Creative Writing
Content
2/16/2015
Creative writing Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Creative writing
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Creative writing is any writing that goes outside the bounds of normal professional, journalistic, academic,
or technical forms of literature, typically identified by an emphasis on narrative craft, character
development, and the use of literary tropes or with various traditions of poetry and poetics. Due to the
looseness of the definition, it is possible for writing such as feature stories to be considered creative writing,
even though they fall under journalism, because the content of features is specifically focused on narrative
and character development. Both fictional and nonfictional works fall into this category, including such
forms as novels, biographies, short stories, and poems. In the academic setting, creative writing is typically
separated into fiction and poetry classes, with a focus on writing in an original style, as opposed to imitating
preexisting genres such as crime or horror. Writing for the screen and stage—screenwriting and
playwrighting—are often taught separately, but fit under the creative writing category as well.
Creative writing can technically be considered any writing of original composition. In this sense, creative
writing is a more contemporary and processoriented name for what has been traditionally called literature,
including the variety of its genres. In her work, Foundations of Creativity, Mary Lee Marksberry references
Paul Witty and Lou LaBrant’s Teaching the People's Language to define creative writing. Marksberry
notes:
“
Witty and LaBrant…[say creative writing] is a composition of any type of writing at any
time primarily in the service of such needs as
1. the need for keeping records of significant experience,
2. the need for sharing experience with an interested group, and
3. the need for free individual expression which contributes to mental and physical
health.[1]
”
Contents
1 Creative writing in academia
1.1 Programs of study
1.2 In the classroom
1.3 Controversy in academia
2 Elements of creative writing
3 Forms of creative writing
4 See also
5 Further reading
6 References
7 External links
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_writing
1/6
2/16/2015
Creative writing Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Creative writing in academia
Unlike its academic counterpart of writing classes that teach students to compose work based on the rules of
the language, creative writing is believed to focus on students’ selfexpression.[2] While creative writing as
an educational subject is often available at some stages, if not throughout, K–12 education, perhaps the
most refined form of creative writing as an educational focus is in universities. Following a reworking of
university education in the postwar era, creative writing has progressively gained prominence in the
university setting. In the UK, the first formal creative writing program was established as a Master of Arts
degree at the University of East Anglia in 1970 [3] by the novelists Malcolm Bradbury and Angus Wilson.
With the beginning of formal creative writing programs:
“
For the first time in the sad and enchanting history of literature, for the first time in the
glorious and dreadful history of the world, the writer was welcome in the academic place. If
the mind could be honored there, why not the imagination?[4]
”
Programs of study
Creative Writing programs are typically available to writers from the high school level all the way through
graduate school/university and adult education. Traditionally these programs are associated with the
English departments in the respective schools, but this notion has been challenged in recent time as more
creative writing programs have spun off into their own department. Most Creative Writing degrees for
undergraduates in college are Bachelor of Fine Arts degrees (BFA). Some continue to pursue a Master of
Fine Arts in Creative Writing, the terminal degree in the field. At one time rare, PhD. programs are
becoming more prevalent in the field, as more writers attempt to bridge the gap between academic study
and artistic pursuit.
Creative writers typically decide an emphasis in either fiction or poetry, and they usually start with short
stories or simple poems. They then make a schedule based on this emphasis including literature classes,
education classes and workshop classes to strengthen their skills and techniques. Though they have their
own programs of study in the fields of film and theatre, screenwriting and playwriting have become more
popular in creative writing programs, as creative writing programs attempt to work more closely with film
and theatre programs as well as English programs. Creative writing students are encouraged to get involved
in extracurricular writingbased activities, such as publishing clubs, schoolbased literary magazines or
newspapers, writing contests, writing colonies or conventions, and extended education classes.
Creative writing also takes places outside of formal university or school institutions. For example, writer
Dave Eggers set up the innovative 826 Valencia in San Francisco, where young people write with
professional writers. In the UK, the Arvon Foundation runs weeklong residential creative writing courses
in four historic houses. In New Zealand, creative writing courses at NZIBS are popular because they are
homestudy to diploma level.
