Creative Nonfiction

with Akhil Sharma

This course aims to help writers interrogate actual experience. We will ask questions that will allow the representation of that experience to have some of the qualities of fiction. How did a particular moment “feel”? To what extent was meaning generated in a particular moment and to what extent was it superimposed later?

Unfortunately, we are full!

Registrations for this course are now closed but do join our mailing list here to be updated on future courses like this.

Summary

Course code: AS1

5 workshops

For Foundation to Intermediate Writers

Limited places available

Selective entry – we’ll offer places to writers based on writing samples sent on application

Dates

5 sessions on:

20 August 2022 (Saturday)
27 August 2022 (Saturday)
3 September 2022 (Saturday)
10 September 2022 (Saturday)
17 September 2022 (Saturday)

2:00 to 5:00pm SGT

No partial sessions accepted

Venue

NTU@one-north
11 Slim Barracks Rise
Singapore 138664

Overview and Learning Outcomes

The easiest way to learn how to write is to try to convert our own experiences into prose.

Our knowledge of what is reality helps us more quickly understand what is important and what is not.

This course is geared to helping us interrogate actual experience. We will ask questions that will allow the representation of that experience to have some of the qualities of fiction. How did a particular moment “feel”? To what extent was meaning generated in a particular moment and to what extent was it superimposed later?

The goal of the course is to respond to what matters for each student.

Learning Outcomes

After completion of the workshops, partcipants will:

understand creative non fiction including autobiographical fiction, the memoir and personal essay
gain a deeper knowledge of how to write creative non fiction
gain skills and experience to enable them to write new and revise existing creative non fiction work.

Please note participants are required to attend all 7 workshops.

Who should register?

Writers including:

Foundation Writers — Early stage, promising writers with no requirement for any publication history. Foundation writers are those who are writing for the first time or have never written with deadlines or structure before.
Intermediate Writers — Writers who have chosen to pursue writing as a full time or part time career with a serious, professional intent but who are not yet published with a mainstream or recognised independent publisher.

This course is especially targetted at writers interested in developing a Creative Nonfiction text, a memoir, autobiographical fiction and/or a personal essay.

Participants will be selected by the Visiting Writer with assistance from the Asia Creative Writing programme. A waiting list will be maintained.

Registration and Pricing

Course Prerequisites

To sign up, please register at the link above with the following documents:

A 500 word writing sample
A short summary of your writing project of ~100 words
A short biography of ~100 words

Course Fees

For 5 workshops:
- $145 for adults
- $50 for students, unemployed, low income migrant workers
Free for undergraduates from Singapore tertiary institutions
Non refundable if cancellation 2 weeks or less before course starts
Please email us if financial assistance is needed

About Akhil Sharma

Akhil Sharma was born in Delhi in India and emigrated to the USA in 1979. His stories have been published in the New Yorker and in Atlantic Monthly, and have been included in The Best American Short Stories and O. Henry Prize Collections. His first novel, An Obedient Father, won the 2001 Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award. He was named one of Granta’s ‘Best of Young American Novelists’ in 2007. His second novel, Family Life, won The 2015 Folio Prize and the International Dublin Literary Award 2016. Sharma is currently a Fellow at The New York Public Library’s Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers.

Other Courses & Events with Akhil Sharma

Teaching Creative Writing in Singapore: A Sharing with Akhil Sharma

On 17 December 2022 at NTU at OneNorth, ACWP presented a sharing of Akhil Sharma’s insights during his time as a Visiting Writer on Teaching Creative Writing in Singapore. During the discussion, we explored best practices for teaching Creative Writing in Singapore....