August 12-17, 2012
poet Dan Beachy-Quick
with Jeremy Pataky
Poets of all experience are invited to gather in the Alaskan town of McCarthy, where new lakes grow beside massive glaciers and history complements sweeping wild nature. The second annual Wrangell Mountains Poetry Workshop is pleased to host poet, writer, and critic Dan Beachy-Quick for an intimate (16 participants max) poetry workshop in the inspiring Kennicott Valley, deep within Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve. Based out of the nonprofit Wrangell Mountains Center, a creative community of poets and essayists alike will write, read, and discuss while exploring inner and outer landscapes.
This program is offered in partnership with the 49 Alaska Writing Center, whose members are entitled to a 10% discount.
Workshop theme
Strangeness: A Poetry Workshop in Accuracy’s Paradox
Poetry is a means of mapping not only the environment we find ourselves in, but is also a method of charting inner territories, the environment we find within ourselves—self, memory, and imagination. Taking our direction from Lyn Hejinian’s essay “Strangeness”, we will consider the ways in which poets attempt to accurately and honestly describe their environments, creating something that is not a direct portrait of the world, but one that is secretly devoted to strangeness.
Poetry is an art that was often governed, in the ancient mind, by tricksters: Hermes, Pan, and Coyote. A trickster refuses to keep boundaries definite, and poetry itself seems inclined to such instability. We’ll resist common sense and estrange ourselves from the familiar in order to make it more dear, more meaningful. In doing so, we will examine an eco-poetic hope: that to write a poem can be part of the sustenance of the world.
Our days will include excursions and field notes, ways to widen our inquiry in poetry even as we strive to hone our attention. We’ll read an eclectic variety of materials—poems, essays, travelogues, and journals—that are meant to not only guide us in our endeavors, but also to show us a way into a more genuine and useful perplexity. We’ll find time not only for discussion of these texts, but time to write, workshop, hold individual conferences, and to explore the McCarthy-Kennecott area.
In this week-long adventure, poets can expect:
- Writing prompts and exercises
- Hikes through forests and meadows beside a large valley glacier
- A public reading from workshop staff and the opportunity to share their own written work at a public Community Word Jam event
- A deadline—to draft original work to share at a final participant reading
- Feedback from groups and one-on-one conversations with instructors
- An intimate community of caring and purpose / the pleasures of shared meals and shared commitment
About the Workshop Staff
Poet and essayist Dan Beachy-Quick 
was born in Chicago and raised in Colorado and upstate New York. He was educated at Hamilton College, the University of Denver, and the University of Iowa.
Beachy-Quick's poetry collections include Circle's Apprentice (2011), North True South Bright (2003); Mulberry (2006), a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Award for poetry; and This Nest, Swift Passerine (2009), and Spell (2004). He is also the author of A Whaler's Dictionary (2008), a collection of linked essays responding to Herman Melville's Moby Dick and Wonderful Investigations (2012). Beachy-Quick's work has been supported by the Lannan Foundation. He has taught at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Colorado State University, and lives in Fort Collins, Colorado with his family.
Drawing its material from a wide range of sources, Beachy-Quick's poetry is often united by a focused engagement with the fabric of sound and the pattern of echoes. In a review of Mulberry for Jacket Magazine, poet Tim Kahl noted, “[J]uxtaposing and intermingling a strangely patterned nature with an equally strangely patterned domestic life, Beachy-Quick draws a haunting parallel between the realm of nature and the realm of the human.”
Dan’s latest book, Wonderful Investigations: Essays, Meditations, Tales,(Milkweed Editions, March 2012) is “an eagerly anticipated book of nonfiction and fables that provides a walking tour of the creative mind. Over the course of six critically acclaimed books—including a compelling meditation on Moby-Dick—Dan Beachy-Quick has established himself as ‘one of America's most significant young poets’ (Lyn Hejinian). In Wonderful Investigations, Beachy-Quick broaches ‘a hazy line, a faulty boundary’ between our daily world and one rich with wonder; a magical world in which, through his work as a writer, Beachy-Quick participates with a singular combination of critical intelligence and lyricism. Touching on the works of Emerson, Thoreau, Proust, and Plato, among others, Beachy-Quick outlines the problem of duality in modern thought—the separation of the mind and body, word and referent, intelligence and mystery, human and natural—and makes the case for a fuller kind of nature poetry, one that strives to overcome this false separation, and to celebrate the notion that ‘wonder is the fact that the world has never ceased to be real’.”
About Beachy-Quick’s most recent book of poetry, Circle’s Apprentice (Tupelo Press, May 2011), Susan Howe writes “Dan Beachy-Quick's splendid new collection reveals the echoes between the measure of verse and the measure of time. If it is true, as Thoreau suggests, that the poem of creation is ongoing, this ambitious and prolific poet shows us that learning to listen for that music of daily life involves a lifetime. Circle's Apprentice vividly reminds us that all our human life may be marked by ritual but is returned to us through song. 'The minute gears mutely whir. / To put your ear / against it is to put your ear inside it.'”
