The Writer's Center - Workshop and Event Guide - Fall 2015

EVENTS 12

WORKSHOPS 18

BOOK TALK 51

Workshop & Event Guide

Write Who You Are

Fall 2015

The Writer’s Center Workshop & Event Guide Fall 2015

www.writer.org

DEPARTMENTS DIRECTOR’S NOTE EVENTS

Editor

Vanessa Mallory Kotz

INSTRUCTOR BIOS

vanessa.mallorykotz@writer.org

BOOK TALK

Contributors

WORKSHOPS: Schedule Descriptions

Jenny Apostol Jamie Contreras Genevieve DeLeon Sydney Frymire Kathryn Johnson Vanessa Mallory Kotz José Antonio Peña Rosales Michelle Rago Martin Sack Thomasina Sligh Kara Thompson Estela Velasquez Cathy Wu

ON THE SCENE REGISTRATION

FEATURES 6 Write Who You Are A collaboration between the Center and The Carlos Rosario International Public Charter School brings creative writing classes in English to immigrants in D.C.

Graphic Design

Virtually Detailed, Inc. Copyeditors

10 The Drama of Everyday Life

Caitlin O’Beirne Laura Spencer Ellyn Wexler

Genevieve DeLeon interviews Jack Sbarbori, co-founder of Quotidian, The Writer’s Center’s resident theatre company.

15 How The Writer’s Center’s Students Inspired a Book

Cover Image

Erica Sanchez

Longtime instructor Kathryn Johnson talks about her new book, The Extreme Novelist, and what she learned from her students.

Contact Us

4508 Walsh Street Bethesda, MD 20815 301-654-8664 (p) 240-223-0458 (f) Writer.org

41 From the Workshops From the sensuality of food to a dreamy portayal of the beach in childhood to family vacations and sexual harrassment, this round of writing from workshop participants takes you on a journey.

Facebook.com/writerscenter Twitter: @writerscenter

The Writer’s Center cultivates the creation, publication, presentation and dissemination of literary work. We are an independent literary organization with a global reach, rooted in a dynamic community of writers. As one of the premier centers of its kind in the country, we believe the craft of writing is open to people of all backgrounds and ages. Writing is interdisciplinary and unique among the arts for its ability to touch on all aspects of the human experience. It enriches our lives and opens doors to knowledge and understanding. The Writer’s Center is a 501 (C) (3) nonprofit organization. Donations are tax deductible. A copy of our current financial statement is available upon request. Contact The Writer’s Center at 4508 Walsh Street, Bethesda, MD 20815. Documents and information submitted to the State of Maryland under the Maryland Charitable Solicitations Act are available from the Office of the Secretary of State for the cost of copying and postage.

Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

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ABOUT US

The Writer’s Center

Other Locations Annapolis Maryland Hall for the Creative Arts 801 Chase Street Annapolis, MD 21404 marylandhall.org

Capitol Hill

Executive Director

Marketing & Communications Manager

Stewart Moss

Vanessa Mallory Kotz

Assistant Director

Managing Editor of Poet Lore & Membership Manager

Sunil Freeman

The Hill Center 921 Pennsylvania Ave., SE Washington, DC 20003 hillcenterdc.org

Genevieve DeLeon

Program Manager

Office Manager & Graphics Assistant

Laura Spencer

Judson Battaglia

Development Manager

Glen Echo

Night Receptionists

Rachel Colombana

Glen Echo Park 7300 MacArthur Blvd.

Glen Echo, MD 20812 glenechopark.org

Andrew Brooks Amanda Stoltz

Board of Directors Leesburg Leesburg Town Hall 25 West Market Street Leesburg, VA 20176 leesburgva.com

Chair: James Mathews

Vice Chair: Naomi Collins

Treasurer: Margaret Meleney

Secretary: Patricia Harris

Chair Emer: Sally Mott Freeman Ken Ackerman • Margot Backas • Linna Barnes • Mark Cymrot Michael Febrey • Les Hatley • John M. Hill Jeff Kosseff • Howard Lavine • C.M. Mayo • Jim McAndrew Ann McLaughlin • E. Ethelbert Miller • Joram Piatigorsky

Poet Lore is the oldest continuously published poetry journal in the United States. We publish it semi-annually, and submissions are accepted year-round.

Subscription and submission information is available at poetlore.com.

Bill Reynolds • Mier Wolf • Wilson W. Wyatt, Jr.

Honorary Board Kate Blackwell • Dana Gioia • Jim & Kate Lehrer Alice McDermott • Ellen McLaughlin • Howard Norman

Supported in part by:

Book Gallery TWC’s book gallery carries an extensive collection of literary magazines and books on craft.

4508 Walsh Street Bethesda, MD 20815

The Writer’s Center also gratefully acknowledges the support we receive from: The Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation, The TauFoundation, The Omega Foundation, and The Bydale Foundation.

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View online at www.writer.org/guide

DIRECTOR’S NOTE achieve a common goal that is central to both of our missions.

The National Endowment for the Arts and The Veterans Writing Project

Stewart Moss, Photo by Judson Battaglia

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ew to The Writer’s Center, the Write Who You Are program at The Carlos Rosario International Public Charter School offers creative writing classes for adult immigrants in D.C. (page 6). This exciting collaboration involves the staff of the school, the Center, and our gifted instructor, Naomi Ayala. In fact, The Writer’s Center partners with many organizations to develop programs that serve the local writing community.

If you go to our website and click on the About Us tab at the top of the page, you’ll find a listing of our partner organizations. Among these organizations are six, in particular, whose collaboration I’ve especially appreciated: The Morris & Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation

We couldn’t have undertaken the Write Who You Are program without the generous support of the Cafritz Foundation. Prior to submitting our grant proposal, the foundation challenged us to extend our engagement to a broader, underserved segment of the population.

In so doing, we worked together to

Since 2012, The Writer’s Center has provided programmatic support for the NEA-funded healing arts program at the National Intrepid Center of Excellence, located on the campus of the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center.

Ron Capps and Dario DiBattista of the Veterans Writing Project lead creative writing workshops. More than 800 active-duty military, who suffer from post-traumatic stress and traumatic brain injury, have had the opportunity to experience the healing power of writing.

The Arts & Humanities Council of Montgomery County

Although the AHCMC is one of our major funders, they also have provided numerous opportunities for professional development for the Center’s staff and have done much to advocate for the importance of the arts and humanities to residents of Montgomery County and beyond. Also, without a generous capital improvement grant from the County, we wouldn’t have been able to renovate our lower level into a vastly improved space.

Quotidian Theatre Company

As our resident theatre company, Quotidian enriches the literary diversity of the Center’s events and invites theater goers to participate more widely in our programs.

Read more about this collaboration on page 10. We’re also fortunate to share our theater with other talented companies such as Flying V Theatre and Bethesda Little Theatre.

Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

Bethesda Urban Partnership

Not only does the Bethesda Urban Partnership sponsor the Bethesda Literary Festival, for which The Writer’s Center provides a venue, but it is also part of a broader community coalition that includes the Bethesda-Chevy Chase Regional Services Center. The Services Center’s support and flexibility made it possible for us to relocate most of our workshops there while we were renovating our lower level last summer.

In closing, I share a thought by poet Alli Warren, which I think accurately describes our workshops, as well as much of what we do at The Writer’s Center: “Shut up alone with a blank page and my own habits, I can get caught in a hall of looping self-doubt. But when I’m attending to another in poetic collaboration, I’m brought open to possibility, to new bonds and intimacies. Collaboration is for me a way of being permeable and open to change. It is a powerfully direct way to engage other practices of reading, listening, and thinking.

If I’m being bold, I might even say that collaboration is one way to expand the boundaries and limitations of subjectivity.”

Whether you’ve taken a workshop here, attended (or read at) our Open Door readings, or contributed to strengthening the Center financially, we are grateful to you for your role in collaborating with the staff, workshop leaders, the Board, our partners, and me in making the Center a better place.

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Write Who You Are

By Vanessa Mallory Kotz

Students are led by Instructor Naomi Ayala in one of the morning sessions. Photo by Vanessa Mallory Kotz

I

n the heart of D.C. something powerful is happening. People who are often ignored in this country are finding a voice.

Through a partnership between The Writer’s Center and the Carlos Rosario International Public Charter School, immigrants from around the world are describing their journeys (both physical and emotional) on paper, in English.

These poems and essays express excitement, loss, nostalgia, fear, confusion, and joy. Behind every word, there is a brave soul who left everything he or she knew behind to seek a better life.

In the Write Who You Are program, English language learners tell the stories immigration statistics do not. Students work with a local author to study poetry and the personal essay as vehicles for exploring who they are, honing literacy skills learned in the school’s cutting-edge ESL and workforce development cur-

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“If poetry can make a tiny positive wave on the lake of human beings and society, if it can make us and anything around us warm and healthy, then the value of poetry seems to be enough.”

Eunjin, Write Who You Are Participant

riculum. Most of them have never taken part in any form of creative writing prior to the program.

Endeavoring to preserve their identity in the course of integrating into a new culture and economy, participants write about work, family, their home countries, their vision of community, and the internal conflicts wrought by displacement. Their stories represent the landscape of newcomers in an ever-evolving America.

In early 2015, approximately 80 students participated in the program by taking part in a weekly course.

This idea was born when the Center’s Executive Director Stewart Moss consulted with poet Yvette Moreno to create an outreach program that would bring the writing workshop format to underserved members of the community. Moreno thought of longtime instructor Naomi Ayala and The Carlos Rosario International Public Charter School.

Ayala, who has been teaching writing for decades, developed the curriculum for the classes. “The Writer’s Center is a place that I trust,” Ayala explains. “I trust the leadership at Carlos Rosario; they trust me. The school is

View online at www.writer.org/guide

nized as a model in adult education, offering an award-winning holistic program that includes language, literacy, GED, workforce development, and comprehensive support services.

There are two campuses: the main center on Harvard Street in Columbia Heights and the Sonia Gutierrez Campus, which opened in 2013. Housed in a dark grey The Carlos Rosario Internaindustrial-looking building lotional Public Charter School cated next to a cement factory and For more than 40 years, the train tracks in northeast D.C., this school has served Washington, is the site of the Write Who You D.C.’s diverse immigrant populaAre program. Once inside this tion. Its 2,500 annual students, formidable structure, a bright, ranging in age from 17 to 85, towering atrium welcomes visitors. Clean architectural lines and large flat-screen monitors make it a modern space.

Here, students focus on workforce development (health academy, technology academy, culinary arts academy) and learn the importance of Workshops are filled with enthusiasm. Photo by Erica Sanchez community involvement. The school “This was a dream collaboration. won the Migration Policy Institute’s Sometimes the best opportunities National E Pluribus come about serendipitously.”

Unum prize, recognizing its work in Stewart Moss, Executive Director, immigrant integraThe Writer’s Center tion. passionately dedicated to helping these students prepare for their future—from the janitor to the principal.”

Ayala moved to the states from Puerto Rico in 1978, and she understands the difficulties people face when leaving the familiar behind. The experience is often traumatic and always emotional.

come from 73 countries and speak 57 different languages. An overwhelming majority of students live below the poverty level.

As the first adult charter school in the nation, Carlos Rosario is nationally and internationally recog-

THE PLACE I USED TO LIVE Estela Velasquez How to forget? How to erase it?

My mind thinks, my brain keeps thoughts that wander, that are lost inside of me.

How to forget?

It seems like yesterday when one day, unexpectedly, I left the place where I was born, leaving behind part of my soul.

How to forget?

I left my childhood in your fields when every morning the crow of one rooster, the mooing of cows was my alarm.

How to forget?

The first time I was in love, you were my only witness in the entire globe.

How to forget?

Little bit of heaven, I miss you.

You are incomparable, with no equal.

How to forget you?

In the Classroom Classrooms of the Sonia Gutierrez Campus are filled with desks angled into small groups, while shelves of books and brightly painted accent walls warm up the space.

In Write Who You Are, once per Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

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“If it takes six weeks to write one poem, that’s okay. I’ve been doing this for a long time, and I’m still captivated. Everybody has their own story. It will live long after the program. These students will become less invisible. That invisibility can be incapacitating.”

Naomi Ayala, Instructor

Students work on their essays. Photo by Vanessa Mallory Kotz

week, advanced ESL students are offered personal essay and poetry workshops during the second half of a regular lesson. This inaugural year, workshops were offered February through June during two morning classes, one in the afternoon, and one in the evening.

Teacher Christopher Ladd has been working in adult education for more than 20 years. Eight years ago he started the vocabulary class at Carlos Rosario. “I was a journalist, and I write fiction,” he says. “The writing process

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itself can be personal, individual, isolating. Teaching gets me out and puts me in a place where students have a huge appreciation for what I know about the language. I have the sense that I’m helping them.”

The workshops offered through The Writer’s Center complement his lessons. It “gives students a low-stake opportunity to produce written English,” allowing them to put into action what they’ve learned in grammar and vocabulary lessons. Ladd tells the story

of Irvin, a student who has taken many of his courses. “He came in so reticent. I was worried he couldn’t produce,” he says. “But after several classes he wrote a huge essay. He always wrestles with this stuff, but he does it with a smile on his face.”

Ayala admiringly describes a student “who works as a butcher all night, gets home at 9:30 a.m., then comes to class, prepared and enthusiastic.”

Nicodème, who emigrated from Cameroon, recently earned his GED. “I’m preparing to write my college essays,” he says.

“Before the Write Who You Are program, our students rarely had the opportunity to develop their story to its fullest potential,” says Jorge Delgado, the Sonia Gutierrez Campus principal. “Through this program, students are able to improve their writing and language usage by writing poetry and essays in the form of personal narratives. Students also learn the value of feedback and collabo-

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WITH MY DAD José Antonio Peña Rosales I don’t know what age I was but my first memory, in my mind, is with my dad.

Some people don’t believe me when I say that I can remember being held in my dad’s arms.

He held me and covered me with a cloth.

I could see through this cloth my mom, aside, speaking so low, and the numbers of the elevator while we were waiting for it.

Students give each other feedback on their work. Photo by Vanessa Mallory Kotz

ration through participation in student-centered groups.”

The first assignment in Ayala’s personal essay class is to write about the moment the students arrived in this country, written in the first person, present tense.

Ayala splits up the class, explaining the benefit of having a small group to share, revise assignments, and support each other. This is the most important concept taught at The Writer’s Center—the power of joining a creative community—and it was essential to Ayala to bring that experience to the charter school.

Each team has to name their group, and thus, the Incredibles, the Dream Team, Mystic Writers, the Dragons, and Mesaco Team (a mix of Mexico, El Salvador, and Morocco for team members’ country of origin) are formed.

The lesson is filled with laughter and light-hearted teasing, punctuated by Ayala’s energetic instruction. She teaches the fundamentals of writing as she

would in any beginning essay class, starting by describing the difference between fiction, nonfiction, and memoir, as well as the basic elements needed to write a personal essay.

Vinh, from Vietnam, is preparing to apply for a master’s degree program in education. “When I write out everything, I feel better, much less stressed,” she says.

“When I’m angry, I don’t want to say it out loud.”

Jingson, from China, exclaims, “I would rather talk than write!”

But she is interested in taking the poetry and essay classes to improve her vocabulary. Despite what Jingson says, Ayala recalls a lesson in which the young student’s essay had everyone “weeping, it was so touching. These stories are close to my heart, stuff that’s hard to write about,” Ayala says. “They know I have the freedom to challenge them and that it comes from my deepest love for them. These are the best students I’ve ever had.”

Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

YOU Jamie Contreras You’re just like my coffee cup.

I need your smell to get my body awake.

Getting my feet on the ground every morning is what my body’s thirsty for ...

Can’t wait to feel you in my lips, to taste your exotic flavor, needing you as the flowers need the sunlight to open their petals.

The poems in this piece are examples of work from Write Who You Are. This program is made possible through the generous support of the Morris & Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation. Future Write Who You Are efforts will include scholarships for students from Carlos Rosario to take workshops at the Center to further their classroom experiences and join the wider community of writers in the D.C. area.

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The Drama of Everyday Life An Exchange with Jack Sbarbori

By Genevieve DeLeon

Center’s partnership with QTC, I had the following exchange with Sbarbori about the company’s history and directorial vision.

Jack Sbarbori

J

ack Sbarbori co-founded Quotidian Theatre Company (QTC), The Writer’s Center’s resident theatre company, with his wife Stephanie Mumford in 1998.

They set out to produce plays by Anton Chekhov, Horton Foote, and other realistic or impressionistic writers, in the spare, understated style intended by the playwrights.

They have collaborated on more than a dozen Chekhov and Foote plays—as well as newer work— over the past 17 years. Although Sbarbori’s work as a director has been recognized with many awards, the greatest honor—as he sees it—came when Foote allowed him to direct the de facto premiere of the1996 drama, The Day Emily Married. In honor of The Writer’s

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painting of Monet and other artists whose work features minimal brushwork, color, and light to create a moving image without the detail chosen by the realist artists.

When did you begin present- The playwrights we choose create ing work at The Writer’s Cen- moving, emotional material, but it is presented in a subtle manner, ter? How did you find us? not unlike the minimal stroke of color or light the impressionist artWhen we decided to create our own theatre company, we searched ist uses that gives meaning to the canvas. We chose the word “quothrough churches, schools, and recreation centers throughout the tidian” for we wanted to present the drama in everyday life. Our Bethesda-Rockville area. Happily, goal is to provide the audience we chose The Writer’s Center afwith an opportunity to experience ter attending an event here, and both the strength and frailty of the staged our first play, by Horton human spirit.

Foote of course, in 1998.

Quotidian Theatre Company presents plays in an impressionistic style. That style hinges on realism with what one scholar called “a strong element of subtle, intuitive emotionalism” and a “vague compositional form.” What drew you to showcasing work of that nature? What are the challenges of presenting “impressionistic” plays?

The impressionistic style of theatre, while present from Chekhov through Foote, has only been described by scholars in recent years, and is often compared to the

You’ve mentioned that Horton Foote is of great importance to Quotidian. A New Yorker article said he was “a quiet voice in noisy times” and Tennessee Williams wrote to Foote in 1944 with the advice, “Keep your ear to the ground and concentrate on honesty.” What lessons have you taken from Foote’s sensibility and his rich and lengthy career?

I could easily fill many pages praising Horton Foote. Perhaps his most valuable gift to Quotidian was his advice to perform the work you love and respect, and

View online at www.writer.org/guide

never be discouraged. In the late 1960s, Foote was unhappy with opportunities both on Broadway and in Hollywood. He announced to his wife that he was considering buying an antique shop in New Hampshire. Lillian’s advice was to “just keep writing.”

For a few of Quotidian’s early plays by Foote, the cast sometimes outnumbered the audience.

But we persevered, and without any major marketing efforts, we prospered and were able to stage new work by playwrights such as Conor McPherson, an immediate favorite. As resources grew, we were able to present elaborate productions such as Joyce’s The Dead, O’Neill’s The Iceman Cometh, and the U.S. Premiere of McPherson’s The Veil.

Tell us why you’re committed to “no frills” storytelling.

How do you feel it’s best to engage audience members in the discovery process of the play?

Financial resources are a definite factor. But, we also feel, in these ultra-high-tech days, there is nothing more powerful than one’s imagination. QTC productions deliberately demand our exceptionally intelligent audiences to invest their minds into the world of the play to not only draw inferences from the script, but to also envision that world.

The three productions mentioned above, while demanding on our resources, were produced without special effects. We will always keep in mind that meaningful plays, produced with talented

actors, directors, and designers are much more important than the latest in theatre technology. We are proud to have earned the trust of a growing, loyal audience whose support has given us the resources to continue producing “quotidian” plays.

Plans are forthcoming for a renovation of The Writer’s Center’s theatre—what are your hopes for the new space?

When co-founder Stephanie Mumford and I opened our first production in October of 1998, the auditorium at The Writer’s Center featured metal folding chairs set on wooden risers with vinyl floor tiles covering the stage area. Without a tech booth, our sound and lighting technician had Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

to peer through a small window (visible to the audience) in order to execute cues. Foote’s words on perseverance were very important to us in those days.

We share everyone’s excitement over The Writer’s Center’s planned renovations, especially the auditorium. While we look forward to the increased flexibility and lighting and sound capabilities, we are so very happy that the planned auditorium will still have the same intimate space that has been our home for 17 rewarding years.

Information about the coming season can be found at www.quotidiantheatre. org. For tickets, visit quotidiantheatre. org/tickets.htm or call 301-816-1023.

The Writer’s Center members receive 50% off in-person and over-the-phone ticket sales.

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EVENTS

The Writer’s Center

We host more than 70 events annually, including free Sunday Open Door readings & ticketed productions in our historic black box theatre. For more details, visit www.writer.org/events.

EVENTS

OPEN DOOR READINGS & EVENTS

POETRY & PROSE OPEN MIC

OCTOBER 7:30 p.m.

Sign-up begins at 1:30 p.m.

Readings begin at 2 p.m.

SEPTEMBER 27 DECEMBER 20

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OCTOBER

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6 p.m.

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The Writer’s Center presents The Cities We Live In: New Writing from South Asia.

Readers include Kavita Daiya,Tula Goenka, and Rashmi Sadana with moderator Leeya Mehta.

2 p.m.

Celebrate the opening of Vivid: David Camero & Vatsala Menon, an exhibition of work by two very different artists from very different worlds.

Meet the artists during a wine reception.

AUGUST

Join The Writer’s Center and Fall for the Book for a reading by Jacob Appel, author of The Magic Laundry and Einstein’s Beach House, and T. Dasu, who reads from Spy, Interrupted: The Waiting Wife.

Kavita Daiya

AUGUST 2 p.m.

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Visiting poet Marcela Sulak, author of Decency and Immigrant, is joined by Brandel France de Bravo, who reads from her new collection of poems, Mother, Loose.

Brandel France de Bravo

Marcela Sulak

SEPTEMBER 2 p.m.

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Novelist Michelle Brafman reads from Washing the Dead. She is joined by Dylan Landis, author of Rainey Royal.

Tula Goenka

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Emerging Writer Fellowship recipient Tanya Olson reads from her collection of poems, Boyishly. She is 2 p.m. joined by Nancy Carlson, who reads from her two recent poetry translations, The Nomads, My Brothers, Go Out to Drink from the Big Dipper by Abdourahman Waberi and Suzanne Dracius’ Calazaza’s Delicious Dereliction.

