Thinking some more about what we mean by CNF

Your journal prompt was about scars, disease, and broken bones - traumas that you carry with you in your body. You made a list and did some thinking about what you might say about how such experiences shape your lives or open your minds or relate to larger patterns in "the way things are."

The rest of the class was devoted to discussing Lott and Kincaid. Our discussion of Lott examined his essay's tone, content, and structure. You may find this analytic process useful when you begin to look for publication venues for your writing. Scoping out a journal's preferences in terms of subject material, tone and form will help you choose the right place for your essays. Often - getting your work published is more about finding the right venue than about the quality of your work. We approached discussion of Kincaid a little more holistically, but in the end we again considered content, structure and tone - though we added on some reflections about her "vehicle" - the method/material she used to "carry" the main focus of her essay. We noted that the central ideas in her essay were conveyed through presenting a more or less chronological series of memory snapshots (to supplement the central snapshot of herself in the yellow dress) and that these images were sensory rich. We also noted that Didion's central ideas were conveyed through returning to "snapshots" of writing from her journal, that Beard's were conveyed through a storyline, and that Lott's relied heavily on examples from other writers' writing. So now you have four different models for presenting your ideas. In this class - copying is OK, even expected - so long as you do it with a twist.

For Wednesday, read the Montaigne and Orwell essays (the links should be here). These essays were written before creative nonfiction was invented - or at least before it was named. So if CNF is the child of these essays - do some written thinking in your blog about what it inherited from its parents, and what it generated on its own.