Fall 2011: Creative Nonfiction

Rehearsal + final questions about portfolios

2010-12-13T16:01:00.000-08:00

It sounds like you all have a good hand on what you will be reading for Wednesday's performance. I am looking forward to seeing you all there. We have the Cougar's Den reseved from 6-8 - but if you have an extra piece to read that you'd like an audience for - bring it along, and maybe we will be able to either stay a little longer than we've reserved - or move venues.

Final comments on portfolio.

1. When you post your final essay - include a brief introductory paragraph about whether you got what you wanted out of it - and who you envision as its audience (who might like to read it). If you plan to send it out - list the places where you might send it.

2. Your portfolios are due no later than Monday night at 7:15. However - if you are finished early - I would appreciate it if you would send me an email so I can get a head start on grading.

See you at the reading!

Schedule for reading

2010-12-09T07:16:00.000-08:00

In class tonight, we talked through plans for the last couple of classes, and you workshopped your reflective essays. I repeatedly directed you to the assignment sheet in response to your questions about the essay - so see what you can do in terms of constructing the expectations for this assignment from the written directions.

The plan for how much credit will be accorded which aspects of your work was posted on the syllabus as follows.

Grades

1. Writing projects & portfolio

Drafts + revisions Project 1 150 points

Drafts + revisions Project 2 150 points

Drafts + revisions for reflective essay 100 points

Portfolio (includes finished writing for two essays + reflective essay) 200 points

Total points 600 points

2. Blog 200 points

3. Participation, blog comments, writing journal, presentations 200 points

Total points for course 1000 points

Points for the portfolio are based on overall quality of work; evidence of thoughtful, on-going exploration of and experimentation with features of creative nonfiction from draft to draft and from project to project; completeness, and organization.

In class on Monday we will make sure everyone is set to turn in the completed portfolio no later than Monday by the end of class. I do not expect to hold class on Monday, December 20, but if individual students make appointments to finish up work, I will arrange to be present.

Reading at the Cougar's Den

Class for Wednesday, December 15, will be held in the Cougar's Den in the seating in the room to the right of the cash register. It is a big room so there will be plenty of space for our class and any guests you might choose to invite. The reading is from 6:00 to 8:00, and the schedule is as follows.

6:00 Hamilton
6:10 Marilyn
6:20 Fran
6:30 Casey
6:40 Elizabeth
6:50 Yasmin
7:00 Marjorie
7:10 Nashira
7:20 Erin
7:30 Chelsea|
7:40 Ashley
7:50 Josh
8:00 Michael

No blog assignment. Keep working on whatever writing you need to work on to finish work for the course.

For class Monday, we will tie up loose ends with respect to questions about outstanding work, due dates, grades, and anything else relevant to your writing you would like to discuss. You will then rehearse for the reading in groups. The purpose of the rehearsal (as for the NDW rehearsal) is to get a feel for how long 10 minutes is, talk through your introductory material, and get some preliminary response.

Have a good weekend and see you on Monday.

Workshop Groups

2010-12-08T14:52:00.000-08:00

These somewhat random groups were set up with the intent to put you in conversation with individuals you haven't yet worked with.

Josh

Elizabeth

Marilyn

Erin

Casey
Marjorie

Fran

Yasmin

Chelsea

Ashley

Michael

Nashira

Robyn

Eric

Hamilton

For Wednesday: finishing up the reflective essay + Workshop

2010-12-07T07:40:00.000-08:00

In class tonight you finished up your presentations - and took a minute to make sure you knew how to post your work on the portfolio.

Questions included:

- Should I post the version with comments? (NO)

- Can I set my portfolio so that no one can see my work? (YES => go to more actions; share this site, and select private.)

For Wednesday:

no blog

Come to class prepared to workshop your reflective essay (bring your computer or a print copy) + the essay of your choice.

Class will be a writing workshop.

Presentations

2010-12-01T16:01:00.000-08:00

Tonight you gave your presentations on publication venues - good job! Good information.

On Monday, the six of you who didn't get a chance to present will talk about your venues. W e will also check portfolios - just to make sure you are OK with the software & do some workshopping for any essay you want to work on. We will also finalize plans for the reading on December 15.

Blog: Post Revised Essay 3/4

Summing up thoughts on CNF

2010-11-29T16:20:00.000-08:00

Tonight we talked through definitions of CNF in light of the book's introduction + the craft essays - and ended with a discussion of what CNF is "good for" => what it is retorically suited to "do."

Good talk! I think we pulled together most of the main ideas of the course>

For Wednesday:

Blog: Post your handout for the Rhetorical Analysis of a Publication Venue. The handout should have suitable links so you can "illustrate" your talk with the pages/essays/information as it is presented on the publication's web site.

In class you will report to your classmates what you have found out about your publication venue. Your discussion should give your classmates a clear idea of the kinds of CNF pieces your venue is looking for - and what the requirements are for publishing work with their journal.

See you Wednesday.

Journal Listing

2010-11-29T14:12:00.001-08:00

Poets and Writers has a search engine for literary magazines. This should make finding a home for your writing much easier.

Reflective Writing

2010-11-23T09:56:00.001-08:00

During class tonight you started on the reflective writing for the entry page for your portfolio (the prompt is posted), and I caught up on conferences for Draft 4.

We discussed revising Essay 3/4, and decided that you had gone the distance writing "eye" essays, and that rather than requiring you to write a polished "eye" essay, you can revise Essay 3/4 in a form that best represents the ideas/representations you want to convey.

For Monday:

Blog 22: Post a draft for the reflective writing

Read: Craft essays of your choice

In class on Monday we will talk over the craft essays you have been reading + the reflective writing & do some group work on the publication venue project.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Revised Essay 1 or 2, and Class Monday

2010-11-18T06:44:00.000-08:00

Check out the two earlier posts for information on the conference schedule, groups & selections for the Rhetorical Analysis of a Publication Venue assignment.

For class Monday, turn in the revised version of Essay 1 or 2. Send this essay as an attachment to the ENG4017 email. Your essay should include a title that suggests, sets up or resonates with the focus of your essay. You should also include the name of the venue where you might consider sending this essay and a short indication of how it "fits" with the audience for that publication. This information will help me in providing feedback for your essay. I will be assessing both how well your essay fits the criteria for the assignment (the "I" essay assignment) and your perspective on where your writing fits within the world of publication.

In class, we will talk about the reflective writing you will post on the first page of your portfolio. This assignment is meant to set you up to think about who you are as a writer, your strengths, weaknesses & "fit" with respect to CNF, and your plans for your writing future. The assignment will ask you to use work for this class - your journal, your drafts, your blog & your response to assigned readings - as evidence for the claims in your essay.

Blog 21: describe the audience you envision for your work. List some journals that have an audience interested in your work? How does your work "fit"?

Conferences for Essay 4

2010-11-18T06:39:00.000-08:00

I will read Essay 4 over the weekend and make notes and you have signed up for conferences on Monday and Tuesday in terms of the following schedule.

Monday:

2:30 Elizabeth

3:30 Josh

4:10 Marilyn

4:30 Nashira

4:50 Marjorie

5:00 Hamilton

5:10 Robyn

5:30 Ashley

7:15 Fran

7:35 Casey

Tuesday

4:00 Michael

2:30 Erin

Chelsea, Eric, and Yasmin - please be in touch. Also - we are going to need to do some shuffling around the 5:00 appt on Monday since it ended up double booked. We'll see how it goes.

Rhetorical Analysis of Publication Venues

2010-11-18T06:33:00.000-08:00

Groups for the Rhetorical Analysis project are as follows:

Ashley, Elizabeth, Fran, Robyn

Nashira, Marjorie, Marilyn, Michael

Hamilton, Josh, Erin, Casey

Chelsea, Yasmin, Eric

Your group will be the people who you keep in touch with and use as a sounding board as you develop your project. Although you will present together in that you will all sit up at the front at the same time, each of you will give an individual presentation. The purpose of setting you up in groups was to create a designated set of colleagues to confer with - not to require you to create one coherent project.

The tentative list of publications you will check out as possible venues for your work is as follows:

Literal Latte Elizabeth
Brevity Josh
Literary Mama Robyn
Teacher's Voice Marilyn
Blackbird Erin
Hunger Mountain Casey
Crazy Horse Marjorie
Upstreet Hamilton
North American Review Eric
Narrative Fran
Word Riot Ashley
American Scholar Michael
JMWW Nashira
Drunken Boat Yasmin

Finish Essay 4

2010-11-15T16:08:00.000-08:00

In class tonight you set up your online portfolios - and you talked in groups about Essay 4.

For Wednesday:
Provide comments to individuals in your group.

Blog 20: Post Essay 4

Check out the online portfolio and bring anything you can't figure out to class on Monday, Nov. 22.

In class we will go over the rhetorical analysis for publication venues project (posted at right under writing assignments).

Create an online portfolio

2010-11-15T10:22:00.000-08:00

I've set up a template for the final portfolio .

Tonight in class, we will discuss how you might use your portfolio & you will begin to set up your portfolio.

Some other writers who have online portfolios (well, sort of)include:

John McPhee

Annie Dillard

Susanna Rich

Thomas Lynch

Narrative descriptions + Working on Essay 4

2010-11-11T09:44:00.002-08:00

Tonight we spent some time writing & sharing descriptive writing that not only sets a scene - but also tells a story or implies an idea.

Here is another sample of what I was trying to get at.

I'm standing in the middle of the old bridge crossing the slow stream where it joins Dilner's Pond. Duckweed and spatterdock grow close to the banks, but surface beneath me is undimpled except for a few water striders. The water is very still. It is near midday and the sun is almost overhead. The surface is like a fierce brown mirror and the heat and light bound back from it almost as if they could cast my shadow across the wooden planks if the angler were right. I lean over the railing and suddenly I see fish, 10, maybe 20, made visible by my shadow. I watch them hang there, still except for the flicker of their fins,barely distinguishable against the muddy bottom. Then just as I begin to count them, my face comes into focus and they disappear.

The description makes a point about an idea - but does not state the idea directly.

You then worked in groups to get/give some feedback on Essay 3, and to work on Essay 4. At this point I have conferenced with all of you (except Josh - I've read the essay and will get back to you soon) and it sounds like you are in good shape.

For Monday:
Blog 19: Post whatever writing you have for Essay 4

In class on Monday you have some time to work in groups on your essays, and you will work on setting up a portfolio using google sites. I will give you a template (what you need to post for this class), but ultimately this site might serve as a tool for you to showcase or circulate your writing.

To build this site you will need a gmail account. If you don't have a gmail account - it would help to set one up before coming to class.

Have a great weekend and see you Monday.

Description

2010-11-08T16:01:00.001-08:00

Tonight we wrote descriptions of places at Kean (or not). When we read them aloud, we noticed which features of the writing tipped us off to where we were, which kinds of writing held our interest, and how combinations of description and assessment/metaphor worked together to draw in the reader (though I confess I got so taken up with what you wrote I forgot to do the teacherly/analytic part of drawing your attention to how the pieces worked - so I'm hoping you did some of that for yourself.

You also signed up for conferences on Essay 3, and spent some time talking over your essays in small groups.

Wednesday is again going to be "workshoppy" - so remember your groups - and you will work with them again. I will also be available in class Wednesday for conferences - and we will do a little more exploration of some of the writerly moves you can make with description.

The journal prompt for Wednesday will be to write a description that tells a story through detailed elaboration on the detail of a person, place or thing, or some combination. Some examples from class writing by previous CNF students include:

The sun is shining. I walk up through the green and flowery dunes to see the oceans waves are big, clean and peeling perfectly right off the pier.

The beach is uncrowded except for a couple other surfers. Tucked away behind mansions in a little shore town that nobody really knows about besides the rich inhabitants of these estates from that are never even at these palatial homes with the exception of a few summers out of the summer. The ocean a clear greenish color. A secluded paradise in New Jersey, all to myself and my friends behind the tall, vacant summer homes of commuters from new york. I park my car and get changed in front of a huge house that must cost millions of dollars. There are no cars in the drive way. I see workers mowing lawns but no people living in the yards. I grab my surfboard run onto the beach, passing a sign that reads "cation unprotected beach, no lifeguards, no swimming."

Blog 18: whatever writing you need to work with for class on Wednesday

A sample of the kind of descriptive narrative practiced by Robbe-Grillet.

Writing an essay with an "agenda"

2010-11-04T06:51:00.001-07:00

Brett Lott's definition of CNF indicates that writing with an agenda is not really what the genre is about; rather - he emphasized the persisted questioning and the importance of entering multiple perspectives. At the same time - a number of CNF essays we've read so far (Final Cut, Marvin Gardens, The Patch, Invisible Man) in our text have definitely made forceful points - though they did so indirectly. Tonight's class was about examining the strategies these essays use to argue an agenda (and there is no doubt that many CNF essays do exactly that) without degenerating into a rant - or assaulting their reader's sensibilities.

