What do you think?
Rate this book
Inside Out: Poems on Writing and Reading Poems with Insider Exercises
Marjorie Maddox knows poetry. If I had to pick one book to introduce students to the joy of writing poems, this would be it. Maddox creates a book full of original poems to show us the inside out of every kind of poem you could ever want to write. I dare you to read a page or two without reaching for your pen and composing a poem of your own. From alliteration to sonnets and the villanelle, Marjorie Maddox makes metaphors meaningful and memorable. —Charles Ghigna - FatherGoose® It is clear that Marjorie Maddox loves poetry and loves her audience. The poems of the book—“How to Write a Villanelle,” “How to Touch a Poem,” to name two—illustrate the topics. For instance, “How to Touch a Poem” starts with “Forget distance or that anemic wave / you save for mere acquaintances and great aunts.” Sometimes people may not write poetry because they don’t know how to approach it, and Maddox removes the barriers. If you have ever thought about writing poetry and needed concrete tips, this is the book for you. —Kim Bridgford, editor, Mezzo Cammin Inside Out … combines original poetry with inviting activities to guide young people in writing poetry themselves. More than two dozen inventive poems present key concepts, elements, and forms of poetry, each … accessible and engaging. For example, her poem, “Simile Explains Metaphor,” cleverly uses the teen-speak of “like” to illustrate how similes and metaphors work in just six lines. Puns, paradoxes, and alliteration, as well as clerihews, acrostics, and sonnets are all presented in pithy poems that provide a laser focus on the poetic element being introduced. Then Maddox offers nine in-depth “insider exercises” grounded in the previous poems with helpful steps and fun challenges for young writers. It’s a unique combination of playful poems about poetry and crackerjack exercises for aspiring writers. — Sylvia Vardell, author of Poetry Aloud Here! and co-editor of the Poetry Friday anthologies with Janet Wong
63 pages, Paperback
Published March 31, 2020
20 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
April 21, 2020
"Always look for the 'meta.'"
This something I say often in Room 407. I try to tuck some of this into my own artwork and the poetry I create. 'Meta' is the term I would use to describe Marjorie Maddox's new collection from Kelsay Books, INSIDE OUT: POEMS ON WRITING AND READING POEMS WITH INSIDER EXERCISES. As you can see, the 'meta' here seems to begin with a title that suggests the generative nature of poetry.
There is a sort of reciprocity without an edge like a Mobius loop that leaves the reader to wonder: Does the poetic form dictate the kind of content that must fit inside or does the content begin to seek its own shape on the page? Marjorie Maddox presents a response to a question such as this while inviting possibilities for conversations that would extend beyond the answer we think we might know.
With blurbs by Father Goose, Charles Ghigna, and Dr. Sylvia Vardell of Pomelo Books and the Poetry Friday series, I was already hooked on this book. I knew I would need to see it. Now, having read through the book on a Tuesday morning, I am not only better for the experience, I find myself longing again for the classroom where I would be putting these poems up on the document camera for consideration.
At a slim sixty-one pages, Marjorie Maddox packs this book with invitations to not only consider but to cogitate. As a somewhat experienced poet in the area of wordplay, I am amazed at what Maddox is able to do within the form and the shape to present within that space a comment on the form itself. Much of this book is like walking around in multi-colored stanzas with a combination of what might be the U.S. Poet Laureate meets Willie Wonka. There is a playfulness within the text that does not get in the way of presentation of poetry and poetic forms. The "fun" of, and within, the forms will make Maddox's book a go-to for classroom teachers looking to invite poetry into their classrooms.
And this will be a push. How many times are students taught the rules of the form which are sometimes most rigid to really look at the relaxed posture one might take in entering into a form to consider how the subject fits or could fit. Marjorie Maddox invites us to take our own subjects into the dressing rooms of form to see what fits in a three-way mirror of subject, poet, and form.
In my classroom, we use Sondra Perl's FELT SENSE book to enter into our year-long multigenre/multiform project. The first five poems in Maddox's book are actually "sense" poems asking the reader to consider the senses attached to poetry. We all know how a poem might feel to us upon seeing one on a page, right? Or is this a sort of perception? Have we ever thought about entering into poetry via the individual senses? Maddox invites the reader to do just this. "How to Hear a Poem," the second piece in the collection is a concrete poem that spirals inward and reminded me of a sort of earworm presenting on the page.
As I say, "Look for the 'meta.'"
