Sign Up Now for “The Poet’s Masquerade” Workshop in April

Saturday, April 7 at the Orcas Library

April is National Poetry Month and Orcas poet, writer and teacher Jill McCabe Johnson will offer “The Poet’s Masquerade: A persona poetry workshop” on Saturday, April 7, followed by a poetry reading for the community. The workshop will take place from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. and the poetry reading by Jill Johnson and Orcas Poets will start at 4 p.m.

The word “persona” derives from the Greek word for mask. In persona poetry, poets temporarily don masks and speak from the imagined voices of other people or objects. Much like “method acting,” writers temporarily become the character in the poem. In this workshop we will read and write persona poems in voices from history, mythology, fiction, nature, family, and more.

Prose writers, screenwriters, and playwrights working on character development and dialogue are also encouraged to attend. Both events are sponsored by a generous grant from the Friends of the Orcas Island Library and are open to all, without cost.

Those who wish to participate in the workshop are asked to register at the Library by March 30. Class size will be limited to 25 participants, on a first-come basis. A waiting list will be established if necessary.

Jill McCabe Johnson is the Director of Artsmith, a nonprofit to support the arts. Winner of the Paula Jones Gardner Award from Floating Bridge Press, and the Editor’s Poetry Prize from ScissorTale Review, she has received Pushcart nominations for her poetry, fiction, and nonfiction. Her writing has appeared in such literary journals as Harpur Palate, Iron Horse Literary Review, Prairie Schooner, Brevity, and the Los Angeles Literary Review, among others. She has received grants and fellowships from the A.P. Anderson Center, the Deborah Tall Memorial Fund, and the Center for Great Plains Studies. Johnson is editor of the anthology Becoming: What Makes a Woman from the University of Nebraska Gender Programs.