WV Wesleyan Low-Residency MFA Program
Winter 2017 Residency Seminars
All students, regardless of genre track, are required to complete the assigned reading before the residency. Note that Graduate
Seminars (the seminars taught by graduating students) will run concurrently. You may attend the Graduate Seminar of your
choice during each concurrent session; there will be a sign-up sheet at the residency to ensure balance in attendance; you are
required to complete pre-assigned work, if any, for only the Graduate Seminars you attend.
Purchase (or check out of a library) all assigned books (there are two assigned books); download and print all attached
documents (there are seven PDF attachments), or store all documents in an organized fashion electronically, for easy access. At
the residency, you are required to have at the ready all materials relevant to the day’s seminars.
ONCE UPON A TIME LAST TUESDAY: THE POWER OF FAIRY TALES, Diane Gilliam, 1-day seminar. Jungian
psychology views fairy tales, like dreams, as one of the ways in which the unconscious tries to tell us what we need to know. When
we engage with fairy tales as we would with dreams, understanding each element of the tale as an aspect of a single psyche, they can
map for us some of the deepest contents and structures of the human psyche. When we bring them to bear on our writing, our
own work can borrow from the depth and appeal of the fairy tale, while at the same time amplifying the tradition by lending it our
own lived and felt experience. We will look at two tales, “Brier Rose” and “The Handless Maiden” for what they might tell us about
the creative life. The poems and novel excerpt in the handout are by way of possibilities for engaging with fairy tales—not so much
to look at analytically as to see as opening a creative space.
ASSIGNED READING:
Download 1 Gilliam PDF which includes: Brothers Grimm (Brier Rose, The Maiden without Hands), Linda Pastan (This
Enchanted Forest), Lisel Mueller (The Mermaid, Reading the Brothers Grimm to Jenny, Voices from the Forest, Bread and
Apples, The Story), Denise Levertov (The Spirits Appeased, The last heavy fairy tale, in which one lays one’s heart bare
before the knife), Margaret Atwood (Girl without Hands), Eleanor Wilner (Beauty and the Beast), Anne Sexton (The
Maiden without Hands), George Ella Lyon (Gina, Jamie, Father, Bear)
THE ROLE OF VULNERABILITY, Karen Salyer McElmurray, 1-day seminar. American scholar and author Brené Brown
says that “vulnerability is the birthplace of many of the fulfilling experiences we long for—love, belonging, joy, creativity, and trust,”
and that “the process of regaining our emotional footing in the midst of struggle is where our courage is tested and our values are
forged.” This seminar will examine the role of vulnerability in our work as writers, especially of prose. We will discuss issues of
corporeality and craft, including absence and presence of details of characterization; showing much and withholding much on the
page; risks inherent to writing darkness and writing light. We will look at a variety of examples from film and from literary works
including “Leslie in California” by Andre Dubus, “The Death of Marilyn Monroe” by Sharon Olds, and other selections.
ASSIGNED READING:
Download 1 McElmurray PDF
WRITING ABOUT ECOLOGY, Katie Fallon, 1-day seminar. Dictionaries define ecology as the study of the relationships
among organisms and their environment. But how do writers define it? Does writing about ecology have to be political, or
celebratory, or reverent? This seminar will explore some of the different ways we can write about ecology, which can include nature
writing, food writing, travel writing, place-based writing, and more. We will discuss the importance of close examination, how to
“translate” science, and ways to incorporate reflection and personal experience. Although this seminar will focus primarily on
creative nonfiction, writers of other genres should find this discussion useful, as well. Participants should come prepared to discuss
the assigned reading and will be asked to complete a short writing exercise.
ASSIGNED READING:
Download 1 Fallon PDF which includes “Buckeye” by Scott Russell Sanders; excerpt from The Third Plate by Dan Barber;
and excerpt from The Forest Unseen by David George Haskell.
