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May 18, 2024
Purple Doesn't Look Good on Anyone: How to Write Emotion
Presenter: Ryan Dennis
Location: Zoom
Presentation Category:
Nonfiction, Fiction, Craft (skills and techiniques), Writing, Editing
Readers come to a story wanting to feel something. It’s our task as writers to remind them that they’re human and prone to all the complexities of joy and sorrow that comes with that. For better or worse, that doesn’t happen by accident. It’s not enough to simply write about something sad.
This workshop will break down techniques essential for delivering emotion within fiction and nonfiction that avoid cliché, melodrama or disengaging the reader. It will focus on preventing pitfalls that are common among beginning and experienced writers, as well as how to deliver prose that are original and stay with the reader once they leave the story. We’ll look at how the whole scene can be used to create emotion, as well as an examination of how to best use interior monologue.
Ryan Dennis is the author of The Beasts They Turned Away, published by époque press. The Irish Times described the novel as “a demanding debut, dense and dark, but ultimately rewarding in its strange beauty.” His work has appeared in various literary journals and he is a syndicated columnist for agricultural print periodicals in four countries and two languages. He is also a Fulbright alumnus and PhD in creative writing, and has taught at the University of Education Schwäbisch Gmünd, the National University of Ireland Galway and Maynooth University.
In addition to exploring the dynamics of rural life in literature, Ryan also seeks to serve those communities more directly. In 2020 he founded The Milk House, an initiative to showcase the work of those writing on rural subjects in order to help them find greater audiences. Born on a farm in New York State but now living in the West of Ireland, he has been featured in numerous rural publications and programs, such as The Irish Farmers Journal and RTE’s Countrywide, addressing agricultural policy concerns. In 2021-2022 Ryan was selected as a Writer-in-Residence at Maynooth University. As part of the residency, he created and edited Voices from the Land, a collection of short stories, essays and poems by Irish farmers.
Purple Doesn't Look Good on Anyone: How to Write Emotion
Presenter: Ryan Dennis
Location: Zoom
Presentation Category:
Nonfiction, Fiction, Craft (skills and techiniques), Writing, Editing
Readers come to a story wanting to feel something. It’s our task as writers to remind them that they’re human and prone to all the complexities of joy and sorrow that comes with that. For better or worse, that doesn’t happen by accident. It’s not enough to simply write about something sad.
This workshop will break down techniques essential for delivering emotion within fiction and nonfiction that avoid cliché, melodrama or disengaging the reader. It will focus on preventing pitfalls that are common among beginning and experienced writers, as well as how to deliver prose that are original and stay with the reader once they leave the story. We’ll look at how the whole scene can be used to create emotion, as well as an examination of how to best use interior monologue.
Ryan Dennis is the author of The Beasts They Turned Away, published by époque press. The Irish Times described the novel as “a demanding debut, dense and dark, but ultimately rewarding in its strange beauty.” His work has appeared in various literary journals and he is a syndicated columnist for agricultural print periodicals in four countries and two languages. He is also a Fulbright alumnus and PhD in creative writing, and has taught at the University of Education Schwäbisch Gmünd, the National University of Ireland Galway and Maynooth University.
In addition to exploring the dynamics of rural life in literature, Ryan also seeks to serve those communities more directly. In 2020 he founded The Milk House, an initiative to showcase the work of those writing on rural subjects in order to help them find greater audiences. Born on a farm in New York State but now living in the West of Ireland, he has been featured in numerous rural publications and programs, such as The Irish Farmers Journal and RTE’s Countrywide, addressing agricultural policy concerns. In 2021-2022 Ryan was selected as a Writer-in-Residence at Maynooth University. As part of the residency, he created and edited Voices from the Land, a collection of short stories, essays and poems by Irish farmers.
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