Let's talk, explore, and experiment with the blurred line of facts/fiction. We'll read and discuss the work of writers who so beautifully ride the line (Jo Ann Beard, Ocean Vuong, etc.) and engage in generative exercises to stretch our writerly muscles, ignite a new project, or fill out an existing one. This class is open to and encouraging of writers in all genres, since we all fall somewhere along the fiction-autofiction-memoir-nonfiction-poetry spectrum. I'm less interested in making clear genre distinctions and more interested in sparking conversations about the weird and wonderful ways we cull our own experiences and weave them into words, into story, into art.
Heather Hasselle is a writer and educator in New Orleans, Louisiana. She spent two years as an editorial assistant at American Short Fiction and has attended various workshops, including the Tin House Summer Workshop in 2016 and the Sewanee Writers’ Conference in 2021. She currently teaches art and writing through the non-profit programs Young Audiences of Louisiana and Community Works. She has fiction in Pithead Chapel, Nurture Literary, Joyland Magazine and The Harvard Advocate. She is at work on a novel, Dirt Don’t Hurt, based on a childhood spent at the dirt track races across the American South.
"Heather is fantastic and makes every individual feel valued and heard. The readings she selected for the class were incredible and thought-provoking, and the writing prompts tied in perfectly and helped me understand the genre better. Highly recommend taking any class with Heather!"
"Really grateful for the variety of perspectives provided both by our group and the writers that Heather selected. I feel like I have learned so much and that aspects of my budding style have been affirmed in so many ways!"
"Heather was a great facilitator and shared very useful and illustrative examples."
