Beginning Workshops

We'll examine creative nonfiction from all of its sides beginning with the rhetorical precision of Aristotle and moving through the rigorous interiorself-mapping of Montaigne, the looping denials of DeQuincey, and then into the modern modes courtesy of Audre Lorde, Virginia Woolf, David Foster Wallace, Arundhati Roy, and others.

This course addresses a range of techniques for writing poetry, making use of various compelling models drawn primarily from international modernisms on which to base our own writing. (Our textbook is Poems for the Millennium, edited by Rothenberg & Joris.) In this sense, the course will constitute an apprenticeship to modern poetry. We will consider the breadth of approaches currently available to poets, as well as the value of reading as a means of developing an understanding of how to write poetry. Each week students will bring poems for discussion, developing a portfolio of revised work by the quarter's end. Additionally, students will keep detailed notebooks, as well as developing critical skills for understanding poetry in the form of classroom discussion.

The Line

The focus of this beginning course will be on one of the most conspicuous elements of poetry: the line. If for no other reason, we often identify a poem as a poem because it is written lines. Why? What is it that makes the line such a distinguishing aspect of poetry? This class will deliberately practice various forms of line making, ranging from traditional metrical lines to modern "free verse," with forays into the wilderness of prose itself. We will read work that conceives of lines in radically different ways --for example, as a rhythmic unit, as a container, as a vehicle of exploration, as ideological marker, or as an intertextual allusion. Furthermore, we will attempt to trace the ways that the intersections of lines and syntax affect a poem's sense of voice. Readings will include a range of poems and essays by contemporary and canonical writers.

This course will be roughly one-third lecture/discussion and two-thirds workshopping of student work. We'll read and analyze primarily contemporary short fiction, by writers like Edward P. Jones, Mary Gaitskill, Ben Fountain, Z.Z. Packer, George Saunders, and Sherman Alexie. Discussions will tend to be focused around one particular subject each week: setting, dialogue, character, perspective, etc. We'll also address more subtle concepts like psychic distance, free-indirect style, and movement through time. Students will present their own work to the group for critique and discussion. We'll seek to both hone our skills as attentive readers and to further develop as writers of clear, sophisticated prose.

Writing the Short Story: "The novel is exhaustive by nature," Steven Millhauser once wrote. "The short story by contrast is inherently selective. By excluding almost everything, it can give perfect shape to what remains." This course will consider the particular spaces that short fiction occupies in the literary landscape as a means to giving students a clearer understanding of how to compose brief and high-functioning narratives. Through readings of published stories and workshops of students' own fiction, we'll explore the parameters of the short story, its scope and ambitions, its limitations as well. We'll read established masters like Raymond Carver, Alice Munro, and Joy Williams as well as newer voices such as Wells Tower and Anthony Doerr, breaking down their stories, not simply as examples of meaningful fiction, but as roadmaps toward a greater awareness of what makes a short story operate. Over the course of the quarter, students will submit stories for consideration in workshop, as well as other experimental efforts in short-short and micro fiction. Discussion will revolve around basic elements of story craft-point of view, pacing, language, etc.-in an effort to define the ways in which a narrative can be conveyed with economy, precision, and ultimately, power.

The Anxiety of Getting Started

"Every story is perfect until you write the first sentence - then it's ruined forever." So said prolific fiction writer J. Robert Lennon. This craft-focused course is geared towards those who don't quite know how to begin, who might be afraid of writing, and who feel burdened by their own inhibitions and expectations. With creative exercises, readings, and workshops, we'll find ways to warm up our writerly voices and use them as a guiding force in creating short fiction. We'll learn how to mine the readings - by an eclectic mix of authors including Miranda July, Noviolet Bulawayo, John Cheever - for specific techniques and skills to apply to our own work. We will workshop our writings throughout the term. By the end, we will have built up a modest but powerful portfolio.

The world is made up of stories, and stories about stories. Telling our stories, honoring those stories, listening actively and empathetically to the stories of others—this is all part of the propulsive work of democracy. Of course writing our stories is not a skill separate from thinking, and there's nothing more interesting, engaging, and, yes, precarious than an intelligent mind thinking out loud. The practice of writing is a journey, not by a tourist, but by a pilgrim struggling to make sense—and the reader must actually see the struggle. We will be concerned in this workshop with writing creative nonfiction: memoirs, polemics, personal essays. We’ll consider fundamental issues in writing nonfiction—creating a credible narrator and becoming a compelling story-teller; describing a scene in sufficient detail; diving into (and not running away from) contradictions; knowing when to “show, don’t tell” and (just as important) when to “tell—synthesize, generalize, sum up—don't show.” We will read a few pieces on the art of writing creative nonfiction, and we will focus on engaging and responding to primary texts by several authors. The heart of our work together will be ongoing workshops of original student writing.

Day/Time: Mondays, 10:30-1:20

Fiction author James Joyce believed that by writing toward the heart of Dublin, he could get to the heart of every city. His idea set a difficult literary standard for writers of contemporary creative nonfiction: no longer could they write about a particular subject without the expectation that it should resonate on a universal level. In this course, we will cross-examine the values behind the countless mantras that circulate creative writing communities in order to trace how they influence the creative process of nonfiction writing, a genre that has only begun to gain independence on bookshelves. As we read authors who specialize in exploring particularities such as childhood and identity, we will focus on crafting and discussing stories which are uniquely ours. Students will workshop and revise one personal essay and several micro-essays for a final portfolio that demonstrates originality and versatility. Potential guides for our reading include: Mary Karr, Frank McCourt, Kiese Laymon, Yiyun Li, and Lucy Grealy.  

Day/Time: Mondays, 1:30-4:20

This course addresses a range of techniques for writing poetry, making use of various compelling models drawn primarily from international modernisms on which to base our own writing. (Our textbook is Poems for the Millennium, edited by Rothenberg & Joris.) In this sense, the course will constitute an apprenticeship to modern poetry. We will consider the breadth of approaches currently available to poets, as well as the value of reading as a means of developing an understanding of how to write poetry. Each week students will bring poems for discussion, developing a portfolio of revised work by the quarter’s end. Additionally, students will keep detailed notebooks, as well as developing critical skills for understanding poetry in the form of two short essays.

Day/Time: Tuesdays, 2-4:50 PM

Style, it might be said, is a truce the writer makes between her material and what she can do with it. This course will focus on the latter—especially the things that beginning writers can do to take control of their writing. Directed prose exercises, edited by the instructor and returned for revision, will sharpen your technical self‐mastery. For larger issues of craft we'll examine two or three stories each by a succession of vivid stylists. In written assignments, you will be asked to experiment with the picaresque elaborations of Nikolai Gogol, the ruthless dreams of Jamaica Kincaid, the limited point of view of a Katherine Mansfield character, and the supple empathy of David Foster Wallace's indirect discourse. In the second half of the course, you will twice submit an original story for peer workshopping, and will turn in polished revisions at the semester's end.

Day/Time: Fridays, 12:30-3:20