Monday, May 20, 2013
Hawthorne Fellows Update
The Hawthorne Fellows, The Attic Institutes publishing program just released it's first issue. Everyone worked hard, gave each other essential feedback and helped each other create a workable whole. See their good work and enjoy: Issue #8.
5/20/13 editorial staff assignments:
Sandra's editors: Kirsten & Ellen
Kirsten's editors: Ellen & Cynthia
Ellen's editors: Cynthia & Heidi
Cynthia's editors: Heidi & Nicky
Heidi's editors: Nicky & Sandra
Nicky's editors: Sandra & Kirsten
The remaining schedule: 6 - 9 p.m.
June 3 & 24
July 8 & 22
Aug. 2 (TIME TBA)
Sept. 9
*To apply for the Fall Fellows (deadline Sept. 25, click here).
Monday, May 13, 2013
Teaching Point: A Moment's Pause
These are the questions that arise again and again for the storyteller. For the memoirist, it's often a vulnerable question because it's about the hidden teaching within, that terrible gift, that awaits an opportunity to spring forward. Life has been lived but what did that life mean to the soul? The story is the answer. And the soul isn't much about trite matters. In my view, the soul is about the most serious matters we must address. Wisdom, balance, insight, surrender, connectedness, love. To get to these matters, we must, in the end, write about our heartbreak. What could be more difficult? We are so fragile. But I also know, we are so strong.
This fine student with good skill will find her way. We all will. We have no choice. We are the storytellers. We bring comfort to the reader in the cold night while fear lurks around in the shadows. We bring comfort, insight, peace and connection. Our stories let others know they are not alone. What better life? What better path?
In this last year, I've seen my memoir/fiction teachings grow to remarkable levels thanks to the faith placed in me by David Biespiel at The Attic. Fifty students a week, a dozen active consults. My own writing takes off, inspired by the writing I take in each week.
This small writing is to send out great thanks to everyone who comes to see me, who puts faith in my guidance and who has the courage to write.
Thank you.
~ Jennifer
Friday, May 10, 2013
PM Craft Class: Reading Schedule
Extended Class: 6/16
Class 7, May 19
Debbie
Sue
Kriya
Bonnie
Class 8, May 26: Prompt – workshop
Elizabeth
Kristan
Cloie
Candace
Patricia
Debbie
Sue
Kriya
Class 10, June 9: Workshop
Kristen
Elizabeth
Bonnie
Kristen
Elizabeth
Bonnie
Reading Details: Sight read first round. This means you bring copies for
everyone or half the amount so people can share. 13 total copies.
Or 7. Pre-read for rest of
term and you submit pages four days prior to class to Cloie Cohen cloiecohen@gmail.com*
Up to eight pages, DOUBLE SPACED, with page numbers and
name, .doc or pdf. Format, 12 pt. font.
Each student is responsible for printing, reading and
coming to class prepared to discuss pages that have been pre-submitted.
*If you do
not submit or miss your deadline, you have the option
of bringing pages to sight read but only five.
Thursday, May 09, 2013
Beach Retreat
The Ground Rules of Story: Fit Your Memoir into Classic Story Form
Novels and movies use a basic formula to tell a great story and once you discover this for structure for yourself, your writing life will change. We’ll map out the four-part story structure, study two films as well as one memoir in order to deepen your understanding through experience.
Writers will also be asked to bring a 5-20 pg. layout of their entire book idea, prior to arriving, which will be shared and discussed as part of series of workshopping/brainstorming sessions.
This four day workshop is an annual event on the Oregon Coast and is open to a dozen writers. There will be two days of intensive teaching, from 10-4 with a break for lunch and two days of broken teaching, in the AM and the PM, leaving you time for writing/revision and for resting your mind as you stroll the wide, long beach of Manzanita or hike the narrow, steep trails up Neakahnie Mountain.
DATES: August 16, 17, 18, 19
TIMES: Aug. 16 &; 18, 10-1 & 5-7:30
Aug. 17 & 19 10-4 p.m. (Snacks, tea, coffee provided)
COST: $475.00 *
ADDL DETAILS: You are responsible for your travel and your accommodations. Great places can be recommended, just ask me at jenniferlauck@gmail.com.
Spindrift Sunset Surf Ocean Inn Inn at Manzanita Coast Cabins Sunset Vacation Rentals * THERE ARE NO REFUNDS ON DEPOSITS OR WORKSHOP TUITION ONCE PAID.
Friday, May 03, 2013
Theme & Structure Class
(Summer class - 5 weeks - June 11)
Reading Schedule:
May 21 - Maria and Paul
May 28 - Sophie and Jennifer
Submitting (no more than 20 pgs):
1) Idea
2) Concept as a series of what if questions
3) Theme
4) Character study
5) Description of whole project as an overview
Agenda for discussion:
1) Writer to offer some questions they have about the outline provided
2) Two people in the group will share what the project is about, a summary
3) Answer the questions the writer asked
4) Offer additional helpful insights/discuss
5) Writer to take notes and then ask questions at the end.
AM Spring Craft Class
Class 9, May 27 – Prompt - Workshop
Bill, Fufkin, Lesley, Karena
Class 10, June 3 – workshop
Rose, Jessica, Marla, Joyus, David
Books for Class: Tell it Slant by Brenda Miller, Story Engineering by Larry Brooks, Sense & Sensibility by Jane Austin.
Reading Details: Sight read first round. This means you bring copies for
everyone or half the amount so people can share. 13 total copies.
