Expanding the Elegy: Reading and Writing from Victoria Chang’s “Obit”

with Melanie Figg

Genres: Poetry, Reading

Online

Intermediate, Advanced

4 Sessions

Start Date: February 23, 2023
End Date: March 23, 2023
Day of Week: Thursday
Time: 5:00 pm - 7:00 pm PT
Capacity: 15 seats
Member Price: $216.00
General Price: $240.00

Explore the elegy by studying Victoria Chang's powerful collection, Obit, in which she reinvents the newspaper obituary to capture the full scope of loss. We'll discuss the book as a whole, read it front to back, and spend concentrated time on individual poems offered as prompts as we find new ways to write about and express loss. Each class begins with sharing our work aloud, but this is not a workshop. Read the first eleven pages before our first class.

Registration dates:

December 5: Scholarship Donation Day (Learn more.)

December 6: Member registration opens

December 13: General registration opens

Melanie Figg

Melanie Figg

she/her

Melanie Figg is a poet and essayist, currently working on a hybrid memoir. Her award-winning poetry collection, Trace, was named one of the year’s "Best Indie Books" by Kirkus Reviews. She's received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Maryland State Arts Council, and others, and has had work published in dozens of literary journals, including The Iowa Review, Nimrod, The Rumpus, Hippocampus, and the American Journal of Poetry. As a certified professional coach, Melanie offers women’s writing retreats and works remotely with writers on their manuscripts as well as their creative process.

Website: melaniefigg.net

Most classes are offered at a general and member tuition rates based on instruction hours, with Hugo House members receiving a 10% discount on classes fewer than six sessions.

Early bird discounts are available during the first two weeks of registration and apply to both general and member tuition rates.

To help provide financial accessibility to our class offerings, some classes each quarter are offered with a sliding-scale tuition model, allowing students to pay what they can for the class. For these classes, tuition increments starting at $5 and going up to 125% of the standard pricing will be listed on the page.

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Class sessions may be recorded if a session falls on a holiday, or if a student has access needs. Class recordings are not guaranteed.

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Classes may be cancelled if less than the minimum number of students are enrolled within ten days before the class start date. If Hugo House needs to cancel a class for any reason, students can choose between receiving a full credit toward future classes or full refund.

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