In the classroom
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_writing
2/6
2/16/2015
Creative writing Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Creative writing is usually taught in a workshop format rather than seminar style. In workshops students
usually submit original work for peer critique. Students also format a writing method through the process of
writing and rewriting. Some courses teach the means to exploit or access latent creativity or more technical
issues such as editing, structural techniques, genres, random idea generating or writer's block unblocking.
Some noted authors, such as Michael Chabon, Kazuo Ishiguro, Kevin Brockmeier, Ian McEwan, Karl
Kirchwey,[5] Rose Tremain and reputed screenwriters, such as David Benioff, Darren Star and Peter
Farrelly, have graduated from university creative writing programs.
Controversy in academia
Creative writing is considered by some academics (mostly in the USA) to be an extension of the English
discipline, even though it is taught around the world in many languages. The English discipline is
traditionally seen as the critical study of literary forms, not the creation of literary forms. Some academics
see creative writing as a challenge to this tradition. In the UK and Australia, as well as increasingly in the
USA and the rest of the world, creative writing is considered a discipline in its own right, not an offshoot of
any other discipline.
“
To say that the creative has no part in education is to argue that a university is not
universal.[6]
”
Those who support creative writing programs either as part or separate from the English discipline, argue
for the academic worth of the creative writing experience. They argue that creative writing hones the
students’ abilities to clearly express their thoughts. They further argue that creative writing also entails an
indepth study of literary terms and mechanisms so they can be applied to the writer’s own work to foster
improvement. These critical analysis skills are further used in other literary study outside the creative
writing sphere. Indeed the process of creative writing, the crafting of a thoughtout and original piece, is
considered by some to be experience in creative problem solving.
It is also believed by some in the academic sphere that the term "creative writing" can include "creative
reading" which is the reading of something not typically understood to be a creative piece as though it were
creative. This expanded concept further addresses the idea of "found" materials being of literary value
under a newly assigned meaning. Examples of this might be product assembly directions being considered
"found poetry."
Despite the large number of academic creative writing programs throughout the world, many people argue
that creative writing cannot be taught. Louis Menand explores the issue in an article for the New Yorker in
which he quotes Kay Boyle, the director of creative writing program at San Francisco State for sixteen
years, who said, “all creativewriting programs ought to be abolished by law.” [7]
One author argued in a Modern Scholar course on creative writing that sometimes authors borrow character
traits from real people, but that in the creative process, authors transform these characters into unique
creations by using their imaginations:
I think that writing, like love and war, is not an entirely 100% squeaky clean moral act. Our job
as writers is to capture the truth about life. We refract it through a fictional lens and put it on
the page so that it becomes truth on the page.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_writing
3/6
2/16/2015
Creative writing Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
—Jenna Blum in The Author at Work, 2013[8]
Elements of creative writing
Character
Point of View
Plot
Setting
Dialogue (fiction)
Style (fiction)
Theme and Motif
Forms of creative writing
Autobiography/Memoir
Collaborative writing
Creative nonfiction (Personal & Journalistic Essays)
Epic
Flash fiction
Novel
Novella
Playwriting/Dramatic writing
Poetry
Screenwriting
Short story
Songwriting
Bibliography
Stream of consciousness (narrative mode)
See also
Asemic writing
Author
Book report
Creativity
Electronic literature
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_writing
4/6
2/16/2015
Creative writing Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Expository writing
Fan fiction
Fiction writing
High School for Writing and Communication Arts (in New York City)
Iowa Writers' Workshop
Literature
Show, don't tell
Writer's block
Writing
Writing circle
Writing process
Writing style
Writing Workshop
Further reading
Brewer, R.L. (ed.). 2014 Writer's Market. Cincinnati: Writer's Digest Books, 2013.
Everett, Nick. 2005. "Creative Writing and English." The Cambridge Quarterly. 34 (3):231242.
McGurl, Mark. The Program Era: Postwar Fiction and the Rise of Creative Writing (Harvard
University Press, 2009).[9]
Myers, D. G. The Elephants Teach: Creative Writing since 1880. Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 2006.
Palmer, A.J. "Writing and Imagery How to Deepen Your Creativity and Improve Your Writing."
[Aber Books]2010. Republished as Writing and Imagery How to Avoid Writers Block (How to
Become an Author). [Aber Books 2013]
Roy, Pinaki. “Reflections on the Art of Producing Travelogues”. Images of Life: Creative and Other
Forms of Writing (ed. Mullick, S.), Kolkata: The Book World, 2014 (ISBN 9789381231036), pp.