You listed issues you could write an "agenda" essay about, wrote from the other perspective (to explore both sides), and then wrote a section/paragraph that would set up/introduce the issue without polarizing the discussion. The strategies you used to set up your subject material were the focus of the class discussion. Although you used different strategies in terms of content - the stance toward the material was descriptive, "objective" and often in the third person. You described persons, places or things, scenes, processes, actions/interactions, and so on - but always in the even, contained voice of the observer who renders the details - the complex, dynamic circumstances - that define the issue. These approaches can engage both the reader and the writer in genuine contemplation of the material at hand - which is the object of CNF.

Blog 17: Essay 3

In class Monday you will work in groups on giving/receiving feedback on your work. You will also have the opportunity to sign up for conferences.

I hope to have some time to give you some blog feedback over the weekend that might support you in working through your draft.

Marvin Gardens and Journal mining

2010-11-01T16:03:00.000-07:00

You spent the first part of class reading through your journals and looking for patterns in your entries. These patterns might be in terms of content (always about "success" stories, or always about certain people, places or things), or they might be in terms of themes (injustice, love, discovery of self), or they might be related to your relationship to the material (nostalgic, distanced, analytic. . .), or in the outcome (always told with a positive spin or with a "lesson") - or in the lesson they teach.

You then wrote a list of topics you would never write about - and did a similar kind of classification. Were there patterns in the kinds of things you would never write about? What were they?

We then (briefly) wondered if there were any connections between patterns in the lists and anecdotes in your journal - and the list of things you would never write about.

This is only one strategy for mining a journal. Reading and re-reading your entries in light of your changing experience should generate plenty of others. The idea is to see your experience - and your self - in the light of the new reader become in the time between writing and reading - again and again.

We then talked about John McPhee's "Search for Marvin Gardens." We talked about the "facts" McPhee included - and gradually figured out the "message" - or one message - he set us up to read into those facts. We thought about why he might write his essay in the form he wrote it - the audience he was writing to - and how that strategy (engaging the reader in "solving" the essay as opposed to simply reading it) might be useful to you as a writer.

You spent the rest of class working in small groups to zero in on your topic & develop a line of thought - a focus - for essay 3.

For Wednesday:

Read: Gawande, 245.

Blog 16: Post any writing you have for essay 3 with requests for comments

The real date for turning in revised Essay 1 or 2

2010-10-27T16:43:00.000-07:00

Tonight we reviewed the due dates for the remaining assignments. The revised calendar - with the agreed upon due dates - is posted to the right.

We then talked about "Invisible Man" - with a particular focus on how Graham presented controversial material in a manner that allowed readers to "watch" and think about behaviors that might otherwise get lost in the drama and emotion that often accompanies their presentation.

In this essay, Graham was a "participant observer" => a role you are invited to step into for the "eye" essay. Although in class I indicated that "watching" classrooms, friends, even family might make good material for an essay - remember the people in these "groups" have perspectives and sensibilities that turning them into "objects" is not really OK. I would hope these essays would have as their true object what Lott described as "our responsibility as human beings to answer for and to our lives" = to seek to understand.

For Monday:

Blog 15: any kind of writing you want to work on to develop an "eye" essay

Read: McPhee, "The Search for Marvin Gardens" 117

Essay 3

2010-10-25T16:33:00.000-07:00

Tonight we talked over "Meet the Shaggs" and "eye" essays.

Also, you signed up for conferences for Essay 2 as follows:

Wednesday, October 27

9:00 Casey

2:00 Yasmin

3:20 Hamilton

3:40 Michael

4:00 Nashira

4:20 Marjorie

4:40 Robyn

5:00 Fran

5:20 Eric

7:15 Josh

Thursday, Oct 28

6:00 Ashley

If your name is not on the list - send me an email so we can work something out.

For Wednesday:

Read: Lawrence Otis Graham: "Invisible Man"

Blog 14: Brainstorming for essay 3

Who are the Shaggs?

2010-10-25T14:02:00.001-07:00

I know you can find these sites on your own - but just so we have heard some of the important songs. . .

Philosophy of the World

Who are parents?

It's Halloween

National Day of Writing

2010-10-23T08:55:00.000-07:00

The Open Mic for ENG 4070/5070 was a great success! Thank you for your participation, and if you like, I will look into reserving a warmer space for a second reading at the end of the term. I enjoyed every reading - and was greatly impressed by the quality of thinking and revising just since our conferences of a week ago.

Keep writing into your second "I" essay and post as far as you've written for Monday. We will sechedule conferences - and then you will make some decisions about submitting your first "finished" piece.

Meanwhile, in class we will start to talk about "eye" essay - which as we've discussed in class are more "objective" or journalistic. At the same time, they are still and inescapably focused through the lens of the writer's sensibility. The difference is one of balance and focus = in an "eye" essay the "revellation" or "discovery" is directed more toward external facts and interpretations than internal ones.

For Monday,

Read: Orlean, 52

Blog 12: Draft Essay 2

Reasonable Lies, Unacceptable Lies, and CNF

2010-10-19T11:46:00.000-07:00

Tonight we talked about lies - both in terms of our experiences with lies and lying in our own lives, and in terms of lying in writing - particular in terms of the way James Frey used a lie about the "truth" of his writing for his own purposes. I think we started the conversation with the acknowledgement that because our representations of experience are from our own perspectives - and always partial - in some sense everything we write is going to be a kind of - if not a lie - then at least some kind of not-quite-truth. That given - there are some kinds of lying that go beyond what it is OK to do in writing. Different writers draw the line in different places - but all writers should do some serious thinking about where their line is, and what it means to draw it "there" and not somewhere else.

After writing into a prompt about lies that hurt (thank you for the good contributions) we listed all the ways Frey lied - and then we classified the kinds of lies he told. We came up with 4 different kinds of lies:

lies about himself/his identity (posing as a classic "hero-rebel");
lies that affected/represented other real people;
what we called "lies of principle" that went beyond lying about a particular person or group - and moved to represent "the way things are" based on Frey's (false) experiences;
and "meta-lies" or lies about the truth, source, basis of his writing

We then ranked the "evilness" of the lies Frey told and came up with the observation that in some sense - without the meta-lie that his book was true - all the other lies wouldn't matter.

So it seems -in writing CNF - in the very act of proclaiming the "truth" of your material - you take on an ethical responsibility - to examine, be forthcoming about, and reflect on the quality of truth in the material you present. Of course this is only a partial representation of what we did in class (a lie?). . . .

For Wednesday:

Blogs: Provide comments for whatever is posted for Draft 2 for writers in your rehearsal group

See you at Liberty Hall!

For Monday:

Blog 12: Post Draft 2 - a second "I" essay

Wednesday, October 13: Rehearsal

2010-10-13T10:57:00.001-07:00

Tonight you will practice your readings for the Day of Reading, October 20.

For most literary readings the author begins by introducing her/his self - and giving a short background on the piece s/he will be reading. Then s/he reads the piece, there is applause, and sometimes - there is a short discussion afterwards.

We have scheduled readings to last about 10 minutes. You should divide up your time to include your introduction + background, the reading - and any discussion you might hope to facilitate.

For the rehearsal:

1. Make sure someone in the group is keeping time.

2. One group member will practice his/her introduction + background + reading just as s/he will give it.

3. Note how long the performance took.

4. Respond to any questions the reader has about "how it went." Audience members should primarily receive the work and provide validation. This rehearsal is not about really about critique, however if the reader asks for specific help such as shortening (or lengthening) a piece - the audience's description of their respose (which parts were necessary to understand the idea, exciting, engaging) can be useful.

5. Go on to the next reader.

Rehearsal groups:

1. Chelsea, Josh, Casey, Marilyn

2. Marjorie, Hamilton, Yasmin, Fran

3. Nashira, Michael, Erin,

4. Ashley, Eric, Robyn, Elizabeth

Over the weekend:
I will be reading blogs and providing comments.

For Monday:

At this point I have conferenced with everyone (except Marjorie- who I will be in touch with) and hopefully you have some ideas about where to go with your first piece, as well as some ideas about what to do for your second piece. Make some notes & do some thinking - but I am recommending that you let the first piece simmer - and get started on the second piece.

In class on Monday we will talk about TRUTH.

Read: Smoking gun expose of A Million Little Pieces (if you haven't read it already)

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/celebrity/million-little-lies

and the Winfrey backlash

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/27/books/27oprah.html?ex=1296018000&en=ddd9b3b2c1f92c9a&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

Blog 9: Brainstorming for Essay 2

Have a good rehearsal and see you on Monday.

October 6: National Day of Writing, Emotions and Truth

2010-10-07T06:46:00.000-07:00

National Day of Writing Plans

We spent the first part of class firming up plans for the National Day of Writing at Liberty Hall on October 20. I have reserved the Carriage House for an Open Mic reading from 4:30 - 7:30. You have signed up for readings according to the following schedule:

5:00 Robin

5:10 Nashira

5:20 Marjorie

5:30 Hamilton

5:40 Marilyn

5:50 Yasmin

6:00 Ashley

6:10 Josh

6:20 Fran

6:30 Elizabeth

6:40 Casey

6:50 Chelsea

7:00 Erin

Wednesday, October 13. At the beginning of class - I will set you up in groups and go through the protocol for practicing your reading. In general- the practice reading takes longer than the performance.

As you can see from the schedule, you will each have 10 minutes (more or less). That would probably be around 8 pages of prose - depending how fast you read. For poetry - I can't really guess. Decide whether you want to include time for providing background for your piece, or a short introduction about your self - or why you wrote this piece, etc. In general, reading slower - rather than faster - is better. Your listeners need to take in both your words and the effect - so they might need some time.

What we did in class October 6. Your journal writing was on emotions. I presented some of the background from the research in psychology and neurology that bears out connections between thinking and feeling. Feelings not only help orchestrate access to our memories, they are also influence our interpretation and representation of what our memories mean. The series of prompts we used were meant to set you up to see patterns between your emotions and the particular events you call to mind, the kinds of stories associated with particular emotions, and your "attitudes" toward your emotions. The particular stories you shared with class - as well as your observations about how your emotions connected to your lists of stories - were rich and thought provoking - and should make good material for essays.

We spent an extremely short time talking about O'Brien and truth - and made a brief comparison of his understanding of truth to Lopez. As Chelsea pointed out, O'Brien published his work as fiction (even though it has been anthologized as an essay) - so maybe what we are looking at is the difference between the way fiction and nonfiction writers regard truth? We will continue this discussion when we get to the discussion of Frey and the analysis of his work on The Smoking Gun.

For Monday, October 11:

Blog 8: Post Draft Essay 1

Come to your conference (see earlier post for revised schedule - anyone who wants to meet Monday night should send me an email to make an arrangement).

For Wednesday, October 13:

Come to class prepared to practice reading the piece(s) you will read at The National Day of Writing.

Conferences + Class October 13 + Day of Writing

2010-10-05T06:22:00.000-07:00

Tuesday October 12

12:40 Casey

Wednesday, October 13
9:40 Erin
11:40 Chelsea
12:40 Nashira

1:00 Marjorie

2:20 Elizabeth

3:00 Eric

3:20 Yasmin

3:40 Marily

4:00 Michael

4:20 Robyn
4:40 Hamiton

5:00 Fran

5:20 Josh

Ashley - I forgot - I will be out of town October 14 so we need to set up another time.

For those of you who have not signed up - speak to me in class so we can set a time.

Class October 13

My flight is 8:35 - so I will probably need to leave for the air port right around when class starts.

We can talk about this in class - but I would like to propose that the rehearsal for the National Day of Writing be on October 13. We can set up a format for practicing your readings. We had a very successful approach last year that was primarily peer-to-peer.

National Day of Writing

Come to class with some ideas about what you might want to read. Readings can be a polished piece - or a work in progress. Last year students did both - and both kinds of readings were well received. The audience will be primarily your classmates and the friends and fans they invite. It is a chance to "publish" some of your work.

Your reading should not be longer than about 12 minutes. That way we get 5-6 people in an hour, and everyone can read in the 3 hour period we have reserved.

I will have a sign-up sheet and we can do some arranging for "short" & "long" slots to accommodate your individual work.

See you Wednesday.

Family stories & converging landscapes

2010-10-05T05:58:00.000-07:00

We talked about Barry Lopez' essay, Landscape and Narrative. I focused discussion on the first part of the essay - the exploration of stories and the convergence of inner and outer landscapes - but the last section, the discussion of truth - makes a transition to the consideration of truth we will begin with Wednesday's discussion of "How to tell a true war story." Lopez distinguishes several different kinds of truth. He presents truth as a distinction between what is authentic & what is inauthentic where myth rooted in the local landscape is "as real as the story of a wolverine in a man's lap" - as in contrast to a notion of truth as "something that can be explicitly stated." In contrast, authentic truth is "something that can be evoked in a metaphorical way" (though not reduced to aphorism, formulas etc).

