Finding Memoir in Your Life Story

There are stories within you that have been waiting for the right moment, the right guidance, and perhaps the right city to bring them fully to life.

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Join acclaimed memoir teacher Marion Roach Smith in Florence for an intimate writing retreat devoted to uncovering the material only you can write. With Marion’s wise, practical guidance, you’ll learn how to recognize the rich and resonant stories within your own life, choose one with depth and promise, and begin shaping it into compelling memoir.

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Using her clear and powerful approach to structure, Marion will help you move beyond memory alone and into craft: identifying what your story is really about, finding its emotional center, and giving it shape through a simple three-act framework.

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And then there is Florence itself, a city that invites reflection almost effortlessly. In the golden morning light along the Arno, in quiet piazzas, in centuries-old cafés, and in the art-filled corridors of the Renaissance, something begins to soften and open. Florence has long been a place where artists, writers, and visionaries came to deepen their craft, and there is a particular kind of creative clarity that emerges here, spacious, sensory, and alive.

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This retreat is designed not only as a writing experience, but as a creative pilgrimage into beauty, memory, and meaning. Between workshops, shared meals, and walks through the luminous streets of Florence, you may find yourself remembering parts of your own story in entirely new ways.

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Come to Florence with your life. Leave with the beginning of a story only you can tell.