Writing Workshops

Over the years, from time to time, I've taught writing workshops. My close friend, a consultant with expertise in many areas, is my favorite writing teacher. He can always pull stories out of me.

In the May 26th issue of the New Yorker Magazine there's a remarkable article by a man named Ian Frazier who taught writing workshops for homeless people for 14 years. He started by stationing himself outside a soup kitchen in an Episcopal church in Manhattan, Many of his homeless students have had their work published.

Following are some of the people he encountered:

- A scary looking man in a hooded sweatshirt, seeing Frazier stationed outside the soup kitchen said, "Uh-uh, I ain't doin' no writer's workshop. I done that before." Turns out he had taken a writing class from John Cleever - that's JOHN CLEEVER - at the prison in Ossining. (John Cleever later wrote a No. 1 best-seller about the prison.)

- Sundance, a hobo, wrote about etiquette in hobo camps.

- Jay, a soup kitchen volunteer wrote interestingly about the history of the neighborhood, Chelsea.

- Donald wrote a book-length memoir about being homeless - and an article that was published on the Op-Ed page of the Times.

- William wrote about an intergalactic battle among God, various super-heroes, and the Alcoholics Anonymous Higher Power.

- Norm wrote a poem entitled, "On Achieving Section 8 Housing."

- Jeff disappeared one year and returned the next saying that he had been traveling internationally as a player on a homeless men's soccer team. (A claim that turned out to be true.)

Some of the best topics were "How I Came to New York," "The Other Me,"" "Shoes," and "My Best Mistake." Some topics had to be retired like "My First Love." It was producing too many wrenching tales of first encounters with drugs and alcohol.

All of us writers know that the # 1 rule is "Write about what you know."


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