Workshops

HELLO! 

Here is a description of what happens in workshop.

EXPLORE DROP DOWN MENU OF “WORKSHOPS” for other info/schedule

In light of Covid 19 all workshops will be held on ZOOM.  Stay safe!

“Write, don’t think.”  Ray Bradbury

*  *  *
Small writing workshops
with Rosemary Moore

Write in the comfort of your home…

 

Have you found that goal oriented solitary writing can sometimes jam your flow? My fun, eclectic methods and experienced guidance will free your writing in unexpected and productive ways.

  •  My small, supportive workshop is designed to help you generate writing through prompts, short exercises and guided meditations as a warm up to a period of intensive free writing in the quiet company of others.
  • The workshop is limited to a small group of participants of all levels or genres who want to begin or continue a project, or just want to experiment. Sessions work equally well for revising work. Beginners are welcome.
  • The pages that come out of our evenings will add up, though maybe not logically at first glance. I cultivate a “no rules” atmosphere that leaves an opening for something new to emerge- a choice fragment can lead to unlocking a scene in a play; an image remembered from a dream can fuel a whole novel. Our sessions will give you strategies and tools to generate writing in any situation.
  • At the end of each session writers will have the option to share their work and receive friendly feedback from me (and others, if so desired).
  • All classes are ZOOM during COVID times
  • If you are interested please contact me:  roseleap229@gmail.com
  • Current Schedule  on this web site in “Winter 2022 Workshop” tab

TESTIMONIALS FROM WORKSHOP PARTICIPANTS

Joan Larkin, poet: – Rosemary Moore is an exceptional teacher, just the guide I needed to open the door to fiction I wanted to write but was afraid I couldn’t. Skilled, innovative, generous, attentive to individual needs and strengths, Rosemary creates a safe space for discovering and pursuing work that’s uniquely one’s own. Drawing on her wealth of creative experience, she offers strategies for tapping intuitive resources, and support for exploring possibilities of structure. Somehow my writing anxiety melts away with her prompts, and something unexpected and useful happens in every session.

Arthur Strimling, playwright, storyteller: Rosemary Moore’s workshop stretched, flexed and toned my writing muscles. The combination of a completely inviting, encouraging atmosphere, a small group of mature, engaged fellow writers, and Rosemary’s imaginative prompts and love for the very act of writing, got us all going every time. I wrote stuff I never would have imagined I would and never would have done on my own. And the feedback from my colleagues and Rosemary just encouragedme to go on.

Melissa Connelly, novelist   I’ve been in too many writing workshops to count, and rarely have I found a teacher as gifted as Rosemary Moore. She pays careful attention to the atmosphere she sets and the direction she gives. Her prompts are both brilliant and flexible. The class really helped open up my second novel—something that had been paralyzing me. Her home is a beautiful space, and surrounded by art and interesting objects, you feel the creative process being honored and nurtured.

Lisa Chess   Actor/Director  In the lovely, supportive environment of Rosemary’s home, participants were encouraged, using diverse and fascinating prompts, to write without restriction or edit. “Write without lifting your hand from the page” (or fingers from the keys). “Raw”.  I loved that. Though I’ve been writing for about two years, I feel like a novice. Rosemary’s process helped me to open my mind and I think my work made significant progress.  The six week workshop had a kind of magic in it and I recommend it unequivocally.

Leila Gastil  Fiction writer/Memoirist Wonder if you’ll ever know how much CHUNK (all day workshop) meant to me? It was pure fun. That safe space and structure you provided connected me to the joy of writing. JOY. In the following days, I felt more myself in the world. For that Saturday, I let that part of myself live and be visible. I’m so grateful. and YES, I’d like to do it again., if you’ll have me.

Rob Lenihan, blogger, novelist, journalist : Rosemary Moore’s workshop was a fabulous experience for me. I got to work with a great teacher and extremely talented classmates. The class pushed me out of my comfort zone and gave me the confidence to experiment with my writing. I loved it.

Gil Ortiz, memoirist : I think the key for me was the safety I felt in the room with you, Rosemary, and my classmates. You made it clear that there was no right or wrong way to write — just to write all over the place, crazy like. Your prompts forced me to write things I really didn’t expect to write. Getting feedback from classmates was great. It helped to unfreeze a little where I felt stuck in my writing.

Stacey Gladstone  fiction writer As a new writer, I found Rosemary’s workshop to be revelatory. I never knew I had so many stories lurking inside of me but Rosemary supplied me with the keys to unlock them. Her prompts and visualizations cued fragments of dreams, memory, and fantasy that I was able to access immediately. The safety of the environment allowed me to explore that access. I am so looking forward to continuing with her guidance in future sessions.

Gabrielle Prisco, novelist  Rosemary Moore’s workshop was transformative and I suspect I will return to her living room in the future. It opened new doors inside me and on the page. As I recently told someone about her: she is an alchemist.

