Why Clarion Doesn’t Workshop Novels
Eilene Gunn, director of Clarion West, discusses why Clarion focuses on short stories: reading a novel takes up too much of the time and attention of the other students; critiquing a novel takes up too much time of the writers in residence, as well as the students; novels prepared in advance aren’t a work in progress (which affects the wrtier’s development).
You’re really there to writer a short story a week so that you can develop and grow by employing what you’ve learned as you learn it. From painful experience, I will say the more you write while at Clarion, the better a writer you will become.