In a playful exploration of diaristic writing across poetry, fiction, and nonfiction, this six-week course will test the relationship between ourselves and the voices we create on the page. We’ll learn about confession and omission—the things we share and the things we keep secret. We’ll consider audience—how a personal voice might shift in anticipation of its reader. And we’ll ask: are diaries, journals, and other forms of written self-address artifacts of privacy or performance? What distinguishes a journal from a diary, and how might gendered stereotypes play into such classifications?

Together, we’ll read from texts including Rilke’s The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge (trans. Burton Pike), Nathanaël’s Je Nathanäel, Bernadette Mayer's Milkweed Smithereens, and Sarah Manguso’s Ongoingness: The End of a Diary. Participants will keep a diary of some regularity (with daily or weekly entries), ultimately using their diaries as source material for creative works of their own. Each class meeting will contain time for group reading, discussion, and writing exercises, with the final gathering devoted to workshop.