The Backstory Above
A community & coworking space for writers
Classes and Events
Our classes bring in teachers who facilitate workshops and talks focused on creativity, writing, and learning the the publishing industryCommunity & Coworking memberships
Memberships give you access to the space, a 15% discount on classes, discounts on neighborhood stores (including Green Apple Books on the Park downstairs), a community slack, and free members-only classes, workshops, book clubs, and events
Membership options
Memberships start at $20/month for community memberships. Benefits include:Access to all community programming for free, which includes:
Monthly member lunches
Weekly-ish writing warm-ups and close reading exercises
Community reading series
Book club
Ability to purchase additional co-working day-passes and packages
Day pass: $35 dollars (expires after 1 mo.)
5 pack: $165 (expires after 3 mo.)
10 pack: $310 (expires after 6 mo.)
20 pack: $600 (expires after 12 mo.)
15% discount on all paid programming (classes, workshops etc.)
10% off books purchased at Green Apple Books on the Park (with membership card)
Various local discounts (Luke’s Local, Sunset Gym) with membership card
A five-part series with local poet Leigh Lucas.
Motherhood is laden with contradictions and extremes—tenderness, tediousness, rage, devotion, filth, awe, grief, gratefulness, terror, joy, monotony, mystery. This is why some of the most exciting writing happening today, across poetry and prose, is about this wild, varied, and singular experience. Motherhood makes us vulnerable, heightens our senses, and rewires our brains. Any external thing we once defined ourselves by—the way we spent our free time, the threads of thought we chose to pull at, the ways we rebelled, the ways we flexed our independence—these have fallen away as we’ve rearranged ourselves around our child. We start anew, ours and their lives a fragile miracle. These are the conditions for great art, and the conditions for an artist at any point in their development to make a real artistic leap.
And yet, the unfortunate contradiction of this moment is that most mothers find themselves with less time to write and think than ever before. This class aims to address all of this: We will read and revel in some of the greats writing about motherhood today, write our own stories and poems, and build sustainable writing practices that can flex with the unpredictability of caretaking.
We’ll read and discuss Motherhood by Sheila Heti, Linea Nigra by Jazmina Barrera, and Mothersalt by Mia Ayumi Malhotra, do in-class writing from prompts in the form of your choice, and the course will culminate in a mini party where we’ll read new writing aloud and cheer for each other.
Fridays, 9:30am - 11:00 am
Oct 23, Oct 30, Nov 6, Nov 13, Nov 20
$350
15% off for Backstory co-working & community members