Gurlesque A Go-Go: A Bold Trend in Contemporary Poetry

 
Within the past decade, a stealth wave of female poets born in the 1960s, ‘70s, and ‘80s has snuck onto the contemporary poetry scene, reinvigorating it by raising pertinent, paradoxical questions about femininity, sexuality, and pop culture. In 2003, poet Arielle Greenberg outlined her theory of the Gurlesque: “I came up with the term Gurlesque because of the word’s evocation of three different ideas: Mikhail Bakhtin’s theory of the carnivalesque, burlesque theater, and the feminist punk movement riot grrl.” Greenberg noticed a trend among female poets of her generation to write poems that reveled in traditional aspects of girlhood (sparkly things, dresses, dolls, barrettes, and the like) while simultaneously subverting them, often by juxtaposing the cute and the grotesque.
 
But there’s much more to the Gurlesque than blood-spattered, sequined prom gowns. This course will explore the works of several prominent Gurlesque poets to see how writers from disparate backgrounds and parts of the world, working independently, all started addressing similar concerns. More a cultural phenomenon than a movement, Gurlesque poems (and other associated works) offer entry into a world both autobiographical and fantastical, an often giddy mélange that may challenge your ideas of what poetry is and how women should sound on the page.
 
Writers we will discuss include Arielle Greenberg, Danielle Pafunda, Catherine Wagner, Chelsey Minnis, Lara Glenum, and Aase Berg as well as others. (One independent chapbook press, Dancing Girl, publishes chapbooks exclusively by women, many of which include poems that could be considered Gurlesque: I have some of these, which are difficult to find in libraries, and am happy to share them during class.) I also work at Johns Hopkins, so I can easily access the Eisenhower Library’s excellent collection of these poets for class use.
 
Questions that we will discuss include the following: What do other Gurlesque art forms look/sound like (visual art, film, music)? How do writers from non-white, non-middle class backgrounds approach the Gurlesque? What forms does the Gurlesque take outside the United States? Will the Gurlesque continue for the foreseeable future or will it lose momentum as the poets age and become more established in their fields? Will the Gurlesque poets “outgrow” the Gurlesque? What is the male equivalent of the Gurlesque, and can male poets be considered Gurlesque? How do these writers feel about the term being applied to them anyway?
 
The first Gurlesque anthology, edited by Arielle Greenberg and Lara Glenum, will be published next year, so this discussion course will give you a one-up on your coffee shop cohorts who are sure to be poring over  it once it hits bookstores.
Discuss this course.