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August Newsletter & Upcoming Courses
Welcome to our August Newsletter where the focus is on the power of creative tension.
To fully harness your potential as a fiction writer, learning the craft requires you grasp the subtleties of the creative process. At first, elements of the craft of writing and storytelling can feel counter-intuitive or counter-instinctive.
Robert Fritz wrote, “Most people who are not consummate creators avoid tension. They want quick answers. They don’t like living in the realm of not knowing something they want to know. They have an intolerance for those moments in the creative process in which they have no idea how to get from where they are to where they want to be.”
This becomes apparent with writers when they begin our 4-Week Unlocking Creativity course. They can take some time to fully embrace the new tools and techniques while learning to sit with the power of creative tension and counter-intuitive emotions this can trigger. This takes practice, commitment and a certain degree of courage.
To create powerful stories that move readers, you have to keep learning and growing as a writer.
James Clear writes that this takes, “The courage to keep trying despite your fears of what others may think. The courage to keep trying without knowing how the future will unfold. Your great work is on the other side of your early work. The only way to be exceptional later on is to have the courage to be ‘just okay’ right now. This is how it is for everyone.”
The art is in the doing. If you want to be a writer, the only failure is stopping…
Click to read more here
Celebrating 30 Years!
“Roland Fishman’s Writers’ Studio is one of the quiet success stories of Sydney.” The Sydney Morning Herald
This year is the 30th Anniversary of the founding of the Writers’ Studio!
Roland Fishman founded the Writers’ Studio in 1992, with the very first classes being held in his lounge room in Bondi. The classes proved popular and were subsequently run out of studios in Surry Hills and then Bondi Junction until The Writers’ Studio found its current Studio and beautiful home in Bronte in 2006.
To celebrate this milestone, we will be offering something different each month via the newsletter, including course discounts, short story competitions, giveaways, culminating in a celebration to be held in summer in early 2023.
To kick off, this month we are offering a $30 for 30 discount on our 4-Week Unlocking Creativity courses. This is an extra $30 dollars off the Earlybird fee!
Use this discount code below when registering or send to a friend to use.
Enter this code into ID Code field: 1992
Click to register here
Place open in First Draft Live starting September!
 A place has opened up in our 10-Month First Draft Live course starting next month on 10 September.
The course is no longer up on the website, if you want to register and take this spot, the only link to register is below.
You do need to have undertaken Unlocking Creativity to join this course:
Click here to register
Second & Third Draft Online
Our next Third Draft Online course is starting on 22 August with a few places still open.
 While you will refine your structure in the Third Draft course, the focus is very much on the craft of writing, re-writing and editing and making each scene as good as it can be.
Writing your chapters in a way that will engage your readers and keep them turning the page, wanting to know what happens next.
Learn how to create compelling drama and micro-tension on each page so the tension builds organically and logically and receive a detailed critique from your tutor.
Register now to commence your 1st session work: here
The next Second Draft Online course is starting on 26 September with some places open.
 The Second Draft “is where you will nail your story down, so that it works from beginning to end and you get the action, character arc and theme all working together. Something that is not possible in the first draft. “The second draft is the up draft – you fix it up. You try to say what you have to say more accurately.” Anne Lamott
We expect writers in the Second Draft to improve their stories by at the very least 200 percent. Seeing your story come together in this course is a pivotal and exciting part of the journey.
Click for more information and to register: here
Quick Course Round-up
The next Unlocking Creativity Online course will commence 21 September more >
Unlocking Creativity Live course will commence 1 September more >
The next 6-Week course is the Short Story Genre course starting 31 October (Unlocking Creativity is a prerequisite) more >
The next 10-Month First Draft Online course will commence on 24 October more >
The 10-Month First Draft Live with Roland, Kathleen & Richard is starting on 4 March, 2023 more >
Second Draft Live will commence on 4 February 2023 more >
Second Draft Online will commence on 26 September more >
The next Third Draft Online will commence on 22 August, register now for your pre-course work. Limited places more >
Third Draft Live will commence on 29 October more >
Third Draft Part 2 Online course will commence on 7 November more >
The Third Draft Part 2 Live July 2023 course will open for bookings in the next few weeks more >
Please contact the office on (02) 9386 4994 between 10am and 5pm Monday to Friday, if you have any questions at all about which course is right for you.
