Courses: Fall 2020

All CWL courses 4 credits unless noted otherwise. FLM courses 2-3 credits.

NB: Fall semester begins Monday, August 24. Classes are not in session on Monday, September 7, Labor Day. Fall break is Monday, October 12-13. Thanksgiving break is: Wednesday, November 25 – Sunday, November 29. Last day of Saturday classes is Saturday, December 5. Last day of M-F classes is Monday, December 7.

GRADUATE COURSES IN SOUTHAMPTON

Stony Brook Southampton: Chancellors Hall or Carriage House (Technology Center)
239 Montauk Highway; Southampton, New York 11963

CWL 520.S01 (Class #93498) Forms of Fiction: The  Short‐Short, Prose Poem, or “Couldn’t Finish,” Amy Hempel
Mondays 2:20 – 5:10 pm, 4 cr.
In this course we will read and discuss short-short stories and prose poems from several countries and centuries, drawing mostly from contemporary examples. Students will write frequently in one or both forms, after we look at the specific requirements of each, a variety of definitions, and differences, and similarities. As one practitioner noted, “The short-short is like a regular story, only more so.”

 

CWL 520.S01 (Class #93499) Forms of Poetry: Writing from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Star Black
Tuesdays, 2:20 – 5:10 pm, 4 cr.
Ovid's Metamorphoses is an essential compendium of classic mythology that has influenced Western art and literature since the Middle Ages. Through in-class and take-home writing assignments, students are encouraged to re-interpret the whims and follies and nobilities of ancient gods and distinguished mortals, as have painters and poets from the Renaissance through the 20th Century. Each week we will read one book of Ovid's Metamorphoses, then write contemporary pieces derived from the text. A mid-term writing project and final writing project will be also assigned. Both projects will contain the student's original poetry or short fiction inspired by Ovid's mythological stories.

 

CWL 540.S01  (Class #95575) Forms of Nonfiction: The Ways of the Essay, Molly Gaudry
Tuesdays 5:20 - 8:10 pm , 4 cr.
This course will be a Whitman’s Sampler of approaches to writing the contemporary essay. We will read and discuss personal essays—about the body, identity, illness, trauma, history, and travel—as well as essays that make use of innovative forms, such as lyric essays, list essays, braided essays, collage essays, collaborative essays, graphic essays, and essays in disguise (hermit crab essays). Expect to read and discuss two to three essays a week, to write mimetic responses weekly, and, by the end of the term, to develop two of your responses into full-length essays—one traditional, one experimental. You’ll also produce an informal, semester-long meditation on The Essay—what it is, what it does, how it does it. Authors include: Durga Chew-Bose, Jabari Asim, Ross Gay, Han Kang, Phoebe Robinson, Thomas Glave, Carole Maso, Esmé Weijun Wang, Gwendolyn Wallace, Robert Lopez, Torrey Peters, Ben Fountain, Jericho Parms, Kai Minosh Pyle, Maia Kobabe, Art Spiegelman, Shailja Patel, Eula Biss, Claudia Rankine, Anne Carson, Diane Glancy, Alexander Chee, and more.

 

CWL 580.S01 (Class #93500 ) Practicum in Arts Administration, Christian McLean
Wednesdays, 11 am – 12:30 pm , 1‐4 cr.
This course teaches important skills in arts/event management. It provides education in marketing, design and software that will boost your résumé and increase your workplace skill set. We’ll examine work/volunteer opportunities in local arts organizations and you will design an MFA event from the ground up. Learn the basics in Photoshop, Mailmerge, Google Docs/Sheets, Constant Contact, plus Facebook and Twitter ads. Completion of at least 6 program credits or permission of instructor required.