OCTOBER

Tanya Olson

Michelle Brafman

2 p.m.

Nancy Carlson

40th Anniversary Event

Dylan Landis

SEPTEMBER

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Grace Cavalieri reads from her new memoir, Life Upon Life Upon the Wicked WickedtheS tage Stage. She is joined by Eric Lindner, author of Hospice Voices: Lessons for Living at the End of Life. a Memoir by

Grace Cavalieri

OCTOBER 7:30 p.m.

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Kick off the The Writer’s Center’s 40th Anniversary with a reading honoring Richard Ford as part of the F. Scott Fitzgerald Conference. Readers include novelists Alan Cheuse, Howard Norman, Susan Shreve, and Jeffrey Eugenides. $15 nonmembers/$10 members

Eric Lindner

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Rashmi Sadana

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EVENTS 2 p.m.

Poet Karina Borowicz, recipient of the Emerging Writer Fellowship and author of Proof and The Bees Are Waiting, is joined by novelist Ann McLaughlin, who reads from Sunset at Rosalie.

Karina Borowicz

Karina Borowicz

Ann McLaughlin

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2 p.m.

David Nicholson reads from his collection of short stories, Flying Home. He is joined by poet Elizabeth Poliner, who reads from What You Know in Your Hands.

David Nicholson

OCTOBER 2 p.m.

NOVEMBER

NOVEMBER 2 p.m.

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Author Leslie Pietrzyk reads from her collection of short stories, This Angel on My Chest. She is joined joi by Jehanne Dubrow, author of The Arranged Marriage.

Ar

Jehanne Dubrow

NOVEMBER

Baron Wormser ser

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Raoul Wientzen

40th Anniversary Event Members-Only Cocktail Hour

Elisavietta Ritchie

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Reading by writers published 2 p.m.

by Washington Writers’ Publishing House, including Michelle Chan Brown, author of Motherland With Wolves, and Patricia Schultheis, author of St. Bart’s Way.

DECEMBER

Mingle with some of the artists and raise a toast to their talent.

ST. BART’S WAY A STORY COLLECTION

By Patricia Schultheis

ȱ Ȃȱ

Patricia Schultheis

DECEMBER

Art Taylor

Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

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John Grady 2 p.m. reads from his biography Matthew Fontaine Maury, Father of Oceanography. He is joined

by Art Taylor, author of On the Road with Del and Louise.

7:30 p.m.

The Writer’s Center and Letras Latinas Jennifer Anetta present an evening of Flamenco dance, music, and Spanish and English poetry inspired by Federico Garcia Lorca’s Theory and Play of the Duende. Readings by Cacayo Ballesteros and Rod Jellema. $15 nonmembers/$10 members

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Elisavietta Ritchie reads from her latest collection of poems, Guy Wires.

She is joined by poet Richard Harteis and poets who will read from Andrew Oerke’s collection of poems, The Wall.

2 p.m.

The Writer’s Center welcomes Raoul Wientzen, winner of the 2014 McLaughlin-EsstmanStearns First Novel Prize, who reads from The Assembler of Parts.

2 p.m.

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Celebrate the 6 p.m. opening of The Writer’s Center’s latest art exhibition, Organic Elements, a group show that explores color and form through abstract paintings presented in grids.

Meet the artists during a wine reception.

Leslie Pietrzyk

Visiting poet Baron Wormser, whose most recent book is Unidentified Sighing Objects, is joined by Susan Muaddi Darraj, who reads from her collection of short fiction, A Curious Land: Stories from Home.

5:30 p.m.

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The Writer’s Center welcomes authors published in The Delmarva Review.

Elizabeth Poliner

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NOVEMBER

2 p.m.

NOVEMBER

P r o of

OCTOBER

NOVEMBER

EVENTS

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OCTOBER

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LEESBURG EVENTS

EVENTS

SEPTEMBER 4: JOINING FORCES: STARTING, FINDING, & SUSTAINING CRITIQUE GROUPS

Leesburg Town Hall

LEESBURG FIRST FRIDAYS 7:30 p.m.

TWC Leesburg 2015 First Friday Programs Lower Level Meeting Room Leesburg Town Hall 25 West Market Street Leesburg, Va. 20176

Finding a writing partner or critique group can make all the difference in your writing. It can help you set goals, keep you on track, provide editorial feedback, and make writing less of a solitary endeavor. Representatives from several local writers groups will be on hand to share their insights and suggestions in a round-table format moderated by Jeff Kleinman, a literary agent with Folio Literary Management. He has worked with The New York Times bestselling authors Garth Stein, The Art of Racing in the Rain; Eowyn Ivey, The Snow Child; and Elizabeth Lett, The $80 Champion.

OCTOBER 2: WRITING THE QUERY (IT’S NOT SO SCARY!) Laurie K. Miller

You’ve written, revised, and polished your novel, and you’re ready to send it out into the world.

Congratulations! But pitching a novel takes a different set of skills than writing one. In this workshop, we’ll discover the elements of a

$4 TWC members & residents of Leesburg $6 General admission More info at Writer.org

The Writer’s Center successful query letter and learn the art of hooking a reader with a few short paragraphs. Laurie K. Miller is a screenwriter and a novelist. She has also worked as a development writer for a television production company for more than 12 years, where she learned the art of ‘pitching,’ a skill she enjoys sharing with novelists and screenwriters alike.

LaurieMillerWrites.com

NOVEMBER 6: GETTING TO THE FINISH LINE Barbara Esstman

Writers who start a project with enthusiasm often later find themselves bogged down and frustrated. Learn the tricks of the trade for getting your story and characters moving again; knowing when to “float” scenes and plot lines you’re not sure about; cutting the unworkable and the impossible; calming your suspicion that you’re producing one big mess; and surviving happily to the end of your draft. Internationally published and nationally awarded author Barbara Esstman, B.A., M.F.A., is a National Endowment for the Arts Individual Artist grant recipient and a VCCA, Virginia Commission for the Arts and Maryland Arts Council fellow.

WRITING IS ITS OWN REWARD… BUT WE’VE GOT EXTRA REWARDS IN STORE! There are new ways to use your membership! Beyond discounts on The Writer’s Center’s offerings—workshops, events, advertising, studio subscriptions, and room rental fees—membership with the Center connects writers to the literary resources and local businesses that matter to them.

Because so much of achieving writing goals involves “sticking with it,” this year, attendees who come to THE MOST Leesburg First Friday events will be entered into a drawing to win a one-year free membership to The Writer’s Center.

In July, The Writer’s Center offered members the chance to enjoy wine and conversation at the first Membership Happy Hour. Photo by Judson Battaglia

Just steps away from the Leesburg Town Hall is La Lou Bistro, and this year, La Lou is offering our participants a 10% discount on their First Friday night dinner. Remember to tell them you are with The Writer’s Center event.

Cash payment preferred.

Our partnership with Vino Volo Bethesda Row, a wine bar and café located a short walk from the Center, allows members 20% off wine and gourmet food in an intimate setting. Members now also receive half-off tickets to productions by Quotidian Theatre Company, 25% off Poet Lore magazine, as well as a 10% off publications from the independent bookstore Upshur Street Books and two local presses—Broadkill River Press and Washington Writers’ Publishing House. Look for more members-only events in the near future. To join, visit www.writer.org/ membership

14

View online at www.writer.org/guide

How The Writer’s Center’s Students Inspired a Book

By Kathryn Johnson

M

ore than a year after I started teaching at The Writer’s Center, in 2008, the lessons my students were teaching me finally sank in. (I’m a slow learner.)

As instructor of a course called Writing the Popular Novel, I addressed the usual fiction techniques: characterization, plot, point of view, and dialogue.

While lectures focused on the basic skills, discussions centered on topics in which a particular group was most interested. Some students asked for more information on pacing and creative plotting. Others seemed more concerned with deep characterization or viewpoint issues.

One student might be working on a love story, while another on a thriller, mystery, Western, fantasy, or family saga. But they consistently voiced two concerns: not enough writing time, and fear of failure.

It didn’t matter whether an individual writer was working full-time or retired, everyone was desperate for practical tips that would enable them to complete their writing projects without neglecting jobs, families, and other responsibilities. And without spending 3, 5, or even 20 years to complete a single book!

It seemed to me that they needed help in the form of an aggressive

but reassuring model. And so, for the summer of 2009, I proposed a new course that would be like an adult writer’s camp. We called it The Extreme Novelist. I envisioned it as a kind of tough love for writers—an 8-week, intensive course that would support 15 authors through the process of writing a fast, rough draft of their novels. It would be as informative as any writing craft course, while reinforcing a daily writing habit and troubleshooting life’s inevitable intrusion on writing time.

To make sure students understood how serious I was about the program, and how committed I expected them to be, every student was required to sign a contract.

It declared their promise to write “at least 90 minutes a day, 6 days a week for the duration of the course.” In addition, there was “accountability time” at the outset of each weekly class, to make sure everyone was on task, and to urge on slackers and encourage the faint-hearted. The emphasis was on making pages, building confidence, and getting the job done with less trauma—and with the knowledge that revisions and Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

polishing to qualify their work for publication would come later.

We’ve run The Extreme Novelist course for 2 to 3 seasons every year since then. The classroom is almost always full, and there’s often a waitlist. But it wasn’t until 2014 that I took to heart the comments from authors who said they would love to take the class but, for various reasons, couldn’t. They lived too far away from Bethesda. Or the Wednesday evening class times were already spoken for. Several said, “It’s a shame you can’t package it [the course] in a book.” I

15

thought, “Well, why not?” After all, hadn’t I told them they could write any book they wanted to write? Shouldn’t I follow my own advice?

This spring, that idea became a reality. The Extreme Novelist: The No-Time-to-Write Method for Drafting Your Novel in 8 Weeks became available in The Writer’s Center bookstore, as well as on a variety of digital platforms.

16

It will be the first of a series of books intended to address novel writing from a practical, 21stcentury perspective. When I tell people I couldn’t have done it without my students, I’m dead serious. While I may have succeeded in inspiring them to persevere and get their stories written, they have taught me how to teach better and support them through the challenging

process of writing book-length fiction. For that I will forever be grateful.

May all your writing days be productive and satisfying!

The Extreme Novelist is available in the Center’s bookstore. For more information on The Extreme Novelist course, or the book, feel free to contact: Kathryn@WriteByYou.com

View online at www.writer.org/guide

WORKSHOP GUIDELINES WORKSHOP GUIDELINES Learning to write is an ongoing process that requires time and practice.

Our writing workshops are for everyone, from novices to seasoned writers looking to improve their skills, to published authors seeking refinement and feedback, to professionals with an eye on the competition. Group settings encourage the writing process by teaching writers to prioritize and to help each other use many skills at once.

From our workshops, participants can expect: • Guidance and encouragement from a published, working writer; • Instruction on technical aspects such as structure, diction and form; • Kind, honest, constructive feedback directed at individual work; • Peer readers/editors who act as “spotters” for sections of your writing that need attention, and who become your community of working colleagues even after your workshop is completed; • Tips on how to keep writing and integrate this “habit of being” into your life; • Tactics for getting published; • Time to share work with other writers and read peers’ work, and • Help with addressing trouble areas and incorporating multiple, sometimes conflicting, ideas into a revision.

BEGINNER LEVEL We strongly suggest that newcomers start with a beginner level workshop. They are structured to help you discover the fundamentals of creative writing, such as:

• Getting your ideas on the page; • Choosing a genre and the shape your material should take; • Learning the elements of poetry, playwriting, fiction, memoir, etc.; • Identifying your writing strengths and areas of opportunity and • Gaining beginning mastery of the basic tools of all writing, such as concise, accurate language, and learning how to tailor them to fit your style.

smaller groups with distinguished writers on a specific project or manuscript.

Workshop leaders select participants from the pool of applicants; selection is competitive.

REGISTRATION Workshop registration is available online at www.writer.org, in person at The Writer’s Center, via mail, or by phone at (301) 654-8664.

INTERMEDIATE LEVEL

REFUND POLICY

These workshops will build on skills you developed in the beginner level, and are designed for writers who have: • Critiqued some published works; • Taken a beginner-level workshop; • Achieved some grace in using the tools of language and form and • Have projects in progress they want to develop further.

To receive a credit, you must notify TWC by e-mail ( judson.battaglia@ writer.org) within the drop period.

• Full refunds are given only when TWC cancels a workshop.

• Workshop participants who have enrolled in and paid for a workshop and choose to withdraw from it within the drop period (see below) will receive a full credit to their account that can be used within one year to pay for another workshop and/or a membership.

ADVANCED LEVEL Participants should have manuscripts that have been critiqued in workshops at the intermediate level and have been revised substantially. This level offers: • Focus on the final revision and completion of a specific work; • Fast-paced setting with higher expectations of participation and • Deep insight and feedback.

MASTER LEVEL Master classes are designed for writers who have taken several advanced workshops and have reworked their manuscript into what they believe is its final form. Master classes are unique opportunities to work in

Find Your Niche The Writer’s Center recognizes that all writers and styles are unique!

Our staff can help you find the right course(s) for your level of experience, preferred genre and overall goals.

Call us at (301) 654-8664.

Drop Period for Credit 5 or more sessions: 48 hours notice required before the second meeting 4 or fewer sessions: 48 hours notice required before the first meeting Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

17

FALL WORKSHOP SCHEDULE

The Writer’s Center

SCHEDULE

FICTION (PAGES 22-25)

LEADER

DATES

DAY

TIME

LEVEL

Getting Started: Fiction Intensive

Elizabeth Poliner

9/3–10/22

Th

7–9:30 p.m.

B

The Facts of Fiction

Robert Friedman

9/14–11/2

M

7–9:30 p.m.

ALL

Writing Stories With Philosophical Questions *

Nicole Idar

9/14–10/19

M

7–9:30 p.m.

I/A

From Novice to Novelist

John DeDakis

9/16–10/28

W

7–9 p.m.

B

Write More Right Now

Sinta Jimenez

9/16–10/14

W

11 a.m.–12 p.m.

ALL

The Extreme Novelist

Kathryn Johnson

9/16–11/11

W

7–9:30 p.m.

I/A

Flash Fiction

Lynn Stearns

9/16–11/4

W

12:30–1:30 p.m.

ALL

Fiction II

Jennifer Buxton

9/17–11/12

Th

7–9:30 p.m.

I

Queer Fiction

Sinta Jimenez

9/17–10/22

Th

6–8 p.m.

ALL

Intro to the Novel: Writing Compelling Fiction

Alan Orloff

9/19–10/31

S

10 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

B

Elements of Fiction: Dialogue

Alan Orloff

9/19

S

2–4:30 p.m.

B/I

Short Story I

Jim Beane

9/23–11/11

W

7–9 p.m.

B

A Perfect Ending *

Lynn Schwartz

9/26

S

9:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

ALL

Guides on Craft and the Writing Life

Nicole E. Miller

9/26

S

11 a.m.–4 p.m.

ALL

Writing Short Stories

John Morris

9/28–11/16

M

7–9:30 p.m.

ALL

Novel in Progress—Keep it Going

Dana Cann

9/29–11/17

T

7:30–10 p.m.

ALL

Whodunnit? How to Write a Mystery

Alan Orloff

10/3

S

2–4:30 p.m.

B/I

Finish Your Short Story

Kathleen Wheaton

10/6–11/10

T

7:30–9:30 p.m.

B/I

Writing Description and Setting: The Fabric of Fiction

Nicole E. Miller

10/10

S

10:30 a.m.–4:30 p.m.

I

Beginning Fantasy Fiction

Brenda W. Clough

10/14–10/21

W

7:30–9:30 p.m.

B/I

Fiction II

Aaron Hamburger

10/21–12/16

W

7–9 p.m.

I/A

The Novel in You

Ann McLaughlin

10/24–12/12

S

10 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

B/I

Creating Conflict & Tension

Kathryn Johnson

10/31

S

10 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

ALL

Ten Steps To A Great Tale

Lynn Schwartz

11/7

S

9:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

ALL

Writing the Ghost Story

Nicole E. Miller

11/14–12/12

S

11 a.m.–3 p.m.

ALL

Story Basics & Structure

Kathryn Johnson

11/21

S

10 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

ALL

Plotting 101

Kathryn Johnson

12/5–12/12

S

10 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

ALL

MIXED GENRE (PAGES 25-26)

LEADER

DATES

DAY

TIME

LEVEL

Reading and Writing Women’s Lives

Sara Mansfield Taber

9/15–11/17

T

7–9:30 p.m.

ALL

Get Published!

Nancy Naomi Carlson

9/19

S

1–4 p.m.

ALL

Outlining and Organizing Projects

Sinta Jimenez

9/23–10/7

W

6–7:30 p.m.

ALL

B—beginner

I—intermediate

A—advanced

M—master

ALL—all levels —online class

* Indicates workshops held at one of our satellite locations. Please see descriptions for more information.

18

View online at www.writer.org/guide

MIXED GENRE (continued)

LEADER

DATES

DAY

TIME

LEVEL

Advanced Fiction and Memoir

Barbara Esstman

9/30–11/18

W

7–9:30 p.m.

A

Structure Your Book!

Hildie Block

10/3–10/17

S

10 a.m.–2 p.m.

ALL

Readers Love to Laugh

Mary McCarthy

10/12

M

6-9 p.m.

ALL

Twenty Minutes a Day

Willona Sloan

10/17

S

10 a.m.–1 p.m.

I/A

Getting Started: Creative Writing *

Patricia Gray

10/17–10/24

S

1–3:30 p.m.

B/I

Words and Wine: Use Your Senses to Improve Your Writing

Aaron Hamburger

10/20

T

6:30–8 p.m.

ALL

Applying Stand-up Comedy Techniques to Your Writing

Basil White

10/24–10/25

S/Su

1–5 p.m.

ALL

Ask an Agent

Zahara Heckscher

10/27–11/10

T

6:30–8:30 p.m.

ALL

Inspired by Literature

Nancy Lemann

11/2–12/7

M

7–9 p.m.

ALL

Mixed Genre Experimentation

Sinta Jimenez

11/3–12/8

T

6–7:30 p.m.

I/A

The Writing Staycation

Zahara Heckscher

11/9–11/13

M-F

10 a.m.–5 p.m.

ALL

NONFICTION (PAGE 26-29)

LEADER

DATES

DAY

TIME

LEVEL

My Life, One Story at a Time

Pat McNees

9/10–10/8

Th

7:15–10 p.m.

ALL

The Writer’s Toolbox

Sara Mansfield Taber

9/15–11/17

T

10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

ALL

Non-Narcissistic Personal Essays *

Mary McCarthy

9/16

W

6–9 p.m.

ALL

Memoir Workshop

Lynn Stearns

9/16–11/4

W

10 a.m.–12 p.m.

ALL

Pay Attention, Be Amazed, Write About It

Maxine Clair

9/17–11/5

Th

7–9:15 p.m.

ALL

Writing From Life

Ellen Herbert

9/23–11/11

W

10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

ALL

Getting Published: Nonfiction Articles

Ellen Ryan

9/26–10/31

S

9–11:30 a.m.

B/I

4 Essays/Memoirs, 8 weeks

Dave Singleton

9/29-11/17

T

7-9:30 p.m.

I/A

Writing the Memoir and Personal Essay

Ron Capps

9/30–11/4

W

7–9:30 p.m.

I

Writing the Family Memoir

Cheryl Somers Aubin

10/3

S

10 a.m.–2 p.m.

B

Finding Structure for Your Book-length Memoir

Janice Gary

10/5–10/12

M

7–9:30 p.m.

ALL

One day, One Personal Essay *

Tiffany Hawk

10/10

S

10 a.m.–4 p.m.

ALL

Boot Camp for Writers: So the Words Don’t Get in the Way

Beth Kanter

10/15–11/5

Th

7–9:30 p.m.

ALL

Life Stories Intensive

Lynn Schwartz

10/17

S

9:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

ALL

Writing the Personal Essay

Christine Koubek

11/4–12/9

W

7–9:30 p.m.

B/I

From Contract to Finished Book

Gina Hagler

11/5-12/17

Th

7-9:30 p.m.

ALL

Writing the Family Memoir

Cheryl Somers Aubin

11/7

S

1–5 p.m.

B

Narrative Arc in Memoir and Personal Narrative

Janice Gary

11/14

S

1–5 p.m.

ALL

Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

19

SCHEDULE

FALL WORKSHOP SCHEDULE

FALL WORKSHOP SCHEDULE

The Writer’s Center

SCHEDULE

NONFICTION (continued)

LEADER

DATES

DAY

TIME

LEVEL

One-Day Revision Retreat: Nonfiction

Willona Sloan

11/14

S

9 a.m.–2:30 p.m.

I/A

4 Essays/Memoirs, 4 Weeks

Sara Mansfield Taber

12/1–12/22

T

10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

I/A

Writing about Faith

Cheryl Somers Aubin

12/5

S

10 a.m.–1 p.m.

B

POETRY (PAGES 29-32)

LEADER

DATES

DAY

TIME

LEVEL

Poetry I: An Introduction to Craft & Beauty

Melanie Figg

9/8–10/27

T

7–9:30 p.m.

B

Poetry Workshop: Documentary Poetics

Kelly Forsythe

9/14–10/19

M

7–9 p.m.

B/I

What Sound Effects Can Do for Your Poetry

Sue Ellen Thompson

9/20

Su

1–4 p.m.

ALL

Poetry II: Banish Mediocrity

Dan Gutstein

9/22–11/10

T

7–9:30 p.m.

I/A

Making It New Again

Nan Fry

9/22–10/27

T

10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

ALL

Poetry and Place *

Elizabeth Lindsey Rogers

9/22–10/27

T

6:30–9 p.m.

ALL

The Poem Starts HERE!

Marie Pavlicek-Wehrli

9/29–11/3

T

10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

I

The Force of Poetry

Elizabeth Rees

9/30–12/2

W

7–9:30 p.m.

I/A

Reading as Apprenticeship

Marie Pavlicek-Wehrli

10/1–11/19

Th

10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

ALL

Free Verse Line Breaks

Kim Roberts

10/3–11/14

S

10 a.m.–12 p.m.

I/A

Long Poems and Poems in Series

Elizabeth Lindsey Rogers

10/5–11/16

M

7–9:30 p.m.

