Gouri’s Workshops

Basics of Fiction and Non-fiction Writing Workshop

Whether you are a published or aspiring writer, or simply enjoy writing, this ‘Writer’s Gym’ Module 1 will help the writer in you emerge stronger. It will enable you to:

• Understand your own writing aspirations
• Hone writing habits
• Transform the personal into the universal
• Work with the Elements: Plot, Character, Setting, Conflict Theme
• Depict human relationships in a layered way
• Build your vocabulary – working with words and making words work for you
• Reverse-engineer well-known stories and opinion pieces
• Write fiction, non-fiction and faction
• Play with various genres and learn to use the right one
• Learn about the writer’s juggle: of demands, realities, inspiration, bad days, good days; enabling and disabling situations and choices.
• Understand the balance between writing ‘for myself’ and writing-to-order. The craft and commerce of writing.
  Duration: 4 days, 3 hours each day.

What some participants said:
“Thank you. 18th and 19th was an experience I will always treasure. The ambiance and your ready sharing of tips and…thanks!”

“Not only was it interesting and informative … it was also relaxed, enjoyable yet so very motivating to some of us hesitant writers.”

“The module made me turn to my ‘writerly self’ again. And the picnic atmosphere during lunch hour in the garden was priceless!”

“I especially liked the open style which stimulated discussion and your genuine interest in helping us find our writing path.”

“I found it very useful to kick-start some story ideas I had been keeping aside. It also helped me to see where I was falling short:
character development, dialogues, etching negative characters well, good narration.”

“The important thing is you demonstrated how to be inspired by the simplest everyday things around us, and to write diligently and yet joyfully…and to go beyond the autobiographical.”

“Thank you for a wonderful workshop! i have recommended it to many a friends. I still have grin on my face about many writing exercises that we did.”

Fiction and Non-fiction

This second level workshop is for participants with a specific idea of what they want to write, and have at least 3000 words already written in the form of a chapter draft, or concept note, or character descriptions, or an outline for a book or a series of articles, or the framework for a set of stories or a novel, or a little of all of these.
Before enrolling, each participant will decide how much they want to grow or expand their material over the course of the workshop. The facilitator will help you think through and take your material forward, flesh it out, either as a complete piece or a substantial part of a larger piece of writing.
Duration: Three half-day sessions (3 hours each) or two full-day sessions (4.5 hours each).

Participants will be guided to:

• Discover and detail the core-central theme of your work
• Learn about characterization in the show-not-tell mode
• Form a structure/plot/argument which can be later fleshed out
• Edit and evaluate your own work
• Study the use of dialogue in fiction writing and human-interest additions in non-fiction
• Learn how to write a detailed proposal to a publisher or a publishing agent

At the end of the workshop, participants will have a better grip on their material, the direction in which they want to take it further, and build a momentum to their writing practice.

What some participants had to say:
“I cant think of a better way to reconnect with my ‘writerly self’ who was lost.”

“What a wonderful mix of fellow-writers and their different subjects – it made me want to recommit to my half-done writing work.”

“How we were taken through the paces of advancing our different work of fiction or non-fiction – that was just masterful. Thank you!”

“I was staring at a wall, now I have so many doors and windows open to let in the ideas and the writing energy.”

A writing workshop for animal lovers and wordsmiths

A one-of-a-kind writing workshop, offered online as well as offline. For those who want to write about thoughts, feelings, experiences with their pets and the birds and animals we interact with or observe. The workshop is for anyone who works and plays in the field – for pet parents and professionals.

Duration: Two days, three hours each day.

Participants will work with fiction as well as non-fiction. The writing exercises will cover all writing moods and styles: from the funny and playful to the serious and sentimental, the informative and educational.
Unleash the writer in you with a variety of writing exercises that will cover:

• The animal-human bond
• The comic and the entertaining
• Animal activism
• Wildlife world
• Pet products and services
• Obituaries and memorials

Playing with different genres like poems, blogs, podcasts, print features, haikus, short-stories, novel plots, essays, editorials, petitions…the workshop will provide tools to budding as well as seasoned writers to express themselves about the joys, fears, heartbreak and responsibilities of being an animal lover and also working with animals.

The workshop will be conducted by published writer, counsellor and animal lover Gouri Dange.

The workshop is meant for ages 16 and above – age no bar!

A suggested reading and film-watching list will be provided for participants to follow up on after the workshop.

Kitchen Chronicles Workshop

A three-day (three hours a day) workshop to guide people who want to write family or community cookbooks, or write personal food-related memoirs in the form of books or blogs, that stir together food, anecdotes, memories.

This workshop is for people who want to plan to put together one particular book, or a series of articles or blogs, perhaps for the family or for an elder’s birthday or anniversary, for future generations, for a reunion group. It would also be of use to writers taking on such projects for a client too. It would be of great value to food bloggers too.

While each participant may have very specific needs to put together such a book, the facilitator would show participants the pre-writing and writing tools and structures needed for such a project. This would involve modules and exercises during the workshop on how to:

• Find and develop a theme for your particular cookbook-chronicle or blog or website
• Go about gathering material, sourcing stories, possibly letters, handwritten notebooks, and other material
• Sequencing the text so that there is a pattern and not just a jumble of stand-alone recipes and stories
• Finding the right tone and level of information, ensuring readability as well as ease of use
• Learning to title and subtitle chapters, visuals, in an interesting, evocative way
• Putting together a first draft and then taking your work further
• Thinking visually to be able to work with a designer/photographer/artist
• Generating an index, glossary, ingredient sources, and other garnishes for the reader
• Creative funding and publishing options for your book project
• Reading list of other similar books and blogs to browse

By the end of the three days, participants will be able to build and finalize their specific, ready-to start cookbook project with workable timelines and deadlines.

What lies unexpressed within us, controls and limits us.

• Do you want to learn how creative writing can take you on a journey of exploration and self-discovery?
• Would you like to handle unresolved issues better and also convey joys never before felt or expressed?
• Would you like to ‘play’ with writing forms that will help you touch and air your innermost feelings and become more authentic?

This unusual workshop uses the written word as a tool for self-awareness. The exercises, using various writing genres, will help participants shed new light inwards. You will experience significant shifts, and emerge with a new understanding of your inner and outer world.

This workshop is extremely useful for all those who are in jobs that need clarity, communication skills, balance, self-knowledge and unbound creativity…which are needed in virtually every walk of life! This workshop is also extremely useful for all those who are in the helping-enabling professions (counsellors, psychologists, social workers, trainers, teachers etc.), and therefore need to equip themselves with tools to energize and empower others. It is also a powerful tool to unlock creativity.