DESIRE & MEMORY: Poetry & Creative Nonfiction
we are always digging each other out from an intimate / sort of rubble….
– Natalie Diaz
Course Description
If I want you, how do I remember you?
If I cannot or should not want you anymore, how do I learn to forget you?
In this course, you will read and produce original writing that explores the transformative relationship between desire and memory. Of course, desire takes many shapes. Not only do we want love and sex but also trust, belonging, history, and knowledge. How does desire shape the ways we illuminate the past, present, and future? What do we want to remember? What do we want to forget? Specifically, through the genres of poetry and creative nonfiction, we will ask and creatively attempt to answer these questions with honesty, compassion, and careful attention to craft.
ENG 313 introduces students to the basic principles of craft through writing. Whether you are a beginning or practiced writer, this course will allow you to develop your creative writing skills, explore your voice, and participate in a creative community. We will explore poetry in the first half of the semester and creative non-fiction in the second half. Each unit will involve studying elements of craft, completing writing exercises, discussing course readings, and workshopping student projects.
We all have stories to tell, and how we share them defines us as writers. So while the writing process may be vulnerable, it does not have to be alienating or destructive. Throughout the semester, we will build a learning community that is supportive and thoughtful.
Required Course Texts
- Monica Ong, Silent Anatomies
- Natalie Diaz, When My Brother Was an Aztec
- Rigoberto González, Autobiography of My Hungers
Major Assignments
- Four original workshop submissions (2 poetry, 2 CNF)
- Letters of responses to workshop group
- Final Portfolio
- 6-10 polished poems
- Process-and-revision reflection on at least two poems (2 pages, double-spaced)
- “I remember” short essay (2-3 pages, single-spaced)
- Lyric research essay (4-5 pages, single spaced)
- Letters of response
- Four strongest letters written to peers (2 poetry, 2 CNF)
- 1 letter of response written by a peer who gave you the most effective critique