Peggy started us out with the lists in The Pillow Book, by Lei Shonagon. She then asked us to make our own list of annoying things, and write on one of them. Homework: Revise something you’ve started.

David started a discussion which rather ran away with us on fiction as opposed to nonfiction.He then gave us a writing exercise–Write a conversation between at least two characters, and make it direct–no talking past each other. Then, as homework, take that same situation, but write it more indirectly–allow the people to talk past each other, conceal their motives, and so on.

Jeanne handed out a poem: “Sacred” by Stephen Dunn and led us in a discussion of the poem. She then had us write something that explored the role of “Sacred” to us. Her homework assignment part 1 was to revise something already started. Part 2 (as she reminded me in a comment) is to write something on “Why I write.” She also thought these should be exchanged, and one way of doing that is to post them as comments to this blog. Just click on “Comment” below the bottom picture if you’re on the general page (without comments on the bottom) or if other comments are showing, fill in the white box with your comments and then click on “post comment.”

As should be apparent from the rest of these photos, we spent the afternoon in the Georgeson Botanical Gardens, where by a minor miracle it did not rain.