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WORD-for-WORDS
A monthly newsletter with news for the WWW Community, writing wisdom,
prompts, and information on upcoming events.
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Come see what's new
at the Westport Writers' Workshop this Fall! |
Alas, summer does not last forever. But we hope you'll be cheered and inspired when you see the full schedule of offerings we're planning for our Fall 2012 session. If you can't sign up for a full series, we've got some great new Saturday workshops as well. General registration officially begins August 15. Until then, prior workshop participants have priority to re-register for their spots. (Current participants: Don't lose your spot! Make sure we hear from you if you plan to re-register.)
Spaces fill quickly. Don't delay if you're ready to get your writing life back in gear or under way.
New workshops series launching this Fall: - "Creativity Jumpstart" Brown Bag (Mondays, 12 to 1 pm, beginning Sept. 10). Start your week writing! Join us every Monday for one hour of directed writing, using prompts and quick, inspirational "assignments", to get your creativity gears in motion. Free trial period begins Sept. 10. Hurry and reserve your spot.
You can register now for any of the above new workshops and many more. If you want us to hold your spot from spring or summer, sessions we must hear from you by August 14. All workshops are open to the public for general registration on August 15.
We've also got some great new Saturday Workshops, including a new talk in Suzanne Hoover's Essentials for the Fiction Writer series. See article below for details.
We look forward to seeing you!
Jessica Bram
Founder/ Director
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Events
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What have you been writing? We want to know! Please share your work with us at our next
OPEN MIC NIGHT
This Week
Thursday, Aug. 9
7 - 9:30 pm
Admission $5
Read a selection of your work to an audience of your peers and other interested listeners. All genres including Fiction, Memoir and Poetry are welcome. Or just come to listen and be inspired.
Only $5 admission includes coffee, tea, cookies and inspiration. Bring your friends, and learn more about your fellow writers.
Register Now
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In Case You Missed...
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On Saturday July 14, screenwriter and TV writer GiGi New led an intensive Screenwriting Immersion Workshop that guided a select group of committed writers through the screenwriting craft. She covered a wide array of topics that pertain to delivering a strong script for today's market. Two of GiGi New's screenplays and movie ideas pitched to Hollywood producers are currently in development.
Disappointed that you missed the workshop? If you are ready to finally get your screenplay onto the page, join GiGi on October 19, 20 and 21 when she leads a 3-Day Intensive Screenwriting Immersion workshop. Registration is limited to allow time to focus on each writer's work.
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Registration for Fall 2012 workshops
is currently under way.
Aug. 1-14: Priority registration for Spring/Summer 2012 participants who wish to re-enroll in their same workshop.
Aug. 15: All workshops open for registration.
Don't delay if you're thinking of registering.
Workshops fill quickly.
For information call (203)227-3250.
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For the first time this fall, we are excited to offer a new one-time Saturday workshop:
Structure and Plot of the Contemporary American Novel
Saturday, Sept. 8, 9 am to noon
Sandra Rodriguez Barron is the author of two novels published by HarperCollins: Stay With Me (2010) and The Heiress of Water (2008), winner of the 2007 International Latino Book Award for debut fiction.
DESCRIPTION
The structure of a novel may be its most essential element. Regardless of genre, every well-crafted novel must have a cohesive structure and plot
that keep the reader engaged to the end. For the novice as well as the most accomplished writer, how to go about structuring one's novel may also be the most difficult challenge faced. This workshop will take on that challenge.
This workshop will demonstrate the fundamentals of story structure, and show how to develop an enticing plot that will keep readers wanting more. We will introduce The Hero's Journey as one of the basic structures of storytelling, as well as present structural elements inherent to themes such as love, coming-of age, pursuit, revenge, and others.
In this workshop participants will learn:
- How to structure your novel;
- How to shape your story through linear methods like plot diagrams and outlining;
- Alternatively, how to shape your story using non-linear, intuitive methods such as character-driven plotting, dream/sensory plotting, imitation, and tracking;
- How to create a satisfying rhythm of action;
- The use of reflection in your novel;
- How to use the concept of stakes, yearning, consequences and causality, and power shifts, to create a dynamic narrative.
