Autopoiesis is term used in systems theory to refer to an autonomous system that contains within itself the ability to engage in the processes that sustains itself. The term was appropriated by Mark McGurl for use in a cultural studies/literary criticism-history context — most prominently in his landmark work The Program Era: Postwar Fiction and the Rise of Creative Writing. Being a literary critic, he, of course, has to turn it into the pun “autopoetics.”

He applies it specifically to creative writing programs and writers produced by creative writing programs that create “a cultural system geared for the production of self-expressive originality” (49). McGurl specifically creates an abstract model of the “creative writing process” as composed of the interplay of three major values promoted and pedagogied by creative writing programs:

* Experience (Authenticity) Memory, Observation, “Write What You Know”

* Creativity (Freedom) Imagination, Fantasy,”Find Your Voice”

* Craft (Tradition) Revision, Concentration, “Show Don’t Tell”

I hope to write more about McGurl’s work. It’s got a lot of theory in it so it’s a bit of a slog, but he raises some interesting issues, and, more importantly in my case, he disabused me of some of the reductive notions I had in regards to creative writing programs.

Kind of what I was envisioning was a story night where a group of writers gets together to make a story–they’ll only invest 2 to 3 hours into it, and there will be food, so it won’t be a waste.

The idea of it would be to go kinda wild, to throw things together that haven’t been thrown together before and make something new. I find myself sometimes getting morassed in my own story ideas. They become too canoical and staid. It would be fun to see what a group could conjure up.

Then, if the story is especially interesting to someone, he or she can take it up. But the purpose would be to exercise your story muscles on a regular basis and keep your creativity fresh.

I actually did a mini version of this with a class I taught once, and it worked out well.

Those collaborative writing ideas are very interesting and exciting. There’s a Young Adult series of books called “The 39 Clues,” that takes a bit of this ethos. It’s a kind of epic where two teenagers are trying to find 39 clues, in competition with a huge cast of characters, that will help them inherit a fortune. Each book is written by a different author. The first was Rick Riordan, whose book The Lightning Thief will be released as a motion picture pretty soon. The second was by Gordan Korman, a favorite author from my own youth.

So obviously the story outline was hammered out at the beginning, but it’s fun to see the different voice each author brings to the series.