He adds yet another twist to this discussion of truth when he nots that "because of the intricate, complex nature of the land, it is not always possible for a storyteller to grasp what is contained in a story. The intent of the storyteller, then, must be to evoke, honestly, some single asplect of all that the land contains. . .[and because] different individuals grasp the story at different levels. . . regard for truth must be at the primary (level)" - with focus on who was there, what happened, whe, where, and why things occurred." So that is something to think about as you read O'Brien - who presents a version of truth that is both radically different and the same as what is posed here.

You then recollected + wrote family stories. Family stories can become part of the "landscape" of an extended group - they define identities and realitionships, what is "done" and what is not"done." The unconscious choices involved in creating and telling family stories reflect both the culture at large, and the more local culture of a particular family. Adding to this list - can open up both a reflection on self - and on the ways the culture sets us up to be those selves. The stories I shared included a "rebel-hero" story, a 'wise' parent story, and a crafty pet story - all of which have corelates in the Arne-Thompson tale-type index for folklore. So it seems things change and stay the same. Our story heritage creates that are tellable - and it sets aside some experiences as not-stories - experiences that don't fit into our unconscious assumptions about what makes a story. Those experiences may need telling - but can become forgotten because their "unthinkableness" excludes them from the narrative carriers we use to hold & remember experience. One line of creative nonfiction is about telling those kinds of stories - and O'Brien's piece is one of those.

For Wednesday:

Read: O'Brien: "How to tell a true war story" http://us.history.wisc.edu/hist102/pdocs/obrien_story.pdf

Blog 7: More brainstorming for Project 1

Bringing landscapes together

2010-10-04T14:38:00.001-07:00

Just in case you would like to hear the "blackpoll warbler's burst of sound."

FYI: Barry Lopez also writes fictive essays - fiction that is written "as if" it is a personal (CNF-y) type of essay.

September 29

2010-09-30T05:40:00.001-07:00

We spent some time this evening working through a prompt that moves from feelings, to ideas, to stories - rather than staying in feelings, or moving directly to stories. The idea was to explore some writing strategies that help you think about writing concept or idea centered essays - essays that have strong stories to draw the reader in - but that are also definitely ABOUT something.

The rest of the class was devoted to clearing up questions about some of the terms and forms we have been discussing with respect to creative nonfiction. We went back through the different kinds of structures CNF writers have identified as useful in organizing their work, we re-visited the differences (and fundamental similarities) between "I" and "eye" essays, and we went through a point-by-point discussion of your first assignment. Hopefully I answered your questions; if not, be in touch.

Your revised calendar should be posted by the time you read this. There is still a gap in the blog sequence (there is no Blog 13 - sort of like there is no 13th floor) - but the major confusions with dates are revised. Thanks for your patience - and if there are other mistakes that I just didn't see - let me know.

For Monday

Blog 6: Brainstorming as far as you've gotten for Project 1, Draft 1. At a minimum, develop some writing that identifies/reflects on what your essay is "about"(these direct statements may or may not end up in your final essay - but they can be important to help you be clear in your mind about what your stories need to "do") - and some of the stories, scenes, descriptions, information, characterization that develop what your essay is about.

Read: Lopez., 271. His essay is the counterpoint to the insistence that CNF be idea focused. While he is writing about "landscape and nature" set in a particular place - this is also an intimate story about writing - on the purpose and mystery in how "a story draws on relationships in the exterior landscape and projects them onto the interior landscape."

September 27

2010-09-27T15:27:00.000-07:00

We started out making a list of stories that changed us - but before you wrote into a particular story we talked about factors that swayed us to choose one story over another. We used this discussion both to classify some of the common types of stories that get written (or that it is our first impulse to write) - and to think about why it is that some (good, important) stories don't get written. We noticed that coming to a resolution or having an (acceptable) ending played a role in defining stories, and in driving us to tell them. We also noticed that stories that weren't "resolved" pressed us both to tell and not tell them. So this is sort of an unstorylike post in that it doesn't come to a clear conclusion about why we write what we do (and don't) - but then I think maybe that is accurate.

You wrote and shared some "stories that changed you), and we covered some serious ground in terms of grappling with experiences that left us wondering - or at least thinking. Thanks for the good talk.

We then talked about John McPhee's "The Patch." And while it may have had more information about pickerel than some of you necessarily wanted to know, it also used the fish, its ways, and McPhee's contemplation of fishing as a metaphor to a much more emotional message. As we talked in class this essay was "about" McPhee's relationship to his father, a contemplation of learning to "listen" be aware of our fellow beings, a wish to take part in human connection, and a perhaps a commentary on - if not hospital care - at least one conception of "care" that often plays out in hospitals. And while this essay clearly is filled with detailed observation and facts characteristic of "eye" essays, I included it as an "I" essay precisely because that observation so stands in for the "I" the narrator "gives"" to his father.

For Wednesday:

Read: an "I" essay or two from your text

Blog 5: For whatever essays you chose to read - what is the main concept/idea in these essays (what is the 'point')? How do authors develop their ideas? What kind of structures do the essays use to build the dramatic impact for that concept?

The point of this post is to get you thinking about a conceptual focus for your essay. OFten the story wells up and you feel it and you know that is what you want to write about - but the "what is it about" comes with more difficulty. In class Wednesday we are going to talk about the idea part - and you will (finally) get your first writing assignment.

Great class tonight. I am really getting quite impatient to start reading your writing!

Wednesday, September 22

2010-09-23T05:45:00.000-07:00

Smells. They ground the reader in your writing perhaps more effectively than any other appeal to the senses. We shared a list of smells that have strong associations, thought about how smells can set a mood, define a character, evoke a place, imply a story - and raised the possibility of a smell-based essay.

We then moved on to the readings - and talked about how an essay's organization/order of presentation IS a central component of the content. The ordering of information and the relationships between juxtapositions create the reader's line of response. While the readers' construction of what an essay is about generally takes place at the unconscious level - it is powerfully present. You won't necessarily be able to construct a line of presentation that works at multiple levels to evoke the kind of complex story we found in Cofer's piece in your first draft = but stepping back, thinking through the parallels, contrasts, narrative (dis)continuities, gaps (for the reader to fill in) that writers create in the white space between sections will allow you to create more powerful, more artful writing as you revise.

In Cofer's piece we noticed the movement between two separate perspectives - the home video (a representation of family caught in the past - showing themselves at a particular point in time - without the ability to speak) - and Cofer's narrative recollections which included interpretations of her past life and of the movie. The while at first the two representations were distinct - by the conclusion they seemed to merge as Cofer dreamed herself into the movie. This structural move set me up , as a reader, to feel the inescapable connection between past identities (represented in the movie) and the interpretations of those identities. In the conclusion - they bring forward all their conflicts (in the personae of the different characters) while at the same time presenting themselves as part of a single, dream-logic conversation. The structural identification of the two perspectives (movie/Cofer's recollections) followed by the move to orchestrate them as a single cacophonous voice IS, in a sense, a kind of model for the feel/problem she represents in this text = her conflicting relationships to her Puerto Rican/American identities, her family, and her past.

Our list of the sections on the board documented some of the (lovely, artful) connections and transitions as she moved from section to section - the presentation of the women, the men, and the children - in the movie and her recollections. We might think of the sections as working to set up the physical spaces where we could visit the connected but separate perspectives at work in her past.

In his essay "Collage, Montage, Mosaic, Vignette, Episode, Segment," Robert Root names segmented structures in terms of the relationships between their sections. The following listing is taken from his essay, with a few modifications.

juxtaposition - arranging one item alongside another item so that the comment back and forth on one another
parallelism - altermating of intertwining one continuouse strand with another (a present tense strand with a past tense strand, a domestic strand with a foreign strand, etc)
patterning - choosing an extra-literary design and arranging literary segments accordingly (for example, using the structure of/associations with the seasons, a musical piece, preparing a meal as the sequential frame for an essay)
accumulation - arranging a series of segments or scenes or episodes so that they add to or enrich or alter the meanings of previous segments with each addition, perhaps reinterpreting earlier segments
journaling - actually writing in episodes or reconstructing teh journal experience in drafts (this approach may include notes, earlier versions of the essay, reflections on how to revise earlier sections, etc.)

We have barely scratched the surface for working the connections between structure and meaning. Tonight's class really just opened the conversation. Hopefully each of you will write into the possibilities - both for Blog 4 - and in your essays.

For Monday

Blog 4: Do some exploratory writing to think about how you might develop an essay that uses segments to develop/enhance your focus. This doesn't have to be an essay you would actually write. Just do some on-the-page thinking about how you might use the form of an essay to set up a particular idea. You can use forms from the list above - or you can model your ideas on the segmented essays we've read so far (Grealy, Koesterbaum, Cofer, Simic, Atwood).

Read: "The Patch," by John McPhee, in The New Yorker, February 8,2010, p.32 - available through the Kean University Library Databases - click on periodicals, select The New Yorker.

In class on Monday we will continue to think about how CNF essays are built - only this time from a more narrative perspective - in terms of scenes, backstory, characterization riffs, and other devices.

Enjoy the beginning of fall (and the coming of those good smells!)

Monday, September 20

2010-09-21T07:35:00.000-07:00

Tonight we used Phillip Lopate's essay on becoming a character in your writing as a basis for your writing prompt. After characterizing yourselves in a list-y sort of way using his categories + some of our own - you developed some sketches/stories that are "so you" and we shared them - and they were AWESOME. Clearly you are developing some strong material that could serve as a basis for a CNF essay.

Two caveats= 1. do not choose/dedicate yourself to a topic too soon -work at staying open so you can spend some time window shopping; 2. remember that CNF is both a story AND the exploration of an idea. In otherwords CNF is about something that makes "sense" of what otherwise could degenerate into an anecdote.

We then talked about Kidder's emphasis on point of view - and the importance of making the truth believable, followed by an overview of Lott's listing of what CNF is. For Lott - we paid attention to the structure of the essay (since it is in itself a CNF essay) and noticed both his use of segments - and the recurring refrain where he restated his points.

Great stories tonight - I am getting really excited about reading your work.

For next class:

Blog 3: Continue to develop your definition of CNF. How does the concept of believability fit into your definition? point of view? your self as a character? and what about the elements on Lott's list? Use your blog to contemplate one or more of these features in terms of what you feel CNF is or ought to be.

Read: 3 more "I" essays => Cofer, 83; Simic, 166; and Atwood, 288.

Wednesday, September 15

2010-09-15T16:44:00.001-07:00

Tonight we started with a visualization exercise to connect to "felt" experiences associated with place. I talked you through a visit to your memories using techniques derived from work in active dreaming. In discussion of the writing you developed from this, we noticed how watching these places while you are awake calls up experiences metaphorically - in the nonverbal, visual language of dreams. This kind of exploration can open up perspectives that might not be available to you in a more conscious, directed approach to your material.

We spent the rest of class identifying and thinking about the structure and "moves" of creative nonfiction authors use to design and orchestrate the effects in their essays. You worked in groups and we created a collaborative set of observations which (appropriately) ended up the perspective of the author in the center of the board. This movement between the author's perceptions/experiences/representations and exploration of a concept prevaded both the "I" and the "eye" essays.

Among other things, we noticed:

creation of an artistic, thematic sense of wholeness or coherence - as in conventions for fiction (as if experience were organized or meaningful) => using techniques such as foreshadowing, extended metaphors, repetitions, reflectio
segmentation and varied strategies for placing chunks of story, exposition, and reflection next to one another
manipulation/intentional rearrangement of time
dialog & dramatic scene
characterization, in terms of
1) the persona of the author,
2) description/development of personalities in the story, and
3) personification of place,
4) reflection across time,
5) reflection through shifting perspective (representing the pov of other 'characters')
descriptive power of place
flashback, backstory, dramatization of past as exposition
use of historical fact/ invocation of other texts
casting experience in light of a stance: eg idealization, de-mystification, de-glamorization
use of lists and other non-traditional narrative forms
attention to contrasts between different perspectives

And of course, we ran out of time.

For next class, we are going to continue our exploration of what creative nonfiction is and what it does through reading essays about the form itself, and through writing.

Read: Kidder, 67; Lopate, 69; and Lott, 194. Each of these CNF authors presents a slightly different take on the genre.

Blog 2: Do some writing about your perception of what CNF is - and what it does. Because the course - like the book - makes a distinction between "I" and "eye" essays - devote some writing to the differences between these two versions of the genre. The purpose of this post is for you to do some reflecting on expectations for each kind of essay.

I really enjoyed class tonight and I'm looking forward to talking some more on Monday. Have a good weekend

Monday, September 13

2010-09-14T12:58:00.000-07:00

We spent most of the evening working through practices for mining your memories for appropriate topics for creative nonfiction essays. Tonights journal prompt was to think back to your earliest memories - from before you could even remember. As you wrote and shared your notes we reflected on the nature of remembering - how it is often surrounded by a haze of uncertainty - while at the same time (paradoxically) existing as a clear, felt (but not in words) knowing or feeling - a glimpse or flash (words two of tonights readers used) - that feels real and "there" inside you.

