ENG 308 - Time & Space in Creative Nonfiction

Memoirs and essays can never correspond directly with reality. One real-world element that we can manipulate, like magicians–while remaining firmly in the realm of fact–is time. Compressing, speeding up, slowing down, or otherwise manipulating time can help us convey the meaning and emotional resonance of events. If we accept that linear time itself is a fiction-albeit a useful one-a new universe of possible story structures opens up around us. In this course, we will examine memoirs and personal essays (and a film or two) that flout conventional structures and play with time in innovative, interesting ways, and use these explorations as inspiration for our own writing, with a particular focus on the events of our lived realities.