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Learner Reviews & Feedback for Creative Writing: The Craft of Character by Wesleyan University

4.5
stars
1,864 ratings

About the Course

At the center of a good story are the characters in it. In this course aspiring writers will discover how to build and bring to life complex, vivid and unforgettable characters. We will study the choices a writer makes to bring all characters to life on the page, and we will perform written exercises in order to develop a variety of writing and pre-writing techniques, in order to create a variety of characters. We will learn how to use our own life experiences, and the people we know (and how not to!). We will develop inner (thoughts and feelings) and outer (appearance, habits, behavior) lives for our characters and see how that can lead us to richer and more interesting stories. We will breathe life into our characters and let them surprise us....

Top reviews

SS

Aug 10, 2016

I loved this course! Extremely useful and hands on. The course instructor was really impressive, both informative and empathetic, both arty and to the point. Totally admired her style of instruction.

NM

Sep 25, 2020

The course was very well-structured and challenging. The instructor is very experienced and good, thus used relevant materials for this course, be it the guests, or the assignments, or the examples.

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501 - 525 of 551 Reviews for Creative Writing: The Craft of Character

By Chaz G

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Jan 25, 2017

As much as I enjoyed completing this course, as I've enjoyed every course in this program, this one feels less organised than the others simply in that the learning material doesn't clearly connect with the writing material and it was difficult to predict what the review criteria might be. I found myself guessing at the meaning of each week's modules before completing my assignments and more often than not I discovered little correlation between the videos and assignments.

By Björn R

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Mar 16, 2021

I'm a bit torn when it comes to the review. The teacher and the material is all top notch, but the review system is seriously flawed. There are far too many non-serious students who leave useless reviews, i.e. just answering each review question with a dot or "yes", and there is no good way to report these reviewers, or to reject flawed or non-existent reviews. It's a real shame because you also get really great and helpful reviews from those who take this seriously.

By Caroline G

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Apr 29, 2021

I like the approach but I was disappointed that, once again, only peer reviews were given. Getting feedback on time is complicated (not many students registered at the same time ?) and some reviews are clearly from people "just there for the credit" who don't take the time to read or give coherent feedback. I received the marvelous "qrt" as feedback on my last assignment.

Mixing peer reviews with the professor's (or his / her assistants) would be more appropriate.

By ALS

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Nov 22, 2020

The instructors were great. I learned a lot from them. Sadly, the reviews by other students were, in many cases, substandard. Some would give one-word answers while others just entered a period so the system would record a response. Since I am more interested in learning than in the certificate, I see no reason to pay for the course. I can get the same value by auditing the course. It would be most helpful if the responses were monitored.

By Michael H

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Aug 16, 2016

Compared to other courses in the creative writing specialization, I felt that this one needs some improvement. The video lectures just didn't have enough meat to them. For example, in other courses in the specialization, there will be links to optional readings or videos, leading to a deeper understanding of the concepts. Some readings, for example, would be welcome to give example of great (or even not so great) characterization.

By Aisha S

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Jul 24, 2023

The course assignments were more challenging but, trying to inject emotion into characters can be challenging. But, the instructions for each task were a little difficult to understand and follow, which is where the Discussion Forum helped.

But, I did develop an appreciation and respect for the ability of authors and fellow students who can accomplish such a feat. I enjoyed reading the assignment stories and reviewing them.

By Elizabeth E

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Mar 12, 2017

I did come away with some good books/stories for reading, but would have like them to be included in the course the way it is in the Setting and Description module. I found the videos did not always lead up to the assignment, and I think the assignments could have been more clearly laid out. I still came away learning, but it did not feel very structured. To be fair, character is a sort of amorphous subject to begin with.

By Hardik R

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Jul 4, 2021

The course discusses a lot of useful techniques and ideas involved in building deep characters and communicating them with the reader. However, I did find many parts of the course to be repetitive and too abstract to be of any practical use. The shop talks especially seem to be loosely focused on the week's material and the interviewees rarely have helpful responses to Ms Amy Bloom's questions.

By John W

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Apr 5, 2021

Like a lot of other reviewers have said the utility of this class is limited by the wide range of skills of students in it. That means both the work you review and the reviews of your work will vary in quality quite a bit. The lectures themselves are a bit meandering but I think it's mostly very hard to something both broad and substantive about art.

By subash G

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Mar 3, 2017

If the week 4 was not there, i would have a 2 or even a 1 for this class.

Until week 4, there was very little connection between what we were watching and what we were asked to write assignments. And the assignments were also confusing and overly restrictive. There didnt seem to be any sense in why we were asked to write those.

By Finn C S

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Dec 25, 2020

It was good , but in comparison to the other courses it had problems.

There was way too less of clear strucutre to follow and it was too much of just talking, with different authors. I would have liked to have a more organized and better structured theoretical input.

Also some of the assignments I did not find usefull.

By Janice R B

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Aug 14, 2021

The peer reviewed assignments don't really strike me as peer reviewed if you are just begging in forums for someone to hit a button. The feedback so far has only a few times been valuable. I don't get the point of the system if reviews can be shopped in forum It negates some of the value of it all.

By Jamaluddin K

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Nov 6, 2019

The lectures were informative, but the end-of-week assignments were VERY poorly explained, generally had little to do with the week's lectures, and to add insult to injury had grading criteria that did not correspond with the points that were laid out in the instructions.

By Lauren V B

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Mar 23, 2018

The first assignment was a lot of fun but the other three were a little confusing, as evidenced by the ever-recurring questions on the forum. The videos were usually really interesting though. Amy has a very pleasant voice but seems to rely on her notes a little too much.

By Thomas O

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Feb 27, 2019

Not by far as good as the first module (Craft of Plot). This course seemed less planned and structured. The videos were mostly interviews that sort of touched upon the subjects but hardly ever got into detail. The assignments were often vague and harder to understand.

By gabisamuel@ymail.com

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Jan 12, 2017

I found the assignment instructions to be quite confusing. Some of the questions asked for the peer-to-peer reviews were very unclear. I didn't feel the course, overall, offered the same level of content and knowledge that the Craft of Plot offered.

By Elisabeth P

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Oct 17, 2022

The instructor is phenomenal and so is her writing. However, the assignments (imo) are too difficult for beginning writers such as myself. Trying to write to such specific guidelines really slowed down my progress because I had such a hard time.

By Jeanette D

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Feb 11, 2017

I think Judy Bloom is a brilliant writer. She is also an engaging instructor but I found it difficult at time to discern what the salient points or "take-aways" were from the lectures. I also found the assignment to be less than clear.

By Gabriel T

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Apr 6, 2016

I've got the chance to practice writing and I've learned some interesting insights, but I think the instructor didn't put too much effort into this course. All there is to it are 'shop talks' and too little structure.

By Crystal M

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Mar 19, 2017

I felt like the teaching was fairly abstract, and I had a difficult time figuring out how I was supposed to apply certain lessons. Overall, I did pick up several helpful hints, so the course was worth it.

By Nathan B

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May 15, 2018

I found most of the assignments very confusing and difficult to complete. It is a real challenge and forces you to really think, think hard and hope for the best. If you take the course, good luck.

By Mahaba S A S

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Jun 13, 2017

The course was very interesting and shed light on the specifics on character development. However, the questions in most peer-graded assignments were some times not suitable for the assignment.

By Yash K

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Feb 21, 2021

The course material is great, but the grading usually doesn't result in me getting good feedback. Most students just write "good" without expanding on how I can improve.

By Dominique S

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May 14, 2019

The information provided is great, but there's so many "shop talks" aka interviews with other Coursera instructors that it misses out on so many possible true lessons.

By Lu O

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Sep 4, 2020

Achei as atividades um pouco cansativas, e pouco intuitivas. Os vídeos mais longos e com momentos mais entediantes em relação ao primeiro modulo.