Wednesday, October 6, 2010

Writing Seminar

If I taught a character development seminar for writers, would anyone want to come?

Here's what I'm mulling over:

Time: Something 10am-4pm on two consecutive Saturdays, possibly in the late spring.

Place: Either a conference center or a college campus in the Boston area.

Specifics: This program would train writers to develop distinctive characters and narrative voices using Porter's Motivational Values System (MVS). MVS is like Meyers-Briggs, but it's much more intuitive and practically applicable (and very heavily protected by copyright. I had to take a training course to be certified to teach this stuff).

Participants would start by discovering their own MVS and how to identify MVS in others.  We'd use group exercises to explore how people react to different MVSs, how MVS identity changes under stress and in conflict, and how people of different MVS groups react differently to the same events or situations.

We'd work through the different ways that people speak, use body language, express emotion, react to change, etc. We'd discuss the advantages of the different narrative voices, and how they all impact the expression of action, character, and setting. 

That's the first day.  There'd be a few homework assignments over the week, and then the second Saturday would be workshops and critiques of those assignments, as well as how to grow and change characters as the plot progresses, how to compensate for the "blind spots" in our writing, and how to improve our existing and future works by making the characters more real, unique, and vibrant. 

Costs: To Be Determined.  The biggest factors are the location costs and the proprietary MVS documents I'd need to provide. Got any suggested price ranges? What if I throw in this lovely set of Ginsu knives--NOW how much would you expect to pay?

So, that's what I've go so far. Any interest?  Any suggestions? Feel free to mention other locations you'd like, other information you think should be included, etc.

6 comments:

Disgruntled Bear said...

Maybe we should include lunch, too.

vic caswell said...

if only it were kansas! :(

Disgruntled Bear said...

Well, if I can get this to work and can generate enough interest, in a few years it could be!

Cindy said...

I'd come, Kate!

Disgruntled Bear said...

I'm seriously considering doing this, but I need to find a place with a conference room that wouldn't cost too much and gave people some lunch options. Or perhaps I could just have some pizzas delivered...

So many choices.

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