Sarah Berry Tschinkel, performer, writer, Jungian Psychoanalyst    Rosemary created a safe and inviting space for me to explore new material and areas of interest with a small cohort of other writers. She encourages access to those mysterious and unknown parts of self through the creative use of prompts and visual stimuli, and this varies this weekly. Her warmth and knowledge gave me the confidence to share my work with others, and to benefit from their support.

Annabel Lee poet, writer  If there’s any formula for these workshops it’s “write—don’t think.” These are intimate workshops. What gets written in the group, what gets said, stays within the group and only lives inside each of our writer’s heads and in what we are working on.The participants came from varied backgrounds and all those in the group I was in had great stories to tell and intense commitment to their own writing. In that group there was a nurse, a college professor, a musician, and a couple of others. The youngest participant was in his twenties, and the oldest probably in his seventies.

We received very specific prompts, which I found helpful, although there was no compunction to use them. They key to writing from the prompts was the quality of letting go, letting go of the gnarly critic inside our heads, and not letting ourselves be concerned about the quantity of writing we got done—it was about process, not the product.

Leslie Weber,  writer,  fundraiser  Rosemary’s gentle preparation and creative prompts revealed a part of my imagination I didn’t know I had, and inspired writing I had no idea I was capable of! Her generosity and genuine curiosity bring forth the best in everyone in the group. I can’t wait until my next workshop.

David Telson   composer/musician/fiction writer   Rosemary Moore’s workshop is the ideal setting for one to develop one’s creative craft. The prompts always change and are original and inspiring. Rosemary also leads everyone through a meditation that really works to get everyone in the zone before they write. Worth mentioning too is that the environment in the workshop is such that one feels comfortable sharing what they’ve written. Lastly the workshop has not only inspired me to take up writing, but has also elevated it and has resulted in more joy in my life.

Tammy Pittman, visual artist “As a newcomer to writing as a purely creative act, I am so grateful to Rosemary for her light touch, inviting us to relax our minds, open up to unanticipated connections, be free. That is the key and without it, I don’t think I would be able to do this writing at all. I don’t have goals for writing and Rosemary says that’s good, it keeps your ego out of it. She’s liberating. She invites you to free associate, play, be experimental. At the end, I’m always surprised by what I’ve written. ”

Lizzy Fruehling actor, playwright     The greatest thing about Rosemary’s class, for me, is the way it encourages a writer to loosen the reins (for just an hour). I think when working outside of this workshop, it’s too easy to work efficiently – to think of a plot, then sit down and fill it in with scenes. Inside of the workshop, with the help of Rosemary’s prompts, I was able to write without worrying about where I was going. I could spend some time writing about the contents in my character’s purse. And while that scene might not make it into the final draft, at least I know that my character has a messy purse. And somehow, that feels important.

Bio. Rosemary Moore    Published writer and playwright Rosemary Moore, a longtime resident of Park Slope, has been teaching writing for over 15 years to all ages in all genres. She taught for many years in the Writing Program at Rutgers University. She has been a writer-in-residence in New York City public schools through the South Street Seaport Museum, Teachers & Writers Collaborative, Henry Street Settlement and New York City Opera’s Opera is Elementary schools program. She has taught playwriting to adults at the Park Slope YMCA, Brooklyn Arts Exchange and many branches of the Brooklyn Public Library. She created, with writer Honor Molloy, the reading series Six O’clock Shadow at the noted nightspot Barbes in Park Slope and curated New Plays by Brooklyn Playwrights as part of Louise Crawford’s Brooklyn Reading Works series at the Old Stone House.

She was selected by A.R. Gurney as one of five Emerging Playwrights in the Cherry Lane Alternative Mentor Project for the development and production of her play “Aunt Pieces”, which was directed by Michael Sexton at the Cherry Lane Theater. “Side Street”, directed by Ian Morgan, had a workshop production recently at Theaterlab in New York City. Her play “They’re Back” was part of New Georges’ 2nd George Sand Invitational One-Minute Play Festival at City Center this past January, directed by Tea Alagic and Lyto Triantafyllidou. She is a member of New Georges Theatre and the Dramatist’s Guild.

Her play “The Pain of Pink Evenings” was published in The Best American Short Plays of 2001, Applause Books. “Aunt Pieces” was published this past year in The Plays of the Mentor Project; A Cherry Lane Theatre Anthology.  She was profiled in The Brooklyn Rail in 2013 by playwright Lizzie Olesker in “Side Street and the Dead Possible”. Her personal essay “Night Feeding” was published in The Breast, An Anthology by Global City Press, and her short stories have been published in BOMB and New Observation magazines.

Rosemary holds an MFA from the Dramatic Writing Program of Tisch School of the Arts at New York University where she studied with Maria Irene Fornes and Tony Kushner.

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