Then there is the problem of understanding. Our memory is partial - focus on a piece of what happened that may or may not be at the center of what was "really" happening. Our sense of proportion, or attention to specific details, our knowledge base and experience for the memory is located both in the time of the experience and in the always changing present. So while the memory recedes - our understanding of it grows - even as it disappears into uncertainty?

The point of tonight's discussion was to begin both to accumulate a data-base of memories in your journal - and to position ourselves to see these ideas as emblematic - as something more than the events or feelings they report.

We also spent some time discussing the three readings. Within this short talk we moved back and forth between the details of the story - and the ideas the stories engendered.

And you set up your blogs. Hopefully there will be links to your blogs at the right of this post - soon, if they are not there already.

For Wednesday:

Read: Lowry, 48; Vowell, 130; Bellow, 76.

Blog 1: What is your definition of creative nonfiction? What are CNF essays about - and what do they do?

First Class

2010-09-09T09:36:00.001-07:00

Tonight we preformed the usual rituals for first meetings of college classes - with a CNF twist. I handed out the syllabus and the calendar (which are also posted here on the blog), and gave you a very brief overview of the text book and what we will be doing for the course. I am hoping you will give the syl + cal a careful read over the weekend and if you have questions we can talk about them on Monday. As you read - take a look at due dates for your writing assignments, notice that you receive extensive feedback (but not grades) for drafts - and that you will be asked to participate (read some of your writing) at the National Day of Writing on October 20 at Kean Hall (across Morris Ave).

As a way to get to know each other, you first did some reflective writing about an experience with writing that changed the way you think or who you are. And then we shared. Your stories were great! Thanks to each of you - both for sharing and for being a receptive audience.

Finally - we spent some time talking about what CNF is - through naming some works that you have read that you think might be CNF - and identifying the features. As you glance through the table of contents of your textbook - you will get an even better idea.

Great class!

For Monday, September 13:

Read: Grealy, 23; Danticat, 89; and Koesterbaum, 184 in your text book.

Write: Send an email to ENG4017@gmail.com from the account that you want to use for this course.

AND bring a writing journal to class - a dedicated notebook to gather your ideas for work for the course (and beyond).

In class on Monday, you will do some journaling, you will set up your blog (you do not need to be tech savvy to do this - we will walk you through this) - and we will talk about what CNF is.

Welcome to ENG 4017

2010-05-16T08:15:00.001-07:00

The course syllabus and the calendar are posted at the Course Documents links - but as noted - these are only "rough drafts" for what we will actually be doing this term.

This blog is your up-to-date connection to class activities.

Monday, December 14

2009-12-14T12:02:00.000-08:00

Turning in your portfolios + getting your grades

I have returned your revised essays 3/4 so you should have all you need to finish your portfolios. If you didn't turn in revisions for Essay 3/4 - I will give you comments with your portfolio.

I have portfolios from about 6 of you - and the rest of you will turn in your work at the Diner on Thursday.

Grades-
I will read through your portfolios as soon as possible - and send you a gradesheet with comments. The gradesheet will list all comments on work, points, and your grade. Hopefully I will have your grades to you by Saturday or Sunday.

Look over your gradesheet - and get back to me if you have questions or comments. If I don't hear from you by Tuesday, I will assume that you are OK with your grade, and I will post it on Keanwise.

At the Diner (University Diner on North Avenue at @:00 pm on Thursday) - we will share work, read favorites, eat and talk. You are a great class - I really got a lot out of this course. Thank you for your good writing.

December 10

2009-12-11T15:58:00.001-08:00

Monday you will work on your porfolios. I will bring a computer you can burn your CDs on if you need to. Your classmates and I will be available for feedback or support on anything you are working on.

You posted Blog 24 with the feedback for the course (thank you).

I will do my best to read through revised Essay 3/4 and have your grades/comments returned by Monday.

We will meet at the University Diner (just to the right of the Kean Parking Lot, on North Avenue) on Thursday - and have a farewell class. You are invited to bring anything you are working on to read. We will eat and read and talk.

Have a great weekend, and see you Monday.

December 8

2009-12-08T10:52:00.000-08:00

Most of you gave presentations on the publication venues - we have one group left

The gentlemen at the back of the room will give their presentation on Thursday. You will then do some writing to reflect on the course and think about your future as a writer - and if there is any time left you will work on your portfolios. I will bring a computer to burn CDs for anyone who will need that kind of assistance.

The calendar has you turning in your final portfolio on Monday (the Diner Day). If that seems like it is not going to give you enough time - we can have a pizza-in-the-conference room along with burning CDs final class. We can talk about this on Thursday.

For Thursday: Post Revised Essay 3/4 on your Blog

November 30

2009-11-30T12:20:00.000-08:00

In class today we talked about revision - and you did some writing to dig in to some of the thinking/re-thinking work you need to do to sharpen your focus + development.

You also had some time to work on your presentations.

For Thursday:
In your text book, read the section on Revision (Chapter 17, 83 - 96).

Blog 21 Choose one of the writing prompts from Theils "suggestions for rewriting" (at the end of the sections) - and do the writing on your blog.

Also - just to keep us all on the same page, I have posted the calendar for the rest of the term.

Th Dec 3
Work on revising either Essay 3 or 4; in-class conferences on your work; work on your presentation on a publication venue
Go over format for turning in your portfolio (CD)
Blog 22: Post handout for presentation on publication venus

M Dec 7
Presentations on publication venues
Blog 23: Post revised Essay 3 or 4
Choose what you will read for the final reading/last class

Dec 10
Writing journal: your plans as a writer
Practice reading your piece
Blog 24: Reflections on the course

Dec 14
Last class - turn in your portfolio - read your work

November 23 & Happy Thanksgiving

2009-11-23T12:15:00.001-08:00

Below I have listed your presentation groups + your choices of publications for the assignment analyzing publication venues.

Elliott -
Joe T.- JMWW
Rebecca - Word Riot
Tim - Thoreau's Rooster
Benny - Literal Latte

Nicole - Upstreet
Cara - Blackbird
Julie - Collision
Allison - Silk Road
Brittany - Crazy Horse

Kim - SubLit
Lauren - Drunken Boat
Maureen -
Jaimesue -
Kelly - The Teacher's Voice

Deji - Nidus
Joe F. MidAmerican Review
Stephen-Fourth River
Alex - Big Ugly Review
Nic - Literary Mama

For those of you who were not in class, choose a publication (not already taken) from the internet or from the link-list on this blog (below). Your assignment is to present an analysis of the publication venue (this does not necessarily need to be the publication you end up submitting your work to). The assignemnt sheet is also posted below (Rhetorical Analysis of Publication Venues).

I will look over Essay 4 over the break and send you some written feedback.

For Monday, Blog 20: post a discussion of which essay you will revise for your "final" for essay 3/4. Write a specific statement of your focus/ the point you will develop & how you will revise it. Go into some detail with respectd to the plan for revision => the more writing you do here the more focused your revisions can be.

On Monday, Nov. 30, we will have a writing workshop. We will start out with you doing some work on your revision for Essay 3/4 - and then move to open work on the project of your choice.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving!

November 16

2009-11-16T15:07:00.000-08:00

In class today you worked with a writing partner to resolve any remaining issues surrounding writing Essay 4.

As announced at the beginning of class - we are up to date (with the exception of Nicole + Jaimesue - and I hope to send feedback for those essays by Wednesday) on feedback, and on Monday - when you turn in Essay 4, we will be ready to start work on preparing your final portfolio and submitting your work.

There is no class on Thursday, November 19.

For Monday
Blog 19: Draft essay 4
In class you will get started on finding publication venues for your work, and on developing a presentation to tell classmates about a particular publication that seems as if it would be a good match for your work.

Have a good weekend and see you next week.

November 12

2009-11-13T05:46:00.000-08:00

In class you looked at your descriptions of places, and we talked about how describing a place can "tell a story" or "make a point" indirectly - like in McPhee's writing. We then looked at some narrative paintings. Most of our discussion was on interpreting what was going on - when I didn't get lost in the pleasure of exploring the paintings - I tried to remember to bring attention back to the features of the paintings that operated in our interpretations. For example in the first painting that we looked at, the way the woman (nurse) was dressed along with the trash can and the physical set up of the room said "doctor's office" but the picture on the wall, the magazine, the remote + the CD suggested a connection to pornography. Taken together - these clues identified the man at the center of the picture as a sperm donor. In all cases, the titles of the paintings were suggestive.

The point in this exercise was to think about: how descriptions of images, actions, placement, and all the other observable features of a situation might tell your story/convey your feelings & interpretations.

In our discussion your interpretations mentioned:
colors, numbers, size, texture, direction of movement, facial expressions, clothing, lighting, connections between what was there & other situations, actions, what the characters were looking at, what seemed to be at the center, (and I am sure you remember more). Your observations of these features drove your interpretations.

Before writing your blog, do some freewriting, talking, reflecting to identify a subject. If your are hazy about exactly what you want to say, do some more invention writing until you figure out your focus, your focus may be a questions. So deciding to write about your brother is not a focus; deciding to write about sibling rivalry between brothers, about shared your shared identity; about closeness between brothers, etc - is a focus.

Blog 19: Write down your main focus + the points you want to explore in your 4th draft. (I know this is different from what I said in class, but I thought it over and I think it will give you a better basis for feedback this way). Then:
list some scenes, activities, background "facts", places, things, settings, characters that you can describe as a way to open up + present your take on the concept you are exploring. After you make the list - do some writing to develop material what you think of as the 4 or 5 most important or "best" items on your list. At this point, don't worry about how they fit together, but make sure each description/piece of writing makes a particular point for your overall focus.

You can think of this as planning the "picture" you want to present to your reader to interpret. IF you dig into this writing - you should be in good shape to write Draft 4.

In class you will workshop your pre-drafts, so that you can finish them for the next class.

Important reminder: There will be no class on Thursday, November 19.

Have fun and see you in class Monday.

Narrative painting

2009-11-12T10:38:00.000-08:00

http://mocoloco.com/art/archives/002168.php

http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/blogon/upload/2007/05/hong.jpeg

http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/blogon/upload/2007/05/hong.jpeg

November 9

2009-11-09T13:04:00.000-08:00

In class today we did a close reading of John McPhee's "Search for Marvin Gardens"; we paid particular attention to how he used movement among descriptions of playing Monopoly, walking around Atlantic City, and presenting the "facts" of Atlantic City's history to develop and reflect on his focus.

You signed up either for a f2f conference or for written feedback.

The conference schedule is as follows:
Tuesday Nov 10
3:00 Julie Jackson

Wednesday, Nov 11
10:00 am Joe Tingle
11:00 am Kelly Quinn
12:00 pm Benito Nieves

Thursday Nov 12
12:30 Nicole DeLuccia
12:00 Tim Lowe
1:30 Stephen Mesa

Monday
3:15 Nic Garripoli

Written feedback
Brittany Piano, Rebecca Wood, DJ Akinyemi; Joe Fernandes, Cara Liveto, Kim Castro

For Thursday:
Blog 18:list some places that have been important in your life; if possible, go to one of them and write in your writing journal about what you see => use this writing to create a blog entry where you use description to make a point/reflect on a realization (like McPhee). Do not state your reflection directly.

In class on Thursday we will begin by looking at the blog entries - and then do some more work on using description to "embody" ideas.
Great class today. McPhee's essay is not always an easy read for students - and you talked about it with some sophistication. Thanks for the good participation.

November 5

2009-11-05T10:24:00.000-08:00

In class today you worked on your draft for Essay 3. Be sure both to comment on the pre-drafts for writers in your group, and to post a short blog entry (in class) where you write about what you plan to do to develop/move forward with/finish your essay.

For Monday, finish draft Essay 3.
Read: John McPhee, "The Search for Marvin Gardens."

Blog 17: Draft Essay 3

No - you are not losing your mind (if you looked at this earlier) - I have revised what is due for Monday. Finishing your essay is enough, and will count as Blog 17.

The original post listed what follows as Blog 17, but I am going to revise that for Blog 18. You have enough to do. If you have already done this blog - you are ahead, if not, you have some time to catch up. Sorry for any confusion.

(this will be Blog 18, due for Thursday): list some places that have been important in your life; if possible, go to one of them and write in your writing journal about what you see => use this writing to create a blog entry.

November 2

2009-11-02T11:11:00.000-08:00

This week is going to be primarily devoted to workshopping and writing.

Today you started out by reading your clasmates essays (by group) and offering some comments to receive/reflect on what you wrote.

Groups were:
Rebecca Wood, Allison Cherry, Benny Nieves, Brittany Piano

Tim Lowe, Julie jackson, nic Garripoli, Alex Cade

Cara Oliveto, maureen Peterson, Joe Tingle, kim Castro

Stephen Mesa, Elliot fant, Joe fernandex, Lauren Buttacavole

Nicole DeLuccia, Deji Akinyemi, Kelly Quinn, Jaimesue Salva

After you read some of your classmates' work, you then did some reflecting on your own. Specifically, you wrote me an email where you stated:
- how/whether your essay met the requirements of the assignment
- what you focused on during your revision
- how/whether you addressed what we talked about in your conference
- what you would like to do some more work on
- what grade you think you piece should receive.

