The French word “collage” comes from the verb “coller”: to glue or paste. A collage essay is made up of found and invented fragments of discourse placed side by side, “glued” together with an asterisk or a white space. What happens when you rearrange the order? Meaning emerges from juxtaposition. What happens when you write five paragraphs, each to a different prompt, and then place them next to each other to make the result an essay? What happens when you add pieces of found language?
In this hands-on workshop, we will play with generating and putting together fragments of writing, pieces of our fragmented world. Bring pen and paper.
Nancy Kline has published nine books, including a novel, a critical study of René Char's poetry, a biography of Elizabeth Blackwell, MD, and book-length translations of a number of modern French poets (Char, Paul Eluard, Lorand Gaspar, Jules Supervielle, and others). Her short stories, essays, memoirs, and articles have appeared widely, most recently, in Asymptote and Saranac Review. She writes regularly for The New York Times Sunday Book Review and has received a National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Grant. She currently teaches 20th Century French Literature in Translation for the Bard Prison Initiative and Fiction and Personal Narrative for Poets & Writers.