I/A

Multicultural Poetry Workshop

Maritza Rivera

10/10–10/31

S

1–3 p.m.

ALL

Opening the Field: Poetry Basics

Anne Becker

10/10–11/14

S

10 a.m.–1 p.m.

B

How to End a Poem *

Sue Ellen Thompson

10/24

S

1–4 p.m.

ALL

The Art of the Prompt

Baron Wormser

10/25

Su

10 a.m.–1 p.m.

ALL

The Art of Revision

Bernadette Geyer

10/26–11/16

N/A

ALL

Formal & Free: How the Poem is Built & Melanie Figg Moves

11/4–12/9

W

7–9:30 p.m.

I/A

The Mystery of Line Breaks

Sue Ellen Thompson

11/15

Su

1–4 p.m.

ALL

Write Poetry for Fun: The Poetry Game

Zahara Heckscher

12/1

T

6–8 p.m.

ALL

Metaphor, Mischief, and Grit

Nan Fry

12/1–12/22

T

10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

ALL

Revisiting Rhyme

Sue Ellen Thompson

12/6

Su

1–4 p.m.

ALL

PROFESSIONAL WRITING (PAGES 32-33) LEADER

DATES

DAY

TIME

LEVEL

Selling Your Point: Fundamentals of Persuasive Writing

James Alexander

9/9–10/14

W

7–9:30 p.m.

B/I

Design Your Author Website 101 *

Sheila McMullin

9/21-10/12

M

7-8:30 p.m.

ALL

Public Writing for Physicians, Health Specialists, and Scientists

Peter Lovenheim

10/1–11/5

Th

7–9 p.m.

B/I

Write & Publish: Arts Journalism

Willona Sloan

10/8–11/12

Th

7–9 p.m.

I/A

Writing for Twitter

Kimberly Palmer

10/8–10/15

Th

6–8 p.m.

ALL

Writing the Dreaded Query Letter

Alan Orloff

10/24

S

2–4:30 p.m.

I/A

Write Like the News

Hank Wallace

11/4

W

7–9 p.m.

ALL

20

View online at www.writer.org/guide

PROFESSIONAL WRITING (continued) LEADER

DATES

DAY

TIME

LEVEL

Literary Blogging and Social Media

Sinta Jimenez

11/11–12/16

W

6–7:30 p.m.

ALL

Blogging and Social Media: Changing Landscapes

Mary McCarthy

11/11

M

6–9 p.m.

ALL

STAGE AND SCREEN (PAGES 33-34)

LEADER

DATES

DAY

TIME

LEVEL

Elements of Playwriting: Dialogue

Richard C. Washer

9/16

W

7–10 p.m.

ALL

Writing for Television

Khris Baxter

9/22–10/13

T

7–9:30 p.m.

ALL

The Art, Craft, & Business of Screenwriting *

Khris Baxter

9/26

S

10 a.m.–4 p.m.

ALL

Intermediate Playwriting

Richard C. Washer

9/26–11/14

S

10 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

I

Adapting Your Writing for The Big Screen Khris Baxter

10/10

S

10 a.m.–4 p.m.

ALL

To Write the Great Film Scene

John Weiskopf

10/13–11/17

T

7:30–10 p.m.

ALL

Anatomy of Academy Award Winning Scripts

John Weiskopf

10/31–12/19

S

10 a.m.–1 p.m.

ALL

The Art, Craft, & Business of Screenwriting

Khris Baxter

11/7

S

10 a.m.–4 p.m.

ALL

The Art, Craft, & Business of Screenwriting *

Khris Baxter

12/5

S

10 a.m.–4 p.m.

ALL

YOUNGER WRITERS (PAGE 34)

LEADER

DATES

DAY

TIME

LEVEL

Teen Poetry Workshop

Lucinda Marshall

10/10–11/7

S

2–4 p.m.

B/I

ONLINE

LEADER

DATES

LEVEL

Introduction to the Short Story

Christopher Linforth

9/7-10/26

B/I

The Art of Songwriting

Mary Alouette

9/8–10/13

ALL

Your Nonfiction Book Proposal

Jack McEnany

9/8–10/27

ALL

Creative Nonfiction II

Dave Singleton

9/8–9/29

I/A

Poetry Comics

Bianca Stone

9/8–12/22

ALL

Intro to the Novel

T. Greenwood

9/11-10/30

B/I

Creating Novel Characters

T. Greenwood

9/11–10/30

ALL

Establishing Your Online Presence

Bernadette Geyer

9/14–10/5

ALL

Writing the Television Spec Script

Robert Forman

9/16–11/4

B/I

Fiction II: Novel Intensive

Tiffany Hawk

9/21–11/9

I/A

Poetry I: Sparking Creativity

Peter Kline

9/21–10/26

B/I

Forging the Creative Habit

Naomi Ayala

10/1-11/19

B/I

Owning Your Niche

Gina Hagler

10/5-11/16

I

From Contract to Finished Book

Gina Hagler

10/8–12/17

ALL

Alternative Forms

Bianca Stone

10/12-11/9

ALL

Poetry Comics

Bianca Stone

10/12-11/9

ALL

The Art of Revision

Bernadette Geyer

10/26-11/16

ALL

Intermediate Novel

T. Greenwood

10/30–12/18

I/A

Plotting Your Novel

T. Greenwood

11/6–11/27

ALL

Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

21

WORKSHOPS

WORKSHOPS

WORKSHOPS

The Writer’s Center

FOR MORE DETAILED CLASS DESCRIPTIONS, PLEASE VISIT WRITER.ORG NOTE: TWC will be closed for Labor Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas Day.

FICTION Getting Started: Fiction Intensive Elizabeth Poliner In this four-week workshop, those new to fiction will explore the basic elements of writing stories: characterization, plot, setting, point of view, dialogue, and scene. After laying a foundation with these elements, participants will put them together and write a short story. You’ll be surprised at how much you can learn and do in just four weeks.

8 Thursdays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

Beginner

Introduction

9/3–10/22 $360

to the Short Story

Christopher Linforth

WORKSHOPS

Participants will read classic and contemporary short stories, and develop their own theories and opinions on the constituent elements of the genre.

That is: what makes a short story, and more importantly, what makes a good short story. Through a set of writing exercises, explore the craft of short fiction and establish a sound grasp of the essential building blocks: character, point of view, dialogue, setting, plot, structure, and theme. By the course’s end, participants will have written, workshopped, and revised a complete story and have plenty of material for many others.

8 Weeks Online

Intro

the direction and creative leadership needed to jumpstart a dry spell or power through a current project.

The Facts of Fiction

N/A 9/7–10/26 Beginner/Intermediate $360

to the Novel

T. Greenwood If you have always wanted to write a novel but didn’t know where to start, this workshop will help you understand the process of writing a novel so you can get started putting pen to paper. We will focus on everything from generating ideas to developing characters to establishing point of view. We will touch on many elements of fiction (dialogue, scene, etc.), but the emphasis will be on discovering the writing process that works best for you.

Robert Friedman This workshop is for writers who want to use reallife characters and/or true events in their fiction.

Each writer comes to class with a “newsworthy” character or event he or she would like to “novelize” as we explore the nexus between journalism and novel-writing. We will discuss how journalistic principles may apply as the writer researches a factual article about the character or event, then creates a fictional piece putting the character or the event in a central role, while (hopefully) intuiting a fictional “truth,” as filtered through the writer’s research and imagination. After the first session or two, the workshop will be heavy on writing and critiquing.

8 Mondays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

All Levels

9/14–11/2 $360

Writing Stories With Philosophical Questions Nicole Idar This workshop will focus on examining and strengthening the key philosophical question(s) that makes a short story memorable. Flannery O’ Connor says of her work that she concerned herself with “the action of grace in territory held largely by the devil,” for example. If you find yourself writing stories that wrestle with essential philosophical questions like “Do we have free will?,” “What is the self?” and “Which fantasy series reflects reality more closely, Game of Thrones or Lord of the Rings?” then register for this workshop! Each week participants will discuss a particular short story (a short reading list will be announced beforehand) with a strong philosophical underpinning, and then workshop stories everyone has written. The goal will be to produce and polish a short story that effectively engages with the kinds of philosophical questions that concern us all—with an eye toward publication, so it can be shared with the world!

6 Mondays Capitol Hill

7–9:30 p.m.

9/14–10/19 Intermediate/Advanced $270

8 Weeks Online

N/A 9/11–10/30 Beginner/Intermediate $360

From Novice to Novelist

Creating

Novel Characters

A step-by-step guide on how to write a novel -- and how to sell it. We’ll go from how to get the nub of an idea all the way through to getting your novel into the hands of expectant fans. By the end of our time together, you will have started your novel and you will be equipped with the skills you’ll need to perfect it. Participants are invited, but not required, to share works in progress with the class to get constructive critical feedback.

T. Greenwood When writing a novel, we must know our primary characters inside and out. We need to understand their desires, motivations, and frustrations, their histories and their futures. This workshop will focus on the development of authentic characters. We will examine character as both autonomous and residing within the context of the other novelistic elements, and we will discuss the challenge of creating and integrating these various elements into a cohesive and credible whole. Participants will explore the main character(s) in their novels-in-progress.

8 Weeks Online

N/A All Levels

9/11–10/30 $360

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7–9 p.m.

Beginner

9/16–10/28 $270

Write More Right Now Sinta Jimenez This workshop will focus on strong, in-class and at home, exercises to provide participants with

11 a.m.–12 p.m.

All Levels

9/16–10/14 $100

The Extreme Novelist Kathryn Johnson Can’t find the time/energy/inspiration to get your novel written? This popular course, developed by the author of the book with the same name, will help you complete a rough draft in just eight weeks. Participants will receive the encouraging guidance of a professional writing coach and author of more than 40 published novels. Each author will commit to an aggressive writing schedule and learn the tricks pros use to create a productive working environment and meet their deadlines, despite life’s distractions. Classes will include troubleshooting discussions, a brief lecture and handouts from the instructor, in-class writing time, and the opportunity to submit portions of the work-in-progress for individual feedback and guidance. (Note: This is not a workshopping course. Further information will be sent to registered participants, in advance of the first class.) No meeting October 21.

8 Wednesdays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

9/16–11/11 Intermediate/Advanced $360

Flash Fiction Lynn Stearns The focus in this workshop will be on writing concise, effective stories that have a specific, meaningful point, and remain with the reader. Participants will read various styles of flash fiction, discuss what makes them successful, respond to prompts, and probably stretch some comfort zones, but all for a good cause! Participants should expect to finish the workshop with at least two pieces of flash fiction critiqued, and a solid understanding of how to critique their own work in the future. Everyone is invited to bring eight copies of a story, up to three pages double spaced, to the first workshop.

8 Wednesdays Bethesda

John DeDakis

7 Wednesdays Bethesda

5 Wednesdays Bethesda

12:30–1:30 p.m.

All Levels

9/16–11/4 $135

Fiction II Jennifer Buxton You are considering an intermediate class, which means you are writing regularly or feeling guilty for not. Welcome! We all struggle to find the time and space to write. This workshop is designed to get you working and keep you going with deadlines, feedback, and practical advice. We’ll workshop participant pieces and do close readings of outside stories, all with an eye toward improving your practice and, finally, publication. No meeting November 5.

8 Thursdays Bethesda

View online at www.writer.org/guide

7–9:30 p.m.

Intermediate

9/17–11/12 $360

WORKSHOPS Sinta Jimenez This workshop class will focus on LGBT issues and literature providing a strong community for LGBT writers and allies. Participants can expect to learn and refine their storytelling abilities while in an accepting LGBT environment in contrast to traditional heteronormative class settings.

6 Thursdays Bethesda

6–8 p.m.

All Levels

9/17–10/22 $215

Intro to the Novel: Writing Compelling Fiction

fiction fundamentals intertwine and collaborate to create successful short stories. Become a better reader and writer through roundtable discussions on the importance of setting, characterization, plot, theme, voice, structure and style in both modern and classic short stories. Each session will have a specific focus on one element supported through assigned readings. Become familiar with workshopping your fellow writer’s stories and the positive impact of critique, both of your own work and others. Hopefully, you will have something to share.

Bring pen and paper, an open mind and a willingness to delve into what makes a story work.

8 Wednesdays Bethesda

7–9 p.m.

Beginner

9/23–11/11 $290

Alan Orloff Have you started a novel—or have a great idea for one—but need some direction and feedback?

In this workshop, participants will learn about the building blocks—plot, characters, setting, dialogue, conflict—and how they all fit together to create a solid foundation for page-turning fiction. Sessions will include instruction and writing exercises, with an emphasis on giving and receiving critiques of participants’ work. Oh, and it will be fun, too! No meeting October 10.

6 Saturdays Bethesda

10 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

Beginner

9/19–10/31 $270

Elements of Fiction: Dialogue Alan Orloff Having trouble getting your dialogue to sparkle? In this workshop, you will see that writing realisticsounding dialogue has little to do with how people actually speak. You’ll learn how to use dialogue to advance the plot and reveal character, and we’ll cover the effective use of tags, oblique dialogue, and subtext. In addition, we’ll discuss how to incorporate actions within conversations to make written scenes spring to life. Don’t let one of the most important building blocks of fiction fall flat!

1 Saturday Bethesda

Fiction

2–4:30 p.m.

Beginner/Intermediate

9/19 $50

II: Novel Intensive

Tiffany Hawk To write a novel of publishable quality, you will need more than ambition. You’ll need a strong foundation built on craft, community, and wholehearted discipline. Start laying that groundwork here. You’ll work on technique (clarity, scene development, character, plot), explore the publishing process, and develop a mindset that will weather inevitable setbacks like writer’s block and rejection.

By the end of this course, you will have a deeper understanding of craft, at least one polished chapter, and a plan for moving forward.

8 Weeks Online

N/A 9/21–11/9 Intermediate/Avanced $360

Short Story I Jim Beane Designed to familiarize aspiring short story writers with “what it takes” to bring the story in their heads to the page, the focus in this workshop is on how

A Perfect Ending Lynn Schwartz The ending is the last thing your reader sees, but will often feel rushed, added on without thought.

Find an organic end for your story or novel. Is there an epiphany or a question? A traditional plotted ending or a resonant finish? Learn to combine the inevitable with the surprising; resolve interior and exterior conflicts; understand rounding, climax, dénouement and more.

1 Saturday Annapolis

9:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m. 9/26 All Levels $50

Nicole E. Miller In the sea of books on becoming a writer and mastering one’s craft, which volumes form the life raft? This seminar will offer critiques of a number of the classics, including E.M. Forster’s Aspects of the Novel and Edith Wharton’s The Writing of Fiction.

We will talk about the value of these idiosyncratic approaches to reading and writing, and the extent to which “the cult of personality” still matters in finding a voice and courting a readership. Then, we will turn to fiction’s more recent gurus and apostles (Charles Baxter, Robert Olen Butler, James Wood) for some controversial do’s and don’ts. We will also look at accounts of the writing life—Dorothea Brande’s On Becoming a Writer and Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird, and the host of books which have sprung up following Francine Prose’s Reading like a Writer. Please bring your thoughts on the essays and guides that have been most helpful to you. At the end of class, the instructor will offer her “best of” bibliography, and an evaluation of titles that deserve a more serious investment.

11 a.m.–4 p.m.

All Levels

Amin Ahmad Fall: September 15-December 8 Winter/Spring: January 12-April 19 Summer: Individual monthly check-ins with instructor, June-August This brand new twelve-month program will support serious novelists looking to revise and pitch their novels. Novel Year participants will experience the rigor and structure of an M.F.A. program, but with less of an expense and time commitment.

Under the guidance of a published novelist, ten participants will workshop their entire novel-in-progress.

Benefits include: 1. Consistent writing deadlines, studying aspects of craft, and being part of a supportive community 2. Panels and Q&As with experts in the industry, including literary agents and visiting writers

Guides on Craft and the Writing Life

1 Saturday Bethesda

The Novel Year

9/26 $100

Writing Short Stories John Morris This workshop will offer focused, constructive criticism of your short story draft, with the goal of bringing your work to a new level of accomplishment. By discussing the craft of the short story as it applies to actual examples before us (your story drafts), we will provide useful, practical insights into the writing process. By the end of the work-

Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

3. Free access to the Studio at The Writer’s Center twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week during the full year (valued at $1,000) 4. Free admission to literary events at the Center 5. Being a featured reader (reading works-in-progress) at the 2016 Bethesda Literary Festival Participants must have completed at least 150 pages of a novel before enrolling. To be admitted into the program, potential candidates will need to submit: • A one-page cover letter detailing their interest in the program.

• A twenty-five page writing sample from their novel in progress. (Submissions must be double spaced and use a standard font.)

Admissions will be on a rolling basis and limited to ten participants, so submit early!

Send submissions to laura.spencer@ writer.org Tuesdays Bethesda

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7–9:30 p.m.

Master

9/15–8/31 $4,995

WORKSHOPS

Queer Fiction

WORKSHOPS shop, all participants will receive in-depth critiques and suggestions for revision; many will have an opportunity to present a new draft.

8 Mondays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

All Levels

9/28–11/16 $360

Novel in Progress—Keep it Going Dana Cann Does your novel have legs? For writers with a novel in progress, getting through the first 50 to 100 pages is a critical first step in determining whether you’ll get to the end. This is a workshop for writers who are there (or just about there). We’ll cover the basics—character, dialogue, plot, point of view, voice, and structure. Each writer will distribute a brief synopsis and up to 25 pages of his/her novel in progress for constructive critique.

8 Tuesdays Bethesda

7:30–10 p.m.

All Levels

9/29–11/17 $360

WORKSHOPS

Whodunnit? How to Write a Mystery

dropping, among others. Fun, educational, and… mysterious!

1 Saturday Bethesda

2–4:30 p.m.

Beginner/Intermediate

10/3 $50

Finish Your Short Story Kathleen Wheaton Do you start stories that peter out after three pages? Do you have a feeling for character and situation but not for plot? In this class, we’ll work on breaking the logjam and moving on through to the end. Expanding on in-class assignments, the goal is to write a complete short story in six weeks.

6 Tuesdays Bethesda

7:30–9:30 p.m.

10/6–11/10 Beginner/Intermediate $215

Writing Description and Setting: The Fabric of Fiction Nicole E. Miller

Alan Orloff If you’ve always wanted to write a mystery novel but didn’t know where to start, this workshop is for you. Learn about writing fundamentals as they apply to the mystery. You’ll examine characteristics of the many subgenres (thrillers, too!) and learn about mystery-specific conventions and pitfalls such as TSTL syndrome, MacGuffins, red herrings, killer twists, wacky sidekicks, and smooth clue-

T.S. Eliot once wrote that “the great aim is accurate, precise and definite description. The first thing is to recognize how extraordinarily difficult this is... each man sees a little differently, and to get out clearly and exactly what he does see, he must have a terrific struggle with language.” This oneday seminar will focus on the difficulties and the pleasures of setting, mood, description, and the telling detail: the subtle elements that constitute the fabric of fiction. We’ll examine rich examples of setting from various authors, including Dickens

The Writer’s Center (city), Hardy (country), Melville (sea), McCarthy (frontier); Woolf (atmosphere); and study portraiture

by Eliot, Wharton, Forster, and Orwell who captured the beautiful, the ugly, and the strange. Participants are encouraged to bring a descriptive passage they have written. In addition to a lecture and in-class reading, we will be use class-time to rewrite and enhance these excerpts. This workshop will help you texture and fully realize the worlds you are building in your fiction.

1 Saturday Bethesda

10:30 a.m.–4:30 p.m. 10/10 Intermediate $115

Beginning Fantasy Fiction Brenda W. Clough The first session of this workshop will be devoted to the basics of fiction and story construction. In the second session, participants will do a start-up exercise to help get them started on a possibly longer work.

2 Wednesdays Bethesda

7:30–9:30 p.m.

10/14–10/21 Beginner/Intermediate $80

Fiction II Aaron Hamburger In this interactive writing workshop, we’ll create and respond to participant fiction as well as explore some key elements of story and novel writing through guided discussion and exercises, and explorations of published work. Participants will have an opportunity to have their work thoroughly vetted in a class conversation moderated by the instructor.

Bites & Flights!

Vino Volo and The Writer’s Center have entered into an exciting partnership!

All Writer’s Center members now receive 20% off their receipt at our Bethesda Row location!

Join us on October 20th for a workshop on words and wine with instructor Aaron Hamburger!

301.656.0916 7247 Woodmont Avenue Bethesda, MD 20814 vinovolobethesdarow.com

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View online at www.writer.org/guide

WORKSHOPS All participants are required to produce written responses to the work at hand, plus the instructor provides written comments and edits. This is a fun and dynamic setting in which to expand your skills and confidence as a writer! No meeting November 25.

study the architecture of a novel and devise a plan for plotting your novel.

8 Wednesdays Bethesda

Ten Steps To A Great Tale

The Novel in You Ann McLaughlin In this workshop we will discuss novel manuscripts by class members, both those barely begun and those almost completed. We will concentrate on how to create believable characters and telling details and we will return often to the question: What is this novel really about? Everyone will have an opportunity to submit her or his manuscript for class discussion at least twice, beginning with Chapter 1. We also will discuss a short novel by William Maxwell, So Long, See You Tomorrow, since it is crucial to read thoughtfully when you write. Those who join the class, can expect serious consideration of their work and the stimulation of working with other writers.

8 Saturdays Bethesda

10 a.m.–12:30 p.m. 10/24–12/12 Beginner/Intermediate $360

Intermediate

Novel

T. Greenwood In this workshop, participants will expand upon what they have learned in Intro to the Novel about the key components of novel writing. The focus of this workshop will be on character development, scene building, narrative structure and the process of writing a first draft. Participants will be encouraged to submit a chapter of their work for peer review. Please purchase a copy of John Truby’s Anatomy of Story for this class.

8 Weeks Online

N/A 10/30–12/18 Intermediate/Adanced $360

Creating Conflict & Tension

Let’s discuss the necessary elements to make your story compelling, resonant and accessible to the reader. Learn to identify where to begin, how to end and the skills needed to traverse the murky middle. Appropriate for those writing short stories, novels and those who wish to incorporate fictional techniques in memoir.

