Write like a poet, whatever your genre
Prose works written by poets hold a special place of honour on my bookshelf. The memoirs of Lorna Crozier and Patrick Lane, Johanna Skibsrud’s novel The Sentimentalists, and Molly Peacock’s two non-fiction works, The Paper Garden and Paradise, Piece by Piece, are a few well-worn examples.
The artful approach to prose and storytelling is what I love about each of these books. They are meditative in tone and setting, full of vivid, precise language, rich in metaphor and imagery, and mindful of the need for books to show us the wonder of words.
I’m not a poet (not yet, at least), but I hope I can learn to write like one!
Post by Erica Mattson (TWS 2012).
Photo courtesy of the author.
