My Back Pages

Sometimes the only thing that separates who we are in the morning from who we are in the evening is how much we have learned (or forgotten) in between. If we measure time by this process, the more we learn, or the less we forget, then that span serves to increase this time which is “OUR LIFE”. We live longer. We grow old slower. The more we learn, the younger become. Remember Dylan’s (Bob Dylan, not Dylan Thomas, from whom Bob took his last name) words from “My Back Pages”?


A self-ordained professor’s tongue
Too serious to fool
Spouted out that liberty
Is just equality in school
“Equality,” I spoke the word
As if a wedding vow
Ah, but I was so much older then
I’m younger than that now

Copyright © 1964 by Warner Bros. Inc.; renewed 1992 by Special Rider Music

Anyways, I wanted to share these two free courses that I am taking through the M.I.T. Open Course Ware site. For anybody who is interested in learning something “just for the heck of it”, here is the link:
http://ocw.mit.edu/index.htm

21M.604 Playwriting I
As taught in: Spring 2005
Level:
Undergraduate
Instructors:
Laura Harrington
Course Description
This class introduces the craft of writing for the theater. Through weekly assignments, in class writing exercises, and work on a sustained piece, students explore scene structure, action, events, voice, and dialogue. We examine produced playscripts and discuss student work. This class's emphasis is on process, risk-taking, and finding one's own voice and vision.

21W.731-1 Writing and Experience: Exploring Self in Society

As taught in: Spring 2004
Level:
Undergraduate
Instructors:
Dr. Andrea Walsh
Course Description
The reading and writing for this course will focus on what it means to construct a sense of self and a life narrative in relation to the larger social world of family and friends, education, media, work, and community. Readings will include nonfiction and fiction works by authors such as Maya Angelou, James Baldwin, Andre Dubus, Anne Frank, Tim O'Brien, Flannery O'Connor, George Orwell, John Steinbeck, Amy Tan, Tobias Wolff, and Alice Walker. Students will explore the craft of storytelling and the multiple ways in which one can employ the tools of fiction in crafting creative nonfiction and fiction narratives.

The only thing you don't get is a teacher or classmates.
Or deadlines.