A collection of craft essays about the lyric essay form, this book features both lyric and traditional essays that describe, demonstrate and explore the form's techniques.

The first craft guide to the lyric essay form, this book combines hybrid craft essays that embody the key elements discussed, with more traditional craft essays that review relevant lyric theory, craft and history. An orientation to a form that is critical and creative, practical and accessible, Heidi Czerwiec centers the lyric essay on the lyre, on lyric mode, focusing on the resonances of sound, silence and image at the level of language. With topics including sound effects, imagery development, lateral movement, white space, fragmentation, using poetic craft and forms, and pedagogy, this book connects the dots between lyric theory and practice, offering the beginnings of a critical framework for a form that has been vastly undertheorized until now. An essential guide to this exciting and popular hybrid form, Crafting the Lyric Essay will invigorate the study and writing of creative non-fiction.

"Crafting the Lyric Essay is a timely treatment of the lyric essay from the perspective of a poet who takes the musicality of language seriously (and playfully)." - Christine Howe, Lecturer in Creative Writing, University of Wollongong, Australia

"Groundbreaking—this book is going to change the landscape of literary nonfiction and change everything we thought we knew about lyric essays." - Karen Babine, Editor of Assay: A Journal of Nonfiction Studies and author of All the Wild Hungers