Or 7. Pre-read for rest of
term and you submit pages four days prior to class to Cloie Cohen cloiecohen@gmail.com*
Up to eight pages, DOUBLE SPACED, with page numbers and
name, .doc or pdf. Format, 12 pt. font.
Each student is responsible for printing, reading and
coming to class prepared to discuss pages that have been pre-submitted.
*If you do
not submit or miss your deadline, you have the option
of bringing pages to sight read but only five.
Monday, April 15, 2013
Teaching Point: Definition of Terms
In class, I will edit your pages and make all kinds of comments as we go along. Most, you will forget. Why? You are all worked up! It's terrifying to read in front of me and the group. Don't worry. You'll get what you need to get. And, when you go through your pages later, you'll notice a few terms on the page. Here are explanations to help you find your way:
Beat: This means to slow down and add a
moment, a beat. It’s almost as if
you need to add a second for a sensory detail like sound. Just stopping and looking at that place
to see what could go there to even the pacing of the sentence. When you see this instruction on your
page, stop, read the sentence out loud and see what comes. Put it on the page.
Unpack: Unfold what you are saying in a simple
way with more complex description.
This usually means add more details. IE: It was a
hot day. (Or unpack). It was hot, too hot, sweating hot,
sticking to every chair hot, the kind of hot that made me want to suck on ice
all day long, or stick my face in the refrigerator or go the waterfalls and
just loll around.
Body: This means to describe the body—what is
being touched, what is touching, what is the body doing in space in
relationship to other bodies and objects.
Sensory: This means to add one of the senses
(not seeing in fact, remove seeing, looking, watching, observing and all this
from your text). Sight is the last
sense—not the first. Try smell,
taste, touch.
Nature: I’m looking for a moment to include the world around
you—weather, flowers, birds (no barking dogs), wind, sun, dark, crickets,
something from the natural world.
Leaves falling, rain etc.
Slow Down: This is similar to beat but beat is short. Slow down means to really S L
O W down in your story
telling. Freeze the moment in
time, spread it thinner and wider, expand the moment.
Voice: When you see this on the page, it means I am hearing
your voice and that’s a good thing.
I’m just bringing attention to that mystical elusive aspect of writing.
Space/Place:
When you see this on your pages,
this means I want you to describe your physical location—underfoot, overhead,
right, left. It’s like
checking in with the staging aspect of writing
Go Vertical:
This is your moment to ruminate and
to ask questions and even attempt to answer them. Pat answers are suspect. You are not looking for answers you are looking for
questions and shades of answers to your questions and the willingness to be
wrong. If you are firm on your
assessment of the situation and what it all means, stop doing that and look at
your need to nail it all down. Put
that on the page. IE: I need things to make sense, I do, I
feel safe and right and pulled together.
I can take this question off the checklist, but can I? Is being safe about being alive? Can any of us make sense of the
complexity of living and life and love and loss?
Bump: This means that something in that moment (and I am
not sure what) didn’t quite work—it’s bumpy. Something needs to be added and it’s usually something from
the active part of the scene—a detail about the action that is taking place in
the scene.
Saturday, April 13, 2013
Teaching Point: Critique
Critique Sheet
Evolved from Chapter 14 – Tell it Slant
Writers need feedback. The myth of writers as loners who
follow their vision and remain true to their inner muse, bucking rather than
embracing outside help, is very much a myth…writers use one another unceasingly
as idea sources and sounding boards.
Virtually all writers do.
“I write,” Terry Tempest Williams, “in a solitude born out of
community.” TIS, Pg. 162
Remember always that as you
give to others in your group, you will get back. You have a deep commitment to their growth as writers and to
the productive workings of the group as a whole, so always act accordingly. Also,
we often learn the most about our own writing while listening carefully to
critique about someone else’s works.
What is true for that person struggling with a satisfying ending is
probably true for you as well. Don’t
assume that the only time you learn anything is when your own piece is up for
discussion. TIS, Pg. 165
Do & Don’t: Pg. 165-166
- Don’t use pointlessly critical language: IE
- Don’t be subjective or start talking about your own experience unless there’s a specific reason to, such as an expert knowledge you can add to the work at hand.
- When you give praise, do see if you can add even more to your comment by suggesting another place where the same writing tactics can help the essay. Do provide revision suggestions freely, along with support and encouragement. The other side of the workshop coin from the pick-it-all-apart session is the lovefest, which ultimately disrespects the writer’s ability to bring her work to a higher level, and do him no good.
- Do jot down the scenes, descriptions, and images that stick what you: the “Velcro words and phrases,” as writer and teacher Sheila Bender put it. Put the essay down and make note of the first thing you remember about it. Generally these passages are the ones that not only are the best written, but the most key to what the essay is doing at a deep level.
- Do identify the emotionally tones of the essay and its prose. You may sense the pleasure of a friend’s visit, of a hike, the anxiety of sentences that all begin with, “I think, or “I believe.” Do you get the sense of over formality in a phrase like “I am perturbed”? Do you wonder why the author calls her mother by the definite article, “the mother”? Does it feel somewhat chilly? In all cases, are these feelings ones the author intended to convey, or do they seem unintentional and perhaps working against the movement of the essay?
- Do identify your curiosity. Make note of where specifically you want to know more. Which locations/characters would benefit from more description? Which characters’ voice do you want to hear? Where do you want to know more about the author’s responses and feelings? These curiosities help locate places for expansion.
When you write well,
revision becomes not a chore, but the essence of the writing act itself.
~ TIS, pg. 158