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One Time  Saturday Workshops
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Here is what's coming this Fall:
Structure and Plot of the Contemporary Novel
with Sandra Rodriguez Barron
Sept. 8, 9 am to 12 noon
The structure of a novel may be its most essential element. Regardless of genre, every well-crafted novel must have a cohesive structure and plot that keep the reader engaged to the end. For the novice as well as the most accomplished writer, how to go about structuring one's novel may also be the most difficult challenge faced. This workshop will take on that challenge.
Register Now
Screenwriting: 3-Day Intensive
Oct. 19, 20, and 21
9 am to 12 noon or 1 pm
"The story doesn't need to be original, but the execution does." This is the basic
premise for screenplays. Perhaps every story has been told. But has it been told in the way that you can tell it?
 If you have a story idea that you believe will make a great feature length film, then don't miss out on this opportunity to get your idea onto the page under the guidance of professional screenwriter, GiGi New.
This 3-day Screenwriting Intensive Workshop will focus on specific and concrete techniques for writing a great screenplay that's compelling and cinematic. The workshop is appropriate for anyone who has a screenplay already in progress, as well as anyone with a story idea and a desire to finally get started.
During the workshop, you will begin to craft the first few pages of your screenplay and receive feedback. We will get specific with story, character arcs, putting action on the page, and how to convey your unique voice.
Whether you are a beginner or a seasoned pro, this workshop will enable you to see how a story progresses on the page. Are your character choices interesting? Does your idea track well and have stakes that move the story forward?
How to Publish Your eBook
Sept. 15, 9 am to 1 pm
It's the hottest news in publishing today: Today many authors are bypassing traditional publishers and reaching readers by publishing their work as ebo oks at relatively low cost. Digital format can achieve a readership, earn fans, create buzz, and yes, earn money. In fact, self-published e-books have cracked best seller lists and are changing the face of publishing.
If you are ready to publish your novel, short stories, essay or memoir as an eBook, this workshop is for you. Join us as we learn how to publish and promote an eBook suitable for all formats from iPads to Kindles to Nooks. Participants will learn the insides and out - from manuscript to finished book - of the eBook publishing process from a writer's perspective and direct personal experience.
"Get Published" Boot Camp
Sept. 22, 9 am to 12 noon
You've worked hard to develop your craft. You know your essays, short stories or poems are good, and you get great feedback from readers. Isn't it time you had your work published? Are you ready to begin building your portfolio of publishing credits?
Becoming a good writer is just the first step. Finding markets for your work takes research. Breaking into those markets requires a focused plan and d
edicated follow-through. But where to begin?
The objective of this workshop is to show you how to develop a focused action plan for selling your short stories, essay, and poems to magazines, literary journals, respected online publications, and other reputable press venues.
Please note that the emphasis of this workshop is on short pieces (not novels or nonfiction books).
Register Now
Cracking the Code of the American Bestseller
Saturday, Oct. 27, 9 am to 12 noon
What can we learn from studying the most successful novels of all time? What do these books have in common? And what do they tell us about the general reading public and about ourselves?
These are essential questions for the contemporary fiction writer, and the subject of this important workshop. From tempting glimpses inside secret societies in The Hunt for Red October and The DaVinci Code, to representations of the American Dream and its opposite-the American Nightmare-in The Firm and The Godfather, this workshop will reveal twelve common elements shared by the most popular and enduring books of all time.
Register Now
Pitches Made Perfect
with Ellen Ullman
Oct. 6, 9 am to 12 noon
Just as the early bird gets the worm, the cleverly written pitch gets the editor's attention-and usually the assignment. But how can you be sure your pitches are fun and functional without being sappy or boring? How can you write a pitch that is guaranteed get you in the door, and ultimately the job?
There is a formula to pitch writing, and this workshop will help decipher it. Workshop participants will study a sampling of pitches recently received from editors-some that turned into assignments and some that didn't-to determine which ones made the grade and why. They will learn what editors look for in a pitch and will then spend a great deal of time turning ideas into pitches.