Blog 16: The assignment is to post:
1. your proposed focus + the object, place, or person you will write about to develop that focus
2. the specific descriptions or information you will present to develop your focus
3. what each description shows about your focus
4. a specific request for feedback

The more writing you do here the further along you are with your draft. This post will be the "pre-draft" that you will discuss workshop with classmates on Thursday.

October 29

2009-10-30T07:50:00.000-07:00

Today you looked at the assignment sheet for Project 3&4, and we talked over the differences in writing for this part of the course, and what you have done so far. The biggest difference is that for these drafts you need to experiment with segmented essays, and your writing will turn from using your experience as evidence, to using observation, description, references to "facts" and so on to develop the "evidence" for your reflection.

We discussed the essays by Lott & Cofer, and looked at how they developed their reflections using references to images (photographs, home movies). Lott moved primarily between describing the images and reflecting; Cofer moved among her reflections/experiences and descriptions of the film. She used creative ways to open up the evidence of the film (she "dreamed" that the people in the movie actually talked to her). So as you can see - there are lots of possibilities.

Over the weekend - work on revising either draft 1 or 2. This will be your first "finished" essay. Post it to your blog for Monday (Blog 15).

In class we will spend some time responding to your posted essays, and do some more writing/exploring to move forward with your next draft.

Good class today - and have a happy Halloween!

October 26

2009-10-26T15:06:00.001-07:00

We discussed Stanton's essay "Laundry" as a way to get some ideas about what is expected for essays 3&4. The assignment sheet is posted at the bottom of this page - above the syllabus, calender + assignment sheet for Essays 1& 2. We will discuss the specifics in class on Thursday. As you read through - you will notice that this assignment requires you to write a segmented essay. You will also notice that the essays we are reading as "example" are broken into segments. In class, we will discuss how the reader's participation in figuring out relationships between the segments contributes to the essays' meanings.

In class discussion of Stanton we noted how her essay included detailed description & "reporting" concerning the object in her essay, and that she used this discussion as a vehicle for telling a more "human" story about her understanding of "the way the world is." You also did some writing to look for patterns in your relationships to "things."

In class Thursday you will continue to brainstorm, write into your ideas for essays 3 & 4.

Read: Cofer, "Silent Dancing," 154; Lott, "Brothers"
Blog 14: Write about a photograph; this does not need to be a complete piece, just write, maybe ask some questions about what was going on, or what happened before or since to the people in the photo - or to the place or things ; bring several photos to class.

Conferences

2009-10-19T12:23:00.001-07:00

Wednesday October 21
11:00 DJ; 11:20 Benny; 11:40 Joe T; 1:20 Rebecca

Monday, October 26
10:00 Cara; 1020 Lauren; 11:00 Kelly; 3:15 Nic; 3:25 Tim

Tuesday, October 27
2:00 Joe F.; 2:20 Maureen; 3:00 Julie; 3:40 Nicole

Wednesday, October 28
2:00 Kim

Thursday, October 30
1:15 Brittany

If you haven't signed up for a conference - I will pass around the sign up sheet again on Monday.

October 19

2009-10-19T11:34:00.000-07:00

You practiced your readings for tomorrow's National Day of Writing presentations: from what I heard you were great!

Before you got together to read to each other in groups, I went back over where the class will be going in the next couple of weeks.

First - if you haven't turned in your draft essay (new topic, second essay) as an attachment, send it to the ENG3017@gmail.com address asap.

In class I passed around the sign up sheet for a conference on the second essay. In this conference we will talk over which essay you want to revise for your "final" essay (for a grade), and what you want to do to revise it. The final essay for 1/2 will be due on November 2.

For Monday, October 26, you have two sets of assignments Since we will not be meeting as a class on Thursday - we talked through them both today. we will have sort of a double-class next Monday to catch up.
Read what Thiel writes about revising. pp 88-96.
Blog 12:write a narrative (rambling planning document) to describe how you decided which essay to revise - and how you will revise it.

Also read: Stanton (link at the bottom of this page) and review Kincaid, "Biography of a Dress"
Blog 13: look in your closet, a drawer, your purse or wallet, your pockets or backpack (if you are really into this you can look in boxes where you've put away things from your past) - then write the story of one or two thinks you find.

In class on Monday - we will talk briefly about revising, and dig into brainstorming for your next assignemt (Essay 3&4): an object/place focused CNF essay.

Break a leg at the reading!

October 15

2009-10-15T11:46:00.000-07:00

In class today we talked about commenting on classmates' blogs - and then you did some commenting on the first drafts.

We then finalized the schedule for the reading on October 20 (see last post). It will be in the Carriage house - over by Liberty Hall (across Morris Ave) _ hopefully I will have more specific directions on Monday.

We then talked about how to do a workshop on a partial draft. The writer begins by giving an overview of his/her idea and the stories s/he wants to use to support it. listeners should recive the idea + offer associations + connections - ask questions - say what /she is interested in. In some sense it is a group brainstorming session - where you have a chance to gauge the interest + connections to your focus for your next draft. You then had a workshop.

For Monday:
Blog 11: Draft 2

Come to class prepared to rehearse your reading for October 20. You will get a chance for a "dress rehearsal" - to figure out if you will run into any hitches. We will then discuss how it went - and you will have a second try if you need one.

You will also sign up for your second conference - and we will talk about the revising process.

Have a great weekend - and good writing!

Reading Schedule October 20

2009-10-15T11:24:00.000-07:00

Schedule for CNF reading on October 20
1:30 Joe
1:40 Kelly

3:22 Kim
3:30 Maureen
3:37 Joe T
3:45 Lauren
3:52 Allison
4:00 Julie
4:07 Benny
4:15 Tim
4:22 elliot

5:52 Nicole

October 8

2009-10-09T06:38:00.001-07:00

We talked about truth, lies, "embellishment" and how and whether the accurate representation of experience matters in creative nonfiction. Your discussion explored the kinds of misrepresentations that are possible - self-aggrandizing (creating a false character for oneself), tarnishing & distorting others' reputations (as with the police accused of brutality); "stealing" the pain of people with real problems or tragedy (claims about the extent of his addiction; the train-wreck story); being a false authority (speaking as an authority on recovery - when it is not clear he was an addict); lying about lying (not acknowledging what was true & what wasn't when directly confronted) - and more.

We considered how readers' expectations are set up by genre - and talked briefly about the changing conventions for those relationships throughout the history of fiction and nonfiction. This was a great discussion and I am still thinking about it.

At the end of class, I gave you about 3 minutes to write a list of issues/experiences you would never write about . Naturally we did not share these lists. I encourage you to go back to that list - and add to it and re-think it.

There will be no class on Monday (Happy Columbus Day)so I will see you on Thursday.
For next class you will be working on your 2nd draft essay. This is a new start. Dig into another idea and see what you come up with.

Blog 10: Post a focus (some ideas for what your essay is about/what you will be reflecting on) + a set of related stories that you can use to open up this reflection. This post will serve as a partial draft for your second essay (due on your blog Monday Oct 19). Remember that this needs to be a PUBLIC story - one you can post - and that you might choose to send out for publication. The more writing you have here - the more feedback you can get. In class Thursday you will do some workshopping/writing to develop Essay 2.

I will be giving you some feedback on Blogs 4-9 over this weekend (really).

Have a great weekend!

October 5: groups for commenting on drafts + what we did in class

2009-10-05T17:46:00.000-07:00

I will post the conference schedule tomorrow - Blogger was down so I couldn't post it after class - and I left the list at my office.

the groups for commenting on each other's blogs are:
DJ Akinyemi, Allison Cherry, Tim Lowe, Brittany Piano

Elliot Fant, Nicole Deluccia, Stephen Mesa, & Kelly Quinn

Kim Castro, Julie Jackson, Maureen Peterson and Rebecca Wood
Lauren Buttacavole, Joe Fernandes, Benny Nieves, and Jaimesue Salva

Alex Cade, Nick Garripoli, Car Oliveto, and Joe Tingle

You signed up for conferences - and for reading times (I will post that tomorrow as well)and you then looked through your writing journals for patters. Some of you noticed that you wrote about material you didn't know what you thought about - while others observed that you wrote mostly about material you had resovled; some of you noticed particular topics that came up again and again - or that you focused on traumatic material, material from a particular time period in your life. These patterns can give you some insight in to what is on your mind - as well as to how your mind works - and they can help you find a focus for your next essay.

We breezed through Gutkind's essay - noting his points at the end where he lists do's and don't's for CNF writers. He states that every writer has to write to her or his own conscience - but as the assignment for Thursday makes clear - readers (and publishers) also have ideas about where those boundaries should be set.

For Thursday:
Read the Smoking gun expose of A Million Little Pieces
and the story of Oprah's backlash

Blog 9: What went well in your first essay? What do you need to work on (take a look at the suggestions for revision, (p. 95-96 in your text). What are you going to try to do differently in your next essay? Do some freewriting, associative freewriting (use your journal) clustering/outlining, listing - whatever works best for you to find your focus for essay 2.

In class we will talk some more about author's obligations to readers - and do some more brainstorming for your second essay.

October 1

2009-10-01T12:14:00.000-07:00

Today we talked about truth, creative nonfiction & fiction - with a focus on the different kinds of truths writers tell within the two genres. We will be thinking in some more detail about expectations for CNF writers with respect to truth as you develop your next draft.

We then spent some time talking about O'Brien's "How to tell a true war story." It seems there is more than one way to tell the truth, that truth connects to experience, and some truths can be resistant to being put in words. There was much more to say - and hopefully I will get to read some of what you though about O'Brien on your blogs.

For Monday:
Blog 8: Post your draft for essay 1. Also - email your draft to me as an attachment. On the copy you send to me, write at the top: 1) your focus (the idea/focus/reflections you want your reader to come away with; 2) how your stories set up/connect to that focus; 3) what kind of feedback you want from me during your conference.

Read: Gutkind, "The creative nonfiction police" (in your textbook).

In class you will sign up for conferences on your drafts, do some more talking about truth, and get started on some ideas for your second shot at a creative nonfiction essay.

Have a good weekend.

Slang

2009-10-01T10:21:00.001-07:00

in case you ran into any words in "How to tell a true war story" that didn't quite make sense - check out http://www.vietvet.org/glossary.htm

Monday, Septermber 28

2009-09-28T12:25:00.000-07:00

Today you did some writing about the big emotions in your past - events that evoked intense (often conflicted or confusing) feelings. Within the different experiences you raised we connected to more abstract topics including :
who is responsible for our emotions;
how feelings can sometimes be experienced most intensely on behalf of someone else;
how sometimes it takes us a while to feel what we are "supposed" to be feeling;
how different emotions are connected so that one emotion leads to another;
how our understanding or interpretation of emotional experiences changes over time;
and a few that I forgot.

As usual your writing and reflecting was honest and important. You are doing fine work for this course.

We then turned to freewriting to open up a topic for your first paper - and I didn't give you enough time. If you have trouble freewriting and hate doing it - this is could be a sign that you might benefit from it. It only takes 10 minutes and should result in a page of writing. Think of it as a race between your hand and your mind and the object to get good enough so that your mind always wins (meaning you never stop writing). It works to "turn off your editor" so you get a chance to play around with ideas that your internal editor would block before you even really thought about them. So do a freewrite - at least 10 minutes wort - for homework, in your journal.

We finished class by briefly looking over the sample essays in terms of the assignment sheet. In general - these are very high level works, so the "reflection " part is embedded in the story in very artful ways (repeated phrases or metaphors, in the form or segmenting, in essay's movement back and forth in time, and so on). Your essay will probably be more direct - where you say straight out what you are thinking about - like Alexie or Orwell or Didion. For your first draft - make sure you have some reflections in mind - but focus on getting the stories down.

For Thursday:
Read:"How to tell a true war story" by Tim O'Brien.
Blog 7: What is the "truth" in this story? What does O'Brien believe about truth?

September 24

2009-09-24T12:36:00.000-07:00

We talked over plans for the National Day of Writing, October 20. The tentative plan is for you to prepare something to read (about 5 minutes worth) at Kean University East Campus, during College Hour. For those of you who can't make it then, we may also schedule time in the evening. This is an opportunity for you to make your debut as a writer - and will be in placer of class on October 22. More information to follow later.

You looked over your first assignment (posted at the bottom of this page). You will write two drafts, both of which you will workshop and write some comments about how you would revise; then you will revise one essay for a grade.

For Monday:
Write: Get started on your draft!
Blog 6: Look through the readings so far. Which essay looks like a good pattern for you to use as a model for moving between your concept and your experience. Will using this model allow you to write to the requirements of the assignment (will it give you a focus on concept?) How will you expand on /revise the model? What parts of it do you want to keep the same? Any other comments?

Good class today - and have a great weekend!

September 21

2009-09-21T15:17:00.001-07:00

You got feedback on your first set of Blogs. It was a pleasure to read your responses to the readings. If you have questions about the grades - stop by my office or send me an email.