In "How to Befriend a Poem," Maddox seems to assuage our shared trepidation that we may not understand a poem. Opening lines include, "Best to offer intriguing conversation/that's light on analysis." The last couple of lines of the piece read, "Sometimes he's shy/and just needs a little coaxing./Much of what he has to say/lies between the lines."
Even in this short sample, we could begin to pick apart shape and form and "eye rhymes in 'shy' and 'say.' The internal rhymes of lies and lines. And this is before we get to the real comment of the poem that would serve to bust the lock on poetry for so many. This is the gift that Maddox's book could be the classroom where forms are introduced each year with formality. Here is an informal look at poetry that suggests the genre might be your friend.
Within "Dramatic Monologue," Maddox brings the 'meta' in a manner that would have a public speaking student navigating enough Ps for a thousand pods. All the while building on the idea that poetry invites of itself and one who might write it a multitude of personas and presentations.
And the more technical terms we almost never get to like "Enjambment" and "Caesura?" These are given Maddox's creative treatment as well. Maddox is like the scrapbook artist that shows you a MOMA-worthy look at the family reunion when we are still trying to remember not to touch Instamatic film that is still processing (I hope Maddox likes what I have done here; I'm inspired by this book, I'll tell you).
If iambic pentameter is still giving your students in the room fits, then Maddox's "Getting Ready with Iambic" could become an introductory text allowing for an entry point and toehold into a subject that always began with stressed and unstressed markers that always left me the former and not the later.
Sonnets (English and Italian). Sestinas. Clerihews. Villanelles. They are forms we would love to get to but often the language of the masters gets in the way of how the room is set up for the guest. Maddox invites these forms with accessible language that is figurative without being frustrating.
Maddox completes the book with nine ready-for-the-room invitations for students to consider and create. In no time, they might be composing for Maddox's gentle touch on this genre. A love for poetry and how it is created is not kept from Maddox's reader as she reminds us that this language was never meant to be shibboleth but, rather, shared. Everyone is invited to play here with the ideas and the words they have brought.
A glossary of poetic terms is included as paratext for the reader. Only here does Maddox begin to point the reader to some of the more classic poets and poems we, as ELA teachers, would probably want them to see. The terms are cross-referenced back to the original poems within the collection to help solidify the term to the approach the reader has already seen in poetic form.
I am so glad to have stumbled upon this collection of poems. It is releasing during a time when many a book could get lost. Without fanfare and launch, these are the collections that some of us may know and pull from our sleeves to share at a conference only to watch for you to scribble down the author and the title. Save that conference registration fee.
Marjorie Maddox's book is the one for which you were looking to get your poets cooking. Accessible and full of playful attitude, reading this book made me really think about how much I am missing a classroom full of writers right now.
This something I say often in Room 407. I try to tuck some of this into my own artwork and the poetry I create. 'Meta' is the term I would use to describe Marjorie Maddox's new collection from Kelsay Books, INSIDE OUT: POEMS ON WRITING AND READING POEMS WITH INSIDER EXERCISES. As you can see, the 'meta' here seems to begin with a title that suggests the generative nature of poetry.
There is a sort of reciprocity without an edge like a Mobius loop that leaves the reader to wonder: Does the poetic form dictate the kind of content that must fit inside or does the content begin to seek its own shape on the page? Marjorie Maddox presents a response to a question such as this while inviting possibilities for conversations that would extend beyond the answer we think we might know.
With blurbs by Father Goose, Charles Ghigna, and Dr. Sylvia Vardell of Pomelo Books and the Poetry Friday series, I was already hooked on this book. I knew I would need to see it. Now, having read through the book on a Tuesday morning, I am not only better for the experience, I find myself longing again for the classroom where I would be putting these poems up on the document camera for consideration.
At a slim sixty-one pages, Marjorie Maddox packs this book with invitations to not only consider but to cogitate. As a somewhat experienced poet in the area of wordplay, I am amazed at what Maddox is able to do within the form and the shape to present within that space a comment on the form itself. Much of this book is like walking around in multi-colored stanzas with a combination of what might be the U.S. Poet Laureate meets Willie Wonka. There is a playfulness within the text that does not get in the way of presentation of poetry and poetic forms. The "fun" of, and within, the forms will make Maddox's book a go-to for classroom teachers looking to invite poetry into their classrooms.
And this will be a push. How many times are students taught the rules of the form which are sometimes most rigid to really look at the relaxed posture one might take in entering into a form to consider how the subject fits or could fit. Marjorie Maddox invites us to take our own subjects into the dressing rooms of form to see what fits in a three-way mirror of subject, poet, and form.
