2024 Summer Workshops
This workshop is part of MEMOIR & CREATIVE NONFICTION WEEK
Poet Rainier Maria Rilke explains, “If I lose my demons, I will lose my angels as well.” Likewise, fiction writer Grace Paley cautions, “Don’t be in too much of a hurry to exorcise your demons; they’re also your angels.” “Writing Down Your Demons” is a combination generative and workshop for memoirists, utilizing the inspiration behind Lynda Barry’s “auto-bifictional-ograpy” One! Hundred! Demons! in which she explores the deeper stories behind abstracts like love, shame, fear, anger, hate and yes, creativity. Writing memoir is a way to name, explore and re-shape our demons, using them to grow something beautiful, powerful, and healing. Through in-class writing exercises and readings (share via Dropbox), this workshop is structured to inspire as well as provide you with new tools to continue the work on your own afterwards.
Bring your favorite writing materials and a copy of Lynda Barry’s One! Hundred! Demons! (Read beforehand, please).
Biography
Deborah A. Miranda's mixed-genre book Bad Indians: A Tribal Memoir (Heyday 2013), received the 2015 PEN-Oakland Josephine Miles Literary Award. The author of three poetry collections, Indian Cartography, The Zen of La Liorona and Raised by Humans, Miranda is a member of Sandra Cisneros’ Macondo workshop. She is the Thomas H. Broadus Professor of English at Washington and Lee University, where she teaches literature and creative writing.