English professor says she likes her writing ‘raw, ragged and real’
Star Coulbrooke may not have your typical professor background.
After leaving high school on her 16th birthday, Coulbrooke received her GED at the same time her son did in 1986 and then attended USU in 1992.
At that time, she earned a bachelor’s degree in English, focusing on literary studies. Coulbrook followed up with a master’s degree at USU in American studies with a folklore emphasis, completeing her master’s thesis in poetry before she started teaching in the English department.
When it comes to words, Coubrooke said she likes “the raw, ragged and real.”
“Sometimes when people are writing, they are afraid of what will come out. Afraid that when the story takes on a life of its own … they are not sure of where it will end up and that scares people.
“But facing what comes out on the page is very important to healing and I think that it is something that should be confronted, not ran away from. Personally, I love it … how language lends itself to the real experience and I can uncover that.”
Holding true to the experience is something that Coulbrooke said she feels very strongly about and tries to continue that in her writing and in her teaching.
“A person may be writing a story about their dad and a part comes along that the dad would have sworn under his breath, for instance, but they won’t include that in their poem, they try to clean it up.”
“Or, they only use it to lend impact, trying not to offend someone. I think that detracts from the story,” she said.
“Writing that which holds true to the reality it is based on is much more powerful writing than writing that doesn’t. I tell my students not be scared of words, but that means not being scared of what family, peers or friends may say about those words. One can’t be scared about what another person is going to say.”
Coulbrooke had taken just one poetry class when she was introduced to Utah Poet Laureate Ken Brewer when her boss showed some of her poetry to him.
Her connection to poetry during those years was through the poetry group that came from Brewer’s first class. She eventually took Brewer’s Advanced Poetry class and there, under Ken’s watchful eye, she said her talents came into view.
“Ken Brewer was wonderful. He has such a way of teaching so that I could find inspiration in revising, not just in the writing,” she said.
Coulbrooke said when Brewer retired, he recommended that she replace him, which is how she got her teaching position at USU.
Coulbrooke said she gets most of her inspiration for her own poetry from the valley.
“Cache Valley is such a beautiful place; I love it. But I also get it from animals, people, the stories I read,” she said. Coulbrooke said she mostly finds herself reading the works of Ken Brewer, Steven Dunn, Sylvia Plath and Sharon Olds, to name a few.
As assistant director of the Writing Center, heading up writing and healing workshops here on campus and teaching various workshops around Utah and Idaho, Coulbrooke has plenty to do, but she said she hopes that she can find more time in the future to do more writing.
-nealmsnow@cc.usu.edu