BART 92A13 - On Writing as a process: your independant fiction project

This course aims at guiding you, both individually and as a community of writers, as you work on your writing project. It is your chance to focus and dedicate time to the fiction project of your choice for twelve weeks. This writing project can be anything you'd like: a short story, a short story collection, fragments, novels or novel chapters, a novella or an auto fiction narrative – although please note that for longer-scoped projects, you will only be able to share shorter excerpts with me and your peers. Drawing from my experience as a writer and a literary coach, I designed this class to highlight and walk you through the different steps of the writing process: brainstorming, planning, drafting, sharing, revising—and all over again. While we will all be following the same writing program, the reading list and materials will be adapted to better suits your projects' needs. In other words, you will all become key actors in determining which questions and craft elements we'll be focusing on; you, as students, will be partly creating the course content. You'll learn from your writing process, but also from the challenges faced by your peers, as well as figure out the writing routine that works best for you. At the beginning of the semester, you'll set personal writing goals—goals that might change and evolve—that you'd like to achieve by the end of Spring term. You'll work in pairs with your writing ally to meet them. Twice, you'll have the opportunity to workshop your work with your peers, once half-way through the term and once at the end of April, as well as share your work and questions during weekly mini-workshops and Q&A sessions. You'll grow as a writer, but also as a reader and critic of fiction, by learning how to provide thoughtful, actionable, future-oriented feedback to your classmates—and how to incorporate this feedback in order to take your writing project to the next level. By the end of this course, you will have experienced what it means to stick to characters and rethink plot lines on the long term; you'll have discovered the value of working hard hand in hand with fellow writers to move forward with your project, as well as know the rewards that await those ready to see their draft anew and revise it. And of course, you'll leave this class with a more advanced, polished draft of your writing project.

Julia MALYE

Atelier

English

Workshop Procedures: Your story is your baby. Act accordingly: Give it a thoughtful name. Start the nurturing process early (begin writing at least 2 weeks before your deadline). Tend to its needs – even in the middle of the night or early in the morning. Make sure it is delivered on the correct due date. (If handed in late, you will receive a 0/20 on your engagement grade.) Show up to see its big day (workshop). (Failure to do so will also result in a 0/20 on your engagement grade.) Take pride in its strengths, even when working constantly towards improvement. Formatting Guidelines Stories must be printed in black ink, double-spaced, with standard margins. Word docs or Google docs: no PDFs. The font should be Times New Roman or Garamond, 12 point. Pages should be numbered. Workshop notes can be single spaced.

Please note: You should already have an idea of the fiction project you intend to work on—even if it's a vague one! —over the course of the semester. It is recommended to already have some writing experience prior to taking this class.

Spring 2024-2025

To validate the course, the student is expected to pass the following assignments: 1°) Engagement – 30 %. This grade will take into account your engagement as an individual, in pairs, small group, and large group, as well as your overall engagement with the course materials (weekly goal checklist, writing prompts, in-class exercises, workshop, videos, etc.). At the beginning of class, we'll have weekly Q&A sessions. Two students will bring the questions that they have about their writing project, describe the challenges they faced, the ones they overcame and discuss the past week's rewards: these Q&A sessions will shape some of the themes & readings assigned for the following class. 2°) Writing Allies Report Video – 30 %. A short process memo that provides a swift overview of your collaboration with your writing ally over the first half of the term (identifying challenges you overcame and how, analyzing your role and your classmate's in this duo, thinking of ways to improve your collaboration, etc.). One short, informal, creative video per writing duo. 3°) First Draft & Polished Draft of Your Writing Project – 40 %. You will continuously work on your writing project over the course of the term: you will workshop a first draft half-way through the semester, then be expected to use the feedback you received to revise and polish this first draft. You will have a chance to workshop this second draft by the end of the semester. Please note that the word count limit for both assignments is 2700 (or if you'd rather think in page length, 8 to 9 pages, double-spaced).

At the end of the course, the student is expected to: 1°) Apply multiple theories, concepts, and techniques for creating and evaluating written communication. Students receive instruction on craft elements employed by fiction writers, including plot, point of view, characterization, dialogue, and setting, as well as any other craft elements that the students would struggle with or manifest interest into. They read short stories with an eye to analyzing the way each element works in fiction, and practice these techniques using low-stakes writing exercises and prompts. Instructor assesses informal writing exercises, a first draft of a writing project and revision of this writing project, and written responses to peers' writing. 2°) Think of writing as a multi-faceted process, develop individual strategies to move forward with their project and overcome encountered difficulties, as well as meet their predetermined goals. Students learn how to set motivating but reasonable goals for themselves, how to stick to these objectives or adapt them. They come up with the writing routine and work pace that better suit their project, and make adjustments over the course of the semester as needed. As a community of writers, they support, hold each other accountable, and share their work in informal settings by participating in mini-workshops and Q&A sessions. They learn the value of working on their own, but also in pairs and small groups. They learn to keep on believing in their projects even in the face of challenge. They become more determined and resilient, qualities that every writer needs to produce compelling writing. 3°) Apply critical thinking to writing and writing process, including revision. Students analyze and discuss assigned stories as practice for responding critically to each other's work. Peer responses focus on constructive suggestions for revision. The instructor meets with each student to discuss revision strategies. Students write reflections on the revision process that accompany the final draft. Instructor assesses both oral and written responses to peers' workshopped stories. Instructor assesses students' revised stories.