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E. Dolores Johnson is the author of Say I’m Dead: A Family Memoir of Race, Secrets, and Love. She was born in Buffalo, New York and has earned degrees from Howard University and Harvard Graduate School of Business. After a career in tech, Johnson studied creative writing at Boston’s GrubStreet in their MFA-equivalent Memoir Incubator program. In addition to her book, Johnson is a published essayist focused on inter-racialism. Johnson lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts. To learn more about her and her work, follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

The post Non-Fiction by Non-Men: E. Dolores Johnson appeared first on E.B. Bartels.

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Those of you who knew me back in grad school know that my MFA thesis was a long, rambling 300+ page meditation on my family’s insurance agency and intergenerational trauma, grief, loss, and anxiety. One day I still hope I can rework that beast into a book of its own, but when a place like Evocations Review gives an excerpt of Over-Insured a home, it feels like a little piece of my heart has a place to rest finally. Thank you for publishing this essay, Kim Coates! I’m honored to be part of the first-ever issue of Evocations.

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My grandmother, Genevieve Beckers Bartels.

Writing nonfiction is always personal, in my opinion. You are putting your thoughts, feelings, and point of view out there, even if you are hiding behind the safety of research or criticism. This essay that I published today on Electric Literature is, at its core, a book review, but it is also the most personal thing I have published to date.

Thank you for reading it, and for your thoughtfulness and your care with this subject matter. A special thank you to my editor, Jess Zimmerman, who helped me so much with shaping this piece and clarifying my ideas, and, of course, thank you to my dad who helped me with this essay, and with so many other things, more than he realizes.

But if you only take one thing away from this piece, it better be that you need to go out and buy and read Marin Sardy‘s book The Edge of Every Day ASAP!

The post “How I Stopped Being Afraid of My Own Brain” on Electric Lit appeared first on E.B. Bartels.

Kicking yourself for not signing up for my class Nonfiction: Writing Family History at GrubStreet? Good news! There is still time to enroll! The class meets for 10 weeks on Thursdays from 6pm-9pm, and the new start date is Thursday, June 29, 2017 and the last class will be Thursday, August 31, 2017.

Here is the course description:

As a nonfiction writer, you often pull material from your own life, and that means you may end up writing about the people closest to you: your family. But this brings up some tough questions: How is it possible to create a well-rounded portrait of someone you don’t want to upset? How can you ever get past the thought: what will my grandmother think when she reads this? In addition, when writing about family members who have passed or about intimate family history, how can you avoid falling into the trap of nostalgia and sentimentality? These are exactly the questions that we will tackle. In this ten-week course, you will write several short pieces, including a profile of someone near and dear to you, as well as a retelling of a family story that happened before your time. Through discussion of published works, craft lectures, and workshops, we will delve deeper into the elements of nonfiction that can elevate a personal piece of writing. You will leave the class with several short works based on your family history that you can continue to develop into polished personal essays or memoir pieces. Readings may include excerpts by Mary Karr, Maxine Hong Kingston, Alison Bechdel, Margo Jefferson, Tobias Wolff, Phillip Roth, David Sedaris, Janet Mock, and Vladimir Nabokov.

Did you know that we have scholarships available for all GrubStreet classes? To apply, click the “APPLY FOR SCHOLARSHIP” button in the top right corner of this page. In order to be considered for a scholarship, you must complete your scholarship application and await our Scholarship Committee’s decision before registering for the class. Scholarships cannot be applied retroactively.

The post You can still sign up for Writing Family History at GrubStreet! appeared first on E.B. Bartels.

Have you always wanted to write about your grandmother but aren’t sure how she will react? Do you want to put your sister on blast for all the stuff she did to you as a kid? Do you want to pay tribute to a deceased loved one but are afraid of becoming sentimental? How do you attempt writing about that aunt you’ve never met? Want to conquer your fears of unpacking all that family drama? Then come take my 10-week nonfiction class at GrubStreet this summer on writing about your family:

Nonfiction: Writing Family History
June 15 – August 17, 2017, 6pm-9pm on Thursdays

• 10-week course.
• Open to all writers.
• Scholarships are always available for GrubStreet courses.

There is still time to sign up! You know you want to!

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If you’re looking to take some fun writing classes on creative nonfiction, you’re in luck! I am teaching several classes at GrubStreet this spring and summer that I will now proceed to shamelessly plug.

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Young Adult Writing Program (YAWP): Stranger Than Fiction — The Power of True Stories
Saturday, April 22, 2017, 12pm-4pm

• Happening THIS Saturday!!!
• Open to writers aged 13-18 years old.
• ***100% COMPLETELY FREE!*** 
• Includes free pizza for lunch!

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Nonfiction: Writing Family History
June 15 – August 17, 2017, 6pm-9pm on Thursdays

• 10-week course.
• Open to all writers.
• While not free, scholarships are always available for GrubStreet courses!

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Teen Camp: There’s a Story In That — Making Stories from Real Life
August 7 – August 11, 2017, 10:30am-3:30pm daily

• 5-day writing camp.
  
• Open to writers aged 13-18 years old.
• Again, while not free, GrubStreet scholarships are available!

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Even if nonfiction isn’t your thing, you should definitely consider taking a course at GrubStreet! There are so many amazing teachers there (such as Heather Wells Peterson, Eson Kim, and Annie Hartnett, just to name a few) and a huge variety of classes for every age, schedule, and interest. GrubStreet classes range from one-off Saturday sessions to multi-week workshops to year-long courses that cover everything from slam poetry to sci-fi to the famous novel/memoir incubator.

Please feel free to contact me with any questions, and I hope to see you around GrubStreet soon!

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