1 Saturday Bethesda

2 Saturdays Bethesda

4 Weeks Online

N/ A All Levels

Lynn Schwartz

9:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m. 11/7 All Levels $50

Writing the Ghost Story In a sense, all stories are ghost stories. Words on the written page will inevitably outlive their writer, as stories often capitalize on moments, things, people, and relationships already lost. Many great authors from Mary Shelley to F. Scott Fitzgerald have tried their hand at ghost stories, while some, including Edgar Allen Poe, Sheridan Le Fanu, M.R. James, and Stephen King have made this niche their empire. In this series, we will trace the tradition of the ghost story: its gothic, psychological, supernatural, technological, and weird genesis.

We will read and discuss the eerie short fiction of authors Henry James, Edith Wharton, Muriel Spark, Angela Carter, and Joe Hill, and do exercises to enhance your own ventures into this genre as you compose your own ghost story outside of class.

The instructor will furnish suggestions for further reading as well as a list of magazines that welcome ghost story submissions. In our last two meetings, we will workshop your stories. No meeting November 28.

4 Saturdays Bethesda

11 a.m.–3 p.m.

All Levels

Story Basics & Structure

It’s often said that without conflict there is no story.

It also holds true that strengthening the conflict in any type of fiction will bump up the tension and turn a limp, ordinary tale into an extraordinary adventure that will keep readers turning pages until the end. Whether you choose to write literary fiction, mysteries, family sagas, thrillers, historical fiction, sci-fi, love stories, or fantasy, you can learn techniques for drawing readers into your tales through action, dialogue, setting details, and plot twists that make your work stand out. Join us for Saturday morning coffee and leave with a handout chock full of ideas to apply to your stories.

Kathryn Johnson

Plotting

10 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

All Levels

10/31 $50

Your Novel

T. Greenwood Whether you are a planner or a writer who flies by the seats of your pants when it comes to plot, your novel still needs structure. In this workshop, we will

11/14–12/12 $270

Whether you’re writing flash fiction, a short story, novella, or novel, understanding basic fiction skills and structure will smooth the way toward a completed story that others will want to read. Beginners will choose this Saturday morning workshop to unravel the mysteries of perspective (POV), pacing, characterization, plot arcs, and other necessary elements of good creative writing. More experienced writers may use the session to refresh rusty skills or fill information gaps. A relaxed and educational session with coffee and pastries from the instructor.

1 Saturday Bethesda

10 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

All Levels

10 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

All Levels

12/5–12/12 $100

MIXED GENRE

Nicole E. Miller

Kathryn Johnson

1 Saturday Bethesda

11/6–11/27 $195

11/21 $50

Plotting 101 Kathryn Johnson Give yourself the perfect holiday gift—a plot for your next story! Planning before (and during) writing builds a writer’s confidence and cuts down on revision time. In this two-session course in story

Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

Reading and Writing Women’s Lives Sara Mansfield Taber In this workshop, we will read and discuss memoirs, stories, essays, letters, and poetry written by women about their lives as girls and mature women. Mining these readings for perspectives on what it means to be a woman, we’ll sample a variety of approaches to writing about our lives. Each session will include conversation, discussion of craft, and a writing prompt. The short readings will include such authors as Woolf, Brittain, Collette, Carson, and Walker. No class October 6 and November 3.

8 Tuesdays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

All Levels

9/15–11/17 $360

Get Published!

Nancy Naomi Carlson If you’ve always wanted to get your writing published or want to publish in more competitive markets, this is the class for you. Fall is the prime time for submitting your writing to literary journals and magazines. In this workshop, we will learn about the business of poetry and short story submission, including how to target appropriate markets for your writing. By the end of the day, you will be all set to send out your work.

1 Saturday Bethesda

1–4 p.m.

All Levels

9/19 $50

Outlining and Organizing Projects Sinta Jimenez This workshop will focus on exercises, at home and in class, to help writers organize their projects.

This will be especially helpful for writers of novels, longer works, and poetry/fiction collections. Participants should bring their project to the first class.

3 Wednesdays Bethesda

6–7:30 p.m.

All Levels

9/23–10/7 $80

Advanced Fiction and Memoir Barbara Esstman This workshop is for serious writers with a booklength project and hopes for publication. Learn

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WORKSHOPS

7–9 p.m.

10/21–12/16 Intermediate/Advanced $290

development, participants prepare to write a novel, novella, theme-connected collection of stories, or single short story by brainstorming possibilities.

Each participant will gain insight into the value of preparation while learning the ways that professional writers prepare to write their stories. The class will explore the advantages of timelines, wall mapping, and the narrative outline, which encourages rather than stifles creativity and provides the author with a reassuring safety net that enables timely completion of even a complex story. Individual support will be given to participants attempting to build a full plot from scratch, or whose flawed plot is crying out for rescue. (For additional information, contact the instructor: Kathryn@WriteByYou.com)

WORKSHOPS technical skills: character/scene development, language, dialogue, conflict and plot. Discuss the psychological aspects: how to locate and stay with the emotional core of the story and keep going to the end. We’ll also touch on rewriting and directions for getting an agent. Each writer will submit up to 25 double-spaced pages for in-class critiques.

8 Wednesdays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

Advanced

9/30–11/18 $360

Structure Your Book!

WORKSHOPS

Have a book in your mind but no idea where to start? Sometimes the best place to start is to create a structure, an outline, or scaffold that works. This short workshop will give participants techniques and exercises to create that structure. We will critique drafts of those structures. (Great way to prep for NaNoWriMo!) Bring 15 copies of a one-paragraph description of your work and a bag lunch! No meeting on October 10.

10 a.m.–2 p.m.

All Levels

10/3–10/17 $135

Readers Love to Laugh Mary McCarthy A laughing reader is a happy reader. This workshop will cover how to add humor to your essay, manuscript or everyday writing. We will review the different types of written humor and how to incorporate them into your writing in a subtle yet effective way.

Bring a scene to which you’d like to add humor, or a humorous story idea. Dust off your funny bone and let’s engage your reader!

1 Monday Bethesda

6-9 p.m.

All Levels

10/12 $50

Twenty Minutes a Day Willona Sloan You’re busy. You want to write. Learn how to make the most of writing 20 minutes a day. With focus, you can achieve a great deal in short bursts. Learn how to generate new writing, tackle revisions and even submit your work for publication, using the time you have. We will do in-class writing exercises, and discuss ways to develop a productive daily writing practice. This class is for participants with experience in writing fiction, nonfiction, or poetry and revising their work.

1 Saturday Bethesda

2 Saturdays Capitol Hill

1–3:30 p.m.

10/17–10/24 Beginner/Intermediate $100

Words and Wine: Use Your Senses to Improve Your Writing Aaron Hamburger

Hildie Block

2 Saturdays Bethesda

shop include in-class assignments, opportunity to read your writing aloud (only if you choose), and positive, helpful feedback that will point the way toward each individual’s writing talents. Please bring digital or print writing implements to the first workshop meeting.

10 a.m.–1 p.m.

10/17 Intermediate/Advanced $50

Getting Started: Creative Writing Patricia Gray Before holiday madness sets in, why not take a personal breather? In just two Saturday afternoons, you can explore various forms of writing and express your creativity. Using tried-and-true exercises, we’ll circumvent the analytic brain and give imagination a chance to thrive. You will receive tips on how to free up experiences and use them as inspiration for memoir, fiction, poems, creative essays or journal-writing. Hallmarks of this work-

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Join us at Vino Volo on Woodmont Avenue for a unique evening of tasting wine and learning how to maximize the power of taste, smell, sight, touch, and even sound in your writing. Drinking and writing seem to be a natural combination, at least in popular folklore, but the experience of tasting wine has much to teach us about how to expand our creative powers of description. We’ll taste various wines, learn about the nuances of wine tasting, then practice translating this experience into vivid language. The goal is for this process to be one you can then use to enliven description in the rest of your work, no matter the subject. The Writer’s Center is proud to partner with Vino Volo to offer two flights of complimentary wine to each participant.

Must be 21 years or older.

1 Tuesday 6:30–8 p.m.

Bethesda (Vino Volo) All Levels

10/20 $80

Applying Stand-up Comedy Techniques to Your Writing Basil White If you can read this and you can laugh, you can write humor! Learn to apply the basic psychology of how your brain gets a joke to discover what’s “gettable” about your subject matter, real or fictional, for humor writing or other ironic purposes. This class also works as a fun introduction to the fundamentals of workshopping for those new to the expectations of creative workshops. Before class, read the handout at basilwhite.com/comedyworkshop and bring questions.

1 Saturday/Sunday 1–5 p.m.

Bethesda All Levels

10/24–10/25 $135

Ask an Agent Zahara Heckscher Everything you want to know about agents—with a different agent in all three sessions to answer your questions: When do you need an agent? How do you find an agent? What do agents love (and hate) in queries and manuscripts? How does the financial arrangement work with an agent? Optional: Each participant will get feedback on a query letter or first page of a manuscript. The first session will focus on the role of the agent and logistics of finding and working with an agent. The second session will guide you through preparing your manuscript for an agent. The final session will focus on query letters.

3 Tuesdays Bethesda

6:30–8:30 p.m.

All Levels

10/27–11/10 $115

The Writer’s Center Inspired by Literature Nancy Lemann Learn methods and technique from classic works of literature. Weekly reading assignments will be accompanied by suggested writing exercises inspired by the text. Syllabus chosen among George Eliot, Gabriel García Márquez, Edith Wharton, Walker Percy, Jane Gardam, Kate Atkinson, Edward St. Aubyn, F. Scott Fitzgerald, John McPhee, Vladimir Nabokov, Evelyn Waugh, Graham Greene, Raymond Chandler, & others.

Depending on class consensus, we can read excerpts, short stories, and essays if reading a novel per week is unrealistic for busy participants. Class discussion of texts and editorial feedback on writing submissions.

6 Mondays Bethesda

7–9 p.m.

All Levels

11/2–12/7 $215

Mixed Genre Experimentation Sinta Jimenez This is a dynamic and creative workshop for writers intrigued and inspired by the fusion of various genres. Flash fiction, multimedia, creative nonfiction, and poetic prose will be explored. If you’re looking to break up the monotony or learn about other genres, this is the class for you.

6 Tuesdays Bethesda

6–7:30 p.m.

11/3–12/8 Intermediate/Advanced $135

The Writing Staycation Zahara Heckscher Do you dream of participating in a writing retreat, but can’t get out of town? Then this non–residential retreat at The Writer’s Center is for you.

Join us for an intensive, supportive, exhilarating, focused week of writing. Each day begins with a short reading, writing warm-up prompt and brief discussion. After that, you’ll have tons of time for working on your own writing–whether it is a poetry chapbook you are compiling, a novel you are writing, a nonfiction work in your brain, or a manuscript that needs some final polish.

Engaging and successful local writers offer lunch workshops and one-on-one sessions. The days include unlimited coffee, tea, and delicious healthy snacks. We nurture you so you can focus on your writing and make a great leap forward in your priority writing project!

Monday-Friday Bethesda

10 a.m.–5 p.m.

All Levels

11/9–11/13 $430

NONFICTION Your Non-Fiction Jack McEnany

Book Proposal

Got a great idea for a book? It all starts with the proposal. This eight-week workshop teaches writers the seven essential elements of a winning non-fiction book or memoir proposal. From the jacket copy that provides clarity for the writer and anticipation for the reader, to a crisp and compelling introduction, and a tight, creative, well-researched marketing plan, you’ll develop

View online at www.writer.org/guide

WORKSHOPS a proposal that will excite editors and sell your book.

pared with a personal essay in progress or one to start. We’ll also cover how to publish your essay.

8 Weeks Online

1 Wednesday Annapolis

9/8–10/27 $360

Nonfiction II

6–9 p.m.

All Levels

9/16 $50

Memoir Workshop

Dave Singleton

Lynn Stearns

Fall back into your writing and get creative with creative nonfiction. Simply put: creative nonfiction is writing about real events and telling a story.

It’s a hybrid genre that pulls in elements of fiction (literary techniques), the writer’s perspective, and factual information. It allows you to be poetic and journalistic simultaneously. You’ll get plenty of personal attention as you work on a variety of assignments. In addition to weekly lessons and assignments, the class will receive and explore pieces by some of the greats, Joan Didion, Sarah Vowell, David Sedaris, Jon Krakauer, Susan Orlean, and Gay Talese, to name a few. Writers will prepare three finished pieces and receive individual comments and suggestions from the teacher and constructive feedback from the class. Deadlines make you write, so give yourself four weeks of deadlines.

Workshop participants will read samples of various styles of memoirs, discuss how to make the most of voice, setting, structure, and other components, and respond to writing prompts, all intended to help the authors take their work to the next level.

Everyone will have an opportunity to share up to 15 pages of work for critiques from other participants, and will finish the workshop with a better understanding of how to edit their own writing. Anyone with work ready to submit is encouraged to bring 8 copies (double spaced) of a chapter or several short pieces, to our first class.

4 Weeks Online

N/A 9/8–9/29 Intermediate/Advanced $195

My Life, One Story at a Time Pat McNees Guided autobiography (a la James Birren). Capture your life experiences in short pieces of autobiographical writing--two pages (500 words) on a different theme each week, to read aloud. For the first session, write about a turning point in your life, or a time when you made a choice or encountered an obstacle that changed your life. Focus on storytelling and insights into life patterns.

5 Thursdays Bethesda

7:15–10 p.m.

All Levels

9/10–10/8 $215

8 Wednesdays Bethesda

10 a.m.–12 p.m.

All Levels

9/16–11/4 $290

WORKSHOPS

Creative

N/A All Levels

Pay Attention, Be Amazed, Write About It Maxine Clair Capture pivotal moments of your life—moments of challenge, expansion and discovery. As you learn to unearth material from memory, fact and fiction collide, and basic elements of craft come into play. We will look at scene, exposition, figurative language, dialogue and the use of other elements in works by established writers. Four-to-eight page pieces by participants will be the focus of each workshop, with a full revision of at least one piece.

8 Thursdays Bethesda

7–9:15 p.m.

All Levels

9/17–11/5 $360

Writing From Life Ellen Herbert

The Writer’s Toolbox Sara Mansfield Taber Writing is “a careful act of construction,” William Zinsser notes. “You must know what the essentials tools are and what job they are designed to do.”

This is a workshop for those who wish to sharpen the tools in their writer’s toolbox to create fine literary nonfiction. We examine published essays and memoirs and practice aspects of the writer’s craft such as: concrete detail, use of the senses, figurative language, characterization, dialogue and scene, summary and musing. Time for the sharing of work and a free-write are included in the meetings. No class October 6 and November 3.

8 Tuesdays Bethesda

10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

All Levels

9/15–11/17 $360

Non-Narcissistic Personal Essays Mary McCarthy There’s no “I” in essay. Just because a story is being told by you doesn’t mean it has to include repeated use of the first person. In this workshop, we’ll review ways to tell your story and make it more about your reader than yourself. Come pre-

This workshop is dedicated to culling the stories you need to tell from the complicated tangle of memory. Participants will be encouraged to use literary techniques such as recreated dialogue, compression of time, and authenticity to write short personal narratives, which will be shared with the class. Also we will read and discuss the “Modern Love” essay from Sunday’s New York Times. By the end of the class, participants will have written a few personal narratives ready to find a larger audience.

8 Wednesdays Bethesda

10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

All Levels

9/23–11/11 $360

Getting Published: Nonfiction Articles Ellen Ryan Learn how professionals get their magazine, newspaper, and digital nonfiction articles published.

In six weeks, this nuts-and-bolts course conveys ways to write about people and places with life and color plus how to find the right markets for your ideas, reach editors, get published and paid, research, resell, network, understand contracts, and keep correct records for tax purposes. Instructor’s

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WORKSHOPS critiques will guide you toward marketable queries and articles.

6 Saturdays Bethesda

9–11:30 a.m.

9/26–10/31 Beginner/Intermediate $270

4 Essays/Memoirs, 8 Weeks Dave Singleton What’s your story? What are the tales you’ve been dying to tell, but haven’t had the time or structure to put pen to paper? Get started and write about your life in this hands-on, practical course in which you’ll write four pieces in eight weeks, as well as several in-class writing exercises. Whether you have family stories you’d like to record for posterity or different moments of your life you want to capture, you’ll learn new strategies every week to help you write effectively about your life. The class will focus on exercises that will help you develop disparate memories and thoughts into a meaningful and organized form.

Take advantage of practical tools and get supportive feedback from teacher and classmates.

WORKSHOPS

8 Tuesdays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

9/29–11/17 Intermediate/Advanced $360

Writing the Memoir and Personal Essay

say. When we’re not writing or workshopping, we’ll talk about what to put in and what to leave out of a memoir, the process of assembling a book-length work, and what to expect when your memoir is published. Participants should be interested in writing memoir or personal essay. Some participants will be asked to bring work to the first meeting for distribution to the workshop.

6 Wednesdays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

Intermediate

9/30–11/4 $270

Writing the Family Memoir Cheryl Somers Aubin Have you always wanted to write your family memoir but weren’t sure how to start? Join other emerging writers as you learn about the different types of family memoirs and how to work on them. In this one-day, four-hour class, participants will take part in many writing exercises, including writing prompts based on photographs and music. After each writing exercise, participants will have a chance to share their work in small groups.

Participants will leave the class with a greater understanding of family memoirs, resources available to help them, and enthusiasm to begin or continue their family memoirs.

Ron Capps

1 Saturday Bethesda

10 a.m.–2 p.m.

Beginner

10/3 $80

In this writing and workshop intensive course, participants will create new work but can also workshop existing pieces of memoir or personal es-

1 Saturday Bethesda

1–5 p.m.

Beginner

11/7 $80

28

The Writer’s Center Finding Structure for Your BookLength Memoir Janice Gary If you’re having difficulty structuring your memoir, this workshop will provide ideas and solid options. Finding the right structure for a book-length memoir can be overwhelming. Do you start at the beginning of your story or do you move backwards from the end? Should your book be made of linked essays or follow a theme throughout? In this workshop, we will explore structure, studying ways various memoirs have been put together and experimenting with options for structuring our own memoirs. Expect to come away with a better sense of the shape your book will take and knowledge of how to assemble the bones to support your story.

2 Mondays Bethesda

Owning

7–9:30 p.m.

All Levels

10/5–10/12 $100

Your Niche

Gina Hagler Nonfiction writing includes a lot of research. If you can use the research you do for more than one piece, you’ll maximize your time. If you can write about related topics often enough, you’ll create a niche for yourself. In this workshop, we’ll look at ways to identify your interests and the market for pieces on that topic. We’ll also look at the ways to research and reuse that research

View online at www.writer.org/guide

WORKSHOPS

7 Weeks Online

N/A Intermediate

10/5–11/16 $315

One Day, One Personal Essay Tiffany Hawk We all love a good story, but when it comes to our own, we wonder why anyone would care. And if they do (gasp), what will they think? In this full-day workshop, you will learn why personal essays do matter, what the good ones are made of, how to write yours, and how to get it published. Come in with an idea and leave with a solid plan for sharing it with the world.

1 Saturday Capitol Hill

10 a.m.–4 p.m.

All Levels

10/10 $115

plus write and workshop two 1,000 to 1,500 word essays (or, develop one essay from a draft to solid revision). No class November 25.

will be spent writing, sharing work, and discussing craft. By the end of four weeks, four pieces will be on their way to completion!

5 Wednesdays Bethesda

4 Tuesdays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

11/4–12/9 Beginner/Intermediate $270

From Contract to Finished Book

Writing about Faith

Gina Hagler

Cheryl Somers Aubin

Your book proposal has been accepted and the contract is signed. Now it’s time to write the actual book. It should be simple, but once you begin, you realize what was so clear in your proposal is actually quite complicated when you begin to write. In this workshop, we’ll go step-by-step through the process of turning your proposal into a book with voice, a compelling narrative, even if it’s a science title, and illustrations that will bring the text to life for the reader. No meeting on November 26.

Are you interested in writing about faith as part of your memoir? Come and join other emerging writers as your explore writing about your experience of faith. In this one-day, three-hour class, you will have the opportunity to write using prompts based on topics such as miracles, answered or unanswered prayers, and times faith has challenged you. After each writing exercise, participants will have a chance to share their work in small groups.

Participants will leave the class with a greater awareness of the role faith plays in their memoirs, and with writing they may want to share now or give to their families later.

Boot Camp for Writers: So the Words Don’t Get in the Way

6 Thursdays Bethesda

Beth Kanter

Narrative Arc in Memoir and Personal Narrative

1 Saturday Bethesda

Janice Gary

POETRY

This course is for individuals who want to tone their writing muscles so they can go the distance.

Each class will begin with a short warm-up exercise followed by a prompt for a longer piece. We will then focus on specifics like effective beginnings, creative prose, and strong conclusions. You also will learn how to avoid common grammatical and usage errors that can distract from your message.

This class will focus on both craft and technique and is designed for participants of all backgrounds who want to take their writing endurance and skills to the next level.

4 Thursdays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

All Levels

10/15–11/5 $195

Life Stories Intensive Whether you want to write a memoir, blog, college essay, letter to your granddaughter, or use your own life as the basis for fiction, life story writing requires us to tell where we come from and who we are. Learn to identify your story’s essence and to engage the reader through fictional techniques.

Participants will leave inspired to begin or improve a work-in-progress.

1 Saturday Bethesda

9:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

All Levels

10/17 $50

Writing the Personal Essay Christine Koubek Christine Koubek’s essays and travel stories have appeared in The Washington Post; Huffington Post; Brain, Child; Coastal Living; Washingtonian; NBCNews.com and more. In addition, she writes the “Get Away” column for Bethesda and Arlington magazines. Journeys, relationships, hardships, love, and loss—these are just a few of the subjects personal essays explore. In this workshop, we’ll use essays from magazines and newspaper columns as our guide to examine the ways structure, voice, scene, setting, and characterization transform a personal experience into a compelling story. You’ll generate new material through in-class exercises,

7–9:30 p.m.

All Levels

11/5–12/17 $270

Learn how to use the power of the narrative arc to convey the dramatic trajectory of your life story.

Because memoir culls from a lifetime of experience, it’s often difficult to know where to start and how to proceed. But once we understand the dynamics of the narrative arc, we have a powerful tool to help us discern what to include and what to leave out. In this workshop, we write our way into the heart of our story to understand its beginning, middle and end. Expect to come away with a sense of what stories need to be told and the shape those stories will take. You may find several memoirs lurking within.

