The SonnetMaster ClassIn-Person
Tuesday, Dec 01, 2026
9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.
The Salmagundi Club
47 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10003
In partnership with The Salmagundi Club.
What if a fourteen-line square of text could hold an entire world of political urgency, pop culture, and intimate human turmoil? In this master class on the sonnet with Terrance Hayes, you’ll explore how this centuries-old form moves, bends, and reinvents itself in the hands of modern masters. We will examine the architectural bones of the sonnet to uncover what a single contained poem can reveal about our broader lives. Grounded in Hayes’ signature “reading to write” framework, our discussions will directly spark your own creative output.
ENGLISH, CREATIVE WRITING, ETC.
3 credits for school members
CTLE credit available
Limited to 18 teachers
Terrance Hayes
Terrance Hayes is the author, most recently, of So to Speak, a collection of poems, and Watch Your Language, a collection of essays. His other books include American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin and How to Be Drawn, both National Book Award finalists; Lightheaded, winner of the 2010 National Book Award and a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award; Wind In a Box; Hip Logic, and Muscular Music. His honors include a Whiting Writers Award, a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, a United States Artists Zell Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a MacArthur “genius” Fellowship. In 2016, he was awarded the NAACP Image Award for Poetry. He is a professor of creative writing at New York University.