 

CWL 560.S01 (Class #95574) Special Topics in Writing: Experimental Literature, Susan Scarf Merrell
Wednesdays, 3:30 – 6:20 pm, 4 cr.
Nothing great ever comes from following the rules. Or does it? What is experimental literature? How can we think about it as writers, in terms of craft “lessons” that we can learn to use in our own work? This class will examine risk-taking in literature, with a very heavy reading load, weekly annotations on craft, the writing of responsive short fiction, and student presentations. Possible texts include: Moby-Dick, Herman Melville; As I Lay Dying, William Faulkner; The Waves, Virginia Woolf; Labyrinths, Jorge Luis Borges; The Baron in the Trees, Italo Calvino; Beloved Toni Morrison; The Underground Railroad, Colson Whitehead; Revenge, Yuko Ogawa. As well as other experimental short stories.

 

CWL 500.S01 (Class #95628) Introduction to Graduate Writing, Carla Caglioti, Robert Reeves & Lou Ann Walker
Wednesdays, 5:20 – 8:10 pm, 4 cr.
A seminar that introduces students to one another, the faculty, the program in Creative Writing and Literature, and to issues in contemporary writing. Offered in conjunction with the “Writers Speak” lecture series. Students will attend the regular series of readings sponsored by the Writing program and meet at weekly intervals under the direction of a faculty advisor to discuss and write about topics raised in the lecture series, as well as issues generated from seminar discussions and assigned readings. Please note: CWL 500 is a requirement and we encourage you to take this course in your first year.

 

CWL 565.S01 (Class #93543) Topics in Literature: Life, Love, and Responsibility, Roger Rosenblatt
Thursdays, 5:20 – 8:10 pm, 4 cr.
In our times, right now, the subjects of life, love and responsibility, ordinarily important, have taken on a fierce urgency. More than ever, we need an appreciation of the beauty and wonder of life, the sharing and understanding of the power of love, and the demonstration of responsibility toward nature, toward the oppressed, and toward one another. Writers have a special role in expressing and fulfilling these needs. We bear the implicit assignment to address the best of which the human mind is capable.

This is a class in writing about life, love and responsibility. Students will produce poems, stories, meditations, songs, personal essays, prayers, dialogues and monologues, fables, fragments, mixtures of forms—all designed to understand, perhaps improve the world about us. We will also read writers whose work has enhanced these subjects. And we will talk a lot, about how to see the world, and the writer’s role in it. In short, a class in art’s noblest wishes.

 

CWL 535.S01 (Class #93510) Writing in Multiple Genres: Fact Fiction & The Heart of the Story, Lou Ann Walker
7 Saturdays, 10 am – 5 pm, 4 cr. Held on 9/5, 9/19, 10/3, 10/24, 11/7, 11/21, 12/5

When should a story be told in memoir form? As a short story? Do the series of events deserve to be a novel? During this course we will look at the ways in which other writers have told the same story via nonfiction and fiction. Which approach works better for which events? From memoir to novel. From essay to memoir. From novel to memoir. And we won’t be ignoring the Dystopian in fact and fiction—from Kurt Vonnegut’s depiction of the Bombing of Dresden to Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale. We'll be discussing structure, style, and substance as students attack their stories from a number of different points of entry.

 

Thesis—CWL 599 (1 – 6 credits)
You will need your thesis planning form on file and approval of thesis advisor to register.  However, if you have not yet settled on an advisor or focus for thesis, you can enroll in Pre-Thesis Planning for 1 credit. Students in Pre-Thesis will be completing the Thesis Planning Form by the end of semester.

Schedule based in Southampton:
.V01 #93445 Merrell

.V02 #93446 Rosenblatt

.V03 #93447 Walker

.V04 #93448 Jones

.V05 #93449 Caglioti

.V06 #93450 Handley Chandler

.V07 #93451 Hegi

.V08 #93452 Harding

.V09 #93453 Reeves

.V10 #93454 Bank
.V11 #93455 Brandeis

.V12 #93456 Walker – Pre-thesis Planning, 1 cr.

