Lyceum Series – Oops! All Couplets with Dr. James Davis

More than a two-lined stanza, a couplet is a little study of “and.” Couplets help us make sense of relationships: between lover and beloved, body and soul, self and other. In addition to their metaphoric utility, couplets are fun; their jokelike setup-and-punchline structure feeds our hunger for surprise. Rhymed or unrhymed, closed or open, couplets have populated English poetry from Chaucer to the present day. Several acclaimed contemporary collections are written exclusively in couplets (notably, Maggie Millner’s aptly titled 2023 debut, Couplets). This class presents a wide variety of approaches to the couplet, old and new, to show how this stanza may help the poet grapple with the paradox of “and,” which separates even as it joins. The class will respond to writing prompts that take advantage of the couplet’s unique and expansive attributes.

About Dr. James Davis:

James Davis’s debut poetry collection Club Q won the Anthony Hecht Prize. Recent poems have appeared or are forthcoming in The Sewanee Review, Five Points, The Hopkins Review, Barrelhouse, and elsewhere. He is Editor-in-Chief of American Literary Review and will receive his PhD in literature and creative writing from the University of North Texas in May.