Creative Writing Commons^™

We Are Your Epistles: How Christian Writers Communicate The Work Of The Holy Spirit Through The Art Of Spiritual Memoir, Ananda E.G. Peters

Masters Theses

Within the nonfiction genre of memoir lies the spiritual memoir, which emphasizes a divine element at work in the lives of mortal beings. Christian tradition, beginning with the Bible, is rich with accounts of God intervening in people’s lives. By writing and preserving their stories, our spiritual forebearers left behind relics of encouragement and instruction for future generations. This thesis aims to inspire Christians to continue the tradition of preserving personal stories in written form. This thesis is presented in three parts. The Artist’s Statement explains the author’s connection to this sub-genre of creative writing. The Critical Research essay is …

Writing Workshop In Prose, Brenna E. Crowe

Open Educational Resources

A prose workshop where students write a lyrical essay, a satirical essay, a personal essay, an informational interview, and a portfolio.

Satirical Essay Assignment Prompt & Calendar, Brenna E. Crowe

Open Educational Resources

Assignment description with calendar and hyperlinked model & craft essays

Greenhouse, Sophie Hall

WWU Honors College Senior Projects

Greenhouse is a chapbook of creative nonfiction lyric essays and poems about what it means to be at home, fragmented forms echoing my own varied definitions. The writing in this chapbook returns to ideas I have explored for years, expanding on my original college application essay titled “Home” to think about what it means to be at home, what defines a home, and how I am currently building one.

While I was not familiar with the term “creative nonfiction” at the time, my college application essay was my first introduction to the genre, allowing me to reflect on my childhood …

Introduction To Creative Writing, Shamecca A. Harris

Open Educational Resources

This introductory creative writing course asks students to explore their literary interests and proclivities through regular reading and writing activities designed to promote an in-depth understanding and appreciation for the craft of writing. Students will intellectually engage with both contemporary and classic authors within the main genres of creative writing and use the craft elements discussed in class to compose their own original poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction work. While studying various forms of creative writing, emphasis will be placed on the creative process of writing while encouraging students to find their writing voice. Student responsibilities include workshop participation, several …

A Perfect Storm: Nonfiction On The Progression And Regression Of Anxiety, Amanda Guindon

Honors Program Theses and Projects

From the moment I decided to write a creative nonfiction collection of essays for my thesis, I knew that anxiety would be my focus. Mental health awareness is on the uprise as it’s estimated by the National Institute of Mental Health that 31.1% of all United States adults will experience any anxiety disorder in their lives. While I knew anxiety would be an important topic to discuss in order to bring awareness to causes and effects of anxiety, I had no concept of the challenges I would face in portraying my mental health to an audience who may know nothing …

Can We Make It? Coming-Of-Age In A Covid Kitchen, Maila Erickson

Senior Honors Projects

The Covid-19 pandemic has shifted how we interact with our communities and how we carry out our daily lives. If stories in the news and in social media are any indication, food seems to be a surprising focus of the pandemic for young and old. Personally speaking, I delved into cooking. I experienced the tensions at the grocery. I adjusted my food shopping habits. I felt like I grew up. I began to wonder how other people my age might have modified their food preparation habits and what the experience of cooking in quarantine meant to them. In this honors …

Origin Story, Rose Marion Lopez

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

ABSTRACT OF THE THESIS

ORIGIN STORY

by

Rose Marion Lopez

Florida International University, 2020

Miami, Florida

Professor Julie Marie Wade, Major Professor

ORIGIN STORY is a collection of lyric essays that examines coming into adulthood and forging a life with a long-time significant other. These essays explore the speaker’s identity as a daughter, sister, partner, and eventual wife and mother across multiple states and countries of residence. They incorporate both traditional scene-based storytelling and hybrid innovations of text, image, and fragmentation to present the speaker’s journey from as many perspectives as possible.

The literary influences of ORIGIN STORY include Rivka …

Skeletons In My Closet: A Collection Of Personal Essays And Short Fiction, Macey Howell

Honors Scholars Collaborative Projects

My thesis will be a collection of personal essays and short fiction centered on examining the ties between fashion and identity and told through a Gothic literary tradition. I seek to explore my identity by examining my personal style using the mode of the Gothic. Through this project, I will encapsulate my sense of style, and therefore my sense of self, in words and explore the nuances of my identity through creative nonfiction and fiction.

