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writing offerings fall 2008Autobiographical Writing Jane M. Rabb LCRWT 5401 DATE: Mondays, September 29–December 8 TIME: 1:00 pm–3:30 pm LOCATION: University Hall 3-098 TUITION: Non-credit, $270 This course is designed for those wishing to use their personal experience to write effective, meaningful autobiographical pieces. Students are encouraged to explore key childhood events, significant school or job experiences, influential relationships, important philosophical, psychological, and/or spiritual turning points, or any other life experience. They may do so through a new or evolving long project of their choice or periodic essays on topics suggested by the instructor. Classic essays in the genre (such as those by Virginia Woolf, George Orwell, E.M. Forster, John Updike, Tillie Olson) may be read, but classes are mainly devoted to thoughtful analysis of students’ work. Discussions will focus on common problems of structure, style, and, above all, revision. [ back to top ]
The Contemporary Poetic Voice The objectives of this course are to give students the chance to spend time reading, thinking about, and writing poetry. In so doing, students will begin to develop their own poetic voice. How do you give voice to your own experience while also making it resonant and meaningful to others? What details do you include and what details do you exclude? How can the writing process be one of exploration and discovery as well as of communication and craft? We will explore the ways in which the symbolic, the imaginative, the interrogative, the declamatory, and other rhetorical devices can help address these questions. We will look at contemporary books of poetry by James Tate, Carolyn Forche, Franz Wright, Charles Simic, and Claudia Rankine, among others. Along with considering a range of techniques the poets have used to create their own poetic voices, we will look at the “poetic world”—the interior landscapes that surface through their collections of poems. Throughout the semester we will look closely at how these poets achieve a sustaining, cohesive poetic voice and vision. We will begin to develop our individual voices to express our own interior landscapes. Through this ongoing dialogue about published and personal poems, the class will build a community of poetry writers and readers. [ back to top ]
Much Poetry Reading, Much Poetry WritingSuzanne E. Berger LCRWT 5706 DATE: Tuesdays, September 23–December 23 TIME: 10:00 am–12:50 pm LOCATION: University Hall 3-100 TUITION: Non-credit, $460 PREREQUISITE: This course is for intermediate and advanced students.With the exception of students previously enrolled, students must submit three original poems with their registration. This is a poetry writing workshop with emphasis on revision—additive and subtractive—and deep re-envision: that is, radical reworking of the original poem. In a workshop atmosphere of informal but rigorous give and take, students will write new poems and bring in other original poems considered unfinished. Students will benefit from suggestions by the teacher and classmates, and from the extensive reading in the course, which includes poems by Carolyn Forche, Erica Funkhouser, Gerald Stern, Carl Phillips, and others. From analyzing these writers, class exercises, and discussion, students will learn innovative ways to present material and to examine poetic techniques, and will find new inflections for their poetic voices. There is extensive reading as well as writing in the course: a new volume every other week, and an original poem every two weeks. [ back to top ]
I Could Tell You Stories: A Memoir Writing WorkshopJulia Thacker LCRWT 5712 DATE: Saturday, September 27 TIME: 10:00 am–4:30 pm LOCATION: University Hall 3-089 TUITION: Non-credit, $100 Composing memoir is an act of memory, not an act of history, says writer Tobias Wolff. This workshop offers creative strategies to help us recall key episodes from our life experiences, and techniques for retrieving and embellishing what has been lost or forgotten. In a series of in-class writing exercises, we will draw upon ancestral lore, family photographs, and favorite mementos as we compose short autobiographical narratives. Some of these stories will be complete as small gems, while others will become the basis for longer works. We will take turns reading our own stories and those of others aloud in a classic workshop format, followed by a lively discussion of each participant’s work. Together, we will examine excerpts from Patricia Hampl’s I Could Tell You Stories: Sojourns in the Land of Memory, and David Sedaris’s Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim, and consider the elements at the heart of all good story telling: character, style, and dramatic tension. Please bring the following materials to class: two or three old family photographs (perhaps taken before you were born) that you find mysterious or evocative; and a small memento which is charged with memory and meaning. [ back to top ]
Flash Fiction Writing WorkshopJulia Thacker LCRWT 5716 DATE: Saturday, October 11 TIME: 10:00 am–4:30 pm LOCATION: University Hall 3-089 TUITION: Non-credit, $100 Short stories of 1–3 pages, sometimes called Flash Fiction, can be as rich in character, imagery, and meaning as their fulllength cousins. But, whether you aim to produce a beautifully rendered short story or an epic novel, writing fiction can also be just plain hard work. This workshop is designed to remind participants of how much fun—and how joyful—writing can be. In one activity, students spin a short tale using tarot cards and song lyrics. In another, vintage family photographs are the starting point for intriguing characters and plots. Tabloid headlines spark ideas in another exercise: imagine writing a story entitled Farmer Shoots Six Foot Butterfly, or Parking Spot of the Damned. Participants will share their short-short stories, and receive guidance on technique and suggestions for ways to develop their pieces further. We will closely read fiction by such masters of the short form as Sandra Cisneros, Tim O’Brien, and Grace Paley. Come away from this workshop freshly inspired, with new stories in hand. [ back to top ]
The Art of Writing for Newspapers WorkshopSuzette Standring LCRWT 5002 DATE: Tuesdays, September 23–October 14 TIME: 6:45 pm–8:45 pm LOCATION: University Hall 3-089 TUITION: Non-credit, $100 Newspaper writing, especially well-written columns, can open the door to regular publication, authorship or syndication. In this workshop writers and bloggers will learn how to write for the public, based upon the instructor’s experiences and insights from award winning columnists. Learn the craft of doing condensed writing well: point of view, voice, structure, and achieving universal resonance. We will discuss how to identify ideas with a fresh angle when working under deadline constraints, and the common wants and needs of editors and syndicates. [ back to top ]
updated 07/18/08 | 10:17 AM
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