Slantwise to the Truth: Navigating Narrative Nonfiction

All levels are welcome. Limited to 12 participants.

“Tell all the Truth but tell it slant/success in Circuit lies” — let poet Emily Dickinson’s words inspire you as we navigate narrative nonfiction, writing that takes the best elements of fiction, applies those to facts, and ends with compelling stories.

In this workshop you will take your own “big idea” and add to it week-by-week until at the end of eight sessions you’ll have a draft narrative essay of 2,000 words or more. Each meeting will be split between discussing one of six elements necessary for good narrative nonfiction and workshopping participants’ writing. This will be supported by readings related to the discussion and to the week’s assigned writing. Below is an outline covering six weekly discussions. Two additional weeks are left open to allow for flexibility – perhaps there will be spillover from a previous week’s discussion or perhaps by consensus we’ll toss in another idea to discuss or take extra time to workshop participants’ work.

Please note that this workshop will not focus on memoir writing. Although memoir falls into the category of narrative nonfiction, I encourage participants to look beyond it when considering their writing for these eight weeks.