I have a distinct sense of style that is inseparable from my identity as a woman, as an artist, as a human drawn to beauty …

To Drown Or Not To Drown: Self Discovery Through The Lens Of Formalist Theory, Sierra Correia

Senior Research Projects

The purpose of this project was to discover whether or not using creative nonfiction writing as a strategy in narrative therapy can aid in the process of self-discovery, self-awareness, and self-reflection. To begin, I selected creative nonfiction pieces for analysis: Underwater Blue, Forever Blue, and The Knowing, all of which come from a portfolio completed in Fall 2019 and contain traumatic subject matter. Literary formalist criticism, the Narrative Process Model, and narrative themes and the concept of self were the chosen methods of analysis. I found commonalities in writers' craft tools as well as in themes and self in all …

"Free Indirect Suicide: An Unfinished Fugue In H Minor", Seo-Young J. Chu

Publications and Research

In this lyric essay/work of creative nonfiction (listed among “Notable Essays & Literary Nonfiction” in Best American Essays 2020), Seo-Young Chu uses poetry, autotheory, and creative nonfiction to explore the generational trauma/postmemory han she inherited from her parents and the importance of destigmatizing mental illness through dialogue.

Redactándome A Mi Misma: Writing Place, Process, And Identity Across Two Languages, Jenna Ziegelmayer

Senior Honors Projects

Emily Dickinson once wrote a poem titled “Tell all the truth but tell it slant,” where she advises writers to do just that. One should tell the truth about their experiences, but tell it through their own unique perspective in order to make it “dazzle” on the page. My slant? Una segunda lengua.

As a student of Spanish, learning a different language has impacted the way that I see the world and my place in it. Studying abroad taught me about the language and culture of Spain, but it also taught me a lot about myself, my own native language, …

A Refuge For Jae-In Doe: Fugues In The Key Of English Major, Seo-Young J. Chu

Publications and Research

"A Refuge for Jae-in Doe: Fugues in the Key of English Major"

Author(s):

Seo-Young Chu (see profile)

Date:

2017

Subject(s):

Feminism, Creative nonfiction, Asian American literature, Sonnets, Social justice, Trauma

Item Type:

Essay

Tag(s):

#MeToo, Stanford, women in academia, early american

Permanent URL:

http://dx.doi.org/10.17613/cp82-8f39

Casual Myths, David Grandouiller

Creative Writing Minor Portfolios

This portfolio is a multi-genre collection of the best or most representative writing during my three years in the Creative Writing minor at Cedarville University. It includes seven pieces of nonfiction, one short story, and five poems. The most consistent link between these pieces across the genres is an imagist aesthetic, an attempt to live up to W. C. Williams’ adage, “No ideas but in things.” Primary themes the collection explores are my relationship with family, with place, and with God.

Eyebrows: A Collection Of Stories About That Family You Saw In Aldi's Last Week, Wesley D. Pena

Senior Honors Theses

This creative thesis will begin with an introduction to the idea of creative nonfiction and will also present a short collection of creative nonfiction stories. The creative body of the thesis will consist of short stories taken from the author's own life that center around the common theme of family, focusing especially on the author's role as a big sister in a family of nine children. Following these short stories, the conclusion of the thesis will briefly consider the value of personal stories like these in the larger scheme of literature. For those unfamiliar with the genre, this thesis hopes …

Toward Refuge, 43° 18’ N., 70° 47’ W., Ruth E. Towne

Creative Writing Minor Portfolios

This portfolio is a collection of some of my poetry and creative nonfiction pieces, all of which I wrote during my time as an undergraduate at Cedarville University. A few of the pieces in this collection have appeared previously in other publications. Literary Yard featured my nonfiction piece “Four Passages” on their website in November of 2014. Blotterature Literary Magazine published my nonfiction piece “This Is More Than Homesickness” in Volume 2, Issue 1, of their Winter 2015 publication. Burning Word Literary Journal published my nonfiction piece “Sun Fungus” in May of 2015. Magnolia Review featured my nonfiction piece “Nine …

I Am Not A Tree, Ashley Coulter

Mahurin Honors College Capstone Experience/Thesis Projects

I am not going to gut my thesis like a fish. To give you an “abstract” is to give you the “big picture” of this intricate, complex work. I don’t know “love” or “hope” or “humanity” or “loss.” I know a wooden rocking horse, the touch of bare feet on a cold tile floor, the bond I feel when driving for hours on the interstate behind the same car, the sudden hint of despair that comes over me when the car begins to veer toward the exit, as if I’m losing my travel companion. To give you the “big picture” …

Two Of A Kind: The Death And Life Of Patricia And Joan Miller, Monica Spees

Mahurin Honors College Capstone Experience/Thesis Projects

Twin sisters, Patricia and Joan Miller, create an unusual story that few people know. In their youth, they had fairly successful singing and performing careers, but they became reclusive as they got older and continued their lives only with each other. No one knew much about or heard much from them for about 40 years. Then police found them dead in their South Lake Tahoe, Calif., home in February 2012. Autopsy reports showed they died within hours of each other several weeks before police found them.

I intend to investigate the lives of the two sisters and their devotion to …

Three Romanian Postcards, Ania Spyra

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

Whether in memory of some ancient fertility rites, or because of the International Women‟s Day on the eight of the month, March is considered women‟s month in Romania.

Home Movies, Vicki L. Reitenauer

Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

This is a piece of creative nonfiction