This class is for nonfiction writers interested in personal narrative and less linear, more inquisitive and fragmented book forms. In twelve weeks, Cinelle Barnes will guide the class through ten reading assignments and ten generative prompts that aim to yield ten essay ideas or drafts unified by a most-fitting theme, quest, or form.
And because nonfiction projects are mainly sold to publishers on proposal, this 12-week generator's goal is to equip writers with a working skeleton for a submission-ready proposal.
Cinelle will bookend the course with two sessions on proposals.
This course also celebrates the anti-composite, offering several ways to see, shape, or sculpt personal narrative. In other words, this course is about the multitudes in you—and how they can all come together to tell a singular, textured story.
Cinelle will draw from her experience of writing the proposals for, and submitting, Malaya: Essays on Freedom and her work-in-progress, sharing the dos and don'ts and maybes of nonfiction proposal writing. She will compare and contrast proposal elements with the finished book: giving a sneak peek into the long, often circuitous process of ideation, execution, revision, and completion.
*No class February 14th