Greetings!
The unofficial summer season has begun and it’s time to enjoy some outdoor play, a sweet vacay and the overall decadent vibe in the air. To writers, however, I must say this: Have fun and block out the sun, but not your commitment to your projects. Lather up with sunscreen, but don’t forget your screenplay! (novel, memoir, stories, essay, play, poems, what have you …) Okay you get the point. Unless you are lucky enough to be able to afford a three month writing retreat (including child care, and a rich, non-smoking subletter for your fab pad), why not sign up to experience a brief, intense infusion of energy into your writing – smack dab in the middle of summer? In addition to some tasty guacamole, a tall glass of pomegranate juice, and a chance to develop supportive relationships with fellow writers, I offer you this:
Bang the Keys Summer Writing Seminars, located in Chelsea, NY.
Tues. July 13 One Night Only /6:30 to 9:30pm $95
“BANG UP YOUR STRUCTURE SKILLS”
Character is destiny, but if your plot is slack you may be destined for disappointment when you submit your work in the real world. Similarly, spontaneity is grand, but not for serious scribes who want to complete a meaningful piece of writing in this lifetime.
Main Plot: You will learn and practice techniques for developing and tightening the structure of your writing, so that your readers/viewers will experience a pleasurable sense of suspense and engagement, not a desire to skim through in search of the good parts.
Subplot: You will fight your inner procrastinator and get a quick and dirty lesson in organizing your work, your life, and the more adolescent “I’ll do it later” voices in your head.Open to writers of all levels and genres. Costumes optional.
Sat. July 17 / All Day 10am to 4pm $185
“BANG ON THROUGH TO THE END OF THE YEAR”
The temperature is rising and New Year’s Rockin’ Eve seems so far away. But you know how much time it takes to develop and refine your ideas, to make your characters (whether fictional, or real) into compelling creations on the page, to build narrative momentum, to revise and polish so that your work stands out from the crowd …Geez! That’s a lot of work. And TIME. Don’t just tone up your calves by running on the beach this summer, tone up your craftsmanship and come up with a plan that will get your project done by the time we ring in the New Year.
In This One Day Seminar You Will:
• Immerse yourself in inventive and eternal narrative techniques
• Reconnect to your writing, and commit or re-commit to the project you care most deeply about.
• Do writing exercises that help you to up the ante in your prose or plays, and push past previous limits in your craftsmanship. Become a better writer. For yourself and for your readers/viewers.
• Create and commit to a “no b.s.” writing schedule and six month writing plan that will take you to the end of the year, so that you can enjoy a fabulous New Year’s party on December 31, not another pity party for you and your unfinished book or script!
Open to writers of all levels and genres.
Location for both: Broadway near 25th Street, Manhattan.
SPECIAL DISCOUNT:
Sign up for both by June 30 and pay only $250 (save $30)
Contact: JillDearman@gmail.com or 212.841.0177
--Have a Finished Draft in need of analysis and polish? Write me for details on a “Recession Special” Editing package.
--Curious about what effect Jupiter and Uranus transiting through Aries this year will have on you? Drop me a note for more deets!
INSTRUCTOR BIO:
Writing Coach and editor Jill Dearman is the author of Bang the Keys: Four Steps to a Lifelong Writing Practice (Penguin/2009). She has been teaching her Bang the Keys philosophy of writing to new scribes and published professionals since 2003. She is a part-time Professor of Journalism at New York University and holds an MFA in Creative Writing from The New School. An award-winning fiction writer, her prose has been published in numerous publications including North Atlantic Review, The Portland Review, Lilith, New York Stories, and Mr. Beller's Neighborhood. As a journalist, she has written for The
Writer, New York Daily News, Time Out New York, and other
publications. She writes a weekly interview column for Barnes & Noble.com called “Writer to Writer.” She is also a Jungian Astrologist whose books Queer Astrology for Men and Queer Astrology for Women were published by St. Martins. For more:
To Get a Feel for Bang the Keys check out the YouTube video.
Need a quick but miraculous tip for your writing? Read on.
Read the Red Room Article.