11129.
References
1. ^ Marksberry, Mary Lee. Foundation of Creativity. Harper's Series on Teaching. (New York ; London: Harper &
Row, 1963), 39.
2. ^ Johnson, Burges and Syracuse University. "Creative Writing", 3.
3. ^ https://www.uea.ac.uk/literature/creativewriting
4. ^ Engle, Paul. "The Writer and the Place." In A Community of Writers: Paul Engle and the Iowa Writers'
Workshop, edited by Robert Dana, 2(Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1999).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_writing
5/6
2/16/2015
Creative writing Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
5. ^ JOHN SWANSBURG (April 29, 2001). "At Yale, Lessons in Writing and in Life"
(http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/29/nyregion/atyalelessonsinwritingandinlife.html). The New York Times.
Retrieved 20101015. "Karl Kirchwey, who graduated from Yale in 1979, recently became the director of
creative writing at Bryn Mawr College, after having run the Unterberg Poetry Center at the 92nd Street Y for
over a decade."
6. ^ Engle, Paul. "The Writer and the Place," 3.
7. ^ "Show or Tell Should Creative Writing be Taught?" by Louis Menand The New Yorker, June 8, 2009,
Newyorker.com (http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/atlarge/2009/06/08/090608crat_atlarge_menand)
8. ^ Jenna Blum, 2013, The Modern Scholar published by Recorded Books, The Author at Work: The Art of
Writing Fiction, Disk 1, Track 6, ISBN 9781470384371, “...job as writers is to capture the truth about life...”
9. ^ The Program Era: Postwar Fiction and the Rise of Creative Writing (http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?
isbn=9780674033191) from Harvard University Press
External links
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?
title=Creative_writing&oldid=647066817"
Wikiversity has learning
materials about
Collaborative_play_writing
Categories: Writing Communication design Creativity
This page was last modified on 14 February 2015, at 07:28.
Text is available under the Creative Commons AttributionShareAlike License; additional terms may
apply. By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Wikipedia® is a
registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a nonprofit organization.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_writing
6/6
Creative writing Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Creative writing
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Creative writing is any writing that goes outside the bounds of normal professional, journalistic, academic,
or technical forms of literature, typically identified by an emphasis on narrative craft, character
development, and the use of literary tropes or with various traditions of poetry and poetics. Due to the
looseness of the definition, it is possible for writing such as feature stories to be considered creative writing,
even though they fall under journalism, because the content of features is specifically focused on narrative
and character development. Both fictional and nonfictional works fall into this category, including such
forms as novels, biographies, short stories, and poems. In the academic setting, creative writing is typically
separated into fiction and poetry classes, with a focus on writing in an original style, as opposed to imitating
preexisting genres such as crime or horror. Writing for the screen and stage—screenwriting and
playwrighting—are often taught separately, but fit under the creative writing category as well.
Creative writing can technically be considered any writing of original composition. In this sense, creative
writing is a more contemporary and processoriented name for what has been traditionally called literature,
including the variety of its genres. In her work, Foundations of Creativity, Mary Lee Marksberry references
Paul Witty and Lou LaBrant’s Teaching the People's Language to define creative writing. Marksberry
notes:
“
Witty and LaBrant…[say creative writing] is a composition of any type of writing at any
time primarily in the service of such needs as
1. the need for keeping records of significant experience,
2. the need for sharing experience with an interested group, and
3. the need for free individual expression which contributes to mental and physical
health.[1]
”
Contents
1 Creative writing in academia
1.1 Programs of study
1.2 In the classroom
1.3 Controversy in academia
2 Elements of creative writing
3 Forms of creative writing
4 See also
5 Further reading
6 References
7 External links
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_writing
1/6
2/16/2015
Creative writing Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Creative writing in academia
Unlike its academic counterpart of writing classes that teach students to compose work based on the rules of
the language, creative writing is believed to focus on students’ selfexpression.[2] While creative writing as
an educational subject is often available at some stages, if not throughout, K–12 education, perhaps the
most refined form of creative writing as an educational focus is in universities. Following a reworking of
university education in the postwar era, creative writing has progressively gained prominence in the
university setting. In the UK, the first formal creative writing program was established as a Master of Arts
degree at the University of East Anglia in 1970 [3] by the novelists Malcolm Bradbury and Angus Wilson.
