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Writing Creative Writing: Essays from the Field
Essential and engaging essays about the joys and challenges of creative writing and teaching creative writing by a host of Canada’s leading writers.
- GenresWriting
307 pages, Kindle Edition
Published May 5, 2018
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
July 19, 2018
Creative writing is now a business, more for the teachers than for the writers, for there are set wages for the former and uncertain ones for the latter. Creative writing has mushroomed from 77 programs across North America in 1977 to over 900 today. Every aspect of the craft has been analyzed and categorized, and every attempt is being made to extend the form through these programs. One gets the sense that it is impossible to become a creative writer today unless one takes one of these courses.
The book is a smorgasbord of essays written by teachers of creative writing. The subjects vary from the “how to”s of the various forms (poetry, prose, scriptwriting, blogging etc.) to subtle selling pitches for various programs by the highlighting of their unique approaches to teaching the craft, to snapshots of life in the classroom, to glimpses into the lives of the teachers and students. Women in writing is an area of exploration, as is the lamentation on funding cuts to creative writing programs in Canada. I felt the chafing that is going in universities where often the creative writing program is subservient to its colonial master, the English Department.
One essay deals with the challenge faced in teaching creative writing to students, especially overseas students, who have always learned by rote; in this instance, there is a need to “unlearn” past habits and arrive at “point zero” in order to begin the creative writing journey. This prompted me to ask the question: Can one ever be taught creative writing? As a former student of one of these programs, I grant that a student can learn the finer points of craft from such a course, but the writing comes from within, from an area that no creative writing program can reach.
I was intrigued by Priscila Upal’s essay on adaptation—the adaptation of ancient myths to portray contemporary personal stories—for I saw a connection with my novel The Ulysses Man that I wrote several years ago, where I modelled the travels of Odysseus to the modern immigrant story. I also liked the essay on writing sex scenes. and promised myself never to use metaphor in that context again. The reference to the writer as a keeper of secrets, where the subtle is preferred over the overt, was a refreshing perspective.
What I didn’t like was the academic buzz-words that infest this book: pedagogy, textual, intertextual, patriarchy, decolonization, agency; these words are overused in practically every essay. Given that this is a book about creative writing, I wished that more variety had been used in word choice.
There is universal agreement that the greatest contribution literature makes to society is empathy, which leads to social cohesion. But what of the teacher? Stephanie Bolster sums up the life of the creative writing instructor when she says, “A writer in academe gives up the freedom to write—in exchange for the freedom from poverty and perhaps obscurity.” Which prompted another question in my mind: Is the creative writer who seeks the safety of academe truly a courageous soul putting himself out to the winds to collect material for his work? How does one, who plays it safe, teach the really good writer who wants to take the risk? Food for thought...
The book is a smorgasbord of essays written by teachers of creative writing. The subjects vary from the “how to”s of the various forms (poetry, prose, scriptwriting, blogging etc.) to subtle selling pitches for various programs by the highlighting of their unique approaches to teaching the craft, to snapshots of life in the classroom, to glimpses into the lives of the teachers and students. Women in writing is an area of exploration, as is the lamentation on funding cuts to creative writing programs in Canada. I felt the chafing that is going in universities where often the creative writing program is subservient to its colonial master, the English Department.
One essay deals with the challenge faced in teaching creative writing to students, especially overseas students, who have always learned by rote; in this instance, there is a need to “unlearn” past habits and arrive at “point zero” in order to begin the creative writing journey. This prompted me to ask the question: Can one ever be taught creative writing? As a former student of one of these programs, I grant that a student can learn the finer points of craft from such a course, but the writing comes from within, from an area that no creative writing program can reach.
I was intrigued by Priscila Upal’s essay on adaptation—the adaptation of ancient myths to portray contemporary personal stories—for I saw a connection with my novel The Ulysses Man that I wrote several years ago, where I modelled the travels of Odysseus to the modern immigrant story. I also liked the essay on writing sex scenes. and promised myself never to use metaphor in that context again. The reference to the writer as a keeper of secrets, where the subtle is preferred over the overt, was a refreshing perspective.
What I didn’t like was the academic buzz-words that infest this book: pedagogy, textual, intertextual, patriarchy, decolonization, agency; these words are overused in practically every essay. Given that this is a book about creative writing, I wished that more variety had been used in word choice.
There is universal agreement that the greatest contribution literature makes to society is empathy, which leads to social cohesion. But what of the teacher? Stephanie Bolster sums up the life of the creative writing instructor when she says, “A writer in academe gives up the freedom to write—in exchange for the freedom from poverty and perhaps obscurity.” Which prompted another question in my mind: Is the creative writer who seeks the safety of academe truly a courageous soul putting himself out to the winds to collect material for his work? How does one, who plays it safe, teach the really good writer who wants to take the risk? Food for thought...
March 13, 2019
This is a unique collection of essays written by established writers and creative writing professors in Canada. The value in this book for me was three-fold. First, it offers a variety of perspectives on the state of arts and culture in Canada and how creative writing fits within it. The views taken are at times inspiring, and discouraging. Also, there are many interesting descriptions of writing exercises these professors use in their classrooms which offer a unique insight into the field as it’s situated in universities. Finally, the essays offer a glimpse of university creative writing programs in Canada—not a topic I realized I was interested in, but knowledge I don’t mind having in my back pocket nonetheless. Overall, this collection gave me some fresh inspiration and encouraged me to read more Canadian authors.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews