For more than a quarter of a century,
Pat Schneider has helped writers to find and liberate their true voices. Now, in Writing Alone and with Others, Schneider's acclaimed teaching methods are available in a single well-organized and highly readable volume. This is the first book of its kind. Not only does it focus on learning to write on one"s own, but it also shows how to write--and how to teach others to write--in a workshop setting. The first part of the book guides the reader through the perils of the solitary writing life, while the second section describes the Amherst Writers & Artists workshop method, successfully used across the U.S. and abroad. With chapters on fiction and poetry addressing matters of technique, and more than a hundred writing exercises offering specific ways to jumpstart the blocked and budge the rut-stuck, this is the essential owner's manual for the writer's voice.

Praise for Writing Alone and with Others

"Gentle, playful, brilliant, and revolutionary." - Julia Cameron, author of The Right to Write and The Artist's Way

"Heartening and practical.... A rich variety of anecdote, exercise and advice, celebrating both difference and difficulty as the gifts they are." - Janet Burroway, author of Raw Silk and Writing Fiction

"I am grateful to Pat Schneider for recognizing that our species is a writing species. If we don't write, it means something in the culture has blocked our natural instinct.... [This] helpful, totally personable book shows us how to undo that cultural abuse." - Carol Bly, author of Beyond the Writer's Workshop and My Lord Bag of Rice: New and Selected Stories