ENGL 404 - Wounded Story Tellers

Credits: 3 hours
As F. Scott Fitzgerald once said, “There is no greater gulf than the gulf that exists between the healthy and the sick.” This class focuses on how people who are sick or who care for those who are ill, can use writing to explore their condition and what it means. Using guidance from various writers such as Joan Didion, Susan Sontag, and Lorrie Moore, we will discuss how illness is treated in published fiction and nonfiction and can be used to broaden the scope and deepen the emotional stakes of a narrative. In a series of writing exercises, we will also examine how illness can become a writer’s paradoxical gift.