Literature & Writing   

Have the winter blahs? Looking for a Spring class?

Simply sign up for Four Stories-Four weeks, and you’ll be treated to enticing short stories by excellent writers, some familiar ones, and some you’ve never heard of before. This class is an adventure!

 

 

This class will feature a Shakespeare play each week with the intention of making the plays understandable in modern times. We will try to explain the play both in the time period, and when it actually took place and the time period it was written. Shakespeare can be considered the Norman Lear or Woody Allen of his time. Come see why.

 

Participants will write memoirs that detail memorable life experiences. Each week, we meet, share, and read essays written in advance. Participants are asked to honor an 800-word/5- minute reading time limit in order to accommodate all class members. Each author will receive gentle, constructive, and supportive feedback related to the writing following their reading time. Discovering one’s personal writing style, voice, and effectiveness are part of the fun we enjoy in this class. All writing levels are welcome.

Class Leaders: Michael Marshall & Pam Kiwerski

 

NEW BOOK -- This session we will begin reading O. Henry Prize-winning short stories, selected by Amor Towles, from the 2024 edition of The Best Short Stories: The O. Henry Prize Winners. This is an opportunity to read outstanding stories from both new and well-known authors, published in English or translated into English in the previous year. For comparison, a few classic stories published earlier may also be considered. Each week we will read a short story and discuss our responses to what makes the story unique: themes, techniques, characters, atmosphere, etc.

All class members participate, contributing multiple views of the same story. The results are stimulating, entertaining and sometimes surprising.

The new anthology is: The Best Short Stories 2024: The O. Henry Prize Winners, Amor Towles, Guest Ed., with Jenny Minton Quigley, Series Ed. (New York: Vintage Books, 2024). Please, access this anthology to use for class discussions. It is available in several formats: Kindle, paperback, Audible.

 

Each week class participants will have a prompt to which they can respond to share a significant story in their lives. We will learn to share, in the tradition of the “Hopi Story Holes” to help weave the fabric of our lives as community.

Everyone has a story to tell or several stories to tell. Regretfully, they seldom are brought to life, never articulated, never shared. This class encourages us to write our stories and share them in a classroom environment that is attentive and supportive. It offers a sense of intimacy, spontaneity, and possible surprise. This OLLI writing class meets in person. Each week ALL class members will read a story they have written outside of class. Come join our lively readings and discussions.