Mini-Session Workshops at The Center for Continuing Education

May and June Mini-Session Workshops

To register for the Mini-Sessions below, click the "Register online" link next to each class, or download a registration form and return it by mail.

Reading the Short Story

Instructor: Russell Shaffer
Wednesdays, 6 – 8 p.m.
May 25 – June 22
5 sessions; Tuition: $275
Register online»

Short stories give us a glimpse into the world of fiction. They allow us to take off bite-size morsels of the imaginary. In a few pages, short stories show us how to see the world in a new light. In our workshop, we’ll read authors who have mastered the art of the short story—Flannery O’Connor, Ernest Hemingway, Truman Capote, Alice Munro, and Tim O’Brien, to name a few. These authors each have something different to say to us. And each has a different way of saying it. Along with these readings, you’ll be encouraged to bring your own favorite short stories to discuss in class. Not only will we be looking at meaning, but also at the techniques authors use when writing short stories. Flannery O’Connor is known for her symbolism; Aimee Bender, for her magical realism. Ambrose Bierce catches us off guard with surprise endings. And Richard Russo tells us stories within stories. Throughout the class, you will have the opportunity to explore these techniques to strengthen and develop your own writing.

Russell Shaffer (BA, Weber State University; MFA, Sarah Lawrence College) spent the last two years teaching creative writing to youth in Queens. Before his college career, he taught ESL in northern Italy for two years. He has worked as a writer and editor at Inland Empire Magazine in Southern California, as well as freelanced for New Library Press, the Intermountain Commercial Record, and QuantumKids.org. Most recently he taught English at Fairleigh Dickinson University in New Jersey.

Triage for Your Writing: Saving Your Story

Instructor: Marek Fuchs
Wednesdays, 10 a.m. – 12p.m
May 25 – June 22
5 sessions; Tuition: $275
Register online»

You can admit it: you have a half-written article or book buried alive in a drawer. You were going along nicely and then—bam! it wasn’t working. Open drawer. Insert manuscript. But what wasn’t working? The reality is, many articles and books hit a point at which they need triage. It happens to the best of them. Sometimes the structure is off; other times the perspective is all wrong. Still more times, you have a good short piece that is thinning out because you are trying to force it into a larger format. The upshot? What you have is probably fixable. Take it out of that drawer. Revival might be only a single suggestion away.

Marek Fuchs (BA, Drew University) is currently a guest professor of nonfiction at Sarah Lawrence College and a guest lecturer of journalism at Manhattan College. He wrote the “County Lines” column for The New York Times for six years and is a daily contributor to TheStreet.com, with his articles and videos syndicated on Yahoo! Finance. Fuchs published A Cold-Blooded Business in 2009, a book called “riveting” by Kirkus Reviews. He co-founded Better Business Through Writing, a business editing firm, and was serving as the editor-in-chief of Fertilmind.net, a financial Web site, when the site won two consecutive “Best of the Web” awards from Forbes Magazine. Fuchs has also won multiple awards, including the Silver Award in 2007 from the League of American Communications Professionals, and was named the best journalism critic in the nation by Talking Biz Web site. When not writing or teaching, Fuchs serves as a firefighter in Hastings, New York.

Writing and Photography: Thinking Visually

Instructor: Marek Fuchs
Fridays, 10 a.m. – noon
May 27 – June 24
5 sessions; Tuition: $275
Register online»

Our best writers have always thought cinematically, and that’s a good thing. Not only does a visual orientation help us gather the good physical details that build into the larger truth we are setting down as writers, but with today’s emerging technologies putting articles and books on tablets and e-readers, accompanied more and more by vibrant photography and video, the writer must also become the visual artist. Take the first steps here. From travel writing to memoir and everything in between, see and practice how thinking visually can help you verbally.

