Don't Use the Phone: What Poets Can Learn from Books

Don't Use the Phone shows how poets can improve their writing by swapping smartphones for books. Championing the 'slim volume' as the best arena in which poetry can be appreciated, McDonald gives an accessible introduction to seventeen modern poetry collections, explaining how poets can use them in their own creative development. Covering a range of themes including ecology, humour, mortality, philosophy, place, and race, the book mixes criticism with creative writing advice to provide a ground-breaking and indispensable course in poetry writing.