What is poetry?

What is poetry? How much do you really know about it? Is there any relationship between poetry and music? Can we find poetic songs? What is sung poetry? We will try to answer these questions, but before, we have to review the concept of poetry and its main features. First of all, in pairs, you will have to copy in your notebook:

- a definition of  poetry. 

You can find a good definition here  https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/poetry

(and its pronunciation, listen to it carefully!)

- A definition of song.

Click here (choose one related to poetry).

- The translation of both definitions into Spanish.

- The definition of "poesía" and "canción" given by the DRAE (Diccionario de la Real Academia Española) in its digital version. Click here.

- a comparison between the English and Spanish definitions of poetry/poesía and song/canción, respectively. Do you find any difference?

When your work is finished, you will read it aloud, by turns, and we will comment on it.

So, we already have an idea about what poetry and song are. Now, let´s investigate abot the main themes that appear in poetry and in songs. In pairs or in group of three (maximum), you are going to choose one of those poetry and song themes (love or lack of love, friendship, nature, war, money, happiness, sadness,,,). You will have to prepare a document (by hand or by computer) with the title "Poetry and song themes" in which you provide the following information:

- Theme and a brief explanation about that theme.

- A poem and a song in which that theme appears, telling who are their respective authors and the year in which they were composed.

  This document will be evaluated with this rubric and it makes up 10% of the project mark.
You can use google translator.

A RESEARCH ON POETS

Now, let´s investigate about the life and work of two Spanish poets: Federico García Lorca and Gloria Fuertes. You have to prepare a document (by hand or by computer) with the title "Life and work of Federico García Lorca and Gloria Fuertes" in which you provide the following information:

- Biography:

. date and place of their birth and death.

. Other interesting facts about his life.

- Literary production:

. the titles of two poetic works and a brief explanation about what they are about.

. A poem of each one you like best.

 This document will be evaluated with this rubric and it makes up 10% of the project mark.
You can find information about Federico García Lorca in the following pages:
Federico García Lorca´s life
Federico García Lorca´s poems

To investigate about Gloria Fuertes you can click in the following pages:
 Gloria Fuertes´life
Gloria Fuertes´poems

Finally, you have to prepare a PowerPoint (or similar) presentation with all the data collected so far ("What is poetry?") and you will have to expose it in class. This homework will be evaluated with a      rubric  with makes up 10% of the project mark.



INTERVIEWING A POET

Next, you have to make an interview to Federico García Lorca or to Gloria Fuertes, as you prefer. 

1. In groups of three or four, you have to prepare a questionnaire (by hand or by computer) with, at least, eight questions with their respective answers. You can use their biographies (remember the exercises you did last day). This questionnaire will make up 5% of the project mark and will be evaluated with the following rubric.

2. Thereafter, you will have to record on video your interview (use an easy program like VivaVideo). Distribute among the members of your group the following roles: interviewer, poet and camera. This video makes up 10% of the project mark and it will be evaluated with this rubric.

A RECIPE TO COOK A POEM

Do you dare to be a poetry chef? Please, read the poem   "Receta para cocinar un poema",  by Bambú. Read also the following text.
You are going to cook a poem, but before, you need to know all the ingredients. In groups of three or four, you have to prepare a document (by hand or by computer) with the title "Metric notes". It will include the following information:
1. Rhyme: definition and types.
2. Metric licenses: sinalefa, dialefa, syneresis, dieresis.
3. Stanzas: definition and some types, like for example, couplet, tercet, quartet, romance and sonnet.
4. Measure of verses: their names depending on their number of syllables (from two syllables to fourteen). What is a major art verse? And one of lesser art?
5. Rhetorical figures: explain what they are and define (providing examples) some of them, like anaphora, parallelism, metaphor, simile, epithet, metonymy and personification.

You can find information about metric notes in these links:
Metric notes

Metric licenses
Lyric genre

This document makes up 25% of the project mark and will be evaluated with this rubric.


LET´S BECOME POETS

We have learned a lot about the life of poets. We know what their job consists of and what are the tools they use to create their compositions. But, could we become poets for a while? With this activity, we intend to approach what a poet feels when expressing his feelings and emotions in a brief and a simple way. Now, it´s our turn to express our feelings by composing a poem. You can use all you have learned so far to create a poem respecting the following indications:
- choose a topic that you want to express yourself.
- Select the stanza that suits it best.
- The poem must include three rhetorical figures: anaphora, parallelism and another of free choice.
- Deliver the poem with title and if you want, an illustration too.

This is the most important activity: it makes up 30% of the project mark. This is the rubric. All the poems will be collected in a collection of poems and may be published on the department´s blog.