Mapping the Plot: September 14, 2019

Sign up HERE

Feel free to contact me with any questions! 

What We're Doing In Class: "I Am Not a Real Writer"

Today in "I Am Not a Real Writer," the class for people who don't think they're real writers--yet somehow always discover they are :)--one of the things we briefly discussed was "All Rivers" by Amos Oz. 

Besides being a great story, "All Rivers" is structurally interesting in that it might appear to be all flashback, but if you really look, there is a clear present-time progression of action: the action is the narrator sitting at his desk, remembering. It's not him statically sitting there, and then the camera switches to a news report about events that occurred earlier, and then we come back to find him sitting in the same position. (Which is how people too often try to do flashback.) Rather, it's him at his desk actively engaging with the process of memory. This is an important thing to note for memoir too. It's nearly always about more than "what happened in the past;" it's also about the act of attempting to remember.

This touches on themes that come up often in class. What constitutes "action" vs "flashback?" Can a memory be written one way as flashback, another way as exposition, and another way as present action (as in the Oz story)? When writing memoir, what do you do with the fact that memory is imperfect--or rather, that it is its own living, personal thing, and not a recording device you can take back to a fixed past? 

✨✨✨Things to think about.✨✨✨

What we're doing in class: Advanced Year of Your Book

John Truby, who writes about screenwriting, has a theory that a scene should be shaped like this:

From Truby, The Anatomy of Story

In yesterday's class, we talked about the beautiful "A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings" Gabriel García Márquez.

Look at the first paragraph, which is also a complete scene. Does it have that shape? 

Also notice how much it does in 166 words. As novelists we can be tempted to think we need whole chapters to get the reader located in terms of time, place, what matters to the characters, and what the central themes and problems will be. I would argue García Márquez does that all in this one paragraph:

On the third day of rain they had killed so many crabs inside the house that Pelayo had to cross his drenched courtyard and throw them into the sea, because the newborn child had a temperature all night and they thought it was due to the stench. The world had been sad since Tuesday. Sea and sky were a single ash-gray thing and the sands of the beach, which on March nights glimmered like powdered light, had become a stew of mud and rotten shellfish. The light was so weak at noon that when Pelayo was coming back to the house after throwing away the crabs, it was hard for him to see what it was that was moving and groaning in the rear of the courtyard. He had to go very close to see that it was an old man, a very old man, lying face down in the mud, who, in spite of his tremendous efforts, couldn’t get up, impeded by his enormous wings.

From "A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings" Gabriel García Márquez.

Odilon Redon, Aged Angel, 1903

What we're doing in class: "I Am Not a Real Writer": Some short memoirs

The title of my Saturday class, "I Am Not a Real Writer" at HVWC, is meant to bring in people who THINK this about themselves. The truth is everyone who writes is a writer, and if you're writing about things that really matter to you-- whether it's in the form of memoir, journalism, or stories about aliens-- then you're doing something worthwhile. 

This one has turned out to be sort of a memoir class, because that's what the people in it are interested in. As promised, here are some more short pieces we've been talking about. 


Marlon James, "One Day I Will Write About My Mother"

Dylan Thomas, "A Child's Christmas in Wales"

Alexander Chee, "Mr. and Mrs. B"

--

And here's a good recent list: "15 Short Memoirs"

--

This past Saturday, we spent a bit of time on "My Family's Slave" by Alex Tizon, and talked about approaching subjects around which we as writers feel guilt, shame, or conflicted emotions. Class members brought pages of their own writing to read aloud, dealing with this theme.

What We're Doing in Class: "I Am Not a Real Writer"

"I Am Not a Real Writer" is for people who've wanted to take a writing class but have been concerned about knowing how to do it "right."

Unsurprisingly (to me) everyone in this class is writing wonderful stuff. They are all 100% real.

They're leaning towards memoir, and we've been exploring this prompt. It involves being assigned a random phrase and using it as a jumping-off point for a memory. The phrase/image doesn't actually have to be part of your memory, as long as it brings it to mind. For example, one person got the phrase "half a cake" which brought up a memory of someone who temporarily disappeared-- even though there was no actual cake present at the time. Try it!

We're also reading some short memoirs, which I'll post over the coming days. I usually teach fiction, so it's a pleasure to explore this form.

Here's one for today: "One Day I Will Write About My Mother" by Marlon James. This shows how the difficulty in writing about a particular subject can become part of the piece itself-- one of the things it's about.

Mikhail Vrubel, Pencils, 1905

Mapping the Plot: February 10

Mapping the Plot

The Hudson Valley Writers' Center

Sleepy Hollow, NY

⊱✿:✿⊰

Sunday February 10, 12:30 to 4:30

SIGN UP HERE

Take an afternoon to be with your book (whether it's planned or already drafted), standing back to look at the structure; getting in close to look at the building blocks that make it up; looking at how they fit together; and getting an overview of where and how you can enhance, streamline, and clarify your plot.

