Colin Corrigan
Colin Corrigan is a writer and a writing teacher from County Kildare in Ireland. He’s spent a decade working all sorts of jobs in Irish film and television, and another teaching all sorts of writing classes at American universities, including Northeastern University, the University of Michigan, and University of Massachusetts Boston. His short fiction has been published by Amazon and The Fiction Desk, and anthologised in Surge: New Writing from Ireland and Stinging Fly Stories. He has an MA in Creative Writing from University College Dublin, and an MFA in Fiction Writing from the University of Michigan. He’s won a Delbanco Thesis Prize, he’s been a Zell Fellow, and he’s received generous funding from the Arts Council of Ireland and the Elizabeth George Foundation. You can find him writing about The Story Energies on Substack.
Student Feedback for Colin
What I love about this class is how much it’s given me tools that I feel I can keep using. It introduces structure and process into the revision journey, which sometimes has felt more unmanageable to me in the past. Just fantastic! Zoë G.
This workshop was my favorite writing class I’ve taken to date—and I’ve taken a lot of writing classes. The atmosphere was welcoming, safe, and nurturing, while also providing room for growth and discovery. I can’t say enough how much I appreciated this class. I’m sad it’s over! Lauren Harkawik
The workshops were amazing and Colin was incredibly well organized, supportive, encouraging, a great discussion prompter and gave very helpful feedback. Ann Cami
Regardless of whether the student was inexperienced (me) or very knowledgable and on a different level, Colin pushed them a little farther making them better writers. Nice work, Colin. Sam B
I learned a lot, the instructor was awesome, so nice, welcoming, gave great feedback without making us feel discouraged. I loved the entire class, the prompts, the sharing of the essays. I finally actually did write instead of just think about it! I also discovered how much fun writing is for me once I stop over-thinking, over-judging, and over-analyzing. It was so much fun! The highlight of my week for the last 6 weeks. Stefanie Gauguet
Colin was a marvelous teacher! He was so clear about his expectations and the course was so well designed to take a close look at one of our short stories. I learned so much about how to go about revising—it is not just magical thinking! it is a careful checklist of qualities. Colin gave us an invaluable checklist! Thank you, Colin! Kate Sullivan
This class was amazing. Colin is a great teacher and the atmosphere was lively. The class gave me courage to continue on my path. I found it to be intimate and insightful. Deirdre Reddington
The class far exceeded my expectations in how much I learned about short story revision. I am walking away from this class with so much more knowledge and confidence about the revision process. Nancy S.
I must say that the class exceeded all of my expectations on every possible front! At the risk of sounding sappy, I must say this has been the best writing instruction I have ever received! The instructor, Colin Corrigan, was incredibly knowledgable and supportive and structured the class perfectly. Colin’s videotaped lessons were full of helpful information and he selected craft articles and short stories that matched his lesson content perfectly. Even students in the class who had received their MFA’s reported that they were learning new things from these articles and lessons. He established a supportive atmosphere, right off the bat, building trust within the group, and provided us with the most specific and helpful guidelines for offering and receiving writing feedback that I’ve ever seen in my life. The assignments each week were incredibly helpful and relevant and I will use them again for other pieces that I write. Colin was responsive and always participated in every discussion in a meaningful way, but he never dominated the discussion. He knew to wait, to let his students share first, and made sure to remark on the comments of all of his students over the course of the class. He had a way of making us all feel valued in the group. Our class was filled with thoughtful, talented, generous, readers and this added to my enjoyment as well. Many participants were very experienced; some were writing teachers, most were published in numerous places, several had received their MFA’s, and yet Colin was clearly the teacher of this group, adding to the discussion, elevating it, and helping us all to grow from where we started. His critiques were thoughtful and insightful. I left the class with a much more polished short story, but even more importantly, with a new understanding of the revision process and a lot of tools for improving my other work. Alison Bullock
