Delve Readers Seminar: The Art of Memory: Autofiction

“Fiction isn’t memory,” writes Jane Gardam, “but memory is fiction.” Autofiction embodies this view, blending truth and fiction to produce stories rooted in the writer’s life, but filtered through the imagination. Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse, Ocean Vuong’s On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, and Saša Stanišić’s Where You Come From are compelling examples of the genre. To the Lighthouse is the story of the Ramsay family’s holiday on the Isle of Skye. On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is composed as a letter from a young man to his mother, immigrants to the US from Vietnam. Through the story of their relationship, Vuong asks questions about race, violence, masculinity, addiction, and love. Bosnian-German writer Saša Stanišić is little known in the US but deserves a wider readership. His innovative, stylistically distinct novel tells the story of a boy like himself, uprooted by war and forced to resettle in another country. A blend of autofiction, fable, and choose-your-own-adventure, Where You Come From considers the meaning of home and belonging and the power of memory.

Texts
To the Lighthouse, Virginia Woolf (Mariner, 1989)
On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, Ocean Vuong (Penguin, 2019)
Where You Come From, Saša Stanišić (Damion Searls, trans.), Tin House, 2021

In-Person Seminar
Note: This seminar meets in-person at Literary Arts, 925 SW Washington. Literary Arts will require proof of full COVID-19 vaccination, or a negative test result (within 72 hours) from a healthcare provider, for entry into our in-person classes.  Please see our complete Covid-19 policy here.

Access Program
We want our classes to be accessible to everyone, regardless of income and background. We understand that our tuition structure can present obstacles for some people. Our Access Program offers class registrations at a reduced rate. The access program for writing classes covers 60% of the class tuition. Most writing classes have at least one access spot available.

Please apply here for access rate tuition. Contact Susan Moore at susan@literary-arts.org if you have questions.

Liaison position
Every in-person class and seminar at Literary Arts has one liaison position. Liaisons perform specific duties for each class meeting. If you are a liaison for a class or seminar, the full amount of your tuition is covered by Literary Arts.

Apply here for the liaison position.

Sara Atwood

Sara Atwood teaches English literature and writing at Portland Community College and Portland State University. She is Co-Director of the Ruskin Society of North America and has lectured widely, both in the US and abroad, on John Ruskin, education, the environment, and language. Her work has been published in Nineteenth-Century Prose, The Journal of Pre-Raphaelite Studies, and Carlyle Studies Annual. She is the author of Ruskin’s Educational Ideals and has contributed essays to a number of books, including Teaching Victorian Literature in the Twenty-First Century, John Ruskin and Nineteenth-Century Education, William Morris and John Ruskin, and Victorian Environmental Nightmares.