We spent some time talking about transformative experiences - events that changed you - and these included many excellent possibilities for essays: compelling experiences coupled with your reflections on how to make meaning out of those experiences.

We talked about segmented essays - both through looking at how Schwartz used the 6 section & the relationships between those sections to make one of the important points in her essay. We followed up with a list of possible organizational structures for essays, and I am hoping, as you write your essays, you will do some experimenting with some of these forms.

For class Thursday:
Read: Alive by Laurie Lynn Drummond (linked at the bottom of this page) and "Westbury Place" in your book.
Blog 5: What is the main focus of "Alive", and of "Westbury Place"? What kind of structure does each essay use to build the dramitic impact for that point?

In class we will spend some more time talking about structure/organization - and we will go over the assignment sheet for your first essay.

See you Thursday.

Thursday, September 17

2009-09-17T12:47:00.001-07:00

We talked about smells, tastes, the feeling of touch & how these senses connect us to memories and associations that sometimes are more about words than feelings. Research in psychology has suggested that memories of events and extended periods of time can be bundled into associations with these dark senses - and a smell or a taste can evoke those memories whole - complete with all the complex feelings that don't quite have words. We spent a lot of time on fire and smoke, body smells, the smells associated with seasons and weather (rain, the air), places (the ocean or a camp site), and things (coper and blood, soup and The Price is Right).

As we talked about these senses - we speculated about the ideas they might evoke: how their interpretations/meanings change (as in Allison's story about body odors); how they tell our secrets (as in the air freshener and sex story); how they reveal things that are real and there - but which we which we might not consciously pay attention to or perceive -or that we can't name or explain (as when Alex knows he's home by the smell of the air, or Maureen's knowing that spring is here even when there are no plants and birds to testify); or what they tell us about a person's life (smoking, drinking, illness, sexual activity). Then their are bodily reactions - to vinegar, smoke, or snails - smells that make us sick not entirely because of their physical reality - but because of our associations to them => as if imagined reality is more forceful than mater itself.

You have lots of material for reflection here!

We then talked briefly about Montaigne - both as an example of the emergence of essays as a literary genre, and as a "modern" voice (like CNF). You observed that it is in the first person, that he is serious in his questioning, that he reflects and tells (though the examples are not primarily from his own experience - but rather from texts as in academic essays). We also noticed that he was intent on communicating the truth (this essay reads rather more like an argument than most contemporary CNF) rather than his or a truth.

For Orwell, it seemed as if he'd read Lott's essay. We paid attention to how he managed the movement from the story (the compelling experience that drives the writing) to his reflection.

On Monday we will think about form in some more depth.
Read: Schwartz
Blog 4: What is the overall focus of this essay? What is the focus of each section? How does Schwartz use the gaps between the sections (or really - I guess the question is what connections were you as the reader set up to make between sections)?

Have a great weekend, and see you on Monday.

Monday, September 14

2009-09-14T15:17:00.000-07:00

You wrote in your writing journals about scars. In addition to recollecting and describing the experiences assoicated with your scars, we talked about the scars themselves as writing on your body - as witnesses to an event from your past. We also talke about scars as a way to see/feel your self from within two different time/places (like Kincaid). As you told your stories, we developed discussions about how you might connect to an idea - to some reflection on what it is to be human. Hopefully this discussion set you up with some connections to Lott's essay and a definition of creative nonfiction.

In our discussion of Lott, we reflected both on the definition of creative nonfiction his essay developed - and on the form of his essay. We noticed that he set his essay up by telling the reader what to expect (and leaving what the essay would actually "say" at least partially in question); we also noticed that he used a "refrain" - a repeated re-telling (but always with a little different content) as a way to bring coherence and focus to his writing. I heartily encouraged you to pay attention to the forms in the readings - and to experiment with the forms you think will work for you.

Within Lott's definition - I emphasized that for this course, creative nonfiction will include both a detailed, vividly rendered story about experience AND a reflection on what that experience means in larger terms than simply what happened. Think about the implications in Kincaid's story, or in Beard's. These stories are not just about the event, they are also about an idea.

For Thursday:
Read: Montaigne, That men should not judge; and Orwell, Shooting the elepant. Both links are at the bottom of this page, by author's last name.

Blog 3: How are th essays by Montaigne + Orwell different from / the same as the more contemporary essays you have read? What elements mark the voice in the more recent works as "contemporary"?

I will be grading Blogs 1, 2 & 3 over the weekend and giving you some feedback.

See you Thursday.

Thursday, September 10

2009-09-10T12:21:00.000-07:00

Today you got started on your writing journals. You wrote stories, feelings, associations about your earliest memories, and then we sort of randomly shared thoughts and ideas with those experiences. In some ways - that is the essence of what creative nonfiction is: a personal experience that is then opened up or explored in terms of a focus on an idea or thought. Thanks for your good contributions to this discussion. It sounds like you have some good material to work with.

We then (without quite enough time) talked about the different ways writers use writing: to persuade, to inform, to tell stories, to create imaginary worlds and "truths"; to explore new possibilities with their readers; to think (or figure out what they think); and to represent / create the different selves they step into as they live and grow. You then looked at the three essays with a mind toward deciding what these authors did. Our object was to then see if we could find what the 3 essays have in common - so we can keep building on our definition of creative nonfiction - but we ran out of time. And that's OK - we will pick up this discussion on Monday after you have read Lott and Kincaid's essays.

For Monday:
Read: Lott: "Toward a definition of creative nonfiction," 270; Kincaid, "Biography of a Dress," 209
Blog 2 : What does Kinkaid's essay add to ideas of creative nonfiction that are not so strong in the essays by Didion, Beard & Alexie? How did Lott's discussion of creative nonfiction add to your ideas about how to define CNF?

FYI I do not comment on student blogs online - rather I will be sending you an email with feedback. I will send you an email with comments for Blogs 1 & 2 after the second post is due (Monday).

Have a great weekend and thanks for the good class.

September 3 - first class

2009-09-03T12:24:00.000-07:00

Today you introduced your selves, set up your blogs and established an email for the course, and then we sort of randomly talked through the syllabus and the took a look at the calendar. I realize it is a lot of information all at once, but hopefully - through keeping things posted here and being in touch - it will all fall into place.

For Thursday, September 10:
Read: Joan Didion "On keeping a notebook" =>click the link for a pdf - if you don't have adobe reader on your computer- you can get a free download for the software to open this document at http://get.adobe.com/reader/otherversions/

Alexie, "Superman & me" p. 128 in your book,

and Beard, "Out there."

And read about keeping a journal in your text book, p. 7.

Write: Blog 1: your definition of creative non fiction.

And don't forget to bring your spiral notebook to class - we are going to get started on some writing to help you think about/ discover idea/experiences you would like to write about.

Also, I will set up links to your blogs on the course blog. After I have the link list set up - start working on making links to your classmates blogs. To create a blog list, sign into your blog account and view your blog, click "customize" (up in the right hand corner), click "add a gadget" - scroll down and click the + listed next to "blog list" - then follow the directions. If you get stuck, we can work on it in class Thursday.

In class next Thursday, we will use the "evidence" you have collected from reading three creative non-fiction essays to put together some ideas about what creative nonfiction writers do. You will also do some discovery writing in your writing journals.

I think we have a great group and I am looking forward to reading your work.

Welcome to ENG 3017

2009-09-02T12:29:00.000-07:00

This will be our home site for your creative nonfiction course. We will use this site confirm assignments, store assignment sheets, post draft writing, and comment on one another's work.

Today you will get started on getting to know one another and setting up your blogs.

Grades + picking up writing journals

2008-12-18T06:55:00.001-08:00

I sent grades to your email accounts and if I don't hear from you by Monday - to correct my math or contest my assessment - I will post your final grades to Keanwise on December 22. I have placed your writing journals in my mailbox in CAS 301E. That room is generally unlocked so you should be able to pick up your work any time the building is open.

As a class, you were truly outstanding, and I am expecting that a significant number of you will have some luck with publishing one or more of your essays. If you are accepted => let me know! Even if you are not going for the "published essay = A grade option" and even if your publication is much later, I'd like to keep up with your writing and see how you are doing.

Working with you this term was a great pleasure. I looked forward to our class, and I came away from our classes and conferences with much to think about. Thank you for letting me be an incident along the way in your writing life. I wish you each the best, and keep in touch! I will answer every email you send me.

Last class and turning in portfolios

2008-12-13T08:45:00.000-08:00

In class on Wednesday you wrote some reflections on the course. To those of you who answered all those questions and sent them to me - thank you for your feedback. I have lots to think about and you gave me some sound ideas for "tweaking" the presentation of this course. Really though, I think what made this course so successful was in a large part due to the openness and interest you brought into the room. I will always remember this course as a remarkable experience - I wept over your papers, came close to tears in our conferences - and was awed by how well you used your writing to move through the material that prompted all those emotions in me. Thank you. And who knows - maybe I will write an essay about it!

Turning in your work
I will be reading through the last blogs this weekend and on Monday I will be in my office from 9:30 - 3:30 to work with you to burn your portfolio CDs or anything else you want to work on. Unless you have made a different arrangement with me, your portfolio is due by 3:30 on Monday.

Grades
The points for writing were listed on the syllabus as:
Writing projects
Drafts + revised personal essay = 150 points
Drafts + revised essay on place/object or person = 150 points
Drafts for reflective essay on writing = 100 points
Portfolio (includes finished writing for two essays + reflective piece)=200 points

As you know, you did not write the reflective essay, so I am revising the scoring as follows:
Drafts + revised personal essay = 150 points
Drafts + revised essay on place/object or person = 150 points
Final revised essay + publication venue selection = 150 points
Portfolio (overall assessment of presentation of materials, quality of writing, completeness + organization for portfolio contents)= 150 points

The process for giving credit for the blog and participation will remain the same.

As soon as I finish looking through your portfolios, I will send you a grade sheet. Anyone whose CD was blank or who was missing a major assignment will then have the opportunity to re-submit. I will submit your grades (as listed on the gradesheets) on Keanwise 48-hours after I send you the grade sheets. That way, if I hear from individuals with missing material - or if I added something up wrong or left something out - I can re-calculate the grade before submitting it on Keanwise. After grades are submitted on Keanwise - that's the grade you get unless you choose to appeal.

You did some wonderful writing this term, and I am looking forward to reading your final revisions.

Wednesday, December 10

2008-12-10T08:46:00.000-08:00

Reflective prompts

1. What are your plans as a writer (how do you expect to use writing in your future)?

2. Describe any changes in your writing style

3. Describe any changes in your writing process

4. Describe any changes in your attitude toward/interest in/understanding of writing in general, and CNF in particular.

5. What have you learned about yourself as a writer?

6. What features of your writing do you feel are most important for you to work on?

Monday, December 8

2008-12-09T11:28:00.001-08:00

You finished your presentations and we went over the protocol for turning in your portfolio. I passed around a CD for the template; this template will be available on Wednesday for anyone who needs it. You spent the rest of the class working on the essay of your choice.

I am still working on reading your essays and writing back to you with feedback for your presentations. I hope to have everything finished before class on Wednesday.

In class Wednesday, I will return your revised essay 3/4 and you will do some reflective writing on the course. After you receive the graded copy for Essay 3/4, you will have all the work you need to finish your portfolio.

All that is scheduled for class Monday is for you to turn in your portfolio. You may turn in your portfolio any time before Monday by leaving the CD in my mailbox (in CAS 301E).

I will send your grades for the portfolio, its contents and the course by email. Check your email on Tuesday or Wednesday of next week to make sure I received your work and everything was included (sometimes the CD was blank or broken, and you may need to re-submit your work). If you don't hear from my by Wednesday - everything on your CD was OK and you will be receiving your grade by the end of the week.

If you have any questions/concerns - be in touch.

Wednesday, December 3

2008-12-03T16:37:00.000-08:00

You gave your presentations on publication venues today. Those of you who did not get to present today will go through your talks on Monday. Thanks for your good work. It looks to me like you have done an excellent job of finding the right place for your work. All of you who gave your presentations should have a grade with some short comments in your email.

On Monday, after we finish up the presentations, we will have an open workshop. You can work on your putting your portfolio together (I will give a brief demonstration) of what it will look like on a CD) or you can finish up your revisions to Essay 3/4, which will be due at the end of the class.

I forgot to pass around the sign up sheet for conferences on Essay 4/ revising for Essay 3/4 (sorry). I have talked to many of you in class already but if you did not get a chance to talk - and you want to - there should be some time for some quick conferencing in class. ALso I will be in my office from 11:30 until 2 - so you can drop by (Angel is stopping by at 11:30). For those of you who would like to conference on revising your final essay -REMIND ME TO PASS AROUND A SIGN UP SHEET.

The Blog is to post your revised essay; you can post Monday after class rather than before - since the essay won't be due until class is over. Also - you are not required to do the "reflective essay" post - since we cancelled that.

Have a good weekend.

Monday, December 1

2008-12-02T05:56:00.000-08:00

You worked on your presentations on publication venues. We reviewed the assignment sheet and outlined what you would need to include in your presentation.

