If Famous Writers Taught Writing Workshops

if-famous-writers-taught-writing-workshops

Writing is a craft. It takes practice. It take re-writes, and long sessions of staring at your blinking cursor, and many, many hours alone at your computer and/or vintage typewriter. Having a group or a class with a great instructor that pushes you to meet deadlines is invaluable. They are able to pay attention to every kind of writer in their class and help them hone their writing voices.

 

Could you imagine what it would be like if famous authors taught writing workshops? We did.

FICTION WITH J.K ROWLING

 

You know who JK Rowling is. You know Harry Potter took the world by storm. You may even be aware that Rowling had trouble getting published at all. Nobody wanted to take a risk on Harry Potter (shock: publishers do not know everything).

Ms. Rowling knows the publishing world and can speak from both sides of victory and defeat. Her classes would be filled with interesting tips that could help you write the next best-selling series!

Teaching Style: One of the things Rowling has learned over the years is that a writing career is a lifelong process that transcends any particular work. When she reads student writing, she’s not only looking at how to improve the work at hand, but also trying to figure out which tendencies of word choice, characterization, detail, etc. need encouragement and which ones need sharpening. She uses a variety of methods to bring the material alive including readings, discussions, prompts, and exercises. Maybe even an impromptu match of Quidditch?

A writing career is a lifelong process that transcends any particular work.

Attend an Advanced Fiction Class with Michelle D’costa here

 

The class will be focusing on four major aspects of good storytelling which is plot, character, dialogue and setting in addition to other aspects. The highlight of this class will be workshopping your stories.

SCREENPLAY WRITING WITH SHAKESPEARE

 

From power struggles to love stories, adventures in the wilderness to life at court, you can find all of life in his plays. Shakespeare’s writing has proven itself time and time again to be amazingly suited for adaptations on screen! Here’s probably what Shakespeare could’ve taught us about screenplay writing.

 

  • Write about real historical events and characters, or even borrow plots from your favourite books.
  • As Shakespeare wrote in Othello, “There’s magic in the web of it,” so weave some magic into your tale.
  • Have fun with language. Many words and phrases that are in common usage today can trace their origins back to Shakespeare, so feel free to invent words and create new phrases.
  • Write a love story. Like Shakespeare, you’ll have endless themes of love to choose from. Forbidden love is a popular choice, but there’s also jealous love, love-sickness, unrequited love, luckiness in love, or, worst of all, ‘death-mark’d love’ as suffered by Romeo and Juliet.
  • Shakespeare’s plays were written to be performed. His words come to life when they are spoken aloud, and much of that is to do with the rhythm, the famous iambic pentameter he was so fond of. Read aloud what you’ve written, and listen to how it sounds.

 

Teaching Style: Shakespeare loves to see students have fun discovering something they never knew they could do. He helps you get those amazing stories out of your head and into the world through writing prompts, outside readings, direct instruction, and the workshop/peer review model. He encourages you to throw away your dictionary and make up your own language along the way!

Shakespeare loves to see students have fun discovering something they never knew they could do. He helps you get those amazing stories out of your head and into the world!

 In recent years, the Internet has created space for an entirely new storytelling format: the web series. Cheap to make and easily accessible for viewers, a web series can be the perfect way for you to get started as a filmmaker and be noticed for your talent. All you need is the right set of tools and skills.

JOURNALING WITH SYLVIA PLATH

 

Plath published her first poem at age eight, and continued writing rhymes and poems all through her childhood and adolescence. Arguably more important to her development as a writer, however, was her decision to start a journal during her adolescence. Plath would obsessively journal for the rest of her short life, and these records of her thoughts, feelings, and actions helped her not only structure and populate her more autobiographical works (The Bell Jar is semi-autobiographical, and many of her poems are deeply confessional) but also ensured that thought and the written word became closely, almost intrinsically linked – as such, Plath’s writing is startlingly lucid, expressive, and fluent. She would hold the firm belief that practice makes perfect, after all! 

Teaching Style: Plath would encourage the writers she works with to dig up their stories, big and small, in order to find new meaning in the journey of their lives. Participants will be challenged to face their truth, hold it up to the light and transform it into power. It is rumoured participants come out of her workshops weeping.

She would hold the firm belief that practice makes perfect, after all! 

 

Check out the full list of Bound’s online classes here

rheea
Written by Rheea Mukherjee

Rheea Rodrigues Mukherjee is the author of The Body Myth (Unnamed Press /Penguin India 2019) which was shortlisted for the Tata Literature Live First Book Award. Her work has been published and featured in Scroll.in, Southern Humanities Review, Los Angeles Times, Huffington Post, Buzzfeed, Vogue India, Out of Print, TBLM, and Bengal Lights, among others. She co-founded Bangalore Writers Workshop in 2012 and currently co-runs Write Leela Write, a Design and Content Laboratory in Bangalore, India. Rheea has an MFA in creative writing from California College of the Arts.

9. Read Out An Excerpt Of Your Book