Marek Fuchs (BA, Drew University) is currently a guest professor of nonfiction at Sarah Lawrence College and a guest lecturer of journalism at Manhattan College. He wrote the “County Lines” column for The New York Times for six years and is a daily contributor to TheStreet.com, with his articles and videos syndicated on Yahoo! Finance. Fuchs published A Cold-Blooded Business in 2009, a book called “riveting” by Kirkus Reviews. He co-founded Better Business Through Writing, a business editing firm, and was serving as the editor-in-chief of Fertilmind.net, a financial Web site, when the site won two consecutive “Best of the Web” awards from Forbes Magazine. Fuchs has also won multiple awards, including the Silver Award in 2007 from the League of American Communications Professionals, and was named the best journalism critic in the nation by Talking Biz Web site. When not writing or teaching, Fuchs serves as a firefighter in Hastings, New York.

There’s a Story in Every Day: An Introduction to Fiction

Instructor: Jimin Han
Saturdays, 11 a.m. – 1 p.m. (Please note new dates and time)
June 4-July 2
5 sessions; Tuition: $275
Register online»

There are two things most writers need and crave: time and space. In this class, we give ourselves the gift of time. In the nurturing space here at Sarah Lawrence College, we find and begin to write the stories we live every day. Using our histories, our memories, and our senses as launching pads, we will begin to transform the ordinariness of our lives into extraordinary fiction. This class is for those who want to write but don’t yet believe they have anything to say, as well as for those who want to write but need the time and space in which to do it.

Jimin Han (BA, Cornell University; MFA, Sarah Lawrence College). Her nonfiction and fiction can be found in The NuyorAsian Anthology, Global City Review, The Asian American Pacific Journal, on NPR, KoreanAmericanStory.org, and EssentialMom.com, among others.

Novel Writing Workshop

Instructors: Patricia Dunn and Jimin Han
Thursdays, noon – 2 p.m.
May 26 – June 23
5 sessions; Tuition: $275
Register online»

Are you in the middle of a first draft? Second, third, or when-will-this-be-over draft? Or are you just starting to think about writing a novel? Wherever you are in the process of writing an extended piece of fiction, this is a course that will challenge and support you. Along with group feedback, you and your work will receive a great deal of one-on-one attention from the instructors.

Patricia Dunn (MFA, Sarah Lawrence College) was managing editor of Muslim Wakeup!, America’s most popular Muslim online magazine with over 200,000 monthly readers, from 2003–2008. Her fiction has appeared in Global City Review, Salon.com, Women’s eNews, The Christian Science Monitor, The Village Voice, The Nation, and L.A. Weekly, among other publications. Her work is anthologized in Stories of Illness and Healing: Women Write Their Bodies, Kent State University Press. She blogs on the writing life at shewritesbutwhy.blogspot.com.

The Quest: Writing for Children and Young Adults

Instructor: Wendy Townsend
Mondays, 11 a.m. – 1 p.m.
May 23 – June 20
No class May 30
5 sessions; Tuition: $275
Register online»

One of the greatest editors of children’s books said, “I’m looking for energy.” In writing, where there is emotion, there is energy. When emotion and energy flow, the writing quickens and the story becomes clearer. In fact, a story can be described as an emotional quest the main character must undertake. Whether you are writing a picture book, a short story or a young adult novel, our focus is to help you bring energy to your story through developing your character’s quest and finding the emotional core. Our writing exercises will ask questions such as: What is your character’s quest? Is it worthy of your character and the reader? What are the obstacles? How can your character succeed? Our workshop goal is for each writer to come away with a draft of a picture book, a short story, or the beginnings of a novel.

Wendy Townsend (BS, Empire State College; MFA, Vermont College) has taught workshops for children’s writing at Empire State College for the last six years. In 2008, she published her first young adult novel, Lizard Love, which received a Booklist Starred Review. She also co-authored and illustrated Iguanas: A Guide to Their Biology and Captive Care in 1993. Her second novel, The Sundown Rule, will be released this summer by the publishing house Namelos and her picture book, Omar and the Lizards, is in the hands of the illustrator. She is also a regular contributor to Reptiles magazine, and has a third novel currently in the works.