.V13 #93457 Hempel

.V14 #93458 Marx

.V15 #93459 Eady

.V16 #93460 Minot

.V17 #93466 Black

.V18 #93544 TBD

GRADUATE COURSES IN MANHATTAN

Stony Brook Manhattan
535 8th Avenue between 36 & 37th Streets, 5th floor

Please submit a course substitution form for FLM courses in order that they can be credited toward fulfilling CWL requirements. FLM courses are 2‐3 credits, so additional course, practicum, or independent study may be necessary to complete the degree credit requirements.

 

CWL 535.S60 (Class #95572) Social Justice in Fact and Fiction, Robert Lopez
Mondays, 2:20 – 5:10 pm, 4 cr.
In this workshop we'll ask and address questions - how do we derive the authority, expertise, and the imagination to write about social issues while maintaining our allegiance to the creation and manifestation of art? How can we contribute to the vital conversations of the day? We'll read writers such as Garnette Cadogan, Claudia Rankine, Valeria Luiselli, Hanif Abdurraqib, Eula Biss, and others to see how they go about this vital endeavor. We will look within and without to create work that is both artful and impactful, personally and globally .

 

CWL 510.S60 (Class #95573) Topics in Literature: Reading and Writing the Short Story, Susan Minot
Mondays, 5:20 – 8:10 pm, 4 cr.
As our 2013 Nobel Laureate Alice Munro recently said, the short story is “an important art, not just something you played around with until you got a novel.” Focus in this workshop will be on the building blocks of the short story: style, structure and content. In class discussions of student fiction, we will focus on refinement of that style, on varieties of structure, with an eye to finding the subject best suited to each writer. Strong editorial feedback will assist the students in both practicing editing on their fellow students, as well as learning the value of doing draft after draft in order to strengthen and focus the material of his or her concern. Mastery of one’s craft is our goal. Suggested outside reading will direct students to the masters, choosing among: Anton Chekhov, Raymond Carver, Lydia Davis, Amy Hempel, Franz Kafka, Flannery O'Conner, John Cheever, Katherine Mansfield, Ernest Hemingway, Lorrie Moore, and James Salter.

 

CWL 582.S60 (Class #93503) Practicum in Publishing & Editing, Emily Smith Gilbert
Tuesdays, 2:20 – 5:10 pm , 1‐ 4 cr.)
Under the guidance of editors and advisors, students will be exposed to the hands-on process of editing and publishing TSR: The Southampton Review.

 

CWL 540.S60 (Class #93501) Whose Life is it Anyway? The memoir considered in full, Patricia McCormick
Tuesdays, 5:20 – 8:10 pm, 4 cr.
In this class, we'll focus on you as the main character, but also take a look at how the supporting characters are portrayed. We'll talk about the practicalities and ethics of writing about the lives of others as you write about your own life. We'll read work by Tara Westover, Jeannette Winterson, Tobias Wolff, and others to see how they handled these questions. And we'll workshop your memoirs-in-progress in a helpful, constructive manner.

 

FLM 550.S60 (Class #55899) Teaching Practicum, Karen Offitzer
Thursdays, 2:20 –5:10 pm, 3 cr.
This is a weekly seminar in teaching at the University level, with special emphasis on teaching in the creative arts, specifically creative writing and filmmaking. This course plunges into the basics of pedagogy, exploring learning styles, discovering a teaching philosophy, designing syllabi for undergraduate courses, creating assignments and rubrics for grading assignments, and practicing these skills in a classroom setting. You’ll get hands-on experience and mentoring through visits to undergraduate classes and teaching opportunities, and will gain an understanding of what works best for helping undergraduate students learn. Particular focus will be on discussing issues that arise when teaching creative endeavors such as writing and filmmaking.

