Beautiful Chaos: Alternative Forms in Personal Essays [Sonya Lea]

Sometimes our personal material is elusive, fragmentary, or obscured by our emotional response to it. We can represent this beautiful chaos by creating an indirect, meandering way into the essay or book. These ways may include alternating voices or themes, such as music, nature, history, relationships, and more. Braided essays allow the personal to expand outward. The parts create the illusion of wholeness, and perhaps a more satisfying truth. We’ll look at disjunctive, segmented, and sectioned works. Generative writing and craft exercises included.