullaby as a living folk tradition.

Karin Gottshall

Reviews and ratings for Karin Gottshall at Middlebury College.Karin Gottshall teaches The Art and Practice of Poetry, Workshop: Poetry, Writing: Poetry, Fiction, NonF and more.  Explore top rated instructors and find the best for you.Is Karin Gottshall good ? Find out on MiddCourses.

Karin is really nice, but the course is mainly discussion-based with very little guidance. I know she wants us to have different interpretations of the readings, but sometimes we really cannot figure out the meaning of an extremely abstract poem. A new piece of creative writing needs to be submitted every week.

(Fall 25) Professor Gottshall is very caring and all around a very helpful instructor. She articulates feedback on your writing in a direct and actionable way, and the writing could be about basically anything. I thought all the discussions, workshops, and activities we had class were lively and engaging, but never stressful.

I actually took this course in the Fall of 2025. Karin is obviously very passionate about creative writing in general and the creative writing of her students. She is a very flexible and caring professor who prioritizes the well being of her students. There are no specific prompts for assignments and students have complete creative freedom. Very much a class of you get out of it what you put in. 