In a Field of Words: A Creative Writing Text / Edition 1

by Sybil Estess, Janet McCann

Overview

IN A FIELD OF WORDS is designed to help aspiring writers find words for their stories and give them shape. It includes guidelines for writing fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry and features invaluable tips and techniques for getting started, solidifying ideas, and finding help in all elements of writing. The text incorporates ample practice exercises and a FREE companion multi-cultural mini-anthology of work in all three genres (available upon request).

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780130850355
Publisher:	Pearson Education
Publication date:	04/25/2002
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	288
Product dimensions:	7.00(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.60(d)

Read an Excerpt

This book is intended for the beginning creative writer who has perhaps written a few poems and stories but who has not had formal instruction. The book does not expect that its user knows the language of poetry or fiction, or that he or she has read more literature than the average college freshman has read. Its main goal is to provide basic instruction in three genres—poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction. But its method is to present ways to get started, things to write about, and directions to look for help in all elements of writing including first publication.

The book assumes that creative writing provides personal fulfillment and that most people who are interested in writing have an aptitude for it and can, through creative writing courses and other means, find ways to develop their abilities. Also, it assumes that everyone has a story to tell or a poem to write, and that people learn to write mostly by writing. This book will help beginning creative writers to find words for their stories and to give their stories a shape.

Besides serving as a basic text, this book can be used as a self-help book by individual writers putting forth their first efforts. The chapters of the book need not be used in order, since the organization is flexible and responsive to the user's needs. There is enough material in each chapter to use it as a beginning text for a one- or two-genre course, or the book can be used to introduce all three genres—fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry—to the aspiring writer.

We have included an abundance of examples of everything that we discuss, and these vary from the immediately accessible to the difficult, partly to enthrall very different new writers in the pleasure of words, but also to underscore our shared belief that good writing is a wide and varied field.

The text was fun to write. We hope that it will be equally fun to read and that it will be an enjoyable guide for those who wish to wander through the word-field, gathering and scattering.

Table of Contents

A Word of Introduction.


1. Getting Started.


2. Fiction.


3. Creative Nonfiction.


4. Poetry.


5. Revising.


6. Experimental Writing.


7. Creative Writing Exercises.


Appendix A. Publishing in Journals.


Appendix B. Computers and Creative Writing.


Appendix C. Suggested Readings.


Index.

Preface

This book is intended for the beginning creative writer who has perhaps written a few poems and stories but who has not had formal instruction. The book does not expect that its user knows the language of poetry or fiction, or that he or she has read more literature than the average college freshman has read. Its main goal is to provide basic instruction in three genres—poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction. But its method is to present ways to get started, things to write about, and directions to look for help in all elements of writing including first publication.

The book assumes that creative writing provides personal fulfillment and that most people who are interested in writing have an aptitude for it and can, through creative writing courses and other means, find ways to develop their abilities. Also, it assumes that everyone has a story to tell or a poem to write, and that people learn to write mostly by writing. This book will help beginning creative writers to find words for their stories and to give their stories a shape.

Besides serving as a basic text, this book can be used as a self-help book by individual writers putting forth their first efforts. The chapters of the book need not be used in order, since the organization is flexible and responsive to the user's needs. There is enough material in each chapter to use it as a beginning text for a one- or two-genre course, or the book can be used to introduce all three genres—fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry—to the aspiring writer.

We have included an abundance of examples of everything that we discuss, and these vary from the immediately accessible to the difficult, partly to enthrall very different new writers in the pleasure of words, but also to underscore our shared belief that good writing is a wide and varied field.

The text was fun to write. We hope that it will be equally fun to read and that it will be an enjoyable guide for those who wish to wander through the word-field, gathering and scattering.