Reflections on English 649, Autobiography & Memoir Workshop

Below are comments made by the graduate students who completed this workshop during fall semester 1999. The purpose of the request for reflections was to offer students an opportunity to assess their own pre- and post-course expectations, their  contributions to the class, their performance throughout the semester, and the instructor's contributions. The instructor's reflections follow those of the students.

What were you expecting the course to be like when you registered to take it?  How did or didn't the course content and assignments match up with your initial expectations? What did you learn?

"I thought the course would be a lot of writing, not much reading--I was surprised at the load of required reading.  As it turned out, the course was mostly writing and reading other people's stories. I was also scared to share my intimate writing. I was amazed and pleased to find it wasn't hard to share with this eclectic and warm group! . . . Many helpful things about autobiography.  The Tristine Rainer book was great.  She touched on the fears, the personal, the practical, the possibilities.  She really encouraged this type of writing convincingly.  She gives the challenge that anyone who is dedicated to autobiography can and should do it.  I also got a chance to bounce my writing and style off others and got some nice feedback for what works and what doesn't."

"I expected it to be a class in which I would write my autobiography . . . I have learned that I am the most prolific writer in the class. That writing is easy for me.  But, revising and re-writing are almost impossible for me.  I have learned from the textbook that autobiographical writing needs to have stories that have a beginning, middle, and end . . . I have learned that all the ground rules for this class are excellent, that each person in the class helps the other class members to know how their work sounds and how to improve it."

"I expected this course to be similar, though larger than, the journalling short course you taught last spring for MSUS.  The course provided me with tools of writing in modern form . . . I learned something of the art of making my writing less formal and more interesting.  How to include conversation."

""I expected to put more emphasis on course readings and 'creative' memoir.  Even though this did not occur, I still feel that my creative approach to memoir was given full respect . . . Even though I feel the end product I have varies greatly from those of my classmates, I think they (all the projects) are successful.  I learned that there are many ways to complete the same project."

"I expected it to be scary and overwhelming, challenging and helpful.  Of those I would say it ended up being helpful.  Because of the variety in the kind of students in the course it wasn't quite the writing workshop I expected or had experienced in the past . . . I learned that I usually underestimate how wonderful people can be and that mostly good things come from opening up to people.  I would have liked to work harder on specific writing skills and revising skills."

"I wanted it to be a continuation of what we had started in our MSUS class.  My expectations were far surpassed.  I will want to go back and re-read the assigned books as I know I did not do them justice . . . I learned scads!  My biggest gain is in some of the ways to make my writing more efficient content-wise.  Each time I revised one of my pieces I could now see ways to improve it.  I really want to continue &I don't know if I can on my own--it would be good to have some kind of seminar now to add to what we've learned in 649."

"I like the idea that everyone has a story worth writing (Tristine Rainer). I believe that idea, just from reading the stories from people in this class, who think they are merely writing anecdotes but who are really creating tales for me and my classmates. I’ve grown from listening to others’ comments about my work and from being able to critique theirs. Sometimes it takes seeing the splinter in someone else’s eye to find the log in your own!" 

"With this class and through the process of writing, I discover a way to put my life on paper. In the beginning, the idea of autobiography seemed daunting because I’m a private person; I don’t freely share the details of my personal life, and now I see this work continuing and growing, another reason I think the collage technique is useful. It allows me to add pieces as ideas develop. Collage allows me the freedom to jump around in time and play with style. It works like memory. At times a memory is clear and vivid, like a story; at other times, it is a brief flash of a moment. Memory is a juxtaposition of scenes." 

The following are my own observations about the course:

The English 649 writing workshop, which met for three hours on one evening per week, went very well.  Everyone in our group had many daily commitments (work, family, teaching, other course work) and this workshop’s requirements might have been more rigorous than those of some other courses. The approach used in this course was less conventional, comfortable, and/or predictable than that used in other writing workshops.   As the workshop leader, I appreciate the time and energy that all of the participants invested in our workshop.

This English 649 workshop was intended to draw participants whose backgrounds were in the varied fields of literature, creative writing, music, chemistry, health, business, and interdisciplinary studies. As some participants have noted below, our group included members who ranged in age from the mid-twenties to the mid-eighties. Our group included members who had taken a number of writing workshops as well as members who were "getting their feet wet" in their first writing workshop. The one common thread was the participants' intense interest in studying forms of autobiography and memoir, coupled with their high motivation to do some of their own autobiographical writing.

From my perspective, this blend of course participants, reading and writing assignments, workshop sessions, and feedback from others made for an invigorating class in which no single participant was expected to be "the expert" on autobiography and memoir and where each person had chances to contribute in different kinds of ways. The dynamics of the workshop taught me important lessons about how a diverse group of writers can interact and learn from one another. As a teacher and writer, I learned a good deal, too. Thank you all.

--Suzanne Bunkers

"The memory is a living thing–it too is in transit. But during its moment,

all that is remembered joins, and lives–the old and the young,

the past and the present, the living and the dead."

–Eudora Welty, One Writer’s Beginnings (1984)