ENG 317 Creative Writing: Fiction
DCE Online Spring 2008
Instructor: Professor Barbara Drake
Linfield College
bdrake@linfield.edu

Textbook: Writing Fiction, 7th Edition. Janet Burroway and Elizabeth Stuckey-French. Please be sure that you have the 7th edition. It has been revised considerably and has more and different stories than previous editions.

The course:  In this course we will focus on telling and reading the short story. The class is suitable both for students who simply want to explore short fiction and generally improve their writing and also for students who want to make writing a long term goal. I know you all have stories to tell.  We will read and discuss examples of modern fiction in order to see how professional authors have made their stories work. Writing exercises will help you get started.  Besides writing short exercises, you will complete four short stories to be developed, revised, and polished throughout the semester. The course will be conducted as an online workshop with lots of opportunities for discussion and interaction, both in small groups and as a whole class.  You should definitely come into this course expecting to have fun and to cultivate your creativity.

Requirements:  1) Take part in weekly discussions.  This includes making suggestions and comments on other students' work and discussing the reading.  2) Complete reading and writing assignments on time.  3) Write, revise, and polish four complete short stories during the semester.  4) Further develop, revise, and turn in two of the four stories as your final at the end of the semester. 

Submitting work: Submit all work on time and as requested, via Web CT.

Lectures, and letters:  1) Weekly Letter--I will introduce each week with a general letter to the class, calling your attention to things I want you to notice and explaining the week's assignments. These letters will take the place of lectures in a regular classroom. 2) Responding to your work--I will make open comments on your work in the general class discussion as I would in a regular workshop class. Please read my comments to other students' work, as they will often apply to everyone.  For example, if a particular story or exercise brings up a problem in handling point of view, I will explain some things about point of view (pov) and and suggest changes, expecting that everyone will read the message.  Always feel free to ask me questions if something is not clear or needs further elaboration. 

Discussions and groups: Everyone will discuss both the writing assignments and the reading. Participating in discussion is required. Discussion of the reading for the week will take place primarily on the list for the whole group. Your writing assignments will also be posted on the general list and that is where I will post my comments and suggestions.  Students will also be able to post comments, compliments, or suggestions for revision on the general list.  I know that it's sometimes hard to put your work out there when it still doesn't seem finished.  Just remember, though will make each piece of writing as good as possible, all writing until the final revisions should be considered work in-progress; we will treat the class as a workshop, with everyone working together for mutual benefit. In addition to the class discussion list, we will divide the class into small groups. You can go to your group to try out ideas or look for advice. I will scan the small group discussions to make sure people are participating, but I will not interfere with the discussion there. I want group members to take ownership of the small groups and use them as seems helpful. 

Class critiques and the workshop process: Comments on the work of others should be encouraging but honestly helpful.  Mention the strong points and then make suggestions for improvement. Don't pick on everything that needs work.  Usually it's better to be selective; possibly just mention the one change you think would make the biggest improvement. Remember that when we try to figure out and articulate what could make someone else's story work better, we are also learning how to critique our own work.  About accepting advice--you are never required to take someone else's suggestion, even mine.  If I want you to kill off a character and you don't, let him live.  Just consider suggestions and decide if they are helpful or not.  Sometimes advice works in what I imagine as a sort of triangle.  a) I write something this way.  b) A reader critiques my work and says do it a different way.  c) I don't agree with the advice but it helps me see a third way that would be better.  Remember, workshopping is a process.

Individual conferences:  A lot of the class dialogue will involve everyone or at least the small groups. However, I will also be able to address each of you privately--if you have a question or want to talk outside the group discussion about your work or a specific problem contact me via the course email.  I check regularly and that will usually be the most efficient way to reach me. You can also contact other individuals in the class through the course email.  If you need to contact me and the WebCT system is down for some reason, try my general email address, at the top of the syllabus, but otherwise use the course email system which makes it easier for me to keep track of messages. 
 
Due dates and schedules: Please complete weekly writing, reading, and discussion assignments as they appear on the syllabus.  If you are going to be out of town or there is some similar reason you cannot submit work on the due date, please submit it early. If you cannot meet a deadline due to illness or a genuine crisis, please let me know so that I can work with you to catch up. Because this is a writing workshop, not an independent study, everyone needs to be on the same schedule, week by week. This is important and will help me work with you smoothly and effectively.

