Class Description
The fully-realized dramatic scene is an essential building block of fiction. Contrary to the well-known dictum, however, most fiction writers find that they must use both showing and telling to create a clear and emotionally gripping experience for their readers. So how do you decide what to dramatize and what to summarize? How do you “tell” in an interesting way, and what are the characteristics of truly immersive “showing”? In this text-based seminar we’ll consult passages selected from writers such as Edith Wharton, Colson Whitehead, Jim Harrison, John le Carré, Kasuo Ishiguro, Stephen Graham Jones, Junot Díaz, Hilary Mantel, Aravind Adiga, and many others to draw a few useful conclusions, paying special attention to such topics as lively narration, “crowding and leaping,” and writing dramatic scenes that advance the story while offering direct access to your core characters.
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.