1 Saturday Bethesda

Lynn Schwartz

10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

12/1–12/22 Intermediate/Advanced $195

1–5 p.m.

All Levels

11/14 $80

One-Day Revision Retreat: Nonfiction

12/5 $50

Poetry I: An Introduction to Craft & Beauty Melanie Figg Ready to learn more about poetry or rekindle your writing practice? Join us to deepen your experience of poetry with a focus on craft. Each session will be devoted to an aspect of craft (line, sound, imagery, form). We’ll also learn by close reading great poems.

Participants will be encouraged to write a poem each week via writing assignments and receive helpful, encouraging feedback from the instructor.

Each participant will have a poem workshopped by the class, and come away with a solid knowledge of how poems are built and an appreciation for their strength and magic. We’ll use The Poet’s Companion as a text; so please bring a copy to the first class.

8 Tuesdays Bethesda

Willona Sloan

10 a.m.–1 p.m.

Beginner

7–9:30 p.m.

Beginner

9/8–10/27 $360

It’s time to finish that article or essay you’ve been writing forever. You’ve completed the first draft.

Now it’s time to cut the fat, rearrange the structure, check your facts and see what’s missing.

Poetry Workshop: Documentary Poetics

Learn how to read your work like an editor and revise for publication. We will discuss how to choose the right structure for your piece, create a consistent narrative voice, and craft vivid descriptions that engage the reader. Bring a draft to revise and your laptop or writing tools. After a craft lecture, you will work on revising your piece in class. The goal is to produce a strong second draft.

Find inspiration in history: a poetry workshop that explores current or historical events, people, places, or things as poetic muses. Participants will write poems inspired by using pre-existing documents and investigative research of their choosing, leading up to a final project of ten poems.

1 Saturday Bethesda

9 a.m.–2:30 p.m.

Intermediate/Advanced

11/14 $100

Kelly Forsythe

6 Mondays Bethesda

7–9 p.m.

9/14–10/19 Beginner/Intermediate $215

4 Essays/Memoirs, 4 Weeks

What Sound Effects Can Do for Your Poetry

Sara Mansfield Taber

Sue Ellen Thompson

Sandwiches, Truth, The day you wanted to kick your brother…Come receive stimulating prompts each week—or come with your own idea. Workshop time

Assonance, consonance, alliteration, internal rhyme—they’re often called “sound effects,” and they are among the most basic and essential tools

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WORKSHOPS

without writing the same piece over and over again.

WORKSHOPS all poets should know how to use. This workshop will focus on how certain vowel or consonant sounds can be used to evoke or underscore emotion in a poem, and how sound effects can help you convey your poem’s message in a subtle, convincing way.

1 Sunday Bethesda

Poetry

1–4 p.m.

All Levels

9/20 $50

I: Sparking Creativity

Peter Kline

WORKSHOPS

Sometimes creativity just needs a little spark to make it catch fire; through fun and unexpected writing exercises, this course is intended to start conflagrations. This stimulating online course is designed to help participants produce new work and experiment with different ways of writing poems. The class will be structured around a series of writing prompts, from dramatic monologues to anagram-based poems to rhetorical forms like prayer, each designed to teach participants a particular principle of poetry writing. We will share the best of our results in a generous and supportive workshop setting. Participants will finish the course with at least six new poems, along with a richer sense of their own creative potential.

6 Weeks Online

N/A 9/21–10/26 Beginner/Intermediate $270

Poetry II: Banish Mediocrity Dan Gutstein The course seeks to engage participants above all at the language-forming level, leading them toward strategies of adventurous phrasing. Through exercises, readings, and workshop sessions, participants will write and revise poems on a weekly basis. At the end of the course, participants should have an improved sense of what makes for a groundbreaking poem, as well as a group of new works.

8 Tuesdays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

9/22–11/10 Intermediate/Advanced $360

Making It New Again Nan Fry In this continuation of a previous workshop, open to all, we’ll explore the development of modern poetry and the ways it can inspire us today. With Kenneth Koch and Kate Farrell’s anthology Sleeping on the Wing: An Anthology of Modern Poetry with Essays on Reading and Writing as a starting point, we’ll read the work of poets such as Rainer Maria Rilke, T.S. Eliot, John Ashbery, and Imamu Amiri Baraka.

With Koch and Farrell’s brief, accessible essays to guide us, we’ll experiment, both in class and at home, with some of the innovative approaches these and other moderns pioneered. By the end of the workshop, participants will have a better understanding of modern poetry and will have employed some of its techniques in their own work.

6 Tuesdays Bethesda

10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

All Levels

9/22–10/27 $270

Poetry and Place Elizabeth Lindsey Rogers

giving participants the opportunity to write deeply about whatever place(s) inspire them: cities and towns, landforms or buildings, old and new homes, locations we know from travel, or perhaps know from memory or imagination. We’ll read poems to generate ideas and approaches to writing about place, try prompts together in class, and spend significant time responding to each other’s poems in a workshop format. (We may also “visit” at least once local place together as a class.) At the end of the course, each participant will have generated a series or group of poems developed from their own passions and interests.

Forging

6 Tuesdays Capitol Hill

8 Weeks Online

30

6:30–9 p.m.

All Levels

9/22–10/27 $270

the Creative Habit

Naomi Ayala If you ignore the little voice that keeps inviting you to write, it may grow silent, as may the little voice that keeps inviting you to tinker and rework. You may come to believe there never was a little voice.

Aimed at helping you kickstart a regular writing practice, weekly assignments will focus on generating new poems as well as revising existing ones, while reading material and supplemental exercises will focus on process and strategies for creating the space in your life to write.

N/A 10/1–11/19 Beginner/Intermediate $360

The Poem Starts HERE!

Free Verse Line Breaks

Marie Pavlicek-Wehrli

Kim Roberts

Honoring William Stafford’s dictum: “Writer’s block?

Lower your standards!”In this workshop, we’ll put together a toolbox of exercises and strategies for jumping into the poem’s first draft without hesitancy or over-thinking. Revising these drafts toward finished poems to be shared in workshop will open discussion on matters of craft and the often mysterious and unpredictable ways language works to lead the making of the poem forward.

This craft seminar will examine how line length, punctuation, and line breaks affect a poem’s pace, emphasis, and meaning. Participants will read model poems, write new work, and revise.

6 Tuesdays Bethesda

Elizabeth Lindsey Rogers

10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

Intermediate

9/29–11/3 $270

The Force of Poetry Elizabeth Rees In this eight-week workshop, intermediate and advanced poets will concentrate on reading, writing and critiquing poetry. Each class session will include a brief discussion of selected contemporary poems, an in-class writing prompt, and workshopping every participant’s poem. Specific exercises will be given to free the imagination, and quiet the inner censor.

We will explore formal considerations, stylistic choices, and the moments when a poem catches its own voice. By the end of the class, participants will have produced seven original poems and one revision, and will have refined their poetic voice. Please bring 15 copies of a poem you love (not your own) to the first session, as well as 15 copies of one of your own. No meeting October 28 and November 25.

8 Wednesdays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

9/30–12/2 Intermediate/Advanced $360

Reading as Apprenticeship Marie Pavlicek-Wehrli “Learn about poetry from the poem,” writes Ed Hirsch. This workshop offers an oasis of sustained attentiveness to the intricacies of the poem, a made thing, as each week we read, hear, and collectively uncover and reflect upon a varied selection of poems, ranging from Dickinson and Whitman, to Merwin, Rukeyser, Wilner, and Levis.

Essays in poetics will be added to the mix. This is not a writing workshop per se, though the readings and conversation are guaranteed to widen the scope of your own writing.

8 Thursdays Bethesda

This course will focus on poetry as our medium for exploring the natural and man-made world,

The Writer’s Center

10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

All Levels

10/1–11/19 $360

7 Saturdays Bethesda

10 a.m.–12 p.m.

10/3–11/14 Intermediate/Advanced $270

Long Poems and Poems in Series While poetry usually operates on the “less is more” philosophy, we’ll explore how longer poems can afford us many possibilities as writers: content layering, a narrative arc, room for our obsessions, and increased emotional depth. In this course, we’ll examine what approaches other poets have taken to create works beyond 14 or 22 lines, and try our hand at some of these modes. There will be significant time dedicated to workshopping our writing. At the end of the course, participants will have completed a project of several longer poems or a series of linked poems, depending on their inspirations and interests.

7 Mondays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

10/5–11/16 Intermediate/Advanced $315

Multicultural Poetry Workshop Maritza Rivera Tap into your cultural roots to find common themes shared by different cultures and nationalities.

This workshop brings the poetry of Pablo Neruda, Rita Dove, Li-Young Lee, Elizabeth Bishop, Martín Espada, Naomi Shihab Nye, Joel Dias-Porter, Lucille Clifton and many other poets to the table. Discover how they see food, work, love, loss, music and other themes all cultures share. Experience how their work inspires you to write from your cultural roots.

4 Saturdays Bethesda

1–3 p.m.

All Levels

10/10–10/31 $135

Opening the Field: Poetry Basics Anne Becker Explore the field of poetry from its most basic elements—words, silence, image, music, story, structure—to discover the subtle ways it transforms our lives. Starting with the question, What

View online at www.writer.org/guide

WORKSHOPS

6 Saturdays Bethesda

10 a.m.–1 p.m.

Beginner

Alternative

10/10–11/14 $360

Forms

Bianca Stone In this workshop, we’ll explore alternative forms in poetry in response to weekly exercises. We’ll explore new uses of unusual forms such as ekphrasis, erasure, poetry comics, prose, video, and pastiche.

Participants will be encouraged to bring in their own interests and personal skills, and collaboration is inevitable. Readings will include classic and contemporary works by Dara Wier, Lydia Barry, Matthew Zapruder, John Ashbery, Elizabeth Bishop, Matthea Harvey, Syliva Plath, Walt Whitman, Marcel Proust and others. In addition, we’ll look at films, music and visual art from a range of sources, getting out of our comfort zones and challenging our notions of what a poem is.

5 Weeks Online

Poetry

N/A All Levels

10/12-11/9 $215

Comics

Bianca Stone In this exciting eight-week class we will make visual art pieces using our own poems! Juxtaposing two art forms gives us a new and unique experience with our poetic voice. By making “poetry comics” (a term we will also discuss) we’ll be able to see our writing more clearly, thus editing our work from a new angle as we explore our capabilities as visual artists. The class will look at examples, discuss them, and create work based on those weekly findings. Participants will choose one strong piece to create a “poetry comic,” either on the page or through multimedia. Participants must be comfortable making visual art and have a basic grasp of scanning, uploading and sharing work online.

5 Weeks Online

N/A All Levels

10/12-11/9 $215

Short is Beautiful: Haiku, Tanka & Free Verse Melanie Figg Participants will spend the first four Mondays at The Writer’s Center writing and refining short poems, focusing on the Japanese forms of haiku and tanka, as well as American free verse. We’ll study and practice the challenges and simplicity of short poems by reading Japanese masters (Basho, Issa, Buson, Komanchi, Shikibu) as well as free verse poems by modern masters of brevity (Williams, Ryan, Clifton, Levertov, Dickinson). By the final session, participants will have revised one poem for printing. The fifth session will meet at Pyramid Atlantic for an extended Saturdy class with a letterpress instructor who will teach participants to typeset

their poems. At the end of class, participants will take home printed handmade broadsides of their finished work.

4 Mondays/1 Saturday 7-9 p.m.

Bethesda All Levels

10/19-11/21 $360

7–9:30 p.m.

11/4–12/9 Intermediate/Advanced $270

Sue Ellen Thompson

Sue Ellen Thompson Is there a right or wrong way to end a poem? A better way? This workshop will focus on closure— the strategies that poets have traditionally used to bring their poems to a clear, resonant conclusion.

We will also discuss anti-closure—the resistance that so many contemporary poets feel toward poems that “click shut.” Bring a poem of your own and get feedback on your approach.

1–4 p.m.

All Levels

6 Wednesdays Bethesda

The Mystery of Line Breaks

How to End a Poem

1 Saturday Annapolis

strategies for working in form and give extensive feedback on all poems written during the term.

10/24 $50

Many free verse poets write for years without really understanding how a line of poetry functions and where it should end. Should it be as long as a breath, or should it end wherever there is a comma, a period, or a break in the syntax? In this workshop, we will look at how modern poets have dealt with this issue and how their decisions can help us manage line breaks in our own poems.

1 Sunday Bethesda

1–4 p.m.

All Levels

The Art of the Prompt

Write Poetry for Fun: The Poetry Game

Baron Wormser

Zahara Heckscher

Poems spur us to write other poems: participants will write new poems based on prompts while examining how prompts engage us. Writing from prompts (poems by Jane Kenyon, Bruce Weigl, Donald Justice, and others) can open doors that otherwise might not be opened. The prompt can put the poet in the deep moment of responding and thus elicit another poem. Poets have been writing in response to other poems forever. This workshop will acknowledge that tradition while considering how prompts work.

1 Sunday Bethesda

The

10 a.m.–1 p.m.

All Levels

The Poetry Game is an interactive game that makes it easy and fun to write a poem, whether you are an experienced poet seeking a new technique to generate poetry... or you haven’t written

10/25 $50

Art of Revision

Bernadette Geyer Poets often have folders full of poem drafts they’ve abandoned because, while they believe the draft has promise, they can’t seem to figure out how to move the draft in the right direction. For four weeks, we will explore ways to “rethink” stubborn drafts in order to breathe new life into them and ultimately – as Samuel Taylor Coleridge said – put “the best words in the best order.” Participants should be prepared with four poems they want to revise during the workshop.

4 Weeks Online

N/A All Levels

10/26–11/16 $195

Formal & Free: How the Poem is Built & Moves Melanie Figg Want to write some of your best poems while learning a ton about craft? You will be amazed at what you can do and what working in form will teach you. This class will boost your knowledge of and comfort with formal verse and hone your skills with language. Participants will learn and practice a variety of forms (syllabics, quatrains, sonnets, pantoums, villanelles, ghazals, and sestinas) while exploring how issues of craft (rhyme, repetition, line breaks, etc.) inform and strengthen your free verse poems. The instructor will share successful

Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

11/15 $50

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WORKSHOPS

sensations does he poem bring up in you? In each meeting, we’ll read and discuss model poems and experiment with various techniques and strategies. At the subsequent meeting, we’ll bring our own poems, which will be examined with the same respect and depth as the models. Bring to the first class a poem or something else you’ve written to introduce yourself.

WORKSHOPS a poem in decades! The focus is on creativity; sharing is optional and we will not critique or judge the poems that are read. Everyone wins.

The game involves a wide variety of prompts, a supportive and encouraging environment, and an attitude of warmth, fun, and poetic camaraderie.

Educators welcome to come and learn how to use this game in settings including schools and healing environments. The game is family friendly; all ages welcome in this workshop from mature 10 year olds to adult. Snacks provided. Workshop price includes taking home this beautiful game for yourself or to give as a gift.

1 Tuesday Bethesda

6–8 p.m.

All Levels

12/1 $40

Revisiting Rhyme Sue Ellen Thompson Why do so many poets writing today shy away from rhyme? Maybe it’s because they’re afraid it will make their poems sound trite or old-fashioned. In fact, knowing how to rhyme subtly and skillfully can achieve quite the opposite. In this workshop, we will examine the many different rhyming strategies available to poets today. Discussing what distinguishes a “good” rhyme from a weak one will lead us to some conclusions about how rhyme can be used to make your poems both more memorable and more musical.

1 Sunday Bethesda

1–4 p.m.

All Levels

12/6 $50

Metaphor, Mischief, and Grit

PROFESSIONAL WRITING

Nan Fry

WORKSHOPS

In this workshop, we’ll read Like a Beggar by Ellen Bass and In the Salt Marsh by Nancy Willard, exploring their approaches to the natural, the personal, and the cultural. Both are stunning wielders of metaphor, humor, and craft. Though this is a reading workshop, any poems generated by our sessions will be welcomed. Participants may expect to have their understanding and appreciation of these two poets sharpened and their ways of perceiving and writing expanded.

4 Tuesdays Bethesda

10:30 a.m.–1 p.m.

All Levels

12/1–12/22 $195

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Selling Your Point: Fundamentals of Persuasive Writing James Alexander In this workshop, participants will learn the concepts and techniques for conceiving and developing persuasive writing products as ghostwriters, perhaps for their jobs, or as supporting spokespersons of their favorite causes. Persuasive writing is a valuable skill that can include simple everyday writing tasks like memos, emails and requests for information. In every aspect of writing, it pays to

The Writer’s Center be persuasive. During the workshop, participants will learn how to devise a core message, conduct research appropriate to persuasive writing, and structure drafts. At the end of the course, participants will have written at least one major persuasive work (op-ed or speech) and will have the basic skills and knowledge to be competent in this area.

Recommended reading is a part of the workshop.

This workshop also will address the use of social media in persuasive writing.

6 Wednesdays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

9/9–10/14 Beginner/Intermediate $270

Establishing Your Online Presence Bernadette Geyer Afraid to dive into the waters of social media for fear of getting all wet? This workshop for writers, freelancers, and small business owners provides an overview of ways to use the internet and social media to broaden their outreach (website, blog, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, etc.). Participants will receive feedback from fellow classmates and the instructor in response to weekly assignments. At the end of four weeks, you will have established a basic online presence and have a good foundation of knowledge on which to build.

4 Weeks Online

View online at www.writer.org/guide

N/A All Levels

9/14–10/5 $195

WORKSHOPS SONGWRITING

Blogging and Social Media: Changing Landscapes

Writing for Twitter

Mary McCarthy

With its focus on brevity, Twitter is easy for writers to dismiss. When used correctly, however, Twitter can become a valuable writing tool, as a source of inspiration, supportive community, and useful marketing device. Together, we will study the art of good writing on Twitter, learn how a series of Tweets can turn into a longer work or even a book, and get comfortable leveraging the tool as a way to market your published work. By the end of the workshop, participants will feel comfortable with hashtags, Twitter lists, and writing in 140-character spurts. Please bring your laptop or smartphone to class so we can Tweet together.

1 Monday Bethesda

6-9 p.m.

All Levels

9/21 $50

Design Your Author Website 101

2 Thursdays Bethesda

6–8 p.m.

All Levels

10/8–10/15 $80

4 Mondays Capitol Hill

7-8:30 p.m.

All Levels

9/21–10/21 $115

Public Writing for Physicians, Health Specialists, and Scientists Peter Lovenheim Want to join the public conversation about important issues in health, medicine, and science? In this course, we’ll learn how to write in clear, clean prose—with minimal jargon—and in a compelling narrative form to educate, engage, and persuade the general reader. Specific forms covered will include the op-ed, personal essay, and narrative article.

6 Thursdays Bethesda

7–9 p.m.

10/1–11/5 Beginner/Intermediate $215

Write & Publish: Arts Journalism Willona Sloan Enhance your skills in writing about visual art and music in this aggressively-paced course. Arts journalism is a highly competitive field. Learn how to make your own opportunities, find your niche, and sell your stories.

N/A All Levels

9/8–10/13 $270

Writing the Dreaded Query Letter Alan Orloff You’ve spent months (or years) of your life—not to mention copious amounts of blood, sweat, and tears—writing a dynamite novel. Don’t simply spend five minutes slapping together a weak query letter; you owe it to yourself to write a great one that will break through the slush-pile at top literary agencies. In this workshop, you’ll learn how to entice your dream agent into reading your masterpiece by writing a tight query that really sings (while avoiding those pitfalls that will land your query in the trash). Bring four copies of a draft query and a red pen with lots of ink!

STAGE AND SCREEN Writing

the Television Spec

quotidiantheatre.org Script Robert Forman

quotidiantheatre@comcast.net To break into television writing, a writer needs a calling card: a script. Every week, participants will learn about being a working television writer, work on pitching ideas, and be guided through the step-by-step process of transforming those raw ideas into story pages, outlines, and finally a script. By the end of the workshop, participants should have completed a spec script for an existing television show they can use to submit for competitions, workshops, and fellowships, as well as having gained experience in giving and receiving notes by discussing other participants’ scripts.

301-816-1023

1 Saturday Bethesda

2–4:30 p.m.

10/24 Intermediate/Advanced $50

Write Like the News Hank Wallace Lead with the future—rather than with background.

That’s the most important of eight journalism skills that will transform your queries, proposals, and manuscripts. The others: write your readers’ language, be positive (to be both clear and upbeat), lay out logically, be consistent, be precise, be brief, and choose strong verbs. Highlights: master crisis communication, correct errors the correct way, choose between absolute numbers and ratios, and write around generic “he.” (Plus a Speak Like the News skill: avoid “uptalk?”) Emulate the striking news examples you’ll see in this workshop, and you’ll strengthen your writing voice with a lively, engaging news style.

1 Wednesday Bethesda

7–9 p.m.

All Levels

11/4 $40

Literary Blogging and Social Media

You will be expected to launch and/or maintain an arts blog and you will have weekly assignments that include 400- to 500-word blog posts about local exhibitions, live music and more. You also will develop a story idea you will pitch and complete a final project. This class is for writers with experience in writing or blogging about visual art or music.

Sinta Jimenez

6 Thursdays Bethesda

5 Wednesdays Bethesda

7–9 p.m.

10/8–11/12 Intermediate/Advanced $215

Songwriting

Have you ever had a tune in your head and wanted to know how to turn it into a song? Perhaps you are an experienced songwriter but want to strengthen your skills. In this workshop we will study song structures, melody, harmony, tools for lyric writing, commercial songwriting techniques, and how to find your voice. By participating in an online group of songwriters, you’ll have the opportunity to share your work with others, get their feedback, and see different ways these tools can be used under the guidance of a working songwriter.

6 Weeks Online

Sheila McMullin Feeling overwhelmed by the increasing demands of being active online by your publisher, editor, colleagues? Do you want an author website, but are unfamiliar with how to get started? Using Wordpress templates, participants will understand the building blocks of a website and will have set up the basic structure of an effective and personal author site.

Participants will learn Wordpress basics, how to use an author site to promote upcoming events and work, and how to maintain an online presence.

Participants should be prepared to bring their own computer with WiFi capability and digital file copies of CV/resume, creative/professional work, and photographs they wouldn’t mind putting up online.

