OLLI Special Event at Quarryhill
Please Join Us!
INVITED: OLLI Students from SSU, Oakmont &
Vintage House
PLACE: Quarryhill Botanical Gardens (link)
DATE: Friday, September 17, 2010
TIME: Tour starts at 10am
COST: $5 per person
LOCATION: 12841 Sonoma Hwy, Glen Ellen, CA
You are invited to join other OLLI members at this unique and beautiful Asian woodland in the Valley of the Moon, on the rolling hills above Glen Ellen, California. Ed Stolman has coordinated a speaker, William McNamara to give us a special tour/walk.
Founded in 1987, Quarryhill is one of the pre-eminent Asian botanical gardens globally, featuring one of the largest collections of documented, wild-collected Asian plants in the world.
Students are encouraged to carpool. You may bring a bag lunch or order lunch from a local deli or market to share time together after the tour/walk. A sign-up sheet will be available at all Fall Open Houses.
FALL 2010 COURSES AT 3 CAMPUSES!
Highlight from the Fall 2010 Open House at SSU
Fran Claggett, who is teaching Monday mornings, Memoirs and Other Myths, gave the following presentation:
"The French writer Colette, near the end of her life, exclaimed, "What a wonderful life I've had! I only wish I'd realized it sooner." In "Memoir and Other Myths," you'll have a chance to realize memorable moments sooner rather than later.
Everything we remember is through the prism of our own perception. Myths are stories that, on reflection, have a deeper meaning than we originally thought. As we write our memoirs, we will discover levels of meaning that may surprise us. We will contribute to our family mythology from our personal take on our lives.
"Everything is biographical," Lucian Freud says in Michael Ondaatje's new book Divisadero. "What we make, why it is made, how we draw a dog, who we are drawn to, why we cannot forget. Everything is collage, even genetics.... We live with those retrievals from childhood that coalesce and echo throughout our lives, the way shattered pieces of glass in a kaleidoscope reappear in new forms and patterns. We live permanently in the recurrence of our own stories, whatever story we tell."
As we write our stories, we will learn to know our many selves:
· we will look back with new eyes on events and persons in our lives
· we will make the moments add up
· we will render the ordinary so that it becomes significant
· we will explore the kaleidoscopic patterns that form our lives
· we will uncover the myths that underlie our stories
There is no self-examination without challenges. In this class, you are free to take on only those challenges that you find compelling, but always with the consciousness of choice.
We'll look at the challenge of the nature and fallibility of memory. (What is memory, what is myth? What is a 'true' story?) We will examine the challenge of the internal censor. (What if Uncle Bob were to read this? What about my sister-in-law? What would they think?)
Recognizing that memoir is story, we will spend some time looking at how to use such narrative strategies as: Dialog; Point of view; Tone; Suspense; Metaphor and symbol; and Imagery (showing, not telling)
We may experiment with poetry as well as prose as we define or redefine ourselves through metaphor and myth.
Some of the areas that will provide us with our stories:
* Family Stories, the ones heard over and over
* Place. How place has helped shaped who you are?
* People: portraits of parents, children, partners, friends, people who have influenced us
* Loss: what (whom?) have we lost and how have we dealt with it?
* Dreams: what were they, what are they?
* Turning Points and what-ifs (including illnesses of self or family that have had a major
impact on our lives)
* Avocation or Major Passion (an interest that either is always present or keeps recurring
over time)
* Political Leanings (and how they have shaped our lives and friendships)
* Work: how it has determined (or not) the shape of our lives
* Values and Beliefs (these will thread throughout, but you may want to focus on them)
(How many stories have run through your head in the last minute?)
In response to suggestions from students in previous classes, we will have more in-class time for writing. Although I will provide suggestions for starters, you will always be free to write to your own internal prompts. We will then gather in small groups to share, reading our pieces aloud and listening to each other. We will look to each other for gentle critiques.
I will also provide email critiques (or handwritten ones for those of you who don't "do" email).
In these seven weeks, you will have a chance to recreate yourself with every piece you write. Eventually, you may wish to collect these pieces into a memoir for publication for your family, friends, or a wider audience. For this class, however, we will focus on writing small pieces, each a link in the memory chain that contributes to the evolving memoir and myth of YOU.
As I seem to say every year, in this class, it doesn't matter whether you have been writing daily for years or haven't picked up a pen since you left school. I hope to see many of you who were members of previous Memoir writing classes as well as new faces and new voices. All you need to bring to the class is a willingness to remember, to record, to reflect, and to listen.
