Class Description
You’ve got a terrific story to tell—now, how should you tell it? Building on the Memoir Essentials discussions of handling time and narration, we’ll move on to considering structure. The structure of a work can help capture or enhance that work’s thematic meaning. Rarely is the best way to tell a story in the order it happened. In this class, we’ll consider several classic and not-so-classic structures and the advantages and disadvantages of each. We’ll experiment with plugging the content of our memoirs into these structures. You do not need to bring draft pages to this class, but you should have already put some thought into what story you’re trying to tell and why. This is the fourth in a series of one-day classes in writing the memoir that will span the year, appropriate both for memoirists with advanced drafts and for those just beginning their writing.
Part of GrubStreet's "Memoir Essentials" Series, led by Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich and dedicated to exploring the core elements of memoir writing. Classes in this series include:
- Memoir Essentials: Finding Your Story
- Memoir Essentials: Me, Myself, I (Refining the Narrator)
- Memoir Essentials: Nothing But Time
- Memoir Essentials: The Structure of Memoir
- Memoir Essentials: They’re Such Characters! (Characterizing Others)
- Memoir Essentials: You’re Such a Character! (Characterizing Yourself)
- Memoir Essentials: The Spotlight and the Shadows
- Memoir Essentials: Shaping Your Story
Thanks to the excellent literary citizenship of our donors, scholarships are available for all GrubStreet classes. To apply, click the gray "APPLY FOR SCHOLARSHIP" button. In order to be considered for a scholarship, you must complete your application at least one week before the start date of a class. Please await our scholarship committee's decision before registering for the class. We cannot hold spots in classes, so the sooner you apply, the better. Scholarships cannot be applied retroactively.
For more detailed information about GrubStreet scholarships, including how to contribute to scholarship funds for other students, click here.
This class will take place using Zoom videoconferencing. After registering, a yellow Resources tab will appear in this section containing a link to join class. Please note that you will need to be logged into view the Resources tab.
Zoom Participation:
In our experience, the intimate nature of a writing workshop benefits from on-camera participation. Students are of course welcome to turn their camera off whenever they need to, but it is a community norm for cameras to be on most of the time. You can learn more about using Zoom here.
Zoom Accessibility:
You can enable closed captioning at any time during the meeting by clicking the CC button at the bottom of the screen. If you'd like to access the transcript after class, please make sure to let your instructor ahead of time that you'd like a copy.