Over the past week the WS editors had a fun task: hunt down animated videos of poetry and prose. In this search we discovered some really wonderful sites devoted to rethinking the way we process literature. Below I’ve included some of my favorites along with short descriptions of the sites. What was most surprising during the search was how successful collaborations between film makers, designers and poets can substantially improve the ‘reading’ experience. How words accompanied by visually stunning work resonated deeper, so much to the point that I felt them climb the back of my spine, and left me sincerely happy/depressed/hopeful/existentially drained- depending on content.

Here are two of my favorite links. The first is an adaptation of “Render, Render,” by Thomas Lux. The second is a German Translation of “The Chimney Sweeper,” by William Blake. Hope you Enjoy!

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Why not? In a generation of tech-savvy writers, and youtube teenagers, animated poetry seems to be the way to “make it new” and give poetry a public presence. And it’s catching on. Billy Collins calls them action poems and Todd Boss calls them motion poems. But basically, it’s a poem, plus audio, plus film. Animated poetry is even making an appearance in college syllabi.

But what does animation mean to poetry? I’m worried that poets might not embrace animated poetry, arguing that it steps on the poem’s toes, forces a single interpretation, does the reader’s work for her and makes her lazy. To this I say it’s a new piece of art, a hybrid art that should be taken on its own merits—not given a poetic autopsy.

The charm of animated poetry is that it brings poems and the internet together. It gives us another way to engage in the art. It gives us a new kind of audience and something to do with a poem after it’s written. The point is that we write to engage with others, to make our work public, and animated poetry  does that.