ANOTHER VOICE AT THE END OF THE LINE: CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN WRITERS, Doug Van Gundy,
1-day seminar. Students in a low-residency MFA program like ours know this as well as anyone: despite our successful efforts at
building an expansive community of writers, our work—by its very nature—is something that we do alone. This isolation frequently
drives us to reach out to others—writers who can understand our lonely set of circumstances—for solace, counsel, encouragement
and support. Keats and Shelley, Flaubert and Sand, Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell: these writers and their art were sustained by
their extended correspondence. For the past year, poet Marc Harshman and I have been maintaining a regular correspondence and
offering challenges and writing prompts to one another, twice engaging in month-long “poem-a-day” challenges. In this seminar we
will discuss the letters between Leslie Marmon Silko and James Wright, look at poems written collaboratively by Jim Harrison and
Ted Kooser, and share samples of the poetry, commentary, encouragement and friendship that has grown from the email
correspondence between Marc and me. We will explore the benefits of a literary friendship, and offer suggestions for cultivating
such a correspondence of your own.
ASSIGNED READING:
The Delicacy and Strength of Lace, James Wright and Leslie Marmon Silko, Graywolf Press, 2009
(ISBN-13: 978-1555975432)
LEARNING BY DESIGN: USING IMITATION IN CREATIVE WRITING, Nickole Brown, 1-day seminar. Dancers
follow choreographers, visual artists try to copy great works of art or to replicate a subject placed in the middle of a studio, vocalists
and players of musical instruments all learn pieces composed by others. So why should writers be any different? Why this immense
pressure to write unlike anything else that's ever been inked? Why wouldn't poets need to be taught as apprentices, modeling their
work after others until they master the craft? As Nicholas Delbanco mentions in his introduction to The Sincerest Form, sincere
imitation—imitation that truly emulates a poet's original work and uses it as a starting place—can help a writer to “earn” her own
originality. This craft talk, designed for writers of both poetry and prose, is a pedagogical discussion about using imitative exercises
to broaden your range and develop a true muscle memory for craft. No required reading, but come prepared to write—this is a
generative workshop that will require everyone’s participation.
“THE THING AND THE OTHER THING,” Marie Manilla, 1-day seminar. Often the initial impulse behind a piece of
writing is singular: a memory, an object, a sound, a mood, a lesson learned, an encounter, a national or global disaster, a personal
loss or wound, etc. To add layers, writers then look for the “other thing,” (or several things), often seemingly disparate, to add
depth. But how do we find the “other thing”? How do we weave it into our story, poem, or essay in a way that will inextricably link
both “things”? In this seminar we’ll examine several works to see how the authors braided and layered seemingly incongruent
“things” together. We’ll then do a generative exercise in which we’ll look for “the thing and the other thing” to weave together in
our own work.
ASSIGNED READING:
Download 1 Manilla PDF which includes “Bigfoot Stole My Wife” by Ron Carlson, “Blackberries” by Leslie Norris, “Showing
the Father” by Mary Moore, and “Our Secret” by Susan Griffin.
ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS TO GUIDE YOUR READING:
Answer the following questions for both “Bigfoot Stole My Wife” and “Blackberries”
1. What, in your view, is the initial, primary “thing” readers encounter in the short story?
2. What is the “other thing” introduced later?
3. How does the second “thing” inform the first, and vice versa?
4. What would be lost if the second “thing” had not been introduced?
5. Other than the primary “thing and the other thing,” are there additional threads in the story that add layers and depth?
“Showing the Father”
1. What, in your view, is the primary “thing” the poem is about?
2. What, in your view, is the “other thing”?
3. Going section by section, what additional “things” are introduced, and how do they inform the primary “thing”?
“Our Secret”
1. Make a list of the various “things” Griffin introduces in this nonfiction excerpt.
2. How does Griffin present them? Does this organization work for you?
3. Does one “thing” surface as primary to you? If so, what?
4. Though this is a brief excerpt, how do you anticipate these various “things” will eventually come together?
PROCESS, IMAGE, FORM: WHAT WRITERS CAN LEARN FROM VISUAL ARTISTS, Richard Schmitt, 1-day
seminar. I picture, vividly, a class focused on writing process and revision, to see, literally, what we might learn about our work
from illustrators, painters, sculptors, (even architects, choreographers, acrobats). I picture, still, a series of reflections, deliberations,
conversations, generated by and correlated with illustrations via a handout I will provide, the goal being to gain new perspectives on
some familiar situations we typically encounter while attempting to write.
