Michael Evans

Professor Warner

ENGL 112B

December 6, 2006

Teen Identity through Creative Nonfiction

An 11^th & 12^th Grade School Unit Plan

Rationale:

Creative nonfiction has been a consistently growing genre in American literature for nearly a decade now. The most basic principle of creative nonfiction has been employed in nearly all genres of writing for as long as there have been writing strategies; write what you know. Creative nonfiction is the process of writing the truth, and sharing our true stories of what we know about the world and how we understand it with anyone interested enough to read it. Creative nonfiction encompasses a large variety of topics which include literary journalism, memoirs, personal essays, and travel writing. These facets of literature allow the writer to explore themselves, create intimate portraits of other people or places, and give first hand knowledge of an endless variety of subjects. The very same elements allow the reader to see real life through the eyes of another person. Creative nonfiction is an immeasurably valuable arena of literature that deserves to be represented in the curriculum of all students.

Until recently, however, creative nonfiction has been largely ignored by collective academia, especially in the K-12 learning environments. This is an area where creative nonfiction can provide a great service to our students by showing them that their own voice, and their own life, can be a source for meaningful, poignant, humorous, cautionary, beautiful literature. The best way to help students gain an appreciation for creative nonfiction is to introduce them to the infinite variety of literature that is out there, paying equal attention to the heavyweights of the genre, as well as that of young adult contemporaries, while encouraging them to write their own stories throughout the process.

I believe the true power of teaching creative nonfiction to high school students in particular lies not only in introducing them to the enjoyable, enlightening, and educating works of the genre, but to allow the students to find their own voice and tell their own stories. Thus as a centerpiece for the unit I have chosen a creative nonfiction manual broken into two parts; one on writing, and the other on reading creative nonfiction. Because the genre is so vast, yet is given relatively little coverage in typical school curriculum, I feel using only one piece of creative nonfiction as a teaching centerpiece would be a disservice to the students. By using an explorative manual which includes many short stories showing the diversity of the genre, and using longer works as supporting pillars, students will gain a broader perspective of the genre without having to necessarily devote an entire semester to its study.

1. Introducing the Unit:

            There many ways to introduce a unit on creative nonfiction. The concept of creative nonfiction can be given a fresh and clean start, or it can transition quite naturally from several other units. Here are a couple of suggestions:

1. Introduce the unit with the song �Story of My Life� by Social Distortion.

High school seemed like such a blur,

I didn't have much interest in sports or school elections.

And in class I dreamed all day, about a rock 'n' roll weekend.

 

And the girl in the front of the room,

So close, yet so far, you know she never seemed to notice,

That this silly school-boy crush wasn't just pretend.

 

Life goes by so fast, you only want to do what you think is right.

Close your eyes and then it's past - story of my life.

Story of my life.

 

And I went down to my old neighborhood,

The faces have all changed, there's no one left to talk to.

And the pool hall I loved as a kid is now a 7-11.

 

I went downtown to look for a job,

I had no training, no experience to speak of.

I looked at the holes in my jeans and turned and headed back.

 

Life goes by so fast, you only want to do what you think is right.

Close your eyes and then it's past - story of my life.

Story of my life.

 

Good times come and good times go,

I only wish the good times would last a little longer.

I think about the good times we had and why they had to end.

 

So I sit at the edge of my bed,

I strum my guitar and I sing an outlaw love song.

Thinking about what you're doing now and when you're coming back.

 

Life goes by so fast, you only want to do what you think is right.

Close your eyes and then it's past - story of my life.

Story of my life.

 

After the song, introduce elements of the personal essay, and assign students to write about the story of their own life.

2. If transitioning from a unit on race or ethnic identity, use a book like Freedom in the Family or Funny in Farsi as an introductory read, wrapping up the previous unit while introducing the students to creative narrative nonfiction. Have students do brainstorming exercises on differences between fiction and non-fiction in tackling an issue like racism, and compile a list as a class on the advantages and limitations of each format.
3. Transition from any Chris Crutcher young adult novel to King of the Mild Frontier, Crutcher�s autobiography on growing up in a small town, and his experiences writing. Have students do a free write assignment on how much fiction is influenced through personal real life experience, and ask them to identify an instance in one of Chris Crutcher�s novels that is likely to have stemmed from real experience, according to his autobiography.
4. Almost any theme that can be found in fiction can be found in nonfiction as well. Look at the books on the State of California�s recommended classroom literature list to find a nonfiction book covering your topic or theme. Have students analyze the advantages and limitations of fiction and narrative nonfiction.

