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530 Best Creative Writing Classes in 2024

Showing 530 courses that match your search.

Craft of Fiction Workshop: Plot + Structure

Attic Institute

Find your way into your characters’ motivations, interiority, and relationships in this generative workshop for short story writers and novelists. We’ll create complex characters through in-class writing, discussion of short story and novel excerpts, and reimagining in-progress and new work. Open to all writers.

Website: https://atticinstitute.com/node/2870

Categories: Fiction, Nonfiction, Book, Fantasy, and Science Fiction

Start date:

September, 2024

Prerequisites: No prerequisites

2025 Year-Long Creative Nonfiction Writing Project with Sun Yung Shin

The Loft Literary Center

This online course focuses on developing craft in creative nonfiction through writing, reading, and workshopping. Participants will engage with guest authors and publishing professionals, enhancing their writing skills in various aspects while refining their unique voices.

Website: https://loft.org/classes/2025-year-long-creative-nonficti...

Categories: Nonfiction

January, 2025

Writing the Memoir 101

Writer's Digest University

This course teaches structuring personal stories into a memoir, developing storytelling skills, and includes writing assignments with instructor feedback. It covers personal memoir types, character roles, organizing material, crafting scenes, writing opening pages, and finishing strategies.

Website: https://writersdigestuniversity.mykajabi.com/writing-the-...

Categories: Book and Memoir

December, 2024

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How to Write a Novel

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Writing the Mystery Novel

The course includes six weekly sessions that cover essential aspects of mystery writing. Each session features lectures, creative exercises, and personalized feedback on writing assignments.

Categories: Fiction

Prerequisites: None

Accordion Books as Writer's Playground

A workshop focused on creating accordion fold books, integrating image and text, and promoting creative exploration with basic supplies provided. Participants will engage in prompt-based writing and hands-on book-making.

Website: https://www.porchtn.org/class/accordion-books-as-writers-...

March, 2025

How to Write and Draw a Graphic Memoir

This course teaches the process of creating a graphic memoir, including selecting personal life events to share, maintaining privacy, and communicating with family. No professional art skills are needed, as participants will learn to express their stories visually.

Website: https://www.porchtn.org/class/how-to-write-and-draw-a-gra...

Categories: Memoir

Tap Your Creative Vein: Understanding Your Inner Artist

The Writing Barn

This course offers a 2.5-hour session focusing on understanding your inner artist, setting goals, and creating a structured literary life. Participants will receive guidance on their unique passion and purpose, motivational inspiration, and access to community resources.

Website: https://thewritingbarn.com/class/tap-your-creative-vein-u...

Categories: Fiction and Book

Zine Scene: Your Voice, Your Story

Denver Writes

This hands-on workshop teaches participants about zines, their history, and how to create their own. Writers will blend poetry with graphic art to produce a booklet that reflects their personal story or theme.

Website: https://www.denverwrites.org/workshops/

Categories: Fiction and Poetry

Let's Get Practical: How To Write (and Sell) a Book In Two Years

Lighthouse Writers Workshop

This craft seminar focuses on writing and selling a book. It covers queries, proposals, drafting, editing, and project planning to help complete a book while maintaining sanity. Participants receive templates and personalized project plans.

Website: https://lighthousewriters.org/workshop/lets-get-practical...

Categories: Publishing

Poem or Picture Book: Writing the Lyrical Children’s Book

Literary Arts

This workshop explores the intersection of poetry and picture books through collaborative study and practical tools. Participants learn to make their picture book texts more lyrical and enhance the visual appeal of their poetry.

Website: https://literary-arts.org/event/poem-or-picture-book-writ...

Categories: Publishing and Poetry

February, 2025

Resistance Smackdown: A Creative Writing Restoration Workshop

Writing Pad

This workshop focuses on overcoming writing resistance, offering tools for time organization, daily writing routines, and establishing support networks. It is applicable to various genres including blog, essay, memoir, nonfiction, novel, poetry, screenplay, and TV pilot.

