Event

Writing From Experience

With Stephen Elliott and Peg Alford Pursell

Your experiences, and how you process them, are what make you unique as an individual. They are also the most valuable things we can offer readers. We will talk about writing from experience in fiction and nonfiction, and how to use our lives as jumping off points and framing devices for the stories we tell about ourselves and others. We will also talk about the dangers of writing from experience and overcoming the blocks set in place (often unnecessarily) by our fears of exposure. We will look at strategies for getting past those fears and for dealing with friends and relatives whose memories might be different from our own. Finally, we will focus on unlocking our lives and the joy and value of integrating the worlds we know with the worlds we create.

Instructor bio: Stephen Elliott is the author of seven books including the novel Happy Baby and the memoir The Adderall Diaries. His writing has been featured in The New York Times, Esquire, Best American Non-Required Reading 2005 & 2007, Best Sex Writing, Best American Erotica, The Believer, GQ, McSweeney's, and other publications.

Instructor bio: Peg Alford Pursell is an award-winningwriter and instructor with an MFA in fiction and BA in education. She started the creative writing program
at the Charleston School of the Arts, and teaches at the College of Marin, Book Passage, and in private workshops.