Topics in Creative Nonfiction

Often, topics are mistaken for genres or forms. They are neither; topics are simply the situation, especially what is occurring. We can write about any given topic in any genre, using any degree of veracity, and within any form. Below, we focus on a few of the many topics available.  
  
Autobiography is a chronology of the writer’s entire life. It begins at the beginning and ends whenever the writer stops writing. It focuses on all the major details of a writer’s life. The autobiography is shaped to reveal the impact of seminal events and/or shifts on the subject’s emotional, physical, and/or intellectual development—or the subject’s impact on other people.      

Environmental and nature writing focuses on how humans interact with or affect the world around us. These pieces often focus on a place.  

Immersion is where the writer tries on a new life, experience, or activity. This is either something the writer has never done before or something the writer hasn’t done in many, many years. The newness of the activity is what the writer is exploring.  

Literary journalism is the intersection between journalism (factual reporting) and creative nonfiction. Here, writers focus on reporting, but they also lean more into heightened language and scene work.  

Meditation is more philosophical and often works to unpack ideas of profound personal importance to the writer. Meditation tie back to Montaigne’s Essais. Often meditation don’t aim to prove a point but rather to explore a question in depth and with precision. These narratives are often not structured chronologically but instead follow the movements of the mind.  

Memoir is one of the most popular topics of creative nonfiction. The memoir examines a period of a writer’s life, especially as related to a single question or idea, and particularly related to past moments, which is why the memoir takes its name from “memory.” This is a major focus of the memoir: probing our memories in order to reveal complex meaning.  

Personal Essay is similar to memoir. Some writers highlight page length as the difference between these two topics (personal essay is often considered short, say under twenty pages, while memoir is book-length), but we argue that the personal is determined not by length but by a focus on more immediate events than memoir. Whereas memoir looks backward, the personal examines the immediately lived life. In some ways, the distinctions between the two are negligible and indefinable but they are worth offering here as a launching point for discussion.  

Portrait writing examines someone or something other than the writer themselves. The writer turns their gaze from their own life and instead focuses on a person, event, or place.         

Persuasive writing focuses its attention on proving a point. Here, the writer, rather than exploring a question—as seen in the meditation—stares right at the issue and tries to convert the reader to a new point of view.  

Science and math essays deal with explaining or highlighting key new discoveries. This topic often works to “translate” a complex scientific or mathematical idea into language an average reader can understand.  

Speculative writing focuses on situations where the writer uses hypothesis, deduction, and extrapolation to write about something they do not fully know. Often, the speculative looks forward or backward in time to make an educated guess on how an event might have turned out differently.     

Sports writing zeroes in on an event or athlete and focuses on the game or activity being played. These can overlap with the profile.  

Travel writing focuses on giving the reader an inside look at another place. The travel topic often examines insiders and outsiders. 

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Advanced Creative Nonfiction: A Writers' Guide and Anthology offers expert instruction on writing creative nonfiction in any form-including memoir, lyric essay, travel writing, and more-while taking an expansive approach to fit a rapidly evolving literary art form. From a history of creative nonfiction, related ethical concerns, and new approaches to revision and publishing, it offers innovative strategies and ideas beyond what's traditionally covered and is now from Bloomsbury.com

Sean Prentiss is Associate Professor of English at Norwich University, USA. He is author of Finding Abbey: The Search for Edward Abbey and His Hidden Desert Grave (2015), which won the National Outdoor Book Award for Biography/History. He is also co-editor of The Far Edges of the Fourth Genre (2014).

Jessica Hendry Nelson is the author of the memoir If Only You People Could Follow Directions (2014) which was selected as a best debut book by the Indies Introduce New Voices program, the Indies Next List by the American Booksellers’ Association, and named a Best Book of the Year by Kirkus Review. She is an Assistant Professor of English at Virginia Commonwealth University, USA and teaches in the MFA Program at the University of Nebraska, USA in Omaha.