April Parent-Lit Workshop Now Open for Registration
Susan Ito’s January Parent Lit Writing Workshop is off to a terrific start, with fantastic discussions, a wonderful bonding community of parent writers, and of course, great writing.
The next session (April 1-June 3) is now open for registration. Find out more and register here.
Anyone who has had a child knows that parenting is one of life’s most exhilarating, awesome, maddening, humbling, crazymaking, joyful and wrenching experiences–which is what also makes it excellent inspiration for writing. This past decade has shown an explosion in “Parent-Lit,” or the literature of parenthood, in all forms: creative nonfiction, poetry and fiction.
This workshop is for anyone who wants to tap that rich vein in their writing. It’s for new parents, prospective parents, grandparents, stepparents, adoptive parents and birth parents. It’s for people all over who want to come together and share their stories and their words, to learn something about the craft of writing.
It’s not easy for some parents who want to write to get out of the house for a writing workshop. So this workshop will allow parents to participate while breastfeeding, sitting at home in a robe and pajamas, hanging out at the playground (with wireless internet, that is) or in the wee hours of the morning.
About the class:
The class will run for 10 weeks, starting April 1, 2007. Fee for the class is $350. Participants will learn the fundamentals of both creative nonfiction and fiction writing, using parenthood as a theme. We will read and discuss published examples of great parent-lit, and write some of our own. Assignments will consist of a combination of short exercises and more developed projects. If schedules permit, we may have several live “chats” via instant messaging. Class size is limited to ten.
Workshop topics will include (more to come, based on class requests):
* Turning Life Into Fiction
* The Parent Pantoum: the Poetry of Repetition
* The Many Faces of Creative Nonfiction
* Writing Columns: the Slice of Life
* Taking a Stand: Writing Op-Ed and Opinion Pieces
* Flash Fiction: writing short-shorts
* My Family, My Material: How to be intimate, yet not invasive when writing about relatives
5 replies on “April Parent-Lit Workshop Now Open for Registration”
I am currently taking this clas. I am having a blast! I am a mom and have a traditional day job. I enjoy being a mom and I enjoy writing. If there’s anyone out there who is both parent and writer, this is the place for you. You will get continued writing support and your world will EXPAND, seemingly overnight, like mine has. Susan Ito is a great teacher. I am grateful for having stepped forward with my pen!
Since becoming a mom, I’d had a difficult time finding a workshop to suit my new hectic schedule or a genre to provide a jumping-off point for writing about motherhood. Susan’s Parent Lit Workshop has been the perfect answer, invigorating my writing life- in spite of sleep deprivation! Susan’s expertise and great personality make her an accesible, helpful, fun workshop leader. Her workshop has also provided an invaluable sense of community, helping me “meet” many other writing parents. I highly recommend it!
I’m someone who is re-connecting with my writing voice, and I’m loving Susan’s class. It’s a place where I can get insightful, supportive and encouraging feedback on my work. It is an amazing resource, and I’m grateful that I’ve been able to participate.
Susan’s class is terrific for people at all stages of their writing. The readings are well-chosen, the feedback thoughtful and inspiring. Susan has fostered a wonderful writing community in her class and I feel lucky to be a part of it.
I am logging into Susan’s online parentlit workshop from Paris, France. As an American Mama living abroad it feels amazing to be able, thanks to this course, to be part of such a supportive and interesting group of parent writers!
I truly feel that this workshop is enabling me to take my writing to a new level as we all, under Susan’s thoughtful and warm guidance, explore the rich material that parentlit has to offer.