Welcome back. Today we’re going to do a few things. We’re going to consolidate the work we’ve done so far and then we’re going to think about the upcoming assignment. We’re also going to talk about the strange freedom of writing creative nonfiction. When writing creative nonfiction, there is no recipe that you can follow. In her essay “To Fashion a Text”, Annie Dillard says “no subject matter is forbidden, no structure is proscribed. You get to make up your own form every time”. But this, of course, is what makes writing creative nonfiction difficult. And it is also why there is no single recipe for writing a good creative nonfiction piece. You may be able to write down a recipe for an effective academic essay. And there are some arguments to say that all academic essays are, to some extent, the same (this is not quite true, but it’s more true than it is of creative nonfiction). For an academic essay, you can have a clear, proscribed structure that works pretty well for most essays. And if you try to make up your own form, you’re possibly going to get yourself in trouble. But with creative nonfiction, things are different. Think of how different all the pieces we have read are in their structure, their organisation.
So today we’ll be looking at how to manage this freedom, and how to find a
Checking In
First, I’m going to get you to check in. I also want you to discuss anything on the course so far that you don’t understand, or are finding difficult, or are frustrated by. You can talk about fun stuff as well—what you are interested in, what you like. But I’d like to know a bit more about the challenges you are facing in approaching this very different kind of writing.
Then we’ll discuss in the main group.
A Writing Exercise
As we’ve had a short break, let’s get back into the frame of mind of writing. This is a simple task. Write a short piece with the title “My Names”. What names are you known by? What do these names mean to you? What stories do these names harbour?
Assignment Briefing
I’ll take you through the next assignment briefing. Remember everything we have covered: what creative nonfiction is (session 1); what memoir is (session 2); the complexities of memory (session 3 and session 4); the messiness of human life (session 5); the basic logic of memoir — topic, scenes and form (session 6); how to build structure (session 7); the art of storytelling (session 8 and session 9); and voice (session 10).
This is a lot of juggle. But the way that you get better at it is through practice in writing, and through reading!
Let’s look at the assignment briefing.
Questions
Share any questions on the assignment briefing. Then we’ll set to work.
Homework
As you are going to be — for the first time — fashioning a longer text, the homework for next time is to read Annie Dillard’s To Fashion a Text. And to get started on your assignment. Everyone should come to the next class with either comprehensive notes on what they are planning to write, or some drafts for us to look at. We’ll have one session before the break to work together on the assignment, and one after the break.