Episode 204: Things We've Learned from MasterClass

This episode and the notes include affiliate links.

Today, Fable and the Verbivore are revisiting our obsession with the online learning service Masterclass and digging into some specific classes that we've enjoyed and some of favorite takeaways.

We’re not being paid in any way to talk about this. We’re digging into this topic, because we’ve personally found the information in their classes incredibly useful to our writing lives. But we have included an affiliate link within these notes. This means that we receive a financial benefit if you use the links we’ve provided to sign up, which we’ll use to help support the costs of running our podcast.

One of the major selling points for this paid resource is that you can take online video classes directly from individuals who are masters in their field, it’s a personal type of window into the teacher’s experiences and knowledge that is hard to find elsewhere.

That said, we also reference some of the free articles that they have available as writing resources on their website and we’ve often used them to help prepare for our previous podcast conversations. Anyone can access this information free of charge.

In this episode, we each talk about some of the classes that we’ve recently enjoyed and some of our key takeaways. Many of them are directly about writing, but some are about creativity and explorations into areas that sparked our curiosity. Just a few of the classes we cover are:

• Malcolm Gladwell Teaches Writing

• Margaret Atwood Teaches Creative Writing

• Issa Rae Teaches Creating Outside the Lines

• Amanda Gorman Teaches Writing and Performing Poetry

• Billy Collins Teaches Reading and Writing Poetry

• Roxane Gay Teaches Writing for Social Change

We hope you enjoy this episode! Keep reading, writing, and putting your voice out there!

Into the woods,

Fable & The Verbivore

Notes:

The Verbivore talked a bit about Issa Rae and her work, but slightly misnamed both of her series. Her webseries is The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl and her HBO series is called Insecure.

In our original MasterClass conversation, the Verbivore mentions that we’ve referenced some of Masterclasses free articles in preparation for some of our podcast episodes and that they can be a great writing resource. Here are several that we’ve used for previous and upcoming episodes:

• How to Write An Action Scene

• How to Use the Snowflake Method to Outline Your Novel

• Mystery, Thriller, and Crime Novels: What’s the Difference?

• How to Write an Adventure Story

• What’s the Difference Between Middle-Grade Fiction vs. Young Adult Fiction?

• Writing 101: 6 Ways to End Your Story

Previous Podcast Episode Mentioned:

• Episode 110: Something that's improving our writing - MasterClass

Books Mentioned:

• The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

• Verity by Colleen Hoover

• Book Lovers by Emily Henry

• Caraval Trilogy: Caraval, Legendary, and Finale by Stephanie Garber

• So Not Meant to Be by Meghan Quinn

• Once Upon a Broken Heart by Stephanie Garber

• The Ballad of Never After by Stephanie Garber

• Writing the Breakout Novel: Insider Advice for Taking Your Fiction to the Next Level by Donald Maass

Masterclasses Mentioned: 

• Malcolm Gladwell Teaches Writing

• Margaret Atwood Teaches Creative Writing

• Dan Brown Teaches Writing Thrillers

• Issa Rae Teaches Creating Outside the Lines

• Steve Martin Teaches Comedy

• Amanda Gorman Teaches Writing and Performing Poetry

• Billy Collins Teaches Reading and Writing Poetry

• Neil Gaiman Teaches the Art of Storytelling

• Roxane Gay Teaches Writing for Social Change

• Joy Harjo Teaches Poetic Thinking

• Amy Tan Teaches Fiction Memory and Imagination

• Es Devlin Teaches Turning Ideas Into Art

• Corey Damen Jenkins Teaches Interior Design

• Kelly Wearstler Teaches Interior Design

Music from: https://filmmusic.io
’Friendly day’ by Kevin MacLeod (https://incompetech.com)
Licence: CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)