The Art of Mary Alouette

This class will discuss how blogs and social media can further your work, explore creativity, improve your visibility, and find community. Taught by a fiction writer who also owns a digital marketing agency, you will be steered in the right direction with expertise. No meeting November 25.

6–7:30 p.m.

All Levels

11/11–12/6 $135

Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

8 Weeks Online

N/A 9/16–11/4 Beginner/Intermediate $360

Elements of Playwriting: Dialogue Richard C. Washer Among the tools available to the playwright, dialogue is the most obvious and possibly least understood element of craft. In this session we will identify some of the many uses of dialogue and discuss how the writer uses this tool to explore, discover and build a play. We also will discuss how actors and other theatre artists approach the play on the page and consider how this can inform us in the way we approach using dialogue. Although my focus in this session will be on playwriting, writers of all genres are welcome.

1 Wednesday Bethesda

7–10 p.m.

All Levels

9/16 $50

Writing for Television Khris Baxter This is the golden age of television. The opportunities in writing for TV are better than ever, opportunities that didn’t exist until recently. A rapidly changing landscape where new shows, new channels, and new and inventive ways of storytelling

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WORKSHOPS

The landscape of blogs and social media changes daily. Whether you’re an experienced blogger/ author or you’d like to start a blog, this workshop will cover how to spend your time effectively online and the best ways to share your writing and your message. We’ll explore online time management across blogging and social media platforms including Wordpress, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn and more.

Kimberly Palmer

WORKSHOPS are introduced almost daily. In this workshop we’ll discuss the elements of the one-hour dramatic series and the half-hour comedy. We’ll also cover the fundamentals of screenwriting: story, structure, plot, character, dialogue, and format, with an emphasis on writing for television. Open to all levels and genres.

4 Tuesdays Bethesda

7–9:30 p.m.

All Levels

9/22–10/13 $195

The Art, Craft, & Business of Screenwriting Khris Baxter

WORKSHOPS

This workshop will guide the beginning or intermediate screenwriter through the entire process of crafting a professional grade screenplay (or TV pilot): idea, story, structure, scenes, and dialogue. We’ll also discuss strategies for promoting and marketing your screenplay, and advancing your career as a screenwriter (rising above the noise and getting noticed). Other topics, such as finding an agent or manager, working with producers, social media & networking for screenwriters, and the importance of pitching also will be discussed.

1 Saturday Glen Echo

10 a.m.–4 p.m.

All Levels

9/26 $115

1 Saturday Bethesda

10 a.m.–4 p.m.

All Levels

11/7 $115

1 Saturday Glen Echo

10 a.m.–4 p.m.

All Levels

12/5 $115

The Writer’s Center

Intermediate Playwriting

To Write the Great Film Scene

Richard C. Washer

John Weiskopf

In this workshop we will review the basic elements of playwriting in the context of writing scenes (ten-minute plays, one-act and full-length plays).

We will use exercises to jumpstart the imagination, consider various approaches to the writing process, and define a feedback method designed to facilitate continued discovery through writing.

In addition we will begin to consider some of the structural implications in writing for the stage. By workshop end, the goal is to empower writers with sufficient understanding of the process to be able to proceed forward in completing a first draft.

Great films have great scenes. In this course, we will watch a dozen of the greatest film scenes ever written for the screen. Participants will learn the essential writing principles that make these scenes extraordinary. We will discuss how the directing and acting work merges with the script to make these scenes among the greatest in cinema history.

We will workshop your own scripts. You need only bring yourself and any screenplay you are currently writing. If you are developing a screenplay idea, then bring that so we can work on it.

8 Saturdays Bethesda

10 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

Intermediate

9/26–11/14 $360

Adapting Your Writing for The Big Screen Khris Baxter

6 Tuesdays Bethesda

7:30–10 p.m.

All Levels

10/13–11/17 $270

Anatomy of Academy Award Winning Scripts John Weiskopf

We’ll examine proven methods for adapting the novel, narrative nonfiction, memoir, short story, or stage play to the big screen. This intensive (yet fun) workshop will guide you through the entire process of crafting a professional-grade screenplay adaptation (or TV pilot): idea, story, structure, scenes, and dialogue. Additionally, we’ll discuss essential strategies for marketing your adapted screenplay, working with producers, social media & networking, and the importance of pitching.

Participants will watch scenes from six films that won the Academy Award for Best Original or Best Adapted Screen play (American Beauty, Thelma and Louise, All The President’s Men, No Country for Old Men, Crash, Midnight in Paris). Participants will discuss the films based upon structural dynamics of the screenplays and the choices the screenwriter and director made and how those writing choices kept with the traditions of the classic Hollywood script, or how the screenplay took a different path.

No meeting November 28.

1 Saturday Bethesda

7 Saturdays Bethesda

10 a.m.–4 p.m.

All Levels

10/10 $115

10 a.m.–1 p.m.

All Levels

10/31–12/19 $360

YOUNGER WRITERS Teen Poetry Workshop Lucinda Marshall

The Maytag Virgin

by Audrey Cefaley October 2 November 1, 2015

Young authors (ages 12-16) will learn to use workshopping techniques to fine tune, revise, edit, and present poetry. Participants will have a chance to share their work, respond to writing prompts, get feedback, and learn about publishing options.

During the last session, we will hold a poetry reading to share work with family and friends. Please bring a laptop, tablet, or paper notebook. If you are already writing poetry, please bring something you’ve written to the first session. No meeting October 31.

4 Saturdays Bethesda

2–4 p.m.

10/10–11/7 Beginner/Intermediate $135

This production is part of the Women’s Voices Festival

quotidiantheatre.org quotidiantheatre@comcast.net

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301-816-1023 View online at www.writer.org/guide

Online workshops were inspired by the late Robert T. McElwaine, writer and friend to The Writer’s Center.

WORKSHOP LEADERS

JAMES ALEXANDER has worked more than 30 years in communications, first in the newspaper industry as a reporter and more recently in public relations/public affairs for both the private sector and government as a speechwriter and as a media specialist. Alexander, currently employed in the federal sector, majored in journalism at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and has frequently been asked to give talks and appear on panels to discuss social media in government communications and reaching multicultural audiences.

MARY ALOUETTE won Washington Area Music Association’s (WAMA) 2013 PASS songwriting competition. In 2012, she won WAMA’s New Artist of the Year and Best Debut Album. A former Artist in Residence at Strathmore, she also teaches songwriting with Washington Performing Arts and Kid Pan Alley. www.alarke.com CHERYL SOMERS AUBIN has an M.A. in writing from Johns Hopkins University. She’s a featured speaker at personal history writing symposia, writing conferences, and workshops. Her work has appeared in newspapers, magazines, and online journals. Aubin is the author of The Survivor Tree: Inspired by a True Story. www.cherylaubin.com and www.thesurvivortree.com NAOMI AYALA is the author of three books of poetry—Wild Animals on the Moon, This Side of Early, and Calling Home: Praise Songs and Incantations. She is also the translator of Luis Alberto Ambroggio’s book, The Wind’s Archeology/La arqueología del viento, winner of an International Latino Book Award for Best Nonfiction Book Translation.

KHRIS BAXTER is a screenwriter, producer, and co-founder of Boundary Stone Films, which produces and finances a wide range of projects for film, TV, and new media.

Baxter has been a screenwriter for more

than two decades and has taught screenwriting since 2004, most recently at the M.F.A. in Creative Writing at Queens University, American University, and Tinker Mountain Writers’ Workshop at Hollins University of Charlotte. He has been a judge for the annual Virginia Screenwriting Competition since 2004, and is a co-founder of Screenwriters in the Sky, a screenwriting conference held annually in Telluride, CO. JIM BEANE is a short story writer and novelist whose stories have appeared in numerous online and print literary journals and the anthology D.C. Noir. He is a Pushcart Prize nominee, a fellow at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and founding member of a writer’s collaborative culled from a workshop at The Writer’s Center that has been meeting monthly since the mid-90s to review, critique, and support each other’s work. He is currently working on a novel and his second collection of short stories, and spends too much time seeking fuel to power the next story.

ANNE BECKER, author of The Transmutation Notebooks: Poems in the Voices of Charles and Emma Darwin, and The Good Body (chapbook), has presented programs at Johns Hopkins University, University of Connecticut, Folger Shakespeare Library, and the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History. Poet Laureate Emerita of Takoma Park, she is now poet-in-residence at Pyramid Atlantic.

HILDIE BLOCK, M.A., has been leading writing workshops for 20 years. She has published more than 50 short stories, and her book Not What I Expected, was published in 2007. Her award winning story “People” is available to check out as a Kindle Single. She has led many people to publication in this confusing morphing landscape and looks forward to pushing obstacles out of the way for you, as well. www.hildieblockworkshop.com JENNIFER BUXTON has an M.F.A. in fiction from the University of Virginia. Her fiction has appeared in Epoch, Puerto del Sol, and Blue Penny Quarterly, among other places.

She has taught writing in a variety of venues, including the University of Virginia, and the UVa Young Writers Workshop.

DANA CANN is the author of a novel, Ghosts Of Bergen County, forthcoming from Tin House Books in April 2016. His short stories have been published in The Massachusetts Review, The Sun, The Gettysburg Review, Bethesda Magazine, Fifth Wednesday Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

Journal, The Florida Review, and Blackbird, among other journals.

RON CAPPS’s essays have twice been listed in The Best American Essays. His memoir, Seriously Not All Right was published in 2014

by Schaffner Press. He is a graduate of the M.A. in Writing program at Johns Hopkins University and teaches writing at the University of Maryland and College of Southern Maryland.

NANCY NAOMI CARLSON, PH.D., has won grants from the NEA, Maryland Arts Council, and Arts & Humanities Council of Montgomery County. She is a poet, translator, and associate editor for Tupelo Press.

Her work has been published more than 350 times, including in Poetry and Prairie Schooner, and forthcoming in American Poetry Review, The Georgia Review, and FIELD. MAXINE CLAIR has taught creative writing for many years, primarily at George Washington University. She is author of Coping With Gravity, Rattlebone, and the novel, October Suite. Her latest book, Imagine This, is autobiographical nonfiction from Agate Publishing November 2014.

BRENDA W. CLOUGH is a novel, short story, and nonfiction writer. Her recent e-books are Revise the World and Speak to Our Desires.

Her novels include How Like a God, The Doors of Death and Life, and Revise the World. She has been a finalist for both the Hugo and the Nebula awards. She has been teaching science fiction and fantasy workshops at The Writer’s Center for more than 10 years.

JOHN DEDAKIS is a former editor on CNN’s “The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer.” DeDakis is the author of three mystery-suspense novels. During his 45-year career in journalism (25 at CNN), DeDakis has been a White House Correspondent and interviewed such luminaries as Alfred Hitchcock and Ronald Reagan. More about him at: www.johndedakis.com.

BARBARA ESSTMAN, M.F.A., is a National Endowment for the Arts, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Virginia Commission for the Arts fellow, and a Redbook Fiction Award winner, among other distinctions. Her two novels, The Other Anna and Night Ride Home, are in numerous foreign editions; both were adapted for television by Hallmark Productions. She co-edited an anthology, A More Perfect Union: Poems and Stories About the Modern Wedding, and has taught extensively at universities.

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LEADERS

AMIN AHMAD, as ‘A.X. Ahmad’, is the author of two books—The Caretaker (2013) and The Last Taxi Ride (2014), both suspense novels from St. Martin’s Press. He is currently working on a literary novel. His short stories and essays have been published in many literary magazines and listed in Best American Essays. Ahmad was educated at Vassar College and M.I.T. He has studied writing at NYU, The New School, and Grub Street. He has taught The Master Novel and Advanced Novel classes at The Writer’s Center for the last three years. More about him at: axahmad.com.

WORKSHOP LEADERS MELANIE FIGG has taught creative writing for more than 20 years. She has won many awards for her work, including a 2014-15 grant from the Arts & Humanities Council of Montgomery County. She curates Literary Art Tours in local galleries and mentors writers on their creative projects.

ROBERT FORMAN is a veteran TV writer based in Los Angeles who has written on Lifetime’s Army Wives and CW’s iZombie, as well as working behind the scenes on many more series.

KELLY FORSYTHE holds an M.F.A. from Columbia College and is the current Director of Publicity for Copper Canyon Press.

Former Assistant Reviews Editor for the Los Angeles Review, and Poetry Foundation web consultant, she has lectured on publishing at the University of Maryland, NYU, University of Pittsburgh and elsewhere. Her poems and reviews have appeared in The Huffington Post, Columbia Poetry Review, American Poet, and The Minnesota Review.

LEADERS

ROBERT FRIEDMAN was a reporter, columnist, city editor, and Washington correspondent for the San Juan Star, and a correspondent in Puerto Rico for the New York Daily News.

He is the author of four published novels—The Surrounding Sea, Under a Dark Sun, Shadow of the Fathers, and Caribbean Dreams.

NAN FRY has published two books of poetry: Relearning the Dark and Say What I Am Called. Her work has appeared in numerous journals, anthologies, and textbooks. She received an EdPress Award for excellence in educational journalism and taught at the Corcoran College of Art and Design for more than 20 years.

JANICE GARY is an award-winning author and creative nonfiction writing teacher. She specializes in helping writers sort through the vast material of life experience to find the heart of their story. She is the author of Short Leash: A Memoir of Dog Walking and Deliverance, winner of two Nautilus Book Awards, the Eric Hoffer Prize for Memoir and a finalist for the Sarton Award for Memoir. www.janicegary.com BERNADETTE GEYER is a freelance writer, editor, translator, and social media consultant. She has helped independent publishers and small businesses increase their outreach using social media. Geyer’s poetry and nonfiction have appeared in 2015 Poet’s Market, AFAR Magazine, Oxford American, Poet Lore, Verse Daily, and elsewhere.

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PATRICIA GRAY, author of Rupture: Poems, formerly headed the Library of Congress’ Poetry and Literature Center. During the past year, her poems appeared in The MacGuffin, Mantis, Poet Lore, The Louisville Review, among others. She also published two articles on the Splendid Wake-up blog and is currently working on a young-adult novella.

T. GREENWOOD is the author of nine novels. She has received grants from The Sherwood Anderson Foundation, The Christopher Isherwood Foundation, the Maryland State Arts Council, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Two Rivers was named 2009 Best General Fiction Book at the San Diego Book Awards, and Grace received the same award for 2012. Five of her novels have been BookSense76/IndieBound picks. Bodies of Water was a finalist for a 2013 Lambda Literary Award.

DAN GUTSTEIN is the author of nonfiction and Bloodcoal & Honey as well as poems that have appeared in 100 journals and anthologies. He has taught at several colleges and arts organizations. dangutstein.blogspot.com GINA HAGLER is an award-winning nonfiction writer. She covers science and technology for a lay audience. Her book about fluid dynamics was published by Springer Verlag.

Her next book will be about bridge engineering. She has also written about science and technology for children and young adults for Rosen Publishing.

AARON HAMBURGER is the author of The View From Stalin’s Head (Random House), winner of the Rome Prize and Faith for Beginners: A Novel (Random House). His writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Poets & Writers, Tin House, and Subtropics, among others. He has taught creative writing at Columbia University, NYU, the Stonecoast M.F.A. Program, and George Washington University.

TIFFANY HAWK has an M.F.A. in creative writing. Her debut novel, Love Me Anyway, was published in 2013 by St. Martin’s Press.

Her work has also appeared in such places as The New York Times, Potomac Review, National Geographic Traveler, StoryQuarterly, and on NPR’s “All Things Considered.”

ZAHARA HECKSCHER, M.A., is the coauthor of the book How to Live Your Dream of Volunteering Overseas. She also has written numerous articles that have appeared in books and the online travel magazine www.

TransitionsAbroad.com, where she serves as

The Writer’s Center contributing editor. Heckscher is the inventor of the Poetry Game. She is a breast cancer survivor who prefers to be known as a “cancer thriver.” www.cancerthriver.blogspot. com The short stories in ELLEN HERBERT’s collection, Falling Women and Other Stories, have won more than 10 awards, including a Virginia Fiction Fellowship and a PEN Fiction Award. Her writing has appeared in The Washington Post, women’s magazines, and literary magazines. Her novel-in-progress is a finalist for the 2015 Daphne du Maurier Award.

NICOLE IDAR has a B.A. in English from Harvard University, an M.F.A. in fiction from George Mason University, and teaches writing at George Washington University. A finalist for the Bellingham Review’s 2015 Tobias Wolff Fiction prize, her stories have appeared in the New Ohio Review, Rattapallax, and World Literature Today.

SINTA JIMENEZ is a poet and fiction writer.

She has taught children, at the collegiate level, is a writing coach, and at The Writer’s Center since 2012.

KATHRYN JOHNSON has published more than 40 novels with major publishers. Her latest book, The Extreme Novelist: The NoTime-to-Write Method for Drafting a Novel in 8 Weeks, is based on the course with the same name, which she developed for The Writer’s Center. She coaches/mentors writers of all levels; her clients range across the U.S. and abroad, including authors living and working in Australia, Hong Kong, and Brazil. www.WriteByYou.com BETH KANTER’s books and articles help visitors and locals alike experience the tastes, sights, and culture of the nation’s capital. The Washington, D.C. Chef’s Table, now in its third printing, is her third book about her favorite city. She also is the author of Food Lovers’ Guide to Washington, D.C., and Day Trips from Washington, D.C. Kanter’s essays and articles have appeared in a variety of national newspapers, magazines, and online.

PETER KLINE teaches creative writing at the University of San Francisco and Stanford University, where he was a Wallace Stegner Fellow. His work has been honored with fellowships from the James Merrill House and Amy Clampitt House. His first collection of poems, Deviants, was published by SFASU Press in 2013.

View online at www.writer.org/guide

WORKSHOP LEADERS JACK MCENANY is the author of two books: Bode: Go Fast, Be Good, Have Fun (Random House/Villard, 2005) and Brush Cat: On Trees, the Wood Economy, and the Most Dangerous Job in America, (St. Martin’s Press, 2009), cited by Mother Jones magazine as one of “The Best of 2009.” McEnany’s work has appeared in the The Nation, Men’s Journal, The Humanist, “NBC Online” and many others. He is a graduate of St. Anselm College and Johns Hopkins University.

ALAN ORLOFF’s first novel, Diamonds For The Dead, was an Agatha Award Finalist.

His seventh novel, Running From The Past, was a Kindle Scout “winner” and was published by Kindle Press. He belongs to Mystery Writers of America and ITW. www.alanorloff.com

NANCY LEMANN is the author of five books (Lives of the Saints, The Ritz of the Bayou, Sportsman’s Paradise, The Fiery Pantheon, and Malaise) and has contributed to Vogue, Elle, the Paris Review, Esquire, the New Republic, etc.

ANN MCLAUGHLIN grew up in Cambridge, MA and graduated from Radcliffe College. She received her Ph.D. in Literature and Philosophy from American University.

She has taught for twenty-five years at The Writer’s Center and is on its Board. She has published eight novels with John Daniel & Co. and is working on her ninth.

KIMBERLY PALMER is a senior editor of money at U.S. News & World Report and the author of The Economy of You: Discover Your Inner Entrepreneur and Recession-Proof Your Life. She is also an adjunct professor at American University, where she teaches a course on mastering social media. bykimberlypalmer.com

SHEILA MCMULLIN is Assistant Editor for VIDA: Women in Literary Arts where she writes the column “Spotlight On!” celebrating literary magazines that publish a diverse representation of writers. She is Managing Editor and Poetry Editor for ROAR Magazine, as well as Communications and Outreach Coordinator for District Lit. She holds an M.F.A. from George Mason University.

MoonSpitPoetry.com

MARIE PAVLICEK-WEHRLI is a poet, painter, and printmaker. Her poems have appeared in various publications including Ekphrasis, About Place, Anon, Blast Furnace, Poet Lore, Innisfree Poetry Journal, Beloit Poetry Journal. She has been a fellow at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts (Painting) and Ragdale (Poetry), and is a recipient of an Individual Artist Grant from the Maryland State Arts Council. She holds an M.F.A. in creative writing/poetry from Warren Wilson College and an undergraduate degree in studio arts from Seton Hill University. www.mariepavlicek.com

CHRISTOPHER LINFORTH holds an M.F.A. from Virginia Tech. His debut short story collection—When You Find Us We Will Be Gone—was released last year. He has published fiction and nonfiction in dozens of literary magazines, including Gargoyle, Southern Humanities Review, The Rumpus, Notre Dame Review, Denver Quarterly, and many others.

PETER LOVENHEIM is an author and journalist whose articles, essays, and op-eds have appeared in The New York Times, Parade, the LA Times, and The Washington Post. His books include: In the Neighborhood: The Search for Community on an American Street, One Sleepover at a Time (Penguin Books), and Portrait of a Burger as a Young Calf (Random House), a first-hand attempt to understand the food chain. He holds degrees in both journalism and law. More about him at: peterlovenheim.com.

LUCINDA MARSHALL is an award winning artist, journalist, and poet. Her poetry has been published in Sediments, River Poets Journal, Stepping Stones Magazine, Poetica Magazine, and ISLE. She co-facilitates the Gaithersburg Teen Writers’ Club, and is a member of the Maryland Writers’ Association, and Women, Action, and the Media.

Bestselling author MARY MCCARTHY is currently Senior Editor at Splice Today. Her 20-year writing career includes Salon, The Washington Post, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Baltimore Sun, magazine editorial positions and newspaper humor columns. Her debut novel The Scarlet Letter Society was released in June; her second novel The Scarlet Letter Scandal releases in the fall. pajamasandcoffee.com

PAT MCNEES is a former editor in book publishing and independent writer-editor, with 25 years of experience helping people and organizations tell their life stories. Past president of the Association of Personal Historians, McNees is the co-leader of the Washington Biography Group, and a coach on many writing projects.

