Writing the Memoir-in-Essays: 2 Session Seminar starting July 22
Thursdays, 7-9pm Eastern Time, July 22 and 29
A memoir-in-essays is a book length work of linked essays, typically organized around a specific motif, idea, or topic. It is an essay collection that also reveals the interiority of the author and some part of their life, and answers the question “Is this a memoir, or an essay?” with one word: yes.
Thanks to its modular form, the memoir-in-essays allows a writer to make bold moves with time, theme, and chronology, and demands that they make clear the connections between the individual essays that make up the book. It uses the self and the world as two points in a dialogue of ideas, letting personal narrative serve as a way into ideas.
To write a memoir-in-essays, you need several things: a story, an idea, and a connection between them. What part of your life do you want to put on the page as a space in which to explore your idea? What idea feels resonant with the events you’ve lived and witnessed? And, crucially, how does your lived experience illuminate, complicate, or deepen your understanding of the ideas you wish to essay into?
In this course, you will read deeply into contemporary memoir-in-essays, explore the connections between your obsessions and your experiences, and learn craft tools for how to start or continue your own memoir-in-essays. You will respond to guided prompts and exercises that will help you unpack exactly how you want to frame your material, and you’ll consider how to establish voice, tone, pace, and perspective via group discussions and generative writing practices. You’ll leave the course with the groundwork set for your memoir-in-essay, and a plan for how to build and develop it.
This is a 2 week course. We meet on Zoom, Thursdays, 7-9pm Eastern Time, July 22 and 29. Enrollment is $195.