How to Get a Spot in a QWF Workshop
Eight-week workshops: $170 per course ($150 for QWF members)
Quebec City workshop $150
Wakefield workshop and Saturday sessions: $75 each
Arts Journalism workshops $200 (some scholarships available)
Call or email the office to see if there's still space available, and register. Pay for the workshop by cheque, cash or via PayPal.
Pmt by cheque to:
Quebec Writers' Federation
1200 Atwater, Suite 3
Montreal
H3Z 1X4
or by cash at the QWF office (by appointment).
For more information:
(514) 933-0878
info@qwf.org
www.qwf.org
If you're paying with PayPal:
You must contact the office first to get registered. Log on to www.paypal.com and click "Send Money." Recipient's email address is admin@qwf.org In the "Note" box, provide your full name, email address, daytime phone number and the name of the workshop you're registering for.
Note that there is a small service charge for the convenience of paying with a credit card.
Quebec Writers' Federation Workshops
Spring Session 2008
Develop your writing with the mentorship of an acclaimed professional writer and feedback from your peers.
Workshops take place at the QWF office, Suite 3, Atwater Library unless otherwise indicated.
STYLE, SUBSTANCE, STORYTELLING: THE ART AND SOUL OF FEATURE WRITING
Eight Tuesdays, 8:00 to 10:00 p.m. (March 11–April 29)
1200 Atwater Avenue, Suite 3
Workshop leader: Peggy Curran
A compelling opening act, wonderful characters, a meaty plot and a stirring finale – knowing what we want from a feature is the easy part. But finding a story worth telling and wrapping it into a gripping package readers won’t be able to put down takes careful thought, oodles of research and a dash of serendipity. In this hands-on workshop, we’ll begin by looking at the ingredients which go into making feature stories memorable, fresh, heart-wrenching, infuriating. Then we’ll use writing exercises to try it ourselves. During the eight-week session, we’ll look at pieces that work and pieces that fall flat. We’ll dig for stories, then explore ways to tell them – by casting a wide net and then narrowing the focus; sharpening the pen and hitting the delete button; finding the people, anecdotes, language and structure that will bring those words to life and make it real.
For the first meeting: Bring examples of writing you like and writing you despise. Fiction or non-fiction, from newspapers, magazines, radio or television, online or on film, make a note of pieces that moved you or made you laugh or came at you from an unexpected angle. Jot down that chilling quote or bedazzling turn-of-phrase that captures a mood, a moment, a personality. You should also be thinking about at least one story you want to tell – and imagine ways you’d like to approach it over the course of the workshop. (There’s nothing wrong with arriving empty-handed or changing your mind or direction along the way. But it can help to have a head-start and a subject you already care about.)
The workshop leader will provide photocopied materials and suggested readings during the workshop.
During a quarter century at The Gazette, Peggy Curran has burrowed into the lair of the Hell’s Angels, waded through the constitutional muck of Parliament and allowed herself to be poked and probed in search of the secrets of sleep, dreams and the human condition. A former crime and court reporter, Ottawa correspondent, city columnist and television critic, for the last four years she has been a university affairs columnist and feature writer. Winner of The Gazette’s Norman Webster Prize for Writing, in 2005 her series “The Brain” won the Canadians for Health Research/Sanofi-Pasteur Medal for Excellence in Health Research Journalism. In 2006 she received the CAJ/CIDA Africa Fellowship to travel and write in South Africa and Zambia. In September 2007, her seven-part series “On Thin Ice” looked at climate change in Canada’s north from the deck of the Canadian Coast Guard icebreaker Amundsen.
REGISTRATION INFORMATION
Eight-week workshops: $170 per course ($150 for QWF members) • Quebec City workshop: $150 • Wakefield workshop and Saturday sessions: $75 each • Arts Journalism workshops $200 (some scholarships available) • Call to register and for cancellation policy • Payment by cheque to Quebec Writers' Federation, 1200 Atwater, Suite 3, Montreal H3Z 1X4, by PayPal (additional fee-please check with office) or by cash at the QWF office (by appointment).
TO REGISTER, CALL (514) 933-0878
QWF gratefully acknowledges the assistance of the Canada Council for the Arts.
