The Creative Nonfiction Curriculum

During the first two semesters, creative nonfiction students work with Stonecoast faculty according to an individually designed program, designed to challenge and enhance your skill and talent and bring out the unique qualities of your creative nonfiction.   Students in these semesters will concentrate intensively on a range of writing strategies such as setting; character;voice and tone; sentence rhythm; image and detail; dialogue; narrative arc; and innovative writing structures and approaches.

The Stonecoast curriculum requires students in these semesters to read deeply in a range of classic and contemporary creative nonfiction, as well as writing and revising their own creative nonfiction.  Creative nonfiction faculty guide students to explore writing by essayists, journalists, and memoirists from all eras. Stonecoast’s flexible curriculum allows students to write imitative annotations in the style of other writers as well as brief, focused critical papers.

Third semester students round out their understanding of creative nonfiction writing with a third-semester enhancement project.  Stonecoast's six possible academic emphases (craft, creative collaboration, literary theory, publishing, teaching, and social action/community service) allow a student to pursue nearly any deeply held intellectual or artistic passion as an enhancement project. Recent enhancement projects in creative nonfiction have included founding and editing a zine about mothering.

Stonecoast's curriculum offers a unique combination of in-depth knowledge and aesthetic breadth. Special workshop opportunities for creative nonfiction writers during the residency, in addition to the ongoing Creative Nonfiction Workshop, include Master Classes for graduating seniors and half-residency elective workshops in student-driven topics such as "Column Writing," "Travel Writing," "Humor Writing." and "Writing the Personal Memoir."

Each residency, a range of presentations by Stonecoast faculty and visiting nonfiction writers addresses topics in creative nonfiction with in-depth discussion or writing exercises. Recent class topics have included "The Ethics of Memoir," "Narrative Strategies of the First Person," "Interviewing Techniques," " The Sentence as a Rhetorical Structure," "James Baldwin: The Price of the Ticket," and a great range of other topics. A lively mix of visitors  in creative nonfiction add energy to each residency to give readings and presentations; previous and scheduled visitors include Alison Hawthorne Deming, James Howard Kunstler, Meredith Hall, William Patrick, and Bill Roorbach.

Related Links:

Creative Nonfiction at Stonecoast

Creative Nonfiction Faculty

Visiting Creative Nonfiction Writers

Sample Creative Nonfiction Residency Presentations

Alumni Profile