Write Now: The Narrative Palimpsest - a Four-Week Online Workshop

We know sometimes generative workshops can leave you with an overwhelming amount of raw material. In this four-part series (guided by videos featuring our resident mermaid Lidia Yuknavitch) you’ll read, get inspired and discover the germ of an idea, write it, revise it, and finish it—and for those interested in publication, we’ll offer strategies towards that end as well.

This is the Introvert edition of The Narrative Palimpsest — you’ll receive access to four weekly videos, along with readings and writing portals, to work through on your own time, at your own pace. We sometimes offer Extrovert modules that put writers together in groups. You can check in with Daniel at registration@corporealwriting.com if you want to know of any Extrovert groups starting up soon.

What is a Narrative Palimpsest?

pal·imp·sest

/ˈpaləm(p)ˌsest/

noun: palimpsest; plural noun: palimpsests

1. a manuscript or piece of writing material on which the original writing has been effaced to make room for later writing but of which traces remain.

2. 


something reused or altered but still bearing visible traces of its earlier form.

Origin: mid 17th century: via Latin from Greek palimpsēstos, from palin ‘again’ + psēstos ‘rubbed smooth’

A narrative palimpsest is a story that carries LAYERS of meaning; meanings that carry the trace of each other a layer at a time, like an onion or something being uncovered through more than one strata. As if an idea or theme or the thing you want to tell a story about has to be carefully uncovered—lie in archeology--or carefully recovered a layer at a time.

It can also be a text where meanings that were previously “hidden” or unknown suddenly begin to surface a little at a time. Or, it can mean going deeper into the history of the meaning of something to see how the meanings have changed over time. Often narrative palimpsests are meditative, as in the case of Bluets by Maggie Nelson…meditations on a single theme. Other times a narrative palimpsest involves peeling back all the layers of meaning, as in the case of the opening of There, There by Tommy Orange, or the novel Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell for sure…also The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner and pretty much anything by Virginia Woolf.

Four-Part Series—How it Works

• Week One ::  Lidia will talk about palimpsests and their possibilities. You’ll have links to eyeball some beautiful narrative palimpsests for inspiration, some by Lidia, some from some of the books mentioned above, and some from Corporeal Writers who have taken this intensive in-person and published work derives from it. You’ll throw down some ideas of your own, riffing on the ideas that are percolating in your brain in a writing exercise provided by Lidia.

• Week Two :: Looking at what you wrote in week one, you’ll commit to the most resonant idea of the ones you sketched out. Lidia will offer guidance—both practical and abstract/artistic—on structure and process as you layer and un-layer the different levels of the story you are trying to tell.

• Week Three :: Lidia will offer up some of her tried and true revision techniques, such as vertical reading, to help you look for missed opportunities in the text. You’ll be given tips for both opening up the work and paring it down to its essentials.

• Week Four :: At this point you are on your way to a finished draft. Then what? Our workshops are often visited by people who don’t intend to try and get their writing published, but for the most part people are longing to put their narratives out in the world. Strategies and advice as well as reminders to celebrate—you had an idea and you carried it through to completion. Fuck yes.

Payment plans are always available. Please contact Daniel Elder at registration@corporealwriting.com to set one up or if you are feeling challenged by the financial requirements of this offering.