Master Class: Reflecting Psychology: Perceptions and Trauma in Jesus Son' with Kyle Dillon Hertz
Master Class: Reflecting Psychology: Perceptions and Trauma in Jesus Son' with Kyle Dillon Hertz
2 Sessions: Sunday, April 21+28
1:00-3:00pm ET
Kyle Dillon Hertz
Kyle Dillon Hertz is the author of The Lookback Window, a New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice. The NYTBR called The Lookback Window “an achievement of style, of language,” and it was named one of the best books of 2023 by Vanity Fair. He was named a Writer to Watch by Publishers Weekly. His work can be found in Time, Esquire, Lithub, and other places. He received his MFA from NYU and a residency from Yaddo. He teaches fiction at The New School.
Writers frequently feature characters who have undergone various types of trauma, from the psychological to the physical, but how does one reflect such a mind in a first-person narrator? Simply referring to previously endured events fails to accomplish one of the major effects of encountering trauma, oftentimes reducing the violence a person experiences into a narrative excuse for present-day actions in a narrative. A writer must reflect the psychology through the prose, combining elements of disordered time and comprehension, in an effort to elucidate the violences and recoveries of such a character.
In this class, writers will examine Jesus’ Son by Denis Johnson, one of the masters of traumatized narrators. How does a writer reflect the psychology of a character through the prose? What are the methods used in Jesus’ Son? How does Johnson use time? Voice? Confession? What are the methods of investigation and reveal? How can we play with psychology to deeply embed a reader into the mind of a character? You do not need to read Jesus’ Son in advance of the class, although it will help.
Workshop Highlights:
Learn ways of representing disordered thinking, displacement, and associative logic in prose
Become aware of the ways that representations of trauma impact a narrative, for better or worse
Apply lessons learned from Denis Johnson to your own writing in order to maximize psychological acuity in your sentences
2 full scholarships available. For information, please contact Kate Mabus, kate@theshipmanagency.com
Kyle Dillon Hertz is the author of the debut novel The Lookback Window (Simon & Schuster, 2023), a New York Times Editors’ Choice. Vanity Fair named The Lookback Window one of the best novels of 2023. His work can be found in Esquire, Freeman’s, Time, and elsewhere.