With the beginning of formal creative writing programs:
“
For the first time in the sad and enchanting history of literature, for the first time in the
glorious and dreadful history of the world, the writer was welcome in the academic place. If
the mind could be honored there, why not the imagination?[4]
”
Programs of study
Creative Writing programs are typically available to writers from the high school level all the way through
graduate school/university and adult education. Traditionally these programs are associated with the
English departments in the respective schools, but this notion has been challenged in recent time as more
creative writing programs have spun off into their own department. Most Creative Writing degrees for
undergraduates in college are Bachelor of Fine Arts degrees (BFA). Some continue to pursue a Master of
Fine Arts in Creative Writing, the terminal degree in the field. At one time rare, PhD. programs are
becoming more prevalent in the field, as more writers attempt to bridge the gap between academic study
and artistic pursuit.
Creative writers typically decide an emphasis in either fiction or poetry, and they usually start with short
stories or simple poems. They then make a schedule based on this emphasis including literature classes,
education classes and workshop classes to strengthen their skills and techniques. Though they have their
own programs of study in the fields of film and theatre, screenwriting and playwriting have become more
popular in creative writing programs, as creative writing programs attempt to work more closely with film
and theatre programs as well as English programs. Creative writing students are encouraged to get involved
in extracurricular writingbased activities, such as publishing clubs, schoolbased literary magazines or
newspapers, writing contests, writing colonies or conventions, and extended education classes.
Creative writing also takes places outside of formal university or school institutions. For example, writer
Dave Eggers set up the innovative 826 Valencia in San Francisco, where young people write with
professional writers. In the UK, the Arvon Foundation runs weeklong residential creative writing courses
in four historic houses. In New Zealand, creative writing courses at NZIBS are popular because they are
homestudy to diploma level.
In the classroom
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_writing
2/6
2/16/2015
Creative writing Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Creative writing is usually taught in a workshop format rather than seminar style. In workshops students
usually submit original work for peer critique. Students also format a writing method through the process of
writing and rewriting. Some courses teach the means to exploit or access latent creativity or more technical
issues such as editing, structural techniques, genres, random idea generating or writer's block unblocking.
Some noted authors, such as Michael Chabon, Kazuo Ishiguro, Kevin Brockmeier, Ian McEwan, Karl
Kirchwey,[5] Rose Tremain and reputed screenwriters, such as David Benioff, Darren Star and Peter
Farrelly, have graduated from university creative writing programs.
Controversy in academia
Creative writing is considered by some academics (mostly in the USA) to be an extension of the English
discipline, even though it is taught around the world in many languages. The English discipline is
traditionally seen as the critical study of literary forms, not the creation of literary forms. Some academics
see creative writing as a challenge to this tradition. In the UK and Australia, as well as increasingly in the
USA and the rest of the world, creative writing is considered a discipline in its own right, not an offshoot of
any other discipline.
“
To say that the creative has no part in education is to argue that a university is not
universal.[6]
”
Those who support creative writing programs either as part or separate from the English discipline, argue
for the academic worth of the creative writing experience. They argue that creative writing hones the
students’ abilities to clearly express their thoughts. They further argue that creative writing also entails an
indepth study of literary terms and mechanisms so they can be applied to the writer’s own work to foster
improvement. These critical analysis skills are further used in other literary study outside the creative
writing sphere. Indeed the process of creative writing, the crafting of a thoughtout and original piece, is
considered by some to be experience in creative problem solving.
It is also believed by some in the academic sphere that the term "creative writing" can include "creative
reading" which is the reading of something not typically understood to be a creative piece as though it were
creative. This expanded concept further addresses the idea of "found" materials being of literary value
under a newly assigned meaning. Examples of this might be product assembly directions being considered
"found poetry."