2. The Centerpiece:

            The manual which this unit will be centered on is Writing True: The Art and Craft of Creative Nonfiction by Sondra Perl and Mimi Schwartz. The text is divided into two main parts, each with several chapters covering individual topics. Part one is centered on teaching methods and strategies for writing nonfiction, while part two focuses on reading a wide variety of nonfiction. The chapters of the book are mostly self-contained, so this book is easily adapted to any time schedule. The reading and writing parts can be taught simultaneously or independently, and the chapters can be assigned in any order. Every chapter of this book is useful, but if time necessitates, chapters such as �Workshopping a Draft� or �Literary Journalism� can be skipped if you don�t plan on covering those areas.

            Because Writing True contains nearly 200 pages of creative nonfiction short stories and essays, the book acts as a companion to itself. The best way for students to understand the creative nonfiction writing process is to read an assortment of creative nonfiction works. The best way to critique many creative nonfiction stories is to implement strategies of the creative nonfiction writing process. Although there are many books which will greatly supplement Writing True, the absolute best supplement to this unit will be the student�s own writing assignments.

3. Ideal companion assignments:

1. Write a personal essay, in which they examine their current life as an intersection of past, present, and future. Students should draw on Chapter 12 for inspiration.
2. Write a memoir reflecting all or part of your childhood. Encourage students to use a distinct voice with an original perspective using the writing strategies in Chapter 5. Assign David Sedaris� essay �Let It Snow� as an example of incorporating a distinct voice.
3. Write a profile essay on one of your classmates. This should include preparing questions in advance, and conducting an interview with the classmate, as well as the finished written profile.
4. Write an essay of place in which use vivid descriptive detail to show a place to a reader that has never been there. The place can be your house, your favorite hangout, the city you live in, or your family�s favorite vacation spot. Use Chapter 14 for inspiration.

4. Supplemental Texts: (All summaries are courtesy of Amazon.com.)

• Teen Angst? Naaah . . . by Ned Vizzini. �The author, who is described as being a little on the geeky side and not too suave with girls, recorded his high school experiences between the ages of 15 and 18. These essays, originally published in the New York Press and New York Times Magazine, now appear in this compilation. Vignettes do not necessarily lend themselves to a straightforward plot, so the fiercely intelligent and introspective Vizzini concentrates on style rather than action. His wonderfully sardonic voice, like Daniel Pinkwater's in The Education of Robert Nifkin (Farrar, 1998), suggests a wisdom beyond his years.�

 

• A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway. �Hemingway beautifully captures the fragile magic of a special time and place, and he manages to be nostalgic without hitting any false notes of sentimentality. "This is how Paris was in the early days when we were very poor and very happy," he concludes. Originally published in 1964, three years after his suicide, A Moveable Feast was the first of his posthumous books and remains the best.�

 

• Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich. �As Ehrenreich points out with her potent combination of humor and outrage, the laws of supply and demand have been reversed. Rental prices skyrocket, but wages never rise. Rather, jobs are so cheap as measured by the pay that workers are encouraged to take as many as they can. Behind those trademark Wal-Mart vests, it turns out, are the borderline homeless. With her characteristic wry wit and her unabashedly liberal bent, Ehrenreich brings the invisible poor out of hiding and, in the process, the world they inhabit--where civil liberties are often ignored and hard work fails to live up to its reputation as the ticket out of poverty.�

 

Between these three texts, the majority of major creative nonfiction genres are explored. Ned Vizzini�s humorous essay collection Teen Angst? Naaah . . . was written at the time he described, and is much more of a series of personal essays, than a memoir. The book is a relatively easy read, written by an at the time high school student about his experiences in high school, and modern students should be able to relate. Vizzini also makes excellent use of voice and tone. Hemingway�s A Moveable Feast on the other hand is a memoir of his time spent in Paris in the roaring twenties. Aside from being a classic of modern literature, and giving readers a comparison between a personal essay and a memoir, it is also a remarkably vivid essay of place, capturing not only the location, but the time period as well. Nickel and Dimed rounds out the bunch with its Literary Journalism approach. Like the other two works it also has a distinctive voice, but challenges a larger social issue, instead of simply relating personal story. Any of these texts would make an excellent companion to Writing True, the four texts together would provide a complete taste of what creative nonfiction has to offer.

