Debra Waves.... On Her Return From The Antioch Writers Workshop

I just returned from a week at the Antioch Writers Workshop. This was my fourth year. I attended in 2001, 2002 and 2003. Each year I've returned my writing level has grown yet I always learn something new. Usually the thing I most need to know. I come away enthused to write, my creative cup overflowing with the urge to get the words down. This writing community is the most supportive I know. But perhaps you've never heard of the Antioch Writers Workshop. (Which is not run by Antioch College and is in no way affected by any rumors of the college closing.) Before I recap my week, let me give you the history of AWW.

Cathy Smith Bowers, poetry faculty

The History of the Antioch Writers’ Workshop
The Antioch Writers’ Workshop (AWW) was initiated by Antioch College, which put out a call for ideas on ways to use the campus effectively in the summer. Two retired professors, Judson Jerome, a well-known poet, and William Baker, an experienced college administrator, dean, and teacher, answered the call in 1986 and began the AWW. From the beginning, the workshop created a community of writers who mingled faculty and students informally throughout the day as well as during classes and seminars. Our mission was to encourage good writing, and we organized a summer week-long workshop as well as (in some years) a one-day fall workshop.

In 1991, a group formed a board of trustees and reorganized to sponsor the summer Antioch Writers’ Workshop using the college as fiscal agent; then in 1993, formed its own 501(C)(3) nonprofit entity. We have brought many well-known and talented writers to Ohio over the years, including Sue Grafton, Ellen Gilchrist, William Least Heat-Moon, Joyce Carol Oates, Melissa Fay Greene, Natalie Goldberg, Sena Jeter Naslund, and Nicholas Delbanco. We have also highlighted prominent Ohio authors, including Allan W. Eckert, John Jakes, and Virginia Hamilton.

AWW Keynote Speakers
1986—John Frederick Nims
1987—Judson Jerome
1988—Mark Harris
1989—Allan W. Eckert
1990—Ellen Gilchrist
1991—William Zinsser
1992—William Least Heat-Moon
1993—Joyce Carol Oates
1994—John Jakes
1995—Sue Grafton
1996—Virginia Hamilton
1997—Melissa Fay Greene
1998—Natalie Goldberg
1999—Ralph Keyes
2000—Linda Barnes
2001—William Least Heat-Moon
2002—Sena Jeter Naslund
2003—Nicholas Delbanco
2004—Kathy Hogan Trocheck (aka Mary Kay Andrews)
2005—Sue Grafton
2006—Larry Beinhart

Our Mission
The Antioch Writers’ Workshop encourages creative writers at all levels by providing inspiring, unique, and inclusive opportunities for professional and personal growth. By offering a variety of distinctive workshop experiences and seminars, we assure both an exciting forum for authors to gather and an inviting venue for the writing community at large. We embrace diversity and strive to meet the high professional and artistic expectations our participants bring to every program. By cultivating excellence in all our workshops, we work to ensure Yellow Springs remains at the forefront of writing communities nationwide.

You can see by the names on the list of keynote speakers the quality of the faculty AWW brings in. But, beyond that, the thing I most admire about Antioch is the way these writers leave their egos at the door. Hierarchy doesn't exist and we come together to talk about the writing, to be trained in the craft of writing, everyone learning from each other. Here it is the work that matters. And that is as it should be.

We learn across genres. Of course no one has to attend all the events, but everyone does. For the writer of fiction can learn from the writer of poetry and the writer of nonfiction and vice versa. This is respecting the craft in all its forms and respecting the author as well. We come together in community rather than breaking into little exclusive groups which jockey for a postion of importance. Morning classes are fiction, poetry and nonfiction. Then we break for lunch with faculty. We walk into the village of Yellow Springs where each faculty member is assigned a restaurant to eat in and participants sign up to eat with them. Faculty are accessible and the sense of community grows each day until by the end of the week, many of us don't want to say goodbye.

I was fortunate enough to be accepted into Elizabeth Strouts fiction intensive. Intensives take place after lunch and are limited to twelve participants. You must submit your manuscript with your registration and they fill quickly.
Eliabeth Strout, fiction faculty with Jan
from my intensive

Intensives end in time for dinner and we are free to eat with whomever we choose. One of my dear friends, Katrina Kittle, was on faculty again this year and it was one of the joys of my week to be able to have dinner with her and get caught up. But the rest of the week I ate with small groups of writers, getting to know them and always talking about writing and the writing life. Writing can be such a lonely endeavor and no one really understands this life quite like another writer. It is encouraging to hear others experiencing the same things.

After dinner, we head to the faculty readings, which on some nights are followed by particpant readings late at night in the coffee houses. The evening events are open to the public and sometimes people from the college come by, or local artists and writers.

Of course in between all this, we squeeze in writing time to work on our manuscripts, and we must get some sleep, though I think most, like me, gave up sleep for writing or reading manuscripts from the intensives. Then there is Glenn Helen and the main building for the workshop is right in the middle of this beautiful setting. I hiked the trail to the Yellow Spring, enjoying the waterfalls and woodland flowers and birds singing. The setting alone feeds the soul.
On the last night at the going away party several of us gathered in the courtyard with madolin and violin and voices raised in song, surrounded by the glen as if in a faery woodland, as if there was magic in the air. Glasses were raised and hugs went round and I was reluctant to leave this place of words which fills me with such joy.

They say that if you drink once from the Yellow Spring, you will return. And as I did drink, I suspect I will return.

July 12 - 18, 2008 is the date of the next workshop. I can't recommend it highly enough.

In 2001, my first year at AWW, I had a manuscript evaluation with Clint McGowen of the first chapter of Desperate Journey, my American Title II manuscript. It was roughly written. I'd only written two or three chapters of my very first novel. I had a lot to learn before this manuscript would be ready. But this very same novel will be published by Samhain Publishing in the spring of 2008. Now if that isn't recommendation enough to attend AWW, well, I simply don't know what is.

http://www.antiochwritersworkshop.com/