September 22: Draft Essays 1 & 2

We talked through the assignment sheet for Essays 1 &2 => the "I" essays, and the process for writing them.

You then turned to your writing journal and looked for repeated topics, patterns in interest, recurring characters or references as a way to identify issues, ideas, topics that you might be lurking at the back of your mind as important - even though you might not have thought of them.  You then did some freewriting, listing, exploring - and I think I spoke individually with everyone in class today - to map out both the stories/events that will be the "action" of your essay, and the "aboutness" that will direct the focus/reflection/concept you are exploring.  It sounded to me like you had some great ideas, and I am very eager to read your writing!

We then talked about John McPhee's essay "The Patch."   I chose it as an elegant example of a segmented essay with more or less three storylines - the frame story, the story he tells his father, and "the facts" about fish - each of which serves a different function in the narration.  The title, and the heading under the title were chosen to set the scene for these narrations - and together - they told a story within a story = and offered McPhee's reflections on one part of his relationship to his father, his regard for impersonal medicine, and fishing the patch. If I didn't make it clear in class today - I love this essay.

For next class:
Read: Nye, 108 (I think that's the right page - whatever I said in class - the essay about moving to Palestine.)
Blog 5: Brainstorming for your first essay = do some writing to develop either your concept/focus (what you will write about); some of the stories/events (actual writing you might use to create "scenes" or the "action" of your piece); planning, or just random freewriting with a little of each to get you started,


In class, you will use the blog writing to do some workshopping and get some support & ideas.   We will also use a discussion of Nye to continue to talk about how creative nonfiction is "built."  Have fun and see you on Tuesday.