Success Stories:
Alyssa Partington
Alyssa, one of our Unlocking Creativity tutors emailed to let us know of a project she’s been working on since last year, was launched last week:
Our Forgotten Epidemic is a six-part podcast series she researched, wrote and produced for the Burnett Foundation Aotearoa (formally the New Zealand AIDS Foundation) about Aotearoa New Zealand’s response to HIV and AIDS. The first episode was released last Tuesday and they will release five more episodes every fortnight until the end of September.
‘It’s been a huge undertaking, and I couldn’t have done it without the experience I’ve gained at the Writers’ Studio, which is why I wanted to share it!’
To listen click here: Apple Spotify
Signed Book, Movie & DVD Giveaways!
 To Paradise
We have a signed paperback copy of New York Times best selling novel, To Paradise, by Hanya Yanighara to giveway!
To win this signed copy, email with your name, address and mobile to:
rsvp@writerstudio.com.au
Bosch & Rockit
 Thanks to Madman Films, we have double passes to giveaway to new release, Bosch & Rockit, starring Luke Hemsworth, opening in selected cinemas on August 18.
In the late summer along the Australian coast, young father Bosch hits the road in a hurry to avoid a run in with the law. In tow is his teenage son Rockit, who believes he is on a magical holiday with his father. Bosch & Rockit is a journey through boyhood and manhood and an unforgettable true story about love, forgiveness and the powerful bond between a father and son.
To win a double pass, please email with your address & mobile to: rsvp@writerstudio.com.au
Signora Volpe
 Thanks to Acorn Media, we have DVD copies of the new crime drama series, Signora Volpe to giveaway.
Top British spy Sylvia Fox (Emilia Fox; Silent Witness, The Trial of Christine Keeler) is in Italy for her niece’s wedding when the groom goes missing. Sylvia solves the mystery and falls in love – with Italy, and with a crumbling old house on a hillside .. starting a new life in the little town of Panicale. But trouble has a habit of seeking Sylvia out and she finds herself tackling a fresh mystery every week – and in the process, becoming increasingly close to handsome local cop Giovanni Riva.
To win a DVD, please email with your address & mobile to: rsvp@writerstudio.com.au
Recent Course Feedback
Some snippets of the wonderful feedback that we receive back from recently completed courses. We update these each newsletter. They show what a large variety of writers get out of our writing courses.
“Unlocking Creativity has both released me from the impossible task of writing a perfectly edited first draft and shown me a fuller picture of how much writing craft I have yet to learn. It was eye-opening to read the many different styles and interpretations of my fellow students and see how the intent behind what we were learning could be achieved in so many different ways. In seeing what my own style did in comparison, I have developed a much clearer idea of what and how I want to write, and plan to continue my journey into learning to craft a full novel in the First Draft course.” Maryann, Unlocking Creativity
“I am utterly grateful and surprised by what this course has reached to inspire and motivate me. It has managed to make me realise how to transform an imaginary ideal and maybe unattainable projection into a real and tangible feat. Through a carefully structured set of exercises, I have been able to sketch out what could become of my creative efforts and what sort of ideas and narratives could arise from a self-disciplined expression of my creative attempts. A quest which would have been far from easy without this frame of shared and safe collective practice.” Martin, Unlocking Creativity
“After reading numerous books about writing and filling random pages of ideas and beginning and false starts, I have finally learned how to write a novel. The process is so perfectly formulated that I felt like the whole class were experiencing similar breakthroughs, difficulties and inspirational moments at similar times. We all learned so much together, and it was a positive and unforgettable course. I look forward to attending future book launches for all my classmates!” Melinda, First Draft Live
“I would strongly recommend doing the Third Draft Online course as this is really the first time that the whole book comes to fruition. In the First Draft, I formulated the initial idea, the stem of the tree occurs in the first draft. In the Second Draft, I formulated the leaves and branches of the tree as the characters in the book started to take shape and become more sympathetic and understandable to the reader. There is no doubt that the Third Draft is the most valuable draft because it now takes the ideas that have been created and helps to format them into chapters …’ Vivian, Third Draft Online
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