Please Join Us!
INVITED: OLLI Students from SSU, Oakmont &
Vintage House
PLACE: Quarryhill Botanical Gardens (link)
DATE: Friday, September 17, 2010
TIME: Tour starts at 10am
COST: $5 per person
LOCATION: 12841 Sonoma Hwy, Glen Ellen, CA
You are invited to join other OLLI members at this unique and beautiful Asian woodland in the Valley of the Moon, on the rolling hills above Glen Ellen, California. Ed Stolman has coordinated a speaker, William McNamara to give us a special tour/walk.
Founded in 1987, Quarryhill is one of the pre-eminent Asian botanical gardens globally, featuring one of the largest collections of documented, wild-collected Asian plants in the world.
Students are encouraged to carpool. You may bring a bag lunch or order lunch from a local deli or market to share time together after the tour/walk. A sign-up sheet will be available at all Fall Open Houses.
FALL 2010 COURSES AT 3 CAMPUSES!
Highlight from the Fall 2010 Open House at SSU
Fran Claggett, who is teaching Monday mornings, Memoirs and Other Myths, gave the following presentation:
"The French writer Colette, near the end of her life, exclaimed, "What a wonderful life I've had! I only wish I'd realized it sooner." In "Memoir and Other Myths," you'll have a chance to realize memorable moments sooner rather than later.Everything we remember is through the prism of our own perception. Myths are stories that, on reflection, have a deeper meaning than we originally thought. As we write our memoirs, we will discover levels of meaning that may surprise us. We will contribute to our family mythology from our personal take on our lives.
"Everything is biographical," Lucian Freud says in Michael Ondaatje's new book Divisadero. "What we make, why it is made, how we draw a dog, who we are drawn to, why we cannot forget. Everything is collage, even genetics.... We live with those retrievals from childhood that coalesce and echo throughout our lives, the way shattered pieces of glass in a kaleidoscope reappear in new forms and patterns. We live permanently in the recurrence of our own stories, whatever story we tell."
As we write our stories, we will learn to know our many selves:
· we will look back with new eyes on events and persons in our lives
· we will make the moments add up
· we will render the ordinary so that it becomes significant
· we will explore the kaleidoscopic patterns that form our lives
· we will uncover the myths that underlie our stories
There is no self-examination without challenges. In this class, you are free to take on only those challenges that you find compelling, but always with the consciousness of choice.
We'll look at the challenge of the nature and fallibility of memory. (What is memory, what is myth? What is a 'true' story?) We will examine the challenge of the internal censor. (What if Uncle Bob were to read this? What about my sister-in-law? What would they think?)
Recognizing that memoir is story, we will spend some time looking at how to use such narrative strategies as: Dialog; Point of view; Tone; Suspense; Metaphor and symbol; and Imagery (showing, not telling)
We may experiment with poetry as well as prose as we define or redefine ourselves through metaphor and myth.
Some of the areas that will provide us with our stories:
* Family Stories, the ones heard over and over
* Place. How place has helped shaped who you are?
* People: portraits of parents, children, partners, friends, people who have influenced us
* Loss: what (whom?) have we lost and how have we dealt with it?
* Dreams: what were they, what are they?
* Turning Points and what-ifs (including illnesses of self or family that have had a major
impact on our lives)
* Avocation or Major Passion (an interest that either is always present or keeps recurring
over time)
* Political Leanings (and how they have shaped our lives and friendships)
* Work: how it has determined (or not) the shape of our lives
* Values and Beliefs (these will thread throughout, but you may want to focus on them)
(How many stories have run through your head in the last minute?)
In response to suggestions from students in previous classes, we will have more in-class time for writing. Although I will provide suggestions for starters, you will always be free to write to your own internal prompts. We will then gather in small groups to share, reading our pieces aloud and listening to each other. We will look to each other for gentle critiques.
I will also provide email critiques (or handwritten ones for those of you who don't "do" email).
In these seven weeks, you will have a chance to recreate yourself with every piece you write. Eventually, you may wish to collect these pieces into a memoir for publication for your family, friends, or a wider audience. For this class, however, we will focus on writing small pieces, each a link in the memory chain that contributes to the evolving memoir and myth of YOU.
As I seem to say every year, in this class, it doesn't matter whether you have been writing daily for years or haven't picked up a pen since you left school. I hope to see many of you who were members of previous Memoir writing classes as well as new faces and new voices. All you need to bring to the class is a willingness to remember, to record, to reflect, and to listen.