NICOLE E. MILLER is the winner of the 2014 Dorothy Churchill Cappon Prize for the essay, “Last Night at the Breakers” which appeared in New Letters. Her work is upcoming in Arts & Letters magazine, and Abundant Grace: An Anthology of D.C. Women Writers. Her fiction has appeared in The May Anthology of Short Stories, edited by Jill Paton Walsh and Sebastian Faulks. She received an M.Phil in Victorian literature from Lincoln College, Oxford, a Ph.D. in English at University College, London and an M.F.A. at Emerson College, Boston. www.inthesmallhours.com JOHN MORRIS has published fiction and poetry in more than 80 literary magazines in the U.S. and Great Britain, including The Southern Review, The Missouri Review, Subtropics, and Five Points. His work has been reprinted in Twentieth Century Literary Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

ELIZABETH POLINER, J.D., M.F.A., is the author of Mutual Life & Casualty, a novel-instories. Her short fiction has appeared in The Kenyon Review, Other Voices, Ascent, and others, with several Pushcart Prize nominations. Her poetry has appeared in The Southern Review, Prairie Schooner, Seneca Review, and others. A recipient of seven individual artist grants from the D.C. Commission on the Arts, she also has been awarded scholarships to the Bread Loaf and Sewanee conferences. She teaches in the M.F.A. program at Hollins University.

ELIZABETH REES is the author of Every Root a Branch (2014), and four awardwinning chapbooks, most recently, Tilting Gravity (2009). Her poems have appeared in Partisan Review, The Kenyon Review, AGNI, Mid-American Review, and New England Review, among others. She has taught at Harvard University, Boston College, the U.S. Naval Academy, Howard University and in Johns Hopkins University’s graduate program, and at the Center since 1990.

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LEADERS

Criticism and Anatomy of a Short Story. His chapbook, The Musician, Approaching Sleep, appeared in 2006.

CHRISTINE KOUBEK’s essays and travel stories have appeared in The Washington Post; Huffington Post; Brain, Child; Coastal Living; Washingtonian; NBCNews.com, and more. In addition, she writes the “Get Away” column for Bethesda and Arlington magazines. Her essay “Portrait in Nature and Nurture,” received an American Society of Journalists and Authors First Person award.

Koubek holds an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Fairfield University.

WORKSHOP LEADERS MARITZA RIVERA is a Puerto Rican poet and Army veteran who has been writing poetry for more than forty years. She is the creator of a short form of poetry called Blackjack and is the publisher of Casa Mariposa Press. Rivera is also the author of About You; A Mother’s War, Baker’s Dozen; TwentyOne: Blackjack Poems, and her work appears in literary magazines, anthologies and online publications.

KIM ROBERTS is co-editor of Beltway Poetry Quarterly, The Delaware Poetry Review, and the web exhibit D.C. Writers’ Homes.

She is the author of four books of poems, most recently Fortune’s Favor: Scott in Antarctica (Poetry Mutual, 2015), and editor of the anthology Full Moon on K Street: Poems About Washington, D.C. (Plan B Press, 2010). http://www.kimroberts.org

LEADERS

ELIZABETH LINDSEY ROGERS’s debut poetry collection is Chord Box (University of Arkansas Press, 2013), finalist for the 2014 Lambda Literary Award and the Miller Williams Prize. She has taught at Tulane University, Cornell University, and Kenyon College, where she was also the 2012-2014 Kenyon Review fellow in poetry. She remains a contributing editor at The Kenyon Review, and has published her poems and nonfiction widely.

ELLEN RYAN has been a writer/editor in Washington for two decades, including nearly 13 years as managing editor of theWashingtonian. Her travel articles have appeared in Good Housekeeping, Outside, The Washington Post, Destinations, Newsday, and many more; she is the author of Innkeeping Unlimited.

LYNN SCHWARTZ is a story development editor and ghostwriter. Her plays have been performed in NYC, including at the Lincoln Center. She founded the Temple Bar Literary Reading Series in NYC, has received two Individual Artist Awards in Fiction from the Maryland State Arts Council, and teaches fiction at St. John’s College.

DAVE SINGLETON is the author of three nonfiction books: The Mandates, Behind Every Great Woman, and CRUSH: Writers Reflect on Love, Longing, and the Power of Their First Celebrity Crush. His honors include the Media Industry Award for Outstanding Exclusive Coverage, GLAAD Award for Outstanding Multimedia Journalism, and a NLGJA Excellence in Online Journal-

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ism. His work has appeared in the New York Times, TheWashington Post, Chicago Tribune, PBS’s Next Avenue, AARP Media, Washingtonian, and Harper’s Bazaar. www.davesingleton.com WILLONA SLOAN has published articles about literature, music, art, culture, education, and social justice in magazines including Publishers Weekly, Northern Virginia Magazine, and the University of Virginia Magazine. She has received an Artist Fellowship award from the D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities and residencies at the Banff Centre for the Arts in Alberta, Canada.

LYNN STEARNS has led memoir and fiction workshops at The Writer’s Center, BlackRock Center for the Arts, Strathmore, and other venues. Her memoirs have appeared in Chicken Soup for the Mother’s Soul 2, New Lines From The Old Line State, Tapestries, and other anthologies and literary magazines.

BIANCA STONE is a poet and visual artist.

She is the author of Someone Else’s Wedding Vows (Tin House/Octopus Books, 2014) and several poetry and poetry comic chapbooks, including I Saw The Devil With His Needlework (Argos Books, 2012), and I Want To Open The Mouth God Gave You, Beautiful Mutant (Factory Hollow Press, 2012). She is also the contributing artist of Antigonick, a collaboration with Anne Carson, and the editor of Monk Books.

SARA MANSFIELD TABER is the author of award-winning Born Under an Assumed Name: The Memoir of a Cold War Spy’s Daughter, Dusk on the Campo: A Journey in Patagonia and Bread of Three Rivers: The Story of a French Loaf. Her essays, memoirs, and cultural commentary have appeared in literary journals and newspapers including The Washington Post, and have been produced for public radio. www.sarataber.com and www.sarataberwritingservices.com SUE ELLEN THOMPSON’s fifth book of poems, They, was published in 2014. An instructor at The Writer’s Center since 2007, she previously taught at Middlebury College, Binghamton University, the University of Delaware, and Central CT State University.

She received the 2010 Maryland Author Award from the Maryland Library Association.

The Writer’s Center HANK WALLACE, a Columbia Law School graduate, was a government reporter for New Jersey’s Middletown Courier and Red Bank Daily Register, and the assistant director of law-school publishing for Matthew Bender. He wrote the FCC’s plain-language newsletter and newswriting tips for the Radio Television Digital News Association. www.wsln.com.

RICHARD WASHER, M.F.A., playwright and director, was a founding member of Charter Theater and currently works with First Draft as a playwright and director. His plays have been produced in the Washington D.C. area and elsewhere. He holds a B.A. (University of Virginia) and a M.F.A. (American University).

JOHN WEISKOPF teaches screenwriting in the graduate and undergraduate programs at American University. He has an M.F.A. in film production from UCLA. Author of eleven screenplays, the U.S. Embassy sent him to South America to teach an international screenwriting workshop.

KATHLEEN WHEATON’s fiction has appeared in journals including Narrative, the Baltimore Review, the Potomac Review as well as two anthologies. Her short story collection, Aliens and Other Stories, won the 2013 Washington Writers Publishing House Fiction Prize. She is currently serving as president and managing editor of WWPH, a 40-year-old cooperative press based in Washington, D.C. BASIL WHITE is a speechwriter, a published joke writer (Judy Brown’s Squeaky Clean Comedy: 1,512 Dirt-Free Jokes from the Best Comedians, Comedy Thesaurus, and Larry Getlen’s The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Jokes), public speaker, and business humor consultant. He helps people add humor to presentations, advertising, movie scripts, and user manuals. www.basilwhite.com BARON WORMSER is the author of twelve books, including nine books of poetry, and the co-author of two books about teaching poetry. He has received fellowships from the NEA and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation and teaches in the Fairfield University M.F.A. Program.

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Exploring Point of View with Leslie Pietrzyk

By Kara Thompson

Leslie Pietrzyk

W

orkshop leader and freshly published author Leslie Pietrzyk believes point of view is incredibly powerful. This literary device is one of the first decisions a writer must make before putting pen to paper, fingers to keyboard.

Getting the right point of view for the story or book helps engage the reader and makes the characters easier to relate to.

Pietrzyk uses a variety of storytelling techniques, such as traditional stories, a YouTube link, a list, a quiz, and a lecture about creative writing, in This Angel on My Chest, published by the University of Pittsburgh Press. Winner of the 2015 Drue Heinz Literature Prize for Fiction, this new collection of unconventionally linked stories, each about a different young woman whose husband dies suddenly and unexpectedly, is a

study in point of view. “I Am the Widow” is told in a traditional, first-person perspective. “Ten Things” involves a list of ten actions, events, and conversations that the main character remembers about her husband.

“What I Could Buy” includes an inventory of items the main character might purchase with the insurance money from her husband’s death. “A Quiz” features a quiz about bereavement.

For Pietrzyk, the most challenging story to write in This Angel on My Chest was “One True Thing,” which follows two close friends as they experience the trials and tribulations of being writers. The story presents a variety of points of view, including first person, second person, omniscient, narrative exposition, and document, to describe the various events that occur during a couple of days at a famous writers conference. “It’s hard enough to tell a story, so in general, most writers tend to stick with a third person, limited point of view,” Pietrzyk said. When it was complete, “One True Thing” was 40 manuscript pages long. But then, “I took a walk to celebrate finishing this story that had taken more than a year to write, and I realized something significant needed to be added,” she said.

“So back to the computer. Because I was trying to show how grief is impossible to explain, I chose to use these alternative forms. I think I was feeling frustrated by the Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

traditional third-person format. I thought, ‘Let me try another way.’”

Pietrzyk touches on her personal experience in This Angel on My Chest. Her husband died at age 37.

“That was several years ago, so I have had time to think, grow, and change. I knew while I was going through that terrible experience that eventually I would write about it,” she said. The title, This Angel on My Chest, comes from a line in one of the stories, chosen “because it exactly conveyed how I felt. I was nervous about using the word ‘angel’ because I worried the title might sound sentimental,” Pietrzyk said. “But I thought about possible titles for a long time, and this one ended up feeling right.”

Pietrzyk’s first two books, Pears on a Willow Tree and A Year and A Day, explore familial relationships.

Pears on a Willow Tree revolves around four generations of Polish American women and motherdaughter relationships. “Women seem to me more prone to keep traditions alive, especially as many traditions filter down through food. For me, food is a way to keep people connected,” Pietrzyk said. In A Year and a Day, fifteenyear-old Alice’s mother commits suicide, but afterwards, Alice continues to hear her mother’s voice speaking to her. Pietrzyk used the mother’s voice as a plot device “to show how people who die are gone, but they are still with us and will always be with us.”

She added, “I wanted something tangible, like the voice, to portray

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that complicated paradox. The idea came to me very early in the stages of writing A Year and a Day.” For Pietrzyk, writing is an integral part of her life. “Writing is how I understand the world and myself. I don’t know how people who don’t write get through the day,” she laughed. Pietrzyk belonged to a writing group for ten years, and the people in the group, “gave me amazing feedback, showing me how my work could be improved. These women also offered emotional support through the writing process,” she said.

When she published her first novel, Pears on a Willow Tree, Pietrzyk “learned that, even though it is a big goal to get a book published, I realized it’s not the end of the journey. There’s

Celebrating

always more to say as a writer.

Seeing your book published, as incredible as that is, will not be the answer to all your heart’s desires.”

She cautions aspiring writers to “remember that in the publishing business, there are no guarantees.

Love the process of writing itself and stick to it.”

Pietrzyk has published widely in journals, magazines, and newspapers. She teaches in the

graduate writing program at Johns Hopkins University in Washington, D.C., and is a member of the core faculty at the low-residency M.F.A. program at Converse College in South Carolina. Founder and editor of the literary journal Redux, she also has a literary blog: www.workinprogressinprogress. com. Pietrzyk will read from This Angel on My Chest at The Writer’s Center on November 15.

126 years of POET LORE

America’s original poetry journal, discovering new writers since 1889. poetlore.com Published by TheWriter’s Center, writer.org

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View online at www.writer.org/guide

FROM THE WORKSHOPS Many talented writers pass through The Writer’s Center’s halls, taking multiple workshops and honing their craft. We present here a small sampling of the amazing work they produce.

The Fantasy of Food

By Thomasina Sligh

I

’m at work. My desk is hidden behind a partition setup in the hallway of this Washington, D.C. non-profit. Those of us behind partitions are in various stages of our twenties. We specialize in international development, running around the globe trying to make positive impacts in child health and gender equality. While I review a travel advance request, the phone rings twice. I pick it up. His deep, husky voice tries to feign indifference. Nevertheless, I can hear his excitement to have reached me. It’s in the rhythm of his words, the groan at the back of his throat.

“Have lunch with me,” Louis says. In a hushed tone I respond, “I can’t. I have no car and cannot possibly get there and back in my allotted hour.” He pushes gently.

“I have something special I want you to try.” Instantly, I’m curious and the kitty cat in me mentally inches closer. “Really? What is it?” I ask. “I’m not telling you,” he says, “You will need to see and taste it.”

I’m a foodaholic. The sight, smell, feel, and taste of a new dish are instantly intriguing. In fact, Louis manages a restaurant in Adams Morgan, which is where we met. Our mutual fascination with good food and drink created an immediate attraction.

We talked about our world travels and played the international food critic, laughing easily as we fell into rhythmic banter, intent on fulfilling our mutually intense curiosity. Who are you? What are your flavors? Are you bitter or sweet? Bold or bland? Tangy or smooth?

Louis was definitely bold and smooth. All of 5 feet 6 inches tall and string bean slender, he was not my physical “type.” His confidence, however, was undeniable. From behind the glittering bottle-ladened bar, he strategically positioned himself just over my cousin’s left shoulder. He flashed a Dentine white smile that set off his dark chocolate skin, added a sparkle of mischief to his eyes, and brought him clearly into focus.

I stopped in mid-sentence as he walked around the bar to ease his way through the packed restaurant. Louis set two complimentary cocktails on our table and introduced himself over the pulsating beat of Zouk. The deep intoxicating flow of his Ghanaian accent teased my palate. He seemed taller, fuller in his classic brown and black boubou with a slightly tilted black kufi atop his freshly trimmed hair. His perfectly groomed beard framed full, soft lips. Yes, my taste buds were definitely craving authentic West African cuisine.

Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

Needless to say, we exchanged numbers, since I’m on this phone trying to decide whether to place my punctual return from lunch in Louis’ hands. Alas, the mystery meal is too enticing to resist and I concede. Knowing Louis and his enthusiasm for tantalizing aromas, comingled spices, and flavorful textures, this lunch will be the highlight of my day. I grab my bag and hurry to the ladies’ room to ensure I’m reasonably enticing. Pink cotton candy dress cut at the thighs. Ebony hair dressed upward to reveal the smooth beautiful contours of mocha latte shoulders and honey almond eyes.

As we enter the café, Louis leads me upstairs to a secluded dining area that overlooks the main floor and bar. “I’ll be right back,” he says, and disappears downstairs to the kitchen. In his absence, my mind imagines all types of delicacies, and I can hardly sit still. To truly enjoy the nuances of this meal, we’ll need 40 minutes at the very least.

Special meals are to be savored, not scarfed down like a tuna fish sandwich. So I pace upstairs with my arms folded across my chest, trying not to be impatient as the minutes tick tock.

Finally, I hear Louis slowly mounting the steps. He appears with a covered tray in hand. My

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FROM THE WORKSHOPS mind races as tingling sensations flow down my back. He places the tray on the table. I walk over, eager to see this masterpiece of culinary delight. As we sit, he looks at me and smiles. “Are you ready?” he asks. Giddy as a girl on her sweet sixteen, I can hardly keep still. “Yes, yes, I’m dying to know what it is!” He removes the tray cover and voila! a very large, baked plantain and roasted peanuts.

In that moment, my grandmother’s instilled lessons in politesse vanish. My eyebrows furrow, my lips purse together at a side, upward angle, and I squint at the plantain and peanuts. Is

this a joke and the real surprise is still downstairs, or has Louis truly brought me here for this?

My grandmother coughs somewhere near the back of my mind.

You know the way grandmothers do when you’re in some reverent location and not behaving as you ought. I immediately snap out of my shock, look at Louis and smile apologetically. “So, this is the surprise?”

“Yes, it is. It may not appear to be much, but taste it.” He breaks off a piece of plantain, presses one end into the roasted peanuts and insists on feeding it to me. I begin to chew and the blend of flavors catch me by surprise. It

The Writer’s Center is a subtle, soft sweetness mixed with a strong, hard earthy flavor.

The merging of the two into one yields a completely unexpected sensation, like receiving a small but extremely beautiful gift in a crumpled, brown paper bag. I look at Louis and smile. I didn’t realize it, but he has been holding his breath. He allows the air to escape. His relief is clear. We spend the remaining 10 minutes feeding each other sweet plantain and freshly roasted peanuts. Laughing at the simplicity of the meal, we appreciate the complexity of its flavors, the intimacy of the exchange, and the deeper meanings within the moment.

When We Awake This Will All Be Under Water

By Jenny Apostol

W

e are different here than our city selves, lean and brown, frayed edges rolled up across thighs, cut off from other people while ankle deep in sand nearly black and wet enough to hold our feet fast to a thousand grainy hands, tiny after years of rushing over rocks and onto shore, soft and clingy, they make each step an adventure we are too young to find threatening. Gently caressed with a hollow groan, our feet rise and plunge again, beckoning the rest of us to bury below inside these silty depths.

We know nothing of quicksand, exploring the flat expanse of seabed revealed to air by waves now in retreat making way for us, the next several hours another

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stretch, time long enough to lose ourselves together in a game of crab-catching, knowing that other treasures created by ocean will be prized, discussed, dried, compared.

It could have been a lazy afternoon, but in air crisp with salt and sun—a beacon for any child, hard to resist—no one but us would shelter here on this point of land now exposed beyond rocky shoreline marking water’s edge, who knows when the waves come back? These tides, only slightly familiar to us, are for the grown-up world to measure; we are moving onto the sea itself like two fish with legs or favorite hermit crabs sideways, shoulders shellacked by daily excursions

shaded only by stringy hair worn loose, bathing suit underwear, day after day, time marked by lunch and the setting sun far on the other side of the Cape.

Raising my head, “I found one!” there’s no need to shout through an afternoon this still, no other sound but squelching feet and eyes peeling the sand, not even lapping water swells beneath the surface, while underfoot a tiny specimen perhaps a sand flea or baby crustacean tickles my hand slightly.

“For the bucket,” my friend commands. She carries the collecting pail. We had to venture far and dig below just to tap seawater deep enough to fill halfway so creatures could

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FROM THE WORKSHOPS slosh in plastic before we decide what to do with them in this, our place, our choice. We are nine.

Dangling from the dock, fishing yesterday for eels, a long seethrough line disappeared under the glare, oil mixed with darker water, a murky rainbow perfect for slimy fish, we’ll inspect inch by every inch before throwing back since we’ve no need, yet, for bait.

Today we’re cast upon the seabed exposed, as other tides brought horseshoe crabs to rest here, some baked or broken to pieces, we leap across them hopscotch, drier sand the further up you go, littered crunchy seaweed strands with bubbles hardened by spray, then drought, like raisins dried on the stem now rancid with the smell of dead sea creatures. A few crab beaks intact we grab, and raise, and whirl until let go, they fly like Frisbees to scuttle landing sometimes softly upside down, an open air ancient pattern of legs and guts.

“They’re spiders,” she exclaims with authority, her father a professor of something that needs

glasses and a beard; they speak in low tones so we won’t pay attention. No words is fine with me, I don’t have a father to keep quiet about, though I made up stories; he would know all about crab shells, reading tidal charts and wind to sail, he imagines one day around the Greek islands, a long way from land-locked Ohio, his temple. I was there once missing the brine embrace of coastal summers and smell of pine.

Tall sweet grass does not compare to a season of afternoons ocean-fed and body-surf drained, our limbs floaty, anchored only by our bones, we gasp laughing and sink deeper with each step closer to the shimmering surface, lake-like the cove gapes wider out in front, it could lead us beyond where we won’t yet go, that far, no border, no sign of warning: people here, marine life there, girls who go beyond the wave break may drown; they remind us every time we go to the ocean side, here is nothing but trickles like a spring, a wet and gentle fluttering sheet if we ever reach open water, we could lie upon it.

When we were five, she and I walked our first class trip one city block from PS 8 to the firehouse, forging friendship, greeting the chief: “We’re witches!” we chimed gleefully daring, “Don’t pour water on us!” that would extinguish our flame; everyone knows witches were once fragile wispy girls who grow up to play house, play records, pretend imaginary love, singing lyrics written for us before we know what it could ever mean to marry, give birth, he’ll end up more clingy than her children, we’ll work it out baby, until she flings him off her back, he was a dinosaur, a hidden cave too old to swallow her whole.

I follow her tall turning tail toward the bay; we’re done with ancient spindly horseshoe crabs already yearning for deeper water, how much longer before the tide returns to greet us like one wet kiss? I am too shy to go first with breasts, periods, cigarettes, make-up, make-outs, sleep-overs, men older than us, we would duck any cresting breaker anyway and dive beneath, prefer to let the undertow instead sweep us to sea.

Stand There, I’ll Take You a Picture

By Cathy Wu

“S

tand there, I’ll take you a picture,” my mom demands for the 100th time this week. Although they’ve lived in America for almost 40 years, my parents, for whom English is a second language, have not mas-

tered articles and prepositions.

My dad talks about “picking up” an option when he means “picking” it. My mom always wishes me “good luck to your test.” Usually, I let it pass, but when we’re on vacation, it can become unWorkshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

bearable because the demand for pictures is so insistent.

“Never stand between a woman and her picture,” a male friend of mine once told me as he worked his face into a pasted-on smile in front of another very old tall tree

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FROM THE WORKSHOPS in Sequoia National Park. I remind my mother that she already has five or six shots of me in front of breathtaking Hawaiian scenes, but she insists this one is different. I find myself perched smiling on a rock just where she wants me.

“Good,” she says, satisfied for now.

“Let me take one of you,” I offer, just so every single picture isn’t of me.

“No.” My dad storms ahead with his socks pulled up, long-sleeves rolled down, wide-brimmed hat and umbrella deployed. The sun gives you cancer but so does sunblock. He is sulking a little but being a trouper considering that we are violating his ban on leaving the house during peak ultraviolet light exposure hours. Running ahead of us is only a little passiveaggressive, so I consider it a success. Everyone’s dad is crazy, I tell myself.

