A memoir is a gateway to meaning. Like fingerprints, all memoirs are unique.
Why write a memoir?
• Writing can help us find the “why” in our lives, the question that takes us backstage, behind what we say and do.
• It can help us come to terms with a foundational period in our life with dignity and confidence, bringing grace to our troubled choices, to family drama, and even failure.
• It allows us to layer perspectives: to tell our story as if it were unfolding now and also bring in a later point of view, showing humor or greater understanding for ourselves and our families.
• It can be a way of building community as we put forward our unique contribution and share in the uniqueness of others.
• It gives art and creative thinking a place in our lives.

In this two-hour class, we’ll use various writing prompts to encourage our unique way of writing about our lives and our families, with help from Natalie Goldberg’s Writing Down the Bones and Arundhati Roy’s memoir, Mother Mary Comes to Me. We’ll look at craft elements such as animating a scene, using dialogue, and imagery to make our stories lively and interesting. Finally, we’ll look at ways of organizing a series of memories through song titles, college, an entry per week, a series of letters, etc. Please bring a notebook and a pen.

Registration required

Teaching the art of writing a story has been something Jeanne Salvato has loved to do professionally both in the States and in France. She has a degree in English literature from Cornell University, and has taught creative writing in various settings in Tucson, Paris, and Rochester.