Class Description
A compelling, carefully crafted beginning is a key aspect of any successful novel. It is an especially important (and delicate) proposition in historical fiction, where the sense of a complete “past” world must be created, where an often overwhelming foundation of research must be sifted through and put to good use, and where it is, unfortunately, especially easy to lose your readership in the early pages. In this craft-oriented workshop, we’ll discuss the opening passages of a selection of contemporary and classic historical fiction novels in order to derive a useful taxonomy of approaches to such elements as narrative stance, point of view, psychic distance, voice, character, world building, and more. We’ll consider the potential advantages and disadvantages of each approach and possibly do a writing exercise to put our knowledge into practical use. Then, we’ll turn to participants’ own works-in-progress for a constructive, non-judgmental, and creatively supportive mini-workshop. Students are encouraged to share a draft of the first few pages of a historical work-in-progress.
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.