58121 Fictional Forms
UTS: Communication: Creative PracticeCredit points: 8 cp
Result Type: Grade, no marks
Requisite(s): 58119 Text and Context
There are also course requisites for this subject. See access conditions.
Handbook description
Students are brought into close contact with creative practice in both mainstream and emergent forms of fiction and narrative as they investigate the question 'what is fiction?'. The subject introduces a wide range of recent and modern forms of fiction writing as technical examples and thematic models. Throughout the semester students produce and collectively workshop their own writing in fiction or script. At the same time, critical debate within the class explores the limits and the possibilities of the contemporary text together with the functional operation of categories such as 'author', 'genre', 'narrative', 'performance', 'subjectivity', 'meaning', 'reading', 'writing' and 'text', including in relation to innovative formats such as hypertext or other electronic formats. Students are encouraged to choose within a wide range of fictional forms for their creative writing.
Subject objectives/outcomes
At the completion of this subject, students are expected to be able to:
- write using creative and imaginative practices
- analyse and edit self-reflectively and critically
- describe fictional forms
- develop a specific form of a narrative
- collaborate with peers
Contribution to graduate profile
This subject makes a major contribution to students' professional capacity to apply their knowledge and skills to write creatively in order to communicate effectively. It contributes to their personal and professional capacity to manage and evaluate their own work, and to work collaboratively. It contributes to students' intellectual capacity to think critically and analytically and to respect the plurality of perspectives.
Teaching and learning strategies
The subject is delivered in lecture/tutorial/seminar mode.
This subject combines lectures, practical writing exercises, critical presentations, UTS on-line peer-to-peer-assessment, workshopping and the discussion of a range of examples and critical material relating to three fictional forms: novella, screenplay and short fiction. Skills are developed through attention paid to the elements of narrative and form. In week five students are streamed into separate classes to focus on the particular exigencies of their chosen fictional form. This subject provides students with a workshop environment for producing and revising new creative work and a space for critical reflection on the writing process.
Content
A creative and theoretical exploration of the three fictional forms — novella, screenplay and short fiction — that investigates the historical and cultural context of the three genres.
Students engage in a creative development process at the same time as reading and critically analysing both prose and script. The similarities and the differences between the three genres are explored before students focus on their chosen form.
The theory and practice of creative writing will include critical debate on form and technique, character and dialogue, focalization and point of view; narration and voice; time and space; narrative and text and structure.
Assessment
Assessment item 1: Minor Fictional Piece
| Objective(s): | a, b, d |
| Weighting: | 30% |
| Length: | 1,000 words |
| Task: | To write one 1,000 word piece in relation to a specific fictional form, and then redraft, taking into consideration critical feedback from workshopping. |
| Assessment criteria: |
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Assessment item 2: Critical presentation
| Objective(s): | b, c, e |
| Weighting: | 20% |
| Task: | To present a short analysis of a fictional form in class, placing it within the context of a general overview of fictional forms, and submit a one-page summary. |
| Assessment criteria: |
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Assessment item 3: Major Narrative or Equivalent in Selected Fictional Form
| Objective(s): | a, b, e |
| Weighting: | 50% |
| Task: | To write a 2500 word narrative in the form of a short story or the beginning of a novella or approximately ten pages of a screenplay and to workshop it online and in class. Students are expected to: - Participate in UTS on-line and in class peer-to-peer assessment to redraft 2500 word narrative or approximately ten pages of a screenplay - Post a draft of narrative on UTS online - Read as allocated one other person's draft on-line - Create comments to give and exchange in class and on-line |
| Assessment criteria: |
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Minimum requirements
Attendance is important in this subject because it is based on a collaborative approach which involves essential workshopping and interchange of ideas with other students and the tutor. An attendance roll will be taken at each class. Where possible, students should advise the tutor in a timely manner if they are unable to attend.
Students who fail to attend 85% of classes may be refused to have their final assessment item assessed (see Rule 3.8).
Required text(s)
Steven Earnshaw, Ed, The Handbook of Creative Writing (Edinburgh: Edinburgh UP, 2007)
E-readings: selected stories
Indicative references
Pat Cooper and Ken Dancyger, Writing the Short Film (Oxford: Focal, 2005)
Marguerite Duras, The Lover. Any edition.
Adrian Hunter, The Cambridge Introduction to the Short Story in English (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007).
Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Chronicle of a Death Foretold. Any edition.
Robert McKee, Story: Substance, structure, style and the principles of screenwriting (London: Methuen, 1999)
James Wood, How Fiction Works (London: Jonathan Cape, 2008).