Praise for Bang the Keys by Jill Dearman (Penguin/August, 2009). Foreward by John Leland, Staff Reporter, New York Times ...
“Few writing guides prove as thoughtful and intimate as Jill Dearman’s, and fewer still dare to be so insistently sensible and efficacious. Part anthology, part manual, part scourge, Bang the Keys distills the know-how of a gifted writer and teacher.”--Robert Polito, Director of the New School Graduate Writing Program, author, Savage Art: A Biography of Jim Thompson (Vintage), winner of the National Book Critics Award for Biography."
A beloved Renaissance chick with wit and passion enough to warm a biodome, Dearman proselytizes to Struggling Writer Nation with utter pragmatism and inventiveness. Dare to resist her injunctions if you can –– there's no better battle plan for sentence-making anywhere on the horizon."--Michael Atkinson, film critic and author, Hemingway Deadlights (St. Martins).
"I sold my first book on a treatment and the first 50 pages. Shortly thereafter, I discovered that the first 50 pages are the easy part. It was awfully surprising to find that, for me, the big challenge in writing a novel is resistance. I have a busy New York City-type career (I'm a Forensic Pathologist) and then a second busy-ish career as a freelance writer (New York Times Magazine, New York, Gourmet, etc.), and finding the time to work on the novel was always 'difficult'. Or so I let myself believe, as I coasted along, ignoring the looming deadline as I took care of more pressing and immediately gratifying obligations. Working with Jill not only forced me to focus on my book, but it proved the initial push –– or series of pushes –– that got me rolling on it, and not just rolling, but actually excited about my book. Jill's mastered the art of being honest, but gentle. Working with Jill for a few seasons has given me enough momentum to finish the book independently. Jill has whipped my self-confidence into such a state that I'm sure I'll finish strong."
---Jonathan Hayes, novelist, Precious Blood and A Hard Death (Harper Collins).
“This is a book about self-discipline, about finding your calling and learning to listen to that calling … so charming, so beguiling and laugh-out-loud funny you won’t even notice that you’re working your butt off . . . and getting it done! Jill Dearman is a national treasure.”
--Alison Smith author of Name All the Animals (Scribner), winner of the Lambda Literary Award for Memoir.
"If you are as ambivalent about your prose as you are about everything else in your life, place it and yourself in the velvet-gloved iron fist of Jill Dearman. She will be your mother and your whore.”
--Donna Brodie, Executive Director of The Writers Room, New York City, An Urban Writers Colony
"If you are sick of hearing goody-goody writing experts preaching their New Age or Know-it-All gospel, then bang on Jill Dearman's door, but quick. She seductively taps into writers' natural desire to write, which is just as natural to us as drinking, complaining and procrastinating. Then, through skill, experience and intuition, she hypnotizes writers into falling in love with their writing, and wanting to write again, and again. And by the end of the Dearman trip, we've learned how to hypnotize ourselves."
--Nisha Ganatra, Screenwriter and Director of the award-winning film, Chutney Popcorn; director of Cake.
“Bang the Keys overflows with contagious humor and energy. In fact, after a few pages you will likely throw it aside and run to bang your own keys! But my bet is that you will return to it and that it will stay on your shelf for reference.”
--Suzannah Lessard, author Architect of Desire (Dial Press), former staff writer, The New Yorker; teacher of Creative Writing at The New School, Goucher College and other universities.
"Ready to write your book? Jill Dearman is the savvy coach and good friend every writer needs. With warmth, tough-love, and humor she provides the inspiration, information, practical tips, exercises, advice, and motivation to get you started and to sustain your writing practice for a lifetime."
--Deborah Landau, Director, Creative Writing Program, New York University and author of the poetry collection, Orchidelirium (winner of the Anhinga Prize for Poetry).
"Jill Dearman has the nurturing power of a Jewish mother (without the guilt) and uses it to help you believe that there is no more important task than for you to finish that writing project! If you've been procrastinating for years –– and who hasn't been? –– then get your hands on this workshop-in-a-book. Her approach just works."
--Beth Greenfield, Author, Ten Minutes From Home (Random House, 2010), editor at Time Out New York, frequent contributor to The New York Times.
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