Kevin Young drops by our classroom to discuss some of the more notable modern poetry hoaxes, glimpsing into the secret history of the poem as something conceived to tempt or even trick. By understanding the ways the hoax works, Young suggests that we may better know our own assumptions, habits, and hurts, and how to subvert them in our writing. For the hoax poem urges us to write poetry that is not afraid of chaos but confronts it.
This lecture was recorded during our 2014 Summer Workshop.