Nona Caspers

While Nona was very kind an sympathetic as a teacher, I felt that she was far too flighty to be effective. She was intelligent, but un-efficent. Taking roll would commenly fill the first hour of class with absudities like, "When I call you're name, tell be about a though you had today." She was sort of a hippy and fits exactly the SFSU writing program--if the story/poem is lover's lament stuff of so intensly experimental that it did not make sense, it was solid gold. Plot was clearly expandable. I saw her chastise an editor for suggesting that the magazine focus more on genre-fiction. She said, "This class isn't about that." As far as Transfer goes, there's two or three weeks of very tough homework, but nothing else for most of the year. The grade is based on that homework, participation, and a final 10 minute speech about you as a writer. It's not a difficult class, but many students disagree with Nona's philosophy of it, and that we actually had extremely little to do with the making of the magazine. That is controlled by editors.

This is a really great teacher of creative writing: intense, passionate, knowledgeable, helpful. Unlike other workshops where my work and spirit were more wounded when I ended than when I started, Nona led discussions that were consistently helpful and compassionate. She focuses her considerable attention on inhabiting material and helping individuals take it to the next level, and does a fantastic job of this. The best workshop I've been in. Her understanding of craft, too, is extensive. Highly recommended.