Stringing the Beads: Craft Your Personal Essay
with Joanna Penn Cooper
June 3, 2026
Length: 6 Weeks
Intermediate, Open to AllText and Live Video
Zoom call June 6 & July 11 at 12pm Eastern
Original price was: $445.00.$380.00Current price is: $380.00.
Original price was: $445.00.$380.00Current price is: $380.00.Enroll Now
In this course, you’ll learn to more powerfully shape your life-based personal essays. We will focus on identifying that which moves us (or baffles us) as seeds for our writing; grounding our writing in specific images and scenes; learning how to make conscious choices about how and where the essay will “move”; and revising drafts to make them really compelling for a reader, in terms of voice, style, and subject matter.
As Phillip Lopate notes in his introduction to The Art of the Personal Essay, “The essay is a notoriously flexible and adaptable form. It possesses the freedom to move anywhere, in all directions…. This freedom can be daunting.”
Together, we will confront the two main challenges of the personal essay form: 1. allowing ourselves to really notice and contemplate what we’re interested in—those ideas and observations that tug at our interest as seeds for possible essays; and 2. shaping our ideas, observations, and memories into compelling scenes (which become the building blocks for compelling essays).
The course will run asynchronously in the Wet Ink platform, meaning that you don’t have to be available to meet at any specific times. Instead, you can access the materials on the online platform and work with them at your own pace. There will also be two optional Zoom meetings.
Who This Course is For
While writers of all levels are welcome, this course is geared toward students who have some writing experience, either in personal essay, lyric essay, memoir, or another genre. If you have already taken a workshop or two, are returning to writing after a break, or are shifting from one genre to another, this course may be especially helpful!
Learning and Writing Goals
Learning Goals
You will learn:
- To identify and work with those scenes, memories, or details of everyday living that draw their attention.
- To focus on finding the key image, memory, or scene for each section of a personal essay or selection of memoir-based writing.
- To give your writing immediacy.
- To experiment with different kinds of “movement” in a piece of writing (for example across time and space; between the concrete and the abstract).
- Strategies for reworking existing drafts to make them more compelling.
- To identify and work with those scenes, memories, or details of everyday living that draw their attention.
Writing Goals
You will write:
- Short (300-500 word) responses to at least two writing exercises per week.
- Two drafts of a longer essay
- Draft one: Up to 8 pages (2,000 words)
- Draft two: Up to 10 pages (2,500 words)
- Note: You can also turn in drafts of two separate essays
Zoom Schedule
We will meet on Zoom:
Saturday, June 6th, from 12-1 P.M. U.S. Eastern Time.
Saturday, July 11th, from 12-1 P.M. U.S. Eastern Time.
Weekly Syllabus
Each week will include written mini-lectures, readings, writing prompts, and chances to enter into discussion with your peers and instructor. You will also receive written feedback from both instructor and peers on your writing.
Final essays will receive thorough written comments from the instructor on how your essay is working in terms of organization, voice, pacing, and the key moments/images on which the essay hangs.
There will also be two optional videoconferences with me to discuss the writing process and craft issues.
Week 1: Grounding in the Now
We will examine how specific memories, details, or scenes from everyday life can tug at a writer and be a way in to creative production. We will also look at how we might ground introductions in image. We’ll read essays from Jo Ann Beard and Kim Barnes as models.
Week 2: Expand and Contract
This week’s lesson will focus on deciding how much you need to provide your reader in a given scene, in terms of context, characterization, and detail. We will also examine how different types of “movement” can enliven a piece of writing. Finally, we will look at how the revision process can function through a process of expansion and contraction. We’ll read short essays and excerpts by Diane Seuss, Dorothy Allison, Sonja Livingston, and others.
Week 3: Engaging the Self and Other
We will look at:
- What it means to be engaging and engaged, as it relates to your voice/style.
- Being in dialogue with another thinker or writer in your piece
- Experimenting with using imagined audience to get at what’s at stake
- Reassessing as you write whether you believe what you are saying
We’ll consider work by Sabrina Orah Mark, Nicole Sealey, and others.
Week 4: “Writing What We Believe
We’ll ask ourselves what feels most urgent in our life narratives and the narratives of our communities, as a way to hit rich veins of material. We’ll work on finding the urgency and following that. We’ll examine the stumbling blocks of perfectionism and of veering away from that which we actually care about passionately, and students will consider ways to avoid these tendencies in our writing.
We’ll consider work by Brenda Miller, Dorothy Allison, and others.
Week 5: “Finding the Story and Making It Your Own
This week, we’ll consider narrative form and personal essay, examining both traditional structures and unconventional forms for organizing our drafts. We’ll consider the “problem” our piece seeks to examine, looking at models from Abigail Thomas, Sinéad Gleeson, and others.
Week 6: “What Is in There”?: Finding the guiding question
In our final week, we’ll deal with the idea of the “crux moment,” a moment in a piece of writing that carries extra energy, thinking about how they function in the work. We will examine how you can tighten/focus a piece of writing, even as you allow for mystery. Some of the most interesting writing has an unanswered question or set of questions at its center. We’ll consider work by Ross Gay and Ann Daum, among others.
Why Take a Personal Essay Writing Course with Writers.com?
- We welcome writers of all backgrounds and experience levels, and we are here for one reason: to support you on your writing journey.
- Small groups keep our online writing courses lively and intimate.
- Work through your weekly lectures, course materials, and writing assignments at your own pace.
- Share and discuss your work with fellow writers in a supportive course environment.
- Award-winning instructor Joanna Penn Cooper will offer you direct, personal feedback and suggestions on every assignment you submit.
Original price was: $445.00.$380.00Current price is: $380.00.Enroll Now
Student Feedback for Joanna Penn Cooper:
Fantastic course. I loved all the generative writing prompts, particularly the focus on different perspectives and experimenting with approaches/style. Readings were interesting and enjoyable. And Joanna’s feedback on my writing was invaluable. One of the best courses I’ve taken through Writers.com! Jennifer Gresham
This course was a great experience! I write for a living, but not personal essays, so I was challenged and learned a lot in a safe and judgment-free environment. Joanna is great at introducing new concepts and ways of writing in an easy-to-understand way. Her feedback and line edits are concise and helpful. It was also nice to give and receive comments from other writers taking the course. Alexis Damen
Joanna was probably the most attentive and conscientious teacher I have had in my courses. She was transparent about when she was (and would not be) available, and she was quick to read and respond to each student. She started thought-provoking discussions and enhanced the learning with video as well as bringing in new material as our class comments warranted. She was a wonderful teacher and I fully intend to take future classes with her. Nancy LaChance
June 3, 2026
Length: 6 Weeks
Intermediate, Open to AllText and Live Video
Zoom call June 6 & July 11 at 12pm Eastern
Original price was: $445.00.$380.00Current price is: $380.00.
Original price was: $445.00.$380.00Current price is: $380.00.Enroll Now