In my classroom, we use Sondra Perl's FELT SENSE book to enter into our year-long multigenre/multiform project. The first five poems in Maddox's book are actually "sense" poems asking the reader to consider the senses attached to poetry. We all know how a poem might feel to us upon seeing one on a page, right? Or is this a sort of perception? Have we ever thought about entering into poetry via the individual senses? Maddox invites the reader to do just this. "How to Hear a Poem," the second piece in the collection is a concrete poem that spirals inward and reminded me of a sort of earworm presenting on the page.
As I say, "Look for the 'meta.'"
In "How to Befriend a Poem," Maddox seems to assuage our shared trepidation that we may not understand a poem. Opening lines include, "Best to offer intriguing conversation/that's light on analysis." The last couple of lines of the piece read, "Sometimes he's shy/and just needs a little coaxing./Much of what he has to say/lies between the lines."
Even in this short sample, we could begin to pick apart shape and form and "eye rhymes in 'shy' and 'say.' The internal rhymes of lies and lines. And this is before we get to the real comment of the poem that would serve to bust the lock on poetry for so many. This is the gift that Maddox's book could be the classroom where forms are introduced each year with formality. Here is an informal look at poetry that suggests the genre might be your friend.
Within "Dramatic Monologue," Maddox brings the 'meta' in a manner that would have a public speaking student navigating enough Ps for a thousand pods. All the while building on the idea that poetry invites of itself and one who might write it a multitude of personas and presentations.
And the more technical terms we almost never get to like "Enjambment" and "Caesura?" These are given Maddox's creative treatment as well. Maddox is like the scrapbook artist that shows you a MOMA-worthy look at the family reunion when we are still trying to remember not to touch Instamatic film that is still processing (I hope Maddox likes what I have done here; I'm inspired by this book, I'll tell you).
If iambic pentameter is still giving your students in the room fits, then Maddox's "Getting Ready with Iambic" could become an introductory text allowing for an entry point and toehold into a subject that always began with stressed and unstressed markers that always left me the former and not the later.
Sonnets (English and Italian). Sestinas. Clerihews. Villanelles. They are forms we would love to get to but often the language of the masters gets in the way of how the room is set up for the guest. Maddox invites these forms with accessible language that is figurative without being frustrating.
Maddox completes the book with nine ready-for-the-room invitations for students to consider and create. In no time, they might be composing for Maddox's gentle touch on this genre. A love for poetry and how it is created is not kept from Maddox's reader as she reminds us that this language was never meant to be shibboleth but, rather, shared. Everyone is invited to play here with the ideas and the words they have brought.
A glossary of poetic terms is included as paratext for the reader. Only here does Maddox begin to point the reader to some of the more classic poets and poems we, as ELA teachers, would probably want them to see. The terms are cross-referenced back to the original poems within the collection to help solidify the term to the approach the reader has already seen in poetic form.
I am so glad to have stumbled upon this collection of poems. It is releasing during a time when many a book could get lost. Without fanfare and launch, these are the collections that some of us may know and pull from our sleeves to share at a conference only to watch for you to scribble down the author and the title. Save that conference registration fee.
Marjorie Maddox's book is the one for which you were looking to get your poets cooking. Accessible and full of playful attitude, reading this book made me really think about how much I am missing a classroom full of writers right now.
April 10, 2020
Marjorie Maddox has done something rather creative and clever in her new poetry collection. She’s written poems about reading and writing poems. “Inside Out” is not so much a book that tells how to read a poem or how to write a poem; instead, it shows you.
And that’s the key – it’s a book that shows rather than tells. This isn’t the teacher standing at the front of the classroom, giving us one more lecture on how to write a poem. This is us, sitting on the floor and surrounding the teacher, as we all add the wings to the airplane while it’s flying.
It’s downright fun, in fact. I can’t remember a time when an instruction manual made me smile, over and over again.
Maddox begins with five poems about poetry and the five senses. In poetic form, she shows how to see a poem, hear, a poem, taste it, smell it, and touch it: “The table’s well set, but please / come as you are. No need for white gloves or black tuxedos…” And after exploring all these ways of experiencing a poem, it’s time to make a new friend.
Befriending a Poem
Invite him home for dinner
but don’t insist on rhyme;
he may be as tired and as overworked
as his distant cousin Cliché.
Best to offer intriguing conversation
that’s light on analysis.
Allow for silences and spontaneity.
most importantly, like any good friend,
be faithful and patient;
remember to listen.
Sometimes he’s shy
and just needs a little time and coaxing.
Much of what he has to say
lies between the lines.
