Writing the Dramatic Truth



June 16, 2005 -- Bill Johnson teaches a workshop on Writing the Dramatic Truth at the Willamette Writers conference August 5-7th in Portland, Oregon. This workshop helps writers to perceive how details in a story ring true when they have a context in fulfilling a story's promise.

One example used in the workshop will come from the opening lines of Prince of Tides, "My wound is geography. It is also my anchorage, my port of call." The descriptive paragraphs that follow ring true because they suggest how and why a particular time and place is both a wound and a comfort to the narrator.

In the novel The Accidental Tourist, a husband and wife enter a divided highway during a storm that speaks to a relationship ending.

Bill is author of A Story is a Promise, a writing workbook that explores how popular stories are both a promise and a promise fulfilled. At his web site he reviews popular novels, plays, and films as a way to explores principles of story structure.

Bill is also a produced playwright. His play, The Baggage Handler, won the Creative Mechanics play festival in New York.

The Willamette Writers conference is held this year at the Embassy Suites Airport Hotel in Portland, Oregon. Writers can attend the conference for one, two, or three days. There are opportunities to pitch to literary agents and editors, and film agents, managers, and producers.

Bill is also a featured speaker at the Cuesta Writing conference in San Luis Obispo, California on September 16th and 17th; the Screenwriting Expo in Los Angeles, November 11-13th; and Write on the Sound in Edmonds, Washington, October 1st and 2nd.





Writing the Dramatic Truth