 

CWL 510.S60 (Class #93506) Forms of Fiction: Beginning the Novel, Paul Harding
7 Saturday Intensive, 10 am – 5 pm, 4 cr. Held on 8/29, 9/12, 9/26, 10/3, 10/17, 10/31, 11/14

The beginning may prove the beginning, middle, end; don't worry; it's about scale, pace, interrogation, and scene; much of the semester will be devoted to slowing down, settling in, and playing your long game, discovering the cumulative ways that novels earn, form, solidify, maintain, and release meaning, w/in the realms of total aesthetic freedom and discipline ... That balance between: Do whatever you want, while I hold your toes ever so encouragingly to the fire thing.

 

Thesis—CWL 599 (1-6 credits)
Schedule based in Southampton
You will need a thesis planning form on file and approval of thesis advisor to register.  However, if you have not yet settled on an advisor or focus for thesis, you can enroll in Pre-Thesis Planning for 1 credit. Students in Pre-Thesis will be completing the Thesis Planning Form by the end of semester.

.V01 #93445 Merrell

.V02 #93446 Rosenblatt

.V03 #93447 Walker

.V04 #93448 Jones

.V05 #93449 Caglioti

.V06 #93450 Handley Chandler

.V07 #93451 Hegi

.V08 #93452 Harding

.V09 #93453 Reeves

.V10 #93454 Bank
.V11 #93455 Brandeis

.V12 #93456 Walker – Pre-thesis Planning, 1 cr.

.V13 #93457 Hempel

.V14 #93458 Marx

.V15 #93459 Eady

.V16 #93460 Minot

.V17 #93466 Black

.V18 #93544 TBD

 

FILM AND TV COURSES OPEN TO CWL STUDENTs

NB: Please submit a course substitution form for FLM courses in order that they can be credited toward fulfilling CWL requirements. FLM courses are 2‐3 credits, so additional course, practicum, or independent study may be necessary to complete the degree credit requirements.

FLM 525.S65 (Class #93514) Topics in Film: TV Guest Series - Alan Kingsberg
Mondays, 7:30-9:30 pm, 1 cr.
A moderated guest series featuring in-depth discussions with TV writers and producers about their scripts, series and careers.   Meets six times during the Fall semester.

 

FLM 526.S60 (Class #95618)  Topics in TV Writing, Scott Burkhardt
Mondays, 5:20-8:10 pm, 3 cr.
Students learn how to write a spec script or pilot.  A “spec” is a script for a TV show that is currently on the air where the writer creates original stories for a show’s existing characters. Students will learn how to brainstorm story ideas, structure an outline and write scenes with dialogue, all in a constructive, supportive workshop atmosphere. The class covers both half-hour comedies and one-hour dramas. In addition, the class will watch, deconstruct and discuss a wide variety of TV shows in order to better understand how a successful episode is built. All the basics of TV writing are covered and the workshop is designed to closely mirror a professional writers room on a prime-time series. 

 

FLM 652.S60 (Class #93546) Advanced Screenwriting, Jennie Allen
Days TBD, 3 cr.
This is an intensive, catchall writing workshop designed to help students as they start, finish, or revise short film scripts and/or feature length screenplays. Classes will be devoted to workshopping student ideas and scripts. Students must come in with clear goals for the semester. These goals must be approved by the instructor. In workshop we will consider emotional impact, visual storytelling force, dramatic structure, character, story arcs, scene construction, pacing, embedded values, the creation of meaning - or “What are we left with at the end?,” and all other aspects of screenwriting. You must present your work in class and be engaged with the work of your classmates. We may read produced screenplays to support and deepen our understanding of how these stories work on us. 

 

FLM 651.S60 (Class #93531) Screenwriting Workshop II , Lenny Crooks
Wednesdays, 5:20-8:10 pm, 3 cr.
This course will build on introductory screenwriting skills and elements. It will offer a more intensive study of the screenwriting craft especially character, scene construction, scene sequence/juxtaposition and dialogue. Rigorous class sessions will consist of group readings and open critiques. The objective of this course will be to structure and write or rewrite a full-length feature screenplay. Intermediate to Advanced Screenwriters. Prerequisite: Screenwriting I, the first act of a screenplay, or instructor’s permission.