I attended Clarion and it was an incredible experience. But it’s frustrating to me that Clarion-style intensive workshops are out of reach for many, and I just happened to be incredibly, incredibly lucky to get the timing to work out the way it did.
A year or so ago I started really thinking about what was most valuable about Clarion, to me, and wondering if that could be replicated in a more accessible format. I think some of it absolutely can.
The most significant aspect of Clarion, for me, was the cohort: meeting and spending time with other writers, many of whom are friends to this day, with whom I communicate regularly. After having spent time in online groups, I believe we can achieve a similar sense of cohesion and camaraderie in an online format as well, if the workshop is cohort-based.
The second most valuable lesson was learning how to critique. It wasn’t so much about getting eyes on my own work — instead, what you learn is how to stretch and expand your own critical muscles, how to look at work (your own or other peoples’) and how to evaluate it, how to understand it, how to maintain sympathy for it while noting how it doesn’t work. The daily critiques were incredible for building that rigor and practice. This is absolutely something that we can achieve in an online space. Daily critique is not sustainable, but a weekly critique absolutely would be.
And finally, there’s the writing, of course! We wrote a story a week for five weeks and that does something to you — mostly good, I think, from observing my classmates and myself. It encourages you to be less precious, more risky in your writing; to throw things out there even if you’re not sure it’s done, or it works. You’re immersed in all these other strong voices, you can’t help but listen to your own voice, too.
And we can do that online, as well. So you don’t have to take five weeks off of your life to achieve some of these goals. It won’t be the same as Clarion? But it will have some advantages: it will be less costly, it will be more international because travel is not required, and it will be sustainable to build into your life after the workshop is over. At least, that’s my goal.
That’s partly why I co-founded Story Kitchen Studio. We offer online, live courses and we are also developing on demand courses as well. To learn more about when these will be offered, sign up for the Story Kitchen Newsletter!
Thank you!