The first love of most readers of fiction is, of course, “story.” But what makes for a powerful story? A great story isn’t defined by subject matter. What is dross in the hands of one writer can be gold in another’s. In The Art of Fiction , John Gardner asserts that, first and foremost, a successful...

In this fun weekend workshop, we'll write our life stories through one single category of objects or experiences. All about my life, according to ... the shoes I wore, the houses I lived in, or the cars I drove. My life told through my most important conversations or the photographs I wish had been...

John Boyne wrote The Boy in the Striped Pajamas in less than three days. Kazuo Ishiguro drafted The Remains of the Day in four weeks. About his process, Ishiguro explained, “The priority was simply to get the ideas surfacing and growing. Awful sentences, hideous dialogue, scenes that went nowhere—I...

In this weekend workshop for beginning and intermediate writers, you will learn the three essentials on how to write fearless and engaging fiction that will not only captivate your readers but also help take you to the finish line with your novel. The triad is simple: learn how to develop a...

At the heart of every memorable narrative are characters that snap, crackle and pop on the page. Good characters, bad characters, heroes and villains, all must spring into three-dimensional life. In this workshop designed for prose writers at all levels, you will be asked to bring a 500-800 word...

The personal essay might be the original selfie: a snapshot of the self, written by the self. The beauty of the personal essay is its smallness, what Phillip Lopate calls its “access to the small, humble things of life,” and a “taste for the miniature.” A love of uneven potato chips, an errand in...

In her poem “Homage to My Hips,” Lucille Clifton offers the reader a proud—not to mention, funny—tribute to her body. And, in turn, to the body of her people. It’s an example of how sensory perception and an awareness of our physical being can serve as keys to unlock poetic expression. On Saturday...

W. Somerset Maugham has said that there are three rules to writing a novel but that, unfortunately, no one knows what they are. We might safely assume, though, that one of these rules might have something to do with plot: Maybe we should have one in our novels? Maybe it would be helpful to plan the...

Whether we’re memoirists or playwrights or writers of fiction, whether we’re at work on fantasy or romance, whether it’s a personal essay or an epic novel, whether it’s all taking place in contemporary times, in times historical, or in times utterly invented, we’re all up to the same thing—we’re...

Many of us come to the page out of grief, loss, or heartbreak; we write to make sense of the impossible, the irreparable. In this workshop, we will read a range of short work by writers who have written themselves around and through and beyond these moments. We’ll find inspiration and let these...