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BETWEEN THE LINES Writing True Stories Inspired by Papers and Photographs

Instructor: Grace Talusan
Date & Time: Saturday, April 13 | 12:00 PM to 4:00 PM
Location: USM’s Glickman Library, Portland 
Level: Open
Maximum Attendees: 12
Fee: Member: $50 | Nonmember: $105
Registration Closes: April 8

What stories does a passport or a diploma suggest about its owner? What lurks outside the frame of a formal family photo from the early 1900s, or a 1980s portrait of a couple at prom?

In this workshop, participants will generate and share new writing from the photographs and papers of their lives and the lives of their family members, images and documents that hint at a larger story an official form alone can’t tell. Participants will bring at least one document (or an image of the document)—such as a diploma, a passport or other identification, a pay stub, a movie, train, or airline ticket, or a letter that changed one’s life—as well as one photograph that suggests a personal story. These photos and documents will serve to spark participants’ memories, to help them recall sensory details, and to locate possible points of focus within their stories.

After participants have generated the beginnings of a few personal stories, they will have the opportunity to give and receive feedback from their classmates and instructor.

Grace Talusan was born in the Philippines and raised in New England. A graduate of Tufts University and the MFA Program in Writing at UC Irvine, she is the recipient of a U.S. Fulbright Fellowship to the Philippines and an Artist Fellowship Award from the Massachusetts Cultural Council. Talusan teaches the Essay Incubator at GrubStreet and at the Jonathan M. Tisch College of Civic Life at Tufts. She is the Fannie Hurst Writer-in-Residence at Brandeis University for 2019–2021. The Body Papers, winner of the Restless Books Prize for New Immigrant Writing, is her first book.