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Meet THe Team
Have you ever read humorous pieces on McSweeney’s or Slackjaw and thought, "Hey, I could do that!"? Join satirist and writer Amy Estes for this introductory class to learn the basics of satire writing. You’ll learn how to brainstorm ideas to develop a premise, how to tell the difference between sarcasm and satire, as well as the basic structures and ideas of successful humor writing. You'll leave with the understanding of two humor-writing forms: the humorous list and the short, imagined monologue, as well as resources to inspire and information on how to submit humorous writing to websites for publication. This class will include generative writing prompts, feedback, and some (optional) sharing of work.
Amy Estes is a writer, storyteller, and educator from Sacramento, CA, and a dual-genre MFA candidate in fiction and non-fiction at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. Amy’s essay writing has been featured on The Rumpus, Huffington Post, Catapult, and elsewhere. In 2022, she was a curated writer for Corporeal Khôra and her piece, “Won’t Someone Think Of The Women?” was nominated for Best American Essays. Amy’s humor writing has been featured on McSweeney's, Slackjaw, The Belladonna, Weekly Humorist, and others. In 2022, Amy was selected for the Kenyon Review’s Summer Residential Writers Workshops in the category of non-fiction, and is grateful to serve as a Peter Taylor Fellow at the 2023 Kenyon Review Summer Writer’s Workshop. Amy was also selected as a 2023 Lambda Literary Fellow in non-fiction.
When she's not teaching middle school English or online satire writing for Second City, Amy enjoys reading, vying for Genius status on the NYT Spelling Bee, drinking vanilla lattes, and spending time with her spouse (also named Amy!) and their two dogs, Hank and Olive. She shares too many photos of flowers at @amymelissaestes on IG/Twitter.
"I so appreciated Amy's experience in the genre of satire. Her confidence was great to see and to learn from. I would take any class Amy taught in the future!"
