Week Eight Greetings and Announcements

Missouri River at Brownville

Congratulations: We reach the term's conclusion.

Give the new video a listen, for I talk about the term's conclusion, which occurs for us on Monday, October 17.

Review the material here about the Short Story and the Final Project. You will get comments back on the Memoir/Creative Nonfiction and, I hope, some of the formal short stories through Sunday.

In addition to Fun with Words and your Short Story, you have a Final Project to complete, another Memoir/Creative Non-Fiction narrative or a Short Story. And then you complete as well your Final Video Project.

Remember that you have, as outlined in the Week Six Writing Assignment, two formal writing projects: the short story and the final project, for which you will write another short story or another work of creative non-fiction.

You must also complete your Final Video Project, which requires that you talk on a video published where I can watch it (and a link you should feel free to share with others) about a couple pieces you have written: suggest something about the genesis of these works and place them as much as possible in the context of what you read and discussed these past weeks.


I go very gentle on the Fun With Words and the short work with which you played last week, Nanofiction and Hyperfiction.


Just reading the stories by your fellow writers will inspire your imagination.

You have worked hard this term, and I appreciate your efforts.

Enjoy a productive week and a most excellent vacation, and I look forward to seeing many of you again in Spring 2012.

You might also enjoy watching and listening to Ellen Klages who visited campus last year at this time. If you want a copy of what Ellen Reads--"Ringing up Baby" and the final pages from White Sands, Red Menace--just let me know, and I will supply you with the material.

Go well, Bill

Week Seven Greetings

Hello Everyone,

I offer a fifteen-minute discussion about the final two weeks, sort of a focused pep talk.

Look over the weekly announcements carefully for this and last week, for you want to get all the dates straight. Last week's Writing Assignment offers a schedule for the final two weeks, which include this week's fiction essay and the final project.

And this week's assignment explains the basic ins and outs of experiments with Hyper- and Nano-fiction; you can have a lot of fruitful fun with these exercises in control--and with humor, to be sure.

Check out the links to various short stories, from "A & P" by John Updike to "Boys and Girls" by Alice Munro.

You will have a good deal of production fun this week.

Enjoy, Bill

Week Six Arrives

Week Six Greetings

Hello Everyone,

We enter the final three weeks of the term. And as always in these courses, matters move swiftly.

This week's writing assignment lists the remaining writing projects, the "fun with words" fiction, a short story, and your last effort that you can complete before the final week, the Oral Project.  So read the instructions.
And make sure to turn in your short memoir, and I will soon get the Poetry Projects back to you. You have plenty of revision work to keep you busy until the final hours of the term.

Continue to experiment and write without fear. 

Read carefully this week's announcement for some important dates.  And remember:  I changed the final assignments:  you will write your "fun with words" piece this week and then work on a short story.  Instead of producing at the very end of the term another short story or memoir, you will revise work and, over the next three weeks, complete your Oral Project.





Enjoy a productive week, Bill