Award-winning author and poet Ellen Waterston will offer her popular The Story You Came To Tell workshop series at Central Oregon Community College (COCC), starting Thursday, May 31 (Corrected date: previously listed as May 28). The workshops will continue for seven sessions, meeting from 4 to 6pm Mondays and Thursdays. The workshops conclude on June 28 with a reception and reading by workshop participants. The series emphasizes the intersection of literary nonfiction and fiction in long- and short-form prose and poetry. Participants will develop their creative writing skills through in-class writing exercises, readings and writing assignments.
Waterston said, “This workshop series welcomes first-time writers and those with an ongoing project. Participants will take their writing to the next level as they explore poetry, fiction and nonfiction.”
John Griffith, a 2012 workshop participant, stated, “What an amazing and energizing process! Your unique method of teaching and guiding was often the topic of conversation during the last six weeks. We all found your approach to be gifted and unique. Between your self-revelations and your laser-accuracy observations, you created an environment where we felt safe to venture forth, out of our comfort zone. You also validated our ‘right’ to speak, each in our own voice.”
Sharon Duerst, also a 2012 workshop student, said, “Your warmth and guidance charmed some great work from us and we are now armed with terrific new tools to extract more from ourselves!”
To enroll, visit the COCC community education website at http:/noncredit.cocc.edu.
The class number is 26547. Class fee, for the entire seven-session series, is $319, which includes a professionally printed and bound copy of the class anthology for each student.
About Ellen Waterston
Ellen Waterston has been teaching writing workshops for several years through the Writing Ranch and in other venues. She brings her expertise and enthusiasm to encouraging new and emerging writers in their craft. Where the Crooked River Rises, a collection of Waterston’s award-winning essays about Central Oregon’s high desert, was published by OSU Press fall 2010. She was the winner of the 2008 Northwest Perspectives Essay Contest and will judge that competition in 2013. Her memoir, Then There Was No Mountain, (Rowan and Littlefield, publisher), was selected by the Oregonian as one of the top ten books in 2003, was a national Foreward and WILLA finalist, and earned her an appearance on Good Morning America with Diane Sawyer. Awards include the WILLA Award in Poetry for her collections Between Desert Seasons and I Am Madagascar, the Obsidian Prize in Poetry, an Oregon Arts Commission Individual Artist Fellowship, a Literary Arts Oregon Literary Fellowship and a Werner Fellowship. Sought-after as an author, a speaker and writing instructor, engagements include Summer Fishtrap, Association of Writers and Writing Programs, OSU-Cascades, Blue River Writers Group, Northwest Poets’ Concord, Oregon State Poetry Association, and Women Writing the West. Ellen is the founder and director of The Nature of Words (NOW), a literary organization that conducts an annual literary festival of acclaimed authors every November in readings, panel discussions, workshops and a gala dinner. NOW also offers creative writing classes to youth and adults. She is the president of the Writing Ranch, founded in 2000, which offers creative writing workshops and retreats for emerging writers in the United States and Mexico. For more information, visit www.ellenwaterston.com
email ellen@ellenwaterston.com or call 541-480-3933.