“The only constraint of creative nonfiction is that it needs to be ‘real,’” says instructor Gillian Osborne. “In this introduction to creative nonfiction, we’ll explore the many ways we can make meaning of reality through this most flexible and capacious of genres.”
In this 5-week class, through in-class discussions, generative writing, and light feedback on one another’s work, we’ll play our way through the essayist’s toolkit. We’ll animate scenes from memory through dialogue and narration, create portraits of others, and practice observation and reflection as we describe objects and places. For guidance, we’ll read works of creative nonfiction by writers such as John Berger, Elissa Washutta, and Zadie Smith, paying attention to the craft and formal decisions each author makes to shape real-life material. Class meetings will be intimate and collaborative, centered on our experiences as writers.
By the end of 5 weeks, you’ll have generated the building blocks for a fully realized essay-in-miniature (1,000 words or less) in one of the following forms: portrait, memoir, a braided essay or essay in fragments, or another form of your own borrowing or innovation. You’ll also come away with a broader sense of what creative nonfiction can do, and where you want to go next as a writer.
About The Writing Salon's In-Person Classes
Before your class meets, you'll receive an email from The Writing Salon with more information about your class. If you have any questions about in-person learning, please don't hesitate to reach out to us at hello@writingsalons.com.
Gillian Osborne is a writer, educator, and editor. She is the author of a book of essays, Green Green Green (Nightboat 2021), a chapbook of poems and drawings, basic research (oxeye, 2023), and the co-editor of a collection of scholarship on ecopoetics. Trained as a poet and scholar of 19th-c. American and environmental literature at UC-Berkeley, she’s been the recipient of fellowships from the Harvard University Center for the Environment, the American Antiquarian Society, and the Emily Dickinson International Society, and has held teaching appointments at Bard College, Harvard Division of Continuing Education, UC-Santa Barbara, and elsewhere. Raised as a Quaker in a small village in upstate New York, she lives in The Bay Area, where her current interests include conversation, essays, gardens, kitchens, poetry, stories, and magic.
- Wednesday, September 23, 6:30pm-9:00pm
- Wednesday, September 30, 6:30pm-9:00pm
- Wednesday, October 07, 6:30pm-9:00pm
- Wednesday, October 14, 6:30pm-9:00pm
- Wednesday, October 21, 6:30pm-9:00pm