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THE WINTER WRITING WEEKEND
FRIDAY JANUARY 27-SUNDAY JANUARY 29, 2023
The Winter Writing Weekend is an invitation for writers at all stages of their craft to meet and learn from each other, and from editors, agents, and others in the field about how and why we write. With professional development workshops focused on elements of fiction, poetry, and nonfiction craft panel discussions with agents and editors about the business of being a writer, a creative pep talk session with poet and teacher Sue Goyette, and a keynote conversation about the writing life with writer, editor, teacher, agent, and former festival director Chelene Knight, The Winter Writing Weekend offers an opportunity to sink deeply into writing while staying connected to a vital community of writers.
SCHEDULE OF EVENTS
FRIDAY, JANUARY 27, 2023
7PM — 8:30 PM (AST)
CREATIVE PEP TALK Q&A
WITH SUE GOYETTE
Bring your thorniest dilemmas and most tender-hearted questions to this interactive creative pep talk led by poet and teacher Sue Goyette. The writing life can offer all kinds of opportunities for self-doubt, self-recrimination, professional envy, and other hard-to-reckon-with feelings. Before you dig into workshops and panel discussions this weekend, check in with Sue and your fellow writers, so that you can go more deeply into your writing time.
SATURDAY, JANUARY 28, 2023
11:00 — 11:45 AM (AST)
SATURDAY MORNING WRITE TOGETHER
Start the day in the virtual hospitality suite. Bring a snack and a drink if you like, meet your fellow writers and chat with them in a lightly moderated interactive Zoom. If you want to start the day with a quick writing warm-up, writer, teacher, and AfterWords Literary Festival cofounder Stephanie Domet will offer you a prompt designed to get you into your writing with ease.
12:00 — 2PM (AST)
FICTION WORKSHOP
MASTERING DIALOGUE
WITH SHARON BALA
By parsing examples from literature, this workshop will go beyond the fundamentals to explore how dialogue can multi-task: convey speech, advance plot, reveal character, add atmosphere, and enhance setting. We’ll also consider the philosophy of quotation marks, consider body language, action, subtext, and how to revise a long passage of direct dialogue. This workshop will include a short writing exercise.
2:30 — 4:30 PM (AST)
NONFICTION WORKSHOP
PUTTING THE CREATIVE IN NONFICTION
WITH DEAN JOBB
Have a true story to tell? This workshop explores how to bring it to life using the storytelling techniques of fiction writers. Recreate gripping scenes that draw readers into the story. Describe places and events in immersive detail. Create vivid, memorable characters and add snippets of dialogue to get them talking. And do it all using only the facts. Along the way we’ll explore an array of research techniques and resources that will elevate your nonfiction writing.
5:00 — 6:00 PM (AST)DISCUSSION PANEL
MEET THE AGENTS
WITH KELVIN KONG AND MEG WHEELER
Join our panel of industry experts to learn how agent and writers work together, navigate challenges, and find success. Bring your questions about the benefits of being agented—and how writers can go it alone if agenting isn't right for them.
SUNDAY, JANUARY 29, 2023
11:00 — 11:45 AM (AST)
SUNDAY MORNING WRITE TOGETHER
Start the day in the virtual hospitality suite. Bring a snack and a drink if you like, meet your fellow writers and chat with them in a lightly moderated interactive Zoom. If you want to start the day with a quick writing warm-up, writer, teacher, and AfterWords Literary Festival cofounder Stephanie Domet will offer you a prompt designed to get you into your writing with ease.
12:00 — 2:00 PM (AST)
POETRY WORKSHOP
POETRY AND THE DOCUMENT WITH
TARA MCGOWAN-ROSS
Tara McGowan-Ross takes emerging writers of all experience levels through the process of creating document poetry. Participants will create their own work after being guided through the exact process developed to write the document-poem STRIKE MOTION — a resistance poem layered directly on top of the document Tara's university department used to go on strike in 2015. Participants are encouraged to bring a document (a lease, certificate, contract, etc.) which is significant to them.
3:00 — 4:00 PM (AST)
DISCUSSION PANEL
MEET THE EDITORS
WITH BETHANY GIBSON AND KATHERINE BARRETT
Join our panel of industry experts to learn how the editor/writer relationship works, and bring your questions!
7:00 — 8:30 PM (AST)
KEYNOTE CONVERSATION
CHELENE KNIGHT IN CONVERSATION WITH STEPHANIE DOMET
Chelene Knight is deeply immersed in the writing life, as a memoirist, poet, editor, agent, former festival director, teacher, mentor, and now fiction author, with her debut novel Junie published in September 2022. Join author and festival cofounder Stephanie Domet in this keynote interview with Chelene Knight about all aspects of her writing life. This conversation will include a reading from Knight's debut novel, Junie.
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