Despite the large number of academic creative writing programs throughout the world, many people argue
that creative writing cannot be taught. Louis Menand explores the issue in an article for the New Yorker in
which he quotes Kay Boyle, the director of creative writing program at San Francisco State for sixteen
years, who said, “all creativewriting programs ought to be abolished by law.” [7]
One author argued in a Modern Scholar course on creative writing that sometimes authors borrow character
traits from real people, but that in the creative process, authors transform these characters into unique
creations by using their imaginations:
I think that writing, like love and war, is not an entirely 100% squeaky clean moral act. Our job
as writers is to capture the truth about life. We refract it through a fictional lens and put it on
the page so that it becomes truth on the page.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_writing
3/6
2/16/2015
Creative writing Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
—Jenna Blum in The Author at Work, 2013[8]
Elements of creative writing
Character
Point of View
Plot
Setting
Dialogue (fiction)
Style (fiction)
Theme and Motif
Forms of creative writing
Autobiography/Memoir
Collaborative writing
Creative nonfiction (Personal & Journalistic Essays)
Epic
Flash fiction
Novel
Novella
Playwriting/Dramatic writing
Poetry
Screenwriting
Short story
Songwriting
Bibliography
Stream of consciousness (narrative mode)
See also
Asemic writing
Author
Book report
Creativity
Electronic literature
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_writing
4/6
2/16/2015
Creative writing Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Expository writing
Fan fiction
Fiction writing
High School for Writing and Communication Arts (in New York City)
Iowa Writers' Workshop
Literature
Show, don't tell
Writer's block
Writing
Writing circle
Writing process
Writing style
Writing Workshop
Further reading
Brewer, R.L. (ed.). 2014 Writer's Market. Cincinnati: Writer's Digest Books, 2013.
Everett, Nick. 2005. "Creative Writing and English." The Cambridge Quarterly. 34 (3):231242.
McGurl, Mark. The Program Era: Postwar Fiction and the Rise of Creative Writing (Harvard
University Press, 2009).[9]
Myers, D. G. The Elephants Teach: Creative Writing since 1880. Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 2006.
Palmer, A.J. "Writing and Imagery How to Deepen Your Creativity and Improve Your Writing."
[Aber Books]2010. Republished as Writing and Imagery How to Avoid Writers Block (How to
Become an Author). [Aber Books 2013]
Roy, Pinaki. “Reflections on the Art of Producing Travelogues”. Images of Life: Creative and Other
Forms of Writing (ed. Mullick, S.), Kolkata: The Book World, 2014 (ISBN 9789381231036), pp.
11129.
References
1. ^ Marksberry, Mary Lee. Foundation of Creativity. Harper's Series on Teaching. (New York ; London: Harper &
Row, 1963), 39.
2. ^ Johnson, Burges and Syracuse University. "Creative Writing", 3.
3. ^ https://www.uea.ac.uk/literature/creativewriting
4. ^ Engle, Paul. "The Writer and the Place." In A Community of Writers: Paul Engle and the Iowa Writers'
Workshop, edited by Robert Dana, 2(Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1999).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_writing
5/6
2/16/2015
Creative writing Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
5. ^ JOHN SWANSBURG (April 29, 2001). "At Yale, Lessons in Writing and in Life"
(http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/29/nyregion/atyalelessonsinwritingandinlife.html). The New York Times.
Retrieved 20101015. "Karl Kirchwey, who graduated from Yale in 1979, recently became the director of
creative writing at Bryn Mawr College, after having run the Unterberg Poetry Center at the 92nd Street Y for
over a decade."
6. ^ Engle, Paul. "The Writer and the Place," 3.
7. ^ "Show or Tell Should Creative Writing be Taught?" by Louis Menand The New Yorker, June 8, 2009,
Newyorker.com (http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/atlarge/2009/06/08/090608crat_atlarge_menand)
8. ^ Jenna Blum, 2013, The Modern Scholar published by Recorded Books, The Author at Work: The Art of
Writing Fiction, Disk 1, Track 6, ISBN 9781470384371, “...job as writers is to capture the truth about life...”
9. ^ The Program Era: Postwar Fiction and the Rise of Creative Writing (http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?
isbn=9780674033191) from Harvard University Press
External links
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?
title=Creative_writing&oldid=647066817"
Wikiversity has learning
materials about
Collaborative_play_writing
Categories: Writing Communication design Creativity
This page was last modified on 14 February 2015, at 07:28.
Text is available under the Creative Commons AttributionShareAlike License; additional terms may
apply. By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Wikipedia® is a
registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a nonprofit organization.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_writing
6/6
