What's New
Winter 2010My essay "The Broken Cup" has been published in Web Conjunctions. It is a lyric essay which braids together four different lines of thought about the ancient Taoist idea that physical emptiness is a pre-requiste to spiritual fulfillment. This summer I read the essay as part of the Ashland MFA program, assisted by three of the other founding teachers in the program: Stephen Haven, Kathy Winograd, and Ruth Schwartz. It was the last reading in the two-week residency and a wonderful night. You can read the essay at this link to the Web Conjunction site: Also, my essay "Blood Mountain" was accepted for publication by the on-line magazine "Ascent." In the essay, an experience of vertigo at an overlook while walking up Blood Mountain with my sons leads to thoughts about what it means to feel 'at home' in the universe. You can read the essay at the link below.I am excited about my creative writing classes this fall. In the Ashland MFA I am conducting an on-line class in creative nonfiction for first-year students. We will read books by writers of creative non-fiction, many of them connected to Ashland either as teachers or visiting writers. It is a great line-up of books so the reading and the residency should be fun. Here are the texts: The Memoir and the Memoirist by Tom Larson, Blessing of the Animals by Brenda Miller, Green Fields by Bob Cowser, and About a Mountain by John D'Agata. I'm hoping for an exciting set of manuscripts from students and a lively on-line discussion of the texts. Any who are interested in learning more about this class or the Ashland MFA should e-mail Sarah Wells at swells@ashland.edu. At Young Harris College we will begin our second year with a concentration in creative writing as part of the English major. I will teach creative writing in prose this fall and the college will offer creative writing in drama this spring--both of these classes are new additions to the YHC program. In the spring our visiting writers will be Robert Rahm, the author of The Mercy Papers (nonfiction), and Enid Shomer, the author of Black Drum (poetry) and Tourist Season (short stories). I also recevied happy news from AWP that two of my panels have been accepted for the annual conference. The first is called "Playing for Keeps: Intensity and Creativity in the Lyric Essay" which includes Bob Root, Kathy Winograd, and Rebecca McClannahan as panelists. The second is called "The Unfolding Story: Narrative Possibilities in Creative Nonfiction" with Joe Mackall, Mike Steinberg, Jocelyn Bartkevecius, and Bob Cowser on the panel. It should be a lot of fun, and I hope to see many of you there. |