Before we left the house that morning, as a consolation, I had tried offering my mom’s extra wide-brimmed hat to my dad to coax him into going. My mom screamed when she found out he was wearing it.

“I don’t like other people wearing my hat. It’s like I don’t like other people using my syringe.”

My mom doesn’t use a syringe for anything. She is making a sick, ridiculous joke.

“For God’s sake, Mom.” For fucking fuck’s sake, I mean. I once dropped the f-bomb in front of my mom. It didn’t go over well but on the other hand I got my

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The Writer’s Center

point across. I debate using it now because her comment is so ridiculous, but I don’t want to overuse it. Everyone’s mom is erratic and controlling.

“Okay, IT’S YOUR HAT, IT’S YOUR HAT, IT’S YOUR HAT,” my dad yells at the top of his lungs.

Everyone else’s family is like this, I tell myself. Worse, even. My family is intact and uncomplicated. Or, at least, the complicated parts were left behind in Taiwan.

My dad hums as he gets ready for the day’s hike. Someone told him to hum a song when he feels stressed. Now you can always tell he’s stressed when he starts humming, loudly and tunelessly.

Everyone’s dad can’t sing. My mom glares at him.

I pose for my mother’s camera four more times along the hike and five times at the top. We walk mostly in silence. We have been arguing all week because of the sun, the wind, the food, the rain, but we have really been arguing because I’m too old to be spending the holidays with my parents and we all know it. I am disappointed with myself. I am too old to be blaming my parents, but I blame them anyway. Everyone’s parents are crazy. Everyone thinks they will never change. Everyone thinks she is right, and they are wrong.

We stop for a break. In my backpack, we have packed about two days’ worth of food for a two-hour walk. I push past three granola bars, one full box of Wheat Thins, and two full heads of celery cut into logs, and take out two bottles of not-yet-hot water and three sandwiches my View online at www.writer.org/guide

mom has packed that have slid around in the Thomas’s English Muffins bag. I pass them out carefully while reassembling the bits.

The cold pulled pork sandwich is sweet and delicious with plenty of fresh cilantro but my mom is dropping pieces of it everywhere. I worry for the animals and for the next people who want to enjoy the shade of the grove.

Passers-by stare at us. I worry that we are violating some kind of No Food rule, which seems like a rule my parents would ignore. Maybe the people are just staring at us.

Everyone else comes to Hawaii to get a tan and be in the sun, and we are hiding from it. I pick up the bits of muffin and cilantro that my mom has left behind and she scoffs at me.

“You worry too much,” she says.

We head back. In the parking lot, we step gingerly back into the hot car. I sit in the front to help navigate. My dad sits in the back and asks us to turn on the air conditioning, and my mom cranks it up. She backs out of the spot excruciatingly slowly and inches her way toward the exit. Cars honk behind us as she misses two opportunities to turn left. When she finally pulls out onto the road, she makes a slow, too-wide turn and the new cars coming behind us honk. I take a deep breath. It occurs to me that there will be a day when my mother and I will no longer be able to ride in the same car together.

A few minutes down the road, the dashboard display blinks and the fan sputters. The acceleration seems to fail momentarily. I begin

FROM THE WORKSHOPS scanning the shoulder for a place to pull over. Something is wrong, but my mom insists she can make it home.

“You can still control the acceleration, right? And the brakes?”

“Yes, the brakes are fine. I just had them replaced.”

“I’m not asking when you had them replaced. I’m asking how they feel right now.”

“Yes, they’re fine. Everything’s fine. I’ll just leave the air condi-

tioning off.” She opens the back seat windows. My dad resents having his window opened for him for the third or fourth time in three or four days.

“Hey, WHY DON’T YOU LET ME CONTROL MY WINDOW? WHY YOU KEEP OPENING MY WINDOW?” “WHY DON’T YOU OPEN YOUR OWN WINDOW THEN? Why do you need to have air conditioning?”

“What?! What you mean ‘open your own window’?”

I groan and close my eyes.

When we get home, we gather our beach gear and go swimming in the ocean, where I spot a massive sea turtle. All is temporarily forgiven. I make my mom promise to get the car looked at tomorrow, let her take a few pictures of me on the beach, and vow to make other plans for Christmas next year.

An Excerpt from “Advantage” A Play by Michelle Rago Characters:

Karl: Man in his 50s Missy: Woman in her 30s

Setting:

An office, Karl and Missy have been, awkwardly, discussing her sexual harassment complaint, leading up to this point in the conversation.

Time:

Present

KARL: No other woman has ever made a complaint against him. Did you know that?

MISSY: No. I don’t care.

KARL: If you insist on moving forward with this you will have to tell us who knew what and when they knew it. Those people will be interviewed. You will have to document exactly what did happen. You will have to come up with evidence to support your claims of fairly regular behavior over the past six years. You’re going to have to share far more than you seem comfortable with. All of this can stop right now. Do you want to reconsider?

MISSY: He used to start meetings by commenting on how I looked, or on what I was wearing. That is

how he started meetings. What should I have done, I mean, should I not try to look nice because he’s a pig? After two years, yes two years, I asked him to stop commenting on my clothes or shoes or how I looked. He never stopped doing it. He thought I was playing with him.

KARL: You didn’t answer my question. I’m thinking about what is best for you here.

MISSY: You’re thinking about me. You know what?

I’ve had it up to here with men thinking about me.

Don’t think about me. How’s that? (Getting upset) Just do your job and let me do mine!

KARL: I’m trying to warn you. You are going to have to get deeper into this before you can get out of it.

Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

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FROM THE WORKSHOPS And frankly, if you keep going with this, you’ll be branded. He might get fired, but you won’t come out of it unharmed.

KARL: But now you’re the one who’s going to be embarrassed.

MISSY: I know that. (MISSY cries) I don’t know what to do.

MISSY: I’ve already been harmed.

KARL: Let’s say that’s true.

MISSY: He would tell me how much he loved women. He said he couldn’t understand how a man could be gay. He couldn’t understand how a man couldn’t be attracted to a woman. I mean, how ridiculous is that? I just love women so much, he would say. Like I want to hear that. When he would talk about other women I wouldn’t say anything. I would just look down. I would just wait for him to finish. How do you think you would perform under those circumstances? I just wanted to be good at my job.

KARL: (Gently) Come on now, Missy. You don’t want to do this, do you? You don’t want to go through this.

You’ve already been through enough. You know this isn’t going to work out for you, don’t you? I don’t want to see you go through this. I don’t want you to be hurt even more. Don’t you want to be done with this? Let’s be done with this. Okay?

(MISSY cries and shakes her head “yes.” She keeps her head down. KARL leans back in his chair.)

END

KARL: Okay, so he’s a pig. What’s your best case scenario? He gets fired. The details of what you report will get out. People you told will be interviewed.

They won’t appreciate being dragged into this.

MISSY: Those people are my friends.

KARL: How many times do you think I’ve seen this happen, Missy? You’re no different, I’m sorry to say.

How do you think people will look at you? Do you want to deal with that? And are you blameless? Do you think I didn’t talk to other people about you?

You like to have fun. You like to joke around. That will come out in an investigation. This is not a slam dunk.

MISSY: He would touch me! The first time I didn’t say anything. He came up behind me and put his hands on my shoulders. I froze. I was shocked. I think...my ears filled up with blood. I almost couldn’t hear. He made a comment about the material of my blouse. He asked me if I was cold. The first few times he did it I didn’t say anything. I was just scared. That doesn’t mean anything about me. One day I finally asked him not to do that. I mean I told him. I told him to not come up behind me and to not put his hands on my shoulders. That’s how specific I was. I didn’t raise my voice. I wish I would have. I wish I would have embarrassed him.

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The Writer’s Center

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FROM THE WORKSHOPS

Trek of Your Life: Fighting Child Trafficking After the Earthquake in Nepal

By Sydney Frymire, LCSW-C

S

ince the earthquake on April 25, 2015, left much of Nepal in ruins, I have anxiously awaited updates about a small group of children I know halfway around the world. These shy, friendly children between 3-15 years old attend Dadagaun Village School and 35 live in the orphanage.

They became a part of my life since I began “voluntouring” in Nepal in 2011. According to news reports, it appears the people in this small community about six miles northwest of Kathmandu have escaped with their lives, but not much else.

Most residents are living in tents or under tarps because their homes are little more than crumbled walls and caved-in roofs. Among those sheltering in makeshift tents are the orphanage children. The orphanage manager’s heartbreaking assessment: “Our building is made rock into soil and is very badly damaged.”

Steve Webster, owner of the Shivapuri Heights Cottages near the village, has worked for almost a decade with Dadagaun villagers.

He reports, “The ground is cold and damp, the rains of an early monsoon add to their discomfort and fear. Landslides are a threat and aftershocks from the earthquake rumble on daily.” Other remote villages have suffered the same or worse. Is it any wonder

that families are desperate? My deepest hope is that the education and sense of self-worth that our small investment has offered to Dadagaun children and families will sustain them through these difficult times and help them persevere and avoid being victims of predatory child traffickers.

Almost one-quarter of the citizens in this ancient and mystical country live in relentless poverty.

Many rural households have little or no access to primary health care, education, safe drinking water, or even basic sanitation.

Nepalese parents, desperate for any means to subsist, can be duped into sending their children into servitude and bondage, believing false promises of education or steady work and good money to help both their child and the larger family. Abandoned or orphaned children are equally ripe targets for human trafficking.

Following the earthquake in Haiti, UNICEF reported that thousands of children were being trafficked out of the country. Could the escalation of this scourge become an appalling consequence of Nepal’s earthquake?

Poor education and limited economic opportunities feed vulnerability, particularly for Nepalese girls and women, who are estimated by the United Nations to have a literacy rate below Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

50% (2013). It is no surprise they make up the majority of trafficking victims who are abducted and sold or tricked into sex work and forced labor. Thousands disappear every year. Boys are trafficked most often for construction or factory labor, conned into believing it will be “migrant” work.

Although Nepal has taken a hard line legislatively on trafficking, enforcement is erratic. On May 1, 2015, encouragingly, the Uttar Pradesh government in Northern India warned of increased opportunities for trafficking and asked police to keep an eye on the notoriously porous Indo-Nepalese border.

There is Hope The fight to protect vulnerable Nepalese from corrupt and malevolent traffickers begins on the ground and on these borders.

Knowing many of the children— especially the orphans of Dadagaun—I have witnessed how a little compassion and charity can change lives forever. Back in 2011, I became part of an ongoing effort to volunteer time and money to improve educational opportunities and living conditions for these children.

My journey toward Dadagaun began in 2000. I was in midlife and wanted to shake up my life as a mid-career social worker

47

FROM THE WORKSHOPS with college-age children, reconnecting with my vital self. Inspired by a transformative experience in Nepal, I hired a coach and in 2010 developed The Trek of Your Life, a voluntourism business designed to offer an opportunity for mid-life rediscovery in a unique environment.

The purpose of my business is to give people a unique opportunity to challenge themselves both physically and spiritually, as they think about how they would like to spend the second half of their lives. My goal is to assist fellow travelers in their interior and exterior journeys as they seek meaning and purpose in their lives by engaging them in global

48

causes. I do this by sponsoring service-oriented group tours to Nepal where participants engage in their own inner journeys while serving others. In 2011, I took a small group of courageous women to join an organized program to interview Nepalese villagers in their homes to determine what assistance they needed most.

One young mother said to a group of us gathered outside her front door, “I will do whatever is necessary for my baby to go to school.” When asked, “What would you like for yourself?” After gentle prodding, she revealed that she had left her own beloved school at age twelve, expected

The Writer’s Center to stay home to care for parents and work on the farm. “If I could have adult education, I would do whatever I needed to do to learn. I would like to learn to be a tailor.” Within a few weeks a sewing machine was donated for her to use.

Last year, we raised money on Crowd Rise to hire a music teacher and purchase 28 indigenous instruments for the children. Enough money remained to pay school fees for 26 orphans. A fundraising concert on our last night in Kathmandu raised additional money for school supplies, $52 per child for one year. And beautifully, it exposed the children

View online at www.writer.org/guide

FROM THE WORKSHOPS to young Nepalese musicians, sharing their unique musical heritage.

Last year, five group members were moved to organize a fundraiser for Nepalese non-governmental organization serving trafficking victims. They raised money by selling bracelets made

by Nepalese children to purchase acreage to grow coffee, allowing formerly victimized people to become self-sustaining. The surprise for many who join Trek of Your Life is not only the personal bonds they make with villagers but also the reconnection with themselves.

To contribute to the rebuilding of Dadaguan, as well as continue support of educational programs, please visit the following websites: http://thetrekofyourlife.com; http://www.dadagaun.com

A Big Sale

By Martin Sack

T

he Belmont Stakes is the third and final thoroughbred horse race of the US Triple Crown, following the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness. It’s been world famous for more than a century.

The horses and their jockeys competing in that race are sports superstars. The event is held at Belmont Park, a racetrack located in Elmont, NY. My father’s retail business, Alexander’s Men’s & Boy’s Shop, was located on the main street of Franklin Square, a town just a few short miles east of Belmont Park.

Although he was aware of the park’s existence, my father was oblivious both to its importance in the racing world and its effect on his business.

Alexander’s—named after my father—was a family business, employing my mother and father full-time. In our teens, my sister and I helped out part-time after school. At first, we handled small

tasks, such as stocking the shelves and straightening up merchandise left lying around after being shown to customers. Later, when we reached our mid-teens, our part-time tasks included helping customers.

One summer day after the end of World War II , maybe 1946 or 1947, I was working in the store when an unusual looking couple came in. He was very short, dark, and slight and couldn’t have weighed more than 100 pounds.

She was at least a head taller than he, blonde and voluptuous.

After browsing through the boys’ size merchandise, they selected enough shirts, pants, and other items to make up several outfits.

Then he went into a fitting room to try them. After making some changes to the original selections they collected their final selections at the register counter.

My mother ran up the total. It was several hundred dollars—

quite a lot of money at the time.

The small man took out a checkbook, wrote a check for the full amount, and handed it over to my father. My father looked at the check, and I could see that he was uncomfortable accepting it. So I looked over my father’s shoulder, saw the name on the check and recognized it. He was Eddie Arcaro, one of the most famous and highest paid jockeys in thoroughbred racing. Obviously, he was in the area because he was riding at Belmont Park. Equally obviously, a person of his stature could attract a woman of his companion’s stature. Leaning over, I whispered into my father’s ear, “You can take that check; the man is good for it.”

My father exhaled when Arcaro’s check cleared the bank and he also started paying attention to what was going on down the road at Belmont Park.

The work published here has been nominated by workshop leaders Maxine Clair, Pat McNees, Richard Washer, and Christine Koubek and was selected by the editors.

Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

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2015 Location

Introduction

The Mariposa Poetry Retreat is held on the 260 acre Capital Retreat Center located in the Catoctin Mountains in Waynesboro, Pennsylvania, just 90 minutes north of Washington, DC. This setting lends itself to serene contemplation of nature and nurturing of your creative spirit.

The 4th Mariposa Poetry Retreat builds community among poets and writers and provides them the time and space to focus on their work in a serene and beautiful setting away from the pressures of daily life.

12750 Buchanan Trail East Waynesboro, PA 17268

Registration Send a one page writing sample with a completed registration form and a non-refundable registration fee.

Fees Non-Refundable Registration fee: $80.00 reserves your space; all inclusive, accommodations in a rustic setting: $295.00 per person, double occupancy only. Total payment of $375.00 is due by: August 31, 2015.

Make check payable to: Maritza Rivera c/o 2015 Mariposa Poetry Retreat

The retreat promotes a safe and instructive environment that addresses the creative challenges faced by writers of all genres. The 2015 weekend retreat will take place at the Capital Retreat Center in Waynesboro, PA from Friday, October 2nd to Sunday, October 4th and is open to writers 18 years of age and older.

The Retreat Features

Workshop leaders who are actively engaged in the writing life Consultations with faculty and workshop facilitators Stimulating activities and workshops Opportunities to read new work Support and encouragement Informal social gatherings Panel discussions

Workshops Workshops consist of writing exercises and group discussions about participants' work. At each workshop, participants are encouraged to create and share new work. Workshops run consecutively therefore participants have the opportunity to take workshops with all faculty members.

2015 Faculty Sarah Browning, Grace Cavalieri, Robert Giron and Cliff Lynn; keynote by Reuben Jackson, and performance by Michael Friend and Soul in Motion.

Mail writing sample, registration form, and registration fee to: Maritza Rivera c/o 2015 Mariposa Poetry Retreat 635 Marcia Lane, Rockville, MD 20851 P: 301.881.8012; Email: mariposapoet611@gmail.com or visit www.MariposaPoetry.org

Friday, October 2nd to Sunday, October 4th, 2015

BOOK TALK Closing the Book on Santa Claus & Other Holiday Stories

The Gift

Ron Chandler

ISBN: 978-1-4931-3940-8

ISBN: 978-1508434900

A delightful book that will brighten your holiday season. The title story is about a father who tries to save his daughter’s holiday celebration after it is canceled at her school.

Other stories deal with traveling through a blizzard, immigrants coping with their first holiday, and a stolen Christmas tree.

Available at Amazon.com

Meenakshi Mohan

The Gift is a story of two sisters—their jealousy and rivalry, their profound love and affection for each other.

Ashok Sinha, author of The Next Life, says, “This little children’s book belongs in the book-shelf of every family, with brothers and sisters growing up to become the grown-ups of tomorrow; for didn’t the celebrated poet, William Wordsworth, say, “The Child is the Father of Man?’” xlibrispublishing.co.uk

ISBN: 978-0692420836

The Extreme Novelist is all about getting a novel written despite the time-sucking distractions of today’s world.

By mastering the simple methods introduced in this book, writers of any genre will commit to an aggressive writing schedule and gain confidence in their fiction skills. They’ll learn how to deal with real-life issues such as time management, as well as establishing a truly productive writing environment. writebyyou.com Her Own Vietnam Lynn Kanter ISBN: 978-0991355525

A nurse who served in Vietnam grapples with her history on the eve of the war in Iraq. An unflinching depiction of a war and a portrait of a woman in midlife –a mother, a nurse, and long ago, a soldier. shademountainpress.com/lynnkanter.php

Advertise Your Book in Book Talk!

Talk

by Meenakshi Mohan

Illustrated by Dwight Nacaytuna

The Extreme Novelist Kathryn Johnson

records, as well as interviews with family and colleagues like Studs Terkel and Toni Morrison, to illuminate Durham’s astounding career. sonjadwilliams.com/word-warrior

The Survivor Tree: Inspired by a True Story Cheryl Somers Aubin ISBN: 978-0983833406

$50 ($45 Members) Winter Issue Deadline: September 29, 2015 judson.battaglia@writer.org We distribute 15,000 copies of the Workshop & Event Guide throughout the D.C.-metro area. Our readers find us in City Paper, at Metro stations, libraries, art centers, cafes and more!

Cheryl Somers Aubin’s book, The Survivor Tree: Inspired by a True Story takes the reader on a journey of hope and healing by imaginatively describing the experiences, memories, and feelings of the 9/11 Survivor Tree. Illustrations by Sheila Harrington. Available on Amazon.com. All profits go to charity. thesurvivortree.com Word Warrior: Richard Durham, Radio, and Freedom Sonja Williams ISBN: 978-0252081392

Are you an artist or collective looking for a place to show your work?

Posthumously inducted into the National Radio Hall of Fame in 2007, Richard Durham creatively chronicled and brought to life the significant events of his times. In Word Warrior, award-winning radio producer Sonja D. Williams draws on archives and hard-to-access family Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

Maybe The Writer’s Center is the right venue for you.

For more information, please send inquiries to vanessa.mallorykotz@writer.org

51

ON THE SCENE

The Writer’s Center

EVENTS Letras Latinas poets gather after a rousing reading in honor of Poet Lore’s 126th birthday.

Photo by Judson Battaglia

Poet Lore Managing Editor Genevieve DeLeon and Co-Editor Ethelbert Miller celebrate the magazine’s 126th birthday. Photo by Judson Battaglia

Writers from the Fledgling Rag Open Door Reading gather during the reception. Photo

by Marian Cannon Dornell

Christian Jungerson, Lars Ramslie, and Katrine Øgaard Jensen discuss the state of Nordic literature during a special reading held in partnership with the Embassies of Denmark and Norway. Photo by Judson Battaglia

52

Letras Latinas poet Elizabeth Acevedo gives a stunning performance of her work at the Poet Lore birthday party. Photo by Judson Battaglia

Architect Mark McInturff accepts a token of appreciation from The Writer’s Center’s Board of Directors during a presentation of a future vision for the Center, celebratory reception, and exclusive tour of the building’s renovation. Photo by Judson Battaglia

View online at www.writer.org/guide

EVENTS

ON THE SCENE

Washington Writers’ Publishing House authors Sid Gold and Kathleen Wheaton lead a discussion on the benefits of working with small presses during the Publish Now! conference. Photo by Judson Battaglia

Publish Now! panelists Mary McCarthy, Sheila O’Shea, Will Murphy, and Becky Brasington Clark take a break during the busy conference.

Photo by Judson Battaglia

Mary Alouette plays guitar during her free songwriting class at the Gaithersburg Book Festival.

Photo by Andrea Holmes

Writer Jennifer Buxton interviews author Robert Bausch during a plenary session at Publish Now! Photo by Judson Battaglia

Executive Director Stewart Moss chats with Publish Now! Keynote Speaker Jane Friedman after her phenomenal presentation. Photo by Judson Battaglia

Frederick, MD-based artist Sheryl Massaro poses in front of her work during the opening of Earth & Spectrum. Photo by Vanessa Mallory Kotz

Workshop & Event Guide FALL 2015

53

We Are Grateful Thank you to all of those whose generous contributions make the workshops and events possible at The Writer’s Center.

For a list of donors to the Center, please visit www.writer.org/donors.

Not suitable WARNING! ! ow minded for the narr

Entertaining

by JOE ORTON

Mr Sloane

An outrageous black comedy...a depiction of violence and desire still explosive 50 years after its premiere Directed by Stephen Jarrett David Bryan Jackson Jim Jorgensen

featuring

Matthew McGee Jjana Valentiner

at The Writer’s Center

November 21–December 13, 2015

universeplayers2.org 54

View online at www.writer.org/guide

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