ASSIGNED READING:
A Giacometti Portrait by James Lord (ISBN-13: 978-0374515737)
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THE ENDEARING PERSISTENCE OF HOUSEHOLD OBJECTS, Devon McNamara, 1-day seminar. Explore how the
objects of our daily lives, whether long ignored or redolent with personal associations, can unlock the springs of our individual
expressions of creative work. Muriel Rukeyser writes in The Life of Poetry, “a poem is not its words or its images, any more than a
symphony is its notes or a river its drops of water.” The work a poem does, she asserts, “can make change in existing conditions.”
Change moves society, even civilization itself, but the vital movement begins in the individual writer’s response to what is ordinary
and ever at hand. No required reading but a list of relevant quotations will be supplied on the day of the seminar from among the
following:
Jan Beatty, the poem “Pittsburgh Poem”
Evan Boland, Domestic Violence and Outside History
Matthew Dickman, the poem “Happy Birthday”
Loren Eiseley, The Mind as Nature
Nikky Finney, Head Off & Split
Medbh McGuckian, Marconi’s Cottage
Irene McKinney, Unthinkable
Czesław Miłosz, Unattainable Earth, the poem
“Angels”
Gerald Stern, the poem “Gelato”
Wallace Stevens, the poem “Sunday Morning”
Richard Wilbur, the poem “Love Calls Us to the
Things of This World”
HOW TO SEE: A SEMINAR IN OBSERVATIONAL WRITING, Eric Waggoner, 1-day seminar. This seminar will
explore using sensory imagery of all types (not just sight) as the catalyst for lyrical and narrative writing. For reference points, we’ll
look at excerpts from J. A. Baker’s The Peregrine, Edward Abbey’s Desert Solitaire, and work by John McPhee, Wisłwa Szymborska,
and others. No assigned reading.
ALTERNATIVE NARRATIVE STRATEGIES, Jaimy Gordon, 1-day seminar. No assigned reading.
TOEING THE LINE—OR NOT, Mark DeFoe, 1-day seminar. Poetry often defies definition. Sometimes we simple say, “it
sounds like a poem.” Often we may be reduced to saying, “Well, it looks like a poem.” Indeed, perhaps the most distinguishing
characteristic of poetry may be its appearance on the page. Poetry uses lines in ways prose does not. In this seminar we shall
consider varieties of the poetic line. In class we shall explore different line techniques, their strengths and limitations—where they
might begin, end, break, their length, and the line’s impact on meaning and sonic effects.
ASSIGNED READING:
Download 1 DeFoe PDF
PANEL DISCUSSION: ABOUT PLACE, Mark DeFoe, Diane Gilliam, Karen McElmurray, Doug Van Gundy. The
relationship between place and identity has been an aspect of this program from the beginning. At the very first residency, Founding
Director Irene McKinney moderated a panel called “New Directions in Regional Writing,” exploring pitfalls and opportunities in
place-oriented writing—especially Appalachian literature—and even interrogating the idea of regional lit. We thought we would
revisit this theme this residency and open up the discussion to any aspect of what it means to “write about place.” We hope to
discuss ideas about writing this region, but not limit the discussion solely to Appalachian writing.
GRADUATE SEMINARS
Concurrent January 5 @ 9 am:
DEVELOPING EMPATHY IN PERSONAL NARRATIVES WITH THE IMAGINING I, Lisa Hayes-Minney
(nonfiction). Empathy, the ability to understand and feel another’s perspective without judgment, has been consistently
declining in the American culture for nearly forty years. Some studies correlate this cultural drop in empathy with the
decline in the popularity of fiction. Meanwhile, with the memoir craze of the 90’s, the popularity of nonfiction has been on
the rise. Thus, I argue that nonfiction writers are responsible to fill the gap--to produce works that help Americans learn,
practice, and develop their empathic skills. During this seminar, we will discuss the importance of empathy and the key
reasons fiction often elicits empathy. Then, by looking at the works of Kristin Dombek, Sonja Livingston, Bernard Cooper
and Terry Tempest Williams, we will examine ways we can create an empathetic connection between our readers and our
characters in nonfiction using the narrative strategy of the Imagining I.
