Spotlight on Creative Writing
The following is a list of classes that relate to various aspects of creative writing. Most of these classes were offered in the past. The particular electives offered by the Institute vary at any given time. The School tries to be responsive to the particular interests of the current student body and aims to have the curriculum reflect those interests. The number of current classes that fall under the category of creative writing depends on both teacher availability and student interest. Information on current classes can be found in the academic catalog.
Transformational Fiction (120)
This class demands the skills of clinical observation, all your intellectual understanding, and a developing capacity to render the world of imagination into engrossing prose.
Personal essays, much poetry, and many ITP papers revolve around a single character: the author. Fiction demands the creation of additional characters as well as other points of view and varied situations. These may or may not be drawn from real events. In any case, they are transformed into narrative, into story. Fortunately, much of this transformation can be achieved in the process of rewriting. Many stories whose first draft is barely more than a description of a hopeless personal muddle can, with work and intention, become fine publishable fiction. To do this well demands intellectual clarity, psychological maturity, and emotional honesty.
Writing fiction can also accelerate spiritual development as well as offer times of transcendent pleasure. However, make no mistake, writing fiction is hard work. Indeed, it is the most demanding form of writing.
Poetry Therapy: the Reclamation of Deep Language (153)
Poetic language, language that comes from the heart, has the potential, the natural ability in fact, to circulate everywhere. The nuance of metaphor becomes a revived capillary that relieves numbness and returns feeling to one's life. For therapist and client, whether it occurs one-to-one or in a group, poetry provides a way to explore that numbness or feeling in a sensitive and creative response to life as it unfolds. Such interaction is positively enhanced by poetry and poem-making.
Course Objectives:
- Learn principles of poetry therapy.
- Apply the reading/speaking evocative poetry for psychological and spiritual growth.
- Explore how the poem-making/writing process serves to enhance psychological and spiritual growth.
- Discuss the overall methodology and process of facilitating poetry therapy: What makes a good poetry therapist? How does therapy work most effectively in a group individually?
Course Topics (general outline—not written in stone)
- Introduction to Poetry Therapy: Principles.
- Reclaiming the Creative Imagination: The Writing Process.
- Processes of Poetry Therapy with Specific Groups and Particular Issues.
- The Use and Selection of Evocative Poetry and other Literature in Healing.
- The Poetry Therapist's Practice: Aligning Heart, Listening, Voice and Presence
- "And What Is It You Plan To Do With Your One Wild and Precious Life?" -Mary Oliver
A poem and poem-making—and consequently, this class—is a good "laboratory," or "field of study" for the transpersonal. Drawing from a splendid range of sources, we will work individually and as a group; experimenting with poem-making as a catalyst for healing and growth. Students will learn: to use the poetic elements of metaphor, sound, rhythm, linebreaks, imagery and symbol to give voice to our sorrows, our joys, our wonderings and our witness to what we experience in the world and within ourselves. Students will experiment with how breathing, stillness and empathic listening serve to deepen the act of writing and making direct contact with experience.
