Calling all teachers who write! Our quarterly writing workshop, Ours Poetica is back. The wonderful Ambalila Hemsell @_ambalievable_ will lead a workshop on September 27th, 5:30- 7:30pm at @bluecactuspress .

“In this generative session, writers will engage with the conceit of the monstrous as a metonym for aspects of the self that are disruptive to internalized normativities.

In literature and film, monsters often represent elements of society that we cannot quite reckon with or believe in as fully human. They might stand in for the destructive forces of nuclear weapons, racism, or patriarchy; surveillance or an unthinking allegiance to technological advancement.

In our writing, monsters or the idea of monstrosity might arise alongside inconvenient truths, truths about the self that have been repressed and then demand to be acknowledged, truths that may upend our lives or introduce discomfort. When they first emerge, they may be unrecognizable as parts of the self, and therefore may ignite an impulse to characterize them as alien.

Discomfort is how we grow, however, and these little monsters are here to teach us, to prod us along on our paths. Let’s give them room to develop in our writing and see what they have to show us.”