5. Further Reading: (All summaries are courtesy of Amazon.com.)

• Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood by Marjane Satrapi. �Satrapi's autobiography is a timely and timeless story of a young girl's life under the Islamic Revolution. Descended from the last Emperor of Iran, Satrapi is nine when fundamentalist rebels overthrow the Shah. While Satrapi's radical parents and their community initially welcome the ouster, they soon learn a new brand of totalitarianism is taking over. Satrapi's art is minimal and stark yet often charming and humorous as it depicts the madness around her. She idolizes those who were imprisoned by the Shah, fascinated by their tales of torture, and bonds with her Uncle Anoosh, only to see the new regime imprison and eventually kill him. Thanks to the Iran-Iraq war, neighbors' homes are bombed, playmates are killed and parties are forbidden.�

 

• Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris. �Sedaris's caustic gift has not deserted him in his fourth book, which mines poignant comedy from his peculiar childhood in North Carolina, his bizarre career path, and his move with his lover to France. Though his anarchic inclination to digress is his glory, Sedaris does have a theme in these reminiscences: the inability of humans to communicate. The title is his rendition in transliterated English of how he and his fellow students of French in Paris mangle the Gallic language.�

 

• You Remind Me Of You by Eireann Corrigan. �Struggling for years with eating disorders, in and out of treatment facilities, Eireann Corrigan is teetering on the brink of no return when her high school boyfriend attempts suicide. Suddenly, Eireann is on the other side of the high-railed hospital bed, and on an entirely unexpected path to recovery herself. In this witty, smart, and heart-rending poetry memoir, author Eireann Corrigan takes a breathtakingly honest look at herself as she wends her way through profoundly difficult times. Her complicated relationship with her sweetheart is captured in the second-person prosaic verses scattered throughout, as well as in the interviews, presumably with a therapist, that fill in many of the blanks left by the sometimes cryptic first-person narrative.�

 

These are three more books that could be recommended for further reading to students, or kept in the classroom to show even more diversity that can be found in creative nonfiction. Persepolis is a graphic novel, as well as being the true story of a girl growing up during the Islamic Revolution. You Remind Me Of You is the author�s true story of coming of age as an anorexic and dealing with a suicidal ex-boyfriend, as told through poetry.

6. Unit Conclusion:

            By the end of the unit, students will have read a wide range of creative nonfiction, including personal essays, memoirs, travel essays and stories of place, profile essays, and literary journalism. Students will have also written several different types of creative nonfiction essays themselves. The class will understand that creative nonfiction can be used to tackle large scale social issues, deeply rooted personal troubles, or merely relate daily life in a fun and interesting way. There are a variety of assignments or final projects that could close out the unit.

1. Have the students write a feature magazine article for a magazine of their choice. This could be Seventeen, Skateworld, or Electronic Gaming Monthly; whatever fits the student�s own interest.
2. Have the students read a piece of creative nonfiction that has been made into a movie, such as Flags of Our Fathers, and then show the movie in class. Have the students write a paper on the power of true stories in any medium, and analyze the differences between the novel and the film.
3. Have the students read a piece of creative nonfiction, and a work of fiction, on the same subject. Readily available historical choices would include World War II, Vietnam, and the Holocaust, but another angle would be to choose a teen coming of age novel. Have the students write a paper on the strengths and limitations of each format.

Works Cited:

<http://www.amazon.com>.

Corrigan, Eireann. You Remind Me Of You. New York: Push, 2002.

Crutcher, Chris. King of the Mild Frontier: An Ill-Advised Autobiography. New York: HarperCollins, 2003.

Donelson Kenneth L. and Aileen Pace Nilsen. Literature for Today�s Young Adults. Boston: Pearson Education, 2005.

Due, Tananarive, and Patricia Stephens Due. Freedom in the Family: A Mother-Daughter Memoir of the Fight for Civil Rights. New York: Random House, 2003.

Dumas, Firoozeh. Funny in Farsi: A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America. New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2004.

Ehrenreich, Barbara. Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America. New York: Owl Books, 2002.

Hemingway, Ernest. A Moveable Feast. New York: Scribner, 1964.

Perl, Sondra, and Mimi Schwartz. Writing True: The Art and Craft of Creative Nonfiction. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2006.

Satrapi, Marjane. Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood. Paris: L�Association, 2003.

Sedaris, David. Me Talk Pretty One Day. Boston: Back Bay, 2000.

Social Distortion. Story of My Life.

Vizzini, Ned. Teen Angst? Naaah . . .. Minneapolis: Free Spirit Publishing, 2000.

Warner, Mary L. Adolescents in the Search For Meaning: Tapping the Powerful Resource of Story. Maryland: The Scarecrow Press, 2006.