Write More, Feel Better: Resources, Routines, and Accountability
$445
This eight-week seminar offers an in-depth exploration of how to optimize writing habits and routines for productivity and mental health. For Virginia Woolf, that meant “a room of one’s own.” For Honoré de Balzac, it meant fifty cups of coffee per day. What does it mean for you?
Answering this question is a process of getting to know oneself as a writer. On the surface level, this means exploring one’s preferences: neighborhood cafe, kitchen table, or seaside retreat? Daily trots or monthly marathons? MacBook, pen and paper, or Olivetti? On a deeper level, we will explore how to set and meet realistic expectations for productivity and mental health. And we’ll ask each other the hard questions to challenge our limiting beliefs and unlock our potential for creative flow.
This class will have two main components. The first component will be a review of the resources available to writers who wish to refine their creative practices. We’ll learn about software and hardware tools that writers can use to minimize distractions. We’ll review also books on writing craft, writing communities within Portland, and other resources for writers outside the home. And we’ll spend some time discussing working with agents and editors to complete and publish a manuscript.
The second component will be in-class writing, accountability, and discussion exercises. These exercises will help us hone our creative practices to feel happy and productive throughout our most arduous creative undertakings. Subjects will include: managing goals and deadlines; when, how, and who to ask for feedback; writing alone vs. working together. We’ll check in which each other about our projects and cultivate accountability. Over eight weeks, these check-ins will help each student develop practices to feel confident and productive as they move their manuscripts forward.
After eight weeks, students will have clear, concise, personalized work plans, including refreshed goals and routines. They’ll also have an updated toolkit of resources to help them along their creative journeys. And lastly, they’ll have built community among fellow process-oriented writers who are serious about doing the work.
Open to writers working on any long-form writing project.
Access Program
We want our writing classes and seminars to be accessible to everyone, regardless of income and background. We understand that our tuition structure can present obstacles for some people. Our Access Program offers writing class and seminar tuitions at a reduced rate. Most writing classes have at least one access spot available.
Please apply here for access rate tuition. Contact Susan Moore at susan@literary-arts.org if you have questions.
Liaison position
Every in-person class and seminar at Literary Arts has one liaison position. Liaisons perform specific duties for each class meeting. If you are a liaison for a class or seminar, the full amount of your tuition is covered by Literary Arts.
Apply here for the liaison position.
Daniel Nieh
Daniel Nieh is a writer and translator from Portland, Oregon. Daniel is the author of two novels, Bejing Payback and Take No Names,both of which were Editor's Choice selections in the New York Times Book Review. His translation clients include publishers, universities, nonprofits, and museums around the world. Daniel’s essays, criticism, and short fiction have appeared in the Washington Post, the New York Times, and Esquire.
