A Beautiful Mess: A Generative Workshop

Writing should, to a degree, always be playful, exploratory. But perhaps there’s no better season than summer to get messy and see where the words take us. In this two-part class, we’ll spend the first three weeks writing together from a wild assortment of generative prompts and texts, including of a range of materials and activities designed to spark inspiration and contemplation along with some consideration of technical craft. Stories, poems, visual art, songs, perambulations, and more–all of these may provoke our newest attempts. In the second three weeks we’ll apply various developmental exercises to those “beautiful messes,” attempting to shape them toward what they want to be. (Perhaps we’ll make them even more messy–but that may be part of the necessary process.) In both parts of this six-week class, we’ll have time to share in-class writing for on-the-spot instructor and student feedback.

The class is designed to be focused on in-class writing, though participants are encouraged to continue working from the prompts on their own time as the muse–or steely discipline–moves them.

•     Instructor: Susannah Felts

•     Length of workshop: 6 weeks

•     Date: Tuesdays, June 12 – July 17

•     Time: 7 – 9 p.m.

•     Location: Refinery Nashville

Source: The Porch