Class Description
In this advanced personal essay class spanning five months, you will come with a concept for a book-length memoir in essays or essay collection, and leave with a solid start of a draft and a plan for where to go next. This class is perfect for those with at least five essay drafts, including students who might be interested in eventually participating in a year-long Incubator course.
In the first section of this class, we will study published collections from authors who might include Grace Talusan, Alexander Chee, Athena Dixon, and Samantha Irby, identifying the elements that help the essays cohere within the collection. We'll tackle challenges like creating a central thread, minimizing repetition while maintaining individual essay integrity, and the difference between a memoir in essays and an essay collection (both are welcome in this class!). We'll work on developing your book's theme, arc, and major goals with each student making a presentation about these concepts to the class. With diligent weekly writing goals, we will begin to lay the groundwork for workshopping the pieces that will appear in your book.
In the next section of class, we will transition towards advancing your essay drafts, using the planning tools you developed in the first section. You will have the opportunity to have your entire manuscript draft workshopped, and to receive in-depth feedback with an eye towards enriching the larger project of your book-length collection. Throughout the workshopping portion of class, your weekly writing goals will continue and you will also receive a one-on-one meeting with your instructor to discuss next steps for your work. The goal is for you to leave this course with a clear vision of how you will successfully bring your essay collection to life.
Important dates: Applications for this class are due on Monday, December 7th, by 11:59PM ET. All applicants can expect to hear back within one week of the application deadline. Applications submitted after the deadline will not be reviewed and will not receive a response.
Please Note: Class does not meet March 16th and April 6th.
Writing Roadmap: We've created a simple, goal-based writing roadmap to help you find the perfect GrubStreet course for your writing needs.
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.