English 290 - Crafting Creative Nonfiction

                                                                                                           Robert Hosmer

                                                                                                            Th 1-2:50 p.m.


“The great thing is to last and get your work done and see and hear and learn and understand; and write when there is something that you know; and not before; and not too damned much after. . .the thing to do is work and learn to make it.”

Ernest Hemingway: Death in the Afternoon

English 290 will be a course for students with a serious interest in developing and refining their skills at formal essay writing. Because reading and writing are complementary cognitive activities, we will spend time reading essays by some of the best writers of the last 100 years or so: Virginia Woolf, George Orwell, James Baldwin, Adrienne Rich, Richard Rodriguez, Alice Walker and Gore Vidal. Selections will be arranged in thematic clusters to inspire, prompt, provoke or incite responses that will generate formal essays. Attention will be paid to the writing process, particularly revision, and to matters of style (“the perfection of style is to be clear without being mean, Aristotle said).

English 290 will be a combination of formal class meetings, workshops, and tutorials.

All majors welcome. Admission by permission of instructor. Interested students must complete questionnaire (available in Pierce 105). Class list will be available prior to the first class meeting.