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Workshop Descriptions & Instructors


Faith Adiele
Mary Allen
Kate Aspengren
Thomas Fox Averill
Nancy Barry
Timothy Bascom
Linda Bendorf
Venise Berry
Bruce Bond

Michael Dennis Browne
Susan Taylor Chehak
John Dalton
Thomas K. Dean
Amber Dermont
Kelly Dwyer
Hope Edelman
Josh Emmons
Katie Ford
Patricia Foster
Laura Fraser
Cecile Goding
Douglas Goetsch
Kevin González
John Griesemer
Sands Hall
Christine Hemp
Jim Heynen
Rick Hillis
Charles Holdefer
Richard Jackson
Cheryl Fusco Johnson
Wayne Johnson
Bret Anthony Johnston
Daniel Khalastchi
Zachary Lazar
Carolyn Lieberg
BK Loren
Fritz Mc Donald
James McKean
Gordon Mennenga
Katherine Min
Sharelle Byars Moranville
Michael Morse
Barbara Robinette Moss
Marc Nieson
Shannon Olson
Lon Otto
Juliet Patterson
Anjali Sachdeva
Sarah Saffian
Sam Samuels
Leslie Schwartz
Sandra Scofield
Mary Kay Shanley
Carol Spindel
Karen Subach
Mary Vermillion
Ashley Warlick
Jan Weissmiller
Bart Yates

Cecile Goding

The He(art) Of The Personal Essay
One-Week Workshop
June 8–13

“This Too Is Life”: Memoirs On Illness & Health
One-Week Workshop
July 6–11

On The Job: Stories About Work
Weekend Workshop
July 12–13

The He(art) Of The Personal Essay
Weekend Workshop
July 19–20

 

Biography

 

The He(art) Of The Personal Essay
One-Week Workshop
June 8–13

Okay, you have anecdotes, little stories about you and yours. Certain images you will never forget. You find yourself compelled to tell these stories again and again, if only to yourself. Why? Essayist Phillip Lopate says that “personal essayists are adept at interrogating their ignorance.” How, then, to convey that interrogation to others? This week, as we read and write together, we will search for the “why” behind the tale; in other words, its heart. And then, as we reshape our pieces, we will walk the wavy line between anecdote and essay, to create heart and art.

While a portion of each day will involve exploring a handful of the best personal essays of the last few centuries, most of our workshop will revolve around your own writing. So plan to bring work-in-progress (up to 12 double-spaced pages), and to share fresh material produced during the week. Bring a lot of blank pages. Nightly exercises and detailed group comments will fill them up, enough to keep you writing the rest of the year.

“This Too Is Life”: Memoirs On Illness & Health
One-Week Workshop
July 6–11

When the body fails us, we are forced to focus on it. How could we not? Yet how many times have you heard this: “For heaven’s sake, others’ physical problems are boring. No one wants to hear about me.” Fortunately, Chinese writer Lu Hsun, who provides the title for this workshop, would beg to differ. Along with many other writers—Joan Didion, Jorge Luis Borges, Richard Selzer, M.F.K. Fisher—Lu Hsun explored illness and health  in personal, poignant essays.

For veterans of this workshop, I have found new  doctors, nurses, and patients to read and discuss. Most of our workshop, however, will revolve around your own writing—as patients, as caregivers, as health professionals. Plan to bring work-in-progress (up to 12 double-spaced pages), and to share fresh material produced during the week. Bring a lot of blank pages. Nightly exercises and detailed group comments will fill them up, enough to keep you writing the rest of the year.

On The Job: Stories About Work
Weekend Workshop
July 12–13

Where was your first job? Was there a window? A tree? A bathroom? What did the typist in the next cubicle bring for lunch? Remember the summer you waited tables? Remember the restaurant's clunky cash register? Have you ever worked overseas? What was the worst job you ever had? Readers want to know. Let’s mold the rich clay of your nine-to-five days into story form—whether nonfiction (memoir) or fiction. This weekend retreat will focus on producing that clay. And as you complete short exercises, then read your writing aloud, you may find yourself looking back on your worklife—its places, its people, its history—in a new, provocative way. That's what art does!

The He(art) Of The Personal Essay
Weekend Workshop
July 19–20

As in my weeklong workshop with the same title, we will devote this weekend retreat to the “why” behind your personal stories. What happens when we add more to them—more details, more reflection, more drama? Rather than polishing old work, this writing retreat will focus on producing freely and abundantly, in response to unusual prompts. For example, what happens when we tell the same story in three different ways? What happens when you add the “you-now” perspective to what happened to “you-then?” As you complete short exercises, then read your writing aloud, you may discover its true center—the heart within the art. Writers at any level are most welcome.

Biography
Cecile Goding (M.F.A., The University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop; M.F.A., The University of Iowa Program in Nonfiction Writing) teaches for Mount Mercy College and The America SCORES Urban Teachers Poetry Workshop. She has worked for Silicon Valley corporations, Saudi Arabian princes, South Carolina nonprofits, Boston libraries, Vermont stonecutters, and Iowa neighborhood centers. Her stories, essays and poems crop up here and there, most recently in the 2007 Southern Poetry Anthology by Texas Review Press.

 

 

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Sponsored by the Division of Continuing Education
Iowa Summer Writing Festival
C215 Seashore Hall
The University of Iowa
Iowa City, IA 52242

Phone 319-335-4160
FAX 319-335-4743
iswfestival@uiowa.edu

Last updated on January 10, 2008