The afternoon will begin with snacks, coffee, seltzer, a table covered with brown paper, and a lot of magic markers. We'll do some low-stress, fun exercises to break the ice and start visualizing your book from different angles. Next, we'll look at possibilities for mapping arcs and storylines, then different ways to delineate acts and scenes. We'll start building a plot map for your book with trifold boards divided into act sections, and sticky notes denoting scenes and plot points. At the end of the luxurious four hours spent elbow-deep in your book and its structure, you'll take the trifold boards home with you, along with ideas for continuing to fill in the sticky notes, and for taking your book to the next stage.

Feel free to contact me for more information. Hope to see you there!

Mapping the Plot

SIGN UP HERE

Map of the World, Gerona Beatus mansucript, c. 975

Mapping the Plot: February Edition

Mapping the Plot

Saturday, February 10

12:30 to 4:30

Hudson Valley Writers' Center

Sleepy Hollow, NY

~.:.~

SIGN UP HERE

Spend an afternoon with snacks, coffee, markers, index cards, and poster board at the Hudson Valley Writers' Center, mapping out a plot for your novel.

Whether you're in the revision stage and want to find the structure in your story, or are in the dreaming stage and want to lay down a blueprint for your novel-to-be, this class will give you the tools and time to do it.

Participants will leave with a physical plot map constructed during the afternoon, plus exercises, readings, and a personalized timetable with deadlines for the next stage of your writing/ revision.

SIGN UP HERE

Map of the World, Gerona Beatus mansucript, c. 975

I Am Not a Real Writer

I Am Not a Real Writer

One-day class

Saturday, January 19

12:30 — 4:30

The Hudson Valley Writers' Center

❉

❉  ❉   Sign up here   ❉  ❉

❉

Did you make a new year's resolution to write in 2019? This fiction writing intensive is for everyone who is concerned about having what it takes, whether the issue is “not being a writer,” “having no good ideas,” or anything else. No experience required. Through exploratory exercises, light readings and discussion, this class will help you find some of the stories that (spoiler alert) are definitely hiding inside you.

Sign up here

or use the contact form on the right to ask a question ->

Basket of Sprouting Bulbs, 1887, Vincent Van Gogh

Year of Your Book 2019

Make 2019 the year you write your book!

Year of Your Book

The Hudson Valley Writers' Center

Sleepy Hollow, NY

Wednesdays 10:15 to 12:15

.. Starts January 16 ..

-

 -  CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP  -

More upcoming classes here

-

Year of Your Book is a yearlong course in six-week sessions. You are encouraged to take all the sessions, but it is possible to drop in and out as well.

This course is open to anyone interested in writing a novel or story collection. Whether you have a partial draft, or just a dream, this class will help you take your manuscript to the next level.

Winter Session: January 16 through February 20
Some things we'll cover: 
How do I even start?
Planting seeds: characters, places, situations, complications
The basics of getting a draft going: a daily practice, permission to be messy, a spirit of exploration, permission to be vulnerable.

Spring I: March 6 through April 10
The middle of the draft: Structure, sketching a plot map, deepening the characters, exploring relationships, getting serious (with a sense of playfulness).

Spring II: April 24 through May 29
The home stretch: getting to the end of the super rough draft. Sketching some endings. Considering the "shadow story." Allowing themes and structure to reveal themselves.

Summer Session 
The summer session is designed to be easy to drop in and out of, to accommodate vacation schedules. Assignments will be low-key, fun, and experimental. A great chance to gain a fresh perspective and let some fresh air into the draft you just finished and start to think about how you'll shape and revise it.

Fall I: September through October
Beginning revision: The big read-through! The pink pen: Being your own editor. A revision checklist. Various fun maps and diagrams.

Fall II: October through December
The trifold board and sticky notes. Dissecting scenes. Winding up the first revision. Looking back and looking forward.


SIGN UP HERE


More upcoming classes

Book of Doves, Nicholas Roerich, 1911

New Classes

Advanced Year of Your Book at the Hudson Valley Writers' Center starts January 14

Year of Your Book @ HVWC starts January 16

"I Am Not a Real Writer!" @ HVWC one day: January 19

Applications are open for the 2019 Yale Writers' Workshop where I'm excited to be teaching a new ten-day "Work-in-Progress" intensive  in June. My intensive is open to YWW alumni only, but the whole program is great, with a range of workshops in different genres, on the beautiful Yale campus.

Edouard Manet, Woman Writing, 1863