ASSIGNED READING:
Download 1 Hayes-Minney PDF: “Monkeys Might Fly” by Kristin Dombek
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ROBBING THE HEADLINES: REPURPOSING TRUE EVENTS IN FICTION, Amanda Jo Runyon (fiction).
Fiction writers are often asked where they get ideas for their work. Author Gwen Rubio said writers “rob the cradle, rob
the grave, or rob the themes of other works” to get ideas. If all writing is inspired by the author’s experiences or
observations in life, how do fiction writers decide how much real life material to include in short stories and novels? This
seminar will discuss the art of “robbing the headlines” and what it means to repurpose historical or true events for a new
use in fiction. We will examine excerpts from works by Jayne Anne Phillips, Colum McCann, Lee Smith, Andrea Kleine, and
others, and discuss the techniques these authors use, the place their work occupies on the spectrum between nonfiction
and fiction, and the role true events play in the work. We will discuss the criteria for what makes certain true events
effectively repurposeable, and how this applies to our own writing. No assigned reading. Handouts will be given in class.
Participants should think of one true event that has inspired their writing and be prepared to discuss it during the seminar.
Concurrent January 6 @ 9 am:
BREAKING PREDICTABLE MOLDS: NARRATOR AS TEACHER, Megan Mallory (nonfiction). As writers of
creative nonfiction, how do we tell a story that avoids predictability and helps our reader see something ordinary in an
extraordinary way? This has been my challenge in trying to write about teaching, a subject universal to us all and, in many
literary examples, predictably presented with the teacher as savior. The answer could lie in educational theory: effective
teaching narratives follow the principles of effective teaching and learning as set forth by child psychologist Lev Vygotsky.
The narrative—and the narrator—become the teacher. My purpose in this seminar is to explore the connection between
theory and practice. We’ll look at how writers such as Bel Kaufman and Ilana Garon bring the classroom to life in
unpredictable ways, helping the reader to learn and experience the world of education anew in the process. Then we’ll
explore Richard Hoffman’s first-person narrative techniques as a way to translate theory beyond the genre of teaching. No
assigned reading. Handouts will be given in class.
“PAPA DON’T PREACH”: ELICITING PROXIMITY IN SPIRITUAL WRITING, Jeremy Bryant
(nonfiction). What comes to mind when you hear the word spiritual? Do you think of “witnessing” or of writers finding
God and becoming “better?” Do you think of writers who create works for a specific religious audience? One way to think
about spirituality is to consider it a process of attempting to make meaning out of life while striving to do the least harm to
the universe at large. A risk that many spiritual writers face is over-indulgence of the intellectual—lecturing or preaching—
which moves the reader further away from the narrator’s experiences. How do spiritual writers provide sufficient
background on spiritual traditions while avoiding lectures that distance the reader from the narrator? How do they avoid
preaching? We will explore works by Faith Adiele, Suzanne Clores, and Ram Das Batchelder. Each of these writers uses
specific methods to achieve proximity or intimacy between the narrator and the reader without over-indulging the
intellectual. Assigned reading: “Weekend Wicca” by Suzanne Clores. Additional handouts will also be provided in class.
ASSIGNED READING:
Download 1 Bryant PDF: “Weekend Wicca” by Suzanne Clores
I DREAM OF DAZZLING DIALOGUE, Elizabeth Hawkins (fiction). Are you suffering from dialogue cringe? This
is a common occurrence when we read dialogue so bad we cringe and think, “Good grief, who talks like that?” There is,
however, a solution and it is called dazzling dialogue. Good writers use dazzling dialogue to help give their characters a
voice that will be either very realistic or very distinctive to the reader. This dialogue comes from the understanding that
dialect, phrasing, and language work together to produce realistic situations and characters that break traditional gender,
regional, and ethnic stereotypes. My purpose is to demonstrate knowledge of and proper usage of eye-dialect to assist
writers with crafting realistic dialogue for characters of various backgrounds. By studying excerpts from well-known
writers—including Robert Gipe, Zora Neale Hurston, and Toni Morrison—who demonstrate a range of different types of
dialogue, we will discuss the importance of communication among characters. And with fun exercises, we will practice
crafting dialogue from characters that are outside of each writer’s comfort zone. No assigned reading.
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