Online Course: Brief Encounters with Ella Frears

We’ll explore narrative, image, form, metaphor and voice and look at how we contain and control these within the most compact forms. Looking at writers who are brilliantly brief we’ll work and rework our texts, creating strange, beguiling gems that are strong, charged, brave and perfectly formed. Bring on the small packages!

What will you do on the course? We’ll read and discuss great pieces of flash fiction and poetry that have mastered the short form – from George Saunders to Lydia Davis, Bashō to Hera Lindsay Bird. Inspired by these texts we’ll condense our emotions, compress our narratives and squeeze our voices into tight corners – working to create works that surprise, delight and unsettle.

You finish with at least three new pieces and lots of tiny beginnings. You’ll receive feedback on your work and give feedback to others. Most of all, this is a course to get you excited about writing! Watch this (tiny) space.

Course begins on September 12th. See course timetable on the website.