Writing and Reading Poetry with Raphael Dagold

May 12, 2017

Before coming to teach at AUCA, Raphael Dagold was teaching at the University of Utah, where he got his PhD in Creative Writing and Literature. Raphael is also a practicing poet, with his first book of poetry published in 2014. Now, he teaches Writing and Reading Poetry at AUCA. If you haven’t taken a class with Professor Dagold, you may have seen his recent “English Poetry Day,” where students read their poems to an audience of AUCA community members. Raphael shares his thoughts below:

 What was the AUCA student poetry reading all about?

There was a reading by the students in my class Writing and Reading Poetry, the first creative writing course at AUCA. Seven students volunteered to read at the event, and there were probably about twenty more students and faculty members who wanted to listen to the readings. My students did really well. Most of my students told me that it was their first time doing it—so I loved that. My students say, “I’m just gonna try...” but then they do great.

The event was a kind of end-of-the-semester celebration—a forum for my students to display what they have done over the semester, and the first of its kind for students at AUCA. Most of the seven students who read, read two of the poems they had written during our coursework. It was a way for them to show people what they have done, as well as an opportunity to experience having an audience, which is a big part of poetry’s spoken tradition. I would love to keep doing these kinds of thing at AUCA.

 What do you see for arts at AUCA going forward?

 Next year I hope to be able to have some kind of publication of student writing. Hopefully, we could even start a Literary and Arts journal at AUCA, which would include photography, visual art, poetry, and fiction by students. It would be great if we could also have more events like this, too. I see people doing films, photography, painting, drawing, and applied art. We recently had a big show which included photographs by student, so I would love to see the arts at AUCA come together.

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