In real life, we’re always told not to make a scene—early training that may work at home or in the office but has unfortunate effects on our fiction. That’s because the life blood of fiction is scene: segments of fully dramatized action in which characters enter into conflict with other characters, speaking, acting, seeing, thinking, and feeling in real time. Scene is the vivid and dreamlike movie that unspools in the reader’s head as the pages whip by. But writing scenes can be confusing and intimidating, even for advanced writers. 

This course is designed to give you a simple, clear roadmap to the writing of scenes, and to travel that road with you step by step, so that you become familiar with each twist and turn. Through lecture and in-class exercises, we will explore how scenes work, what they are made of, and how to make them richer and more dramatic. You will also learn how to “find” the scenes in any story you wish to tell.

You will gain a deep understanding of how scenes work, how they are written, and how to “find” them in any story you wish to tell. You will leave with a series of characters, dramatic situations, and conflict-driven scenes that you can take home and turn into new stories.

In this workshop, we will generate new writing through guided exercises and prompts; offer feedback/first impressions on writing you produce in our weekend.