SEMINAR | When Things Happen: Mastering Chronology in Fiction and Nonfiction
December 12 @ 2:00 pm – 4:30 pm EST
Learn to manipulate your reader‘s experience of time to create pace, surprise, and deeper engagement with your words.
For Fiction and Creative Nonfiction, Essay and Memoir
In the real world, we live our lives forward, chronologically, and at the same rate as everyone else. But writers can master time to speed up and slow down the reader’s experience, move through time for emotional effects, and alter time to support dramatic moments.
In this session—equally helpful for both fiction and nonfiction writers—we’ll examine how narratives by such authors as Cheryl Strayed, Ryan Van Meter, Michelle Kuo, Jaquira Diaz, JRR Tolkien, Jeannette Walls, Nicholson Baker, and others all strategically manipulate the reader’s experience of time and to what effect.
We’ll examine the pacing of a story (how quickly through time we move), the sequence of storytime (whether the story is being told chronologically or not), and the use of flashback and flashforward. We’ll also examine the use of narrative summary versus scene and learn techniques like sentence length, visual layout, and more to alter the experience of time and increase reader engagement in a story.
In this seminar, you will:
- EXPLORE the key elements of manipulating time in your narratives and what effects they have on readers
- DISCOVER alternate storytelling structures for fiction and nonfiction
- LEARN HOW to break free of traditional, linear time management in your narratives
This course is ideal for all writers …
- at all levels, from experienced writers to those new to their genre
- who feel stuck in “this happened, and this happened, then this happened” structures
- who’d like to experiment with structure to make sure their work captures the attention and engages their readers
- struggling with where and how to use flashbacks or add backstory
Closed captioning is available. ✔
Think you might miss a class? No worries, replays will be available. ✔
ABOUT YOUR INSTRUCTOR
Ethan Gilsdorf is a writer, teacher, performer, and a huge nerd. A sharp, funny instructor, Ethan is the author of the award-winning memoir Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks. His work appears in the New York Times, Washington Post, Esquire, Wired, O, Oprah Magazine, Huffington Post, Brevity, Electric Literature, Poetry, and The Southern Review and has been named twice as “Notable” in Best American Essays.
Noted for his thoughtful, generous, and encouraging feedback, Ethan teaches at GrubStreet, where he leads the Essay Incubator program; at LitArts RI and CRAFT TALKS; is on the faculty of Solstice MFA Program at Lasell University; and teaches anyone how to play Dungeons & Dragons.
Testimonials from Past Students
“My work is taken seriously in Ethan’s workshops, and I am taken seriously as a writer.”
“What a master teacher.”
“This may be the best writing class I’ve ever taken.”
“You really are one of the best writing teachers I’ve had.”
“I’m grateful beyond measure for the care that Ethan has taken in teaching us.”
THE FINE PRINT
We understand that life can get in the way of your plans. We want you to be able to get the most out of your course, and our refund policy is designed to balance your need for flexibility with our deadlines and obligations to our teachers.
Before the class, you may request a refund less a $10.00 processing fee.
Please keep in mind that no refunds or credits will be issued after class begins.
Questions? Please email Info@writingcraft.com
