OWC 205 A — Memoir III: Envisioning an Ending
Quarter: Fall
Instructor(s): Julia Scheeres
Date(s): Sep 25—Dec 4
Class Recording Available: Yes
Class Meeting Day: Fridays
Grade Restriction: Letter grade only
Class Meeting Time: 12:00—1:15 pm (PT)
Please Note: No class the week of November 23
Tuition: $1290
Refund Deadline: Sep 27
Unit(s): 2
Enrollment Limit: 15
Status: Registration opens Aug 17, 8:30 am (PT)
Quarter: Fall
Day: Fridays
Duration: 10 weeks
Time: 12:00—1:15 pm (PT)
Date(s): Sep 25—Dec 4
Unit(s): 2
Tuition: $1290
Refund Deadline: Sep 27
Instructor(s): Julia Scheeres
Grade Restriction: Letter grade only
Enrollment Limit: 15
Recording Available: Yes
Status: Registration opens Aug 17, 8:30 am (PT)
Please Note: No class the week of November 23
This course is not open to the public, but rather by admission only. For more information on the Writing Certificate Program and its application process, please click here.
It is time to envision your memoir’s ending, which will provide a clear sense of destination and urgency to carry you through the rest of your project. We will review examples of published memoir endings, explore strategies for concluding a memoir, and work toward crafting a resonant ending that delivers on the promise of the beginning. We will also examine questions of truthfulness in memoir, including the use of representational scenes, time compression, and composite characters. You will continue generating new material to deepen themes and heighten the stakes of your story. While you may not yet be at the end of your manuscript, knowing where you want the story to land will help ensure coherence and imbue the pages you are still drafting with a sense of inevitability and resonance.
It is time to envision your memoir’s ending, which will provide a clear sense of destination and urgency to carry you through the rest of your project. We will review examples of published memoir endings, explore strategies for concluding a memoir, and work toward crafting a resonant ending that delivers on the promise of the beginning. We will also examine questions of truthfulness in memoir, including the use of representational scenes, time compression, and composite characters. You will continue generating new material to deepen themes and heighten the stakes of your story. While you may not yet be at the end of your manuscript, knowing where you want the story to land will help ensure coherence and imbue the pages you are still drafting with a sense of inevitability and resonance.
JULIA SCHEERES
Author
Julia Scheeres is the author of three books. Her memoir, Jesus Land, was a New York Times and London Times bestseller. Her narrative history of the Jonestown tragedy, A Thousand Lives, was included on many best-of-the-year lists. Her biography of Hearst columnist Elsie Robinson, Listen, World!, won the Northern California Book Award for Nonfiction. She is a regular contributor to The New York Times Book Review. Textbooks for this course:
(Required) Tobias Wolff, This Boys Life (ISBN 978-0802136688)
(Required) Lidia Yuknavitch, The Chronology of Water (ISBN 978-0979018831)
(Required) Lidia Yuknavitch, The Chronology of Water (ISBN 978-0979018831)