Apple polishing: fall classes to revive a writer

So many of my friends and family are students or teachers, eager for the start of the academic year, I longed to go back to school too. Only not a regimented way. Not by taking entrance exams or aptitude test. Not, just by choosing classes I wanted to take, when I wanted to take them.

For anyone else feeling that yearning (or if members of your writing critique group keep saying, dude, just take a class!) I’ve compiled a list. Some of these are local to my area of North Texas. Many are online, available anywhere in the world with internet access. Costs vary, schedules vary. The following options are listed in alphabetic order.

2-Day Film School: Carpe Diem Pictures presents a live workshop on the fundamentals of filmmaking October 21-22 at the Dallas Marriott Suites Medical/Market Center, 2493 N. Stemmons Freeway in Dallas. Early bird registration (through September 21) is $389. Later registration $439. Register at the site. For additional details, email questions to dfw2dayfilm@gmail.com or call 940-600-3939.

image: Pixabay

MasterClass: This online classroom offers an incredible number of instructors in various fields, including writing. When I took James Patterson’s course here this past year, the cost was $99, but check the site for specifics, including authors in other disciplines.

NaNoWriMo: If you’ve ever signed up for NaNoWriMo, the annual November writing marathon, you’ve already received their email about the online creative writing courses. If not, read on. (Warning: the discounted rates mentioned here only apply if you at least intend to be a NaNoWriMo participant.) This year, the internet learning project, Coursera is teaming with Wesleyan College to offer five online writing courses for WriMos. Check out the site for details. Each class is offered at a discounted price of $29. After November, participants will be able to share their first chapters with the group for another round of peer review.

The Writer’s Garret: This Dallas institution founded by the late Texas poet-laureate Jack Myers and his wife Thea Temple offers both online and in-person classes in elements of fiction, nonfiction and poetry, from overviews of creative writing elements, to voice to writing with diverse characters, to pitching a project, and more. Costs typically in the $100-$160 range for multiple session classes, but see the site for early bird and members' discounts.

The Writer’s Path at SMU: This is Southern Methodist University’s continuing education program in creative writing. You can take their complete pathway, from which selected participants are chosen for a seminar in New York with editors and agents. Four to six-week long on-site classes leading to the New York seminar range in price from $450 to $625. More intensive tutorials in editing, revision and manuscript evaluation are also available. See the tutorial site or email suzannefrank@smu.edu for more information.

Writers Guild of Texas: This North Texas group offers in-person, daylong semiannual writing workshops. It fall workshop, October 7, features Cindy Dees, New York Times bestselling romance author (who also now writes epic fantasy). 9 a.m. to noon, in the Richardson Civic Center, 411 W. Arapaho, Richardson, Texas. Registration is $25 for WGT members, $35 for nonmembers. Limited seating, so the group urges registration by September 23. Price increases by $5 at the door, to the extent seats are available. See the site for details.

Writing Workshops Dallas: Online classes in fiction, nonfiction, screenwriting and poetry, from a plethora of published, often award-winning Dallas-area writers, teachers and editors. Classes can run multiple weeks or require no more than a single afternoon of your time. Costs range from the low double digits to mid-triples. See the site for details.

Just tell me a story about a guy who. . .

In looking over previous posts, I wonder if I’ve put too much emphasis on the elements of a scene and slighted the importance of character.  Even though I don’t write screenplays, I love the late Blake Snyder’s guide to screenwriting, “Save the Cat!” for his insistence that a movie (for “movie,” substitute “any fiction”) has to be about someone.  As he credited his father with saying, “Tell me a story about a guy who. . .”  Of course, it doesn’t have to a literal guy.  It can be a woman, a child, or as we fantasy and science fiction writers know, a sentient robot – any character that you and your readers can identify with.

I also sympathize with Snyder for admitting that he usually got an idea first and then had to come up with a lead character to carry that theme.  So where does a writer – you, for instance – come up with a character to match those story elements you drew from your ideas folder?  For novels, I use a seven-phase, multipage character worksheet I got in a creative writing class at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, although I don’t know its ultimate source.  It starts with the character’s ethnic background and ends with a description of what the character will become over the course of the book.

I don’t usually do quite as much for short stories.  But for any fictional characters, I add my secret ingredient – a long, lonely, boring drive with nothing to do except converse with them.  The last conversation occurred during a trip to a destination several counties away.  Somewhere I’ve been so many times I could drive it in my sleep.  But your conversation doesn’t have to happen during a drive.  You could be gardening.  Or doing housework.  Or just daydreaming and goofing off.  Whatever it is, seriously, schedule some time alone with your characters, a date, if you want to think of it that way.  A few hours isn’t too much to ask them to spend with you before a word hits the page.  Only don’t tell your friends you’re dating a sentient robot.

(Although Snyder died in 2009, his website is still out there along with lots of dishing, including a site that says the real way to write a screenplay is to start with, gasp, the character.  Whatever – just tell me a story about a guy who. . . .)