"You must go on, I can’t go on, I’ll go on.” These final words of Samuel Beckett’s The Unnamable can inspire—or challenge—any writing practice, from texting, to journaling, to crafting essays, stories, and books. How do we go on through fear, anxiety, blocks, and catastrophes? (Short answer: “Sometimes?!?”) How do we consistently discover and shape new narratives, and then do it all over again in revision? How can our writing benefit from reassessing and reaffirming our voices, languages, craft, and writing identities? This course aims to help us all think and write anew, and to welcome the enlargement, refinement, and transformation of our creative practices. Workshop requires a rigorous level of participation and accountability; it also allows us to take risks with craft, inspiration, and our limitless capacity to grow as writers.

In this intermediate workshop, we will study the essential elements of literary nonfiction through the practices and provocations of mostly living, working writers who represent diverse perspectives, styles, and genres: creative nonfiction, essays, memoirs, articles, criticism, commentary, lyricism, and hybrid works. Students will practice critical reading of published pieces and peer work and write literary narratives of their own. Students’ writing will be critiqued by peers in class on a rotating basis as they progress through a series of drafts and projects, including exercises, final sustained works, and revisions. This course fulfills the Writing elective requirement in Literary Studies. After the first week of the semester, permission of the instructor will be required in order to register for this course.