Jeremy Pataky 
is the author of Fata Morgana (Blue Hour Press, 2010). He earned an MFA in poetry from the University of Montana and his work has appeared in Black Warrior Review, The Southeast Review, Cirque, Crab Creek Review, The Northern Review, Left-Facing Bird, Square Lake, Anchorage Press, Alaska Public Radio, and many others. His essay "The Wild Dead" was published in Permanent Vacation: Twenty Writers on Work and Life in Our National Parks (2011). Jeremy is a founding board member of the 49 Alaska Writing Center. He is the Executive Director of the Wrangell Mountains Center.
In addition to explorations on the page, workshop participants will enjoy the Kennecott National Historic Landmark and the dramatic Kennecott Valley during their week in the Wrangells.
About the Workshop
Location and Venue
The Wrangell Mountains Poetry Workshop is a Wrangell Mountains Center (WMC) program. The WMC is a private nonprofit institute which fosters understanding, appreciation, and stewardship of wildlands and mountain culture in Alaska through scientific and artistic inquiry in the Wrangell Mountains. The course is based at the WMC's headquarters in the Old Hardware Store in McCarthy, Alaska. The town of McCarthy is set in the heart of Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve, the largest national park in the U.S. Over 23% larger than Switzerland, Wrangell-St. Elias is world renowned for its wild landscapes, high peaks, massive glaciers and rivers, healthy ecosystems, and dramatic scenery as well as its unique cultural history.
McCarthy is approximately a seven hour drive from either Anchorage or Fairbanks. It is possible to fly or arrange shuttles from Anchorage to McCarthy, and occasionally we can help arrange carpools for students, though we make no promises.
McCarthy and neighboring Kennecott, a national historic landmark, are situated within the Kennicott Valley (note the different spellings between the natural features and historical features.) McCarthy and Kennecott serve locals and travelers alike as a gateway to world-class backcountry opportunities and amazing frontcountry hikes and walks (including access to the Root Glacier); the Kennicott Valley also provides a window into some of the most unique chapters in Alaska's history and an authentic, lively contemporary community.
The course will take full advantage of the field from its base at the WMC's headquarters, the Old Hardware Store. Built in 1908 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the Hardware Store serves as a cozy, atmospheric place to journal, sketch, and share, and is located just a half mile from the toe of the Kennicott Glacier.
Schedule
The workshop begins with breakfast at 9 am on August 12th. Participants should plan to arrive in McCarthy the day before; anyone seeking WMC-hosted primitive camping should contact us ahead of time so our staff can help you on the 11th. The workshop ends after a closing morning session on the 17th, allowing participants to travel that day. A detailed schedule will be provided with the welcome packet upon registration.
Tasty homemade meals (mostly vegetarian) are included in the price of the workshop. In keeping with the WMC's commitment to cooperative living and sustainable systems, writers are invited to contribute to daily chores connected with our organic garden and clean-up of meals. Every effort will be made to accommodate dietary restrictions with advance notice.
Primitive camping is available for free to participants at a private (and beautiful) site just a short walk from the WMC. Those who opt for camping are welcome to store gear at the WMC and use our rustic shower and facilities there. If you choose to camp, WMC staff will direct you to the campsite and orient you there upon your arrival.
Other lodging options within McCarthy include the full service McCarthy Lodge and Lancaster's Backpacker Hotel, located just down the street. The Kennicott River Lodge and Hostel is another great option outside of town; it's a short bicycle ride or twenty minute walk each way. If you bring a vehicle with you, Currant Ridge Cabins is located on the McCarthy Road about three miles from the road's end; it's about a half mile walk between the parking area there and the Old Hardware Store. Free shuttles run between the river and McCarthy on a rotation with limited hours. If you bring a camper in or would otherwise like to camp out with your vehicle, there are two commercial campgrounds near the end of the McCarthy Road that will accommodate you without advance reservations.
Optional Credit
Two optional ED580 college credits from Prince William Sound Community College will be available for an additional $50 fee, paid separately and on-site, for those interested in credit. Credits typically transfer readily.
Register for the Poetry Workshop
Cost is $465/person if you pay by May 1, 2012. $495/person after May 1st. Current WMC and 49 Writers Members receive a 10% discount (not applicable to the early bird price). The workshop price includes all meals, and optional camping and food storage facilities. A variety of hotel lodging is available nearby. A deposit of $75 is due with registration. All fees paid, minus your deposit, will be refundable until May 1st; your deposit will be refunded only if we are able to fill your slot. The balance of fees is due 30 days before the workshop start date.
To register, please mail a completed registration form (available as a .DOC or .PDF) with your $75 deposit. Instructions are included in the form. If you have questions, please email jeremy@wrangells.org or call (907) 244-7717.
Register soon! The workshop will be limited to 16 participants and a $30 discount is offered to participants who register before May 1st; WMC members and 49 Alaska Writing Center members receive a 10% discount.
The Community Word Jam is a highlight of the writing workshops, giving locals, tourists, and workshop participants all a chance to share original work or just listen in the intimate setting of the Old Hardware Store.
~
![Poetry Flier 2012]](images/Scott-Russell-Sanders-small.jpg)
photo by Jon Campbell
2009 Visiting Writer Scott Russell Sanders reads a passage from his book A Conservationist Manifesto during the annual Word Jam, an open-to-the-public literary and performance art open mic held in conjunction with the Wrangell Mountains Writing Workshop.
