The Healing Power of the Artful Essay
Louise De Salvo compares writing to a fixer, the chemical in photography that stabilizes the image. She is one of many advocates for using writing to discover our strength, power, wisdom, energy, and creativity as a route to managing stressful events and finding healing from difficult experience.
In addition, studies have shown physiological effects from expressive writing such as reduced heart rates and blood pressure and strengthened immune system. This interactive workshop will explore some of the techniques—many of which intersect with practices for artistically strong work—for using writing as a means of transformation and healing. This workshop can be offered both synchronously as a multi-week course, as a two-hour session, or as an online course. Look for the synchronous version at Craft Talks.
Available variations on this workshop include a multi-genre one on writing and healing.
The Shapes of Stories
There are as many ways to tell stories as there are stories to tell. Some writers choose straightforward, traditional approaches, while others experiment with alternative structures inspired by recipes, liner notes, instruction manuals, and quizzes. We’ll look at examples of nonfiction and fiction that borrow from different forms and do exercises and experiments, trying a variety of approaches while discussing what makes a story’s structure effective. This course can be offered as a 2-4 hour workshop or as an online 10-week asynchronous course, Variations include short workshops on hermit crab essays. Find the 10-week course here at Muse Writing.
Finding and Shaping Your True Story
Many of us have important personal stories to tell, but how do we transform interesting anecdotes or fragmentary episodes into fully realized pieces of writing that will engage and move readers? Join me in exploring techniques to find the story you’re really trying to tell.
Storytelling principles dating back to Aristotle still inform our creative nonfiction and fiction and can help us bring our experience to life and make it meaningful to readers. Through discussion, examples, writing exercises, and critique in a supportive setting, we’ll work on telling the truths of our lives using these storytelling principles as a framework. This course can be offered in a synchronous 1-4 hour session, either online or in person.
Bringing Memoir Alive Using Techniques from Fiction
When telling stories from our lives, how can we honor the nonfiction contract with the reader to tell the truth as best we know it while also creating lively, engaging pieces? Through discussion, examples, and lots of writing exercises, you’ll learn to apply devices from fiction to create or enrich your own memoirs. This course can be offered in a 1-4 hour synchronous online or in-person session.