Join us for EMBODY, SPEAK, RELATE, a special series of no-fee, online classes celebrating author and Blue Stoop board member Eshani Surya's debut novel, RAVISHING. Because the novel is an ode to community, care, and resource-sharing, Eshani will use these open class spaces as places to share what she has learned about craft through the writing of her book, as well as places for further exploration and discovery in a group setting.
Join us for 1, 2, or all 3 virtual sessions — Optional donations are tax-deductible and greatly appreciated. The classes are open to all, with 50% of seats set aside for BIPOC writers and disabled writers, in honor of book's characters.
While we encourage you to attend the live sessions, recordings of these events will be shared with those who register. Zoom captions will be enabled for accessibility.
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Our bodies witness all the events of our lives, both traumatic and joyful. What stories does the body carry and how can we uncover them? Following that, how can we best express these stories, alongside their physical manifestations, on the page? And to what ends will we do so? In this session, participants will use prompts to map their bodies and discover what hidden truths they are carrying, as well as consider how their families and society maps them. They will then practice writing in a variety of modes to express these findings. This is a space to excavate, acknowledge, interpret, and nurture our bodies by accepting and communicating their complexities.
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Fiction is a space of ideas: characters come up with, explore, and assess new philosophies, which consequently may inform readers' perspectives. Many of us tend to subtly write ideals and principles into scenes—but in this political moment of silencing, might we dare write characters who explicate their questions, their answers, their hopes, their dreams on the page? And if we do write such characters, how can we do so in ways that don’t overtake the narrative, but instead elevate fiction’s other beauties, such as engaging and suspenseful plots, nuanced relationships between people, and immersive episodes? In this session, we’ll explore the fictional people who speak what they believe and begin to write our own vocal characters. Participants will practice developing their own forthright characters through a variety of inspiring yet flexible prompts, and create a space for collaborative conversation about new techniques they can bring to their work.
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Family dynamics require delicate navigation, especially when family members are absent and/or estranged from each other. Because our families of origin--or other families whom we observe--are often complex in this way, many of us seek to write fractured families on the page. But how can we do so with empathy, while also acknowledging injustice, pain and harm perpetrated by various individuals? And how can we then use those skills to to describe the family unit as a system, imparting onto our readers how history, behavior patterns, and difficult interactions can shape the realities and often futures of each family member? In this session, participants will engage with a variety prompts that encourage them to articulate the nuances of the families they are trying to depict on the page. By the end of the session, they will leave with a basis to continue forward confidently in this work.