She covers all the basics of reading and writing poetry – simile and metaphor, dramatic monologues, paradox, rhyming, alliterations, concreate versus abstract language and more. And then she writes a couplet to explain how to write a couplet/ And a clerihew. And iambic pentameter. And sonnets, sestinas, and villanelles. And even how to write yourself out of a paper bag.
Even then, she’s not finished. She includes nine exercises you can do, individually or possibly in a group, to show yourself how it’s done.
Maddox is the author of 10 previous poetry collections, including “Nightrider to Edinburgh” (1986), “Body Parts” (1999); “Transplant, Transport, Transubstantiation” (2004 and now being republished by Wipf and Stock Publishers); “Weeknights at the Cathedral” (2006); “Local News from Someplace Else” (2013); “Perpendicular as I” (1999 and 2013); and “True, False, None of the Above” (2018). She is the co-author of the anthology “Common Wealth: Contemporary Poets on Pennsylvania” (2005) and author of two children’s books, including “Rules of the Game: Baseball Poems” (2009).
“Inside Out” is addressed to young writers, but it has an appeal to writers of any age and experience. Maddox has created a simple, straightforward, and fun way to read and write poetry. It’s pure genius.
And that’s the key – it’s a book that shows rather than tells. This isn’t the teacher standing at the front of the classroom, giving us one more lecture on how to write a poem. This is us, sitting on the floor and surrounding the teacher, as we all add the wings to the airplane while it’s flying.
It’s downright fun, in fact. I can’t remember a time when an instruction manual made me smile, over and over again.
Maddox begins with five poems about poetry and the five senses. In poetic form, she shows how to see a poem, hear, a poem, taste it, smell it, and touch it: “The table’s well set, but please / come as you are. No need for white gloves or black tuxedos…” And after exploring all these ways of experiencing a poem, it’s time to make a new friend.
Befriending a Poem
Invite him home for dinner
but don’t insist on rhyme;
he may be as tired and as overworked
as his distant cousin Cliché.
Best to offer intriguing conversation
that’s light on analysis.
Allow for silences and spontaneity.
most importantly, like any good friend,
be faithful and patient;
remember to listen.
Sometimes he’s shy
and just needs a little time and coaxing.
Much of what he has to say
lies between the lines.
She covers all the basics of reading and writing poetry – simile and metaphor, dramatic monologues, paradox, rhyming, alliterations, concreate versus abstract language and more. And then she writes a couplet to explain how to write a couplet/ And a clerihew. And iambic pentameter. And sonnets, sestinas, and villanelles. And even how to write yourself out of a paper bag.
Even then, she’s not finished. She includes nine exercises you can do, individually or possibly in a group, to show yourself how it’s done.
Maddox is the author of 10 previous poetry collections, including “Nightrider to Edinburgh” (1986), “Body Parts” (1999); “Transplant, Transport, Transubstantiation” (2004 and now being republished by Wipf and Stock Publishers); “Weeknights at the Cathedral” (2006); “Local News from Someplace Else” (2013); “Perpendicular as I” (1999 and 2013); and “True, False, None of the Above” (2018). She is the co-author of the anthology “Common Wealth: Contemporary Poets on Pennsylvania” (2005) and author of two children’s books, including “Rules of the Game: Baseball Poems” (2009).
“Inside Out” is addressed to young writers, but it has an appeal to writers of any age and experience. Maddox has created a simple, straightforward, and fun way to read and write poetry. It’s pure genius.
May 12, 2020
I taught middle-school-aged students for many years and it was important to me to teach (share?) poetry often with them, hoping they would leave me with a love they would have for the rest of their lives. Thus, I had a lot of books full of poems, and books for teaching poetry, too. They helped me grow my love as well. Now, Marjorie Maddox has written a book that I would have adored during those teaching years. In an exciting opening letter from her, she says: "Welcome to a world of mind-doodling, eye-dazzling, ear-bending, new-fangled, old-fashioned fun! Inside Out teaches writing (and reading) from inside the poem, with plenty of tips and tricks for everyone in and out of the classroom."
Marjorie's book is not full of explanatory paragraphs explaining poetry forms and poetic elements like other teaching texts. Her poems themselves are the explanations, as she wrote above and as the title predicts: "Inside Out!"
Here's an example of the shortest one, clever and definitely a 'show, don't tell'.
Couplet
Poetic twins all dressed in rhyme
stroll side-by-side in two straight lines.
