Writers House Courses

Creative writing courses provide a workshop-like environment for students to work closely with practicing novelists, playwrights, poets, travel writers, writers of creative non-fiction, etc. Individual courses may investigate aesthetic theory, contemporary social issues, balancing research and creativity, and use of multimedia for composition of creative pieces.

In Writers House, our "Digital Storytelling" course approaches filmmaking as creative writing. This class includes the study of film language, grammar and narrative structure with focus on visual composition, placement of dialogue, and editing to assemble a dramatic story for the screen. Our "Documentary Filmmaking for Writers" course allows student the unique opportunity to create character driven, non-fiction stories through the organization of videotaped interviews and supporting visuals that can include a mixture of original and archival footage. Recorded materials (images, sounds and dialogue) from the real world become the 'words' our documentarians use to build their dramatic narratives.

"Digital Storytelling" and "Documentary Filmmaking for Writers" are the gateway courses to the SAS/Mason Gross film certificate program: http://www.masongross.rutgers.edu/content/rutgers-center-digital-filmmaking

Writing for the 21st century must include practice with digital forms of composition.  At Writers House we offer a broad array of courses to stimulate and enhance students' appreciation for these new techniques.  We emphasize not the technology itself, but the activity of composition that makes for excellent work in digital form.  In other words, at Writers House we teach digital composition as a form of Creative Writing.