Tap into your creativity with autobiographical writing while you capture, recall, and retell key events in your life. Whether your interests lie in personal essay, memoir, journal writing or even fiction, “Memoir(ish)” will help you take your memories and get drafts down on paper.

We’ll read some short published pieces and do plenty of in-class writing. You will be encouraged to draft several story “starts” and have the opportunity to get feedback on your work. Most of all, we’ll begin the process of finding some of the best material —- taking stories and experiences directly from our lives.

Other Courses of Interest:

Who Should Attend:

Adults, 18 and over
Beginning or intermediate writers

About the Instructor: Jack Helbig is a theater critic, arts writer, and essayist for various publications. He regularly writes for the Chicago Reader and the Daily Herald. He is also a playwright; his musical adaptation, The Girl, The Grouch, and The Goat, written with songwriter Mark Hollmann has been produced in Los Angeles, Houston, Chicago, Kansas City, and Orem, Utah. His musical, Hotel d’Amour, written with Gregg Opelka (and based on Georges Feydeau’s farce A Flea in Her Ear), was first produced by the Buffalo Theatre Company in Chicago and has since been done around the U.S. He has written two plays, Thinking of Her Made Him Think of Her, an autobiographical piece first produced by the Talisman Theatre in Elgin, Illinois. He has been keeping a journal since he was in Mr. Kramer’s ninth grade English class at St. Louis U. High. He now working on his 66th journal.