Courses

Finding Your Novel’s Voice

with Sharlene Teo

This four‐week workshop combines a review & critique of participants’ work & discussion on assigned readings of Asian & Asian diasporic writers. The workshop looks at distinctiveness of voice on a sentence level, voice in dialogue, voice on a thematic level, and finally voice on an affective level.

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: ST1

4 workshops of 3 hours each 

For Intermediate to Advanced Writers

Limited places available

Selective entry – we’ll offer places to writers who show promise

 

Dates

4 sessions on:

  • 2 July 2022 (Saturday)
  • 9 July 2022 (Saturday)
  • 16 July 2022 (Saturday)
  • 23 July 2022 (Saturday)

2 to 5 pm

No partial sessions accepted

Venue

2 July and 16 July:
Prime 53
53 Mohamed Sultan Road Singapore 238993

9 July and 23 July:
National Library Board
100 Victoria Street
Singapore 188064

Overview

This four-week workshop first considers the distinctiveness of voice on a sentence level, and then looks at voice in dialogue, voice on a thematic level and finally voice on an affective level. Participants will gain a stronger grasp of their literary voice and the ability to sustain and vary it over a longer form such as a novel. This course will help you become a more attentive reader and better editor of your own work.

Week 1:  What is voice? Writing your way into your own/ examining existing work and sharpening the voice; distinctiveness in voice. Narrative voice: points of view, omniscient/ unreliable/ subjective narrators. Who is telling the story?

Week 2: Who is being spoken to? The ideal reader, and dialogue as pacing in fiction. Voice in dialogue: literary vs. literal conversations.

Week 3: Thematic voice: pathetic fallacy (weather/the world reflecting emotion), the objective correlative (weather/the world as external equivalent of emotion), selective descriptions, ambient points of view.

Week 4: Emotive voice: Writerly voice and registers of feeling; affective voice; the motion in emotion. Wrapping it all up. Ways forward

Learning Outcomes

After completion of this course,

  1. Participants will have a stronger grasp of their literary voice and the ability to sustain and vary it over a long form.
  2. Participants’ writing will be enriched and improved on a sentence/chapter level.
  3. Participants will emerge as more attentive readers and better editors.

Please note particiants are required to attend all 4 workshops.

Who should register?

Fiction Writers including:

  1. 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, or
  2. Advanced Writers — Writers who have published at least one book with a mainstream or recognised independent publisher, and/or published in at least one literary journal and/or anthology

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:

  1. A 500 word writing sample
  2. A short summary of your writing project of ~100 words
  3. A short biography of ~100 words

If you have registered with us before, you may send the same information again with an updated bio.

Course Fees

  • For 4 workshops of 3 hours each:
    • $150 for adults
    • $40 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 Sharlene Teo

Sharlene Teo’s debut novel Ponti was published by Picador and Simon and Schuster in 2018. Her work has been translated into eleven languages and featured in places such as the Guardian, the TLS, LitHub, Granta and Vogue. She completed an MA in Prose Fiction and a PhD in Creative and Critical Writing at the University of East Anglia. She lectures at the University of Kent and lives in London.

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