Name of the publication venue (link to web site / address etc)

Bullet-point brief overview of the features of the publication venue to include:
- audience
- purpose
- subject matter
- political / cultural orientation
- patterns in style, voice, form, modes of writing for the pieces they publish

You also need to provide an overview of the publishing requirements including:
- submission dates
- length
- manuscript form
Although it is not on the assignment sheet - you might also mention whether or not the publication is open to "emerging" writers.

In your discussion you should: show your classmates the publications site, describe several essays representative of the kinds of work this journal accepts, point out how your essay is similar and different and discuss why you think it fits with this venue.

At this point you can open the discussion up to questions - so that your classmates can consider whether or not they might want to send their work to this journal. We will get through as many presentations as we can; there may be some spill-over to Monday.

We will discuss "Zion" and "Writing Zion" next Wednesday, when we take up reflective writing.

Monday, November 24

2008-11-25T06:05:00.000-08:00

Today's discussion was about revising and writing about writing. Even if revising is not part of your composing process - as you begin to send your work out to different publication venues, it becomes increasingly important to have an effective process for revisions. Sometimes the first venue you submit to may not accept your work - and you will need to re-cast your essay so that it is a better fit for a different venue. Or you might get a new idea - that opens up your essay and makes it a more resonant, more compelling work. The suggestions in Thiel are a wonderful place to start - but the real discoveries you make about revising will be through your own experimentation with re-thinking, re-arranging and re-constituting your work.

The reading/blog assignment for Monday should take you deeper into the contemplation of your revising process.

Read: Stanton, “Zion,” and “On Writing ‘Zion’,”
I will distribute Stanton's essays via email by this evening (11/25).
Blog 20: How did your relationship to your material affect your composing process? Describe / compare the composing processes you used as you revised one of your essays.

On Monday you will have an open workshop to work on your presentation. I will also be available for conferences on the essay of your choice.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Wednesday, November 19

2008-11-19T12:05:00.000-08:00

Today we worked on creating a list of links (now posted here) for publication venues.
You spent the rest of class working on either your presentations or on your draft for essay 4.

For Monday:
Read: Thiel, "Creating Scenes: A Revision Narrative," 88-94. (reading the Atwood piece is now optional).

Blog 19: Post draft essay 4 (if nothing will get you in trouble with the law)
Send completed draft Essay 4 as an attachment. ENG3017@gmail.com

In class on Monday we will discuss revising + writing about writing.

Monday, November 17

2008-11-17T11:47:00.000-08:00

At the beginning of class you did some writing about your draft for essay 3. you identified your story, your concept and the vehicle for telling your story (description of a person/place/object etc). You then wrote a little about what you think you need to work on, and how you plan to go about revising (working on whatever you need to work on). After class - take a look at your essay and mark it up - do some thinking about how/what you want to revise - and bring your notes/a marked up copy to your conference. I passed around the sign-up sheet for confernces - if you don't have a time - or if you need to change your time, send me an email.

We also talked about what to include in your portfolio (handout posted on this site).

The rest of class was devoted to work on essay 4. Some of you brainstormed your ideas with the class, and you spent the rest of class providing feedback to one another's blogs.

For Wednesday:
Do some writing on Essay 4 and come to class with questions/requests for help so you are ready to do the rest of your writing over the weekend (Draft Essay 4 due on Monday, Nov. 24).

Blog 18: Reflections on comments from classmates regarding Essay 4= more writing for Essay 4.

Also, in class we will do some more talking about publication venues. Come to class with at least one possibile venue for the essay you hope to send out. We will spend some group time getting started on the publication venue project (to make sure you know what you are looking for) and the rest of class will be devoted to work on essay 4.

Groups for Publication Venue Assignment:

Jose, Angela, Nicole, Liz, Tim

Meghan, Angel, Lauren, Sue, Shannon, Camille

Edgar, Diana, Jennifer, Matt, Dan Jenna

Wednesday, November 12

2008-11-13T06:02:00.001-08:00

Today you did some journal writing to help with finding a focus/concept - and we looked at the requirements for the publication venue assignment (now posted on the site). You are going to work in your blog-commenting groups. Each member of the group needs to give a presentation on a DIFFERENT venue,but you will have each other as resources for ideas and support.

We spent the remaining time in class conferencing + working on your drafts for essay 3 + following up on any questions about feedback on the final for Essay 1/2.

For class Monday, finish Draft 3 + post your idea writing/messy draft for Essay 4 on your blog. For the Essay 4 post - make sure to include particular requests for feedback or help. Send your Draft 3 to the ENG3017 address as an attachment. In class you will brainstorm with one another for essay 4 and set up conferences with me to talk over the Essay 3 drafts (just like we did for Essay 1 & 2).

In class Monday we will also take a look at the portolio requirements (the portfolio chec)so you can get started on collecting/reflecting on your work (if you are they type who likes to get things done ahead of time).

Good class today and have a great weekend.

Monday, November 10

2008-11-10T14:32:00.000-08:00

You did some descriptive writing to use place as part of story-telling - and we looked at how John McPhee did the same. His piece uses description that moves back and forth from the game of Monopoly to Atlantic City - the place that the game is was based on - to develop a complex discussion of economics (how strategies of play/development -quick-kill vs games that go on for days - connect to outcomes )and the place of the middle class. We got most of the way through this discussion - but as usual I didn't leave quite enough time.

We took a look at the new calendar (posted) and will go over the revised requirements for the portfolo (also posted) in class on Monday, Nov 17.

For Wednesday: work on your Draft for Essay 3 (no blog assignment!)

In class on Wednesday you can work on either Essay 3 or brainstorm a topic for Essay 4. Also, I will go over the requirements for the presentation on finding publication venues for your work.

The due date for Essay 3 is now Monday, Nov 17.

Wednesday, November 5

2008-11-05T14:31:00.000-08:00

Today you checked out what your classmates are writing about and did some thinking about how you are going to turn your ideas into an essay. You all sound like you are writing into some good ideas - and I am looking forward to another set of exciting drafts.

For Monday:
Finish Draft 3 => date extended, now due Nov 12.

Blog 15: list some places that have been important in your life - if possible - go to one of them and write in your writing journal about what you see => use this writing to create a blog entry. [For those of you who cannot go to a place from your past - you may use the alternatives discussed in class.]

Read: McPhee “The Search for Marvin Gardens” (check your email)

In class we will take a close look at how John McPhee develops his discussion of playing Monopoly and Atlantic City as a way to make his point. As you read - watch how he develops his concept.

Great class today and I will see you on Monday.

Monday, Novermber 3

2008-11-03T13:07:00.000-08:00

We spent a great amount of time and attention on description as story telling.

For class Wednesday:

Blog 14: post what ever writing you have so far for your essay. You might write into an idea/focus and then brainstorm the objects/places/personal descriptions you would use to develop that focus; or you might go the other way and write a series of descriptions of related objects, or the same object at different points in time (etc) and then do some brainstorming about what focus works for that writing. In any case - your post should pose but a focus for your essay - and the "vehicle" for your story (the objects, places, persons you will describe to develop/explore your focus).

In class on Wednesday we will take a minute to see where you are in gathering the materials for your portfolio, and you will spend the rest of the class working on Essay 3.

Wednesday, October 29

2008-10-30T06:24:00.000-07:00

In class today we did some brainstorming/catch up with your writing journal for Essay 3/4. You talked about the writing you did for Blog 11 where you looked into a closer, into a drawer, etc; you made a list of objects with dates to see if the series of objects you were connected to worked together to make a story, and you write a detailed, representational description of a photograph. These exercises were both to help you get started on descriptive writing about objects - and to give you practice seeing stories/ideas in things (as opposed to in your experiences).

The essays you have been reading - Stanton, Kincaid, Cofer + Lott use "things" to provide a ground for the ideas they develop. This is the heart of your second set of essays => to develop an exploration of a concept through writing about an object, place or person (yes, I realize it says place, object & person on your calendar - I don't know what I was thinking).

For Blog 13: describe the character of someone you know in terms of clothing. Write into the details. Only describe what you can see and use your description to tell as much as you can about who this person is. We will read these descriptions in class and wee how much your description lets us know about vocation, age, gender, interests, and so on.

To read for Monday: Review Cofer and Lott, read Nye. We will talk over the structure of these essays and think about how the "things" in the essay shaped the structure and content.

Do some more thinking about what you might write about for Essay 3. Good class today - and see you on Monday.

Monday, October 27

2008-10-27T13:35:00.000-07:00

You read Stanton and reviewed Kincaid and hopefully those readings are giving you a more clear idea about Essays 3 & 4.

Your Blog for today was:
Blog 11: look in your closet, a drawer, your purse or wallet, your pockets or backback (if you are really into this you can look in boxes where you've put away things from your past)- write the stories of one or two of the things you find there.

and your blog for Wednesday is
Blog 12: Write about a photograph; this does not need to be a complete piece, just write, maybe ask some questions about what was going on, or what happened before or since to the people in the photo - or to the place or things.

These exercises should also help you write into a useful place for this assignment.

For Wednesday: bring several photos to class

You will do some in-class work with these.

Also - do the writing about objects listed for in-class today (which we didn't do as a group) and we will pick up on it on Wednesday. That is - in your writing journal => List objects that are important to you; put dates beside them (for when they came into your life), name any people they are associated with; list any experiences they are associated with - then read through and see if there are any patterns in what connects you to things.

Readings for Wednesday are Cofer, "Silent Dancing," 154; Lott, "Brothers" Sorry for the gloss on the Lott piece - maybe a little more than you asked for. These are two more examples of using "things" as a center of your essay.

The revised/final draft for essay 1 &2 will definitely be due Nov 6. See you on Wednesday.

Wednesday, October 22

2008-10-23T09:04:00.000-07:00

Today you thought about titles for the piece you will revise for the Essay 1&2 assignment. Your title is your foot in the door - it is the first impression you make on the reader. Spend some time on it. Your reader reads the essay in light of the feelings/ideas you set up in your title.

You also took a look at the assignment sheet for Essay 3&4. These essays will be very much like essay 1&2 only they have less of a focus on your personal experience and more of a focus on a place, object or person. You then spent the rest of the class opening up some ideas around what and how you might revise your essay.

For your blog Monday you are going to start using objects to develop ideas for writing. Also - you are going to look at some examples of writing that uses "things" as a starting point.

We decided you would see how far you get with revising Essay 1/2 - and we will make a decision about when you want to turn your essays in.

Have a good weekend and see you on Monday.

Monday, October 20

2008-10-20T11:55:00.000-07:00

Son now you have written TWO drafts for this course. Good work! you spent the first part of class thinking/writing about which of the two essays you want to revise. You thought about your essay's rhetorical (audience,purpose, form + overall impression) about the strengths of the essay itself, and about the practicalities of actually revising it. And then you picked one of your two drafts. You then characterized the essay you hope to revise in terms of audience, focus, form, tone, length, style => the kinds of features that editors use to decide whether a piece is right for their journal. Keep this writing so you can come back to it when we do the project on finding a venue for one of your polished essays.

You then spent the rest of class workshopping your essays in groups of two or three. I passed around a sign-up sheet - and so we can talk through your plans for revision.

Good class today.

On Wednesday we will do some specific writing/talking about revising. read Thiel, 88-96 on revising.

For Blog 10: write about how you decided which essay you wanted to revise - and why.

Wednesday, October 15

2008-10-15T11:29:00.000-07:00

You spoent the first half of class commenting on your classmates' blogs. Your task was to support the writer in finding his/her concept, iudentifying the story (the best scenes, characterizations and events) to represent the aspects of that concept they mean to develop, and to figure out the connections between the story and the concept. I encouraged you to ask questions - to identify material you were interested in and to offer information/references/ ideas that you think the writer might be able to use. If you are having trouble identifying the focus - ask what it is - and make some hypotheses.

During the second half of class you took a quick look through the comments - and did a short bit of writing to pull things togetyher - and to make any requests for comments from me that you have in mind. And as usual, we talked.

Post your draft for personal essay 2 on your blog for Monday, and we will do some writing to decide which essay you want to revise.

have a great weekend!

Wednesday, October 8

2008-10-09T09:57:00.000-07:00

Thanks for the great drafts! Every single one of you took on a strong topic - and you have good material you can use as a basis for a polished essay. Some of you might want to work on creating more detailed stories, some of you might work on cutting back on some detail - most of you could strengthen your essay by doing some thinking (freewriting, focusing) on the "concept" you are writing about. What thoughts do you want your reader to take from your essay? How can you circle deeper into your subject? If you ask -"so what" of your essay - what do you come up with? This assignment requires a focus on ideas or concepts - like Orwell's assessment of colonialism, Danticat's contemplation of the processes through which we become aware - and begin to judge.

In class we continued our discussion of "truth" and it seems we circled back to Lott's reflections on writers' responsibilities. And since there are no "creative nonfiction police" it is going to be a personal decision for each of you.