Nine different 'how-tos' (like 'How to Touch A Poem') have fun with the senses, simile and metaphor, then concrete and abstract (in a tug of war). Following are the wonderfully creative poems that each demonstrate a poem form! Sestinas are a favorite form of mine, but it is complex and not so easy to teach, or write! That's one best part about Marjorie's book pages. Her teachings are poems! Wouldn't everyone smile if they saw that a poem titled "Fishing for Sestinas" or "How to Write an English Sonnet"? Here's a taste of this one:
"Good day young reader, might I have this dance,
an English two-step, which I know you'll learn?"
There is more! The second half of the book is titled "Insider Exercises", beginning with "Befriending A Poem". In these, writers are connected to the earlier poems through various creative activities. Explore more about "concrete and abstract" or "colors", perhaps "smells". Direct ideas such as "write similes about eating spaghetti" and whole-class exercises in onomatopoeia. When teaching new topics, like these poetry elements, it always felt good to me to offer lots of choices, but under that same umbrella. Marjorie Maddox manages this with expertise in this new book about poetry writing, yet she remains clear in the definitions of the poem forms and elements.
I'm sure I will use some the ideas in this wonderful book in my own writing, and as I said in the beginning, I wish I had had it when I taught!
October 6, 2020
This is a timely book for anyone who is teaching school-aged children about reading and writing poetry. And...it also is a great book for adults who either are writing or want to write and understand poetry on deeper levels.
Particularly now--with COVID-19 and home schooling--this book is very timely. It is well written with clever examples of poems ("How to See a Poem"..."How to Taste a Poem"..."How to Hear a Poem"), followed by easy-to-understand and -follow exercises for writing poems ("Exercise 4: Simile Explains Metaphor"), and a glossary of poetic terms. It really is the "whole package"--presented in fun, entertaining, helpful ways.
The author--poet and Professor of English/Creative Writing at Lock Haven University Marjorie Maddox--addresses her audience at the beginning of the book by saying "Welcome to the world of mind-doodling, eye-dazzling, ear-bending, new-fangled, old-fashioned fun!" And that is exactly what she brings to the table. If you plan to pick up just one book to help guide young readers and writers--and older folks, too--this is the one to choose.
Particularly now--with COVID-19 and home schooling--this book is very timely. It is well written with clever examples of poems ("How to See a Poem"..."How to Taste a Poem"..."How to Hear a Poem"), followed by easy-to-understand and -follow exercises for writing poems ("Exercise 4: Simile Explains Metaphor"), and a glossary of poetic terms. It really is the "whole package"--presented in fun, entertaining, helpful ways.
The author--poet and Professor of English/Creative Writing at Lock Haven University Marjorie Maddox--addresses her audience at the beginning of the book by saying "Welcome to the world of mind-doodling, eye-dazzling, ear-bending, new-fangled, old-fashioned fun!" And that is exactly what she brings to the table. If you plan to pick up just one book to help guide young readers and writers--and older folks, too--this is the one to choose.
April 8, 2020
It's no secret that people are afraid of poetry. As a college professor, I'm always looking out for poems and exercises to show my students that "poetry" is not a bad word. I love Marjorie Maddox's new book -- a slim volume that examines poetic terms and forms (such as simile, metaphor, couplet, sestina, etc...) through the use of playful original poems and fun writing exercises. This book is geared towards young writers (middle-school age) but I know that many of the exercises could be adapted for older audiences, and indeed I believe many colleage-age students will enjoy some of the writing activities, especially in an introductory creative writing class.
Read
June 25, 2020Falling in love with Poetry again! The poems the author included are fun and thought provoking. This book makes me want to dive in and savor the word-pictures and revel in the authors' creativity.
August 13, 2020
I have put off writing this review because I am not sure what I thought of the book. I have to admit, when I read the title, the phrase "poems on writing and reading" I didn't take it literally...it was a title. When I got into the material and realized that was exactly what it was, I almost closed it and put on the "I can't do this" shelf. For someone who has always been afraid of poetry, it was intimidating. I read through the poems but really didn't know what to make of them. I hung in there until I got to the exercises and they made complete sense....they were clear and helpful. They will help a lot and I learned from them. I am not ready to go back and read the poems yet but I will. They will be more accessible. Although this book is for "beginners" I think its full appreciation will only come if a person has had some introduction to poetry....they will not be intimidated by the forms in the first 2/3 of the book.
Read
May 18, 2020If my count is right, there are 27 brief poems, 9 exercises, and a little over two pages of glossary. Potentially some sparks here for teachers of poetry, or writers who may be daunted by more expansive work. This is a more of an amuse bouche than an actual course.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews