Creative Writing: Four Genres in Brief

Creative Writing: Four Genres in Brief offers concise, accessible instruction in the basics of writing poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, and drama, providing short models of literature to analyze and emulate, plus inventive assignments to inspire and motivate you.

Table of Contents:
Preface: A Few Words to Instructors A Few Things You Should Know about Creative Writing A Few Words about Revision   1 Writing Poetry Write before you read The elements of poetry The short poem: Three models Gail White, My Personal Recollections of Not Being Asked to the Prom *Donika Kelly, Fourth Grade Autobiography Rae Armantrout, Duration Lines and stanzas Meter and rhythm The music of poetry Images, symbols, and figurative language Diction, syntax, and the language of poetry Poetic forms Getting started writing poetry Kick-Starts: Beginning your poems A few tips for participating in a poetry workshop An Anthology of Short Poems 2 Writing the Short-Short Story Write before you read The elements of fiction The short-short story: Three models Isaac Babel, Crossing the River Zbrucz Donald Barthelme, The Baby *Jennine Capó Crucet, Animal Control Structure and design Creating characters Writing dialogue Setting the scene Deciding on point of view, developing tone and style Getting started writing the short-short story Kick-Starts: Beginning your story A few tips for participating in a short fiction workshop An Anthology of Short-Short Stories 3 Writing Short Creative Nonfiction Write before you read The elements of creative nonfiction Short creative nonfiction: Three models Rebecca McClanahan, Liferower *Ylonda Gault Caviness, We Go Way Back David Sedaris, Jesus Shaves Organizing creative nonfiction Telling the truth Creative nonfiction as narrative The poetry of creative nonfiction Writing yourself into creative nonfiction Ethics and edicts Getting started writing short creative nonfiction Kick-Starts: Beginning your creative nonfiction A few tips for participating in a creative nonfiction workshop An Anthology of Short Creative Nonfiction 4 Writing the Ten-Minute Play Write before you read The elements of playwriting The ten-minute play: Three models David Ives, Sure Thing Tina Howe, The Divine Fallacy A. Rey Pamatmat, Some Other Kid Structuring the ten-minute play Creating believable characters Writing convincing dialogue Crafting a theme Onstage: The elements of production Getting started writing the ten-minute play Kick-Starts: Beginning your play A few tips for participating in a ten-minute play workshop Playscript Format: A Model An Anthology of Ten-Minute Plays A Few Words about Getting Your Work Published and Produced A Few Words about Hybrid Creative Writing Sabrina Orah Mark, It’s Dark in There: Confessions of a Prose Poem A Few Words about Writing for Social Change *Claude McKay, If We Must Die A Few Words of Farewell Glossary Acknowledgments Index *Indicates new selection

About the Author :
David Starkey is Professor of English, Director of the Creative Writing Program, and former Director of the Composition Program at Santa Barbara City College. A frequent collaborator with the late Wendy Bishop, Starkey helped develop a pedagogy focused on the cross-pollination of composition and creative writing. In addition to his work with Bishop, which includes the co-authored Keywords in Creative Writing (2006), he is the editor of two collections of essays on pedagogy, Teaching Writing Creatively (1998) and Genre by Example: Writing What We Teach (2001), and a special issue of Teaching English in the Two-Year College (Dec. 2014). Starkey is a poet (Dance, You Monster, to My Soft Song, 2021; What Just Happened, 2021), a writer of fiction and creative nonfiction (published in American Literary Review, in Cimarron Review, in Living Blue in the Red States,and elsewhere), and a playwright whose plays have been produced across the U.S. Starkey is also a committed practitioner, and his writing on corequisite composition is informed by his participation in SBCC’s Express to Success program, an early-adopter of the ALP/corequisite model. His conference presentations in recent years have emphasized his pedagogy and passion for working with a broad range of student writers. He is currently editing a collection of essays on teaching corequisite composition.