The Process of Canonization

Joshua Gage's comment on "Canon Fire" gives a good look at how the ghazal is faring in English. (I wonder how many of the few ghazals he sees are Persian or free in form, and if any are Arabic.) Those of us who believe the ghazal can be an important form in poetry in English have to keep advocating and keep writing ghazals and publishing them.

There is a long ways to go. I'm teaching creative writing this semester. For poetry, I use Creating Poetry by John Drury (Writer's Digest Books, 1991). I've used it as a text before; Drury provides good, basic information and advice on a variety of issues related to poetry. However.

However, his material on the ghazal is very inadequate. The book hasn't been revised since 1991, and much more is now available about the ghazal than then. Drury focuses on the ghazals by Adrienne Rich and Jim Harrison — accomplished poems, of course, but working only one possibility of the form. He does advise using the same rhyme throughout, a reference to the qafiya, I suppose. One could do worse than starting with Drury's description of the ghazal, but it would be nice to see the book updated.

As side comment, Drury's account of the haiku is very inaccurate. In 1991, even, much better information on the haiku in English was available. He doesn't understand the difference between haiku and senryu and the only genuine English haiku he cites are Jack Kerouac's. Etheridge Knight and Richard Wilbur are both excellent poets, but the poems they chose to call "haiku" simply aren't.

For more on haiku, see the Haiku Society of America's definition and AHA Poetry's material on haiku. (Their information on tanka, sijo, and ghazal is good also.)