Website: https://writingpad.com/classes/online-resistance-smackdow...

Categories: Book, Fiction, and Publishing

Create: Free Draft Generator with Camille Cabrera

This course provides a platform for new writers or those seeking inspiration to generate new writing projects through engaging prompts. Participants will connect with peers and learn about further writing opportunities.

Website: https://grubstreet.org/seminar/create-free-draft-generato...

Categories: Fiction, Short Story, Essay, Memoir, Nonfiction, and Poetry

What is creative writing?

Creative writing is often best understood through a description of what it’s not : it is not business, journalistic, academic, or technical writing. 

Here is what creative writing is : it is the art of telling stories through written mediums. To many people, the novel is the most obvious form of creative writing, but it can also be found in essays, screenplays, poetry, memoirs, and much more. 

As you can imagine, one of the common threads that connects all forms of creative writing is, well, imagination. In fiction, this is embodied in the creation of the story itself; in nonfiction, it’s inherent in the way that the author chooses to present (and engage with) facts and real events to create a compelling narrative. 

Why is creative writing important?

We might as easily ask: why is it important to tell stories? Because that’s just what people do. It’s our way to make sense of the world and ourselves, and share it with others. History abounds with the art of the story. Look anywhere on a world timeline, and you’ll find examples of creative writing fulfilling our need for creative expression, from Homer’s epics in 800 B.C. to Dante’s inferno to modern essays shared on the Internet today. 

Nothing suggests that it will ever disappear, either! In fact, creative writing is arguably even more important in the age of AI, in which we must continue to tell powerful human stories instead of outsourcing such a fundamental task to soulless machines. 

How do creative writing courses teach creative writing?

If you’ve decided that you want to invest in your own creative writing, that’s great! Get ready to embark on a lifelong learning path. Like all art forms, creative writing is a skill that you must constantly train in order to improve. 

Learning creative writing, of course, can be as simple as you want. All you need is pen and paper — or, these days, a computer with a writing app. 

You can also take a creative writing class if you’re interested in a certain writing topic, or if you simply want an experienced instructor to point out the way for you. A course can fast-track your writing progress by teaching you something about the art of writing in one day that might otherwise take a year for you to pick up by yourself. They also often specialize in a specific area of creative writing, for instance:

  • Character development, i.e. the way that characters change from beginning to end of a story.
  • Genre conventions and tropes, i.e. what conventions you should write to in a certain genre — and what you can (and perhaps should) subvert.
  • Story structure, i.e. the order of plot points and key events that a story should take in order to be compelling.
  • Writing voice, i.e. the unique writing style that only you can bring to a story. 

Because there are thousands of aspects to creative writing, there are thousands of creative writing classes. That’s why we built this directory of the best creative writing courses. We’ve made it filterable by genre, price, and more to make it easier for you to find the perfect class for your needs. 

But what are the best creative writing classes?

The best creative writing course depends on you , and your own profile! We always recommend that you thoroughly do your research to personalize your choice for yourselves. 

With that said, below are some recommendations to kick you off. 

The best creative writing classes for beginners

If you’ve got a book idea, and you’re willing to invest some money to write it, then Reedsy’s How to Write a Novel could be a great place for you to start. Over three months, this full-fledged course will take you step-by-step from your idea to your first draft — and give you a supportive writing community to boot. 

💲 Cost: $1,000+  👨‍🏫 Type: Video

The best in-person creative writing classes 

Gotham Writers, the biggest adult-education writing school in the US, is based in New York City and offers in-person classes. With self-paced courses, write-ins, and several free events per term, it emulates the university feel wherever possible.

💲 Cost: $165 - $450  👨‍🏫 Type: In-person

The best free creative writing classes 

Reedsy Learning is composed of bite-sized modules that are emailed to you once a day for ten days. They can be read in five minutes — and best of all, they’re free! Each module is packed with practical tips, additional resources, and exercises to sharpen your skills. 

💲 Cost: Free  👨‍🏫 Type: Email

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