A note:  Bring up problems when they arise.  If you need help, I'll do what I can, and if there are things in the course that don't work I'll do my best to fix them. Whatever you do, don't just disappear; I worry when that happens. 

Grades: It is common practice not to grade individual assignments in college creative writing workshops. All writing until the final portfolio is regarded as work in progress and grades can be an impediment to risking new subjects and techniques. This is how it will work. Everyone who fulfills basic requirements, i.e. completes writing exercises and assignments on time, keeps up with the reading schedule, contributes to the discussion of the various chapters, gives thoughtful feedback to others in the class and their group, and completes the final portfolio, will get at least a B. Those who show exceptional effort or exceptional quality of work (or both), will get higher than a B. Those who are lacking in any part of the basic requirements will get less than a B. I don't mind giving high grades as long as they are truly earned. Feel free to ask me about your standing at any time during the semester.

 
Getting ideas for stories: Whenever and wherever you are, keep a pen and notebook handy to write down story ideas. You never know when you will think of something that will make a good story and if you don't make a note of it the idea can just float away. This means literally all the time, whether you are at a meeting, eating lunch, watching television, reading the textbook, or responding to someone else's writing. Someone else's creative work can often give us ideas for our own. You may also get writing ideas in the shower and while driving. I do. Make a note of them as soon as you can. I'm not a fan of multi-tasking while behind the steering wheel, but I do keep a small hand-held tape recorder in the car, one I can easily turn on or off without looking at it, for the occasional thought that needs to be captured immediately. Another important use for a notebook when you're away from your desk is to jot down interesting things such as overheard conversation, odd signs, or descriptions of places and people you might use in a story. Sometimes I overhear dialogue that is so good I don't think I could ever make it up so I just write it down and work it into my own writing. You might see someone in a grocery store or at a party and notice a telling fidgety gesture or an odd tattoo that it will fit perfectly into a story you're working on. A writer often starts with some small seed of an idea that turns into something much larger. Such material can give verisimilitude and atmosphere to your fiction. I am thinking of a small notebook here, something that would fit in a pocket or a small purse and not be burdensome. If you fill it up, you can always get another one.

You will always have a free choice of topics for your stories in this class. You may already have lots of ideas but if not remember that the textbook offers suggestions at the ends of most of the chapters and the short writing exercises can be developed into whole stories. You can get ideas from a newspaper or from something you overhear someone saying on a public telephone. You might remember an old family story about a relative you never met and use that as a beginning point. Perhaps there was some life experience that changed you forever or a person you will never forget.  You can interpret the material in a fictional way.  Or you might just put yourself into the mind of someone who is the complete opposite of yourself, a mean, dishonest, sneaky person, quite unreliable, or someone much older or younger than you, or a person in another time, and let that person tell his or her story. You might write a story as a series of letters: from one person, from several people writing about the same event, or between two people in love, in conflict, meeting over the internet... Think about your childhood and the first time you became aware of something: death, your parents' relationship, the smell of dirt or cotton candy. Could you fictionalize it? Or pull together several independent events or characters that catch your attention and combine them to all in one story. I don't think you'll have any trouble finding subjects.

Using the textbook: Read the whole textbook and all the stories in it. Although I've assigned the chapters week by week, I recommend that you quickly read as many of the stories as you can early in the semester to see which ones give you the best ideas for your own work, and then go back and read them again with the instructive material in each chapter, according to our schedule. They are good stories, fun to read. That said, remember that you will not be reading the textbook the way you would read a text for economics, history, or even a literature class. Read quickly for what you can use, not as if you are going to be given a true-false test on the material. Janet Burroway addresses this difference and asks you to read as a writer. Notice how the stories work. Ask yourself what you admire about them or what bothers you. What entertains or touches you. Notice conflict and character development, dialogue, setting, and point of view. Who is telling the story and in what sort of voice? Ask yourself what you can learn or borrow from the writer's techniques.

Besides the textbook: Look for and read fiction outside the textbook, in current publications such as The New Yorker. When you find something you especially like tell the class about it. If you're reading a good novel, or if you read a good story in a magazine or on a website, tell us about that too.

The Calendar:  Notice that for the first two weeks in order to get up to speed there are a lot of short assignments.  Don't feel overwhelmed.  After we start working on the stories there will be more time between assignments and you will have three weeks at the end of the course to work on final revisions.  Over the whole semester there will be 12 writing assignments.  Four of these are full stories and the rest are short writing exercises.  The 12th writing assignment is to revise two of the four stories.