No class on Monday (have a good break). For Wednesday:

Blog 8: post the experience and the reflection for your 2nd essay + whatever writing you have and would like feedback on That second part is important - in a way it gives your classmates permission to write back to you - to offer comments. So put it out there.

Other than that - do some writing into your second essay. I have had conferences with most of you and we have talked about how to write more strongly into the requirements of the assignment - and you might take some of that with you as you start on your second draft. In class on Wednesday you will give some feedback to your classmates - and work on your drafts. The second draft will be due the following Monday (October 20).

Monday, October 6

2008-10-06T14:09:00.000-07:00

So writing the truth just gets more complicated. In class we discussed the kinds of liberties journalists and creative nonfiction writers are tempted to take with truth - rounding the corners (creating scenes + dialog); compressing time or collapsing dialog, creating composite characters - even inventing testimony or support for the point they are making. Then - in addition to these temptations - there are issues that are not exactly about truth - but about ethics - who does the story belong to? what gives the author the right to write it? what kinds of stories shouldn't be told - and when might you get in legal trouble (even if your revelation is true?) We didn't seem to come to agreement on these issues - and Angel even made it more complicated by suggesting that artistic concerns - whether or not a piece contributes something of lasting value or importance - should also weigh in with the ethical concerns. AND (as if there isn't enough to think about) after class - Liz pointed out that because there are many taboo topics in our culture - writing personal experiences with mental illness, domestic violence, rape, criminal activites => experiences associated with shame, blame or both - provides family, friends as well as the central actors in parallel experiences with the language and validation that they may not be able to find in another place. Writers tell us stories about - help us think about - areas of human behavior that we are too ashamed or too confused to talk about with "real" people. They can help relieve the sense of isolation and alienation of individuals who are "outside" what the culture says is "normal". So that is a counterpoint to the ethical reasons for not telling a story that might make the "characters" in the story uncomfortable or embarassed.

So I think it is safe to say that this is a complicated decision - and that individual writers will go by their individual lights.

You have signed up for conferences on your first essay (and discussion of the topic for your next essay). I will return your essay with feedback during your conference.

For Wednesday - read the two articles about the James Frey debacle - and post to your blog about your experience writing your first essay (see the prompt posted on the calendar).

Also - in addition to posting your essay on your blog -send me a copy at the address for this course: ENG3017@gmail.com.

Good discussion today. I have lots to think about. See you Wednesday.

Wednesday, October 1

2008-10-02T09:27:00.001-07:00

In class today we started our contemplation of "truth" and creative nonfiction. We used O'Brien's "How to tell a true war story" as a way to get into the topic. His writing opened up the idea that it is possible, sometimes even necessary, to tell stories that are not true in order to represent the truth. His story also illustrates how emotional and factual "truth" can often be in conflict - or even mutually exclusive.

I will be reading through your blogs in the next few days and providing feedback on Blogs 4- 7.

Assignments for Monday: Read Lee Gutkind's "Creative Nonfiction Police" in your textbook, and post your draft for Essay 1 on your blog. For your blog, follow the numbers as listed in the calendar (even though this is the second Blog 6 . . .); I figure it would be more confusing to re-number all the subsequent entries. For in-class journal writing you will be working on identifying "themes" from the images and concepts you identified in the analysis of your journal entries we did on Sept. 29.

Monday, September 29

2008-09-29T11:17:00.000-07:00

You did some writing into your emotions today for your writing journal. Most of the prompts you have been writing into this term are connect in some way to patterns psychologists have identified as in some way related to how we categorize memories. Smells, personal associations, bodily sensations/traumas, emotions and so on are all part of the "old brain's" methods for organizing/recollecting experience so it is available to us at the point of need. After we discussed the readings - you began to analyze some of your entries to your journals. In these exercises you took a look at which processes for "remembering" or "connecting to" your memories/experiences worked best for you. You counted which kinds of prompts got the most ideas, and you did some reading to assess which prompts gave you the "best" material. Then you began to look for patterns: you looked for repeating images/language and topics, and if we'd had time you would have looked for repeats in particular stories and concepts. Hopefully this writing gave you some new ways to look at your journal. From your comments, it sounded like some of you were able to use these techniques to see patterns/ideas in your journal entries that might have gone unnoticed with a less analytic reading.

Keep working on writing into a topic for your draft for your personal essay. If anyone is stuck - or wants to talk through some ideas, bring your writing so far to my office for a conference.

For the next week or so we are going to be thinking about "truth" and we are going to start with the O'Brien piece. Hopefully you all have a copy by now. For your Blog - write about what you see as the "truth" in this story. What kind of truth is it? Is it a valuable truth? How can you tell it is true? And is it creative nonfiction or just fiction?

See you Wednesday.

Wednesday, September 24

2008-09-25T05:37:00.000-07:00

In class we talked about "Alive" and "Westbury Place" and paid attention to how both of these essays derived their power from making there readers feel as if they were "there." With Drummond we felt the fear, peered over our own shoulders, and went back to the places and times when we were afraid. With Danticat we were inside a reflective process, remembering, noticing again (her experience and ours - as Matt pointed out) and seeing our experiences - present and past- differently.

You then looked at the criteria for your first writing project - and we talked about the overall plan for your work for this term. As you can see as you look through the calendar - you develop your writing through a series of drafts and you will be sharing these drafts (and revising them) through your blog and classroom workshops. The first draft for this project is due October 6.

For your Blog 6, I've asked you to go back through the CNF essays you've read so far (starting with "Out There," "On Keeping a Notebook," and "Superman & me" up through "Decent" & "Crossing the Border") and rank them according to how they meet the criteria for this assignment. The purpose of this writing is for you to do some thinking about form and focus - what your essay will need to look like in order to meet the particular rhetorical demands of this assignment. Check the calendar for the specific demands of this post. I will not be writing back to you about your blogs this weekend. My next response to blogs will be for posts 4- 7. And yes - I have a loop in the numbers for the blogs. It seems no matter how carefully I proofread I always mess up the blog numbering. . .

In class Monday, 9/29, you will spend some dedicated time finding your subject(s) through going back through your journal. You will work on techniques for "mining" a journal and hopefully it will be useful for you even if you've already picked a focus for the present essay (I am assuming you will be writing other essays - and maybe something you discover in your journal will work for a later project).

The readings for Monday are "Decent" (posted) and Thiel's "Crossing the border" (in your book).

I really enjoyed the family stories. There is something tremendously important about the "culture" we create as families - through telling about our shared experiences. Reflecting on these stories will tell you something about yourself - but writing about them can help all of use make a little more sense of who we are and how we share who we are with others.

Have a great weekend and see you on Monday.

Monday, Sept. 22

2008-09-22T12:36:00.000-07:00

We talked about segmented essays - though really most of your time was spent planning ideas for how YOU might write a segmented essay. For those of you who would like to look at more than one example of a segmented essay, or who would like to read more about how and why writers choose to write them - I am leaving a copy of Fourth Genre in my mailbox in 301E, and you can pick it up, take it home overnight, etc to read through some examples (segmented essays are listed on xii, and Root's essay on segmented essays is on p. 404). I wanted you to do some brainstorming, planning, thinking about how *you* might write a segmented essay before overloading you with models so you wouldn't get "boxed in" in your thinking. From the brainstorming you were doing it sounds like this is going fairly well for you.

If you look ahead in the calendar - you see that on Wednesday I will finally give a presentation on what is expected for your first essay. I wanted you to have lots of ideas - lots of writing - in your notebooks before you begin to plan any of the essays you are actually going to write. On Wednesday we will look over the assignment sheet for Essay 1 - and you will get started on writing some CNF.

For class, read Danticat, "Westbury Court" - in your textbook, and "Alive" by Laurie Lynn Drummond (link on your web site). In class on Wednesday - and in your blog - do some thinking about focus => what the essay is about. Your essay needs to relate an experience - tell a story - depict events - AND it needs to convey an idea. Your essay needs to be ABOUT something, and that something needs to come through as embodied in the story you tell and the reflective writing that surrounds that story.
Both the Danticat + Drummond have strong narrative lines - but they are also both "about" an idea. In your Blog - write about what that idea is - and how the story/reflecting in these two pieces set up and convey that idea. Describe how the story's structure contributes to getting that point across.

Good class today. I am getting really eager to read some of your writing in the form of an essay!

Wednesday, September 19

2008-09-19T14:53:00.000-07:00

I didn't update this right after class - and then I forgot . . . it is always OK to send me an email to remind me.

IN class you wrote listed sensory impressions that connected to memories - smells, physical sensations, tastes - the dark senses, and after we shared some of our evocative experiences, you did a little writing to map out some ideas, experiences you could connect to that sensory memory.

The rest of class was devoted to discussion of Montaigne and Orwell. We listed the features we have identified as belonging to CNF and rated the two readings - to get an idea for how close a fit they were for the current definition. Montaigne did not use features of "fiction" nor did he develop as much reflective exploration of self or recurring, circling ever deeper questioning as we expect in CNF - however - for an essay written more than 400 years ago - the sensibility was remarkably modern. Orwell was a closer fit, but again was less self conscious and more direct and less literary (though he was clearly working with a central metaphor) than some of the other CNF essays we have read. It seems readers came to these texts - especially Montaigne - with different expectations - expectations that reflected their time.

Monday we will be talking/writing about segmented essays and we will use Mimi Schwartz' "My Father Always Said" as an example. For those of you who do not have a copy, there are copies available in my mailbox in 301E. For Blog 4, work through the questions on the calendar: "What is the overall focus of this essay? What is the focus of each section? How does Schwartz use the gaps between sections?" I am looking for you to start thinking about how putting two "sections" next to each other works to make a larger meaning.

I will be reading your blogs over the weekend - and will send you an email, probably Sunday, with my response for posts 2 & 3. See you Monday.

Thinking some more about what we mean by CNF

2008-09-15T12:35:00.000-07:00

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.

Figuring out what makes nonfiction creative

2008-09-10T16:31:00.001-07:00

Today in class you got started on some exploratory writing in your journals. You wrote into some of your childhood memories and started to think about how you might use those memories to develop a creative nonfiction essay. We also talked some about particular features of creative nonfiction texts - how the authors used character, scenes, narrative, themes/symbols, reflective analysis, and so on. You then looked at the three sample texts that you read for homework and took a close look at how the authors "built" their essays. From my talk with your groups - it sounds to me like you are beginning to talk like writers => digging into the structure and figuring out how the essays "work".

For Monday, read Brett Lott's essay on defining creative nonfiction, and Jamaica Kincaid's "Biography of a dress." In your blog, continue to write into your understanding of what creative nonfiction is and how it works. Note and analyze any new features that you find in Kincaid and Lott. I read and commented on blogs posted before class. Take the comments as feedback and I will send you a number score and an explanation of how I assigned it in an email. FYI scores for first blogs were on the generous side. As we get into the course I will be looking for you to write into the prompts more deeply.

Good class today and I will see you Monday!

First Day of Class and what to do for Wednesday

2008-09-08T14:58:00.000-07:00

We got off to a good start - you've all got a blog set up and are working on putting in the links to classmates blogs (I've got a start on that and will finish up tomorrow). I suggest that you edit the blog titles so that they all list the owner's name.

The readings for Wednesday (as listed on the calendar) will set you up with some "evidence" for the writers of those pieces think creative nonfiction is - and after reading their essays do some more thinking about what CNF is and how it works (how it connects to readers) finish your first post.

Be sure to read about keeping a writing journal and to bring a writing journal to class. In class - we will talk a little about how you want to use your journals, and then you are going to get started with some writing to generate material for your essays.

If you have questions or concerns - of if the technology is feeling intimidating - send me an email and we will work things out. I am looking forward to reading your work!

Addresses for your blogs

2008-09-08T12:15:00.000-07:00

Jennifer http://thetruthstates.blogspot.com/

Dan http://sirlusciousleftfoot.blogspot.com/

Shannon http://dunkindonutslover.blogspot.com/

Matt dempseym73.blogspot.com

Suzanne http://woozie300.blogspot.com/

Camille http://camillejoyadalla.blogspot.com/

Liz http://lizdamnit.blogspot.com/

Edgar http://edgardinzey.blogspot.com

Diana http://d-mitchell.blogspot.com/

Jose http://return2sender-josemaria.blogspot.com/

Nicole http://nicmacs.blogspot.com

Angel http://superblogissuper.blogspot.com/

Lauren http://www.laurenjw.blogspot.com/

Shamira http://shamiranonfiction.blogspot.com/

Jenna http://www.jennacwnf.blogspot.com/

Angela http://angelacreativenonfiction.blogspot.com/

What is creative nonfiction anyway?

2008-08-15T13:40:00.000-07:00

Welcome to ENG 3017: Creative Nonfiction. In this class you will read, read about, and most importantly, you will write creative nonfiction. If you don't exactly know what creative nonfiction is - that's just fine - since the first part of the term will be spent exploring exactly what writers mean and readers expect with respect to that term.

Meanwhile - set up your blog, check out the syllabus, and look through the readings in your text book - and we will get started!