Workshop in Fiction

This is a course for students with a serious interest in writing fiction and imaginative prose. We'll read and discuss plenty of contemporary fiction, with a particular focus on the short story, considering each piece from a writer's perspective: How is it put together? What makes it unique and interesting? How and what can we learn or steal from it for our own writing? Students will put into practice what we discover in our reading, developing skills at building characters, exploring narrative form, and honing their use of image and voice. Students will complete and revise a variety of exercises and creative pieces, including three short stories. Much of class time will be devoted to workshop discussion of student stories