Multi-Genre Novice Workshop: Finding the Right Form

All writers start with the gathering of raw material and then proceed to shape it, in hopes of transforming that material into art – a poem, a short story, a personal essay, a memoir, or a novel. Sometimes the material falls easily and naturally into one of these forms, but often it does not. Sometimes it falls into several. This workshop is designed to deal with work that is taking shape, and to guide the writer in helpful directions by taking a look at the techniques and possibilities of the different genres. Writing experience is not required for this workshop, but writers of all levels are welcome.

Judson Mitcham’s work has been widely published in literary journals, including Poetry, Harper’s, Georgia Review, Hudson Review, and Southern Review. He has been the recipient of an NEA Fellowship in Creative Writing, as well as a Pushcart Prize. He is the only writer to win the Townsend Prize for Fiction twice. His most recent book is A Little Salvation: Poems Old and New, published by the University of Georgia Press.

Mitcham teaches writing at Mercer University. In May of 2012, he was named poet laureate of Georgia, and he was recently inducted into the Georgia Writers’ Hall of Fame.