Enrol on our Fact-based Storytelling short course and benefit from a series of workshops to help more experienced writers develop skills and techniques to create engaging non-fiction pieces.
No starting dates
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Starting date to be confirmed
- Duration: 20 weeks (non-consecutive) (unconfirmed)
- Fees: £375 (unconfirmed)
- Location: Online (unconfirmed)
Fact-based Storytelling Course overview
As a report from the world – a mix of experience, observation, memory, opinion and hard fact – narrative non-fiction can be more dramatic, vivid and moving than any work of fiction. But what makes a book is the storytelling. Reporting, research, plot techniques, theme and tone of voice are your tools.
Understand how to structure, plan your progress, build dramatic tension, how to create character and instill a sense of place and time.
Over 5 monthly Saturdays you will look at the way narrative drives different genres including memoir, biography, travel and food writing.
The course centres on providing support and ideas via discussion and feedback for your own specific projects, possibly started in Narrative Non-Fiction.
Who is it for?
Aimed at those who wish to enhance their skills in non-fiction writing, this series of workshops is taught over ten Saturday classes and delivered by a leading published writer. Over the 5 monthly sessions you will develop your own work, learning from the group and tutor feedback and discussion.
Find out more about our Creative writing and publishing courses
Timetable
Over 5 monthly Saturdays you will look at the way narrative drives different genres including memoir, biography, travel and food writing.
This storytelling course will run during 10am - 12pm on the following Saturday mornings:
January: 22nd
February: 5th, 19th
March: 5th, 19th
April: 9th, 23rd
May: 7th, 21st, 28th
Benefits
Inspirational, informative and thought-provoking, these inventive fact-based storytelling Saturday workshops are about developing longer pieces of compelling narrative based on accuracy, honesty and truth.
What will I learn?
Over the course of five Saturday classes on the Fact-based Storytelling short course, you will learn how to:
- Structure your writing
- Plan your progress
- Build dramatic tension
- create character
- instil a sense of place and time.
Assessment and certificates
There will be no formal assessment in this storytelling course. Teaching will be through discussion and exercises and your work will be shared with the group for discussion and input.
Students who complete 70% of the classes will receive a Certificate of completion at the end of the course.
Eligibility
No specific qualifications are necessary but students are advised to take the Narrative Non-Fiction course before embarking on the Fact-based Storytelling course.
English requirements
You will need a good level of spoken and written English to enrol on this course.
Recommended reading
There will be no formal reading list. Students will look at extracts from a variety of texts during the course. But the following books would all provide valuable understanding of the skills required to write longer projects:
- A Natural History of the Senses, Diane Ackerman, Random House
- Stet, Diana Athill, Granta
- In Cold Blood, Truman Capote, Random House
- Wild Swans, Jung Chang, HarperCollins
- The Midnight Watch, David Dyson, St Martins Press
- The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion, HarperCollins
- How to Cook a Wolf, MFK Fisher, Daunt
- Complications, Atul Gawande, Macmillan
- Body Parts, Hermione Lee, Pimlico
- Giving Up the Ghost, Hilary Mantel, Fourth Estate
- The Snow Leopard, Peter Matthieson, Viking Press
- The Emperor of All Maladies, Sidhartha Mukherjee, HarperCollins
- Julie and Julia, Julie Powell, Little, Brown
- Bad Blood, Lorna Sage, Fourth Estate
- The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Rebecca Skloot, Pan.