What is the state of fiction today? In this class, we will examine the art of fiction writing and study the movements of fiction in the past three years. We’ll dip our toes in with a few classics from the Norton Anthology of Short Fiction and then we’ll read modern authors like Susan Choi, winner of the Asian-American Literary Award and a Pulitzer Prize finalist, and Kristen Roupenian, who sold her debut fiction collection for $1.3 million after one of her short stories went viral in 2018.

Our emphasis is on contemporary works that deftly handle the basic aspects of scene and elements of storytelling. We will observe how authors paint their settings, create memorable characters, and evoke emotion through dialogue. You will learn the vocabulary of fiction, including point of view, fragmentation, avoidance, and exposition. The heart of this course is in craft investigation, prompt experimentation, and the workshopping of two of your own original manuscripts. At the end of the semester, you will produce a final portfolio that polishes one of your manuscripts and articulates your writerly decisions for revision.