This paper examines the teacher's role in elementary and secondary school writing workshops--the teacher as Dostoevskian novelist creates a classroom novel and takes up relations with student-characters. The paper focuses on: the rejection of traditional relations among novelist and character, teacher and student, and the embrace of new ones; how students' freedom is imagined and achieved in writing workshops; and teacher authority and power in the writing workshop. The workshop approach outlined parallels that used by Dostoevsky in his novels: the creation of a world in which multiple voices coexist and interact. This environment, an adventure plot in contrast to traditional classroom plot, encourages freedom in students' writing. By writing students into an adventure story, and by constructing the teacher's role as one of supporting student-adventurers, this workshop approach has provided opportunity and motive for student expression in schools. However, the reflection moment, i.e., the examination, criticism, and reconstsruction of intention, meaning, and value, has not generally been addressed. The teacher's role is to promote this sort of reflection, a reflection adequate to what students' writing expression means in their lives within and without the workshop. The unfettered expression of the student depends on this imposition of reflection by the teacher-as-Dostoevskian novelist who risks sharing everything with student-characters in dialogue. (Contains 39 references.) (ND)