Essentials for the Fiction Writer: Endings
Saturday, Nov. 10, 2 pm to 4:30 pm
Essentials for the Fiction Writer is a series of high level, craft-oriented workshops for fiction writers. Each delves deeply into critical elements of fiction writing, with emphasis on the novel.
There is a reason why the ending is perhaps the most difficult part of a story to write. It presents a knotty dilemma: if we have written a good story, our readers will want it to continue. So how, then, do we push back, and provide an ending that feels necessary, proportionate and satisfying?
In this workshop we will look at the complex question of what makes a story's ending feel "necessary, proportionate and satisfying." And we will identify some things we can do early in the story, that will strengthen the ending, when we arrive there. Finally, using examples from literature, we will survey different types of endings, to see how others have approached the poignant problem of closure.
Participants are invited to bring their most challenging questions about endings for the second half, Q&A portion of Professor Hoover's talk.
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What is your child doing for the rest of the summer?
|  Our Writopia Lab: Creative Writing Workshop for kids and teens is sold out this week (Aug. 6-10).
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A filled first day of Writopia Lab at the Westport Writers' Workshop on Monday, August 6.
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Good news! Several spots remain open in selected workshops for the rest of August.
It is not too late to register for remaining Writopia Lab spaces. Computers - and fun! - are provided for all participants. To check availability call Writopia Lab at (914) 401-4159.
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Under the Spotlight
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The highly respected quarterly magazine, which has a large and fervent reader base, is published both in print and online. Here is the announcement by Brain, Child, with a note from Marcelle.
We hope you will LIKE Brain, Child on Facebook. Submissions of fiction, poetry, essays and memoir are now open.
News of Our Writers
Congratulations and good wishes go to writer and poet Sharon Bloom who was accepted into Fairfield University's Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program, which she began this month;
.. and to Margot Epprecht who this fall will begin the Master's program at Columbia University's School of Journalism.
Publishing News
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What We're Reading...
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 This month writer Rebecca Martin recommends Just Kids (Ecco, 2010) by Patti Smith. Rebecca has had several of her pieces crafted in WWW's Examined Life workshop published.
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Just Kids by Patti Smith does not read like the memoir of the godmother of punk, but more like that of Patti Smith the poet because it is her lyrical prose that makes the book. 
Patti Smith has an amazing story to tell, moving to New York at age 19 without any money or anywhere to stay, meeting Robert Mapplethorpe on her first night, and eventually living with him as they pursue their art. The way Smith captures dialogue and feeling, and the rich detail of a Coney Island Portrait of the two of them is just as remarkable. Also surprising to me is that as famous and as closely associated with punk rock and sexually explicit photography, respectively, as Smith and Mapplethorpe became, the book is primarily the tale of two young lovers who live for art-a sort of seventies New York La Boheme. Along the way they have brief but searing encounters with Janis Joplin, Jimmi Hendrix, and Allen Ginsberg, among others.
The book inspired me as all great writing does, pushing me to find more simplicity and meaning in each word I write. I was also moved and inspired by the commitment Smith and Mapplethorpe made to their work, and to each other.
What are you reading? Please share your book reviews or thoughts with us at info@westportwritersworkshop.com.
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Westport Writers' Workshop
3 Sylvan Road South
Westport, CT 06880
203-227-3250
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Well Said
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 "I believe in lists and I believe in taking notes, and I believe in index cards for doing both. I have index cards and pens all over the house-by the bed, in the bathroom, in the kitchen, by the phone, and I have them in the glove compartment of my car. I  carry one with me in my back pocket when I take my dog for a walk. In fact, I carry it folded lengthwise, if you need to know, so that, God forbid, I won't look
bulky...
I fold an index card lengthwise in half, stick it in my back pocket along with a pen, and head out, knowing that if I have an idea, or see something lovely or strange or for any reason worth remembering, I will be able to jot down a couple of words to remind me of it.
-Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird (Random House Inc., 1994)
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| Please feel free to forward this newsletter WORD-for-WORDS to your friends and fellow writers. Visit our website to sign up for newsletters. You can also read past archived issues here.
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