ENGLISH
201
Introduction to
Creative Writing
Spring
Semester 2005
Robert
Love Taylor
Office: Carnegie 201; Hours 1-2 MWF
email:rtaylor@bucknell.edu
This course is meant to
introduce the fundamental techniques of writing imaginatively in
fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction. It assumes that you may wish
to try writing in a variety of genres before
committing yourself to advanced courses in one genre or the other, and
it will prepare you for entering intermediate workshops in
creative writing (ENGL 202, 203, 204). In a larger sense, the course
should enable you to strengthen your ability to use written language
for expression and communication.
Assumptions: 1) Creativity in writing
grows out of a sense of formal possibilities in play with one's
imagination, 2) analyzing fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction is
an important
part of learning to write effectively and creatively, 3) writing
creatively enriches
your knowledge of literature, 4) artful writing is a process of
discovery, of happy accidents, as well as of calculated effects.
The course will be conducted as a
workshop, with your own weekly writing exercises as the chief basis for
discussion. However, published poems, essays, and stories will also be
discussed with a view to understanding how they make themselves worthy
of attention.
Policy on classroom
attendance:
--More than two absences will lower your grade
--More than three absences
will lower your grade a full letter
--Six classroom absences
will result in an F for the course.
In addition to attending regularly, you should
be prepared to answer and raise questions about the readings, propose
interpretations, and, when it seems necessary and appropriate, suggest
directions for discussion.
|Syllabus|