Amy Catanzano on Ed Sanders and Investigative Poetics

Wake Forest University poet-in-residence Amy Catanzano talks to Ian McDowell of Yes! Weekly about investigative poetics. Catanzano, who says she is “inspired by Ed Sanders, the poet, singer, and social activist who co-founded the ‘60s avant-rock group The Fugs and wrote the radical manifesto Investigative Poetry,” will soon be teaching a workshop on the subject for the North Carolina Writers’ Network 2019 Spring Conference. More:

...When she teaches investigative poetics in her college classes, she leads students in discussions of Sanders’ manifesto and asks them to come up with their own topics for investigation, conduct site visits, complete exploratory exercises, write poems based on their findings, and then discuss those poems in a workshop setting, where feedback is provided.

“For the one-day class, I’ll draw from the most essential aspects of this process and give the participants resources to move forward on their own. Participants can already have a topic of investigation in mind, or they can wait to be inspired during class.”

Since 2009, Catanzano has published a series of essays on a form of investigative poetics that she calls “quantum poetics,” exploring the intersections of poetry and science, particularly physics. The term is derived from quantum physics, also known as quantum theory and matrix mechanics, a fundamental theory in physics which describes nature at the smallest scales of energy levels of atoms and subatomic particles, incorporating the concepts of quantization of energy, wave-particle duality, and the uncertainty principle.

“Quantum poetics is my integrated artistic theory, interpretive framework, and writing praxis that explores poetry in relation to quantum physics as well as string theory, astrophysics, and more. As part of this work, I conduct site visits to scientific research centers.”

Read on here. And if you're interested in more investigative poetics, head here.